Rasputin's Revenge (11 page)

The champagne flowed like water. Lupa was truly in his element as the plaudits for each new taste exceeded the last. Only Katrina Sukhomlinov seemed immune to our high spirits. She held her glass of champagne stiffly in front of her, her face a mask. She looked almost ill, and I wondered fleetingly why she had come to the dinner if she wasn’t up to it.

When we had disposed of the hors d’oeuvres, we sat down to dinner. Lupa, it seems, had prepared his Plateau Royale as a sort of tour de force. He was not Anastasia’s chef, so he sat down to dine with the rest of us.

After we’d been served our first course, sturgeon in aspic, I brought the conversation back to Lupa’s solution to how Rasputin could have known Alyosha’s bruises weren’t serious.

“But Jules, there is only one possible explanation.”

I glanced at Elena, saying that I didn’t see it.

“Nor do I,” she agreed.

“That is, of course, true. Both of you looked at something without seeing it.”

I smiled. “What should we have seen?”

“First let’s establish what you looked at. There was a horse running wild with Alexis in the saddle, as you put it ‘holding on for dear life.’ When he saw Rasputin, he called out to him. Is that all?”

Both Elena and I said yes.

“So your assumption was that Alexis, because he was screaming in panic, was somehow as out of control as the animal.”

“But he was,” Elena averred.

“No, madam, he could not have been. Unless he were perfectly in control, he would have been thrown to the floor. He might have been scared, but he was riding correctly—holding on with his hands, riding with his haunches flexed and off the saddle. It’s the only way he could
have stayed on the horse. Where you, Jules, and you, Miss Ripley, saw the panic and madness of the beast, it seems that Rasputin saw the control of the rider. He also saw the fear, but fear doesn’t cause bruises.”

Anastasia said, “So there was nothing miraculous about his prediction. Another fraud!”

Sukhomlinov answered. “Not at all. He never claimed a miracle.”

“But neither did he deny it,” Elena said hesitantly.

The general chuckled. “Who can blame a man for taking advantage of other people’s false perceptions?”

“It’s not particularly honorable,” I said.

He shrugged as though that concept had no meaning for him. “But he did, after all, calm the animal in the first place, didn’t he?”

“For that,” Lupa said, “I have no explanation.”

“And with that,” Anastasia said, “let’s drop this topic. Surely there must be better things to discuss than Rasputin.”

Elena took the cue. “Jules, can you tell us what brings you to St. Petersburg?”

Possibly I’d had too much champagne. At any rate, I was entirely forthright in my response.

“Oh dear,” Anastasia said when I’d finished, “first religion and now politics. How can we enjoy our dinner?”

“Rasputin is hardly ‘religion,”’ Katrina said. They were her first words since she had chided her husband.

“I really am going to forbid his name being mentioned if this continues.” Anastasia’s party was turning all too serious. “Ivan, surely there are other things to discuss.”

But she had appealed to the wrong man. Kapov smiled thinly, and addressed himself to me. “You realize, Giraud, that if we keep fighting, as you propose, then we are doomed. But of course,” he added sarcastically, “that doesn’t matter if France can survive.”

“Oh, dear,” Anastasia said again.

Lupa interjected. “And if you stop fighting you will get a peace from Germany that will make what it did to France in ‘70 seem mild.”

“And that was rape,” I added hotly. Both Elena and Anastasia were shocked at the word, but it was appropriate for the reparations Germany had forced on us, for annexing Alsace-Lorraine, for marching its army through l’Arc de Triomphe.

“Nonsense,” Sukhomlinov retorted. “You have no appreciation of the ties that bind the Kaiser and the Czar. They were allies against Japan, you remember, less than a decade ago.” He stabbed some food on his plate, but continued speaking. “You republicans forget the value of blood …”

“What an unfortunate turn of phrase,” I said.

Kapov joined in again. “The General means blood relationships. Nicholas and Wilhelm are cousins, after all.”

“And ten million people have died,” Lupa said blandly. “Just imagine if they didn’t like each other.”

“Events took over,” Sukhomlinov said.

“So it would seem,” I responded. “And now what we’re trying to do is help Russia until we can fortify the Western Front. America will be joining the War in the Spring.”

“Wilson will never join a war,” Kapov said.

“And even if America does,” the General said, “what will it matter? They’ve never fought in Europe. Untested armies don’t win battles.”

“Neither, it would seem, do unarmed ones,” Lupa said. It was a direct blow to Sukhomlinov, who had failed so miserably while he had been Minister of War to put Russian factories to work making munitions, with the result that brave Russian troops often went to battle without weapons, with instructions to loot the battlefield for arms as they came upon them.

The General flushed deeply as Kapov started to say something in his defense. But evidently Anastasia had had enough. She rose from her chair and fairly shouted, “Gentlemen, please!”

Kapov, who had risen halfway out of his chair, bowed in deference to her wishes and offered a tight-lipped apology. The Grand Duchess nodded her acceptance, smiled formally at each of us, and sat down. “Now,” she said, striving against the current for the earlier light tone, “I think we’d all be happier discussing something else. Auguste, won’t you entertain us with one of your little conclusions?”

I was proud of Lupa. Two years before, I doubt if he would have responded so gallantly to a request to treat his tremendous ability as a parlor game. After all, the question was comparable to asking a trained assassin to demonstrate his garroting technique over dinner. For surely Lupa’s deductive ability was as deadly a weapon as any bullet, wire or blade.

But he nodded graciously, even going so far as to apologize again to Sukhomlinov and Kapov for upsetting them. He then turned to our hostess. “What should be my subject, madam?”

At that moment one of the servants entered with a fresh bottle of wine. I was closest to him and he poured a sip for me to taste. At my approval, he began filling glasses. As he reached Lupa’s end of the table, Anastasia whispered, “Leo,” indicating that he would be Lupa’s subject. When he reached the Grand Duchess, she touched his arm and addressed him.
“Stand up straight and let Monsieur Lupa look at you.” The man was identical in dress and manner to every servant we had seen that night.

“That isn’t necessary,” Lupa said. “I’ve seen the man.”

“And?” Anastasia said, dismissing Leo to the kitchen.

“Beyond the obvious facts that he is newly married, deaf in his left ear, scrupulously honest, and plays the balalaika, I see nothing very distinctive about the man.”

There was a general murmur around the table. Elena was the first to speak up. “But how?”

I said, “I think I understand newly married. The ring?”

Lupa nodded. “Of course. Still shining, completely unscratched. He cannot have worn it over a month.”

“Leo was married three weeks ago,” Anastasia confirmed.

“But the rest?” Elena asked. “How could you see all that?”

“When Anastasia said the man’s name while he was pouring my wine, he didn’t respond in any way. Surely he didn’t hear her. His left ear was facing her. Therefore, I presumed he’d lost the hearing in it.”

“And the honesty?” In spite of himself, Kapov was intrigued.

“He offered Monsieur Giraud the first sip of wine from a full bottle. Many a servant will take the first nip, thinking it would never be noticed.”

“It’s true,” Anastasia said. “I’ve heard the other servants tease Leo for his honesty. When he finds coins that have fallen between the cushions in the furniture, he always returns them to me.”

“And the last, the balalaika?” Kapov said.

“Calluses on the tips of his right-hand fingers.” Lupa, slightly embarrassed by this public display, tried to make light of it. “Really nothing very complicated, you see?”

But Elena was impressed. “Do you see that much in all of us?” she asked. “It’s really rather frightening.”

Throughout the display, Sukhomlinov hadn’t said a word. Now he spoke up. “Yes,” he said, “it is rather frightening. What does a chef do with such a skill?”

The ever-effusive Anastasia answered. “Oh, Monsieur Lupa is not here as a chef. He is here for the murders.”

“The murders?” Elena said.

“You remember,” Anastasia said, “while you were in the Crimea with the girls?”

“Oh yes, for the first one anyway. I remember.”

“And I’m afraid I have news on that score,” Lupa intoned. “It’s been determined that the total has now reached four, the latest being Commissar Minsky He was murdered last night, here, in Tsarkoye Selo.”

Kapov raised his patrician brows. “Indeed?” he said.

At the mention of the Commissar’s name, Katrina Sukhomlinov, who had been so withdrawn all evening, suddenly burst into tears, covering her face with her napkin. After the first heartrending sob, she excused herself and rushed from the room.

Her husband, struggling to retain his aplomb, rose stiffly, bowed to all of us, and followed her.

“Oh dear,” Anastasia said again. “I’m afraid this isn’t going very well.”

Kapov took it as a cue himself. “I confess that my appetite has also deserted me. Will you please accept my apologies?” So saying, he got up and left us.

Just then, Leo entered with a crown roast of venison. Lupa beamed. “Your Highness,” he said to our hostess, then nodded to Elena, “Miss Ripley. Jules. Since those of us that remain appear to be of like mind, may I propose a toast to victory?”

We lifted our glasses. “And to the Czar,” I added.

Elena looked at Anastasia. “And to your husband’s safe return.”

We drank the toast and when Leo had served us, Lupa took a tentative bite of the venison. After a thoughtful pause, he said, “I think the classic hunter sauce benefits from a taste of red currant. Don’t you agree, Jules?”

6

W
hen I first heard the truth of it, I was furious. Now I am not so sure.

Dinner was most pleasant, with Elena and Anastasia doing most of the talking. After the disputes over Rasputin and government policy, it was nice to eat and listen to the women gossip over local affairs. Also, after my black thoughts earlier in the evening, it was good to remember that normal life does go on. All is not intrigue, treachery, and dishonor.

But Lupa had, after all, invited me to the dinner, and we had barely finished dessert when he indicated to me that it was time we leave. Thanking our hostess and bidding adieu to Elena, Lupa and I walked out into the frozen wonderland of Tsarkoye Selo.

The sky in the North glowed with the shimmering aurora borealis and the frozen crust of snow crunched under our feet as we walked the length of the main street of the Czar’s enclave. It was cold, but with the food and wine we’d consumed, I was comfortable.

We shared a few moments of small talk. Since leaving Valence, Lupa had spent some time in Corsica, done a job in Italy, and then had settled back in Montenegro. There, his relationship with his fiancée, Anna Dubrov, had come to an end. It had been regrettable, but for the best, since women, he said, could not understand his methods or his work.

Finally, I said, “It’s a wonderful coincidence to run into you again here in St. Petersburg.”

There was a moment’s silence, broken only by our quiet footfalls over the snow. “Yes,” he said at last. “Yes, it’s extraordinary.”

After a few more paces, I noticed that he was chuckling.

“Would you care to share the joke with me?” I asked.

“There is no joke, Jules,” he said. “I am amused at times by the amount of coincidence you are willing to credit.”

I remembered his first words upon seeing me at Minsky’s—“Ah, satisfactory!”—as though I’d been expected. Suddenly I felt like a pawn being moved by unseen and powerful hands, one of them Lupa’s, whom I’d always viewed as a friend.