This left the administrators and bureau chiefs to meet their new leader. Nicholas Chaikovsky came out from behind a curtain and bowed before the council. He had the white mane of an aged Viking, and blue eyes that flashed with confidence. Apparently, he had been a member of the Constituent Assembly in tsarist Russia, or he was a religious leader—his credentials, if pressed upon, tended to splay. He had spent twenty-five years in exile. He spoke English, believed in God, and was able to produce testimonials from a couple of Russians who had pined for his return. Further, he spoke well of capitalism, so the United States sent him into Archangel.

Which needed him. Sallow-faced ministers explained: in the wake of counterrevolutions, the town had been sacked as effectively as if worked over by second-story men. There was no money. The influx of soldiers overburdened the poor sewage system, the ground all over town was covered with excrement and effluvia, and the townspeople tended to throw dead farm animals into the streets, where packs of wild dogs fought over them.

Chaikovsky invited every minister in the room to dinner at his palace. The delight at this invitation was somewhat undercut by the discovery that Chaikovsky had given himself a palace, but he was an excellent host, his speeches were persuasive, he insinuated there was a great deal of power to be shared, he loved the people of Russia, things hadn’t been the same since 1873, but soon they would be.

Two mornings later, the streetcar conductors vanished.

Rather, they elected as a unit to be sick. All being sick together struck them as the most genteel way to be noticed, and perhaps there would be soup.

Chaikovsky ordered the conductors back to work at the same time that Poole ordered Allied soldiers to duty. The soldiers made it to the electric-trolley station first, and the workers who appeared soon after stared in disbelief as their jobs were apparently taken from them by occupying forces.

One of the men so drafted was Pfc. Hugo Black, who had spent the previous several days walking back from Verst 38. He was in a mood. His protests that he knew nothing about streetcars weren’t believed, since it was quite obvious he had already operated an entire train. Grudgingly, he studied the schematics of the trolley car, which had been copied from a Key Route design in America, with overhead single-phase electricity—a fundamental system, just what the DUR was running in Detroit.

Hugo noticed screw holes by the gearbox where a familiar faceplate had been removed: the driving turbine had been built by Westinghouse. This discovery was like meeting an old friend who had been robbed and beaten by hooligans. He was reminded of home, his enlistment, and how much he already hated Russia.