In the midst of this emotional turmoil, Uncle Misha arrived and immediately went to speak to Papa. We saw him come, and a little while later we saw him go—head down, wiping his eyes—but none of us had a chance to speak with him. He rushed past us without even a glance.
“I wanted to talk to him!” Alexei complained. “Why won’t they let me?”
“Maybe it’s better if you didn’t, Lyosha,” Tatiana said, trying to soothe him.
I dreaded leaving, but I also hated waiting for the time to come. I just wanted to get it over with. We were tired, all of us, even the dogs. Of course we were taking Alexei’s Joy, my Jimmy, and Tatiana’s Ortino. Mama’s Eira would come later with Baroness Buxhoeveden. At the last minute Count Benckendorff agreed to adopt Olga’s cat. The count looked so funny holding Vaska, who rubbed against the count’s whiskers and purred.
Kerensky sent word that we were to be ready at midnight. Soldiers were ordered to carry our trunks from the palace to the train station, which they did, grumbling and complaining, even after the count paid them each three rubles.
“What time is the train coming?” I asked for maybe the third time.
“It’s supposed to be here at one o’clock,” Papa said patiently. “That’s all I know.”
We sat in the hall, waiting. The hours passed. The night was hot, and we were exhausted. We weren’t used to staying up so late. Mama went to her room to lie down, fully dressed. But we were restless. Alexei’s dog, Joy, bounced around on his leash, pulling Alexei first one way and then another.
Colonel Kobylinsky, who we were pleased was to accompany us, kept checking his watch. He was restless, too.
Finally, as dawn was breaking, several motorcars arrived to drive us to the station. It was time. The train was ready. The baggage had been loaded. Mama, in an agony of weeping, had to be carried to the motorcar. All of us were crying, except Olga, who was always so reserved. She may have shed her tears in private, like the words in her notebook.
The train waiting on the tracks was not the dark blue imperial train with the golden Romanov crest emblazoned on the cars. This was an ordinary train marked RED CROSS MISSION and flying Japanese flags. How strange that seemed! Another train stood behind it, but it wasn’t a decoy like the one that always went ahead of the imperial train or behind it to deceive any revolutionary plotting to blow up the tsar’s train. This second train carried three hundred soldiers who would guard us when we arrived at our destination.
“We’re traveling in disguise,” explained Kobylinsky. “It’s better if the people in the little towns along the way don’t know who’s on board.” He laughed nervously, showing lots of crooked teeth. “When we are passing through villages, I must ask you to close the blinds of the car in which you are riding.” He looked at me, shut one eye, and wagged his finger. “No peeking, Anastasia Nikolaevna!”
We climbed aboard. Clouds of steam hissed from the locomotive, and the train lurched forward. The sun was just coming up, bathing the world in a golden glow. We were on our way to Siberia, leaving behind everything beautiful, everything we loved.
• • •
The journey was hot, dusty, and monotonous. All we wanted to do that first day was sleep. When I awoke around noon in the sweltering heat, I was told that luncheon would be served at one o’clock. And it was! Then I had another long nap until teatime. After tea, the train halted somewhere out in the countryside, and we were allowed to get out to walk the dogs along the tracks. Mama stayed on the train, sitting by an open window and fanning herself. The sun was still high in the sky, and the heat shimmered on the steel rails. We climbed aboard again, and I peeled off my sweaty clothes and ran cold water on my wrists to cool off. Choking dust settled everywhere, on everything, and gritted between my teeth.
The two trains chugged steadily eastward. Each time we approached a town or station, we obediently pulled the curtains across the windows, but I ignored the colonel’s “no peeking” order and peered through a small gap. On the third day there was a change; we were crossing the Urals, where it was much cooler. Papa took this opportunity to lecture us on the mineral wealth of the mountain range, everything from diamonds and emeralds to coal. The Asian steppes stretched on to the horizon and, after thousands of miles, to the Pacific Ocean.
“Wouldn’t it be wonderful,” Papa suggested quietly, “if Kerensky has arranged for the train to keep going, all the way across Siberia to Japan.”
“So that must be why we’re flying the Japanese flag!” I said excitedly.
Everyone told me to hush.
On the fourth day, very late at night after we’d all gone to sleep, the train came to a halt. I woke up and looked out. It was mostly dark, but I could see that we had stopped at a station near a river. There was a low murmur of voices, and figures were carrying our trunks and boxes and crates from the baggage car and loading them into small boats that were then rowed out into the river. This went on throughout the night. I watched until I could not stay awake any longer.
Long before sunrise we were roused by a knock on our compartment door and told to dress quickly. The train would take us no farther. Our possessions had been ferried across the river to a steamer tied up at the dock. A curtain of fog shrouded the opposite bank.
We huddled silently in a launch that puttered across the river in the darkness, before the residents of the town—it was called Tyumen—noticed the presence of strangers surrounded by dozens and dozens of soldiers and started asking questions. Mama clung to Papa’s arm as we climbed the gangplank onto the steamer. Tatiana said wistfully, “Do you remember when we took the steamer on the Volga River, on our way to the village where Mikhail Romanov was born?”
That was four years earlier during the tricentennial celebration, the people shouting “God save the tsar!” and wading into the ice-cold river, just to get a look at the tsarevich. It made me sad to think of it.
Once we were aboard, Kobylinsky revealed our destination: Tobolsk, a small river town two hundred miles north known chiefly for trading in fish and furs. “The governor’s mansion is being prepared for you. The people will be friendly to you,” he promised. “No revolutionary sentiment has taken root there.”
Now we knew where we were going to live. It wasn’t Crimea or England or Japan but some remote town none of us had heard of.
CHAPTER 20
The Governor’s Mansion
TOBOLSK, SIBERIA, AUGUST 1917
Before daybreak the steamer, Rus, had slipped away from the dock and nosed out into the Tura River, smoke billowing from the stacks, paddle wheels churning. My sisters yawned and went immediately to our quarters. I was too restless to lie down and climbed to the upper deck as the fog was lifting and the sun edged above the horizon. I found Gleb already there, making drawings in a sketchpad as we steamed past a field on the outskirts of Tyumen. Peasants were cutting hay. I went to stand at the rail next to Gleb.
“It’s like a dream, isn’t it, Anastasia Nikolaevna?” he asked. His pencil glided swiftly over the smooth paper, and an image of a peasant swinging his scythe emerged.
“You draw so much faster than I do,” I said. We were standing so close that my hand brushed the sleeve of his jacket. With a few strokes of his pencil, a woman carrying a basket appeared.
Gleb glanced at me. “It just takes practice, Anastasia Nikolaevna. You have the talent, I know you do. I’ve seen some of your paintings—”
“They’re not really paintings,” I protested, pleased but a little embarrassed. The air was cool, but my face was hot. “They’re nothing, just something I do.”
“You don’t take your painting seriously enough. You should, you know.”
“I once told my aunt Olga Alexandrovna that I wanted to be a famous artist someday,” I confessed. “And she said I must concentrate on painting, and not on being famous.”
“That was good advice.”
I stayed quiet for several minutes. The sun climbed higher and the light changed. I glanced sideways at Gleb’s profil
e. The gawky boy who’d once been convinced that all the Russians had to do to defeat the Germans was to throw their caps at them had turned into a handsome young man. When had that happened?
Then I blurted boldly, “We were at Peterhof for my thirteenth birthday when my aunt said that. You found a piece of green sea glass and gave it to me.” As soon as I’d said it, I wished I hadn’t. It sounded foolish.
“You remember that, Anastasia Nikolaevna?”
“I still have it,” I said, adding, a bit too abruptly, “and I wish you wouldn’t address me formally. If you can draw me as a mouse, surely you can call me by my familiar name.”
Gleb looked at me with a puzzled smile. “You would prefer that I address you as Anastasia Mouse?”
Blood rushed into my head, and I felt dizzy. “No—just as Nastya. And I don’t believe I’ve thanked you properly for that birthday greeting. It’s very clever, you know, very—”
Gleb, still smiling, laid his pencil and sketchpad on a bench and placed his hands on the rail next to mine. I stopped gazing at his face and studied his long fingers instead. I couldn’t think what I wanted to say, my words were tumbling out all muddled, but I wanted this conversation to continue. I willed his hand to touch mine, and it did. It moved closer until our hands were not only touching, but our little fingers were linked.
If Dr. Botkin had appeared with his medical bag, as he did every day, and checked my temperature and listened to my heart, he would surely have diagnosed a mild fever, my heart banging against my rib cage, and irregular breathing—all symptoms caused by those two linked fingers.
A familiar voice startled us. The fingers separated.
“Good morning, Gleb Evgenievich!” Papa called out cheerily. “And there you are, Nastya! Your mother has been asking for you. Please go down to her, will you?”
“Yes, yes, of course, Papa,” I said, shoving both hands deep into the pockets of my skirt. Without another word to Gleb, or even a look at him, I turned and fled.
I was grinning madly. Everything between us had changed.
• • •
Later that morning, when I felt calmer and less likely to do or say something silly or stupid, I climbed back to the upper deck. I hoped to find Gleb, but I was also afraid he might be there. How could I have both feelings at once? And there he was, sketching!
But Papa was there as well, dressed in his army uniform as usual, staring moodily off into the distance.
I settled onto a wooden bench with a book I’d brought along, close enough to watch Gleb but far enough away that it wouldn’t draw attention. I tried to read, but I could hardly concentrate, turning the pages without remembering a single word. My sisters and Gleb’s sister came and went, as did others. As much as I was dying to talk to Gleb, I didn’t want to attract Papa’s notice or, worse, the attention of Olga or Tatiana, who would certainly have a lot to say about it to me, and possibly to Mama.
It was enough just to have him nearby, even if we didn’t exchange a word.
So I was surprised when Gleb approached the bench where I was sitting. “May I join you, Anastasia Nikolaevna?” he asked with a little bow. He was speaking formally, I understood, for Papa’s benefit.
“Of course, Gleb Evgenievich.”
“Beautiful day, isn’t it?” He sat down—close, but not too close.
“Indeed it is.” When I was sure my voice wouldn’t shake, I said, “Will you show me some of your drawings?”
Side by side, we turned the pages slowly, going backward through time. There was the guardhouse at Tsarskoe Selo where he’d visited his father every week while we were under house arrest. His sister, Tatiana, dressed as a nursing sister early in the war. The Standart sailing off on a Baltic cruise before the war began. In a sleeve at the back of the sketchpad were a few worn photographs: his brothers, Yuri and Dmitri, now dead, when they were cadets, and a photo of a pretty young woman with an uncertain smile.
“My mother,” he said. “Before their divorce. My father doesn’t know I have it. It’s been years since I’ve seen her.” He gazed at the photograph.
“Where is she?”
“In Germany, if she’s still alive. She left Father for our German tutor. She said my father was devoted to the tsar, and not to her.”
I studied his profile—the elegant nose, sensuous lips, well-shaped chin. I thought I saw a strong resemblance to the photograph. “It must have been very painful,” I said, because I could not think what else to say.
“It was.” He slid the photograph back into the sleeve with the others. “I try not to think about her. I hardly ever look at the photo. I wanted you to see her.”
Impulsively, I reached out and took his hand. It seemed like the most natural thing to do, and I held it just for a moment before I let it go.
• • •
As the hours passed and the steamer moved steadily with the current, everyone seemed calmer, more relaxed, as if all the usual rules had been suspended. If I was observed spending more time than usual talking with Gleb, no one seemed concerned.
On the afternoon of the second day on the river, our family had gathered on the upper deck. The boat was steaming close to the shore by Pokrovskoe, the village where Father Grigory had been born.
“That must be Grishka’s home,” Mama said, pointing to a handsome two-story house with a riot of flowers blooming in window boxes and a little front garden. “He caught fish in this river and brought them to Tsarskoe Selo. He predicted that one day we would pass by here.” She turned to us, her eyes shining. “I believe he has sent us a sign,” she said as the village receded behind us. “Our friend is with us, I’m sure of it.”
Later that day we had our first glimpse of the Tobolsk fortress, looming in the distance, then the church towers came into view, and soon after sunset the Rus eased next to a dock. My sisters and I were eager to go ashore to see our new home. We tried to imagine what the governor’s mansion would be like.
“Maybe it will be something like Peterhof,” I suggested.
“Probably it will be more like Spala,” Olga predicted glumly. “Damp rooms that smell like mold, so dark you have to keep the electric lights burning all the time.” The hunting lodge in Poland was the least favorite of all our palaces and lodges.
But I was excited for another reason, one I couldn’t mention. Now there would be more chances for conversations with Gleb, talks about art and painting, maybe even talks about our dreams for the time when our imprisonment would be over and we’d be free again. But I could not say anything about this to my sisters—not even to Marie, who would certainly have loved to hear it.
Colonel Kobylinsky went on ahead to inspect the governor’s mansion, while we waited anxiously. Hours later he returned with a grim expression. “My apologies, Nikolai Alexandrovich, but you and your family must spend another night or two on the steamer,” he informed us. “There is work that must be done before you can move in.”
When Mama asked if she might be permitted to tour our new home the next morning, Kobylinsky put her off. “To be truthful, madame, the house is in some disrepair, and several pieces of furniture must be supplied. I beg your patience.”
A lot of work, as it turned out, and the governor’s house was as empty as a barn, with not a stick of furniture to be found in it. Papa found the situation amusing. “The inability even to arrange for lodgings is astonishing,” he said. “We might as well retire early with the hope that our new home will be ready for us tomorrow, or the next day, or the next.” Or perhaps the day after that.
To keep us from expiring of boredom while a small army of plasterers, plumbers, carpenters, electricians, and painters was hired to fix the house, Kobylinsky arranged for the Rus to take us on excursions on the river. He said we could stop and get off to go for walks along the way.
I didn’t mind at all. Gleb was always nearby, and we even had several chances to talk—sometimes on the Rus, sometimes while we walked along the riverbank, past fields where peasants stopped swinging thei
r scythes through the golden wheat to stare at us—although never alone and never close enough to touch. No linked fingers, even for a moment. My sisters and Gleb’s sister were always part of the group, and Alexei, too. My brother adored Gleb.
“I’m working on a surprise for the tsarevich,” Gleb confided as we returned from one of our river trips. “I think your whole family will enjoy it.”
“What is it?”
“I told you, Nastya—it’s a surprise. You’ll see.”
• • •
On the morning of our eighth day of waiting, the colonel announced that the governor’s mansion was now ready. We left the Rus, Mama and Tatiana riding in a carriage while Papa and the rest of us walked along a road ankle-deep in dust. Soldiers armed with rifles and bayonets lined both sides of the road, not allowing us to forget for a moment that we were prisoners, and in their minds very dangerous ones.
Tobolsk did not look like much of a town. Most of the houses were built of logs or rough-hewn lumber, and it was easy to pick out the house where we would live—a two-story white stone building with a balcony on each end of the second floor.
“I would not call that a mansion,” Olga muttered under her breath.
Kobylinsky, like a host anxious to please his guests, led us on a tour, glancing at Mama to see if she approved of the colors he had chosen for the walls and the furniture he had bought from townspeople who were willing to sell. There was a large table for dining, for instance, but none of the chairs matched. Our camp beds had not yet arrived; we would sleep on the floor. “But only for a night or two,” Kobylinsky promised.
The so-called mansion was barely big enough for our family and a few members of our household. The rest, including the three Botkins and most of our servants, would stay on the opposite side of the street in a house commandeered from a rich fish merchant.
I felt a little sorry for the colonel, because I could guess what Mama was thinking. She said nothing until the tour had ended and Kobylinsky, nervously twisting a button on his jacket, asked, “Is there anything else you wish to have, Alexandra Fyodorovna?”
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