Note 6 — Chapter XI · THE RED ARMY

In such company I was regarded as an invalid, suffering in body and mind from the ill-treatment received at the hands of a capitalistic Government. The story ran that I was born in one of the Russian border provinces, but that my father, a musician, had been expelled from Russia for political reasons when I was still young. My family had led a nomadic existence in England, Australia, and America. The outbreak of the war found me in England, where I was imprisoned and suffered cruel treatment for refusal to fight. Bad food, brutality, and hunger-striking had reduced me physically and mentally, and after the Revolution I was deported as an undesirable alien to my native land. The story was a plausible one and went down very well. It accounted for mannerisms and any deficiency in speech. It also relieved me of the necessity of participation in discussions, but I took care that it should be known that there burned within me an undying hatred of the malicious Government at whose hands I had suffered wrong.