Angel on the Square Page 9

  “Mama,” I asked, “why doesn’t the Empress let the people know that Alexei is ill and that Rasputin comes to the palace to help him?”

  “The Empress and the Tsar don’t want the people to know that Alexei is ill, Katya. One day Alexei may be the Tsar, and the people he rules should not believe him to be weak. A weak ruler would soon be overturned.”

  I could see what Mama meant, but the people continued to be so angry, I doubted that Alexei would ever have the chance to be Tsar.

  It was in December, on one of Rasputin’s frequent visits to the palace, that Stana and I caught him. We were sneaking down a back stairway to the dairy, for we knew it was the day for making farmer’s cheese. One of the dairy maids, Nadya, would let us sample the cheese. With the Empress’s new austerity, we were always hungry. As we neared the dairy room where the cream was separated from the milk, we heard a loud scuffling and angry voices. We stopped and looked at each other. It was not unusual to hear quarreling among the servants, but this had a different sound.

  We tiptoed to the dairy doorway and peeked in. There was Rasputin, his strong arms around Nadya’s waist, while she tried to squirm out of his grasp.

  Rasputin was laughing at her struggles. “Now, my girl,” he said, “if you keep on fighting me, you will soon be out of a job. The Empress has fired ministers of state for me; she will have no problem firing a maid.”

  Stana and I looked at each other. A moment later Stana marched into the dairy. I was right behind her. She announced to Rasputin, “I believe the Empress is looking for you. Shall I tell her that you are busy and can’t come just now?”

  Rasputin glared at Stana. There was so much hatred in his eyes, I was afraid he would strike her, but he only scuttled away. Nadya was sobbing. She threw her arms around Stana.

  “That evil man will be back,” she sobbed.

  Stana said, “Don’t worry, Nadya, we’ll find a way to make sure that he leaves you alone.”

  We hurried away with the sound of Nadya’s sobs still in our ears. When we were safely in our rooms, Stana asked, “What can I do?”

  “Write a letter to your mama,” I said. “I’ll help you. Tell her exactly what we saw and heard. She’ll believe her own daughter even if she doesn’t believe anyone else. She knows you would never lie to her.”

  Together we wrote the letter:

  My Dearest Mama,

  It is only because I love you so much that I have to tell you a terrible thing. You must promise to believe me. Today in the dairy Katya and I saw Grigory Rasputin forcing dear Nadya to be his sweetheart even though she didn’t want to and was struggling to get away. He said if she didn’t do what he wanted, he would tell you she was a bad person and you would take away Nadya’s job. Rasputin is very evil. I don’t think he should come to the palace anymore.

  Dear Mama, please believe me. Katya saw him too.

  With God’s blessing and all my love,

  Your devoted daughter, Anastasia

  We were a little frightened, but proud of our letter. For once someone would get the better of Rasputin. We planned to give the letter to the Empress right after tea, but we never did. A telegram came from the Tsar. Alexei was suffering from a nosebleed that could not be stopped. The Tsar was on his way home with Alexei. The Empress was so crushed, the telegram might have been a heavy club rather than a piece of paper. When she could speak, the Empress said, “Thank God Father Grigory is here.”

  That evening Alexei was carried into the palace on a stretcher. The nosebleed had not stopped. He was as white as a sheet of paper. His eyes had the beseeching look of a wounded animal. It was plain to see he was near death. The Empress pushed aside the Tsar and the stretcher bearers and threw her arms around Alexei. When at last she stood up, her silk gown was stained with his blood.

  Rasputin strode into the room. “Let me see the boy, Mama,” he said to the Empress. He stood gazing into Alexei’s eyes for what seemed like hours but was only a few minutes. At last he turned to the Tsar and the Empress and said, “Don’t be alarmed, Papa. Don’t be alarmed, Mama. Nothing will happen.” Moments later Alexei fell asleep. The bleeding had stopped.

  Stana and I looked at each other. I saw her reach into her pocket and crumple the letter.

  Everyone was hoping the Tsar would go to St. Petersburg and set the government to rights. The foolish and incompetent men chosen by Rasputin were destroying the country. Only that morning, when the people found there was no bread to buy, there had been riots in the streets. The soldiers ordered to stop the rioting refused to turn on the people. If there was no one to stop the riots, what would happen to the city?

  But the Tsar would not go to St. Petersburg. “I must get back to my men,” he said.

  When we were alone, I asked, “Mama, how can the Tsar turn his back on St. Petersburg?”

  Mama shook her head sadly. “It is true the Tsar wishes to be back with his armies, but he also wishes to be away from here with all the trouble in the Duma. If he leaves, the Empress and Rasputin will go on making difficulties. Now the Empress is talking of shutting down the Duma. And the trouble is not just in the city. I had a letter from Vitya at The Oaks. There are no men left in the village to do the work on the farm. They have all been conscripted into the army. Fifteen million men taken into the Russian army, our dear Misha taken prisoner, and for what?”

  These were the first words I had heard Mama speak against the Empress. I could hardly believe my ears. I saw that Mama wished she had not spoken in front of me, but it was too late to take the words back.

  “Perhaps I should not say such things, Katya, but you are sixteen now, and our future is with the future of the imperial family. If things go on as they are with such high-handedness, there will surely be a revolution.”

  I had never paid attention to Misha when he spoke the terrible word “revolution.” Now Mama was using it.

  “But, Mama,” I whispered, “in the French revolution the aristocracy all had their heads chopped off by the guillotine.” We were members of the aristocracy.

  Mama tried to smile. “Now, Katya, your imagination is running away with you. This is not France. You can be sure nothing will happen to the great families of Russia.”

  A week later, on a cold December day, the Empress learned that Rasputin was missing. At first we thought there was a plot by the people against the imperial family. That night we were all so frightened that Stana and her sisters and I all slept together in one room.

  The next morning Rasputin’s body was found in the Neva River. He was not murdered by the people but by an aristocrat and a relative of the Tsar. Prince Yussoupov, the richest man in Russia after the Tsar, and Grand Duke Dmitry, the Tsar’s cousin, had murdered him! The terrible story came out bit by bit. The Prince and the Grand Duke had seen that all of Russia was furious because the crude and evil Rasputin was running their country. Over and over they had tried to tell this to the Tsar, but the Tsar would not listen. Fearing for the country, the two men invited Rasputin to the Prince’s palace. They fed him poisoned petits fours. He ate them all up and did not die. They shot him. Still he did not die. Finally they hit him with a club and threw him into the river.

  I could not get the image of the murdered man out of my mind. I had nightmares of his bloody body rising out of the icy Neva and making its way back to the palace.

  The city of St. Petersburg rejoiced, but the Tsar was furious. The Prince was exiled to one of his estates in a far corner of Russia, and the Grand Duke was sent to Persia to fight in the army.

  The Empress could not be consoled. After the funeral she wandered about the palace like a ghost, her eyes red and swollen from weeping. Mama and I took the icon of St. Vladimir to her and pressed it into her hands. She gave Mama so sad a look that Mama forgot all about her being the Empress and threw her arms around Alexandra.

  When we were alone, I asked Mama, “Isn’t the country better off without that evil man?”

  Mama shook her head. “The country may be better off w
ithout him, Katya, but when it takes a murder to rescue a country, nothing will save it.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  THE REVOLUTION

  Winter 1917

  There had never been a gloomier January. It was as if the sun had been exiled along with Rasputin’s executioners. Snow never stopped falling from gray skies. I remembered my first year in the Alexander Palace and how we had skated and had snowball fights. Now we had lost the secret of enjoying ourselves.

  The Tsar abandoned army headquarters and came to stay at the Alexander Palace. He followed the advances and retreats of the army, sticking paper flags on maps, but he showed little interest in the war. When official dispatches were handed to him, he barely glanced at them. I sighed as I recalled Stana’s promise that her father would bring Misha back. I was sorry for the Tsar, but I could not help being a little angry at his indifference.

  The Tsar often wandered out by himself into the punishing weather, slogging through the snow for an hour at a time. He was always trailed at a discreet distance by a pair of armed Cossacks, for there were rumors of threats on the Tsar’s life. The scarlet jackets of the Cossacks were the only bright spots in the gloomy landscape. In the evenings the Tsar sat silently pasting the hundreds of photographs he had taken of the imperial family into albums, as if he wanted to preserve memories of happier times.

  The Empress did not even try to play her sad music on the piano. The busy hands that had always held some embroidery as an example to the girls now lay idle upon her lap. She seldom went to the Catherine Palace to nurse the soldiers. The girls tried to cheer her, taking turns spending the day at her side.

  The only thing that interested her was the coming and going of the government ministers. When they met with the Tsar in his study, she asked that he leave the door ajar so that she might listen to their reports. When they left, she hurried to consult with the Tsar. She could be heard denouncing any minister who expressed a wish for a democratic government.

  The Empress’s response to such talk was “Don’t listen to such nonsense. You are the Tsar of all the Russias. We must pass on a strong monarchy to Alexei.”

  Stana and I still visited the soldiers. As I talked with them, I prayed that they would bring me some word of Misha. France and England were at last sending arms to Russia. With the new arms the Russian army was able to retake German land it had once given up. As the Germans retreated, they were releasing Russian prisoners of war.

  Each day I eagerly looked through the hospital admission records and examined the faces of the soldiers who were brought in. I questioned them to find out if they had heard of Misha, showing his picture to any soldier who would look at it. No one had seen him. The soldiers shook their heads and said, “I’m sorry, Miss; I wish I could help you.”

  Stana tried to comfort me. “Don’t you worry. He’ll turn up,” she said. I tried to believe her.

  Stana was with me when it happened. All morning she and I had labored with Pierre over French verbs. We were not planning to go to the hospital. Anya had promised to show Stana and me how to pin our long hair up properly. “If you attend a formal occasion, you must look like the young ladies you are.” But at the last moment Mama had a headache, and Anya sent us off. “Go and amuse yourselves. I must see to Madame.”

  With nothing to do, and the palace so gloomy, we begged a ride to the hospital. Cheering the soldiers always cheered us as well. One of the officers was looking for us. “Well, Miss Katya, and the Grand Duchess, too, we were just about to send a message to the palace. Someone wants to see you.”

  From the pleased expression on the his face, I guessed that it was Misha. “Where! Where!” I cried. Without even waiting for an answer, I began to run through the ward, searching for Misha. A man on crutches walked toward me, a smile on his face. He was thin, with a shaven head, hollow cheeks, and sunken eyes. He appeared half starved. Impatiently I looked past him, searching for Misha.

  “Katya,” the man said, “aren’t you going to say hello? I’ve come a long way to see you.”

  I knew the voice. I looked into Misha’s eyes. Sobbing, I threw my arms around him with such force that his crutches fell to the floor, and I had to support him until we could get untangled.

  “Have pity on me, Katya. Your assault is worse than having the whole German army against me.”

  “Misha, where did you come from? Why are you on crutches? Oh, Misha, I thought I would never see you again. St. Vladimir must have brought you back.”

  “So that was St. Vladimir driving a wagon pulled by a lame horse? I thought it was a peasant hoping to make a few rubles by selling me back to the Russian army.”

  The whole ward was staring at us. Several of the men were laughing. “Katya,” Misha said, “you know this place. Surely there is a corner where we can talk. And where are your manners? Introduce me to your young friend.”

  I had completely forgotten Stana. “This is Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolayevna,” I said. “Stana, this is Mikhail Sergeyevich Gnedich.”

  Misha gave the best formal bow he could, considering his crutches. Stana cheerfully shook his hand and declared that she was pleased to see him safe. Then, glancing from one of us to the other, she quickly said, “I promised to play chess with one of the soldiers.” She began to giggle.

  Hastily I led Misha away to a small room where supplies were kept. Pushing aside washbasins and towels, we sat down on a bench. I was still holding on to him. I felt if I let go, he would disappear again.

  “Misha,” I said, noticing for the first time a gold medal pinned to his chest, “you have been awarded the George Cross! That means you have been in great danger. You must tell me what happened to you. We only knew that you were a prisoner.”

  “There isn’t much to tell.” His voice was strained and hoarse. “The Germans encircled our regiment. Half of our men were killed, and the rest of us were marched into German territory. When the Germans were short of horses, they hitched prisoners up to move their artillery wagons. Some of us would not move cannons into a position to bombard our own men. The Germans started shooting those who refused. I thought I would be next, but an officer said, ‘Let the rest be. We need men to cut wood.’

  “We worked in the forest from sunup to sundown. In the summer it wasn’t so bad. We foraged in the woods for the shoots of young ferns. There were ponds where we could dig in the muck for the roots of water lilies.” Misha grimaced. “It was all very tasty. Then winter came down upon us. Our boots wore out, and we wrapped our feet in rags. Snow was our water and the bark of trees our food. Every few days we were given a little porridge. When the Russian army began to take back what the Germans had seized, the Germans fled, leaving us behind. That’s when I hitched a ride with St. Vladimir and his lame horse.

  “And I am a little lame myself,” he added. “While I was cutting wood, a tree trunk fell on my leg.” When he saw the expression on my face, he quickly reassured me. “It is nothing. They’ve bandaged it up, and the doctor told me to stay off it for a few days.”

  He took my hands in his and smiled. “The soldiers here tell me that you and Aunt Irina and the Grand Duchesses and even the Empress have become nurses.” He gave me a serious look. “I have heard nothing but good of you, Katya. Molodyets! Well done!” He continued to look closely at me until I felt my face flush. His voice became tender. “You are sixteen, now, Katya. A young lady. Who would have thought it?”

  My heart turned over at his words. I felt my cheeks burning.

  He smiled. “Now, Katya, you have heard my story. Let me hear yours. How is Aunt Irina, and what have you been up to?” He gave me one of the tolerant smiles he had sent my way when I was a child, but his words were bitter. “I suppose life is very merry at the Alexander Palace.”

  I was so happy to see him, I forgave him his condescension. “Oh, Misha,” I said in a low voice, anxious to at last have someone to confide in, “things could not be worse. The Empress is terribly sad because Rasputin was murdered, so there is no one to help Alexe
i, and the Tsar is like a man asleep. He spends all his time pasting pictures into an album.”

  I heard a cry and, looking around, saw Mama. She threw her arms around Misha. “Anastasia hurried to tell me, and I flew over here. Misha, you are so thin. And your poor leg! You must tell me everything.”

  After Misha had repeated his story to Mama, she took his hand and said, “The Empress has been most thoughtful. She has invited you to stay in the palace until you are better.”

  Misha’s face tightened. “I am sure she means well, but I will never accept the Tsar’s hospitality.”

  I was not surprised. I even admired Misha’s independence a little, but Mama was hurt. “Misha, you must believe the Tsar means nothing but kindness.”

  “Forgive me, Aunt Irina. I am sure the invitation was kindly meant, but if you had seen, as I have, what this war of the Tsar’s is costing our country, you would feel the same. He threw fifteen million men into the war. Half of them are wounded or prisoners—or dead. The Tsar doesn’t want for food, but the villagers in the countryside are starving. There are no crops, for the peasants are all fighting Germans, and what little remains is commandeered by an army desperate for food. And Katya tells me the Tsar spends his time gluing photographs into an album. I’ll tell you this: If there is a revolution, the army will not come to the Tsar’s aid. The men cannot forgive him. No! I’ll die before I spend one night under the Tsar’s roof.”

  Misha’s face was feverish, and his eyes were like two points of fire. In the past Mama would have been indignant at such words, but now, seeing how sick he was, she did not argue with him but only said, “I’ll ask if we can’t take you to St. Petersburg for a few weeks until you are yourself again. But Misha”—Mama looked about—“you must guard your tongue. It is not safe to say such things in front of other people.”

  Misha nodded. “Of course, I promise. You are right, Aunt Irina; I am still recovering. No doubt I will come to my senses.” I knew that Misha was sparing Mama. I also knew he believed every word of what he had said. His words made me think of Alexei’s war game, with its little cardboard cannons and hospital wagons, and how at the time we had taken pleasure in its cleverness, not understanding how cruel the real game of war was.