“Hide these envelopes as you did before,
So that was what I did. I hid the two envelopes in my undergarments, and when I went to the Soviet for more food from the cafeteria, I stopped briefly at the Church of the Ascension. Meanwhile, the Empress remained indoors with her oldest daughter, Olga, the two of them madly stitching their corsets, and the Tsar and others descended into the rear yard where they paced in the tropical heat of the Siberian summer. And I… I went out, delivering the envelopes to Father Storozhev. One contained letters to their dear Anna Vyrubova, while the other contained the reply to the loyal officers, in which I much later learned the Tsar tried to call off the liberation attempt:
We do not want to, nor can we, escape, We can only be carried off by force, just as it was force that was used to carry us from Tobolsk. Thus, do not count on any active help from us. The komendant has many aides; they change often and have become worried. They guard our imprisonment and our lives conscientiously and some are kind to us. We do not want them to suffer because of us, nor you for us; in the name of God, avoid bloodshed above all. Find out about them yourself. Coming down from the window without a ladder is completely impossible. Even once we are down, we are still in great danger because of the open window of the komendant’s bedroom and the machine gun downstairs, where one enters from the inner courtyard. If you watch us, you can always come save us in case of real and imminent danger. We are completely unaware of what is going on outside, for we receive no newspapers. Since we have been allowed to open the window, surveillance has increased, and we are forbidden even to stick our heads out at the risk of getting shot in the face.
And so it was that the Tsar, the Orthodox Tsar, put the squash on the rescue plans not simply because of worries for himself and his close family, not simply for we who served them, but for those thugs who guarded them and were soon to kill them. How could he have been so stupid? Couldn’t Nikolai, didn’t Nikolai, see the tidal wave of blood flooding toward them, toward all of Rossiya?
Oh, as the tragedies of Shakespeare have revealed, the fall of kings is but fodder for the richest of entertainments. The tumble of this Tsar and his consort was the grossest, however, and the conclusion of this story, I regret to foreshadow, was all the worse. In those days as the Imperial Family sat unknowingly waiting for their own executions, the Tsar’s younger brother, that sweet, dashing Grand Duke Mikhail, was taken out into a field and shot like a dog. And the Tsaritsa’s sister, Grand Duchess Yelizaveta? She and a handful of other Romanovs were thrown alive down a mineshaft, with hand grenades and burning brush tossed in atop them. Unfortunately, they lived through it all, singing praise to the Lord, until hunger itself took them days later. This we know to be true, for dirt was found in their stomachs once their bodies were exhumed.
Such were the times, so black, so crazy.
12
Lord, forgive me. But first make me suffer. I am the devil’s creation. Torture me and make me cry out for mercy, but make me suffer… for history shows that it was my grave error that precipitated the murder of the Tsar and his family. Yes, my dear granddaughter, Katya, I confess that it was my stupidity, an ignorant decision by a lowly kitchen boy, that gave the
By July 5 the revolution was collapsing in all directions. The
It was a Friday, not hot, not like the days before, but a pleasant thirteen degrees. The rains resumed, which would pose a problem for the night of July 16-17, yet on the fifth things seemed ready to burst with hope and promise. Not only had the vulgar Avdeyev and his crew been replaced by a new
Sister Antonina, tiny and round as she was, squinched up her nose like an old hedgehog, and said, “During Avdeyev we brought this much and more every time. But there was a toll, per se.”
“What?”
Novice Marina, her voice small, asserted, “It’s true – they wouldn’t let us pass otherwise.”
“Now that we know the way is clear,” beamed the good
When we walked into the tiny kitchen, cook Kharitonov saw the goods and was beside himself, putting aside his boiled potatoes and immediately bragging about what he would make.
“Maybe even some meat pierogi!”
I placed the larger of the baskets upon the kitchen table and fetched a bowl for the eggs. As I unloaded them, the young Novice Marina stepped forward, clutching dearly one of the
And, yes, the tiny pocket cut into the cork did in fact contain a note, the fourth and final one the Tsar was ever to receive. No sooner had Sister Antonina and Novice Marina departed, than big Dr. Botkin appeared in the kitchen doorway. Everyone was hoping for more news from the outside, and he pushed up his gold spectacles and studied me quite eagerly.
“Would you be so kind, Leonka, as to fetch a glass of water for Aleksandra Fyodorovna?” he requested, his dentures oddly clicking as he spoke. “Her eyes are aching, and I have prescribed valerian drops to calm her nerves.”
“Certainly,” I replied.
I did as requested. As before, I removed the cloth covering the crock of water, ladled a glass of fresh, cool water, and set upon my way to the bedchamber. As I traversed the dining room, I fell under the stern eyes of one of the new guards. Did he know? Could he guess?
“Ah, Leonka,
I approached him, handing him the glass of water.