“One of you,” shouted Lepa, “go rouse up the ones asleep in the dining room. I’m going to direct the men up above.”
With that, Lepa bounded north up the corridor, cut left, and then practically flew up the main set of stairs to the upper floor. He found there the four guards for that floor, looking through the windows at the fire in the Kornilov House.
“What are you idiots doing?” Lepa demanded. “Shoot back for fuck’s sake.”
“Shoot at what?” asked one of the men.
“Muzzle flashes, you idiot.”
Lepa turned and retraced his steps down to the main floor, then turned left again, heading for the dining room. There he found men half asleep, but fast awakening, pulling on bits of uniform and boots.
“Forget the boots and shirts, you idiots! All you need are your rifles and ammunition. The house with the commander and our comrades is under attack. Half of you… no, that’s wrong… the second shift, upstairs to the large hallway and return fire. The third shift, come with me.”
Meanwhile, Ortipo, Tatiana’s little French Bulldog, ran back and forth, barking excitedly at all the noise and confusion. Lepa thought briefly of shooting the animal, but, All things considered, he’s not as annoying as those three women shrieking behind the officers’ room.
South of the town park, Tobolsk
It’s the odd crack of a passing shot that tells one someone has become annoyed with him. Those shots started coming in, filling the air with a malevolent sound, like a nest of hornets on the rampage but smacking head-on into a glass wall.
Federov shouted, “Panfil and Oblonsky, get those guns on the…”
Crack. Down went Federov, with blood gurgling in his lungs and pouring from his lips to the ground.
The section sergeant, Yahonov, ran to his downed officer. He flipped him over, only to see a seeping hole in the lieutenant’s chest, by the flash of a firing cannon. There was no pulse, no sign of breathing.
A bullet cracked by, far too close for comfort, especially given the dead young officer on the ground.
Yahonov heard Panfil ordering his gunner to shift fire left. Even as he did so, another shot bounced off the steel gunner’s shield, setting it to ringing, long and loud.
“Goddammit,” Panfil cried, “that’s too close. Target: Main floor windows, right. Fire! Continuous fire!”
The infantry gun began pouring forth high explosive shells at a rapid rate, twenty shells a minute. True, they weren’t bunker busters, but twenty of them a minute made them nearly as good, especially exploding in a not very large room. On the other hand, the Governor’s House was very thick-walled, indeed; if a shell didn’t go through a window or explode on the inside of a window opening, it was pretty much useless.
A couple of seconds after Panfil’s gun switched, Oblonsky’s joined in, blasting at the upper floor windows on the southeastern corner.
It didn’t stop the firing from that corner of the Governor’s House, but it reduced it in both volume and accuracy by a good deal.
The problem of the Kornilov House, however, remained, and one antitank rifle could hardly be sufficient to solve it if the men from Yekaterinburg tried a breakout.
Still, thought the gunner, squeezing the trigger as his sights lay on the right side of the main door, I’ve got to try… no matter how much it hurts.
Governor’s House, Tobolsk
With the dousing of the street and house lights, the group with Cherimisov—his company Headquarters, battalion Headquarters, and his Second Platoon under Collan—lit their head lamps and leapt forward. One squad threw itself against the door leading to the kitchen, sending it crashing, while two more erected ladders against the stockade and crossed over by a mix of those and men boosting each other over. Collan’s Headquarters followed through the broken kitchen door.
Only one guard was present on that section of the wall, and he was distracted by the initial firing coming from the Kornilov House. He hardly noticed the clubbed machine pistol that split his skull and laid him out from behind. Slammed forward into the stockade, the guard crumpled at its base, alive but bleeding and insensate.
“Repin,” said Sergeant Bogrov, “kill him quietly.” Repin promptly drew his knife, knelt down beside the prostrate guard, lifted his head back by his hair, and then slashed his throat from ear to ear. The gushing blood made little sound in comparison to the hellstorm arising across the street.
From both sides of the kitchen, and through the door, Second Platoon converged on the passageway to the Governor’s House. Briefly, confusion reigned until Collan said, “Second Squad, take point,” physically pointing Sergeant Yumachev in the right direction.
Second Squad, under their sergeant, followed by First, under Tokarev, bounded through the door and up the stairs. The glow from their carbide lamps flickered and flashed in the cut crystal of the overhead dome light, just inside of the doorway. Ahead, they could hear firing to the right and the sound of men trying to organize and equip themselves, to the left.
We have to go into the hall to go upstairs, thought Yumachev. But that means instant fighting.
“Flash,” Yumachev said to the man following him. Then the sergeant pulled a flash grenade from his belt, unscrewed the cap, armed it, and tossed it down the hall in the direction of the dining room. The man following, Ilyukhin, the coal miner’s son, did the same thing in the other direction. They waited a few seconds until they heard two booms, in rapid succession. Then Yumachev shouted, “Romanovs down! Romanovs down!” while charging down the corridor toward the dining room.
It wasn’t entirely clear that the men in the dining room could see anything at. But Yumachev and Ilyukhin beside him could see well enough by the light of their carbide lamps. They began firing, spraying bullets as if water from a hose, cutting down the Yekaterinburg Bolsheviks with neither hesitation nor mercy. As the other four men of the squad showed up they came on line and likewise began firing into the mass of writhing, screaming, begging, bleeding, and—most importantly—dying communists.
“All right,” said Yumachev, “back to the stairs and up.”
Meanwhile, covered by the fire and bodies of Second Squad, Tokarev and First Squad entered the corridor, rounded it into the staircase, and continued on up.
First squad, third in order of march, came out of the stairwell and, recognizing that there were two kinds of fire at play, and only their side’s was going to be full automatic, entirely, turned right in the direction of the other. The Bolsheviks there were not so stunned. Yes, Ilyukhin’s grenade had stunned and half deafened them, but, because they’d been facing out, it hadn’t done nearly as good a job of blinding them.
Thus, when First Squad came south down the hallway, five Bolsheviks were waiting and almost ready. They fired first, taking down the squad leader, Bogrov, one of the men, Levkin, both dead or soon to be, and wounding a third man, Bok, before the automatic fire of the remaining three cut them down while they were trying to reload.
Lieutenant Collan, meanwhile, guarded by his runner, Lopukhov, stood in the main floor corridor shouting, “Romanovs here after freed! Romanovs here after freed!”
His platoon sergeant, Feldfebel Kostin began searching the rooms. This was done by a process they hadn’t rehearsed, but hit upon by Kostin once he realized the rooms were too small down here, most of them, for the flash grenades. Instead, he kicked open a door, then had his assistant place a flash grenade at the opening.