Anastasia and Her Sisters (25 page)

Long before sunrise we were roused by a knock on our compartment door and told to dress quickly. The train would take us no farther. Our possessions had been ferried across the river to a steamer tied up at the dock. A curtain of fog shrouded the opposite bank.

We huddled silently in a launch that puttered across the river in the darkness, before the residents of the town—it was called Tyumen—noticed the presence of strangers surrounded by dozens and dozens of soldiers and started asking questions. Mama clung to Papa’s arm as we climbed the gangplank onto the steamer. Tatiana said wistfully, “Do you remember when we took the steamer on the Volga River, on our way to the village where Mikhail Romanov was born?”

That was four years earlier during the tricentennial celebration, the people shouting “God save the tsar!” and wading
into the ice-cold river, just to get a look at the tsarevich. It made me sad to think of it.

Once we were aboard, Kobylinsky revealed our destination: Tobolsk, a small river town two hundred miles north known chiefly for trading in fish and furs. “The governor’s mansion is being prepared for you. The people will be friendly to you,” he promised. “No revolutionary sentiment has taken root there.”

Now we knew where we were going to live. It wasn’t Crimea or England or Japan but some remote town none of us had heard of.

CHAPTER 20

The Governor’s Mansion

TOBOLSK, SIBERIA, AUGUST 1917

B
efore daybreak the steamer,
Rus
, had slipped away from the dock and nosed out into the Tura River, smoke billowing from the stacks, paddle wheels churning. My sisters yawned and went immediately to our quarters. I was too restless to lie down and climbed to the upper deck as the fog was lifting and the sun edged above the horizon. I found Gleb already there, making drawings in a sketchpad as we steamed past a field on the outskirts of Tyumen. Peasants were cutting hay. I went to stand at the rail next to Gleb.

“It’s like a dream, isn’t it, Anastasia Nikolaevna?” he asked. His pencil glided swiftly over the smooth paper, and an image of a peasant swinging his scythe emerged.

“You draw so much faster than I do,” I said. We were standing so close that my hand brushed the sleeve of his jacket. With
a few strokes of his pencil, a woman carrying a basket appeared.

Gleb glanced at me. “It just takes practice, Anastasia Nikolaevna. You have the talent, I know you do. I’ve seen some of your paintings—”

“They’re not really paintings,” I protested, pleased but a little embarrassed. The air was cool, but my face was hot. “They’re nothing, just something I do.”

“You don’t take your painting seriously enough. You should, you know.”

“I once told my aunt Olga Alexandrovna that I wanted to be a famous artist someday,” I confessed. “And she said I must concentrate on painting, and not on being famous.”

“That was good advice.”

I stayed quiet for several minutes. The sun climbed higher and the light changed. I glanced sideways at Gleb’s profile. The gawky boy who’d once been convinced that all the Russians had to do to defeat the Germans was to throw their caps at them had turned into a handsome young man. When had that happened?

Then I blurted boldly, “We were at Peterhof for my thirteenth birthday when my aunt said that. You found a piece of green sea glass and gave it to me.” As soon as I’d said it, I wished I hadn’t. It sounded foolish.

“You remember that, Anastasia Nikolaevna?”

“I still have it,” I said, adding, a bit too abruptly, “and I wish you wouldn’t address me formally. If you can draw me as a mouse, surely you can call me by my familiar name.”

Gleb looked at me with a puzzled smile. “You would prefer that I address you as Anastasia Mouse?”

Blood rushed into my head, and I felt dizzy. “No—just as Nastya. And I don’t believe I’ve thanked you properly for that birthday greeting. It’s very clever, you know, very—”

Gleb, still smiling, laid his pencil and sketchpad on a bench and placed his hands on the rail next to mine. I stopped gazing at his face and studied his long fingers instead. I couldn’t think what I wanted to say, my words were tumbling out all muddled, but I wanted this conversation to continue. I willed his hand to touch mine, and it did. It moved closer until our hands were not only touching, but our little fingers were linked.

If Dr. Botkin had appeared with his medical bag, as he did every day, and checked my temperature and listened to my heart, he would surely have diagnosed a mild fever, my heart banging against my rib cage, and irregular breathing—all symptoms caused by those two linked fingers.

A familiar voice startled us. The fingers separated.

“Good morning, Gleb Evgenievich!” Papa called out cheerily. “And there you are, Nastya! Your mother has been asking for you. Please go down to her, will you?”

“Yes, yes, of course, Papa,” I said, shoving both hands deep into the pockets of my skirt. Without another word to Gleb, or even a look at him, I turned and fled.

I was grinning madly. Everything between us had changed.

•  •  •

Later that morning, when I felt calmer and less likely to do or say something silly or stupid, I climbed back to the upper deck. I hoped to find Gleb, but I was also afraid he might be there. How could I have both feelings at once? And there he was, sketching!

But Papa was there as well, dressed in his army uniform as usual, staring moodily off into the distance.

I settled onto a wooden bench with a book I’d brought along, close enough to watch Gleb but far enough away that it wouldn’t draw attention. I tried to read, but I could hardly concentrate, turning the pages without remembering a single word. My sisters and Gleb’s sister came and went, as did others. As much as I was dying to talk to Gleb, I didn’t want to attract Papa’s notice or, worse, the attention of Olga or Tatiana, who would certainly have a lot to say about it to me, and possibly to Mama.

It was enough just to have him nearby, even if we didn’t exchange a word.

So I was surprised when Gleb approached the bench where I was sitting. “May I join you, Anastasia Nikolaevna?” he asked with a little bow. He was speaking formally, I understood, for Papa’s benefit.

“Of course, Gleb Evgenievich.”

“Beautiful day, isn’t it?” He sat down—close, but not too close.

“Indeed it is.” When I was sure my voice wouldn’t shake, I said, “Will you show me some of your drawings?”

Side by side, we turned the pages slowly, going backward through time. There was the guardhouse at Tsarskoe Selo where he’d visited his father every week while we were under house arrest. His sister, Tatiana, dressed as a nursing sister early in the war. The
Standart
sailing off on a Baltic cruise before the war began. In a sleeve at the back of the sketchpad were a few worn photographs: his brothers, Yuri and Dmitri, now dead, when
they were cadets, and a photo of a pretty young woman with an uncertain smile.

“My mother,” he said. “Before their divorce. My father doesn’t know I have it. It’s been years since I’ve seen her.” He gazed at the photograph.

“Where is she?”

“In Germany, if she’s still alive. She left Father for our German tutor. She said my father was devoted to the tsar, and not to her.”

I studied his profile—the elegant nose, sensuous lips, well-shaped chin. I thought I saw a strong resemblance to the photograph. “It must have been very painful,” I said, because I could not think what else to say.

“It was.” He slid the photograph back into the sleeve with the others. “I try not to think about her. I hardly ever look at the photo. I wanted you to see her.”

Impulsively, I reached out and took his hand. It seemed like the most natural thing to do, and I held it just for a moment before I let it go.

•  •  •

As the hours passed and the steamer moved steadily with the current, everyone seemed calmer, more relaxed, as if all the usual rules had been suspended. If I was observed spending more time than usual talking with Gleb, no one seemed concerned.

On the afternoon of the second day on the river, our family had gathered on the upper deck. The boat was steaming close to the shore by Pokrovskoe, the village where Father Grigory had been born.

“That must be Grishka’s home,” Mama said, pointing to a handsome two-story house with a riot of flowers blooming in window boxes and a little front garden. “He caught fish in this river and brought them to Tsarskoe Selo. He predicted that one day we would pass by here.” She turned to us, her eyes shining. “I believe he has sent us a sign,” she said as the village receded behind us. “Our friend is with us, I’m sure of it.”

Later that day we had our first glimpse of the Tobolsk fortress, looming in the distance, then the church towers came into view, and soon after sunset the
Rus
eased next to a dock. My sisters and I were eager to go ashore to see our new home. We tried to imagine what the governor’s mansion would be like.

“Maybe it will be something like Peterhof,” I suggested.

“Probably it will be more like Spala,” Olga predicted glumly. “Damp rooms that smell like mold, so dark you have to keep the electric lights burning all the time.” The hunting lodge in Poland was the least favorite of all our palaces and lodges.

But I was excited for another reason, one I couldn’t mention. Now there would be more chances for conversations with Gleb, talks about art and painting, maybe even talks about our dreams for the time when our imprisonment would be over and we’d be free again. But I could not say anything about this to my sisters—not even to Marie, who would certainly have loved to hear it.

Colonel Kobylinsky went on ahead to inspect the governor’s mansion, while we waited anxiously. Hours later he returned with a grim expression. “My apologies, Nikolai Alexandrovich, but you and your family must spend another
night or two on the steamer,” he informed us. “There is work that must be done before you can move in.”

When Mama asked if she might be permitted to tour our new home the next morning, Kobylinsky put her off. “To be truthful, madame, the house is in some disrepair, and several pieces of furniture must be supplied. I beg your patience.”

A
lot
of work, as it turned out, and the governor’s house was as empty as a barn, with not a stick of furniture to be found in it. Papa found the situation amusing. “The inability even to arrange for lodgings is astonishing,” he said. “We might as well retire early with the hope that our new home will be ready for us tomorrow, or the next day, or the next.” Or perhaps the day after that.

To keep us from expiring of boredom while a small army of plasterers, plumbers, carpenters, electricians, and painters was hired to fix the house, Kobylinsky arranged for the
Rus
to take us on excursions on the river. He said we could stop and get off to go for walks along the way.

I didn’t mind at all. Gleb was always nearby, and we even had several chances to talk—sometimes on the
Rus
, sometimes while we walked along the riverbank, past fields where peasants stopped swinging their scythes through the golden wheat to stare at us—although never alone and never close enough to touch. No linked fingers, even for a moment. My sisters and Gleb’s sister were always part of the group, and Alexei, too. My brother adored Gleb.

“I’m working on a surprise for the tsarevich,” Gleb confided as we returned from one of our river trips. “I think your whole family will enjoy it.”

“What is it?”

“I told you, Nastya—it’s a surprise. You’ll see.”

•  •  •

On the morning of our eighth day of waiting, the colonel announced that the governor’s mansion was now ready. We left the
Rus
, Mama and Tatiana riding in a carriage while Papa and the rest of us walked along a road ankle-deep in dust. Soldiers armed with rifles and bayonets lined both sides of the road, not allowing us to forget for a moment that we were prisoners, and in their minds very dangerous ones.

Tobolsk did not look like much of a town. Most of the houses were built of logs or rough-hewn lumber, and it was easy to pick out the house where we would live—a two-story white stone building with a balcony on each end of the second floor.

“I would not call that a mansion,” Olga muttered under her breath.

Kobylinsky, like a host anxious to please his guests, led us on a tour, glancing at Mama to see if she approved of the colors he had chosen for the walls and the furniture he had bought from townspeople who were willing to sell. There was a large table for dining, for instance, but none of the chairs matched. Our camp beds had not yet arrived; we would sleep on the floor. “But only for a night or two,” Kobylinsky promised.

The so-called mansion was barely big enough for our family and a few members of our household. The rest, including the three Botkins and most of our servants, would stay on the opposite side of the street in a house commandeered from a rich fish merchant.

I felt a little sorry for the colonel, because I could guess what Mama was thinking. She said nothing until the tour had ended and Kobylinsky, nervously twisting a button on his jacket, asked, “Is there anything else you wish to have, Alexandra Fyodorovna?”