How pleased we all were! I whispered to Vera: “You see! They do care! Their hearts are touched. We can do anything with them now!”
Even Uncle Ivan was moved, and murmured to himself “Poor Belgium! Poor Belgium!”
How delighted, too, were the gentlemen on the platform. Smiling, they whispered to one another, and I saw several shake hands. A great moment. The little Consul bowed finally and sat down.
Never shall I forget the applause that followed. Like one man the thousands shouted, tears raining down their cheeks, shaking hands, even embracing! A vast movement, as though the wind had caught them and driven them forward, rose, lifted them, so that they swayed like bending corn towards the platform, for an instant we were all caught up together. There was one great cry: “Belgium!”
The sound rose, fell, sunk into a muttering whisper, died to give way to the breathless attention that awaited the next speaker.
I whispered to Vera: “I shall never forget that. I’m going to leave on that. It’s good enough for me.”
“Yes,” she said, “we’ll go.”
“What a pity,” whispered Uncle Ivan, “that they didn’t understand what they were shouting about.”
We slipped out behind the platform; turned down the dark long passage, hearing the new speaker’s voice like a bell ringing beyond thick walls, and found our way into the open.
The evening was wonderfully fresh and clear. The Neva lay before us like a blue scarf, and the air faded into colourless beauty above the dark purple of the towers and domes. Vera caught my arm: “Look!” she whispered. “There’s Boris!” I knew that she had on several occasions tried to force her way into his flat, that she had written every day to Nina (letters as it afterwards appeared, that Boris kept from her). I was afraid that she would do something violent.