The Tsar read well. His voice was quiet but he knew when to raise it for effect. Natasha wondered if it was true what they said in the servants’ quarters, that he was a bad ruler, that his indecision and his incompetence would ruin Russia. As the children filed out and began to make their way upstairs for bed, she felt the touch of a hand on her shoulder.
‘Natasha, my child,’ said the Empress Alexandra, ‘you know something, don’t you? Something about what happened in the city today?’
‘Yes, Your Majesty,’ said the girl. ‘I do know something, but whether it is true or not, I do not know.’
‘What do you know, child?’ said the Empress, drawing Natasha over to sit on the edge of a sofa.
‘All I have heard, Your Majesty,’ said Natasha, remembering her father shouting at her brothers not to believe every bloody rumour they heard in this rumour-sodden city, ‘is that there was a lot of shooting in St Petersburg, and many people were killed by the soldiers.’
Suddenly she wanted to cry for her unknown dead, mown down on a January Sunday.
‘They were bad people, very bad people.’ The Empress had raised her voice. For one glorious moment Natasha thought Alexandra was talking about the soldiers who had killed the marchers. ‘They’re all the same,’ she went on, and Natasha knew her hopes were false, ‘assassins, revolutionaries, bomb throwers, constitutionalists, liberals, seekers after the false gods of freedom and democracy. These are the people who murdered the Tsar’s grandfather, and God knows, they have tried to blow us all up enough times since. Why do you think we have to hide away out here, child? I will tell you. It is because the authorities tell us it is too dangerous for the moment to live in Petersburg. Until these people realize who rules Russia, we shall have more crackpot episodes like today. Do you know what they wanted to do, these scum? They wanted to hand over a petition to the Tsar! As if they had any right to tell him what to do! Let us hope that the rabble have learned their lesson today. If not we will just have to shoot more of them next time.’
Natasha bent her head so the Empress might not see her horror.
‘On Tuesday, Your Majesty, it is my afternoon off. Could I have permission to go to the city in the afternoon to see my family?’
‘Of course you can, my child,’ said the Empress. ‘I have no doubt you will find opinion in the city even firmer against the rabble than my own.’
Lord Francis Powerscourt was confident enough now of his knowledge of the geography of central St Petersburg to make his own way to the Shaporov Palace to collect Mikhail for their second meeting at the Interior Ministry. Snow had fallen during the night, obliterating the last stains of Bloody Sunday. Bits of clothing flapped about the streets, fragments of hats and caps were stuck on the railings, the front of a shirt, the sleeve of a jacket now shrouded in white. Dogs patrolled the area, still seeking, and occasionally finding, pieces of human flesh. Small scraps of proclamation still fluttered around the Neva. There was a bitter wind and the sun was in hiding. Powerscourt was just turning into Millionaires’ Row when two men in dark greatcoats stopped him.
‘You are to come with us,’ the taller one said in broken English.
‘Please,’ said the smaller one, though he didn’t sound as if politeness was his normal stock in trade.
‘I’m terribly sorry,’ said Powerscourt, trying to walk on, but finding his way barred, ‘I’m going to meet a friend just up the road here.’ If he shouted, he thought, they might just hear him in the palace.
‘Later you meet friend,’ said the taller one, who seemed to be the chief spokesman. ‘Now you come with us.’
‘Please,’ said the smaller one again, ‘no trouble. We no want trouble.’ Powerscourt felt something hard and round pressing into his side from the pocket of the smaller one’s coat. This was trouble.
‘Do you mind telling me who you are?’ said Powerscourt angrily, as he was frogmarched back the way he had come. ‘The British Embassy will hear about this.’
‘British Embassy!’ The taller one laughed. ‘This is St Petersburg, not London. British Embassy go to hell!’
They left him at a tall building on the Fontanka Quai by the Fontanka river that flows through the centre of the city and whose banks are graced by many fine buildings. A bald man shook him warmly by the hand and brought him indoors. ‘I think you will find it is warmer inside today,’ he said, in flawless English. ‘I hope my men did not inconvenience you too much.’
‘I have been inconvenienced quite enough,’ said Powerscourt, ‘and I demand to be released. It is barbaric to go around threatening people like this. And who the devil are you?’
‘I thought you might have worked that out for yourself by now, Lord Powerscourt, a man with your reputation as an investigator. My name is Derzhenov, Anton Pavlovich Derzhenov. I am a general in the army of the Tsar, and Chief of the Okhrana, the secret police charged with the responsibility of defending the person of His Majesty and the integrity of his state. At your service.’ He bowed deeply to his visitor.
De Chassiron had told Powerscourt about the many different secret organizations charged with extirpating terrorism, special sections of the police, of the military, of the troops guarding the imperial family, even of the customs. None, in his view, could compare with the Okhrana in the cruelty of their interrogations or their determination to achieve their goals. Not that General Derzhenov looked like a secret policeman. People seldom did. His most distinguishing characteristic was that he was completely bald. Powerscourt didn’t think he had ever seen a man so bald. He looked as though he had never had any hair at all. Perhaps, Powerscourt thought, he had been born bald and nothing had ever grown on the top of his head. He was of average height with a small goatee beard and he was conservatively dressed as if he was going to a board meeting. Powerscourt felt he would not have looked out of place in an Inn of Court, relentlessly harrying opposition witnesses and flattering the jury.
‘Let me give you a very brief tour, Lord Powerscourt. Our visitors are always curious about what goes on in the Okhrana.’ Derzhenov laughed an ominous laugh.
With that he led the way down a flight of stairs to a very long corridor in the basement. Powerscourt saw that the building went back a very long way. There was a series of doors in antiseptic green on either side of the passageway, some with small glass peepholes near the top. There was a very bad smell that might have been rotting flesh. Powerscourt thought he could see a trail of blood oozing out of one of the doors at the far end.
‘It’s a lot quieter since we taped up all their mouths, Lord Powerscourt.’ Derzhenov spoke as if he was showing a potential purchaser round a desirable residence in Mayfair. ‘The neighbours used to complain about the screams. One or two of the guests manage to free themselves of the tapes but not for long.’
He talked, Powerscourt thought, as if he were discussing a new method of producing pig iron or some other industrial process rather than the torture techniques of the Russian secret service. He shivered slightly.
‘We’ve been trying out some new methods,’ General Derzhenov went on, peering in through one of the grilles and making approving noises. ‘We’ve recruited a number of former peasants recently. They have a remarkable aptitude for the work.’
The General tapped lightly on the glass and made winding movements with his hand as if he thought the rack or the press holding the victim should be made even tighter. Then he waved happily as if his suggestion had worked.