'He's such a bigoted Zionist--he cannot understand that Zionism is _ein überwundener Standpunkt_.'
'Ah!' said the young man eagerly. 'Then you can understand how I have suffered since I evolved from Zionism.'
'The only thing that a self-respecting Jew can be--a Sejmist, of course!'
'A Jewish Party?' asked David eagerly. After all the enthusiasm for Russian politics and world politics he was now pleased with even this loquacious form of Self-Defence.
'Come and have a glass of tea; I will tell you all about it,' said the young man, soothed by the prospect of airing his theories. 'We will go to Friedman's inn--the University Club, we call it, because the intellectuals generally drink there.'
'With pleasure,' said David, sniffing the chance of recruits. 'But before we talk of your Party I want to ask whether you can join me in a branch of the _Samooborona_.'
'Our Party cannot join any other,' he said.
'I am sorry. But I'm too busy just now to consider anything else. Our Party-Day falls next week, and there's infinite work to be done.'
'Work!' cried David desperately. 'What work?'
'There will be many great speeches. I myself shall not speak beyond an hour, but that is merely impromptu in the debate. Our Referat-speakers need at least two hours apiece. We did not get through our last session till five in the morning. And there were scenes, I tell you!'
'What is there to discuss?' The Sejmist looked pityingly at David. 'The great question of the Duma elections, for one thing. To boycott or not to boycott. And if not, which candidates shall we support? Then there is the question of Jewish autonomy in the Russian Parliament--that is our great principle. Moreover, as a comparatively new Party, we have yet to thresh out our relations to all the existing Parties. With which shall we form _blocs_ in the elections? While most are dangerous to the best interests of the Jewish people and opposed to the evolution of historic necessity, with some we may be able to co-operate here and there, where our work intersects.'
'Doesn't our name tell you? We are the _Vozrozhdenie_--the Resurrectionists--our work is an unconditional historic necessity springing from the evolution of----!'
The door of the inn arrested the Sejmist's harangue. As he pushed it open, a babel of other voices made continuance impossible. The noise came entirely from a party of four, huddled in a cloud of cigarette-smoke near the stove. In one of the four David recognised the tea-merchant of the morning, but the tea-merchant seemed to have no recollection of David. He was still expatiating upon the Individuality of Israel, which, it appeared, was an essence independent of place and time. He nodded, however, to the young Sejmist, observing ironically: