The Red Tide

by Christopher Nicole

  “You had better go home,” Sonia told Nathalie.

  “I shall kill myself,” Nathalie moaned.

  “Do it at home,” Sonia recommended. “But go there, now. Don’t you realise you are in danger here?” Nathalie’s head came up. She might be contemplating killing herself, but she did not want to be lynched by a mob. “Hurry!” Sonia said. Nathalie stumbled from the room.

  Anton did not bother to close the door behind her. “What are we to do, madame?” He was white with fear.

  “Get out of here,” Sonia told him. “As quickly as possible.”

  “But where can we go?”

  Sonia hesitated, biting her lip. Her instincts were to run and run and run. At least as far as Bolugayen, no matter what kind of welcome might await her there. Besides, once she reached Bolugayen she would be able to leave the country, and get to Trishka. But she knew she would never reach Bolugayen. Certainly not if she tried to take Anton with her, and however much she despised him for serving such a master, he had never done any harm to her. But they would both be recognised, very quickly. She had no more desire to be lynched by a mob than had Nathalie. So then, her house? But the mob would find her there too. That left...she snapped her fingers. “Can you drive an automobile, Anton?”

  “Oh, yes, madame.”

  “Then drive me, us, out to Tsarskoye Selo.”

  “The palace, madame?”

  “We will find shelter there,” Sonia said. She could only pray she was right.

  *

  “Mother is distraught,” the Grand Duchess Olga explained. Her sisters, and her brother, stared at Sonia, as did the flunkies who had shown her into the royal presence.

  “Is it possible for me to stay here?” Sonia asked. “At least for awhile.”

  “You’re a Jew!” the Tsarevich Alexei pointed out.

  Sonia sucked in her breath as she continued to look at Olga. “People on the streets recognised the automobile,” she said. “And threw stones at it. If I were to go back out...”

  “Of course you must stay here,” Olga said. “You were Father Gregory’s friend. So you will be our friend.”

  “Thank you, Your Highness. I am asking on behalf of the valet, too.”

  “Oh, him as well,” Olga agreed. “I will speak to Mama.”

  “Are you really a Jew?” asked the Grand Duchess Anastasia, youngest of the four sisters.

  “I was,” Sonia said. “But I became a Christian when I married Prince Bolugayevski.”

  “I thought Jews never changed their religion,” remarked the Grand Duchess Marie.

  “They don’t,” Sonia acknowledged. “Usually.”

  “Stop asking Madame Bolugayevska silly questions,” Olga admonished, and signalled one of the waiting maids. “Show Madame Bolugayevska to an apartment. And see to quarters for the valet.”

  “I shall be eternally grateful, Your Highness,” Sonia said.

  Olga gave a curious smile. “No one has ever said that to me before,” she said.

  The Tsaritsa was more than distraught. She had had Rasputin’s body brought out to Tsarskoye Selo and spent the next forty-eight hours kneeling beside it, strewing flowers on the corpse. On the Thursday the staretz was buried, in the palace gardens, with as much honour as if he had been a grand duke. Then Alexandra sought vengeance. “I wish Prince Felix arrested, charged, convicted, and hanged,” she declared. “Now!”

  Prime Minister Sturmer, a heavy-set man who exhaled frightened incompetence, twisted his fingers together. “Only the Tsar can order the arrest of a member of his own family, Your Majesty.”

  “My husband left me full powers to act in his name,” Alexandra asserted.

  “I know that is true, Your Majesty. But not everyone believes it. In any event, in this instance, may I beg Your Majesty for restraint. The fact is that Prince Felix is at this moment a hero to the people; they are kneeling outside his house to give thanks to God for their deliverance from that...from Father Gregory.”

  Alexandra pointed. “Do you realise that you are standing there, holding the powers you do, simply because of Father Gregory? He recommended you to me. And you would not have me avenge his death?”

  “I am merely suggesting prudence, Your Majesty. Prince Felix has fled to his estates. Why not simply command him to remain there, until further notice?” Alexandra snorted, but Sturmer could tell he was winning. “We do have the name of one other person who was present, Your Majesty. A doctor, named Purushkevich.”

  “Then he, certainly, will pay.”

  Sturmer coughed. “The doctor cannot be charged with the murder of Father Gregory unless the Prince is charged also. The people would not stand for it.”

  “The people,” Alexandra said contemptuously.

  “But there is a war on, Your Majesty, and medical men are urgently needed at the front. No one could object to that.”

  “Yes,” Alexandra said. “Send the swine to the Polish front, and perhaps he will get his head shot off.” She gave a great sigh. “But what is to happen, Sturmer? Without Father Gregory to guide me...”

  “We must do the best we can. With God’s aid…”

  “God’s aid,” Alexandra said, more contemptuously yet. “And when the Tsarevich has another attack? What do we do then, Sturmer? Tell me that.”

  “I am sure Dr Botkin has absorbed sufficient of Father Gregory’s methods...”

  “Methods? You are a fool, Sturmer. Our friend did not have methods. He was a holy man, and he prayed. Oh, Botkin is a good doctor, and an able man, so far as he goes. But he is not a holy man. I am lost. Alexei is lost. The Dynasty is lost.”

  “I do assure Your Majesty that my colleagues and I will serve you to the last.”

  “The last,” Alexandra sneered. “Then go away and serve me, to the last. Go away! Get out!” she shouted.

  The children had been listening in the next room, with Sonia. She was old enough to be their mother herself; she was only a few years younger than the Tsaritsa. But they had adopted her as a kind of large toy, female equivalent of the French sailor, Derevenko, who was Alexei’s nurse. “Are we lost?” Anastasia whispered, tears in her eyes.

  Olga rubbed her sister’s head. “Of course we are not lost. Mama just talks like that.”

  *

  “It is almost impossible to believe,” Anna remarked as she studied the newspaper.

  “This makes it sound as if he was a great man,” Priscilla commented, reading the other newspaper. “Did you know him, Grandma?”

  “Thank God, no. Great man! Ha! He was a lecherous rogue, by all accounts. You do know it was he caused the divorce?”

  Priscilla bit her lip. “I thought there was another man.”

  “You do not call Rasputin a man? Yes, there was another. Your predecessor was not very selective in her love affairs. I wonder what has become of her?”

  Priscilla got up and left the breakfast table; she did not have any desire to consider what might have happened to her predecessor. Little Anna joined her on the gallery. “Does the death of Monsieur Rasputin mean that the war will end, Priscilla?”

  “If only it would. But I don’t think so.”

  “Oh!” The little girl pouted. “I was so hoping Colin would come home.”

  “I know, darling.” Priscilla hugged her. “He will be coming home, I promise. Soon.” She went to the huge French window looking out over the porch and the drive, and a waiting footman hastily drew the drapes so that she could see out. She smiled at him, as she always smiled at all the servants, and gazed at the snow covering the estate. Bolugayen was at its most beautiful in the winter, but it was also at its most isolated.

  They’ll soon be coming home, she thought. Both of them. She had to tell herself this, every morning. In a curious way Rotislav’s news, while raising her spirits, had also made her the more anxious. She believed Alexei was still alive. But she did not know. She believed he would come back to her. But she did not know. So many emotions tumbled through her mind, continually, but were most i
nsistent in the early hours of every morning, when she lay alone in the huge bed she had once shared so enthusiastically. She wanted, with both mind and body, and had to exist on memories. She even, daringly, considered alleviations. She reminded herself that had Grandma been in her position at her age she would have had a constant stream of all the handsome young men in the village knocking on her door. But she was not Grandma, and could never be.

  However, she did try to rationalise her situation, to tell herself that it was absurd for her to remain hopelessly in love with a man twice her age when her life was there to be lived. But there it was, life had ceased to be lived, as a wife or a woman, when Alexei had gone away. Since then she had lived only as a mother...and a princess, to be sure. But, oh, how she longed for her life to be complete again. So she stood at the window and looked out at the snow-covered road down from the hills, all the while knowing that there could never be anyone coming down that road in December, and feeling her heartbeat quicken, because there was a vehicle on the road...a horse drawn wagon, moving slowly through the snow.

  For a moment she could not believe her eyes, then she turned to the patiently waiting footman. “He’s coming!” she shouted. “The Prince is coming. Ring the bell. Summon the servants. The Prince is coming!”

  He hurried away, but she was herself running along the gallery, almost bowling over little Anna, summoned by the shouts. Grandmama was in the breakfast room doorway. “Whatever is the matter?”

  “Alexei! He’s here,” Priscilla panted. “Grishka! Grishka! Bring baby down to meet his father.”

  The house bustled as it had not done for a long time. Priscilla went downstairs, baby Alexei in her arms. Gleb was marshalling the servants, lining them up to greet their returning master. Anna also descended to the ground floor, assisted by her namesake. “Are you sure it’s Alexei?” she asked.

  “Of course I’m sure, Grandma,” Priscilla said. “Who else would be coming to Bolugayen in December? Home for Christmas. Home for...” She stared as the double doors were thrown open, and several people got down from the wagon at the foot of the steps. Two of them, wrapped up in furs, hurried towards her. “Sophie?” she asked. “Janine? But...”

  “Oh, it’s been terrible.” Sophie embraced her, while snow fell from her coat and hat to gather on the parquet. “Oh, it’s so good to be here.”

  Priscilla looked past her at Janine Grabowska. “Burned out,” Janine said. “We’ve been burned out.” Priscilla was speechless.

  “You mean the Germans are in the Ukraine?” Anna demanded.

  “No, no,” Sophie said. “These were Russians.”

  “They were rioting because there was no bread in Kiev,” Janine explained. “My husband was in Petrograd. It was terrible. We felt we had to get out while we could.”

  “They were after our blood,” Sophie explained.

  “Well...” Janine gave one of her pretty little giggles. “They were after something.”

  “So you came here,” Anna said, with some grimness.

  “This is my home,” Sophie said, with dignity.

  “If we could stay, for a while, until things sort themselves out,” Janine begged.

  “Of course you may stay,” Priscilla said.

  “Riots,” Anna commented. “It really is absurd. You say they burned your house, Countess?”

  “We saw it go up, after we had left,” Janine said. “Ha! You should have stayed and defended it. Well, I can tell you, that will never happen here.”

  “We know that. Which is why we came.”

  “Gleb, you will see to apartments for the countesses,” Priscilla instructed. Gleb bowed and hurried off, beckoning the bewildered servants to follow him.

  Priscilla found herself staring at Rotislav. She often found herself staring at him, as, while he was a member of the house staff, in the absence of the Prince and with baby Alexei still too small to require a male servant, he had no specific duties. But he was always there, staring at her. He gave her the creeps. She did not know what had happened between him and Alexei during their imprisonment. But something had. Something that had dissipated Rotislav’s innate subservience. Now he looked at the family almost as if he was their equal. At her, as if he were her equal! And today his stare seemed to have redoubled in intensity.

  She wanted to weep with frustration and anger; but they would also have been tears of fear. If only Alexei would come home.

  *

  Christmas was not celebrated at Tsarskoye Selo. There was a Rumanian chamber orchestra in residence at the palace, and the Tsaritsa spent her time listening to them playing mournful music, or writing long letters to the ‘Tsar. She wanted him to come home, but she didn’t want him to give up the command of the army. She didn’t know what she wanted. As she confessed to Sonia, with whom she had become amazingly friendly, because she supposed Sonia, having lived with Rasputin, had been as fond of the staretz as she herself — and Sonia was not about to disabuse her of that idea — she really just wanted to weep and weep and weep.

  The girls did what they could, handing out little presents to each other and their favourite servants, who included Sonia. and when by themselves singing carols, but without decorations the palace remained a vast, exquisitely furnished, empty cavern. Yet strangely, as it seemed, Rasputin’s death had no immediate impact outside of the royal family. The supposition. shared by Sonia and the Empress, that with his demise the mob would immediately take to the streets, was proved wrong. The mob certainly did take to the streets, but this was simply in the search for bread, as had happened the previous winter. They were beaten and shot and driven back to their lairs by the police and the Cossacks. But everything else remained static, while the winter had stopped operations on the front and equally shut down the rest of the country.

  Sonia wondered what Patricia thought of it, but she did not dare write any letters. Equally, she wondered what Lenin, and more important, Trotsky, thought of it. But, in, as it appeared. their permanent exile, they could do nothing about it. As for her own future, she did not dare contemplate it at the moment. As Rasputin’s housekeeper she was apparently welcome in the royal palace, especially as Alexandra discovered in her someone to talk to. Being with the royal family also meant that she was beyond Michaelin’s reach. But equally, as Rasputin’s mistress, she would not be welcome anywhere else, and she had no doubt the Okhrana were waiting, with their invariable deadly patience, for her to fall out of favour. She could not risk that happening, because if Colin was not on Bolugayen then she had nowhere to hide, save right where she was. And it was where she wanted to be. Whatever might be happening in the outside world, Tsarskoye Selo was the most peaceful place she had known for a long while. It reminded her of Bolugayen when she had first gone there, and been taken in by Alexei. She had been so tormented, physically and mentally, by her existence in Irkutsk and then when escaping that perhaps she had overvalued the security offered her. She would not make that mistake here, because she knew how temporary this was likely to be. But she still needed it, desperately, after the trauma of the previous year.

  And Tsarskoye Selo offered attractions even Bolugayen had never possessed. Here she was not required to act either the princess or the chatelaine — or even the wife or mistress: she was simply a companion. And the grand duchesses were such delightful girls. If they took their positions and their prerogatives for granted — there was never any shortage of bread or indeed any other commodity at Tsarskoye Selo — they remained amazingly unaffected by the omnipotence they possessed through their parents, laughed and joked with their servants and their tutor, an anxious young Frenchman named Gaillard, and talked frankly and openly with Sonia about every subject that came into their heads.

  Sex and men topped the list, not only because the older girls were approaching the age of marriage.

  Another attractive aspect of their personalities was the way they sought to protect their young brother. Not only in a physical sense, although the risk of a fall which might bring back the drea
dful internal bleeding was present in all of their minds all the time, but in loving and giving. What was sad was Alexei’s inability to respond. Obviously, as he knew he trembled on the edge of life, he could hardly be expected to possess his sisters’ gaiety, but he was in any event a much more serious character. He was now twelve, and very well aware of the responsibilities of his position. He often sat with his mother when she was receiving Baron Sturmer or one of the other ministers, and was quite willing to air his own opinions.

  Sturmer invariably painted a grim picture of life outside the palace walls. Sonia knew of this because Alexandra often discussed the situation with her. The new year was one of the coldest on record, even in Petrograd: the ice lay thickly on the streets, and people were starving and freezing to death daily “I feel we are sitting on a powder keg of resentment, Your Majesty,” the Prime Minister said.

  “You are an alarmist old woman,” Alexandra riposted. “Answer me a few questions. Is it not true that just about every winter this century there have been food and fuel shortages in Petrograd?”

  “Well, Your Majesty...”

  “And nothing has changed. Is it not true that every winter this century there have been strikes and riots in Petrograd?”

  “Well, Your Majesty...”

  “Which have always been ended by the police and the Cossacks. Is it not true that there is normally a garrison of perhaps eighty thousand troops in Petrograd?”

  “That is so, Your Majesty, but...”

  “And what is the present strength of the garrison?”