‘HE’S GONE-GONE-GONE,’ SAID the train speeding towards Dieppe, ‘and he’s gone-gone-gone.’

The passenger opposite was asleep, his face supported on his hand. Through the window the grey landscape unwound and hurried into the past. I now had no fear that I was followed. The Tcheka had achieved its purpose, and its agents had melted into the shadows from which they had come. And I was going to London – to find Sidney.

It was terrible – doing nothing in Paris. I felt like a lost wanderer in the crowd of life. I could not remain. My Russian acquaintances there – I had no friends – were dumbly sympathetic. They were helpless. They could do nothing. What was to be done? They had spent years waiting in the antechamber of Fortune. They were fatalists. They were content to wait. They were sorry, very sorry, but— They had lives, cares, worries of their own. They were strangers to me. Who could help me? Z. could not. General K. could not. There was Commander E. And Commander E. had gone abroad. He would be ‘away some time’. There was no one to help. And I knew nothing. I was ignorant. It was as if the world had combined in a conspiracy against me – against me and Sidney. I remembered how at dinner in Paris, before Sidney had set forth upon that fatal journey, Commander E. had mentioned, in the course of conversation, that when in London he usually stayed at the — Street Hotel. If he had not yet gone abroad, he would be there now. It was a poor chance, but one who drowns proverbially clutches at a straw. I might catch him there. Something I must do. I could not wait. I could not sit still and do nothing. And so I set forth from Paris on my wild-goose chase – for London and the hotel.

I had no suspicions now of my fellow travellers. I was past fearing. I did not think that I was watched. The thought gave me no pleasure, only another stab of anguish every time that my mind recurred to it, and I remembered – each time with a new and entirely fresh realisation – that the Tcheka’s work was done, and he was gone, for whom they had watched and waited.

The crowd at the Gare du Nord was indifferent. People were seeing off friends, relations, dear ones. For me, the tide of life had passed over my head and engulfed me.

I arrived late in London. I called a cab and drove to the hotel. A feeling almost of suffocation came over me as I approached it. Had I come on a wild-goose chase after all? Would I find Commander E. there? Had he already departed on the journey of which he had spoken in his last letter?

I arrived at the hotel and booked a room for the night. I was tired out. I asked to be shown immediately to my room.

‘By the way,’ I asked the porter as I followed him across the foyer, ‘is Commander E. staying here?’

‘Yes, madam,’ he replied. My heart gave a little bound, but I veiled my excitement with a yawn.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said with an affected carelessness of manner. ‘I will see him in the morning perhaps. At what time does he take breakfast?’

‘About nine o’clock, madam,’ replied the porter.

So the first part of my mission was successfully accomplished. I was determined. Come what might I was going to find out what had happened to Sidney. I was going to him – even if I had to go to Russia to find him – I was going to him. Nothing should stop me. I would find him.

Next morning I waited until E. had finished his breakfast before I revealed myself to him. For my part I was too disturbed to eat anything. As he came out of the room I emerged from the recess in which I had concealed myself and called him by name. To say that Commander E. was surprised to see me but faintly describes the stress of emotion under which he suffered at that moment.

‘You,’ he gasped. ‘You?’

‘Where can we talk in peace and quietness?’ I asked him.

Without a word he turned and led me to a seat. His hand was trembling like a leaf.

My arrival had obviously disconcerted Commander E., but he was quite ready with an explanation of his conduct in having sought to avoid me. In the circumstances of Sidney’s death, it was impolitic for a British official to be seen in my company, and he had received an instruction to that effect from his superiors. The explanation was satisfactory. Sidney himself had repeatedly told me that ‘the service must not be brought into it’.

I talked with E. for some time. He could add nothing to what I already knew. The party of men, with which Sidney was, had been attacked by bandits as it returned to the frontier. Sidney had been badly wounded. What his ultimate fate was E. did not know, but he feared the worst.

‘But we have our agents in Russia,’ he assured me. ‘They will find out in time, you may be certain of that.’

There was obviously no help here. But I had another string to my bow. There was the Foreign Office. I had written to Captain Hill, telling him of my news. He came at once to my aid. But the Foreign Office either could or would do nothing. The papers were strangely silent. Not a word had escaped from the Bolsheviks of the fate of Sidney Reilly.

What to do? I was like a caged lion. I could not rest. The precious time was slipping by. The suspense was terrible – waiting, waiting. I must move. Nobody could help me. I must act for myself.

Then somewhat to my surprise, Commander E. invited me to dine with him and to meet a friend. As soon as he saw me the Commander reminded me that I had in my keeping many confidential documents, including letters from himself. As these papers would be of the utmost value to the Bolsheviks, I would be in the gravest personal danger if they remained in my keeping, and Commander E. suggested that I should hand them over to him for safe custody. This, however, I flatly refused to do. The friend whom I was to meet, turned out to be Bunakoff, who had arrived in London on a mission to Commander E. The Commander had described him as ‘a man who does not ask money for his services, but does not refuse money if offered’; a sufficiently apt description. I saw Bunakoff and questioned him, Commander E. acting as interpreter. Bunakoff knew nothing. He had acted but as an intermediary for higher powers. Marie Schultz was his immediate superior. Who was Marie Schultz? That he could not say. He knew that she was in close touch with a world-wide anti-Bolshevik organisation, of which the headquarters were in Moscow itself. Beyond that – nothing. Could I see Marie Schultz? Bunakoff shrugged his shoulders. She was in Helsingfors.

During the past few days of vain labour and grief a plan had been slowly forming in my mind.

I must go to Helsingfors. Helsingfors had been Sidney’s base of operations. Helsingfors had been the site of the ‘factory’. In Helsingfors was Marie Schultz. Yes, I must go to Helsingfors. There could henceforth be no rest for me until I had found something definite, till I could be assured whether Sidney was dead or alive. Henceforward I was enrolled in the anti-Bolshevik cause as an active agent. There should be no rest for me in the fight against that enormity, against which Sidney had fought until it had swallowed him. To Helsingfors, then. And then? Over the border into Russia, if need be – to Petrograd, to Moscow itself – to find out. I knew no fear. My sorrow – my rage against the Bolsheviks was too great for that.

Such were the thoughts which swarmed in my mind as I dined with Bunakoff and Commander E.

I booked my passage to Helsingfors on the Hull steamer Astraea. There were several days to wait. I put my affairs in order, made a will, left final instructions in case I did not return. Then suddenly the desire came to me to put the whole matter to somebody absolutely independent. My mind went to Dr Harold Williams, of The Times, a man who knew Russia and had been acquainted with my husband. To Dr Williams I went and told him the whole story, and that I counted on him to take the matter up if I did not return. He was absolutely dumbfounded when he heard the story. At first he earnestly tried to keep me from going to Finland, but when he saw it was useless he promised to do all he could. Further I arranged for him to publish the announcement of my husband’s death, should I wire him to do so. I had to make this arrangement as Sidney was expected back in New York on urgent business and, though I had held the fort until now, I could not do so much longer.

It was a foggy morning when I got in the train for Hull. I boarded the Astraea that night. Such a queer little ship. Such a queer little cabin. Such a dear old captain. Such excellent food. Hardly ever have I tasted the like.

A telegram was waiting for me: ‘Good luck to a plucky brick. Hill.’

I was on the captain’s bridge most of the time. He looked after me like a father. He took it upon himself to be perturbed when he found that I was going to Helsingfors alone without knowing a word of the language. When he heard that friends were meeting me, he became happier. He said that he would hand me over to them himself.

It was bitterly cold, but I think that the sharp frosty wind, blowing across the bows of the Astraea, cleared my fevered mind and helped me to see things in a better perspective. The weather was fine. Never have I seen such stars. The nights were like day.

On our arrival at Copenhagen the captain took me to see the town and buy provisions. Next morning we were nearing Helsingfors. This was the first time I had been in this part of the world, and never, I thought, had I seen such a pretty picture as the entrance to Helsingfors harbour. It had been snowing in the night, but now there was brilliant sunshine. The place looked so small, so quaint, so white, so golden, that it seemed to me for all the world like one of those old-fashioned German Christmas cards, in which the little spire of the little church and all the little houses stand out against the white landscape.

Helsingfors! I woke from the dream. I was back to earth and stark reality. On the quay three men were awaiting me. I recognised Bunakoff at once and waved to him. The dear old captain bade me goodbye, and I left the friendly little ship.

One of the two men with Bunakoff turned out to be his brother. The other, an insignificant looking boy, was Schultz. I could almost recognise him from my husband’s picture – ‘perhaps a very fine boy and undoubtedly a very brave boy, but what you would call a nincompoop.’

The air was very shrewd. My hands were so cold that I could not open my trunks for the Customs, and my legs were almost frozen, though I was wearing thick woollen stockings.

At last we got into a motor car and drove through streets white with snow. Bunakoff had engaged me a room in a pension, because, as he explained, the best hotel was known to be a meeting-ground of all the Bolsheviks. Helsingfors was a hot-bed of intrigue. Measure and counter-measure were being taken there, plot and counter-plot proceeded daily. It was important that I should be unobserved.

I had no complaints to make about my pension. It was spick and span and very clean. The bed looked very comfortable. The appointments were first class. The room had double windows and was very warm. To this day I laugh when I recall the chambermaid’s cry of alarm when she brought my coffee in the morning and found that I had slept with my window open.

And here I was. The man-boy Schultz told me in broken German that his wife would call on me in one hour’s time, and I was left alone. And how alone I felt God only knows. My courage seemed to have ebbed away. For the first time I felt like breaking down.

But after a good meal I began to feel more mistress of myself, and I awaited the coming of Marie Schultz with the greatest curiosity to see the woman on whom so much depended. I was naturally highly suspicious, and in my own mind had very little doubt but that she was a provocation agent.

Punctually at the hour there was a knock at the door, and in came a slender woman with plain yet attractive, capable face, steady, honest, blue eyes, obviously well bred, and answering very well to Sidney’s description of her as a school ma’rm. At my first glance I decided that I could trust her. At my second I knew that I was going to like this woman.

Seeing me thus, looking very mournful, very desolate, very lonely, Mme Schultz embraced me with great emotion, telling me that she felt herself entirely responsible for my husband’s death, and that she would not rest until all the circumstances had been discovered and a rescue effected if he were still alive, or a revenge secured if he were in truth dead.

‘When your husband arrived here,’ she told me, ‘I explained to him the exact situation of affairs as far as our organisation was concerned. On our side we have some of the principal Bolshevik officials in Moscow, who are anxious to bring the present regime to an end, if only their safety can be guaranteed. This means support from outside Russia, and it was on this point that we wanted your husband’s advice. I may mention that I am in very close touch with the Moscow heads of this organisation. In fact I live in Moscow, and came here to see Captain Reilly and discuss the chances of outside help with him.

‘Captain Reilly was rather sceptical. He said that foreign help could only be obtained if the nation giving it could be assured that the anti-Bolshevik organisation in Russia was more than a shadow. Granted that there was a solid body of support in Russia itself, he thought that the anti-Bolshevik coup d’état could be played without difficulty. But convincing proof would be required before the necessary support could be obtained.

‘I assured him that our organisation in Russia was powerful, influential and well-knit, and that it included among its members one or two highly placed Bolshevik officials. And finally I sent a message by an agent to Moscow requesting one of the heads of the organisation to attend.

‘The meeting place was fixed at Wyborg, which is much nearer the Russian frontier than Helsingfors. Our man from Russia could not venture very far over the border without arousing suspicions. Besides, there are so many Bolshevik agents here that he was bound to be recognised. Near Wyborg is living a Russian exile, who belongs to our organisation, and at his house the meeting was to take place.

‘Well, we all went to Wyborg, George, Mr Bunakoff, your husband and myself, and at the house we met the men who had come out of Russia. Your husband questioned them very searchingly, and they confirmed my words with regard to the strength of the organisation. Captain Reilly was much impressed by them, particularly by their leader, a very highly placed Bolshevik official, who beneath the cover of his office is one of the most ardent enemies of the present regime. This man said that he thought it wise for your husband to meet the other heads of the organisation in order to assure himself of the importance of the movement. With this he pulled out of his pocket a passport made out in the name of Nicholas Nicholaievitch Steinberg, and invited your husband to accompany him to Moscow to verify the truth of his assertions. At the same time he assured him that the organisation was so powerful, and included such influential persons among its members, that there was absolutely no risk in his crossing the border. The ‘Trust’, as we call ourselves, could pull him out of any difficulty. Now Captain Reilly was a very shrewd judge of character and, while the other was talking, I could see your husband eyeing him up and down, summing him up and slowly arriving at a favourable conclusion.

‘The upshot of it was that he decided to make this journey to Moscow. He borrowed a suit from my husband, but wore his own linen, which was marked, his watch, which bore his initials, and a photograph of you. I mention this to show that the Bolsheviks would have no difficulty in identifying him, if they caught him.

‘So the next day we set out for the frontier. We had already arranged with the Finnish patrols to see our party over the river, and I told George to accompany them as far as the train. For my part I went as far as the frontier to wish them God-speed.

‘Now you must know that the frontier between Russia and Finland is marked by a narrow stream. On each side at intervals are the block-houses of the patrols, the Finnish on this side and the Russian on that. The greatest hostility exists between them, and the only communications between the one bank and the other are carried out surreptitiously and under cover of darkness. The country on each side is very sparsely populated, and you may go for miles without meeting a soul. It is necessary for our people to be ferried across this stream when the Red patrols are not looking, and then slink under cover of darkness across the open country to the railway station. They get shelter from our sympathisers among the villagers on the other side of the river.

‘Well, we duly arrived at the Finnish block-house, Captain Reilly, George, myself and the men out of Russia. Three Finnish soldiers were there. They had reconnoitred the river bank and found all clear. They provided us with food, and we sat down and waited for night.

‘The night was ideal for the venture, fine and clear. We waited for the setting of the moon and then moved off in Indian file to the river. At last our guide called a halt, and peering through the darkness we could see the rising ground the other side of the border, and its bare edge resting opaque against the deep grey of the sky. At our feet the river flowed sluggishly.

‘For a long time we waited while the Finns listened anxiously for the Red patrol, but everything was quiet. At last one of the Finns lowered himself cautiously into the water and half swam, half waded across. Your husband followed. Then went one of the men out of Russia, until all were across.

‘Two Finns and myself remained on this side. Peering over the water we could distinctly see them filing obliquely across the field on the further bank. Then they vanished into the gloom. By-and-by we saw their figures faintly outlined one by one against the sky as they crossed the crest. We gave them ten minutes. All was as silent as the grave, and we returned to the block-house.

‘George returned the following day with the news that they had boarded the train without incident. All had gone well.

‘Well, your husband visited Petrograd and Moscow, whence he sent postcards to yourself and Commander E. On the day appointed for his return I was at Wyborg waiting for him. But he did not arrive.’

Here Mme Schultz laid before me a cutting out of the Bolshevik paper, Isvestia, which ran as follows:

‘The night of 28–9 September, four contrabandists tried to pass the Finnish frontier with the result that two were killed, one a Finnish soldier, taken prisoner, and the fourth so badly wounded that he died on the way to Petrograd.’

‘This was the first news I had of the disaster,’ Mme Schultz resumed, ‘and I at once sent George across the frontier to confirm the news. He questioned the peasants and they confirmed the story just as the Bolsheviks had told it. They had heard the shooting on the frontier on the night when the party should have returned.’

‘And do you think that my husband is dead?’ I asked her.

‘Who can doubt it?’ she answered sadly. ‘According to accounts it was he who died on the journey back to Petrograd. But you are not convinced? Why should you think that he is still alive?’

‘For these reasons,’ I told her. ‘If he were dead, there is no doubt that the body would have been examined: the Bolshevik police would have noticed that the man wore shirts and underwear marked SR. They would find the watch and my photograph with an inscription in English. And they would find a passport with the name of Steinberg. Then you must remember that the Bolsheviks have in their possession several very good photographs of my husband, and there are plenty of people in Russia who know him perfectly well by sight, and me too. How then can they fail to have identified him? And if they had identified him, why have they simply put in the paper this small notice instead of shouting from the housetops that they had captured the famous Sidney Reilly like a rat? They would have been quite justified in exulting, as Sidney has twice been condemned to death in contumaciam. Why this silence, if he is really dead? Is it not much more likely that he has been badly wounded, but that there is still hope of his recovery, and they are only waiting for that to make a further diabolic move?’

Mme Schultz could not but admit the force of my reasoning, and admitted that the possibility which I indicated had not previously occurred to her.

We now decided to work together on this hypothesis and endeavour to get at the truth. But where were we to begin?

Turning the matter over in my mind hour after hour that night, I suddenly remembered Sidney’s Berlin acquaintance, Orloff, and I hit on an expedient of getting information from Orloff without betraying Sidney’s whereabouts to him.

I wrote him a letter, which purported to be dictated to me by my husband, who was ill and could not write himself. In this I said that a very good friend of his, named Nicholas Nicholaievitch Steinberg, had met with an accident in Russia, and I should be obliged if Orloff could find out anything definite for me about him.

Orloff telegraphed his answer – to go to such-and-such address, where I could see a friend of his, to whom he had wired the story. The address was in a small street, on the first floor of a house there, and I was to ask for Nicholas Karlovitch.

So off we went, the two Schultzes and myself to the house indicated. The arrangement was that, if I did not come out in half an hour, they were to come and enquire for me. My heart was beating very fast as I went up to the door and rang the bell.

The door was opened by a short, thick-set man, whom I asked whether I could see Nicholas Karlovitch. The man bowed and smiled, asked me in and gave me a chair. I explained my mission fully. After I had finished he asked me to wait a minute, and called up a number on the telephone. I tried hard to memorise it, but it was in Finnish, which does not fall within the range of my accomplishments. After a few words with somebody at the other end of the wire, the thick-set man handed me the telephone and said that Nicholas Karlovitch would speak to me.

‘But you pretended to be Nicholas Karlovitch,’ I said indignantly. The thick-set man smiled and shrugged.

In the meantime a suave voice was coming over the wire. It told me that its owner was very pleased I had called, and that he would give himself the honour of calling on me at my pension that night, if it were convenient to me. I answered that I would be delighted to see him and was proceeding to give him my address.

‘Do not trouble, do not trouble,’ said the voice with a chuckle. ‘I know perfectly well where you are staying. I know the floor you are on, the room you occupy, and what you had for breakfast this morning. I will be with you at eight o’clock tonight then.’

I came away with a chill feeling at the base of my spine. I had purposely kept my address a close secret and all my letters came Poste Restante, and yet this terrible man knew all about me. The Schultzes looked grave when I told them. They at once suspected Nicholas Karlovitch of being a Bolshevik agent, and they decided to post themselves where they could watch him when he came to see me, and follow him to see who he was and where he went.

Eight o’clock came and Nicholas Karlovitch had not arrived. At half past he rang me on the phone and told me he could not come until nine. I knew that the Schultzes were waiting in the bitter cold outside, but I dared not communicate with them for fear of bringing them under observation. And this was not all. They expected my visitor at eight and might follow the wrong man.

However, at nine o’clock a knock came at my door, and there stood a tall man of military build and appearance, who clicked his heels and introduced himself as Nicholas Karlovitch in the German way. When he had seated himself he told me that he had received a letter from his friend Orloff in Berlin, which left him rather in the dark, and he would be much obliged if I would explain the matter more fully.

I did so in a few words, telling him the same story as I had told Orloff but adding that my husband was ill in Paris and had sent me to enquire into the fate of his friend Steinberg.

Nicholas Karlovitch listened to my story without looking at me and without a word. But when I had finished he suddenly leaped to his feet and stared into my eyes in a dreadful, piercing, hypnotic way. His eyes were like steel gimlets and seemed to pierce to the inmost depths of my soul.

My heart turned to water and my knees became loose beneath me; my blood seemed to freeze in my veins; I felt as if I were paralysed. This then was the famous Tcheka look of which I had heard so much.

‘Do you know General K.?’ asked Nicholas Karlovitch.

It was the most terrible and pregnant question he could ask. It was understood that General K.’s name was never to be mentioned, as his connection with this business was supposed to be unknown save to very few, and never did Commander E. or my husband pronounce those fateful syllables.

With an effort I controlled myself, and answered with an air of simple unconcern:

‘No, I don’t know him. I think I have heard his name. Isn’t he a Russian? It’s a Russian name.’

‘Do you think,’ resumed the inquisitor, never for a moment taking his dreadful gaze off my eyes, ‘that you are quite sure that you do not know him?’

‘Might he help us?’ I asked innocently. ‘Is he in Finland?’

The dreadful eyes held mine, and without answering my questions, Nicholas Karlovitch asked again:

‘You are quite sure you do not know him?’

My voice failed me. My tongue stuck. I shook my head. Nicholas Karlovitch looked down.

‘I think,’ he said, ‘that I might be able to help you trace your friend, Steinberg, but, of course, it will cost money.’

‘I am prepared to pay for the information,’ I answered.

‘Well, then,’ said Nicholas Karlovitch, ‘I have a friend in the Tcheka in Russia, who will be able to help you. If this Steinberg is alive, I will find out for you where he is. If he is dead, I will try and get you a photograph of the body. I will come and see you again tomorrow at the same time, and let you know how much it will cost.’

A few minutes after Nicholas Karlovitch had gone, I dressed and left for the Schultzes’ house. As I descended the stairs of the pension I passed a man on the landing. Outside the door was another. I saw Mme Schultz in a doorway opposite but made no sign, as I realised that I was watched. At the corner of the street I took a taxicab, and the man took another.

I ordered the driver to go to the station, and arrived there just as the pursuing cab came round the corner. I went in at the door and took shelter behind a kiosk, and my pursuer running into the station almost brushed me where I stood. As soon as he was past I slipped out of the door and jumped into a taxicab, giving the driver an address which I knew to be near the Schultzes’ house. The streets were quite deserted when we arrived, and, making sure that I was not followed I entered the Schultzes’ house.

Mme Schultz was waiting for me, and lost no time in telling me what she had observed from her vantage point. Two men had been watching in front of my house at eight o’clock. Another man shortly came by and whispered something to the watchers as he passed. On this they disappeared and returned again at about twenty minutes to nine. The Schultzes had seen the arrival of Nicholas Karlovitch at nine o’clock, and had seen him enter after being saluted by the two men. M. Schultz and another man had followed him when he left, but had not yet returned.

While we were talking together M. Schultz and his friend arrived rather dispirited. They had to own that Nicholas Karlovitch had given them the slip.

The next day I noticed that a new lodger had taken the room opposite mine. The maid, too, a stupid Finnish woman, on whom no words of mine seemed to make any impression, took to entering my room suddenly and without any pretext. When I was going out that morning, I saw her run suddenly to the back of the house and begin violently shaking a small carpet out of the window. As I passed down the stairs I took a casual glance out of one of the windows which commanded the back of the house. Two men were waiting there.

I was obviously being closely watched, and the Finnish servant had apparently signalled the news that I was going out. Sure enough I was followed from the door of the pension, and I amused myself by taking my trackers on a long circuitous walk.

However, I expected Mme Schultz in the course of the afternoon, and the attentions of the two men were becoming something of a nuisance. I discussed the matter with Mme Schultz that afternoon. I was rather amused than anything else, but this constant watching was an annoyance. As we were talking the matter over and wondering how to get to the bottom of the affair, there came a frantic message from Bunakoff asking what was Mrs Reilly doing, as he had just heard from somebody who was in his pay in the secret police that she was to be arrested.

This, of course, did not suit our plans at all, and Mme Schultz sent her husband to the Chief of Staff of the Finnish Army. The Chief of Staff was a friend and a coadjutor of the organisation, and helped its members to cross the frontier on their various enterprises. Of course he knew all about my husband, and indeed was personally concerned in helping him over the border. M. Schultz then saw this man, explained the position to him and gave him the address which Nicholas Karlovitch had given me. M. Schultz returned with the news that the Chief of Staff was looking into the matter, and we awaited the result rather breathlessly.

That day my room was searched during my absence. But as I had the day before given into Mme Schultz’s keeping my revolver and various papers and addresses, nothing was found. And when the evening came I sat down and waited for Nicholas Karlovitch to come as he had promised and let me know the price of the investigation he was making.

Instead of Nicholas Karlovitch there came the following letter:

Meantime the spies remained at their post. The following morning Nicholas Karlovitch telephoned me to say that he could not come that day either, and at lunch time I noticed that the spies had left. Very shortly afterwards Mme Schultz called with the news that I was to have been arrested that afternoon had we not communicated with the Chief of Staff, who had telephoned the secret police instructing them to find out about Nicholas Karlovitch and to have the spies arrested.

Then the ‘murder’ was out. Nicholas Karlovitch turned out to be an agent of the Finnish Secret Police, who had taken me for a Bolshevik provocateur. And the affair ended with a severe reprimand to the police from the Chief of Staff. It was not until the episode was over that I realised how much it had begun to play upon my nerves.

The same day a message came from Russia to the effect that no more had been found out about Sidney.

I was now desperate. My mental balance was upset and I was far from normal. I begged my new friends to secure me a Bolshevik passport with which I could go into Russia and find my husband. Mme Schultz was horrified at the thought. She said it was suicide. I knew it was suicide. But suicide was better than this, suicide was better than uncertainty, suicide was better than kicking my heels, suicide was better than waiting, waiting, waiting.

I believe I broke down. I called aloud for revenge. Something could be done, and if nobody else would do it, I would. And there I was, helpless in an indifferent world. Mme Schultz stood over me, kind, capable, sensible, sympathetic. She asked me to trust her completely. I took her hand dumbly. She asked me to join the organisation. I trusted her. With the approval of the Moscow centre I joined the ‘Trust’ under the party name of ‘Viardo’.

And thus it was that I stepped into my husband’s place in the ranks of anti-Bolshevism.