The Witches of St. Petersburg

²⁷ 20 November 1907, St Petersburg

It took Militza the summer to betray him.

She was not a woman to react rashly, so she went over and over what she had seen and heard during the last few months and just before the Tsar went on manoeuvres with the Navy, she, together with Peter, invited Rasputin to dinner at Znamenka. It was far enough away from the city, they concluded, that he couldn’t arrive and then disappear off on another appointment. They also invited Nicky and Alix – and were somewhat surprised when they both accepted.

What passed was an extraordinary evening, where the true extent of Rasputin’s influence became frighteningly apparent. They learnt he visited the palace two or three times a week, turning up unannounced, arriving at any time he pleased and that Alix was calling him frequently on the telephone. It wasn’t daily (not yet, anyway) but she spoke to him three or four times a week, about many subjects, but mainly for advice on the Little One.

‘He is always so reassuring,’ she said, playing with her food.

‘It makes Alix happy,’ Nicky added, patting his wife on the back of her hand.

Rasputin simply sat there, smiling, soaking it up, drinking more wine, eating more sweetmeats, appearing more and more benevolent.

‘Just so long as I am near, the young boy will be well,’ he declared, his knife and fork in the air.

‘So reassuring,’ Alix nodded.

‘Very reassuring,’ agreed Nicky.

‘I don’t know what we’d do without him,’ smiled Alix.

Fortunately, Alix and Nicky left early, because Alix had a slight chill. As soon as the door was closed, Peter and Militza turned on Rasputin. They accused him of betraying them, of ignoring their wishes, their express wishes, for him not to visit Tsarskoye Selo without them. They told him he was disloyal, unfaithful, treacherous, untrue. He was trying to undermine them. He was trying to edge them out, pushing himself forward at their expense. Somewhat embarrassingly, they ended up shouting at him. Both of them raised their voices in fury.

‘You are a charlatan! And a traitor!’ Militza yelled.

‘We trusted you!’ added Peter.

‘We made you!’ Militza continued.

‘You couldn’t make a simple borscht!’ sneered Rasputin, before starting to laugh. ‘You can’t make anything! You, Mamma, are nowhere near as powerful as you think. I could destroy you – like this!’ He clicked his fingers. ‘I have Philippe’s icon, John the Baptist…’ He smiled wolfishly and then laughed louder.

‘What’s he talking about?’ asked Peter, looking bemused and certainly the worse for wine.

Her husband could wait. She could explain away the icon and the wolfish stare. It was the laughter that really unsettled Militza. She hated the sound of laughter. It reminded her of the night when George – Stana’s George – had laughed in her face, showering her with spittle and humiliation. How she hated the sound of laughter. And Rasputin would not stop. He laughed as he walked down the steps of Znamenka and laughed as he stepped into the car to take him to the station. Militza imagined he laughed all the way back to St Petersburg.

If she’d doubted her plan, or hesitated for a moment, then it was Brana who strengthened her resolve. The stories the old crone had discovered after ferreting about in the filth of St Petersburg beggared belief.

‘Sex,’ she said as she shuffled along the path to the walled herb garden, her stooped shoulders covered in a dark cape despite the sunshine.

‘Oh?’ Militza feigned surprise.

‘In the banya…’ This was news. The banya? ‘In the afternoons. Two, three – as many as four at a time. Women. Girls. Sometimes it is hard to see through the steam and the writhing flesh. But he’s there, all right, surrounded by a harem. It’s like an orgy, sometimes they’re whipping each with birch. You can hear the screams—’

‘Of pain?’

‘No. Pleasure,’ replied Brana. ‘They scream for more, apparently. They drink vodka, loads of it. Beer, sometimes. And not all the girls are young. Some are married. Wives, whose husbands are hoping that if they manage to satisfy the Beast, he might put a word in, write a letter, get them a job or a promotion.’

‘So the women are prostitutes?’ Her mind was whirring with confusion.

‘No, Madame. Aristocrats. He is said to have bedded half the court.’

‘Not half, surely?’ Her hand quivered, as she gripped her parasol.

‘His member is reported to be the size of a horse’s,’ Brana continued, with a wide toothless grin. ‘It has a wart on the end, which apparently makes it more pleasurable.’

‘Really?’ Militza swallowed.

‘A healing – that’s what he calls it.’

‘That’ll be all, thank you, Brana,’ she snapped. How much more detail could she bear?

In the end it was easy to denounce Rasputin as a member of the Khlysty. If he were going to offer himself so freely around town, with his favours and his healings and not acknowledge her as his mistress, if her charge would not behave, then she would see him hounded out of the city herself.

It was not difficult to convince the police that Rasputin was some sort permanently priapic Holy Satyr. His behaviour in the city was enough. Plus, there were the rumours beginning to surface out of Siberia, where as many as eight women were cited as living in his house in Pokrovskoye. The house that she, Militza, had paid for! She had also donated 5,000 roubles to build a new church in his village. Where had that money gone? Blackmail? Prostitution? Corruption? There was talk of meetings below his floorboards, of secret dancing and whipping. Plenty of whipping. There were also several young girls who came forward and spoke of being stroked and caressed, so the Tobolsk Ecclesiastical Consistory was alerted and an investigation was launched.

All Militza had to do was to put her considerable weight, rank, connections and credibility behind these allegations; sitting there, dressed in black, a heavy veil over her face, as she convinced them the dreadful sectarian should be banished back to Siberia with his substantial tail between his legs.

Did she feel guilty while she was whispering, playing with her handkerchief, sharing her accusations? Not in the slightest. He’d betrayed her confidence and been totally duplicitous. Even Stana was inclined to agree that Rasputin had overstepped the mark. Not that she was prepared to put her name to anything. The man had been so instrumental to her current happiness she could not turn against him. And besides, she was still such a firm follower of Philippe (who’d foretold of Grisha) and a colleague of his, the eminent Papus who had come to visit over the summer and had shared his knowledge and his Martinist beliefs, that she found it hard to speak ill of Rasputin. In fact, truth be told, she was a little scared. She’d seen him read minds, look into souls. What if he could read hers? See into hers? What if he knew she’d betrayed him? What then? She knew how powerful he was. She’d been there, at the beginning, knew how powerful the magic had been to create him. So she was glad when he disappeared, glad he’d been warned about the investigation, glad he’d decided to go back to Siberia, to lie low, hoping the thing would blow over.

Life was a little more relaxing and predictable when he was not around.

However, the void Rasputin left behind at Tsarskoye Selo took both Stana and Militza by surprise. They’d presumed, in his absence, it would be like old times, that they could pick up where they’d left off, spend their afternoons together talking, reading books to one another, playing the piano, bezique, sharing their thoughts. But every time either of them went to take tea with Alix, inevitably with the rotund Anna, and occasionally with the Grand Duchesses and the little Alexei, it seemed as if the whole palace was in mourning. They were dull, listless, depressed, devoid of conversation; they had no news to tell. But then, none of them ventured beyond the park. The Tsarina had not been into St Petersburg itself now for over a year.

‘Mama is so quiet these days,’ Olga confided in Militza one afternoon. ‘She stays in her room eating biscuits in bed and rarely comes out. She dresses to see Papa in the evening, but very rarely sees the rest of us at all. She will sometimes come and take the air with us. She might watch Alexei on his toy horse. But Anna is her only comfort.’

With Rasputin gone, the Tsarevich’s bodyguard, Andrei Derevenko, barely let the heir’s feet touch the ground. He was carried everywhere at the Tsarina’s insistence, although he was now three years old and perfectly capable of walking without endangering himself. But Alix was terrified should anything happen to him. The result was that the boy was becoming increasingly spoilt. He’d cry if things didn’t go his way and refused to do as he was told. The others (OTMA – as Alix referred to them as a group, using their initials) had been brought up to share bedrooms, sleep on camp beds with no pillows, make their own beds, take cold showers every day and had received few presents save for a diamond and pearl for every birthday. However, Alexei’s room was infinitely more luxurious, lined with icons and full of toys, including a giant train set which he’d play with for hours, his Cossack guard always at his side.

But Militza persisted in her visits, despite their dullness – she had her father’s interests to think of; he had ideas to expand his circle of influence in the Balkans and Nicky owed him and Montenegro a sense of loyalty. Needless to say, her father also wanted money. He always wanted money. The ‘perper,’ his new currency, was not doing so well and he’d had to relinquish some power, like most leaders at the time, to his increasingly demanding populace. But he had his eye on the future and his jubilee celebrations next year, which he’d certainly need some assistance in financing.

Stana also was very much at her side. Returning from honeymoon, she’d seen enough of the reaction to her wedding to know that good relations with Nicky and Alix would be her lifeline back into society. While Militza’s diary was full to capacity for the social season – some twenty-two balls in almost as many days – hers was more sparsely filled and this worried her. She was married to one of the most powerful men in Russia; she should be right at the top of everyone’s list.

‘Isn’t there something you can do?’ asked Stana one cold February afternoon as she and Militza travelled in the carriage together for tea with the Tsarina. Though swathed in fur and blankets, both were still shivering.

‘I think in time it will be fine,’ replied Militza. ‘They don’t like change, it’s that simple.’

‘The truth is it was much easier to invite me when I was on my own. They could patronize me, feel sorry for me. I made everyone feel happier about their own lives. “At least I am not Stana,” they could say. “At least my husband isn’t openly fucking whores in Biarritz.”’ She sighed.

‘One whore.’

‘One whore,’ agreed Stana. ‘Which is worse.’

‘That’s true,’ said Militza, staring out of the window at the flat grey light and the thin, cold layer of snow that barely covered ground. ‘Mostly I am sure they do it just to keep warm!’

Stana laughed. ‘Do you know, I barely think about him now? Nearly twenty years of marriage and I can’t think of a single thing I miss. I pity that poor whore, actually. He was a terrible lover and, worse, a boring conversationalist. She’s welcome to his soft cock and dreary anecdotes! And don’t tell anyone I said that!’

‘Of course not!’ smiled Militza, patting her sister on the knee.

‘They can all go to hell. I don’t care about the court and their opinion of me!’

‘You sound like the Tsarina.’

‘For her it’s different. The more she stays away, the more stories they tell to fill the vacuum.’

‘Rumours are more dangerous than the truth,’ nodded Militza. ‘You and I know that.’

‘I hear terrible things. That the Tsarevich suffers convulsions, that he has tuberculosis…’

‘He was born missing a layer of skin… I know,’ agreed Militza. ‘But also, the more isolated she is, the more difficult it is for her to talk when she does come to say something. She doesn’t know half the people’s names any more, she doesn’t know any of the stories, she can’t ask them about their children as she hasn’t ever met them – and those girls,’ she added, shaking her head. ‘They know nothing, they have seen nothing. She’s isolated them too and they don’t know what to make of the world. At least before they used to be able to look out of train windows when they travelled to the Crimea – now since that incident with the madman who tried to blow himself up on the train, they travel in secret and put curtains on the train so they can’t even see out any more. I can’t help but think that’s bad,’ she said. ‘In England they keep their Royal family visible, they meet their subjects, but ours? They hide away. No one knows what they look like. I see things. Terrible visions, visions about the future that are so frightening…’

‘Like what?’

‘You don’t want to know,’ whispered Militza, resting her forehead against the cold windowpane, her breath fogged against the glass. ‘Not even the Devil himself could conceive of such misery.’ She looked back at her sister. ‘Even He might have to turn his face away in shame.’

As they drove through the frosted park towards the palace, they saw Nicky out walking with his dogs. Eleven long-haired Border collies ran in circles around him, wagging their tails and barking. He was shouting at them, white clouds of his breath hanging in air. His arms gesticulated, telling them to heel, or pointing out terrified squirrels for them to chase. He looked around as he heard the car and waved happily as it passed.

‘I often think Nicky would have found more joy in his life if he weren’t on the throne,’ mused Militza as she watched him striding through the long grass in the fading afternoon light.

‘The mantle of government weighs heavy on those narrow shoulders,’ agreed Stana, also looking out of the window, towards the frozen ornamental lake and the upturned boats on the grass.

Arriving at the palace, they were escorted to the Mauve Boudoir, where they found Jim Hercules standing guard outside the door. Dressed in his scarlet and black uniform, with golden tassels and golden epaulettes, a red turban on his head, he was the only black American servant to work in the palace. As tall as the other Abyssinian doormen, the erstwhile boxer hailed from the South of the United States and famously brought pots of delicious guava jelly back for the children whenever he went home on leave. His job, like his fellows’, was simply to open the door, but his appearance in the room would either indicate that the Tsar or Tsarina or both were about to arrive; and more usefully, given the dreariness of many a garrulous official, that they were about to leave. The children adored him, as did the Tsar, and indeed anyone else who regularly frequented the palace. Normally, he would stand immobile as a statue, but he was permitted to respond if spoken to.

‘Good afternoon, Jim,’ smiled Militza, speaking in English. ‘Is her Imperial Majesty in her boudoir?’

‘She is indeed, Your Imperial Highness.’ He bowed and Militza smiled; she found the way he spoke enchanting.

‘Going home soon?’ asked Stana.

‘Not for a while yet, Your Imperial Highness,’ he replied, moving to open the door.

‘When you do, please bring back some preserves,’ implored Stana.

‘Sure thing, Your Imperial Highness,’ he said, opening the door.

The sisters entered the boudoir to find Anna sitting in one of the pale purple upright chairs, a cup of tea in one hand, an egg sandwich in the other, while Alix was lying prone on a divan, dressed in a pale high-necked day dress, her legs covered in a fine, cream-coloured blanket, her head propped up with the lace pillows.

‘Ah!’ She managed a little wave in the direction of an attentive footman. ‘More tea.’

‘How are you?’ began Militza, bending down to kiss her on the cheek. ‘Is it your heart? Or your back?’

‘Have you heard from him?’ asked Alix, grabbing hold of Militza’s hands. ‘Our Friend?’ She shifted around on her divan. ‘When’s Our Friend coming back? Anna had a letter last week.’

‘I did,’ the lady-in-wating said, nodding, taking the corner off her sandwich.

‘He talks of building his church and of praying with his family,’ said Alix. ‘He says he’s busy, says he’s neglected his duties. But he doesn’t say when he is coming back.’

‘I think it may be better for him to stay away at the moment,’ suggested Militza.

‘Better for whom?’ Alix sounded a little agitated.

‘Him,’ added Stana. ‘He needs to be with his family. He has not seen them in a while. His wife, Praskovya, his three children.’

‘But we’re his family,’ Alix replied.

‘I am sure he feels that,’ agreed Militza, patting the back of the Tsarina’s hand, ‘but I think he’s missing them.’

‘Let’s bring them all to St Petersburg!’

‘I’m sure he’d love that,’ replied Stana, smiling as she glanced out of the window.

Something had caught her eye and she laughed and gestured for Militza to turn around. Through the large, almost floor-length window, the girls were playing on the terrace, sliding sideways, skidding on the thin ice over the frosted paving stones, their arms extended, pulling faces through the window. First Olga, then Maria, followed by Anastasia and Tatiana – each more ridiculous and hilarious. Maria’s was perhaps the most amusing, with her tongue out and her eyes crossed; she was by far the naughtiest of the girls. Their laughter was contagious. By the time they slid past for the second time, their gloved hands in the air, their faces contorted, everyone in the room was giggling. Then suddenly little Alexei joined in. Arms open wide, he slid past the glass pane, grinning like a fool.

‘He shouldn’t be doing that!’ Alix said yet laughed despite herself. ‘But look at him. He is so silly!’

‘Derevenko is outside,’ said Anna.

‘There he goes again!’ Alix smiled, pointing at her son. ‘So funny!’

‘I didn’t know he was such a comedian,’ laughed Stana.

‘No,’ agreed Militza.

Then it was back to Olga, who was perhaps a little too old to be fooling around on the ice. And then suddenly it was Alexei again. He skidded, grinned, threw his arms in the air and then slipped, crashing down on the terrace, landing on his forehead. Alix screamed and leapt off the divan, running towards the window.

‘Alexei!’ she yelled, pounding on the glass with her fists. ‘Alexei! Alexei!’

Militza ran after her, Stana right behind. They stared through the window as Derevenko ran towards the boy and snatched him off the ground. Immediately, blood poured out of the gash on his head.

‘Oh my God! Oh my God!’ Alix was hysterical, banging harder and harder on the window. ‘Alexei! Alexei!’ she shouted. The boy turned to look at his mother, too shocked to cry, too bewildered to do anything as the blood poured down his face. ‘Do something!’ implored Alix, turning to look at Militza. ‘Do something! He’s going to die!’

For the next ten minutes there was total chaos as servants ran, Alix wailed and Jim Hercules rushed outside, bringing the girls in. By the time Derevenko carried the boy into the Mauve Boudoir, Alexei’s face was so swollen and covered in blood that he was no longer able to open his eyes.

‘My darling, my darling,’ wept Alix, placing her son on her divan. ‘What have you done to yourself?’ Covering him in her blanket, she immediately set about trying to stem the dreadful flow of blood with her handkerchief. ‘Get me warm water,’ she shouted. ‘Towels!’

By now the room was full of people, running to and fro, trying to help.

‘The blood!’ exclaimed Anna. ‘I have never seen so much blood!’ Her round face blanched as she collapsed into a chair.

Stana glanced over at Militza. The blood would not stop. The boy was now screaming in agony. They had to do something.

‘Is he all right, Mama?’ asked Olga tentatively, her hands twisted with concern.

‘Of course he’s not – and I blame you all. You know he is not allowed to play around outside! He is to be carried at all times!’

Olga withdrew, as did the other girls; this was clearly not the first time they’d been blamed.

‘Has Botkin been called?’ Alix asked, looking around the room with her haunted, pale eyes.

‘Yes, Your Imperial Majesty,’ confirmed a footman.

‘Where is Our Friend?’ She started to sob. ‘Where is he!’ The tears poured down her cheeks as she started to rock back and forth on the edge of the divan, hugging herself.

‘Hush, Mama,’ Alexei whispered through his dry, swollen, bloodied lips.

‘You hush, you hush,’ she said, sniffing, gently patting his arm. ‘It’ll be all right, you’ll be all right.’ She dabbed tentatively at the blood that continued to seep from the cut on his face. ‘You’re strong and God will look after you.’

Militza indicated to Stana that she should follow her out of the room.

‘What are we going to do?’ Militza hissed as soon as they were out of earshot. ‘He looks terrible. And the blood is unceasing.’

‘I know.’ Stana’s eyes were wide. It was the first time either of them had witnessed ‘an incident’ at close quarters.

‘It’s my fault,’ whispered Militza, her hand shaking a little.

‘No, it’s not.’

‘I sent him away.’

‘You didn’t!’ Stana took hold of her sister by the shoulders and stared into her eyes. ‘You reported your well-founded concerns to the authorities and they are investigating him. You have not sent him away. He has chosen to leave town while the authorities look into his actions. That is all. You did not do anything or say anything. You have not sent anyone anywhere, he went of his own accord.’

‘As I knew he would!’

‘No one knows it was you who reported him and no one ever will.’

‘But what if they look at the records?’

‘There will be no records, Nikolasha will see to that.’ She nodded firmly at her sister. ‘Do you understand? There will no record that you were involved at all. And the Tsarina knows nothing. She doesn’t know why he left. She doesn’t suspect a thing.’

Dr Eugene Botkin rushed past the sisters, clutching his leather bag. ‘Is it bad?’ he asked, a look of deep concern on his kind face.

‘Not good,’ replied Stana.

‘Poor soul,’ said the doctor, pausing to gather himself a little before the footman opened the door. He smoothed down his thinning hair and took a breath, crossed himself and placed a smile on his face. ‘Hello,’ he said, taking a step forward. ‘Now what have we here…?’

‘A spell?’ suggested Stana. ‘We could call on the Virgin to sew up the wound?’

‘I haven’t used that spell in a long while,’ replied Militza shaking her head, her shoulders slumping.

‘What’s wrong with you?’

‘I feel responsible.’ The colour drained from Militza’s already pale cheeks.

‘But you are not. You’re not responsible for him falling. You’re not responsible for him having the Hesse disease. You are—’

‘But I am the reason Rasputin is not here!’

‘To hell with him!’

‘He’s the only one who can help.’

‘You don’t really believe that! You’re much more powerful than him. You made him!’

‘I am not more powerful now he has Philippe’s icon.’

‘Just do the spell! Go to the garden, the park, find somewhere and call up your guide.’ Militza looked at her sister. ‘Now! Go!’

Militza found herself in the park in her silk shoes, shivering in her satin dress; she’d had no time to find her felt boots or put on her furs, for Stana had pushed her through the French doors with some force. In the crisp, cold dark, she looked around for a rowan tree that might help her spell, but the sky was black and there were no leaves on the trees, let alone any red berries to help guide her.

‘Come on,’ she said to herself, rubbing her hands together in the freezing damp air. Her whole body was beginning to shake and her nose was dripping with the cold. ‘Come on.’ She scoured the silhouettes in the darkness, stumbling and tripping in her thin, soft-soled shoes. ‘Concentrate. You can find it, use your second sight.’ The wind blew through the trees; the loose thin powdering of snow swirled and whirled, as the branches began to talk.

‘Militza!’

‘Militza!’

‘Look out!’

‘Take care!’

She looked left, right, her breath catching in her throat, fear mounting. It was as if he were there. Rasputin. Stalking her. Tracking her through the trees, like a wolf playing with a deer. She could hear him breathing, panting down her neck. She could hear him pawing the ground. She ran faster, deeper, deeper into the woods.

‘Militza!’ cried the trees.

‘Liar,’ rustled the leaves.

‘Turncoat!’ mumbled the frost as she crunched it underfoot.

‘Bitch!’ cried the moon.

‘Whore!’ cried the wind.

She could see his eyes. Those haunting, horrible eyes, pale as glass. Behind her. In front. Her heart was pounding, her hands were shaking, her body was shivering. Still she ran. She ran from what? From whom? From herself? She no longer knew. Branches tore at her clothes, brambles scratched at her ankles. BANG! God help her! She screamed. There he was! She felt his arms, his rough hands, his tight, tight grip. She shut her eyes.

‘Militza?’ said Nicky, slapping her gently around the face. ‘What are you doing out here?’

That night while Alix slept, thanks to a large dose of laudanum administered by the traumatized Dr Botkin, Militza and Stana prayed.

On discovering her running through the woods, Nicky had immediately removed his thick fur-lined coat, wrapped it over her shoulders and escorted the disorientated Militza back to the palace, where he’d immediately placed her in the capable hands of his valet, instructing him to draw her a hot bath, feed her warm brandied milk and give her a change of clothes. Meanwhile he hurried, his face blanched white with worry, to his son’s bedside. There, the vision of a bleeding Alexei, blinded by bruising, attended to by his hysterical, wailing wife, was enough to chill his soul.

‘Nicky!’ she screeched, throwing herself towards her husband as soon as he walked through the door of the boudoir. ‘Help him! Get Rasputin!’ At which point Alix promptly fainted.

After that, although she was determined to tend to her critically ill son, Dr Botkin forbade Alix to leave her own chamber.

‘You need your strength,’ he told her firmly, as he placed the drops on her tongue. ‘Alexei needs you and you are no use to him if you don’t rest.’

So, fortified by her bath and brandy-soaked milk, Militza joined Stana and sat up with Alexei, tending to him along with the old nurse Gunst who had been at the boy’s side ever since he was born. The amount of blood pouring from the wound was slowly easing; Botkin had cauterized the edges in an attempt to stem the flow, but the boy’s face was so swollen, his eyelids so red and inflamed, that he was still unable to open them. He barely spoke as he lay there, only emitting the occasional agonized moan. Gunst went back and forth during the night, bringing fresh bandages, water, compresses – anything that the sisters asked for. And all the while Militza and Stana chanted, prayed, whispered and lit heavily scented herbs: sage to clear the air of bad spirits, rosemary to sterilize and they rubbed henbane on his feet to induce sleep. And as he slept, they called on the Virgin to heal him.

‘In the sea, in the ocean, sits the most holy Virgin,’ mumbled Militza, her eyes closed as she fingered Alix’s jet rosary.

‘We call on her,’ whispered Stana. ‘We call on her now.’

‘She holds a golden needle in her hand, she threads a silk thread, she sews up the bloody wound. You wound, do not hurt, you blood, do not flow…’

‘You wound, do not hurt, you blood, do not flow…’

‘You wound, do not hurt, you blood, do not flow…’

‘You wound, do not hurt, you blood, do not flow…’

Again and again they repeated it, over and over they chanted, the words slowly slipping and merging together, the room beginning to hum as the meditation reverberated. It was hypnotic and strangely relaxing. Soon the Tsarevich began to snore.

Come the first rays of dawn and the wound was no longer bleeding, but the child was shivering and shaking with a fever.

‘This is how it happens every time,’ said Dr Botkin as he stood, slowly shaking his head, in the doorway to Alexei’s room.

‘Every time?’ asked Stana, rubbing her tired eyes. Both she and Militza had been at the boy’s bedside the entire night. The doctor nodded. ‘But he will live?’ she whispered.

‘The worst is over, I think,’ he replied. ‘But the illness can carry on for weeks. No wonder the mother is so exhausted.’ He glanced up the corridor towards Alix’s room. ‘She spends her whole life fearing the worst – and when the worst does happen, it’s agony. And the agony lasts for weeks. It never stops and it will never stop…’ He sighed. ‘And the only person she seems to listen to, or who can do anything to help her, is that filthy Siberian peasant.’

Militza walked out of the room, closing the door quietly behind her. ‘Brother Grigory?’

‘He’s no man of God,’ the doctor snorted. ‘But she’s sent word to him already, in whatever dark corner he resides. Someone is standing by for a telegram lest he bother to reply! As if that appalling man is going to make any difference!’

‘How is he?’ came a voice from behind them.

‘Your Imperial Majesty!’ said Dr Botkin, with a deep bow. His cheeks flushed a little and his moustache moved nervously. How much had she heard?

‘Any better?’ she asked, reaching for the door handle. ‘Nicky keeps telling me he’s fine. But then, Nicky always tells me he’s fine.’

‘He’s well, though feverish.’ Botkin smoothed his hair.

‘Feverish? How we hate fever.’ Her voice was weak. She appeared drained of all emotion. She slowly lifted her eyes to look at Militza. They were flat and dull, all joy and life long since extinguished. ‘Has any news come from Our Friend?’