KALIAYEV: Yes, it’s dying twice over. Thank you, Dora. There’s nothing with which anyone can reproach us. Now, I’m sure of myself. [A short silence.] What is it, Dora? Why are you silent?
DORA: I’d like to help you in another way as well. Only …
KALIAYEV: Only … what?
DORA: No, I’d better not.…
KALIAYEV: Don’t you trust me?
DORA: It’s not that I don’t trust you, darling; I don’t trust myself. Ever since Schweitzer’s death, I’ve been having … queer ideas. And anyhow it’s not for me to tell you what will be so difficult.
KALIAYEV: But I like things that are difficult. Unless you have a very low opinion of me, say what you have in mind.
DORA [gazing at him]: I know. You’re brave. That, in fact, is what makes me anxious. You laugh, you work yourself up, you go forward to the sacrifice in a sort of rapture. But in a few hours’ time you’ll have to come out of your dream and face reality, the dreadful thing you are to do. Perhaps it’s best to speak of this beforehand—so that you won’t be taken by surprise, and flinch.
KALIAYEV: That’s nonsense! I shall not flinch. But please explain …
DORA: Throwing the bomb, the scaffold, dying twice over—that’s the easier part. Your heart will see you through. But standing in the front line.… [She pauses, scans him again, and seems to hesitate.] You’ll be standing in front, you’ll see him.…
KALIAYEV: See whom?
DORA: The Grand Duke.
KALIAYEV: Oh, only for a moment at most.
DORA: A moment during which you’ll look at him. Oh, Yanek, it’s best for you to know, to be forewarned! A man is a man. Perhaps the Grand Duke has gentle eyes, perhaps you’ll see him smiling to himself, scratching his ear. Perhaps—who knows?—you’ll see a little scar on his cheek where he cut himself shaving. And, if he looks at you, at that moment.…
KALIAYEV: It’s not he I’m killing. I’m killing despotism.
DORA: That’s quite true. And despotism must be killed. I’ll get the bomb ready and when I’m screwing in the tube—that’s the moment when it’s touch and go, and one’s nerves are taut—I’ll feel a queer little thrill … of joy. But, then, I don’t know the Grand Duke; it wouldn’t be anything so easy if while I was screwing in the tube he were sitting in front of me, looking at me. But you’ll see him quite near, from only a yard or two away.
KALIAYEV [vehemently]: I shall not see him.
DORA: Why? Will you shut your eyes?
KALIAYEV: No. But, with God’s help, my hatred will surge up just in time, and blind me.
[A single ring at the bell. They keep very still. STEPAN and VOINOV enter. Voices in the hall. Then ANNENKOV, too, comes in.]
ANNENKOV: It’s the porter. The Grand Duke’s going to the theater tomorrow. [Looks at them.] Please see that everything is ready, Dora.
DORA [in a low, toneless voice]: Yes. [She walks slowly out.]
KALIAYEV [after watching her receding form, turns to STEPAN and says with quiet assurance.] I shall kill him. With joy!
CURTAIN
ACT II
Scene as before. Night has fallen. BORIS is at the window, DORA beside the table.
ANNENKOV: They’re at their posts. Stepan has just lit his cigarette.
DORA: When is the Grand Duke expected to drive by?
ANNENKOV: Any moment now. Listen! Isn’t that a carriage?… No.
DORA: Don’t fidget like that! Do sit down.
ANNENKOV: What about the bombs?
DORA: Do sit down.… There’s nothing more we can do.
ANNENKOV: Yes, there is. We can envy them.
DORA: Your place is here. You are the leader.
ANNENKOV: I’m the leader, yes. But Yanek’s a better man than I, and perhaps he is the one who …
DORA: The risk’s the same for all. For the man who throws and for the man who doesn’t throw.
ANNENKOV: In the long run, yes, the risk’s the same. But at this moment Yanek and Alexis are in the firing line. Oh, I know I haven’t the right to be with them. Still, I can’t help fearing sometimes that I’m a little too ready to play my part; after all it … it makes things easier, not having to throw the bomb oneself.
DORA: What if it does? The only thing that matters is for you to do your duty, to the end.
ANNENKOV: How calm you are, Dora!
DORA: I am not calm; I’m frightened.… Let me tell you something. I’ve been with the group for three years, haven’t I? And for two years I’ve been making the bombs. I have done all I was told to do, and I don’t think I ever let you down. That’s so, isn’t it?
ANNENKOV: Of course it is, Dora.
DORA: Well, all those three years I have been afraid; I have been haunted by that creeping fear that leaves you only when you go to sleep, and are lucky enough not to dream; but when you wake up, there it is, waiting at your bedside.… So the only thing was to get used to it. I’ve trained myself to keep calm just when I’m most afraid. But it’s nothing to be proud of.
ANNENKOV: On the contrary, you should feel proud. Look at me! I’ve never mastered anything. Do you know, I often catch myself regretting the bad old days—a gay life, pretty women, and all the rest of it! Yes, I was fond of women, wine, dancing through the night.…
DORA: I’d guessed as much, Boria, and that’s why I am so fond of you. Your heart is not dried up. Even if it’s still hankering after pleasure, surely that’s better than the hideous silence that often settles in at the very place where voices used to rise—authentically human voices.
ANNENKOV: Dora! I can’t believe my ears! You, of all people, feel like that?
DORA: Ssh! Listen. [She puts a finger to her lips, listening intently. A distant rumble of wheels; then silence.] No. It’s not he, not yet. My heart’s thumping. You see! I’ve still a lot to learn.
ANNENKOV [going to the window]: Ah! Stepan’s made a sign. He’s coming. [Again there is a rumble of wheels; it comes nearer and nearer, passes below the windows, then gradually recedes. A long silence.] In a few seconds … [They listen.] How long it seems! [DORA makes a fretful gesture. A long silence. Suddenly, a peal of bells in the distance.] What can have happened? Yanek should have thrown his bomb by now. The carriage must have reached the theater. And what about Alexis? Look! Stepan’s turned, now he’s running toward the theater.
DORA [clinging to him]: Yanek’s been arrested. I’m sure it’s that. Oh, Boria, we must do something, we …
ANNENKOV: Wait. [Listens.] No, nothing. That settles it.
DORA: I don’t understand. How can Yanek have been arrested when he hasn’t done anything? Oh, I know he was quite ready for it. In fact, prison, the trial, were what he wanted. But after he’d killed the Grand Duke. Not like this, not like this!
ANNENKOV [looking out]: Here’s Voinov. Open, quick! [DORA opens the door. VOINOV enters; he is greatly agitated.] What’s happened, Alexis?
VOINOV: I’ve no idea. I was waiting for the first bomb. Then I saw the carriage rounding the corner, and nothing’d happened. I was completely baffled. I thought a bit, then I concluded you had called it off at the last minute. So I ran back here.
ANNENKOV: What about Yanek?
VOINOV: I haven’t seen him.
DORA: He’s been arrested.
ANNENKOV [who is still looking out of the window]: No. There he is. He’s coming back.
[Dora opens the door. KALIAYEV enters, his face streaming with tears.]
KALIAYEV: Brothers … forgive me … I couldn’t bring myself …
[DORA goes to him and clasps his hand.]
DORA [soothingly]: That’s all right. Don’t worry.…
ANNENKOV: What happened?
DORA [to KALIAYEV]: Don’t take it so hard, Yanek. Sometimes it’s like that, you know; at the last minute everything goes wrong.
ANNENKOV: No, I can’t believe my ears.
DORA: Let him be. You’re not the only one, Yanek. Schweitzer, too, couldn’t bring it off the first time.
ANNENKOV: Yanek, were you … afraid?
KALIAYEV [indignantly]: Afraid? Certainly not—and you haven’t the right …
[A knocking at the door in the agreed code. At a sign from ANNENKOV, VOINOV goes out. KALIAYEV seems completely prostrated. A short silence. STEPAN enters.]
ANNENKOV: Well?
STEPAN: There were children in the Grand Duke’s carriage.
ANNENKOV: Children?
STEPAN: Yes. The Grand Duke’s niece and nephew.
ANNENKOV: But Orlov told us the Grand Duke would be by himself.
STEPAN: There was the Grand Duchess as well. Too many people, I suppose, for our young poet. Luckily, the police spies didn’t notice anything.
[ANNENKOV speaks in a low tone to STEPAN. All are gazing at KALIAYEV, who now looks up and fixes his eyes on STEPAN.]
KALIAYEV [wildly]: I’d never dreamed of anything like that. Children, children especially. Have you ever noticed children’s eyes—that grave, intent look they often have? Somehow I never can face it. I have to look away.… And, to think, only a moment before I was so gloriously happy, standing at the corner of that little side street, in a patch of shadow. The moment I saw the carriage lamps twinkling in the distance, my heart began to race. With joy, I can assure you. And as the rumble of wheels came nearer, it beat faster and faster. Thumping inside me like a drum. I wanted to leap into the air. I’m almost sure that I was laughing, laughing for joy. And I kept on saying: “Yes … Yes …” Do you understand? [Averting his gaze from STEPAN, he relapses into his dejected attitude.] I ran forward. It was then I saw the children. They weren’t laughing, not they! Just staring into emptiness, and
