White Nights, Red Morning by Judith Pella

Author:Judith Pella [Pella, Judith]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: FIC042030, FIC042000, FIC026000
ISBN: 9781441229700
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2015-10-08T00:00:00+00:00

37

In 1913 Lenin said, “A war between Austria and Russia would be a very useful thing for revolution, but it is not likely that Franz Joseph, the Austrian Emperor, and Nicholasha will give us that pleasure.”

Shortly before that statement, the Bolshevik leader had moved to Kracow with the unofficial blessing of the Austrian government. It seemed he was being encouraged to be a thorn in the flesh of Russia’s tsarist regime. Clearly, the enemies of Russia were using the country’s internal and external foes in any way they could to undermine the tsar. And the Russian government was doing the same to their international foes by secretly backing Serbian nationalists to stir up dissention in Vienna. It was a political game, and Lenin was an expert player.

But it was more than politics that drew Lenin to Kracow. Lenin was a nationalist through and through, and he suffered greatly from homesickness for his beloved Russia. Kracow, in spite of the fact that it was part of Austrian Poland, was Slavic and as such held an ambiance similar to Russia. Lenin was delighted to be there, only an hour and a half from the Russian border, and incredibly, only an overnight journey on the express train to St. Petersburg.

Andrei, too, was glad his personal journey would only take him as far as Kracow. Andrei had desperately needed to get away from home, but he hadn’t wanted to be so far that home was unreachable. Yet by going to join Lenin, he was going about as far from home and his loved ones as possible—emotionally if not geographically. Yuri, because of the monarchist that he was, would be cut off completely. Andrei’s mother, as always, would try to be understanding, but she would cringe at the thought of her son consorting with such hardened radicals. Uncle Paul would be appalled and would blame himself that he hadn’t been able to steer his nephew away from the Bolsheviks.

And Talia . . .

It wouldn’t matter one way or the other to her. She would love him anyway—as a brother only, of course.

But he didn’t want to think of Talia. That’s why he was getting as far away as possible, from her and from all that threatened to spark a memory of her. It wasn’t working very well at the moment, but he hoped that as time passed and as he threw himself into the movement with all the passion and zeal they required, he would soon be too preoccupied to think of Talia.

He could have just as well gone to Paris and joined an artist’s colony there—he knew several artists who would have welcomed him. He supposed his present destination happened a bit as a whim, an impulse. He had moved out of his apartment the day after his fight with Yuri and had already made the decision to leave town, though he had no specific direction in mind. In the meantime he stayed with some Social Democrat friends and tried to get together money for a journey by selling off paintings.

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