29. Rasputin with children in his Siberian village.
Rasputin’s influence reached its apogee late in 1916 following an unsuccessful attempt to bribe him. Trepov was told by the Duma leaders that the price for their cooperation was the removal of Protopopov. He accordingly informed Protopopov that he wished him to give up the Ministry of the Interior and take over that of Commerce. As soon as he learned of this development, Rasputin concluded that a Trepov-Rodzianko intrigue was in the making and intervened with the Empress on Protopopov’s behalf.108 Protopopov stayed on the job. The incident persuaded Trepov that unless Rasputin was removed he would not be able to carry out his duties. Rasputin was known to take bribes left and right: Protopopov alone paid him a monthly subsidy of 1,000 rubles from the funds of the Department of Police.109 Aware of these facts, Trepov decided to tempt Rasputin with a bribe to end all bribes. Using as intermediary his brother-in-law, General A. A. Mosolov, who happened to be one of Rasputin’s drinking companions, he offered Rasputin up to 200,000 rubles in cash as well as a monthly allowance, if he would return to Siberia and stay out of politics. Rasputin promised to consider the offer, but sensing an opportunity to bring down Trepov and enhance his own reputation with the Court, he informed the Empress. This marked the beginning of the end for Trepov.110 Rasputin’s prestige at the Court rose commensurately, for he now had proven that he was, indeed, an “incorruptible man of the people.”
The failure of Trepov’s maneuver persuaded right-wing enemies of Rasputin that they had no choice but to kill him. A conspiracy was hatched in Petrograd in early November, before Trepov’s ill-fated venture, and got underway the following month. Implicated were persons from the very highest strata of St. Petersburg society, including a grand duke and the husband of a grand duchess. The central figure was twenty-nine-year-old Prince Felix Iusupov. Educated in Oxford, handsome in an effeminate way, an admirer of Oscar Wilde, he was known as a superstitious coward. Iusupov initially hoped to influence Rasputin to change his ways and to this end befriended him, but when this effort failed, he decided on drastic action, having become convinced that Rasputin was drugging the Tsar as well as maintaining contact with enemy agents. His mother, Zinaida Iusupov-Elston, the richest woman in Russia (her family income for 1914 was estimated at 1.3 million rubles, equivalent to nearly one ton of gold), had once been friendly with the Empress, but the two had fallen out over Rasputin. Suggestions have been made that it was she who persuaded her apolitical son to organize the plot.111 But it is more likely that the main influence on Iusupov was twenty-five-year-old Grand Duke Dmitrii Pavlovich, a favorite nephew of the Tsar and a leading contender for the hand of Grand Duchess Olga, who filled Iusupov’s head with stories of Rasputin’s alleged treachery.
Once he had made up his mind to kill Rasputin, Iusupov looked for accomplices.* Having heard Vasilii Maklakov attack Rasputin in the Duma, Iusupov invited him to join the conspiracy. He assured Maklakov that no later than two weeks after Rasputin’s death, the Empress would be confined to a mental institution:
Her spiritual balance depends entirely on Rasputin: the instant he is gone, it will disintegrate. And once the Emperor has been freed of Rasputin’s and his wife’s influence, everything will change: he will turn into a good constitutional monarch.112
Iusupov told Maklakov that he intended to hire either revolutionary terrorists or professional assassins, but Maklakov dissuaded him: if the deed must be done—and he did not dispute that—then Iusupov and his accomplices had to do it. Maklakov offered to provide advice and legal help, but regretted being unable personally to take part in Rasputin’s murder, because on the night when it was to occur (December 16) he had a speaking engagement in Moscow. “Just in case,” he gave Iusupov a rubber truncheon with a lead tip.
Iusupov next contacted Purishkevich, who had become persuaded from conversations with the military that the government was leading the country to disaster. Early in November, he used his private Red Cross trains to distribute Miliukov’s speech among frontline troops. On November 3 he dined with Nicholas at headquarters and pleaded with him to be rid of the new False Pretender, as he called Rasputin.113 The Duma speech which Purishkevich delivered against Rasputin on November 19 was second only to Miliukov’s in the attention it received nationwide. Iusupov listened to it from the gallery and two days later contacted him. Purishkevich unhesitatingly agreed to join.114 Two additional persons were brought in: a young lieutenant and a physician named Lazavert, who served on Purishkevich’s train. Grand Duke Dmitrii, the fifth member of the group, was of invaluable assistance because his status as member of the Imperial family gave the conspirators immunity from police searches. The plotters were anything but tight-lipped. A number of outsiders, among them a visiting British diplomat, Samuel Hoare, knew well in advance what was about to happen.115 Purishkevich boasted to more than one acquaintance that on December 16 he would assassinate Rasputin.116
The plan was to commit the murder in such a way as to give the impression that Rasputin was not dead but had disappeared. Iusupov, who had the victim’s confidence, was to lure him to his palatial residence on the Moika, poison him, and with the help of associates tracelessly dispose of the corpse. Detailed preparations were made in late November. The conspirators pledged never to divulge what they had done—a pledge that both Purishkevich and Iusupov would break.
The date for the murder was set for the night of December 16–17, the eve of the closing session of the Duma.
Rasputin had received many warnings of a plot on his life and was not easily enticed from his apartment at Gorokhovaia 64, where he lived under the protection of the police and his own bodyguards. Nevertheless, on December 13 he agreed to visit Iusupov to make the acquaintance of his wife, Irina, a niece of the Tsar. On the fatal day, Rasputin received explicit warnings from Protopopov, Vyrubova, and anonymous callers. He seems to have had premonitions, for he was said during these days to have destroyed his correspondence, made deposits in his daughters’ bank accounts, and spent much time in prayer.117
It was arranged that Iusupov would arrive at Rasputin’s house by car at midnight, after the police guards had been withdrawn, and come up through the back stair. Rasputin attired himself for the occasion in his most seductive clothing: wide trousers of black velvet, new leather boots, a white silk shirt with blue embroidery, and a satin waistband decorated in gold, a gift from the Empress.118 Iusupov recalled that he exuded a powerful odor of cheap soap and looked cleaner than he had ever seen him.
Iusupov pulled up at Gorokhovaia 64 shortly past midnight in Purishkevich’s car, driven by Dr. Lazavert disguised as a chauffeur. Rasputin put on a beaver hat and rubber boots. They then drove to Iusupov’s residence. The conspirators had carefully prepared the scene of the crime. Iusupov led his guest to a room on the ground floor which normally stood empty but which had now been furnished to look like a salon: scattered teacups and wineglasses gave the impression that a party had recently taken place there. Iusupov said that his wife was upstairs but would soon come down to join them (in reality, she was in the Crimea, a thousand miles away). Iusupov’s fellow conspirators were gathered in the room directly above, which served as a study and was linked to the ground floor by a narrow staircase. From there came the sounds of “Yankee Doodle” played over and over on a gramophone. While pretending to await his wife, Iusupov offered Rasputin refreshments from a nearby table, on which stood a tray with almond and chocolate pastries: Dr. Lazavert had inserted into the chocolate cakes powerful doses of powdered potassium cyanide. A bottle of Rasputin’s favorite Madeira was also available, and next to it glasses with the same poison in liquid form. Annoyed at being kept waiting, Rasputin refused to drink or eat, but Iusupov eventually cajoled him into partaking of the pastries and wine. He waited anxiously for the poison to take effect (according to the physician, this should have happened within fifteen minutes) and at Rasputin’s request sang to the accompaniment of a guitar. Rasputin seemed a bit unwell but he did not collapse. The alarmed Iusupov excused himself and went upstairs. By now, two hours had passed since Rasputin’s arrival.