Behind the heavy doors guarded by this flamboyant quartet, the Imperial family lived a punctual existence. In the winter, Tsarskoe Selo lay under a heavy blanket of snow and the sun did not come until nine o’clock. Nicholas rose at seven, dressed by lamplight, had breakfast with his daughters and disappeared into his study to work. Alexandra rarely left her room before noon. Her mornings were spent propped up on pillows in bed or on a chaise- longue, reading and writing long emotional letters to her friends. Unlike Nicholas, who wrote painstakingly and sometimes took hours to compose a letter, Alexandra wrote voluminously, dashing off lengthy sentences across page after page, punctuating only with dots and dashes and exclamation points. At her feet, while she wrote, lay a small shaggy Scotch terrier named Eira. Most people considered Eira disagreeable; he liked to dart from under tables and nip at heels. Alexandra doted on him and carried him from room to room—even to the dinner table.
Unlike many a royal couple, Nicholas and Alexandra shared the same bed. The bedroom was a large chamber with tall windows opening onto the park. A large double bed made of light-colored wood stood between two windows. Chairs and couches covered in flowered tapestry were scattered about on a thick carpet of mauve pile. To the right of the bed, a door led to a small chapel used by the Empress for her private prayers. Dimly lit by hanging lamps, the room contained only an icon on one wall and a table holding a Bible. Another door led from the bedroom to Alexandra’s private bathroom, where a collection of old-fashioned fixtures were set in a dark recess. Primly Victorian, Alexandra insisted that both bath and toilet be covered during the day by cloths.
The most famous room in the palace—for a time the most famous room in Russia—was the Empress’s mauve boudoir. Everything in it was mauve: curtains, carpet, pillows; even the furniture was mauve-and-white Hepplewhite. Masses of fresh white and purple lilacs, vases of roses and orchids and bowls of violets perfumed the air. Tables and shelves were cluttered with books, papers and porcelain and enamel knicknacks.* In this room, Alexandra surrounded herself with mementoes of her family and her religion. The walls were covered with icons. Over her chaise-longue hung a picture of the Virgin Mary. A portrait of her mother, Princess Alice, looked down from another wall. On a table in a place of honor stood a large photograph of Queen Victoria. The only portrait in the room other than religious and family pictures was a portrait of Marie Antoinette.
In this cluttered, cozy room, surrounded by her treasured objects, Alexandra felt secure. Here, in the morning, she talked to her daughters, helping them choose their dresses and plan their schedules. It was to this room that Nicholas hurried to sit with his wife, sip tea, read the papers and discuss their children and their empire. They talked to each other in English, although Nicholas and all the children spoke Russian to each other. To Alexandra, Nicholas was always “Nicky.” To him, she was “Alix” or “Sunshine” or “Sunny.” Sometimes through the rooms of this private wing, a clear, musical whistle like the warbling song of a bird would sound. This was Nicholas’s way of summoning his wife. Early in her marriage, Alexandra, hearing the call, would blush red and drop whatever she was doing to hurry to him. Later, as his children grew up, Nicholas used it to call them, and the birdlike whistle became a familiar and regular sound in the Alexander Palace.
Next to the mauve boudoir was the Empress’s dressing room, an array of closets for her gowns, shelves for her hats and trays for her jewels. Alexandra had six wardrobe maids, but her modesty severely limited their duties. No one ever saw the Empress Alexandra undressed or in her bath. She bathed herself, and when she was ready to have her hair arranged, she appeared in a Japanese kimono. Often it was Grand Duchess Tatiana who came to comb her mother’s hair and pile the long red-gold strands on top of her head. After the Empress was almost dressed, her maids were summoned to fasten buttons and clasp on jewelry. “Only rubies today,” the Empress would say, or “Pearls and sapphires with this gown.” She preferred pearls to all other jewels, and several ropes of pearls usually cascaded from her neck to her waist.
For daytime, Alexandra wore loose, flowing clothes trimmed at the throat and waist with lace. She considered the famous “hobble skirts” of the Edwardian era a nuisance. “Do you really like this skirt?” she asked Lili Dehn, whose husband was an officer on the Imperial yacht. “Well, Madame,
The Empress’s gowns were designed by St. Petersburg’s reigning fashion dictator of the day, a Mme. Brissac, who made a fortune as a
In the evening, Alexandra wore white or cream silk gowns embroidered in silver and blue and worn with diamonds in her hair and pearls at her throat. She disliked filmy lingerie; her undergarments and her sleeping gowns were made of fine, embroidered linen. Her shoes were low-heeled and pointed, usually bronze or white suede. Outdoors she carried a parasol against the sun, even when wearing a wide-brimmed hat.
Lili Dehn, recalling her presentation to the Empress in the garden at Tsarskoe Selo in 1907, gives a vivid first impression of the Empress Alexandra: “Advancing through the masses of greenery came a tall and slender figure.… The Empress was dressed entirely in white with a thin white veil draped around her hat. Her complexion was delicately fair … her hair was reddish gold, her eyes … were dark blue and her figure was supple as a willow wand. I remember that her pearls were magnificent and that diamond earrings flashed colored fires whenever she moved her head.… I noticed that she spoke Russian with a strong English accent.”
For the children of the Imperial family, winter was a time of interminable lessons. Beginning at nine in the morning, tutors drilled them in arithmetic, geography, history, Russian, French and English. Before beginning their classwork, they submitted themselves every morning to the examination of Dr. Eugene Botkin, the court physician, who came daily to look at throats and rashes. Botkin was not solely responsible for the children; a specialist, Dr. Ostrogorsky, came from St. Petersburg to render his services. Later, young Dr. Vladimir Derevenko was especially assigned to care for the Tsarevich’s hemophilia. But Botkin always remained the children’s favorite. A tall, stout man who wore blue suits with a gold watch chain across his stomach, he exuded a strong perfume imported from Paris. When they were free, the young Grand Duchesses liked to track him from room to room, following his trail by sniffing his scent.
At eleven every morning, the Tsar and his children stopped work and went outdoors for an hour. Sometimes Nicholas took his gun and shot crows in the park. He had a kennel of eleven magnificent English collies and he enjoyed walking with the dogs frisking and racing about him. In winter, he joined the children and their tutors in building “ice mountains,” big mounds of snow covered with water which froze and made a handsome run for sleds and small toboggans.
Dinner at midday was the ceremonial meal at Tsarskoe Selo. Although the Empress was usually absent, Nicholas dined with his daughters and members of his suite. The meal began, according to the Russian custom, with a priest rising from the table to face an icon and intone his blessing. At the Imperial table this role was filled by Father Vassiliev, the confessor to the Imperial family. Of peasant origin, Vassiliev had never graduated from the Theological Academy, but what he lacked in schooling he made up in fervor. As he shouted his prayers in a cracked voice, Alexandra was convinced that he represented the simple, essential Orthodoxy of the Russian people. As a confessor, Vassiliev was comforting. No matter what sin was confessed to him, he smiled beatifically and said, “Don’t worry. Don’t worry. The Devil does none of these things. He neither smokes nor drinks nor engages in revelry, and yet he is The Devil.” At the Imperial table, among the gold-braided uniforms of the court officials, Vassiliev cut a starkly dramatic figure. Wearing a long, black robe with wide sleeves, a black beard that stretched to his waist, a five-inch silver cross that dangled from his neck, he gave the impression that a great black raven had settled down at the table of the Tsar.
Another presence, not always visible, graced the Imperial table. It was that of Cubat, the palace chef. At Tsarskoe Selo, Cubat labored under a heavy burden. Neither Nicholas nor Alexandra cared for the rich, complicated dishes which the great French chefs had brought from their homeland to spread across the princely tables of Russia. Nicholas especially enjoyed slices of suckling pig with horseradish, taken with a glass of port. Fresh caviar had once given him severe indigestion and he rarely ate this supreme Russian delicacy. Most of all, he relished the simple cooking of the Russian peasant—cabbage soup or
