middle of a conversation with me, as if he had only just paused to think of the right word to say. I sat by his lifeless body for a long time, hoping I was mistaken, until a nurse came and pulled me away.
I thought of Sasha in every spare hour I had. I had heard nothing from him—I didn’t expect to. We didn’t say anything about writing at our last meeting in the camp. His face haunted me, and I desperately wanted to see him smile again. Every day I wondered where he was, whether he was cold or had enough to eat. I had no way of asking without admitting to knowing him. There were some platoons kept in reserve, I heard. How I prayed that his was one of them!
I kept picturing him walking into the garden, wearing his smart Semyonovsky uniform and his impish smile, waiting to tease me and tell me how they had all gotten lost and missed the action, and now were sent back to Petrograd to form part of the palace guard again. Sometimes I managed to convince myself that my pleasant daydreams were true.
That is, until I discovered with horror that they were not.
On my way into the convalescent ward in the hospital in the Catherine Palace on a beautiful September morning, I passed the orderlies carrying newly arrived wounded soldiers on stretchers, as I did every day. This seemed like a particularly badly wounded lot. Their bandages were dirty and ragged, and so many of the wounds were gangrenous that even though I had accustomed myself somewhat to the smell, I nearly fainted from it.
I had an unconscious habit of scrutinizing each face I could see, thinking thank God each time I realized they were all strangers, not Sasha. But that day, one of the faces caught my attention in an odd way. The left side of it was completely covered with bandages. A dark brown spot of congealed blood made it look as though a child had painted a crude eye on the white linen. The other eye was exposed, but closed. Something in the shape of the nose and the color of the skin, a trace of light freckles and delicately flared nostrils, struck a chord in me. Just as the orderlies were about to wheel the gurney down the corridor that led to the operating theater, the unbandaged eye opened, and I knew in an instant it was Sasha.
My first instinct was to simply run after the gurney, but what if I was mistaken? What if I so longed to see Sasha that even a faint resemblance brought him to mind? Yet I knew I had to find out for certain. “Sister,” I said to the nurse who was leading me away toward the ward where I was expected to go and read, “There is something I must do right away!”
She turned her weary eyes upon me as if to say, I have no time for capricious grand duchesses . “Yes, Anastasia Nicholaevna?”
“Please excuse me—my mother—” I couldn’t formulate any other excuse to get away in the direction of the operating theater. I had lost all capacity to think of words, conscious only of the feeling of my heart dropping into my stomach.
She frowned, but I knew she would not deny me. I hurried without running—I had been told that in the hospital only a hemorrhage was cause for running. Nonetheless, I walked fast enough to catch up with the orderlies just as they were pushing the gurney through the swinging doors—the swinging doors beyond which I was not allowed. The two men handed their cargo off to the nurses on the other side just before I reached them. I wanted to defy regulations and go in, but I had been told that to do so could endanger the lives of those undergoing surgery. The next best thing, I decided, would be to find out from the orderlies what they knew about the wounded soldier they’d just dropped off.
These orderlies were men I had become quite accustomed to seeing. They made an odd pair. One was small with a sharp chin and round eyes, a nose that was a little too long for his face, giving him the appearance of an oversized rodent. The other was as exaggeratedly large as the other was small, with a stomach that
I thought of Sasha in every spare hour I had. I had heard nothing from him—I didn’t expect to. We didn’t say anything about writing at our last meeting in the camp. His face haunted me, and I desperately wanted to see him smile again. Every day I wondered where he was, whether he was cold or had enough to eat. I had no way of asking without admitting to knowing him. There were some platoons kept in reserve, I heard. How I prayed that his was one of them!
I kept picturing him walking into the garden, wearing his smart Semyonovsky uniform and his impish smile, waiting to tease me and tell me how they had all gotten lost and missed the action, and now were sent back to Petrograd to form part of the palace guard again. Sometimes I managed to convince myself that my pleasant daydreams were true.
That is, until I discovered with horror that they were not.
On my way into the convalescent ward in the hospital in the Catherine Palace on a beautiful September morning, I passed the orderlies carrying newly arrived wounded soldiers on stretchers, as I did every day. This seemed like a particularly badly wounded lot. Their bandages were dirty and ragged, and so many of the wounds were gangrenous that even though I had accustomed myself somewhat to the smell, I nearly fainted from it.
I had an unconscious habit of scrutinizing each face I could see, thinking thank God each time I realized they were all strangers, not Sasha. But that day, one of the faces caught my attention in an odd way. The left side of it was completely covered with bandages. A dark brown spot of congealed blood made it look as though a child had painted a crude eye on the white linen. The other eye was exposed, but closed. Something in the shape of the nose and the color of the skin, a trace of light freckles and delicately flared nostrils, struck a chord in me. Just as the orderlies were about to wheel the gurney down the corridor that led to the operating theater, the unbandaged eye opened, and I knew in an instant it was Sasha.
My first instinct was to simply run after the gurney, but what if I was mistaken? What if I so longed to see Sasha that even a faint resemblance brought him to mind? Yet I knew I had to find out for certain. “Sister,” I said to the nurse who was leading me away toward the ward where I was expected to go and read, “There is something I must do right away!”
She turned her weary eyes upon me as if to say, I have no time for capricious grand duchesses . “Yes, Anastasia Nicholaevna?”
“Please excuse me—my mother—” I couldn’t formulate any other excuse to get away in the direction of the operating theater. I had lost all capacity to think of words, conscious only of the feeling of my heart dropping into my stomach.
She frowned, but I knew she would not deny me. I hurried without running—I had been told that in the hospital only a hemorrhage was cause for running. Nonetheless, I walked fast enough to catch up with the orderlies just as they were pushing the gurney through the swinging doors—the swinging doors beyond which I was not allowed. The two men handed their cargo off to the nurses on the other side just before I reached them. I wanted to defy regulations and go in, but I had been told that to do so could endanger the lives of those undergoing surgery. The next best thing, I decided, would be to find out from the orderlies what they knew about the wounded soldier they’d just dropped off.
These orderlies were men I had become quite accustomed to seeing. They made an odd pair. One was small with a sharp chin and round eyes, a nose that was a little too long for his face, giving him the appearance of an oversized rodent. The other was as exaggeratedly large as the other was small, with a stomach that
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