Tolstoy. I tell you, Walter, the nation that can produce a man
such as Saratovsky deserves and some day will win political freedom.
I have heard of this Dr. Kharkoff before, too. His life would be
a short one if he were in Russia. A remarkable man, who fled after
those unfortunate uprisings in 1905. Ah, we are on Fifth Avenue.
I suspect that he is taking us to a club on the lower part of the
avenue, where a number of the Russian reformers live, patiently
waiting and planning for the great 'awakening' in their native land."

Kharkoff's cab had stopped. Our quest had indeed brought us almost
to Washington Square. Here we entered an old house of the past
generation. As we passed through the wide hall, I noted the high
ceilings, the old-fashioned marble mantels stained by time, the
long, narrow rooms and dirty-white woodwork, and the threadbare
furniture of black walnut and horsehair.

Upstairs in a small back room we found the venerable Saratovsky,
tossing, half-delirious with the fever, on a disordered bed. His
was a striking figure in this sordid setting, with a high
intellectual forehead and deep-set, glowing coals of eyes which
gave a hint at the things which had made his life one of the
strangest among all the revolutionists of Russia and the works he
had done among the most daring. The brown dye was scarcely yet
out of his flowing white beard - a relic of his last trip back to
his fatherland, where he had eluded the secret police in the
disguise of a German gymnasium professor.

Saratovsky extended a thin, hot, emaciated hand to us, and we
remained standing. Kennedy said nothing for the moment. The sick
man motioned feebly to us to come closer.