On I went, searching the maze of corridors …
‘Looter!’ The collar of my coat was grasped in a mighty fist and I was hoisted into the air.
‘Not me!’ I gasped.
I’d been grabbed by a giant of a man and he spun me round to face him. Broken teeth, foul breath; he covered my face in spit as he bawled at me, ‘You’re a spy!’
‘No,’ I protested. ‘I hated the Okhrana as much as anyone.’
He spat on the floor at the mention of the State Secret Police. ‘The Okhrana are no more. We are setting up our own secret police squads to torture the truth out of the likes of you.’
‘Please!’ I was crying in fear. ‘I am a revolutionary, like you.’
‘You’re not a Bolshevik and you’re not a starving peasant. You’re a member of the Provisional Government. Or a Tsarist sympathizer.’
‘I’m here to find one of the hospital nurses who got lost!’ My brain was swimming as I struggled for oxygen. ‘I’m a doctor. I worked in the other wing, in the military hospital. I fixed up many soldiers when they were wounded in battle.’
He took his gun from his hip holster. ‘A single bullet is all it takes to spatter your brains across the wall. Let’s see if you can fix that up … Doctor!’
His comrades snorted with mirth. ‘An execution by the people for the people!’
‘Wait! Wait!’ An older man stepped forward. ‘I recognize him. Dr Stefan Petrovich?’
‘Yes!’ I gulped. ‘Yes, I am.’
‘Huh! No sport with you.’ The giant dropped me with a thud. ‘Let’s see if we can find any traitors in this rabbit warren of rooms.’
He strode away, leaving me to crawl, gagging and choking, upon the floor.
The soldier who’d identified me helped me to sit up. ‘They’ve broken into the wine cellars,’ he explained. ‘Everyone is as drunk as a despot. But I’ve been through most of the rooms. The nurse you’re looking for isn’t in this side of the palace. She probably went straight home to get away from the fighting.’
Of course! I should have worked that out myself. If she couldn’t get back to the hospital side, Nina had sense enough to leave the building. By glancing from the window she would have seen what was happening. With the help of the soldier who’d saved my life I made my way outside. Only the ragtail remnants of the invaders were there. The main body of them were inside, attempting to organize their new regime. As I crossed the square I glanced towards the water fountain.
And saw a familiar coloured shawl!
Nina stood holding a bunch of evergreen in her hand.
‘What are you doing here?’ I demanded, torn between relief that she was safe and bad temper at seeing her so unperturbed.
‘I wanted to pay my respects to your mama.’
‘Why? You never knew her.’
‘When I heard the story of Bloody Sunday, it helped me to understand … things … to understand … you.’
‘How can that be?’ My laugh was without humour. ‘I don’t even understand me.’
‘I meant I understand you better, Stefan. It hurts to lose someone we love, but it can help to speak about the person. It eased the pain of my grief when Dr K shared his memories of my papa.’
‘I don’t know if I agree with that point of view,’ I said.
She didn’t reply, but went on tying the evergreen branches to the fountain.
And I found myself telling her more …
‘It was my birthday, my twelfth birthday. I think I might have believed that I could have cake with the Tsar. My father had been dead for many years, but although I wanted to start work and we needed the money, my mother made me take school lessons. So the day of the march was a break from the boredom of studying. I’d no sense of danger. In fact, I was thrilled at being there. We went along with everyone else. As we neared the Winter Palace we were beside Dr K, and he spoke to us.’
My throat was closing over, for I was reliving memories which I’d suppressed for years.
‘When I heard that those at the head of the procession might meet the Tsar, I ran away. I pulled free of my mother’s hand and I burrowed through the crowd to get to the front. It didn’t worry me when I saw the soldiers. I may even have thought they were our escort.
‘They didn’t call out to us to halt. They fired no warning shots above our head.
‘I heard her calling my name …
‘There.’ I pointed to the spot where my mama had fallen. ‘She stopped the bullet that would have killed me.’
‘How brave and selfless of her! Why do you act as though your mama gave you a burden rather than a blessing?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘In Siberia they say that if someone loses their life to save yours, then thereafter you must live the joy of two people.’
‘How can I be joyful when my mother is not here?’
‘Stefan.’ Tears welled up in Nina’s eyes. ‘Had she not died you would not be here. You have become a doctor. She would be so proud of you.’
It was so cold that her tears were almost freezing on her cheeks. It touched me that she should cry. For I had never once wept for my mother. Not then, nor any time in the days and months and years that followed.
I reached to brush them away at the same moment she reached to brush away mine. And I realized that I was crying too, and that tears weren’t a thing of shame or weakness.
And we were in each other’s arms.
And I realized that I loved Nina and probably had done since the moment I met her …
Chapter 41
Within ten days the Bolsheviks had taken command of the city, and of Russia.
I met Fyodor strutting about the Nevsky Prospekt as if he had personally conquered the country. ‘We have the telegraph stations and government buildings. We control the bridges. This is the real revolution!’ he crowed.
‘I congratulate you,’ I said. ‘Where do I go to claim my piece of land?’
‘Stefan, in the past you yourself said that the Duma Council was uselessly slow and badly organized. The self-elected Provisional Government was no better. We have worked so hard and waited so long for this – can’t you rejoice that Russia will have a democracy at last?’
It seemed churlish to throw cold water on his high hopes. Yet I was upset by the indiscriminate violence that had accompanied the seizure of power.
Fyodor viewed this as regrettable but said it was outweighed by the greater good of the result. ‘Lenin has said he will honour the Provisional Government’s pledge to hold democratic elections. The result will prove that we are the party chosen by Russians to lead Russia.’
His arguments were persuasive. If I’d not been involved in the conversations at Dr K’s dinner table, then perhaps I would have been as blinkered as any other Bolshevik.
‘Lenin knows that if the country isn’t given the free elections promised by the Provisional Government then the people might rise against him,’ said Dr K. ‘But if the Bolsheviks are so confident of their universal support why then are they forming their own secret police force?’
‘These Cheka men wear a special uniform,’ Galena scoffed. ‘For a secret police, that does not make them very secret.’
‘There are more of them, and they are more active than the Okhrana,’ said Dr K. ‘One of their commissars came to the City Hospital to check the names of both staff and patients. He took away a dying man for execution, and refused to listen when I pointed out that if they waited another day they’d save themselves the expense of a bullet.’
‘You will need to be careful,’ said Galena, ‘for you were connected to the Duma and the Provisional Government.’
‘I was never a member of either,’ he replied.
‘But everyone knows that you were a close adviser. They seldom held a meeting without you there.’
‘My consultations were to do with providing a health service. I was speaking up on behalf of hospital patients and those who are unwell in the community.’
‘And it is
because you speak up that you will become a target. Until things settle down you must stay at home and not go out on any business.’
‘Woman, when this trouble first began I told you not to leave this house, but you mocked and disobeyed me. Are you saying that I am supposed to meekly do as you order me now?’
‘Yes,’ said Galena. ‘That’s precisely what I am saying.’ And she went to the sink and began to wash up the dishes.
Dr K gave a snort of impatience, but he worked from his study that day and for a few days afterwards.
‘I am going to the railway station to enquire about train tickets,’ Galena told Nina and me. ‘I’ll find out what is available. Dr K would be better out of the city for a while.’ She looked at us both. ‘And I’d be happier if you two went with him.’
‘Would you be prepared to go away?’ Nina asked me when Galena had left the house.
‘I might,’ I replied, ‘but I don’t know where. At least you have a definite place where you would be made welcome.’
‘No I don’t,’ she said. ‘My home in Siberia has been taken from me.’
It pained me to do it – for I’d rather we weren’t parted – but I felt obliged to mention Tomas. ‘You and Tomas regularly exchange letters,’ I pointed out. ‘He’d probably be able to find you accommodation in Moscow while you prepare to be married.’
Nina looked at me steadily and then said, ‘I intend to write to Tomas to tell him that I cannot marry him.’
‘Why can’t you marry Tomas?’ My heart contracted as I waited for her reply.
‘You may as well know.’ Her chin was high, and she spoke defiantly. ‘I am illegitimate.’
‘Illegitimate?’ I repeated. ‘I don’t know what you mean.’
‘My father and mother were not married.’
‘Oh,’ I said, taken aback. When she’d first arrived I’d thought Nina to be quite snobbish, but perhaps that had been her defence against this secret she carried. ‘How unfortunate. Still, I don’t see why that means that you cannot marry Tomas.’
‘There is the stigma of my birth.’
‘What’s that got to do with anything?’
‘Society looks down upon someone in my position, and—’
‘For goodness’ sake!’ I cut in. ‘Our “society” is a collection of narcissistic individuals who gather at events for the purpose of self-adulation.’
‘His parents would not approve.’
‘You are not marrying his parents!’ I raised my voice. ‘You’re marrying Tomas. Don’t insult my friend by crediting him with such a shallow character. He is a staunch ally and a good man.’
She gaped at me like a cod on the slab of a fishmonger. Yet her honourable intentions impressed me. I acknowledged that, really, everything about Nina impressed me. And I asked myself: Why was I making a case for Tomas?
‘Tell Tomas the truth,’ I went on, ‘and see what he thinks. If he says that the nature of your birth means that he cannot marry you, then he doesn’t deserve you as his wife.’
Chapter 42
So eloquently was Stefan arguing the case for Tomas that it was obvious he was not concerned that I should wed another.
I was watching his face as he spoke, but he turned his head to the side and I could not read the expression in his eyes. At the end he’d stumbled over the word ‘wife’. Stefan said that if his friend saw my being illegitimate as a barrier then Tomas didn’t deserve me as his wife – Tomas didn’t deserve me. Did that mean that Stefan considered me a worthy wife for his friend? And if so, in what way? Did he think me clever or kind or wise? I tormented myself with these questions until, through the maelstrom of my frazzled thoughts, a stark fact emerged. Stefan did not seem to care that I might consent to marry his friend.
But why this should upset me so much I did not know.
This winter was not as intensely cold as the previous one, but severe enough that, to cope with shortage of fuel, we removed the doors from the rooms on the second floor of the house and then, piece by piece, the upstairs flooring.
‘I often wondered what it might be like to be a vandal,’ Stefan said as carried a pile of wood in the yard and laid it at my feet. ‘There’s a definite satisfaction in ripping things apart.’
He gave a sudden grin as he took in my appearance. With my hair plaited and coiled on each side of my head and wearing an old apron of Galena’s, I was using an axe to reduce the wood lengths to a suitable size for burning. I was very pleased with myself because at last I’d discovered a practical talent that contributed to the running of the household. Dmitri had never allowed me to invade his kitchen domain, but Papa had taught me how to chop kindling for the fire.
‘Stay away from Nina!’ Stefan warned Galena, who was sweeping up after him while muttering about the mess. ‘She is wielding an axe, and is dangerous to approach.’ He went into the house, whistling.
From the scullery door Galena winked at me.
Dr K refused to be downhearted as we reduced the fittings of his home to lumber, merely saying, ‘We must be scientific in how we do this, lest the ceiling fall in upon us as we eat and sleep downstairs.’
Stefan kept to his attic, even though he had to climb over holes in the landing floor to reach his staircase.
We sustained our good humour within the house, but the Bolsheviks were encountering opposition to some aspects of their administration, and the spirit of the city changed. It became clear that the peace they were negotiating with Germany was at a price: the displacement of millions of people and the surrendering of coal and iron deposits … and vast tracts of land.
The discontent began.
Galena reported back from the bread queue what was being said in the city:
‘How can Lenin keep his promise for us to own land if he gives so much of it away to our enemies?’
And: ‘This is not the peace we wanted!’
‘How quickly they forget,’ said Stefan, ‘that their sons and brothers were massacred in a futile war.’
‘It’s because of their loss that they complain.’ I could see the women’s point of view. ‘We’ve still to queue for bread and the children are still underfed. They worry that there won’t be enough land to grow crops or raise cattle to feed the population. They think that those lives were sacrificed for nothing.’
‘But the killing will stop!’ Stefan was too exasperated to empathize.
And the two of us were off again, robustly debating the issue.
Galena had obtained a list of possible destinations to where trains were running. Dr K rejected all of them. ‘You are a stubborn man,’ she berated him. ‘If you delay much longer there will be fewer tickets available.’
‘I have been considering moving to a less turbulent location,’ Dr K replied. ‘But I wanted to see how honest a leader Comrade Lenin actually is. Possibly I am being too cynical and Russia will be reborn. Let us wait for the outcome of our promised democratic election, then we will make our plans.’
‘Let’s make them soon,’ said Galena, ‘lest someday we find an unknown and unwelcome visitor at our door.’
Not long after that an unwelcome visitor did come to the door of Dr K. But this man was not unknown to me.
There was no one but me in the house when the doorbell rang. As I opened the door, the lawyer Viktor Ilyich Volkov raised his hands and pushed his way into the hall.
‘There!’ He closed the front door. ‘Now any cries of protest you make will not be heard. I have been watching this house and know that you are alone.’
‘If you touch me,’ I cried, ‘I will scratch your eyes out!’
‘You are not so beautiful as to be so desirable,’ he said nastily. ‘It has taken me months and months to trace you. I have come for the thing you stole from the house in Siberia that belongs to me.’
‘I took nothing of any worth. Some clothes, and a photograph of my mother in a silver frame.’
‘There is some value attached to those things, but I will overlook that if you return to me the o
ther object.’
‘What other object?’
‘There was a casket. An oblong carved casket.’
Viktor Ilyich knew about the dagger! I shook my head. But, unconsciously, my fingers strayed to my neck.
‘Ah!’ He caught sight of the chain with the tiny golden key. His eyes glistened with that same hunger which I’d noticed on the last day we parted. And I realized now that it hadn’t been with desire for me. What motivated this man was the greed for money.
‘I don’t understand,’ I said.
‘You cannot deny its existence and I know that you have it. You must hand it over. It belongs to me.’
‘I will not. My father gave me special charge of it.’
I braced myself for his anger. Instead he tried a different tack. ‘Nina …’ His tone was wheedling. ‘I realize that my offer of marriage may have come as a shock. You are a plain girl with no sophistication and I sense I frightened you into running away. And for that … I am’ – he hesitated as if the word stuck in his throat – ‘sorry.’
I remained silent even though I suspected that Viktor Ilyich was waiting for me to accept his apology.
‘I have no wish to pursue you against your will, and so I will promise not to bother you again if you hand over that casket.’
I stared at him with contempt.
He gritted his teeth. ‘Don’t you pine for your family home? It must be grim living in this city. There is food and fuel a-plenty in Siberia. Why don’t you come back with me? The house is wide enough to be split into two halves. We’d create a separate entrance for you. I would leave you to live your own independent life.’
I thought of the fresh smell of the country air and the sweet sound of the birds and the wind in the trees. I’d lived in complete peace in Papa’s house, my life bound in a rainbow ribbon which had unravelled since I’d left Yekaterinburg.
‘I know!’ He clicked his fingers. ‘You could be my estate manager. It would give you an independent income. Albeit quite small,’ he added swiftly. ‘And, truthfully, I believe that Dmitri and the rest of the peasants would be happier if you returned. They would work better with you in charge.’
The Rasputin Dagger Page 20
