‘No. But now I know, it has to stop.’
She must have been gaping at him in amazement because he could not help a small smile. ‘Please, Anna, understand, I can’t let this happen. I don’t want to betray anyone but I won’t have any part in the killing of innocent people.’
‘What are you talking about?’ And she flushed hot with anger, tearing her hands from his. ‘Frederick, you’re talking nonsense. It’s a shop.’
‘Tell me you’re not trying to kill the tsar.’
‘That’s the party’s business, not yours,’ she said, her voice trembling with fury.
He reached for her hand again but she would not give it to him: ‘What do you want me to do, Frederick? Tell my comrades my lover is threatening to betray them to the police. I thought you loved me.’
‘Please try and understand, I can’t let it happen. I won’t be party to murder.’
‘It will be the end for us, I won’t see you again,’ she said, her body rigid, her face white, fists clenched tightly beneath the table.
‘I would never betray you,’ he said, ‘but I won’t be party to murder.’
‘But knowing of the shop doesn’t make you party to murder. And it’s not murder. He’s a tyrant.’
‘And those who will be travelling with him?’
‘Stop it, Frederick,’ she said, almost pleading with him. ‘Stop it. Please, please stop it.’
He was at a loss to know what he could say to placate her, conscious too, perhaps, that he was in danger of taking an irrevocable step.
‘Stop it, Frederick,’ she said again. ‘Don’t. I thought you wanted me.’
‘You know I do.’
‘Then what are you thinking?’
The curtain rattled urgently and the old woman was standing in the doorway hugging herself, breathless, quite terrified.
‘What is it?’ Anna snapped at her in Ukrainian.
‘They’re in the street…’ she stammered.
‘Calm yourself. How many?’
‘Many.’
‘What is it?’ Hadfield asked, touching her arm.
‘The police.’
He moved towards the window, but before he could reach it they heard the thump of a fist at the door below and someone shaking the handle, then the echo of voices and steps on the stairs. The old woman began to whimper with fear.
‘You must go.’ Hadfield was pulling at her arm. ‘Go, Anna. Leave here. Go now.’
‘You must come too. You can’t be found here.’
There was the sound of splintering wood.
‘No,’ he said, ‘I’ll be fine. I’ll do what I can. Go.’
‘Frederick, I’m going to have a baby.’
He stood gazing in astonishment at her.
She reached for his hand and held it to her face and for a moment he bent to rest his forehead against hers.
‘Now go,’ and he snatched his hand free and turned to the door. And then she ran. Racing through partitioned rooms, sweeping curtains aside, pushing past anyone who stepped in her way, until she found the other stairs. Down and then on into the darkness.
41
Anna made her way to the flat on the Voznesensky. Vera Figner let her in without comment and led her by the hand to the couch, where she lay in the early hours rolling the same questions through her mind until the worst was all she was able to believe. Then, at nine o’clock the following morning, they had news that the gendarmes had visited the cheese shop again and she knew he had failed her. But she could not speak of it to her comrades. She lay curled beneath a blanket while Vera gave instructions to the scouts. She was frightened as she had never been before. Please God she was wrong.
An hour later they received word that Zhelyabov was missing. He had arranged to meet Nikolai Kibalchich and the four bombthrowers, but they had waited for an hour and were still waiting,
‘Are you strong enough to go to them?’ asked Vera.
Kibalchich had found abandoned workings close to the river at the northern edge of Vasilievsky. The ground was frozen hard enough to keep the market gardeners from their plots, and the vast wooded cemetery lay between them and the island’s lines. They would be safe there from prying eyes and Anna would patrol the edge of the gravel pit to be sure. A fine mist was rising from the land, the weak sun shaping it into layers, the sky luminescent, a diffuse light, the towers of the city churches lost on the soft horizon. The winter silence was broken only by the distant cawing of the rooks in the cemetery treetops and from time to time the voices of her comrades as they practised in the pit with their dummy grenades.
Kibalchich called to her, his eyes shining like a schoolboy’s: ‘We’re going to try one with a charge.’ It was heavy, the size of a large grapefruit, and the worker — she was not to know his name — threw it with both hands. It detonated on the frozen ground with a sharp yellow flash and a fizzle like a damp firework.
‘Well, it works. That’s a comfort,’ said Kibalchich cheerfully, ‘but they’ll have to be close to be sure of killing him.’
When the bombers had learnt all they could of trajectory and blast radius they left to ready themselves as best they could for the following morning. Kibalchich took a droshky back with Anna to the Voznesensky apartment. Two sharp knocks followed by two more, the tinkle of the lock, the drawing back of bolts and Vera stood there with doubt and even a little fear written in her face.
‘They’ve taken Andrei Zhelyabov. Last night.’
The door closed behind them and they stood in the small hall.
‘Does Sophia know?’
‘Yes. She’ll be here soon.’
Poor Perovskaya. She loved him deeply. Everyone would share her grief, hug her, speak to her with sympathy, but there will be no word for me, Anna thought.
‘Can we go ahead without him? Is there word from the shop?’
‘No. I don’t know… oh, Anna, what is happening?’
There was still no report from the Malaya Sadovaya when the executive committee gathered at three o’clock. Long faces, frustrated, frightened, and so many comrades missing. This time there were chairs in Vera’s little sitting room for all. There was no comfort they could give Sophia and she was impatient with those who tried, but she accepted Anna’s hands and offered in return a weak smile. Her face was white and strained, and appeared even more so in her simple black dress. But there was no mistaking her composure, and she was the first to speak.
‘There is no turning back. Whatever happens we must act tomorrow.’ She paused to look about the room, defying any of them to challenge her: ‘The mine must be laid and the bombs primed by morning.’
‘What if they’ve discovered the tunnel?’ asked Figner.
‘We still have the grenades. And we must act for the people. Do we act?’ Sophia asked quietly. ‘Vera, do we act?’
‘Yes. We act.’
‘It’s suicide. The police will be everywhere.’ It was the young naval lieutenant, Sukhanov. He was sitting at
