The King's Commissar

by Duncan Kyle

  He glared down at me, the big moustache bristling. 'Where is the Tsar?'

  I told him straight: 'Imprisoned in Ekaterinburg.'

  He struck angrily at his thigh with a gauntleted hand. 'I knew it! Bound to happen. He's alive still?'

  'To the best of my knowledge."

  'Alive but abandoned,' Dutov raged. 'You've left him to rot.'

  'I was imprisoned, and then turned out of the city,' I protested. 'If I go back they'll arrest me.'

  'Where are you bound now?'

  I said, 'The other royal children are still at Tobolsk. I said I'd return.'

  'Stay by your train,' said he. 'We'll talk when I've done here.' And he wheeled away.

  In the next hour or so he mopped up. The survivors from the attacked Bolshevik train were formed up, with their wounded, and set to marching due north, and a dishevelled-looking crew they were. Dutov's men then swarmed aboard the train and seemed to be taking for themselves anything that was both movable and useful. Then the white horse came cantering towards us and Dutov swung one leg forward over the horse's neck and slid to the ground.

  'Got any vodka?' he demanded.

  There was perhaps two inches of the lemon remaining. I handed the bottle to him and watched his head tilt back as he drained it. 'None on that damned Bolshevik train!' he said. 'Precious little of anything. All we got was a few rifles and some ammunition boxes. God knows what they live on!'

  I told him we had a little food in tins, but he wasn't interested. 'It's arms we want. I could do with money, too-it's a while since my rascals were paid. Not -' and he laughed wickedly- 'that they could spend it anywhere, eh! But it keeps a man loyal, money does, no matter what the Bolsheviks say! Now, tell me about Nicholas.'

  So I told him what I knew: of the pressure for assassination, of the place where he was imprisoned. But not, of course, of the paper.

  'What forces have the Bolsheviks?'

  'Impossible to know. There are guards everywhere, men with weapons in the streets.'

  'Rabble!' says he. 'You can give a man a gun, it doesn't make him a soldier.'

  'You're thinking of attack?'

  He gave me a glittering grin. 'No! I'm not thinking of anything of the kind. God, I had you for a lily-livered nothing running off with your tail curled down, and what is it you want of me? To attack Ekaterinburg with my little force, no less! But don't worry, it will be retaken before too long, that's a promise.'

  'I hope it won't be too late,' I said soberly.

  He regarded me for a moment, then fished in his tunic pocket, brought out a leather cigar case and lit one carefully. 'Upmann,' he said through wreathing, fragrant smoke, 'and I have seven left. The boy's where?'

  'The Tsarevitch?'

  'Yes, Alexei.'

  'At Tobolsk. Why?'

  Dutov drew on the cigar and looked hard at me. 'The succession, man!'

  'Nicholas abdicated for himself and his son.'

  Dutov nodded angrily. 'Damn fool. The boy would have been a rallying point.'

  'Probably a dead one,' I said.

  'Not necessarily. And he wouldn't be the first son to reclaim a father's throne. ' Dutov was tempted, he told me a moment later, to ride for Tobolsk, and secure the Romanov children; and he was angry when I shook my head.

  'Why not?'

  'There are extremists in Tobolstz who'll kill them at the first sign of an army. You'd never get near enough!'

  'But yew would?'

  They know me, the Bolsheviks there.'

  'Maybe, but do they trust you?'

  I shrugged. "The sight of Yakovlev won't set them murdering the youngsters.'

  'Thinking of a boat, are you - from Tobolsk up the Ob?'

  I shook my head, though that was precisely the direction of my thoughts. 'What will you do, General?'

  He puffed smoke. 'More of the same. Harass these Bolshevik dogs wherever I can. Wait for the rest to arrive: they'll be here in a few weeks!'

  'Who will - what others?'

  'The Whites. Kolchak's army, the Czech Legion, all of them. It's advance, advance at the moment and the Bolsheviks are falling back. One day soon you'll get your wish. We'll take Ekaterinburg. Meanwhile I need guns and money.'

  'Let's hope the Tsar will still be alive when you reach him. Will money buy guns?'

  'Takes time,' Dutov said. 'Munitions have a long way to come from the Far East, but yes.'

  For some minutes I had been looking at General Dutov with a thoughtful and sceptical eye, for there was a picture in my mind of that chest of gold coins, and a rearing question: should it be handed to Dutov?

  My own instinctive answer was that it should; what is a royal treasure for if it is not to be spent on the arms necessary to preserve the royal life? But Dutov was a brigand if ever I saw one. He was not a man who, shown the gold, would say at once, 'How generous! A thousand thanks.' Dutov would say, 'Where did it come from?' and 'How much more?'

  Therefore I asked him, as great favour, to arrange for the line ahead to be cleared of the standing train. He agreed- 'I like playing with trains' - and departed to arrange it. The task would be a simple one, for there was a spur siding actually in view.

  Then, while he was away, I had Koznov assist me to lift the chest from the carriage, bear it forward to my wagon-lit, and stow it beneath the bed. That done, I took up the pillow used earlier to surrender, stepped down to the track and began to wave it. The signal brought a galloper and I said, 'Ask General Dutov if he can spare me a moment.'

  The man appeared to regard this as mild effrontery. 'You should go to the General,' he admonished me.

  'Tell him it will be worthwhile.'

  I watched him ride off. A minute passed, then the milk-white beast came flying towards me.

  'What's this?' barked Dutov. 'A damned summons?'

  'Come with me.' I climbed aboard the train.

  'What is it, damn you?' All this was an offence to his dignity. He followed me along to the wagon-lit, growling to himself.

  I flung open the door and pointed to the handle of the chest where it protruded from beneath my bed. 'Help me pull it out.'

  'I'll get one of my men.'

  'Better,' I said, 'if this is private.'

  He looked at me sharply.

  'Entrusted to me by the Tsar,' I said, 'so it wouldn't fall into Bolshevik hands.'

  He gave a little roar of eagerness and together we dragged the box out. When I lifted the lid, I thought he would explode with joy.

  'A king's ransom, here,' he purred.

  'A king's treasure,' I told him. 'To be used, as His Majesty insisted, in the general cause.'

  'General damned nonsense,' said Dutov dismissively, his hands in the chest and coins clinking merrily. 'There isn't a general cause.'

  'There's an anti-Bolshevik cause,' I said, 'and that will do.'

  He was suddenly roaring with laughter. I for one had certainly never seen the like of the fortune in gold which lay in that chest, and I doubt if Dutov had either. Then suddenly the laughter stopped, and he was regarding me with suspicious eyes. 'How much did you take?'

  'None,’ I said.

  ■AA 'None!' he yelled. 'You're a damned liar! I bet you've taken -'

  'Close the lid, man,' I said. 'And you'll see that the chest is full to the top. I have this -' and I took from my pocket a crucifix encrusted with sapphires, and lied to him - 'a gift from the Tsarina which I would not exchange for a moment. Not for all of that!'

  He didn't know whether to gape at me or at the gold; his eyes were not still for a second. Perhaps a minute passed before he said, with a wonderful air of cunning: 'Think what I can buy with this!'

  'Exactly,' I said.

  So now my train could push ahead along a clear track, for Dutov did not remain long after the gold came to him. It was an easy and uninterrupted run through empty country that brought us at last back to Tyumen, and by then my mind was made up concerning the treasure. I left the faithful Koznov and his men to guard it at the station and ma
de my way to the river quay. There was ice on the water still, and plenty of it; but it was broken now and the edges smooth as it melted.

  There was a building containing an office or two, and behind that, a warehouse of good size. A brass plate on the door of the offices proclaimed this to be premises of the West Siberian Steamship Co. The door was locked, and repeated banging on it produced no answer. It was probable, I thought, that the workers in this place would hibernate in the winter. But the winter was over now. I set out to find the responsible men.

  The manager I found without trouble, in a house no distance away. He was a man in some difficulty, for the winter had changed his world. When in October the frosts had rendered the river unnavigable, there had still been a Provisional Government, and the company's owners, though far away in London and Oslo, were at least known. Now he knew only what the local Bolsheviks had told him: that everything belonged to the people. So, with spring upon him and a steamship company to manage, he was looking round for instructions very keenly.

  'That steamer over there -' I pointed - 'is she fit to sail?'

  'Oh yes. We keep a fire going through the winter months so-'

  'How long to get steam up?'

  'What are you proposing, Comrade?'

  'Commissar Yakovlev,' I said, and produced my paper.

  He goggled at it.

  'I intend to requisition that steamer for a journey to Tobolsk.'

  'Of course, of course. We can have steam up in three hours.'

  'Good. And I shall need horses and wagons.'

  There was surprisingly little trouble: Tyumen was once again merely a town along the track, for the men from Ekaterinburg had gone. Carts and horses were rapidly assembled and it was perfectly clear that the relationship between the steamer manager and the carters was both long-standing and amiable. So all was done with fair ease and proper care. I stood by the rail carriages to make sure there was no attempted theft. One might imagine that men like those carters, who could never in their lives have come across such things before, might be at the least curious and at worst fiercely acquisitive; but they were not. In their placidity and capacity for work they much resembled their own horses.

  By mid-afternoon all was aboard the Rus, for that was the steamer's name, and I was ready to depart. The boat's master, one Meluik, was at the wheel and Koznov's men were below, ready to feed the boiler from the stacks of corded wood.

  So we sailed. What I remember from that journey aboard the Rus is a sense of peace. Tyumen is itself a small town and Tobolsk hardly bigger and there is little between them save the waters of the river and a few villages along the banks. So the steamer nudged along through the ice, thrusting it aside; and on either bank the farmland was green with the spring thrust of young corn.

  There came a point when Captain Meluik pointed to a village as we passed and said, That is Pokrovskoe, Commissar.' His tone suggested I should know its name.

  'Pokrovskoe?' I repeated, snapping my fingers. 'Ah, that's where -?'

  'Rasputin,' he said eagerly. 'The mad monk came from there. Last year when the Tsar and Tsarina made this journey on my ship -' and then he caught himself. 'Your pardon, Commissar, the ex-Tsar and ex-Tsarina, that's what I meant.'

  'Tell me.'

  'I pointed out the village to the ex-Tsarina. She wept and fell to her knees on the deck and prayed.'

  'You knew him?' I asked.

  'He travelled on the Rus. I spoke to him.' Meluik gave a little shudder. 'A man to fear. Such eyes!'

  So I was regaled with stories of Rasputin, the ship and the region, as Rus drove steadily north, and came at last, on the next day, to the great bend of the Irtysh River where stands Tobolsk. From the bridge of the steamer the Governor's House was clearly visible, and through my binoculars I could discern that there were figures sitting outdoors on a kind of balcony which caught the afternoon sun. I regarded them with a profoundly guilty feeling.

  For it is here that I must make a most dreadful confession. The peace of mind of which I spoke lasted only the first half of the Rus's journey. It happened that I lay that night, so Meluik told me, in the bed occupied the previous year by Nicholas. Somehow that knowledge made me, for a time at least, quite unable to sleep, so that my mind ran hither and yon over the events of the immediate past and possibilities for the future. It was then, listening to the water and the bumps of ice, that I pictured my own King, whose first mysterious summons had set me upon this road, and who was so desperately anxious to save the Imperial Family. And I realized that I must endeavour by all available means to carry out my Sovereign's dearest wish, whatever the risks. But I had almost no money.

  You may have guessed already the nature of the temptation to which I succumbed. The truth is that at dead of night I entered the hold of the Rus where all the Romanov possessions were stored, and searched among them for small and valuable things, portable and easy to exchange. I came up with a good handful of items, loose jewels, brooches, earrings and the like. Their value cannot possibly be guessed at, but must have been substantial. It was an unforgivable crime: I see that now. But at the time, as I searched among the belongings for suitable items, the thought dominant in my mind was that if the necessity should arise to bribe an official, or purchase services for the Tsar's sake, it would be unthinkable for me to fail to have the wherewithal when the wherewithal was available.

  And so, a thief in the night, I stole. Next afternoon, when the Rus had been tied up at the West Siberian Steamship Co.'s quay at Tobolsk and I strode off to greet the royal children, my pockets contained their things.

  At the gate of the Governor's House I put on a bold manner and called for Colonel Kobylinsky. He came quickly, but with the air of a man looking over his shoulder, and led me, without speaking, inside to his quarters. Once there and with the stout door closed, he asked me at once, 'What of the Tsar?'

  'You haven't heard?'

  'We hear nothing.'

  So I told Kobylinsky briefly of the incarceration of Nicholas and Alexandra and their daughter.

  'Can anything be done?'

  'I'm trying. The situation is very difficult.'

  'Are you taking the others?' Kobylinsky then asked me worriedly. 'They very much want to go to their parents, of course. But I don't like the prospect of Ekaterinburg ... I don't like that at all.'

  'No. There's no question of taking them, but I'll talk to the youngsters.'

  He nodded. 'Try not to worry them.'

  So I made my face as cheerful as possible and adopted a matching tone, but it was a melancholy experience to face the three Grand Duchesses and young Alexei and to tell them the news. That they blamed me was clear in their eyes, but they were all of them too well-mannered to say an accusing word; they simply sat in a little semi-circle round me, listening with great concentration and absorbing every movement of my eyes and lips and facial muscles.

  When I had finished, the questions came, and they were heartbreakingly polite and formal: How is Papa? How is Mama? Is Marie well? I told them what I could, but such explanation as I could make satisfied them as little as it satisfied me.

  The leader among them, though not the eldest, was clearly Tatiana, a thin-faced girl of twenty. She sat silent for a while, listening as I spoke, and then broke in: 'Commissar Yakovlev, we are of one mind. If our parents and our sister are imprisoned, we wish to be with them. Please take us to Ekaterinburg.'

  I had hoped to avoid telling them of my own arrest and expulsion from the city, because to do so must increase their burden of worry, but it became impossible to conceal.

  'I cannot take you,' I told her, and explained why.

  'Then who is responsible?' she demanded. 'We all understood you to represent the highest Bolshevik authority. We understood also that safety, at the very least, was guaranteed.'

  'I have informed Moscow by telegraph,' I told them. 'And I feel sure that authority will soon be re-established over the Ekaterinburg Regional Soviet.' I tried to sound convincing, and perhaps the younger
ones believed me, but plainly Tatiana did not.

  'Did you really come on orders from Lenin and Sverdlov?' she asked me. 'Is it true?'

  'Perfectly true.'

  'But they are masters of all Russia now! How can this happen, this defiance?'

  I told her what I had once thought myself: that the answer lay in a failure of communication, and perhaps in rivalry.

  T, she said, 'think it is all a trick! Commissar, if our request cannot properly be made to you, to whom can it be made?'

  'I will pass it on to Moscow. That is all I can do. And now I must speak alone to your brother.'

  'Why?'

  'I have a gift for him, and a message.'

  Tatiana blinked distrustfully at me, but of course she was powerless to prevent it. She led the girls from the room and I was alone with Alexei.

  He smiled at me, quite cheerfully. 'Tatiana always looks on the black side,' he said. 'I'm sure we'll all be together soon.' And then the smile broadened. 'You said you had a gift and a message. Who from - Papa?'

  I took out the sapphire-studded crucifix and held it up by its chain so that it swung.

  'A crucifix,' Alexei said confidently, 'must be from Mama. Am I right?'

  'Not entirely," I said. 'The gift and the message go together, and really they're from your father. He told me that he had left something with you, a document -'

  I saw the boy's quick frown and made myself smile. 'It is just that he changed his mind, you see. He told you to keep the document safely and to give it to him only when the four of you are taken to join him. I know that's what he said. He told me so. You were to keep it secret and give it to nobody. But now he wants you to give the paper to me.'

  'No.' Alexei's lips were clamped together. 'He said I must give it to nobody.'

  I know he did. You heard me say so. Alexei, he sent the crucifix so you would know the message was from him, because you would recognize the crucifix. I'm sure you do.'

  He was distressed now, and I hated myself for lying to him. The fact remained that the paper might well be the only means of saving all their lives. He said, on the edge of tears, 'But he told me, and made me promise!'