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daughter. Now Lapin interrupts Ehrenburg brusquely, advising him.
    â€˜Please don’t ask anyone else these questions. And if someone raises such matters, just keep quiet.’
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    Now Ehrenburg listens to the lift going up and down in the Writers’ House on Lavrushinsky, and every time the lift stops, with a jerk, he looks up. He understands. No one else is asleep either. The whole house of flats is listening. They are wondering when the next arrest will come, and who it will be. One day perhaps there will be a knock for him. He keeps a case packed with two changes of underwear.
    One night, while he is walking his dog, unable to sleep, Ehrenburg meets Pasternak with a dog of his own. They walk through the snowdrifts together in a shared, troubled silence, until Pasternak begins to wave his hands and mutters, ‘If only someone would tell Stalin what is happening.’
    It was common in those days for people to comfort themselves with the thought that Stalin knew nothing of what was happening to the intelligentsia.
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    Ehrenburg’s plan had been to return to Spain in two weeks, but when he asks for an exit visa his request is unexpectedly refused.
    â€˜Things take time, now, Ilya,’ he was told. ‘You have to be patient.’
    â€˜But I am needed.’
    â€˜We know about your work in Spain.’
    â€˜It’s not just a question of Spain. Talented writers in the West must join the fight against Fascism. Stalin appointed me to that fight. I should be there.’
    No one is impressed by the argument.
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    The weeks tick by. His daughter’s tension becomes even more visible. He guesses unhappily that his presence makes her own position dangerous. He longs to see Babel, the ‘wise rabbi’ as he thinks of him, but he is said to be in Yalta for his asthma. Ehrenburg hopes it is true.
    â€˜My life has come to resemble vaudeville,’ he tells Lyubova.
    â€˜You have always lived like a chameleon,’ she replies, not altogether affectionately.
    In January, his daughter tells him that Vsevelod Meyerhold has lost his theatre. Ehrenburg is thrown onto the defensive, as if personally responsible.
    â€˜I have always defended his genius. I saw his triumph in Paris. Everyone admired him. From Picasso to René Clair.’
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    Worse is to come. Stalin arranges for Ehrenburg to be given a pass for the trial of his old friend and patron Nikolai Bukharin, once editor of Izvestia , who, with twenty other defendants, is accused of forming a cell led from abroad by Leon Trotsky. There is no outcry, although Bukharin had been not only a good friend to Ehrenburg but also an honest supporter of many writers in trouble.
    In court, Ehrenburg can barely recognise his once handsome friend. The thin, broken man in the dock is little more than a shadow. In a low monotone, he confesses to monstrous crimes, sealing his own fate. Ehrenburg can barely speak when he returns to Lavrushinsky Lane. He lies down on the sofa with his face to the wall and refuses all food.
    On 15 March, after Bukharin’s execution, Ehrenburg writes directly to Stalin, begging permission to return to Spain. It may be that the letter never reached Stalin.Ehrenburg is simply told that his request has been denied, and he is advised to have his books and belongings brought from Paris.
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    Trapped.
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    He reflects that he had often been close to death. In Spain his car had collided with a truck carrying artillery shells. He has always lived on his wits and his pen. Rashly, and against the objections of Irina and Lyubova, who fear such an impudence can only bring about his arrest, Ehrenburg writes a second letter to Stalin. He has no great hope that the risk will pay off. For weeks they hear nothing. He listens to the elevator stop and start, quarrels with his daughter.
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    Waits.
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    Then, inexplicably, Stalin responds with permission.
    A few days after May Day 1938, he and Lyubova are allowed to leave