I engaged that bath for an hour in the morning as that seemed to be the correct thing to do. Then I went to bed and heartily envied Buchanan, who did not have to bother about toilet arrangements.
In the morning early there was a knock at the door and when I said “Come in,” half expecting tea, there was my naval officer in full uniform smilingly declaring my bath was ready, he had paid the bill, and I could pay him back when we were on board the train. The chamber-maid, with her hair still done in two plaits—I rather fancy she had slept in them—conducted me to the bathroom, and I pass over the difficulty of doing without brush and comb and tooth-brush. But I washed the dust out of my hair, and when I was as tidy as I could manage I joined the captain of the Askold and we drove back through the town to the railway station.
The station was a surging mass of people all talking at once, and all, I suppose, objurgating the railway management, but we two had breakfast together in the pleasant sunlight. We had fresh rolls and butter and coffee and cream and honey—I ask no better breakfast when these things are good—and meanwhile people, officials, came and went, discussing evidently some important matter with my friend. He departed for a moment, and then the others that I had known came up, my Cossack friend and the Hussar officer, and told me that the outgoing train was a military train, it would be impossible for a woman, a civilian and a foreigner at that, to go on it. I said the captain of the Askold had assured me I could, and they shook their heads and then said hopefully, well, he was a very great officer, the captain of a ship, and I realised that no lesser authority could possibly have managed this thing for me. And even he was doubtful, for when he came back and resumed his interrupted breakfast he said:
“The train is full. The military authorities will not allow you on board.”
That really did seem to me tragedy at the moment. I forgot the sorrowful people who would gladly enough have stayed their journey at Irkutsk. But their faces were set East. I forgot that after all a day or two out of a life would not matter very much, or rather I think I hated to part from these kindly friends I had made on the train. I suppose I looked my disappointment.
“Wait. Wait. It is not yet finished,” said my friend kindly. “They give me two compartments”—I felt then he was indeed “a very great officer,” for the people were packed in that train, tier upon tier, like herrings in a barrel—“and I cannot sleep in four bunks. It is ridiculous.”
That may have been, but it was kindness itself of him to establish a stranger in one of those compartments. It was most comfortable, and Buchanan and I being established, and my luggage having come safely to hand, I proceeded to make the most of the brush and comb that had come once more into my possession, and I felt that the world was a very good place indeed as we sped across the green plain in the sunny morning. I could hardly believe that this goodly land was the one to which I had always been accustomed to think men went as to a living death.
And then I forgot other folks' troubles in my own, for envious eyes were cast upon the spare bunk in my compartment. No one would have dreamt of interfering had the sailor insisted upon having all four for himself, but since he had parted with the rights of one compartment to a foreign woman, it was evident that other people, crowded out, began to think of their own comfort. Various people interviewed me. I am afraid I understood thoroughly what they wanted, but I did not understand Russian, and I made the most of that disability. Also all my friends who spoke French kept out of the way, so I suppose they did not wish to aid and abet in upsetting my comfort. At last a most extraordinary individual with a handkerchief tied round his neck in lieu of a collar and a little tourist cap on the back of his head was brought, and he informed me in French that there was a doctor in the hospital section of the train who had not been in bed for a week, they could not turn the soldiers out, they must have rest, would I allow him to sleep in my compartment?
“Madame,” he said, and the officials standing round emphasised the remark, if it needed emphasis, “it is war time. The train is for the soldiers.”
Certainly I was here on sufferance. They had a right to turn me out if they liked. So the doctor came and turned in in the top bunk, and his long-drawn snores took away from my sense of privacy.