It was freezing that winter, I remember that much. The air in Palace Square was so frosty that every time the wind blew, it bit at my cheeks and ears and the tip of my nose, forcing me to dig my nails into the palms of my hands to stop myself from crying out loud. I stood in the shadows of the colonnades looking at my former home, thinking how different things had been when I had first arrived here two years before, so naive, so innocent, so desirous of an existence different to the one that I had endured in Kashin. What would my sister Asya make of me now, I wondered, huddled up as I was against a wall, my arms wrapped around myself for warmth?
She would think it my just reward, perhaps.
I knew nothing of what had happened to the Imperial Family and had learned precious little as I’d travelled from village to village along the way. I assumed that they had been held for a short time and then sent into exile, Anastasia’s worst fear, transported across the continent to England, where King George would no doubt have welcomed them with a familial embrace and wondered what on earth he was supposed to do with these Romanovs who expected so much from him.
Of course, it was Anastasia’s face that lingered in my mind throughout every day, as I continued my journey and during the nights, when I tried to sleep. I dreamed of her and composed letters and sonnets and all manner of foolish poetry in my head. I had sworn to her that I would never desert her, that whatever happened, I would be there. But it had been almost nine months since we had last seen each other on the night that she had visited me in my room at the Winter Palace, distraught about her family’s unhappiness. We hadn’t imagined that that would be goodbye, but the Tsar had chosen to leave early the following morning, before his family had risen, and it had been my duty to accompany him. I could only imagine how upset Anastasia must have been when she had woken and discovered me gone.
Did she dream of me as I dreamt of her, I wondered, as I lay in barns and stables, peering through the cracks in the wooden beams above me at the stars above? Was she falling asleep at the same time, perhaps, staring at the crackling bursts of silver in a London sky, wondering where I was, imagining that I was lying out under the same night sky as she, whispering her name, begging her to believe in me? Those were difficult days. If I could have written, I would have done so, but where to write to? If I could have seen her, I would have walked across deserts, but where to go? I had no clues and only here, only in St Petersburg – yes, it would always be St Petersburg to me, never Petrograd – could I find someone to answer my questions.
I had been back almost a week when I found the clue I needed. I’d picked up a few roubles that afternoon helping to unload barrels of grain into the storeroom of a new government-sponsored warehouse and had decided to treat myself to a hot meal, the kind that I rarely allowed myself to indulge in. Sitting by the fire in a warm, cosy saloon, eating a bowl of shchi and drinking vodka, trying to enjoy a few simple pleasures for once, to be a young man again, to be Georgy, I noticed a fellow a few years older than me sitting at the table next to mine, who became more and more drunk as the night wore on. He was clean-shaven and wore the uniform of the provisional government, a Bolshevik through and through. But something about him told me that I had found what I was looking for.
‘You look unhappy, friend,’ I said and he turned and stared at me for a moment, examining my face carefully, as if deciding whether I was worth bothering with.
‘Ah,’ he said, waving his hand in the air. ‘I was unhappy, it is true.’ He lifted the bottle of vodka in his left hand and smiled at me. ‘But not any more.’
‘I understand,’ I said, raising my own glass to him. ‘Za vas.’
‘Za vas,’ he said, draining his glass and pouring another.
I waited a few moments and moved across to sit opposite him. ‘May I?’ I asked.
He regarded me warily for a moment, then shrugged. ‘As you please.’
‘You’re a soldier,’ I said.
‘Yes. And you?’
‘A farmer.’
‘We need more farmers,’ he said with drunken determination, banging his fists on the table before him. ‘That’s how we get richer. Through grain.’
‘You’re right,’ I said, pouring more vodka for us both. ‘Thanks to you, the soldiers, we will all get richer in time.’
He exhaled loudly and shook his head, an expression of utter disillusionment on his face. ‘Don’t fool yourself, my friend,’ he said. ‘No one knows what they’re doing. They don’t listen to people like me.’
‘But things are better than they were, are they not?’ I asked, smiling, for even though he was dissatisfied with his lot, his allegiances most likely lay with the revolutionaries. ‘Better than when we lived under the Ts—under Nicholas Romanov, I mean.’
‘You speak the truth,’ he said, reaching across to shake my hand as if we were brothers. ‘No matter what else happens, we are all better off for those changes. Bloody Romanovs,’ he added, spitting on the floor, which led to a cry from the bartender to act in a proper fashion or be thrown out on to the street.
‘So what is the matter?’ I asked. ‘Why do you look so unhappy? Is it a woman, perhaps?’
‘I wish it was a woman,’ he replied bitterly. ‘Women are the least of my worries right now. No, it’s nothing, my friend. I won’t bore you with it. I had expected something from a petty bureaucrat in Lenin’s government today but was disappointed, that’s all. And so I’m drowning my sorrows to get over it. I will still be disappointed tomorrow, of course, but it will fade.’
‘You’ll have a hangover, too.’
‘That will also fade.’
‘You are close to Lenin?’ I asked, sure that I could find out what I wanted by flattering him.
‘Of course not. I’ve never met him.’
‘Then how—’
‘I have other connections. There are men in positions of power who hold me in great esteem.’
‘I’m sure there are,’ I said, anxious to be agreeable. ‘It is men like you who are changing this country.’
‘Tell that to my petty bureaucrat.’
‘Can I ask you…’ I hesitated, anxious not to appear too desperate for information. ‘Are you one of those heroes who were responsible for the removal of Romanov? If you were, say so now that I might buy you more drinks, for all of us poor moujiks owe you a debt of gratitude.’
He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Not really,’ he admitted. ‘The paperwork, perhaps. That is all I had to do with it.’
‘Ah,’ I said, my heart leaping within my chest. ‘Do you think they will ever be allowed to return here?’
‘To Petrograd?’ he asked, frowning. ‘No, no. Definitely not. They would be torn asunder. The people would never stand for it. No, they are safer where they are.’
I breathed a sigh of relief and attempted to disguise it as a cough. This at least was my first sure sign that they were alive, that she was alive.
‘They will be unused to the climate there,’ I said, laughing in order to win his confidence. ‘They say the winters there are cold, but they are nothing like they are here.’
‘In Tobolsk?’ he said, raising an eyebrow. ‘I don’t know anything about that. But they will be taken care of. The Siberian Governor’s house may not be a palace, but it’s a finer home than you or I will ever know. People like that know how to survive. They’re like cats; they always land on their feet.’
It was all that I could do not to let out a cry of surprise. So they weren’t in England, after all. They hadn’t even left Russia. They had been taken to Tobolsk, beyond the Urals. Deep within Siberia. It was far away, of course. But I could turn around. I could go there. I could find her.