Anastasia and Her Sisters Read online

  We began by playing games—my favorite was charades, because I loved to act and I was good at pantomime. Later we wound up Aunt Olga’s gramophone to hear some music. The party ended with tea, the kind of tea I loved—platters of blini, tiny pancakes filled with smoked salmon and cheese; pickled herring on rye toasts; pirozhki, little meat-stuffed pastries; and all kinds of delicious cakes and sweetmeats. So much more delightful than our bread-and-butter teas!

  That winter, another cousin attended one of Aunt Olga’s Sunday afternoon parties: Dmitri Pavlovich, the son of Papa’s uncle Pavel Alexandrovich. Dmitri’s mother had died when he was born, and Papa had exiled Dmitri’s father to Paris for then marrying an unsuitable woman. Dmitri and his older sister, Maria Pavlovna, grew up in the home of Uncle Sergei (another of Papa’s uncles) and Aunt Ella, Mama’s older sister. After Sergei was killed by a revolutionary’s bomb, Maria Pavlovna married a Swedish prince and moved to Stockholm, and Dmitri came to stay in the east wing of Alexander Palace. Papa was very fond of him—they passed evenings playing billiards in Papa’s study and often went out riding together. Dmitri was an excellent equestrian, and he planned to represent Russia at the 1912 Summer Olympics in Sweden, competing in dressage and jumping.

  Dmitri was twenty-one, older than most of the other guests. He flirted with the older girls (Olga and Tatiana, and our cousin Irina) and teased the younger ones (Marie and me). He put a recording on the gramophone and invited my sister Olga to dance with him. “Come, Olya, let me teach you the Boston. It’s like the waltz, and I hear it’s all the rage in America. You’ll be the first girl to do it in St. Petersburg.”

  Olga blushed and shook her head. “No, no, it wouldn’t be proper.”

  Dmitri turned to me and grabbed my hand. “Then Nastya and I will demonstrate the Boston,” he announced, and everyone stopped to stare at us. I had never waltzed. Mama said I wasn’t old enough, and besides, I tended to be clumsy. But Dmitri put his hand on my waist and grinned at me. The gramophone produced a waltz tune. “Just follow me,” he said. “I promise not to drop you when we dip. Here we go!”

  We went spinning away. It was slower than a waltz, and I did not stumble but felt rather graceful. It was almost like floating, until he tipped me over backward. That was the “dip.” I let out a startled squeal.

  Abruptly the music stopped. Aunt Olga was glaring at us. “That will be enough, Dmitri,” she said sternly.

  “I thought Nastya would find it amusing,” Dmitri said, with a charming smile and a shrug. He was right. I was grinning like a fool when he bent over my hand and kissed it. “Thank you, Your Imperial Highness,” he said, without even the hint of a smile.

  That was, without question, the best party I had ever been to at Aunt Olga’s or anywhere else. I also believed I might be a little bit in love with Dmitri. He was the first boy—the first young man—who had ever paid any attention to me, and that was exciting. And I was the first girl in St. Petersburg to dance the Boston!

  Afterward Tatiana said to me, “I think we’d better not tell Mama anything about this. She might be upset that Aunt Olga allowed Dmitri to dance with you like that.”

  “Like what?” I asked with feigned innocence.

  “In such an inappropriate way, Nastya! You’re far too young for such dancing—especially as a grand duchess. We must always remember that we’re the tsar’s daughters, and our behavior must be above reproach.”

  “She was just having fun, Tanya,” Olga said. “But she won’t do it again—will you, Nastya?”

  I promised I wouldn’t, but secretly I was hoping I’d have the chance. I was sure I’d take it.

  We all wrote about the tea dance at Aunt Olga’s in our diaries. I reported that Dmitri was going to the Summer Olympics, but in case someone should read it, I did not mention that we had danced the Boston. Tatiana wrote, “Such a lovely time playing Aunt Olga’s gramophone.” Marie wrote, “I had a game of dominoes with our cousin Vasili, and he cried when he lost. The food was delicious.”

  And Olga wrote, “Irina was paid a great deal of attention by Dmitri Pavlovich.” But in the secret notebook she wrote, I thought only of P. and wished he could have been with me at Aunt Olga’s.

  Dmitri had paid attention to Irina? And all the time I’d believed he was paying attention to me.

  • • •

  On a cold and bitter Sunday in February, our aunt announced that there would be no party that afternoon, but before we could be disappointed, she added, “My darlings, today we are going to the Passage!”

  The Passage was a long arcade under a glass roof on Nevsky Prospect, the main boulevard in St. Petersburg. On even the grimmest winter day the Passage was brightly lighted. Crowds of people in fine clothes and others more humbly dressed strolled from one elegant shop to the next, gazing in the windows at displays of jewelry and furs, leather purses and ladies’ hats the size of serving trays. As always, a half dozen stony-faced Cossacks in bright blue coats, red shirts, and tall black fur hats hovered close by us.

  “I hate being followed around,” I grumbled. “Now everybody recognizes us. Wouldn’t it be nice just to wander where we please without anyone knowing who we are?”

  “Being followed around is part of what it means to be a daughter of the tsar,” Tatiana said. “You should be used to it by now.”

  “I’ll never get used to it,” I said glumly. “And I don’t see why we need protection. Why would anyone bother to shoot us?” I thought of poor Uncle Sergei.

  “Not shoot us, but kidnap us and hold us for ransom,” Tatiana said, “or to force Papa to do something—release prisoners or some such.”

  Now, that was an interesting idea. How much ransom would they demand for me? How many prisoners’ lives was I worth?

  Another part of being a grand duchess, I learned that day, was that we knew very little about handling money. We each received a monthly allowance of twenty rubles’ pocket money, from which we were expected to pay for little gifts for our friends and for our own small wishes. Other than notepaper and perfume or an occasional scented sachet for a governess, we hardly ever bought a thing, and never in a shop. We just asked Shura or one of the governesses to order it for us.

  Marie begged to stop at a flower shop. The owner flitted from one end of her shop to the other, chattering all the while. “Smell this lovely rose, just coming into bloom! And this orchid—have you ever seen one more beautiful?”

  I would have bought flowers to take home for Mama, but it would have taken all four of our entire monthly allowances to afford even a small bouquet! I’m sure the flower lady was disappointed when we left without buying anything, but she would certainly tell her friends and the other shopkeepers that she had received a visit from the grand duchesses.

  “I’d forgotten,” Aunt Olga said as we strolled through the Passage. “You have no idea of money, do you?” She opened her purse and gave each of us a handful of gold coins with Papa’s profile on one side and the Romanov double-headed eagle on the other. “Each gold coin is worth ten rubles,” she explained, and added a warning: “When the shopkeeper recognizes you, he may try to make a gift to you of some item you’ve admired, but you must not accept it. Insist upon paying. When you learn the price, hand him a little more than he asked. You’ll receive change—silver coins and perhaps a few copper kopeks—but don’t count the change in front of him. That makes him feel that you believe he may have cheated you. Take the parcel, thank him, smile, and leave. It’s as simple as that.”

  “And that’s how it’s done?” Marie asked, her big blue eyes—“Marie’s saucers,” we called them—even wider. “Always?”

  “Always,” Aunt Olga assured her. “If you’re a poor peasant buying eggs for your family’s supper, or you’re the tsar ordering a jeweled egg as an Easter gift for the tsaritsa, you find out the price, and you pay.”

  We visited a glove maker’s shop and a perfumery, a shop that sold elegant soaps, another with hand-painted silk scarves, still another with silk stockings as
delicate as spider webs, and a confectionery. I insisted on stopping at a tobacconist’s to buy Turkish cigarettes for Papa, his favorite. We bought and bought, for ourselves and for our favorite servants, and for Mama and Papa and our tutors, enthralled with the idea of shopping. When we ran out of money, as we soon did, our aunt laughed and gave us more. But she made us keep an account of every ruble, every kopek we spent.

  We passed a cinema, a wax museum, and a concert hall where poets were giving readings of their work, but those would have to wait for another visit. When our arms were too full of parcels to carry any more, we stopped at a coffeehouse. We never had coffee at home—only tea. “Oh, dearest Aunt Olga,” Marie begged. “Please may we come here again?” She sported a small mustache of whipped cream from the coffee she thought she wouldn’t like.

  Aunt Olga laughed and promised that we would indeed return to the Passage another time. “But now I’m sending you back to Tsarskoe Selo. You’re like gamblers who don’t know when to quit.”

  • • •

  It was our last visit to St. Petersburg that winter. The Great Fast was about to begin—seven weeks of doing without cheese, milk, eggs, meat, fish, and everything good. March in Tsarskoe Selo was still snowy and cold, and the sky was dark and cheerless. There would be no more performances at the opera house or ballets in St. Petersburg, no balls or parties. No festive Sunday luncheons at Grandmère Marie’s Anichkov Palace, no Sunday afternoon gatherings in Aunt Olga’s salon, no marvelous shopping trips.

  The week before the start of the Great Fast was called Butter Week, seven days of indulging in all the things we’d be denied, but especially cheese-filled blini swimming in butter. Mama barely tasted them. Olga and Tatiana enjoyed them, but Marie and I stuffed ourselves, butter dripping down our chins. Tatiana said, “It’s not a contest, Nastya. You don’t have to prove how many blini you can eat at one sitting.”

  And then it was over, and there was no sour cream on the borscht, no sausage in the cabbage soup, no butter on our teatime bread.

  But we didn’t mind. In a few days we would board the imperial train and set off on the journey toward the sunshine and warmth of Livadia, where spring had surely arrived. No one seemed more excited about going than my sister Olga.

  CHAPTER 4

  Lieutenant Voronov

  LIVADIA, SPRING 1912

  The imperial trains—the real one and the dummy—rumbled slowly southward, leaving winter behind. I played checkers with Alexei. Marie worked on an embroidery project, Tatiana was organizing something—I’m not sure what—and Olga stared dreamily out the window, a book open and neglected on her lap. Our tutors emerged from their car every morning and attempted to give us our lessons, but it was futile. Occasionally the train stopped, we got out and walked around a little, and then we were on our way again.

  My first mission when we arrived in Livadia was to figure out where Olga was keeping her secret notebook. This was important, because soon Lieutenant Voronov would come to play tennis and stay for tea, and he might even go on excursions with us, and I wanted—needed—to know what Olga was thinking.

  But the notebook was not among her devotional books, because, with the exception of those having to do with the Great Fast and Holy Week, she hadn’t brought them to Livadia. As I searched without any luck, I noticed among her music books one I’d never seen, covered in green moiré silk with a picture of Mozart ornamented with gilt. The notebook was wearing a new disguise!

  I skimmed through recent entries and found this, written a week earlier:

  Anya Vyrubova will of course go with us to Livadia, along with her collection of ludicrous hats. I marvel that Mother can put up with it. She wears one of these ghastly monstrosities for every occasion, even when she and Mother are singing duets together, which Anya loves to do. Papa always gets up and leaves the room. Who can blame him! Anya’s soprano vibrato rattles around like a can of dried peas. But I will be glad to have her there, because then I won’t have to keep Mother company while everyone else is out enjoying themselves. I know this sounds as though I’m an unfeeling daughter, but whenever it’s my turn to sit with her, we end up in an argument. Nothing I do pleases her. Anya, on the other hand, never fails to please her.

  This was not at all like what Olga had written just the day before in her “regular” diary, the one she left lying around for anyone to read:

  Anya and Mother entertained us this evening, singing duets.

  That was all. Period.

  • • •

  Anya Vyrubova had introduced Father Grigory to Mama and Papa, and that made her a very important person in our household. I once asked Aunt Olga if Anya had always been with our family, and my aunt replied, “Not always, but for a very long time. She managed to have herself appointed one of the empress’s maids of honor and became her closest friend, although she’s much younger than your mama.”

  Here’s what else Aunt Olga told me: Believing every woman should be happily married, Mama had decided early in their friendship to find Anya a husband. But Anya was very buxom—that is to say, she was fat—and red-faced and frumpy, and Mama had a hard time finding a suitable man for her. Finally, when Anya was twenty-three, Mama was successful.

  Alexander Vyrubov, a naval officer, proposed, Anya accepted, and Mama began to plan the wedding. Around this time, Anya first met Father Grigory and asked him what her marriage would be like. According to my aunt, he looked deep into her soul with those piercing eyes and told her, “It will be far from happy.” Anya couldn’t bear to disappoint Mama, and she decided this was her destiny. Anya and Vyrubov were married, and as a wedding gift Mama gave them a little yellow cottage close to Alexander Palace, so that she and Anya could continue visiting every day.

  Father Grigory was right. Anya was unhappy from the start, and a year later the marriage was dissolved. Anya settled permanently into the yellow cottage, and Mama went there often in the afternoons, taking one or sometimes all of us with her. Soon Anya was going everywhere with us. Wherever we went, there was Anya, keeping Mama company, singing duets.

  • • •

  Life was much more exciting at Livadia than it ever was at Tsarskoe Selo. People on the estates near ours gave parties and went out sailing and organized elaborate picnics, and they often invited OTMA. Mama allowed us to go, with Anya or Aunt Olga or one of our tutors as chaperone. Also, we had lots of guests at Livadia. Army regiments were stationed nearby, and the officers sometimes were invited to lunch with us.

  My favorite guest was the emir of Bukhara, a small, mountainous region in Central Asia that was a Russian protectorate. He arrived with his entourage of ministers and his personal doctor, driven from his palace to ours in a line of black carriages drawn by white horses. And this was just for luncheon! The emir was very tall and very fat, with a hearty laugh, and he dressed in brilliantly colored robes embroidered with gold and a white turban glittering with diamonds and rubies. He presented us all with extravagant gifts. Aunt Olga received an enormous gold necklace with tassels of rubies that quite astonished her.

  The only man in the entourage who did not have a beard dyed bright red and was not wearing embroidered robes was the emir’s translator. The emir had been educated in St. Petersburg and spoke Russian as well as anyone, but a Bukharan rule forbade him to speak to another sovereign in any but the Bukharan language, a Persian dialect. He would say something in Persian, his translator would repeat it to Papa in Russian, Papa would reply in Russian, and the translator would repeat the reply to the emir in Persian. Back and forth it went. The emir liked to tell jokes, and it took a long time to get to the laughter.

  Alexei didn’t want to miss the luncheon with the fascinating emir who handed out such wonderful presents. But when the conversation in two languages went on too long, Alexei got bored, and when Alexei was bored, he was a spoiled brat. Alexei could be charming, but he could also behave badly, and he was allowed to get away with it because he was the youngest, he was a boy, he would be the next Tsar of All the R
ussias, after Papa, and—this was most important—he suffered from a terrible, incurable illness that caused him great pain and placed a huge burden on Mama, and on Papa as well.

  The only one he obeyed without question was Papa, and often Papa was too engrossed in a conversation to notice his misbehavior.

  Alexei was sitting by Olga, but slouching in his chair, toying with the food on his plate, eating with his fingers, and finally—this was the last straw—picking up his plate and licking it. Papa turned away deliberately, saying nothing, concentrating on the emir’s translator. Olga murmured, “Lyosha, please behave like a gentleman.”

  “I’m not a gentleman, I’m the tsarevich, and I can do whatever I please!” he shouted.

  Mama, sitting across the table, scowled—not at Alexei, but at Olga. “Olga, why are you not paying attention to your brother? It’s your duty as his eldest sister to speak to him, to make sure that he doesn’t embarrass himself, or his father or me.”

  My sister stared at Mama. “My duty, Mother?” she said, too loudly. “And what about the embarrassment he causes the rest of us, his sisters?”

  Now it was Mama’s turn to stare, open-mouthed, as Olga jumped up from her chair. “I beg to be excused,” she muttered, and hurried out of the pavilion.

  I felt terrible for Olga, I was sure she felt guilty, and I could guess what would happen next. Mama would write another of those dreaded letters.

  Later I found the expected letter tucked in Olga’s notebook:

  You must be an example of what a good, obedient girlie ought to be. You are the eldest, and you must always do your best to show the others how to behave. I count on you to think of every word you say and everything you do. I expect you to be responsible for Baby’s behavior. That is your duty. Above all, learn to love God with all the force of your soul. Remember He sees and hears everything.