I dreamed that a crowd chased me through the streets of Petrograd. I turned and twisted to avoid their grasping, clutching hands, but there were too many. They got me down on the ground in the filth of a market square and were peeling me with their knives as you peel summer fruit, starting with my face as I screamed and twisted and tried to get away. Finally, they got my skin off in one piece and someone ran away with it. And they left me there, blinded and bloody, and hunk of living meat. How could I go around Petrograd without a skin? People were so hungry these days.