The Last Tsar's Dragons

Chapter 18

The tsarina had sent a note to Rasputin in French. She’d never quite mastered the Cyrillic. Her elegant handwriting hid the meanness of the message. He assumed she meant it to. He got the gist of the beginning but the rest was too difficult for him.

The tsarevitch Alexei will not be able to see you this week.

The tsarina had even left off her signature, which made it unclear if she had written it herself or had someone else do it for her. Possibly something the tsar had dictated. He could not believe the tsarina—who was so devoted to him and so thankful for his tender care of her son—he could not believe she would ever cut him off like this. But the tsar, perhaps. He had been cold to the monk since his return from the front.

Of course he can treat me any way he wishes. He is the tsar. And the monk would never deign to suggest how God’s ruler on Earth should comport himself. But God may judge him harshly if he mistreats such a valuable messenger of His Word as myself.

He needed a much better read of the letter to determine who was behind his exile from the tsarina’s good graces. Since his French was—at best—simple phrases, he would need to find someone else to read the message for him so that he understood it completely. He settled at last on the beautiful Ninotchka, the wife of that silly bureaucrat whose name always escaped him.

She read it eagerly, her small breasts heaving up and down as she translated, which he took for a sign that she might be willing for a tumble in her capacious bed.

Her voice was light, a bit silly, but silliness had never put him off.

“The tsarevitch Alexei…,” she read, “will not be able to see you this week. The doctors have agreed he needs full rest from his latest bad turn…. A nursing staff is in charge. You excite his blood too much, dear Father Grigori. Those trips—that started with the visit to the dragons—must be ended. All other visitations with him will be chaperoned. It is the tsar’s wish, and mine as well.”

Ninotchka finished, bit her lower lip prettily.

“This is just between us, my child,” Rasputin said and took the paper back from her, careful not to touch her hand. He suddenly dared not let a spark travel between them. There were too many other women about, and it was too dangerous. Besides, he was stunned by the coldness in the tsarina’s letter, which the “dear Father Grigori” did nothing to disguise. He had to think about what it meant. And who had written it.

So he gave Ninotchka one of his well-practiced smoldering looks and departed with the note crumpled in his hand.

Back in his rooms, he smoothed out the note with a warm iron and read it himself with much difficulty, hearing it in Ninotchka’s light voice as he did, thinking about the delightful afternoon tryst he’d been forced to forgo. The note’s contents did not improve with a second reading.

Had he overplayed his cards? He was usually good at such games. A champion at Eralash and Siberian Vint. But politics had been the game he played best. ’Til now.

He repeated it out loud and bitterly. “’Til now.”