The Kitchen Boy by Robert Alexander Page B

Little One is still sick and in bed and cannot walk at all – every jolt causes him pain. A week ago, because of the anarchists we were supposed to leave for Moscow at night. No risk whatsoever must be taken without being certain of the result. We are almost always under close observation.
     
    As for the map, it was a penciled floor plan of the dwelling, done by none other than Aleksandra Fyodorovna who, like all women of the nobility, had received not a formal education, but the proper instruction in drawing, watercolors, piano, literature, foreign tongues, and, of course, needlework.
    Within the hour Komendant Avdeyev himself led me out the front door and through the two palisades surrounding the house. I crossed the muddy square, just as Nikolai Aleksandrovich asked, and I went directly to the Church of the Ascenscion, a big white brick structure. Only one small door was open, and I entered and was struck with the scent of the heavens, frankincense and beeswax candles. Searching the hazy church, I spied a nun on her knees in front of a golden icon of Saint Nicholas. Crossing herself over and over again, she dipped repeatedly, bowing her forehead against the cold, stone floor.
    As I approached, the prostrated woman paused in her prayers and stared up at me with sunken eyes. “What is it, my son?”
    “I come from The House of Special Purpose to see Papa Storozhev.”
    The nun quickly crossed herself in the Orthodox manner – using three fingers to represent the Trinity, she dotted her forehead, stomach, right shoulder, left – pushed herself to her feet and hurried away. Disappearing into a forest of icon-covered pillars, she slipped into the dark corners of the church. Within seconds Father Storozhev himself came out, his head and hair covered with a tall, black hat, his flowing, black gown dragging behind him. His eyes as dark as ink pots, he stared down upon me as if I were a Red infidel.
    I boldly said, “Aleksandra Fyodorovna herself asked me to deliver this note, with the request that you pass it on to the sisters at the monastery.”
    I handed him the note requesting thread and tobacco, and Father Storozhev screwed up his eyes, studied the paper. I started to speak yet again, but then hesitated and checked to make sure we were not being observed. Only when I was certain we were alone did I unfasten my garments and withdraw the envelope containing the map and the response to the officer’s letter.
    “Papa, this is from
Batyushka
. Please deliver it to the proper people.”
    And then, of course, began our long wait in The House of Special Purpose.

5
    There are so many things, Katya, that I have never told you nor even my very own son – your father – but I had been with the Romanovs since shortly before they were exiled to Siberia. My own father – your great-grandfather – was off to war, and the food situation at home in the Tula province was difficult, so when my Uncle Vanya wrote to my mother and suggested I come to work at the Aleksander Palace in July of 1917, I was sent right away. We were a poor family, and my mother was only too glad to have one less mouth to feed, particularly during such horrible times.
    I arrived by the end of the month, a fortnight before the Romanovs were sent from their home in Tsarskoye Selo, a suburb of Sankt-Peterburg. The Tsar and his consort had many years earlier decided to make this their principal home, for there the air was clean and fresh, the gardens lush, and of course they were far away from the capital and decadent society. In essence, overwhelmed with the poor health of the Heir Tsarevich, they withdrew, which in the end actually precipitated their fall.
    Of course, another reason they withdrew from Peterburg was fear for their safety. Since the uprisings of 1905, political assassinations had been all too common. Indeed, during those times the whole of the House of Romanov feared for its life, realizing that the anarchists were intent on exterminating the