I therefore rang up Litvinov, and asked if they
had had any reason against my going. He said
that he had thought it would not interest me. So
I went. The Conference was still a secret.
There was nothing about it in the morning papers.

The meeting was in a smallish room, with a dais
at one end, in the old Courts of Justice built in the
time of Catherine the Second, who would certainly
have turned in her grave if she had known the use
to which it was being put. Two very smart sol-
diers of the Red Army were guarding the doors.
The whole room, including the floor, was deco-
rated in red. There were banners with "Long
Live the Third International" inscribed upon them
in many languages. The Præsidium was on the
raised dais at the end of the room, Lenin sitting in
the middle behind a long red-covered table with
Albrecht, a young German Spartacist, on the right
and Platten, the Swiss, on the left. The audito-
rium sloped down to the foot of the dais. Chairs
were arranged on each side of an alleyway down
the middle, and the four or five front rows had
little tables for convenience in writing. Every-
body of importance was there; Trotzky, Zinoviev,

-214-