Rasputin's Shadow

by Raymond Khoury

  Of course, no one knew what was helping him obtain these insights into people’s lives and unveil their innermost secrets.

  It wasn’t long before Rasputin’s circle of admirers grew to include members of the tsar and tsarina’s inner circle. We were now well on the path to the palace and to meeting the royal family. And it was then, through one of these close confidantes of the royals, that my master first heard whispers of what would prove to be the key to his influence over them.

  He had moved into the luxurious home of the Lokhtins. Olga Lokhtina, the striking wife of a senior official in the government and one of St. Petersburg’s most fashionable hostesses, was by now besotted by Father Grigory. She fawned over him publicly and gushed about him to all her society friends, and it was in her elegant salon that he became privy to all of the city’s gossip.

  “The tsarevich is sick,” he announced to me one day, at one of our clandestine meetings, away from his entourage. “He could die very easily. It is a closely guarded secret. It is also an incalculably valuable opportunity.”

  I was stunned by the revelation. The heir—the long-awaited heir, the sole heir to the throne, gravely ill?

  “What is his condition?” I asked.

  “The young child suffers from hemophilia,” Father Grigory informed me, his expression already clouded with machinations. “His veins are too fragile to contain his blood. Even the smallest fall or the smallest wound could cause him to bleed to death.” He paused, thinking things through, then turned to me, his face tight with concentration. “The empress is beside herself with blame. She will do anything to keep him safe.” A chilling vibrancy danced in his eyes. “Anything.”

  My spiritual mentor proceeded to tell me what Olga Lokhtina had told him about the empress. The tsarina was widely known to be highly religious. She was also, it transpired, a fervent believer in the mystical. Before the birth of her son, she had longed desperately for some kind of divine intervention to help her produce an heir to the throne. At a time when her resentful, impoverished populace was turning away from religion, she embraced it more and more, surrounding herself with icons and holy relics and seeking out miracle workers. Much to the dismay and ridicule of the capital’s society and of the royal court, “Men of God” were introduced to her, elders who were believed to be endowed with a special gift from God. One after another, they failed to help her produce a son. And yet, with each daughter she gave birth to—four in all—the empress kept firm in her belief that God would hear her prayers and send her a holy envoy.

  “The last of these ‘miracle workers’ was a French magus they called Monsieur Philippe,” he told me. “He told the empress he could speak with the dead and said he lived between our world and the spirit world, and she believed him. He claimed he could heal all illnesses, even syphilis. And, of course, after insinuating himself into her world—Olga even heard he shared a bedroom with the royal couple—he assured her she would become pregnant and give birth to a son.”

  “But she did,” I interjected.

  “No,” my master corrected me. “She did fall pregnant when under the care of this Monsieur Philippe, but it was a phantom pregnancy. It was simply a testimony to his powers of conviction and to her gullibility. He was banished back to France long before she conceived the tsarevich. But you know what his parting words to her were? He told her he would die soon, but that he would return ‘in the shape of another.’ And still she awaits her emissary from God.”

  “But she has Feofan. She has Iliodor and Hermogen and Father Ioann,” I said, referring to the senior members of the Church.

  “They won’t do,” Father Grigory told me. “They are rigid, trite Orthodox priests. The tsarina is waiting for a true mystic, and what’s more, she believes this starets will come not from the capital, but that he will arise from among the common folk in some distant village—a true Russian who loves God, the Church, and the divine Romanov dynasty.” He nodded solemnly to himself. “I will be that emissary, Misha. And we will rescue the tsarevich and, with him, the monarchy.”

  I could not have hoped for a more noble, or a more redemptive, use for my discovery.

  Saint Simeon was truly walking alongside us.

  ***

  MY MENTOR’S UNSHAKABLE FAITH, his intense passion, and his formidable inner strength had all combined to make a remarkable healer out of him, but this would require everything at our disposal. The life of a young child hung in the balance, and not just any child. This was the heir to the throne. Failure would mean a shameful end to our crusade.

  In October of 1906, and through the championing of Olga Lokhtina and other members of the court, Father Grigory was finally granted an audience with the royal couple. For this occasion, I wouldn’t be able to accompany him. I wouldn’t even be able to be close by. We had anticipated this moment, of course, and I had been hard at work devising an alternative to my machine that my master would be able to carry with him. I was able to produce a small version that could be carried in a low-slung pouch under his coat. I ran a wire up the inside of each of the sleeves of my master’s coat. The wires ended at two small transducers that I sewed on the inside of his cuffs. The whole apparatus was powered by four small dry-cell batteries such as those that Gassner had demonstrated years earlier at the World’s Fair in Paris. I had first seen them for myself in the laboratory of Akiba Horowitz, who had since found fame and fortune in America under the new name of Conrad Hubert, of course, with his “Ever Ready” Flash Light devices. The alternative Father Grigory would be taking with him was not anywhere near as powerful as the larger version, of course. It would only really affect anyone sitting right next to my master, and it would only have one setting.

  We hoped that it would suffice. And, as providence would have it, it proved wondrous.

  I watched anxiously from the nearby corner as one of the tsar’s attendants, a slim man in royal livery and topped by a flat hat festooned with tall red and yellow ostrich feathers, came to fetch my master from the Lokhtin residence. My master appeared, wearing the coat I had prepared and carrying the gift we had carefully sourced. The canvas-topped motorcar disappeared in a belch of smoke, and I could hardly wait until they returned to hear how it went.

  The Alexander Palace, he told me, was magnificent. He had never seen anything like it. The reception rooms were enormous, paved with acres of the finest marble and illuminated by dazzling chandeliers. The chambers had sumptuous gilded furniture, walls that were teeming with glorious paintings and ceilings bedecked with the most exquisite moldings. And in one of those rooms, the tsar and the tsarina awaited him.

  His audience with the royal couple lasted far longer than had been anticipated—over an hour. He sensed their nervousness immediately. He began by presenting them with his gift: an icon of Saint Simeon, the miracle worker of Verkhoturye, the monastery where he and I had first met. He astounded me by telling me he did not make use of my device, not then. He decided he would simply use his own acumen and the powers of insight he had honed for so many years.

  The royal couple were, he told me, enchanted by his words. The empress, in particular, seemed giddy at the prospect of miracles. He spoke to them of the sin of pride and prophesied a great future for the dynasty.

  “You should have seen the delight in the empress’s eyes when I told her she and her husband should simply spit on all their fears and just rule, as God had intended,” he told me.

  It was then that Father Grigory asked for permission to see the child. They did not resist.

  He was led to the children’s wing, where he met the nurses looking after the baby and the heir himself. The tsarevich, now a little more than two years of age, was unwell and in pain. He hadn’t been able to sleep.

  “How long has he been like this?” he asked them.

  “Five days,” the empress replied, pain cracking through her polished veneer.

  “And the doctors?”

  She shook her head. “They say there is nothing they can do. He is in God’s hand
s.”

  “You are right,” Father Grigory replied. “He is in God’s care now. But he will be fine. Of that I can assure you.”

  Without asking for permission, Father Grigory approached the crib, leaned over it, and began praying. The room fell silent. He prayed hard, as he did in these situations, sweat breaking out across his face, his limbs shaking. After many minutes, he reached out and placed his hands on the baby boy’s temples. The royal couple watched in astonishment as their son calmed down visibly, then fell asleep.

  The next morning, Madame Lokhtina received an excited phone call from Tsarskoye Selo. The heir had woken up without crying. He seemed in perfect health.

  Saint Simeon had smiled upon us. I struggled to understand what had happened—had it simply been my master’s gift of healing at work, or did my device contribute to the miracle? After much deliberation, I determined it to be an effect of both. There is no doubt that my master possesses a magical power of his own, and in the case of the tsarevich, the calming effect of my binaural beats had slowed his pulse rate right down as intended, allowing the blood time to coagulate. It was this serendipitous combination that would remain the miracle cure for the ailing prince throughout his short life—and turn my master into the royal couple’s untouchable man of God.

  ***

  OVER THE FOLLOWING MONTHS, my master became the royal couple’s intimate friend and counselor. He is particularly close to the empress, who is prey to many anxieties and suffers from migraines. Father Grigory’s words of comfort about her future in this life and the next soothe her. By getting her to divulge all her innermost fears and desires, he knows everything about her. Then, when she is fully conscious, he regurgitates these secret wishes of hers, presenting them to her as prophesies of his own. Then he schemes to make them come true.

  They summon him every time the prince is ill, and each time, my master restores him to good health. They believe he is the key to their son’s survival, which, in truth, he is. Moreover, he has convinced the royal couple that their own survival, the very survival of their dynasty, depends on his presence and his prayers on their behalf.

  They cannot imagine a life without him.

  Of course, there are many detractors. Tongues throughout society are wagging about this crude peasant and his unsavory influence over the royal couple. It is mostly jealousy about his growing power, of course. But it is also about the women.

  The women are becoming a problem. I worry that this will cause our downfall and prevent us from accomplishing the divine mission I have been blessed to participate in.

  I shall never forget the first time I got wind of the gravity of this situation. It happened late one morning, when I went to visit him for tea at the Lokhtin apartment. There was a screen in his room there, behind which sat his bed. As I entered, I heard what sounded like loud slaps accompanied by moans, then I heard my master hollering, “Who am I? Tell me who I am.”

  “You are God,” a woman replied meekly. “You are Christ, and I am your lamb.”

  I stepped around the screen to witness the most disturbing of sights. Madame Lokhtina, wearing a loose, white dress that was extravagantly decorated with ribbons, was kneeling in front of my naked master. She was holding on to his erect manhood while he beat her mercilessly.

  “What are you doing?” I shouted to him as I tried to intercede on her behalf. “You’re beating a woman.”

  He pushed me aside and did not interrupt his beating. “Leave me be. The skunk, she won’t let me alone. She demands sin. She needs to be cleansed.”

  I left in shock.

  He is frequenting many women. Duchesses and wives of the highest officials fawn over him and kiss his hands openly. They are constantly at his side, whether at the apartment he now occupies here in St. Petersburg or on his trips to Verkhoturye or to his newly built home in Pokrovskoye. They even accompany him to the bathhouses. And that is not all. Aside from spending all this time with these high-placed ladies, he is frequenting prostitutes. He takes them to hotels or to the bathhouses. There have been occasions when I have known him to hire several of them in a single day.

  Accusations are being voiced more and more openly, questioning his morality, claiming he is a scoundrel and a “wolf in sheep’s clothing,” even accusing him of being in a state of spiritual temptation.

  When I questioned him about this, he shrugged and said, “Don’t believe what these people say, Misha. They’ll never understand.”

  “I don’t understand,” I told him, fearful of the answer.

  He fixed me with his deep-set eyes, then he said, “Sin is a vital part of life. We cannot ignore it. God put it there for a reason.”

  “I thought sin was the work of the devil,” I countered, confused.

  “Sin is a necessary evil, Misha. There can be no true life, no joy without profound repentance, but how can our repentance be sincere without sinning? Do you see? We cannot be true to God without sin, and it is my duty at the command of the Holy Spirit to help these women rid themselves of the demons of lechery and pride that live within them.”

  And that was when I started to understand. Father Grigory drives out sin with sin. The crude peasant is taking these poor women’s sins onto himself, selflessly toiling and debasing himself for their redemption and for their purification. These women know to heed my master’s cautions and not say anything to their confessors, whom he considers simpletons. He has warned them that it would only confuse the poor men and, worse, make them commit a mortal sin by passing judgment on the Holy Spirit.

  “Each of us must bear his own cross,” he told me, “and that is mine. So pay no heed to these wicked tongues. The impure will always stick to the pure. They shall answer to God. He alone sees everything. He alone understands.”

  My master’s understanding of God’s will is truly beyond compare, or reproach.

  He is God’s emissary. The empire, and the royal family, are lucky to have their “Blessed One” as their protector.

  * * *

  Yes, the monarchy needs us, Rasputin mused after he left Misha.

  The royal couple need saving if they are to remain my patrons and my conduits to power and gratification.

  He thought back to the times that had shaped him, back when he was a precocious, impatient young man in Pokrovskoye. He had seethed with jealousy and contempt every time the gilded aristocrats thundered by in their sumptuous carriages, on their way to some distant monastery for a frivolous cleansing of their souls. He’d heard about the riches in the big cities, about the motorcars and the ostentatious parties and the lavish lifestyles of the court. It had all festered within him after he’d left his village, during his travels, and it was still with him when he’d heard about the empress’s problems and superstitions. She was the most religious, and the most credulous, of them all, even more so than the wretched souls who flocked to Saint Simeon’s grave and rubbed themselves with its crusty soil in the belief that it would cure whatever ailed them.

  It was a credulity that was begging to be exploited. And the insights he’d gleaned from the myriad encounters he’d experienced during his wandering years had turned him into a master of exploitation.

  One chapter had marked him most of all, and that was his time with the Khlysti in a remote corner of the Siberian outback. He would always remember that first ritual among the sect of resurrected “Christs” who believed repentance was pointless unless it was about repenting for a major sin, which usually took the form of fornication. The chants, the dancing, the frenzied whirling, all of it culminating in the rite of “rejoicing”—the wild orgies, during which the Holy Spirit would, they were told, descend upon them. It was all mind-boggling.

  What a concept, he thought. Rejoicing through group sinning. Abstention through orgies. The purification of the soul through wanton copulation. The boundless debauchery that, according to their beliefs, allowed every man the potential to turn into a Christ and every woman into a mother of God.

  It was so twisted and ingeniou
s, it was no wonder the Orthodox Church had moved quickly to stamp it out. But it survived, in the dark corners of the empire, its “arks” connected to each other by secret messengers—the “flying angels,” or seraphs who wandered the land.

  For a while, Rasputin had become one such seraph. And with Misha’s assistance, he would take the rituals of the secret sect of the poor from the forests of Siberia and unleash his own version of them on the high society of St. Petersburg and its polished, unsuspecting women.

  It was a far better life than any of the illiterate peasant of Pokrovskoye had ever dared dream of.

  29

  Sokolov unlocked the van’s back door and swung it open.

  The rear compartment was empty inside, except for a large metal box. It was a bit smaller than an under-counter fridge, and it was bolted to the van’s floor behind the partition. It had a metal bar across it with a large padlock holding it shut. He checked the padlock. It was still locked and seemed undisturbed, as did the rest of the equipment in the back of the van.

  He closed the rear door, popped the engine lid open, and reconnected the battery. Then he climbed in and turned the ignition key. The engine churned to life, sounding far healthier than it looked. Sokolov had always been fastidious with its maintenance. He pumped the gas pedal gently a couple of times and let the engine warm up a little, then he got out and opened the roller door, backed out, and lowered and locked it again.

  Within minutes, he was on his way, headed for the Triboro Bridge, thinking about the phone call he would soon have to make, and not feeling any more confident about what the night would bring than he had been before collecting his van.