dangerous criminal.
Berezov, located more than a thousand versts (675 miles) from Tobolsk, is a godforsaken hole in the middle of a wasteland of tundra, forests and marshes. The winter is so s evere there that the cold, they say, kills birds in full flight and shatters the windowpanes of the houses. Such misery, after so much wealth and honor, was not enough to undermine Menshikov’s fortitude. His wife, Daria, died of exhaustion along the way. His daughters wept over their lost dreams of love and grandeur, forever gone, and he himself regretted having lived through so much woe.
However, an irrepressible instinct of self-preservation impelled him to keep his head during this adversity. Accustomed as he was to preening in palaces, he labored with his hands, as a simple workman, to put together an izba for hims elf and his family. The neighbors, informed of his “crimes” against the emperor, shunned him and even threatened him with violence. One day a hostile crowd gathered, shouting insults and throwing stones at him and his daughters in the street; he shouted back, “If you’re going to throw stones, only throw them at me! Spare the women!”8 Nevertheless, after a few months of these daily affronts, he did begin to deteriorate; finally, he gave up the fight. An attack of apoplexy carried off the colossus in November 1729. One month later, his elder daughter Maria, the tsar’s little fiancee, followed him to the grave.9 Indifferent to the fate of those whose demise he had precipitated, Peter II went his merry way, continuing his pleasure-filled
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Terrible Tsarinas and chaotic existence. Not having to account to him for any of their decisions, the Dolgorukys, Golitsyns and the clever Ostermann utilized the opportunity to impose their will at every occasion. However, they were still wary of Elizabeth’s influence over her nephew. She alone, they believed, might be able to neutralize the power that the darling Ivan Dolgoruky was gaining over His Majesty, which was so essential to their cause. The best means of disarming her, obviously, would be to marry her off at once. But to whom? Thoughts turned once again to Count Maurice of Saxony.
But Elizabeth didn’t care a fig about him. Her charming cranium held no thoughts beyond the next romp. Sure of her power over men, she threw herself at one after another for casual idylls and liaisons. After seducing Alexander Buturlin, she went after Ivan Dolgoruky, the Tsar’s designated “sweetie.” Was she excited by the idea of charming a partner whose homosexual preferences were well-known? Her sister, Anna Petrovna, retired in Holstein, had just brought a son10 into the world, whereas Elizabeth, at the age of 19, was still unmarried; she was far more concerned, however, with weaving her nefarious intrigue with the darling Ivan.
She was stimulated by the adventure, as if she were trying to prove the superiority of her sex in all forms of perversity in love.
Probably she thought it less banal, and thus more interesting, to take a man from another man than to steal him from a woman.
During the festivities held in Kiel by Anna Petrovna and the Grand Duke Charles Frederick to celebrate the birth of their child, the tsar opened the ball with Elizabeth. After dancing with her gallantly, under the charmed gaze of the assembly, he withdrew to the next room, according to his custom, with his drinking buddies. Having knocked back a few glasses, he noted that Ivan, his usual companion at such events, was not at his side. Surprised, he walked back and saw him dancing, breathlessly, in the middle of the ballroom with Elizabeth. She looked so excited, face
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Machinations around the Throne to face with this cavalier who was devouring her with his eyes, that Peter lost his temper and went back to get drunk. But which one was he really jealous over? Ivan or Elizabeth?
Aunt and nephew were only reconciled after Easter. Forsaking Dolgoruky for once, Peter took Elizabeth along on an extended shooting party. The expedition was expected to last several months. A 500-person retinue accompanied the couple.
Wild fowl as well as large game were the quarries. When the time came to track a wolf, a fox or a bear, valets in silver-trimmed green livery did the job. They would attack the animal with rifles and spears, under the interested eyes of the Masters. After a perusal of the hunting spectacle, a banquet would be held in the open air, followed by a visit to the merchants who came from far and wide to display their fabrics, embroideries, miraculous ointments and costume jewelry.
A piece of alarming news caught Peter and Elizabeth by surprise in the midst of all this revelry: Natalya, Peter’s sister, took sick; she was spitting blood. Was she going to die? But no, she recovered; instead, Elizabeth’s sister in Kiel, Anna Petrovna, Duchess of Holstein, gave her close relatives more serious concern.
She had caught cold while watching the fireworks during her churching. Pneumonia, the doctors declared; and in a few days, she was gone. The poor thing was only 20 years old; and she left an orphaned son, Charles Ulrich, just two weeks old. Everyone around Peter was dismayed. He alone expressed no regret at her passing. Some wondered whether he was still capable of human feeling. Was it the excessive indulgence in forbidden pleasures that had desiccated his heart?
When the body of his aunt, of whom he used to be so fond, was brought back to St. Petersburg, he didn’t bother to go to the burial. And he didn’t even cancel the ball that was habitually given at the palace at that time. A few months later, in November
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Terrible Tsarinas 1728, it was his sister Natalya’s turn - her consumption, which had been thought to be under control, abruptly took a turn for the worse. Although Peter was, as it happened, off hunting and fooling around in the countryside, he resigned himself to a return to St. Petersburg in order to be at the patient’s bedside for her final moments. He impatiently listened to Ostermann’s and Natalya’s friends lamentations, and their praise of the virtues of this princess “who was an angel.” As soon as she died, December 3, 1728, he rushed off again for the domain of Gorenky, where the Dolgorukys were preparing another of their formidable shooting parties for him. This time, he did invite Elizabeth to accompany him.
Without exactly being tired of the young woman’s attentions and coquetry, he felt the need for a change in personnel among his playmates. To justify his fickleness, people said that it was normal for a healthy man to enjoy a succession of relationships more than dreary fidelity.
At the palace, at Gorenky, a happy surprise awaited him.
Alexis, the head of the Dolgoruky clan and a skilful organizer of hunts for his guest, introduced Peter to a new breed of game: the prince’s three daughters, all fresh, available and tempting, with an air of provocative virginity. The eldest, Catherine (Katya to close friends), was breathtakingly beautiful, with ebony hair, eyes of black flame and a soft, matte skin that flushed pink with the least emotion. Bold of temperament, she was a full participant in everything from stag hunt to banquet and toasts; she was clever at parlor games and graceful at the impromptu dances that were put on after hours of riding through the countryside. Observers agreed in predicting that Ivan would soon be supplanted by his sister, the delightful Katya, in the heart of the inconstant tsar. Either way, the Dolgoruky family was ahead.
However, in St. Petersburg, the rivals of the Dolgoruky coalition feared that this passing fancy, the reverberations of which
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