Then one day in 1926, Comrade Krakovitz, who happened to be an undersecretary in the Department of Residential Accommodations, asked if Pushkin would wait in line for a case of French champagne. When Pushkin succeeded, Comrade Krakovitz was loath to show his appreciation by giving up a bottle; so, instead, with the stroke of a pen he reassigned Pushkin to a generous apartment in the Nikitsky Towers – a brand-new complex on the banks of the Moskva River.

Later that night, when Pushkin got home and explained to Irina what had happened, Irina soberly considered the turn of events. It was a common misconception – or so her thought process unfolded – that Communism guaranteed an identical life for all. What Communism actually guaranteed is that, in place of lineage and luck, the state would determine who should get what after taking careful account of the greater good. From this simple principle, it followed that a comrade who plays a greater role in attaining the greater good for the greater number of people should have greater resources at his own disposal. Just ask Nikolai Bukharin, editor of Pravda and champion of the peasant, who lived in a four-room suite at the Metropol Hotel!

Through this indisputable logic, Irina came to see their improved situation as the natural course of events; and she now often referred to Pushkin as ‘comrade husband’.