3

Katya, do you know what is as asinine as kommunizm? Autocracy. One man, one person, cannot rule the hearts and minds of millions. Liberty, freedom, truth – this America can be such a silly place, so fickle and naive – sometimes so childish! – but it saves itself because of those first three things.

If only Nikolai hadn’t so ardently believed in divine rule. If only he’d loosened the reigns. If only Aleksandra’s first child had been a healthy boy. The whole country was waiting for an heir, and when she finally gave birth to a boy, her fifth child, and he turned out to be so sickly, it all but killed her, it truly did. You know, it’s really so odd they called her nemka, the German. True, she was born a minor German princess, but after her young mother’s death Aleksandra was raised primarily by her “darling Granny,” as she called her beloved grandmother, Queen Victoria. So she was essentially English. And then during the Great War there was so much gossip and slander against the Tsaritsa. The newspapers printed such terrible things, they threw so much gas on the flames of discontent. Why, they wrote that she, the most prudish of all tsaritsas, slept with Rasputin, that mystical monk from Siberia whose hypnotic eyes alone eased the pain of Aleksandra’s sickly son. Yes, Rasputin was a scoundrel of the first degree – his debauchery ruined the reputation of the Imperial Family and, no doubt about it, his horrendous advice to the Tsaritsa hastened the revolution – but did she ever have sexual relations with that tall, brutish man with the animalistic stare? Absolutely not. The papers also wrote that Aleksandra kept the Tsar perpetually drunk and had a direct telegraph cable line from her mauve boudoir to her relations in Berlin. And the Russian people – both the nobility and the masses – came to believe it all, that not only was she Rasputin’s mistress, but that she was a traitor to the war and the fatherland. In fact, nothing could have been further from the truth. Why, after her husband’s abdication they dug up her rooms, searched for that cable, and what did they find? Nothing! Aleksandra hated the Prussians, thought her cousin, the Kaiser, a fool, which he was. Her truth is revealed in a letter to her dearest confidant, Anna Vyrubova:

What a nightmare, that the Germans are supposed to save everyone and establish order. What could be worse and more degrading than that?… God save and help Russia!

Actually, it wasn’t Aleksandra but Lenin himself who dealt secretly with the Kaiser. It was the Germans who secretly smuggled Lenin back into Russia in a sealed train car, it was Lenin who signed away all of Poland and a third of European Russia in the treaty of Brest-Litovsk, it was…

Ouf, what’s been spilled by buckets cannot be retrieved by droplets.

Now where was I? Ah, da, the rat and the komendant. The gray rat was chasing the red pig, and the black and white dog was… was…

What a delicious scene!

Well, soon thereafter cook Kharitonov, the maid, Demidova, and I put out the tea. Kharitonov had made the tea concentrate, which he poured into each cup, then added the hot water from the spout of the samovar itself.

“Nice, hot, black chai.” Tea. “Again, no sugar. Again, no limon. But the children will love this!” said cook Kharitonov, reaching for a small bowl of fruit preserves.

“Strawberry jam – what a delight,” exclaimed the maid, a woman with a round face and big body who was most devoted to her mistress. “Wherever did you get it?”

“Sister Antonina brought a jar a few days ago and I’ve been saving it as a surprise. One of the sisters made it from their own fruit. Now, go on you two. On your way.”

Demidova carried a tray with the teacups, while I followed behind with the small bowl. Once she served the tea, she took the jam from my hands and placed it on the table with great flourish.

“What a nice treat we have for you this morning!” she said.

“Sweet preserves! Me first!” pleaded Anastasiya.

Aleksandra issued her dictum: “That will be fine, dear, but you must wait until everyone is seated.”

As we took our places, we were overcome with awkwardness, for the komendant had ordered that we must all sit at one table, master and servant alike. The family and Dr. Botkin were already seated at the large, oak table, and one by one we sat, Demidova, Trupp, me, and cook Kharitonov, who came in bearing eggs for the Heir. The Romanovs accepted the brutal affront to rank more quickly than we, the last of the thousands upon thousands of attendants who had formerly waited upon them hand and foot. And even though we’d been doing this for weeks, it didn’t feel right, the likes of me sitting right across the table from Nikolai Aleksandrovich, even if he was now the former Tsar.

Once we were all at the table, we waited for Batyushka, the Dear Father, to make the first move, signaling the start of our meal. When Nikolai Aleksandrovich reached for his spoon, however, he found nothing.

“Here, Papa,” said Olga, the eldest daughter, unable to hide a smile.

But that’s the way it always was. We were always a spoon, two forks, or a few knives short, because in addition to banishing silver and linen from the table as too decadent, the komendant had purposely ordered a deficit of cutlery.

“Thank you, my dear,” said the Tsar to his daughter.

I thought the shortage of utensils very mean, very humiliating, but Nikolai and Aleksandra dealt with such rudeness without complaint, they did. Nikolai simply accepted it as his fate, for his saint’s day was the day of Job, the long suffering, while Aleksandra found it her duty to follow her husband’s example. And those five royal children likewise complied, never once complaining.

After the Tsar stirred his tea, we all began. That morning we were minus not only one spoon, but one knife as well, and soon the cutlery and the bread and the bowl of jam were going this way and that among us.

“Tatyana,” commanded the royal mother, “make sure that Leonka gets some of the jam as well.”

“Yes, Mama.”

It was only for us children, that sweet heavenly mixture of fruit, and I was not to be excluded, nor was I ever, even though I was born of such lower state. They treated me with fairness and kindness at every turn that morning and every other.

Hardly a word was spoken during breakfast, and after we finished and were excused, I as usual assisted in the cleaning up. I was just wiping the crumbs from the table when Dr. Botkin appeared on the edge of the dining room.

“Leonka,” he said, beckoning me with a slight tilt of his head.

Once I was sure no guards were watching, I headed after the doctor, and was led into the drawing room, a long spacious room with heavy furniture. The Emperor and Empress were seated by the two windows, and as soon as I approached they turned their attention upon me. The Empress even stood, rising from her chair.

By then Nikolai’s beard was speckled with gray, and yet there was still a hint of blond or red around his mustache. He had recently turned fifty, and he was unusually fit, a firm believer in exercise, which I hasten to add had been curtailed. I mean, their walks and wood sawing and such. And while he had terrible teeth, all crooked and tobacco-stained, it was the eyes that I remember the most. The Emperor had the most amazing bluish eyes, and when he held you in his gaze he gave you the feeling that there was nothing more important than his conversation with you. And at that moment, right then and there, I suppose nothing was.

“Izvolite-li vyui, molodoi chelovek, Would you be so kind, young man,” said the Tsar, his voice hushed, “as to tell me the entire story of how you came upon this note? Only keep your voice low so as not to be overheard. Agreed?”