Terrible tsarinas

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Terrible Tsarinas our feet now, we will only bring about a great misfortune. I feel it in my soul - we are on the verge of great chaos, destruction, perhaps even the ruin of the fatherland!” La Chetardie and Lestocq agreed, vociferously. There was no way out, now. Her back to the wall, Elizabeth Petrovna sighed and reluctantly acquiesced: “Alright, since if you push me to do it.” And, not even completing her sentence, she made vague gesture and left it to fate to decide the rest.

Without a moment’s hesitation, now, Lestocq and La Chetardie assigned roles; Her Highness would have to go to the gvardeitsy in person to enlist them in her aid. And just then, a delegation of grenadiers from the Guard, led by Sergeant Grunstein, had just turned up at the Summer Palace to request an audience with the tsarevna: these men confirmed that they, too, had just received orders to leave for the Finnish border. In extremis, the insurrectionists were condemned to succeed. Every minute lost would decrease their chances. Faced with the most crucial decision in her life, Elizabeth withdrew to her own room.

Before jumping into the breach, she knelt down before the icons and swore to revoke the death penalty all across Russia, should they succeed in their enterprise. In the next room her partisans, gathered around Alexis Razumovsky, fretted over these delays. She wasn’t going to change her mind again, was she? At the end of his patience, La Chetardie returned to his embassy.

When Elizabeth reappeared, standing tall, radiant and proud, Armand Lestocq placed a cross of silver in her hands, pronounced a few more words of encouragement, draped around her neck the cord of the Order of Saint Catherine, and pushed her out the door. A sleigh was waiting. Elizabeth took her seat, with Lestocq; Razumovsky and Saltykov settled into a second sleigh, while Vorontsov and Shuvalov rode along on horseback. Behind them came Grunstein and ten grenadiers. The entire group set