Rasputin's Daughter

CHAPTER 8

So what was I now to do with those memories of my father the hero? Burn them, stomp them, rip them to shreds?

Tormented by confusion, I fled the closet and ran to my room, where I leaped into bed and fell into a black hole. When my sister wanted to know what on earth was wrong, I shouted at her to get out, and then my tears came so quickly, so heavily, that by the time I finally stopped crying my eyes were practically swollen shut. I just lay there, hidden and huddled under the down comforter, my arms and hands clasped around my knees. But I could find no comfort, no matter how hard I hugged myself. I simply cried and cried.

Many in the highest society, including the Tsar and Tsaritsa themselves, clung to the myth of the Russian peasant, believing that only in the huts of the poorest of the poor lived the true spirit of Christ. And yet now I knew what even the Tsar did not, that in my peasant father there dwelled both the spirit of Christ and also, at the very least, the spirit of a fool-not a holy fool but a simple one. We should leave the capital. For his own protection, not to mention ours, I should force Papa out of the city. He should abandon any pretense of holiness and simply melt away into Siberia and her endless forests. A life of fasts and visions and ragged clothing-that was what was meant for my father.

My head buried beneath my pillow, my body protected by the billowing feathers of the comforter, I lay curled up for hours, drifting in and out of misery and sleep. Finally, toward six, I heard Dunya beckoning us all to the table, for like all Russian women, she believed in the sanctity of coming together around food. Rising, I made a feeble attempt at brushing my hair and went to the dining room.

Dunya and Varya had obviously been busy. Our brass samovar, polished until it glowed like gold and boiling with water, sat by the window, and our heavy oak dinner table, the kind so popular among the city bourgeoisie, was covered with plates of cold zakuski: pickles, sour cream, salted herring garnished with onions, grated carrots mixed with mayonnaise and garlic, salted tomatoes, pickled mushrooms, smoked fish, stuffed eggs, and Papa’s favorite appetizer, jellied fish heads. Tonight, it was obvious we would feast not on fancy city things but real food.

“Girls, please take your places while I fetch your father,” Dunya said.

As she scurried off, the two of us stood behind our chairs, and my sister looked up at me, asking softly, “Are you all right, Maria? Why were you so upset?”

“Nothing,” I mumbled.

I stared at Varya, who was so proud of studying at middle school here in the capital that even now she wore the black-and-white frock of the gymnasia. She had my father’s blunt chin, his dark hair, his large full lips, and short black bangs, which she kept flipping back. She worshiped Papa, and to her, it wasn’t unusual at all that our humble father should be telephoned once or twice a day by the Empress herself, let alone summoned at any hour to the palace.

“What happened this afternoon?” she asked, not particularly concerned as she scooped up some carrot salad with her finger. “I heard a woman screaming.”

I shrugged. “You know how people are always after Papa for things.”

For the first time ever I was dreading a family meal. What was I going to say to my father? How would I even be able to look at him? But when he came in a few moments later it was not with his booming voice and quick step. Rather it was with a shuffle, for he was walking only with the aid of Dunya, who held him by the left arm.

“Papa, what’s the matter?” gasped Varya, rushing to his side.

He looked awful, as if he’d just aged twenty years, and for a brief moment I felt a pang of worry. His hair fell every which way like a field of wheat after a summer storm, his face was pallid, and his eyes were red. He was dressed terribly too, wearing a dirty pair of baggy pants and an unbelted tunic of coarse cotton.

“I had another dream…another vision…”

“Please, Father Grigori,” coaxed Dunya. “Just tea and a little food. Then you’ll feel better, I promise.”

They led Papa along, Dunya on one side and Varya on the other. Back home there was a bent old man who lived in a falling-down hut, and we taunted him mercilessly, calling him a starii xhren-an old piece of horseradish. Right here and now, that was my father. Had he fallen into a pool of remorse? Had he begged God’s forgiveness for the way he’d treated that woman? I could only hope so.

I stood motionless behind my chair as Dunya poured some tea concentrate from the small pot atop the shiny samovar, to which she added hot water from the spigot. As if it were nothing but cool water from a stream back home, he downed the glass in one gulp. Dunya then poured him another, which he likewise drank to the bottom. And another. Papa sometimes drank as many as fifty glasses of tea in a day, but never like this, as eagerly as a sunburned man just in from the desert. Finally, with his fourth glass in hand, he sat down. Only then did the three of us take our seats.

“What is it, Papa? What did you see?” begged Varya, her smooth young brow wrinkled with concern.

“Blood. I have seen the entire River Neva running with blood.”

Her eyes suddenly beading with tears, Varya pressed, “Whose blood, Papa?”

“The blood of the grand dukes.”

“Oh,” Varya said, not without a bit of relief.

Dunya spoke up softly. “Please, Father Grigori, you mustn’t say such things. Talk like that will only scare the girls, it will only-”

“I’m not scared,” I interjected defiantly.

“Let us pray!” intoned Papa, reaching out.

Beneath the heavy bronze chandelier, with Papa at one end of the table and Dunya at the other, we clasped hands and bowed our heads.

“Dear Heavenly Father, I beseech you to come to the aid of us, your miserablest children who seek Thine forgiveness. We will sin no more. I pray unto you, Thou, to grant us salvation, to drive away our enemies, both those within our borders and beyond. O God, O Wondrous Lord, how can one fail to believe?! The street is crooked, but ahead layest only one destination, and we struggle there on foot. We believe heartily, Thine Lord, and woe unto those who does not! The waves of calumny can only be stilled by good deeds, but it is true, there is far more sickness on land than in your great sea. So in you, Thee, O Lord, O God, help us rejoice, so that in your miracles of forgiveness we find everlasting peace. Ahmeen.”

“Ahmeen,” chimed Dunya and Varya in chorus.

When I failed to speak, Dunya glared at me, and I reluctantly muttered, “Ahmeen.”

As a child I never understood my father’s prayers. Nor did I this evening. What was different about tonight, however, was that I no longer felt awed by my father’s words or his supposed wisdom. I only felt something…something sad, even pathetic.

Papa took a piece of bread in his hand, put a single large pickle on it, and stuffed it into his mouth. It was gone in two bites.

“Wine!” Papa commanded.

“Yes, Father Grigori,” replied Dunya, pushing back her chair and getting up from the table.

Disappearing into the kitchen, Dunya quickly returned, not with a mere glass of wine but with a full bottle. As she poured Papa a glass, however, I could tell it was not with pleasure. Of course Dunya understood that Papa’s physical pain was as great as his mental anguish, but I knew it hurt her terribly to see Papa drink as many as twelve bottles of Madeira in a night, as he had done a number of times in the last month alone. How, I thought for the first time, could my father consume so much and still stand? Indeed, how could he claim to be so blessed and have so many gifts and yet be blind to his gross mistakes, which even I could now see so clearly?

Papa grabbed another piece of bread and piled it with salted herring, an entire stuffed egg, and a ring of onion, all of which he gobbled down like a wild animal. Next, still with his bare hand, he reached into the bowl of jellied fish heads, pulled out a whole cod head, and swallowed it.

“The other day I greatly offended a woman because I ate with my hands and didn’t use a napkin. She even gasped out loud when I wiped my mouth with my beard like this.” Papa chuckled as he pulled up the bristly ends of his beard and cleaned his mouth. “Tell me, girls, does it bother either of you?”

Varya, who was eating a salted pickle dipped in sour cream, grinned and shook her head.

I, on the other hand, blurted out, “Of course it does. It’s awful and…and embarrassing. Why haven’t you ever learned how to eat like a normal civilized person?”

“Maria!” gasped Dunya, horrified. “You mustn’t speak to your father like that!”

Papa only laughed. By court standards, let alone the etiquette of good society, his manners were atrocious, no better than a dog’s. He knew it, exulted in it, and flaunted it, particularly in the presence of the proper titled folk of Petrograd. Any number of times I had watched him wipe his filthy hands on the fine silk dresses, fur coats, or ties of his guests. Any number of times I had watched him order a princess to lick his filthy fingers clean. After a while his devotees understood and even begged for such treatment. Yes, they pleaded for Papa to do such rude things to them. Like washing the feet of Christ, it was all about meekness, submission, and mortification of the flesh.

“No, no, it’s quite all right,” Papa insisted. “My little Marochka speaks the truth of her heart, as she must. As must every Rasputin. And indeed as must every person. And it’s true: I never learned how to eat with the weapons of the court, those forks and knives!”

This, actually, was why Papa always came home from the palace of the Tsar ravenous. After zakuski he could never manage anything but soup. All the rest he could barely take a stab at, literally.

“But do you know why I have never learned, Marochka, my sweet one? Do you know why it’s important to eat with your hands?”

Of course I did. He’d told us not once or twice but a million times. And yet I said nothing.

Finally my little sister blurted it out. “I know! Because Xhristos and the Apostles did.”

“Absolutely correct, Varichka. It’s a rule of the Apostles to use your hands, and that’s why I never cut bread but break it, just as they did. And also why I eat fish and never meat.”

“I’ve never seen you eat a single piece of meat, Papa. Not ever,” said Varya.

“That’s right-never! Meat blackens one’s soul, whereas fish brings clarity and light. I learned this when I was a boy-even before my vision of the Virgin of Kazan. It started one summer night when one of my grandfather’s best horses injured himself and fell lame. This beautiful horse could do nothing but hobble, so I took hold of his bad leg. I clung to the leg, but my grandfather kept telling me it was hopeless, there was nothing to do, and he went to get a gun to shoot the poor thing.”

“No!” gasped Varya.

“Oh, yes. But I took hold of that bad leg and held it in my strong young hands. And do you know what I did, girls? I threw back my head and closed my eyes and I prayed with all my being! I prayed to Xhristos for healing, for compassion, for blessing. And I took the pain from the horse’s bad leg and sucked it into my body and out the top of my head…and then I said to the horse, ‘There is no pain-walk!’ And by the time my grandfather returned with his gun, the horse was just fine, even trotting around a little. Yes, my grandfather’s favorite horse lived for ten more years, never limping again.”

“It’s true,” said Dunya, her voice just above a whisper as she chewed on a piece of bread. “Six people witnessed the healing, and they still talk of it today!”

Yes, I thought as I sat there in silence. People in our village still talked of my father’s first healing, but…but…

“Mind you, I am not Xhristos. I can heal no one, I only do His work. It was the Lord God who healed that beautiful creature, and I only served as His vehicle. But right then and there I understood that all beasts are our brothers,” Papa continued, “and I’ve never eaten meat again, not once. And every day since, my powers have grown. Such is the rule of the Apostles and the powers of fish.”

“Is that why you don’t eat pastries or sweets?” asked Varya.

“Scum! Nothing but scum! I never eat sweet things and you shouldn’t either, little girl! In fact, Dunya, we must not allow it anymore! We must tell all those who come to leave their tortes and their sweet pies at the door! We mustn’t let such foul things as sweets into this house ever again!”

“As you wish, Father Grigori.”

I watched in disgust as my father swiped one of his greasy hands through his coarse beard, leaving bits of food here and there. He poured himself another full glass of wine, which he drank down in one enormous swig.

“Dunya, fetch us soup while I talk to the girls.”

“Yes, Father Grigori.”

Dunya, who was simply glad to have my father walk the floors she mopped, was only too happy to get up and clear the table of zakuski. As she did so, Papa reached out and clasped my hand in his right and Varya’s hand in his left. I tried to pull free, but my father’s meaty, calloused grasp only tightened.

“Great is the peasant in the eyes of God!” declared my father, uttering his favorite phrase yet again. “I have brought you, my precious daughters, here to the capital city, but I see trouble ahead. When things erupt, when this trouble flows through the streets, you must retreat from this decadent capital. You must flee to the place we have come from-our village. There, with your mother in the bosom of your family, you will find safety.”

“Papa,” begged Varya, “I don’t understand. Where will you be? You’ll come too, won’t you?”

“My work is nearly at an end, my child. There will soon come a time when I am gone, and then so will the court be gone and all the riches that you see here in the Tsar’s city. Into this void dangerous waters will flood, drowning those who refuse to repent. And when this happens, you must repent with all your heart and flee that very moment.”

I looked at my sister and saw fear ripple across her face, but I felt nothing. Didn’t everyone see the dark waters swirling at his feet?

“Simply believe in the Divine power of love, my daughters, my beautiful girls,” he said, in his rich, deep voice. “Believe in that, and you will find safety of heart and peace of mind in Thine God, O Lord.” Papa tossed down another glass of wine. “One day you will marry. And in that marriage, you must find truth and honesty. Never forget, my children, that though there are a man and a woman in marriage, the success of that union depends on one thing-that it beats not with two hearts but with one. Do you understand, my little ones?”

Averting my eyes, I managed to say, “Yes, Papa.”

“Keep your hearts simple and your minds clear, and you will find God. Eat kasha for breakfast, for it is the caviar of the people. Bake it in the oven until it’s hot and firm, never mushy.”

As timid as a mouse, Varya ventured, “I’ll always serve it with crispy onions and mushrooms, just as you like it, Papa.”

“Yes, good! Very good!” Papa caught sight of Dunya carrying two large wide-rimmed bowls of soup. “And don’t forget that every meal must have soup! Without soup, your family and your guests will be poor both in spirit and in health!”

“Yes, Father Grigori, soup feeds the soul, does it not?” said Dunya, proudly setting down a steaming bowl in front of him.

“Absolutely. And there is nothing better for the soul than fish soup! Fish soup all the time!”

“Fish soup!” cheered Varya.

Which is exactly what it was: cod soup. Papa loved cod above all other fish, and we ate it once, if not twice, each and every day, either jellied as a zakuska, boiled as a soup, or fried as a main course. Sometimes Dunya made cod soup merely from the juices left over from jellied fish heads, adding cream and a bit of chopped root of ginger-Papa claimed this was his magical soup, the one that would guarantee a strong, long life-but tonight whole pieces of cod floated in the thick creamy mixture.

By the time Dunya brought out the other bowls, Papa was well into his dish, slurping and gobbling down whole pieces of fish. He clutched the large spoon like the peasant he was, in his fist. I remembered the first time Papa had taken me to the palace, how the Tsar and his family had sat across from Papa and me, how the finely behaved imperial children had stared at Papa as he crudely gobbled down a bowl of Villager’s Soup chock full of whitefish and salmon, shrimp and pickles. I was sure their mother, the Empress, would have banished them to a far wing of the palace for eating like that, but the four girls and the heir were not watching Papa in disgust. No, he was Father Grigori to them, the most mystical of people, a man of Siberia and of course a man of God, and they were as fascinated and transfixed by him as I was by their father, God’s Own Anointed, the Tsar Nikolai II. More important, the royal children never saw, let alone talked with, anyone but courtiers, so my father, with his loud laughter, warm kisses, and endless stories of Siberian tigers and bears, was something incredible to them. He was both surreal and yet more real than anyone they had ever before seen or experienced in their sheltered lives.

Glancing at my sister, I noted that she held the spoon just as we’d been taught and ate her soup politely-not in big slurps and gulps but slowly, quietly, properly. Yes, we had been taught well at our school for daughters of good families. How odd, I thought, for the first time. While Papa had always fiercely clung to his Siberian manners and traditions, he had arranged for them slowly to be washed from both of us, his cherished daughters.

Papa poured the last of the Madeira into his glass, took a large drink, and said, “I eat only fish not as part of a diet to prove my faith. No, my sweet children, my thoughts are more sincere than that. Fish is part of a path, a path illuminated by the Apostles, who showed us that by eating fish their bodies were never darkened. People who eat meat have dark bodies, you see, but the Apostles didn’t, not at all. Instead, they found light, they found the Divine way.”

“How did they find that?” asked Varya.

“How? I’ll tell you how! The Apostles ate so much fish, morning, noon, and night, that light started coming from their bodies. Beams of light. At first no one could see it, but then it began to grow until this sweet light glowed around their heads. Yes, they had halos right above their very own heads. And this light, which came from fish, showed them the way, the Divine path.”

Never before tonight had I questioned my father. Never before this evening had I doubted him. But staring at this man with the beastly hair on his head and that thicket on his cheeks, this crude man with bits of food hanging from his mouth and from his filthy, greasy fingers, how could I not? How could he have mistreated that woman, and how could he now drink so much? How could he dress so terribly, and how could he not care for money and the things we, his family, needed? And these words he spoke: Where did they come from? What did they mean? I stared at my father, wondered how many women he’d groped in his study-hundreds?-and understood for the first time why so many people hated him. Was he nothing more than an insane peasant from the distant forests, as his enemies claimed?

“But Papa,” I challenged, “you eat so much fish, why isn’t there a halo over your head too? You claim to be a man of God, so why should the Apostles have halos and not you?”

My father dropped his spoon into his bowl, chipping an edge of the cheap china, and turned and glared at me with those deep icy-blue eyes. But the eyes were not steady; they searched my body, my face, my thoughts. My heart started pounding. Everyone claimed to be frightened of my father’s penetrating eyes, of his hands that never seemed to stop moving. But before me I saw not the man whose name was on the lips of every person in the country, not Father Grigori or Rasputin or Grishka. No, I saw my very own father, and I refused to be intimidated. After all, who was he, this man who insisted that everyone speak the truth? Nothing but a fraud? A charlatan? So I glared back at him, my eyes not as deep as his, or as blue, but every bit as radiant, I was sure. In response, this deep, guttural sound emerged from my father’s throat, an angry sound like a tiger ready to pounce.

Not intimidated, I couldn’t stop myself from pressing the point, as I asked, “So why can’t I see your halo?”

Her own voice trembling, our dear Dunya muttered, “But, child, it’s right there.”

Not taking my eyes off my father, I demanded, “Right where?”

“Why, there above his head. Can’t you see the faint glow?”

I couldn’t, so I turned to Dunya and in her face saw nothing but confidence, nothing but total belief. She saw something, of course she did, but what? Glancing at my sister, I found her staring right at me, and I spied in her young face nothing but fear and disbelief. No, total shock, that was it. How did I dare question our larger-than-life father? And yet as I gazed at him, I saw nothing. I stared and checked, even squinted, but above that crazy mass of hair was…a void.

I was not going to lie, particularly not today when I’d witnessed what had gone on in my father’s study. Full of certainty, my head moved, shaking slowly from side to side. Who was I if I did not practice what Papa had taught me all these years? Who was I if I did not espouse the heavenly beliefs he had instilled in my heart? Better yet, who was he?

It was still there, that blank space above Papa’s head, and I stared at the invisible place, and said, “I don’t see a thing.”

All of a sudden, like an eagle grabbing its prey from a river, Papa jabbed his fingers into his bowl of soup and scooped up not one, not two, but three large pieces of milky cod. He threw his catch into his bearded mouth and down his gullet, consuming it all in nearly one swallow.

As spidery traces of creamy soup swirled on his hairy chin, my father shouted to Dunya, “The lights!”

Her eyes aflame with conviction, Dunya threw back her chair, nearly tipping it over. As quickly as she could muster, she hurried to the wall, where with a slap of her hand she pushed the light button. In one single snap, the heavy bronze chandelier went dark. At first the room was black and then slowly, every so faintly, red-in the “beautiful” corner of the room an oil lamp burned before an icon of the Virgin Mary.

“Bow your heads, my children, and pray! Pray, I tell you!” roared my father in the blood-red darkness. “Pray as if your lives were about to end!”

As if he were smashing a mouse with his bare fist, my father’s paw came whooshing downward, trapping my hand beneath his. I tried to pull away but could not. On the other side, Dunya came clambering back to the table, her hand feeling all about for mine, finally finding my fingers and clinging to them.

“O God! O Lord!” shouted Papa. “Woe unto us that have waxed faith into pride! Magnificent is the brilliance of Thoust power! But woe unto the Devil! Woe unto Satan, who tries through his darkness to trap us all! Only for the light of God do we find Thine path!”

I found myself starting to shake, horribly so. Not just my hands, not just my shoulders, but every limb, every muscle. I bit my lip but could not control it, could not stem the deep sob that erupted from within me and exploded into the blackness of our dining room. Never until that moment had I feared my father. Never until this day had I seen in him anything but kindness and love. And yet all I knew right then was terror, so I bowed my head, squeezed my eyes tight, and buried my soul in humble prayer, pleading for forgiveness. By transgressing the word of my very own father I had sinned, had I not? But no more. No, I was ready to repent, and deep inside my being I begged, even chanted: Lord, O Lord, take pity upon my miserable soul and gather me unto Thy feet!

Out of nowhere Varya’s small voice bloomed like a tiny flower as she gasped, “Maria, look! Look!”

I was so afraid that at first I dared not. When I finally opened my eyes, I saw nothing but a reddish fog of darkness. I gazed across the table, searched the spot where my sister was sitting, but could barely see her. I turned to the right and could only discern the vague outline of Dunya, whose hand I was clasping so hard. When I slowly focused on my left, however, everything was different and-yes-even miraculous. Immediately I was aware of something, some kind of glowing light, which gently filled that end of the room and even my soul. And when I slowly raised my eyes, I saw it and started weeping quietly. A wave of awe and glory surged through my body, for there, right above Papa’s head, hovering just above his messy thatch of hair, glowed something that seemed quite like an arc of light.