A Girl Among the Anarchists | Page 7

long and willowy, and reminded me irresistibly of an unhealthy cellar-grown potato plant. My circle of acquaintances rapidly enlarged, and soon, instead of having too much time on my hands for reading and study, I had too little. At one of the Sunday evening lectures of the Democratic Club, at which I had become a regular attendant, I made the acquaintance of Nekrovitch, the famous Nihilist, and his wife. I took to him instinctively, drawn by the utter absence of sham or "side" which characterised the man. I had never understood why Socialism need imply the arraying of oneself in a green curtain or a terra-cotta rug, or the cultivation of flowing locks, blue shirts, and a peculiar cut of clothes: and the complete absence of all such outward "trade marks" pleased me in the Russian. He invited me to his house, and I soon became a constant visitor. In the little Chiswick house I met a class of people who stimulated me intellectually, and once more aroused my rather waning enthusiasm for the "Cause." The habit of taking nothing for granted, of boldly inquiring into the origin of all accepted precepts of morality, of intellectual speculation unbiassed by prejudice and untrammelled by all those petty personal and party questions and interests which I had seen occupy so much time and thought at the Democratic Club, permeated the intellectual atmosphere. Quite a new side of the problem--that of its moral bearings and abstract rights as opposed to the merely material right to daily bread which had first appealed to my sense of justice and humanity--now opened before me. The right to complete liberty of action, the conviction that morality is relative and personal and can never be imposed from without, that men are not responsible, or only very partially so, for their surroundings, by which their actions are determined, and that consequently no man has a right to judge his fellow; such and similar doctrines which I heard frequently upheld, impressed me deeply. I was morally convinced of their truth, and consequently more than half an Anarchist. The bold thought and lofty ideal which made of each man a law unto himself, answerable for his own actions only to his own conscience, acting righteously towards others as the result of his feeling of solidarity and not because of any external compulsion, captivated my mind.
The Anarchists who frequented Nekrovitch's house were men of bold and original thought, the intellectual part of the movement, and I was never tired of listening to their arguments. Meantime the more I saw of the Social Democrats the less I felt satisfied with them. A wider experience would have told me that all political parties, irrespective of opinion, are subject to much the same criticism, and that Socialist ideas are no protection against human weaknesses; but extreme youth is not compromising where its ideals are concerned, and I expected and insisted on a certain approach to perfection in my heroes. True, Nekrovitch made me hesitate some time before taking the final step. His attitude in such discussions was one of sound common sense, and he never ceased reminding his Anarchist friends, though all in vain, that we must live in our own times, and that it is no use trying to forestall human evolution by some thousand years.
At home I had become more and more my own mistress. I was now full eighteen years of age, and had always been accustomed to think and act for myself. Caroline, with whom I was on most affectionate terms, despite our frequent differences on politics, had accepted an engagement as prima donna with a travelling opera company which was to visit the United States and the principal cities of South America; her engagement was to last two years, and she had left just three weeks before the opening of my first chapter.
Raymond slept at home, but as the date of his final examination drew near he was more and more occupied, and frequently whole weeks passed in which I only caught a glimpse of him. He knew and sympathised with my new line of thought; he had accompanied me more than once to the Nekrovitchs', whom he liked much, but he had no longer the time to devote much thought to such matters. Of money I always had a considerable command; ever since our father's death I had kept house, and now that Caroline was away I had full control of the household purse.
Turning over all these thoughts in my mind as I sat toasting my feet before the fire, I felt more and more inclined to throw in my lot with the Anarchists. At the same time I felt that if I did take this step it must be as a worker and in no half-hearted spirit. The