Dunya left Princess Kossikovskaya vomiting to the sad twang of the balalaika player, and together we pulled Papa into the washroom, where we wiped his face with a damp cloth, changed his soiled shirt, and attempted to comb his unruly hair. As I pulled several strands aside, I hit the little bump on his forehead, a bump like a budding horn that he was always trying to conceal.
“I’ll do it!” he shouted, trying to grab the comb from me.
“No, Papa, let me!” I said, slapping away his hand.
Cowering like a little boy, he bowed his head and let me continue; unfortunately, when I was done he looked no better than a roadside waiter. Meanwhile, Dunya had slipped away to the samovar, to return with a tall lukewarm glass of tea loaded with so much sugar that the granules floated this way and that like snow in a lazy blizzard. This was Dunya’s medicine, which she dispensed not only when the barometric pressure changed, and half the city suffered from headaches, but also for colds, kidney aches, and, naturally, hangovers.
“Drink this all the way to the bottom, Grigori Effimovich,” ordered Dunya, handing him the podstakanik, the metal frame holding the warm glass.
Father did as commanded, downing the entire glass of sweet tea as easily as a shot of vodka.
As I watched him drink, I thought of all the horrible rumors about my father that floated like a black fog across town. The most persistent and most damning, of course, was that he was one of the Khlysty-the Whips-a peculiar and very secret sect that had evolved hundreds of years ago in Siberia. Whether or not their name was a derivation of Xhristi-the Christs-no one was sure, but according to rumor the Khlysty were a strange blend of paganism and orthodoxy and, it was whispered, were not afraid to sin. Because of all the nasty rumors-it was said they gathered deep in the forest, where in the dark of night they had big orgies and even ate the breasts of virgins-I was certain my father had never had anything to do with them.
Suddenly there was a heavy pounding on our front door, and Dunya scurried off. No sooner was she gone than Papa snatched the comb from me and threw it on the floor. I immediately retrieved it, for if one of my father’s visitors found it tomorrow the comb was likely to end up being sold and resold. Indeed, there were many souls, desperate for a miracle, who would pay great sums to run Rasputin’s comb through their own hair-what better way to bring God’s blessings down upon them? Just a few months ago I’d caught a baronessa picking up Papa’s fingernail clippings so she could stitch them into her dress and “be protected by his shield.”
“Dochenka maya.” My little daughter, he said, clasping both my hands in his massive grasp. “I had the same vision again. Earlier this evening I saw it all, quite clearly so.”
“Papa, please, I-”
“No, I’m quite certain of it. Soon I’ll be crossing over, soon we’ll no longer be able to see each other.”
In the last several years, fearing that he’d lost his powers, Papa had grown severely depressed. More recently, however, his gifts had seemed to return. Last week he’d healed a babushka who’d been as bent as a twisted branch with arthritis, and not long ago he’d foreseen a doubling of the cost of a single egg. But the return of his second sight wasn’t so very reassuring. I simply hated this talk of his own death, which he’d been grousing of more and more.
“I’m not afraid, and you must not be either, dochenka maya.”
“But-”
“Don’t worry, once I’ve crossed over I will send you a sign. I will signal you from the hereafter, and you will have proof that I am well and live on. Promise me you won’t be afraid. Promise me you’ll be strong!”
I hesitated before lying. “I promise.”
“Good,” he said, as he examined me with his piercing blue eyes. “Now listen to me. When I am dead you must hurry to the Palace and warn Mama and Papa that their lives are in danger. Promise me this too!”
“Yes…of course.”
“I see it as the truth, and Mama and Papa must be warned!” said my father, his sluggish face now beginning to dance.
“But-”
Dunya came hurrying back, my father’s extravagant thousand-ruble sable coat-a gift from the widow Reshetnikova-and beaver hat in hand, and said, “The motor is downstairs waiting, Grigori Effimovich. You must come quickly!”
Father looked at Dunya as if he couldn’t remember what was happening. Pulling away from me, he shook his head and stumbled. I rushed to his side.
And he said, “Yes, Mama needs me. I must hurry.”
Roused from his drunken stupor as if from a mere nap, Papa grabbed his heavy fur coat and hat from Dunya and started briskly down the hall toward the front door. As I watched him hurry off, I couldn’t help but be swept with worry. All this talk of violence. All this talk of murder. I wanted to dismiss it as simple paranoia, but how could I after the disaster that had struck us not so very long ago?
“Dunya, where’s my cloak? My muff?” I shouted. “Oh, and my shoes-where are my shoes?”
CHAPTER 2
There was no doubt about it, the horrible events of two years ago had been largely my fault.
My father had left Sankt Peterburg to visit a monastery and then return home to our village in Siberia. Varya and I, accompanied by Dunya, followed a week later, taking the train to Tyumen, where on a warm July day we transferred to a riverboat for the last hundred versts. Not long after we’d left the dock, the small cabin in which the three of us were packed became unbearably hot and stuffy.
“I’m going up top for some fresh air,” I said, rising to my feet.
My sister didn’t even look up, for she was already engrossed in a novel, her head propped on one of our bags. But Dunya, whose only duty was to guard us as carefully as a Cossack, immediately dropped her knitting into her lap.
She muttered a hasty, “But-”
“You’d better stay here,” I interrupted, knowing she was loath to let us out of her sight. “It wouldn’t be a good idea to leave Varya here alone.”
“Very well, but be back in thirty minutes-no more!”
Before she could say another word, I slipped out. It was only within the last two months that Papa had permitted me to travel the streets of the capital without an escort; Varya, because she was younger, was still not allowed to go farther than the corner store. And relishing my new freedom, I scurried down the narrow corridor of the steamer, out the door, and up the steep stairs to the top deck, which was totally empty.
All at once I was intoxicated by the magic of my Siberia.
Grabbing hold of a side railing, I peered over the edge at the flat, dark waters of the River Tura, which gave way to the churn of the boat. Gazing upward, I breathed in as deeply as I could, filling my lungs with the rich scents of the endless pine forests on the left and, off to the right, the loamy soil of the wild steppes. I was glad to be going home, glad to escape the capital with its endless buildings and incessant gossip. Here, where the nobility had never held land and so serfdom had never existed, everything was free and open, a nearly endless expanse of opportunity that existed nowhere else in my country.
Suddenly a lyrical voice sang out in the language of my heart:
“I have outlasted all desire,
My dreams and I have grown apart;
My grief alone is left entire,
The gleanings of an empty heart.”
I had thought I was quite alone, yet when I turned I saw a young man with long brown hair and a short beard, half chanting, half singing the words of our greatest writer. He had a smooth dark complexion and wore clothes that were suitably clean but by no means new. I supposed him to be four or five years older than I. In his hands he held a book; I stole a glance at his trim, clean fingers.