Murder and Revolution

by Evelyn Weiss

  He peers at it for a minute, then looks up and says briskly “Oh well. It’s not going to speak to us and tell us what it’s doing here… We’d better get back out on the ice. It’s already mid-afternoon, and you know how short midwinter days are at this latitude. As the light fades, it will get harder to see that gun down there.”

  We go back onto the lake, and Yuri saws a circle in the ice. We look down the hole into the freezing water.

  “Here we go.” Yuri lowers the net. The light is dying on the western horizon, and the sky above us is now like deep blue velvet. The first star glimmers. Not much light is filtering down into the water, but I can just make out the fishing-net far below me, swishing about a few feet above the black shape of the gun. Yuri shakes his head. “I need to go a bit deeper.” He lies flat on the ice and reaches over the hole, his fingers nearly touching the water. I shout excitedly.

  “It’s in the net!”

  Moments later, Yuri tips the gun out onto the ice, and I dry it with a cloth I found in the storeroom. I can feel the moisture in the cloth freezing and stiffening, even as I finish drying the gun. I hold it up, and Yuri peers at it.

  “It’s not a standard Russian Army gun, that’s for sure. A specialist pistol – and not Russian manufacture. We don’t have any gunsmiths making pieces as high-quality as this one. It was made in western Europe, or the United States, and then imported – for sale to a private individual, not for military use. And there’s a serial number – look. But it means nothing to me.”

  The figures DCE5654 are stamped in almost microscopic print on the barrel. The rest of the gun is without marks. I hold it in my hand: a black enigma. Then I pass it to Yuri with a shiver. As he stows it in the haversack, he says “You must take this gun with you, Agnes, when we get back to Ivangorod. You can add it to the other information you and Professor Axelson are gathering.”

  “Thank you. The professor may know how to trace where it’s from.”

  Yuri looks up at the stars which are now appearing one-by-one in the darkening sky. “We needed that daylight for the fishing. We don’t need it for searching the three Princesses. I have a flashlight.”

  We go to each island, and look around each house in turn. None are locked, and all are completely empty, just darkened shells. Even the few pieces of furniture I saw on my other visit have been taken. The last one we enter is the First Princess, and Yuri laughs as we step over the threshold. “This big room, and the one bedroom, were both for General Aristarkhov’s exclusive use. Bukin and I slept on a moth-eaten mattress on the kitchen floor. But look, they even took that mattress away when they cleared the place out.” He’s right: as in the other two houses, there is nothing to see.

  We step out of the house; the lake-ice stretches into a dark distance. I think out loud. “Should we be getting back now?” But I hear something; a scattered sound out across the lake, as if music is echoing off the faraway trees.

  “Yuri, are you sure we’re here alone? For a moment I thought I heard… a kind of shimmering sound. Like sleigh bells.”

  “You still believe in Santa Claus?” Yuri laughs, and I do too. And I hear the sound again.

  “That noise –”

  He holds a hand up to his ear. “Well, well. It must be cold indeed…” We sit on the frozen grass at the edge of the lake, putting on our skates. “Before the war, Agnes, I was stationed in the far north. The Siberian people – reindeer herders – told me what causes that noise. It’s the moisture in our own breath, turning instantly to ice crystals in the air. The sound is close, but it seems to come from far away. The Siberians called it ‘whispers of the stars’. Even most Russians have not heard that sound.”

  “Do we need to get back quickly?”

  “There’s plenty of starlight to light our way.” We push off from the shore, skating out onto the silky ice. The stars are reflected in its shimmering surface.

  “Do you waltz, Agnes?”

  “A little…”

  “Come here.”

  I feel his hands take mine, gripping my gloves. My eyes are level with his shoulders. The next moment I’m sliding backwards; it feels like falling, but his arm is around my waist. I look up and see the stars, shooting past Yuri’s face. We’re gliding and spinning across the frozen surface; the dancing stars like lamps above us, the sparkling ice below. The moment goes on, and I don’t want it to end.

  10 The lowered rifle

  The air feels like spring. It’s late February, but the sunshine is warm through the windows of my train as it pulls into St Petersburg and stops in Vitebsky Station. The carriage door is opened for me by Professor Axelson; he takes my suitcase as I step down onto the platform.

  “Miss Agnes! You have arrived in St Petersburg in the middle of a parade.”

  I look at the professor. “I heard something about a march, for International Women’s Day…”

  “That was a couple of days ago. You’ll see, soon enough, what is going on now.”

  As I look around me, I remember how imposing this railway station is, a symbol of the Tsar’s power. We walk from the platform, down the grand marble staircase into the huge, lavishly decorated ticket hall. The are the usual crowds of well-dressed people, but I hear a hubbub of gossip, an excitement in every voice. The professor explains.

  “Two weeks ago, all workers at the Putilov factory, who supply the Russian Army with armaments and vehicles, went on strike. Then thousands of other factory workers followed suit. It’s understandable; the cost of food has quadrupled since the war began, but wages are the same now as they were in 1914.”

  “So how has the strike turned into a ‘parade’?”

  “Lots of women turned out for the International Women’s Day celebrations, and the strikers joined them. They started by marching, very peaceably, chanting for better wages and working conditions. Then the next day there were even more demonstrators, but this time it was ‘Down with bread rationing’. The day after, the chants changed to ‘Down with the war’. And now the chants say ‘Down with the Tsar’.”

  “So how have the authorities responded?”

  “All this time, Miss Agnes, no-one from the government has come out to talk to the demonstrators. The Tsar and his Duma Parliament are ostriches, as you would say in English. They stick their heads in the sand, and say they can see no problems.”

  Outside the station, there are a number of horse-drawn carriages, and some motor taxis. None of them are moving, and all the drivers are deep in conversation with would-be passengers. The professor glances at them, then at me.

  “The taxi drivers don’t want to enter the city centre. I walked here from the Winter Palace, and we might as well walk back too; it will be simpler and probably quicker. All main routes around the city are jammed, because the Nevsky Prospect and other major streets are blocked by the parades. Let’s walk along the quieter roads: Gorokhovaya Street, then the Moyka Embankment. That route will take us to Palace Square, but will avoid the crowds.”

  As we leave the noise of the station behind, the streets become quiet; much quieter than I remember them from December. Gorokhovaya Street is entirely deserted. Here and there we have to walk around huge piles of swept snow, now turning to slush. The recent mild weather means that the streets are well cleared, and we get along quickly. Soon we reach the bridge where a sidewalk leads down onto the Moyka Embankment. It’s a quaint place: they call the Moyka a river, but it looks more like a canal. The bridges and fine facades of the buildings remind me of pictures of Venice. But now, a wooden barrier and a group of soldiers block our path along the embankment. The professor steps up to one of the soldiers, who all look rather bored with their duties.

  “Can we get through? I and my colleague are medical staff at the Winter Palace Hospital. We need to get there urgently, to treat battle casualties.”

  The soldier looks sheepish. “I’m sorry. No-one’s allowed along the Moyka Embankment, in any circumstances. We have to do our job, I’m afraid, sir.” I notice, behind us, a pol
iceman watching the soldiers. The professor and I leave the soldiers, and carry on walking along Gorokhovaya Street. He sighs.

  “Miss Agnes, that is a typical example of what is now going on in St Petersburg. The Tsar has commanded that soldiers of the St Petersburg Garrison are stationed on street corners, all around the city centre. But the Tsar is not quite sure that all the soldiers of the Garrison are loyal to him… so, to make sure the soldiers follow orders, the police watch them. Regular police – but also every available officer in Okhrana, who are in fact running the show. The soldiers have been told that any man who disobeys Ohkrana’s orders will be sent to the Butyrka Prison in Moscow. No-one who goes there ever returns.” He points to a corner ahead. “Aha – this might be a way through. Let’s try this side street.”

  A narrow, deeply-shadowed street leads off to the right. At its far end I can see the buildings round Palace Square, lit by the afternoon sunshine. There’s no barricade across this street, no soldiers, and no other people. We’re one minute’s walk from the hospital.

  A towering figure on horseback appears silhouetted at the far end of the street. He wears a tall Cossack hat, and I see the outline of a curved military sabre. He reins the horse in, trots towards us, and calls out. Yuri Sirko is looking down at us.

  “Agnes! And Professor Axelson, too! I’ll escort you through here. You will need to cross the top end of the Nevsky Prospect, to get to the Winter Palace.”

  “Yuri! Thank you!...

  “No need to thank me – after all, I’m just doing my duty. All Cossacks and other soldiers of the St Petersburg Garrison have been told to keep the city under control. The housewives of St Petersburg are daring to ask for bread! Dangerous revolutionary activity, don’t you think?” He rolls his eyes to show what he thinks of his orders.

  As we walk towards the crossing-point of the Nevsky Prospect, we start to hear the chants, a rhythmic throbbing that deepens and strengthens with every step we take. The refrain is simple “We need bread!”

  I ask Yuri “Is the city really in danger of starvation? That’s what everyone on my train was saying.”

  “I’ve seen the grain stores. In fact, until two days ago, I was guarding them. They are ample for at least two months. And with the milder weather, the trains are moving again, so supplies can be brought in from the countryside too.”

  Professor Axelson looks surprised. “So why the protests?”

  “You’ll have heard the Tsar’s decree that bread rationing will start in two weeks’ time. The portions are to be reasonable: no-one will starve. So in theory there is no reason for the protests. The rationing is simply a sensible and forward-thinking measure. The problem is that the Russian government has never done anything sensible or forward-thinking before. So people assume that rationing means the grain supplies have already run out. They think there will be no more bread.”

  Yuri pulls the reins gently as the horse trots; we’re closer now to the noise. He resumes. “The bread rationing news is the final straw. Ordinary Russian people have had decades of shortages and deprivation, and then the war came along on top of that. There are few families who haven’t lost a son or husband. After two and a half years of fighting, no-one even knows why we started this war. Or, if it will ever end.”

  The professor and I can hear the noise of the protests more clearly now. I notice the slight anxiety in my own voice as I speak.

  “Listen. The chants have changed.”

  We are now only a few steps from the junction with the Nevsky Prospect. Individual voices in the crowd can be heard; people calling out against the war, against the Tsar, and against Okhrana. Many of the voices are female. Then I hear a man’s voice: low and sharp.

  “Captain Sirko!” It’s a voice I’ve heard before – but only once. General Aristarkhov stands at the corner of the Nevsky Prospect, surrounded by several Cossacks on horseback. Beyond him, a barricade manned by regular soldiers, most of them very young, stretches across to the far side of the Prospect. Beyond the barricade are the massed faces of demonstrators below an array of flags and banners. The largest banner reads “Bread for the children! Their fathers are fighting to defend Mother Russia!”

  Sirko speaks quietly and quickly to us. “Immediate orders from the general, I’m afraid. I’ll have to leave you, and go over there and listen to Aristarkhov. Stay well back here, in the shadows.”

  Sirko rides over to join the group of Cossacks, and we see them all dismounting. The noise of the crowd is now deafening: I can’t hear what Aristarkhov is saying to the men. But then I see each Cossack standing to attention, saluting, then shouldering a rifle, and walking out to stand with the regular soldiers. I also see Sirko glance back at us. He casts his eyes skyward, as if warning us. I look up.

  On the parapets of each building overlooking the Nevsky Prospect, I see sandbags, with the caps and faces of soldiers and police peering over them. Among the sandbags are the black muzzles of machine guns.

  We stand at the corner, hesitant, watching. For some reason, the noise is dying away: the crowd becomes silent. A Cossack officer is putting some kind of box out in the road, just behind the barricade. It’s a large tea-chest. Then the Cossack helps Aristarkhov climb up and stand on top of it. The general shouts out.

  “All of you! Strikers, protesters! You have no business to be here. I have here a personal order from Tsar Nicholas.” He holds up a tiny white scrap of paper: a telegram. “It states that these demonstrations are illegal. The Tsar has authorised the St Petersburg Garrison to clear this parade off the streets, by armed force if necessary.”

  Several voices shout. I can make out only one question clearly. “We all know that the bread has run out. Are we supposed to quietly go home and starve?”

  There are murmurs of agreement from the whole crowd. Aristarkhov answers, his voice shrill with tension.

  “The bread rationing is a precaution, that is all. The stories about bread running out – they are lies, put about by revolutionary factions and other troublemakers. Now clear the streets. You have two minutes to start dispersing.”

  Another voice, a woman, calls out. “What about the Duma? The Duma is our parliament. We were told it was going to hold a session today to debate our concerns.”

  “The Tsar has suspended the Duma indefinitely. He is ruling directly. His personal orders have the full force of law. Any demonstrators who do not disperse will be regarded as rioters. The Tsar has authorised the use of weapons.”

  I hear another woman’s voice.

  “The Tsar’s orders – they prove that he can close the Duma whenever he likes. So the Duma has no power; it doesn’t matter. Parliament, government – they are all just a pretence, to keep us quiet.”

  All eyes are now on the woman who spoke. She stands opposite the centre of the thin line of young soldiers, looking into their faces. Her white face under dark hair is steely and determined. Her voice rings out, clear as a bell.

  “If that telegram is true, then Tsar Nicholas has given the order to shoot us, unless we go home quietly. He is not a leader; he is just a bully. A tyrant, like Ivan the Terrible. If that’s how he behaves, why should we respect him?”

  Five seconds pass. Will Aristarkhov answer the woman’s question? No: the opportunity is gone. She’s speaking again.

  “We all know that the Tsar gave orders to shoot demonstrators in the protests twelve years ago. ‘Bloody Nicholas’ – that’s what they called him in 1905.”

  The general looks silently at the women’s resolute faces; the barrels of the rifles also point at the women. Several of the women start shouting at once.

  “Bloody Nicholas! Bloody Nicholas!”

  Aristarkhov glances along the line of his soldiers. Really, they are just boys in uniforms. Their faces are pale with fear; even from here I can see tears in their eyes. Behind the soldiers stand a few, just a few, policemen. Some of them, in plain clothes, must be senior members of the Okhrana hierarchy. If the soldiers disobey their orders, they face the horror of
the notorious Okhrana prisons.

  I hear the general’s voice once more. “All protesters! Move back. Now.”

  Some faces in the crowd are glancing upwards, and they fill with alarm. They’ve seen the machine gun emplacements. One or two people try to take a step back, but behind them, the huge crowd is a solid, immovable mass. And the small knot of women at the front don’t move at all.

  “Men, ready your rifles!” The soldiers grip their guns with sweaty, trembling hands. But Aristarkhov is looking up to the rooftops. The machine gun muzzles point down into the centre of the crowd.

  With a strange, theatrical air, Aristarkhov holds the Tsar’s telegram high, for everyone to see. It’s a tiny, fluttering white shape. Then, as a signal, his fingers release it. For a moment it doesn’t move, as if the gentle breeze is holding it aloft. Then it drops.

  The air is filled with the stutter of the machine guns; the crowd is a screaming mass of bodies. Some fall; I can’t tell whether they’ve been shot, or if they are trying to take cover. But the crowd is so dense that no-one can move to escape the gunfire.

  After only five seconds, the noise of the guns stops, as abruptly as it started. I see three men’s bodies lying still as death in the road. Then one woman, standing alone on the sidewalk on our side of the street, falls flat to the ground just a few yards from me. Her head is a ragged mess of red.

  The group of women facing the soldiers hasn’t moved. Aristarkhov is looking at them, and appears to have lost his voice. I hear the dark-haired woman speak.

  “You’ve done your worst, and we’ve not moved. What are you going to do now? Kill more Russian citizens, just because we stand on our own streets and ask reasonable questions?”

  Although the machine guns above us were firing, I’ve not heard a single rifle discharge. The young soldiers at the barricade are still levelling their guns at the crowd, but none of them has fired, and they are all shaking with shock. Each of them gazes at the unmoving bodies lying in the street, and I see the horror in their eyes. The soldier nearest us, a boy of perhaps eighteen, can do nothing except stare at the blood pooling around the dead woman’s head. Then he bends double and vomits on his boots.