Chapter Four
Governor’s House, Tobolsk, Russia
Tobolsk, Russia
Chekov’s old rank meant nothing now. As newer men in the First Rifles, Chekov and Dostovalov drew night guard shifts first, so Chekov woke early in the evening of his sixth day at Tobolsk, swung his legs off the wooden board that served as his bed and stood, stretching with a mighty groan. His back creaked as much as the wood planks beneath his feet. The barracks room was quiet, a handful of other night-shift soldiers comatose among the rows of wooden bunks. The rest of the night shift was probably still in town getting drunk and making mayhem. He saw Dostovalov’s bunk empty—easily distinguished by the fact that it was the only one properly made.
Must have woken early. Hopefully I can catch up to him in the canteen.
Chekov pulled his pants on quickly then jammed his arms through his shirt sleeves and started buttoning up. His big friend had been making cow eyes at the oldest Romanov girl, Olga, the one with the lovely round face, ever since they’d first seen one another in the hallway. The girl had a melancholic air to her when she spoke but always seemed to brighten around Dostovalov, and she took frequent occasions to step outside for chats with him. Chekov had forged a wordless alliance with the second Romanov daughter, Tatiana, to keep an eye on the deposed grand duchess and impulsive veteran soldier. Still, he didn’t want to leave Dostovalov alone in the mansion for long; the man was really quite good at talking young women into very bad ideas.
On that dark thought, Chekov jerked close the knot on his bootlaces, slung his rifle over his shoulder, then pushed through the barracks door. He marched rapidly to the canteen. It was a short walk. The door of the canteen creaked open to reveal a couple of dozen brown-uniformed guards already at the dinner meal. The room was dominated by three long picnic tables with a griddle and pot against the far wall.
A bar of soap sat, seemingly untouched, at a sink near the entryway. Chekov frowned as he turned on the faucet and began to rigorously wash his hands, as had been his custom ever since he was a small boy under the watchful eye of his father, a surgeon. The water was pleasantly cool and Chekov kept his hands under the spray for half a minute. Having completed his exorcism of microbes, Chekov twisted the knobs on the faucet to full off, waved his hands dry as there was no towel, and proceeded to the buffet line to retrieve his food.
A chubby, disinterested looking cook piled eggs and kolbasa on his plate and there was a pot of thick black tea next to the griddle from which Chekov poured a mug. Settling down at the far end of one of the tables, Chekov started to inhale his meal as rapidly as safety and a modicum of manners permitted. The manners were not for his fellows, most of whom ate like pigs, but simply more ingrained habits of childhood.
“Hey, Chekov.”
A rough voice drew Chekov’s eyes up from his meal. A tall, broad man, as big as Dostovalov, approached. His brown-yellow eyes held none of Dostovalov’s warmth though as he sat down, uninvited, across from Chekov. The man had black hair with a pronounced widow’s peak over his hatchet nose, and crooked, yellowed teeth were visible in the middle of his bristly black beard. Chekov had seen the man around, he was with another company in the First Rifles, but they hadn’t been introduced.
“Yes, how can I help you, Comrade . . . ?” Chekov kept his voice level.
“Yermilov,” he said. “Washed your hands like you were getting ready to take tea with the tsar over there. Thought you were a hardened war hero, not some bourgeois fop.”
Hygiene is counterrevolutionary now?
“All the war heroes are dead,” Chekov said, in between bites. “I’m a survivor, and I have the habits of a survivor.”
“Oh, daintily washing your hands is what survivors do?” Yermilov said.
“Indeed,” Chekov said, he set his fork down and gave Yermilov a steady, unimpressed look. “I lost boys to German shells, bullets, mines, gas, but unlike other units, none of my men died shitting their brains out. Know why? Because we washed our fucking hands as best we could before we ate.”
“That why the Imperialists gave you their shiny medals? Your table manners?” Yermilov said.
Chekov snorted and picked up his fork again.
“Leading men in war isn’t just about the shooting and screaming,” Chekov said. “It’s about the little shit you do in between to keep the men alive and able to fight. Then again, I expect you wouldn’t know anything about that, would you, Yermilov?”
The big man’s nostrils flared and color tinged his cheeks.
“That’s right, I was never cannon fodder in the tsar’s useless war,” Yermilov said. “From what I hear, though, all the ‘little shit’ didn’t actually keep your men alive after all, did it?”
Chekov’s hand clenched painfully on the handle of his dinner knife. For a second, Chekov imagined Yermilov grasping at its hilt with sticky, red-coated fingers as he died, yellow-brown eyes wide, gasping for air around the dull blade planted in his throat. He was sorely tempted to make the image a reality.
The conversation around them stopped, a couple dozen brown-uniformed men stared, waiting to see how the new man would react. Forcing a deep breath in through his nostrils, Chekov banished the gratifying vision of murder and calmly sawed off another piece of kolbasa.
“So it would seem,” Chekov said. “Do you have a point, Comrade Yermilov?”
Chekov maintained his level, unfazed stare as he chewed another bite of sausage and egg.
“Just this, Chekov,” Yermilov said. “Don’t think you’re better than the rest of us because you managed to kiss enough ass to get both the tsar’s flunkies and the Provisional Government to think you’re some big hero.”
“Right,” Chekov nodded. “Well, I don’t know that I’m better than any of these lads,” Chekov gestured with his chin to encompass the room, “And I’m definitely not better than anyone because I’m a war hero. But I’m better than you, you personally, Yermilov, because you’re a pathetic mudak with a chip on his shoulder and you waste better men’s time with your bullshit because you know that’s what you are.”
Yermilov put a boot on the bench, making to leap across the table, but Chekov’s reflexes were viper-quick. As far as his nervous system was concerned, he was still on the front, ready to kill Germans. Chekov’s left hand shot out and grabbed a healthy clump of Yermilov’s coarse black hair. Using the man’s own inertia against him, Chekov slammed his head down into the table with a mighty crack.
When his head came back up blood poured from Yermilov’s over-prominent nose, while his eyes were unfocused. Chekov, hand still entwined in Yermilov’s hair, pulled his opponent off balance and forward, then twisted, so he sprawled across the table on his back, sending Chekov’s dinner flying across the floor. He pressed his dinner knife, point first, into Yermilov’s throat hard enough to draw a bead of blood. Looking up he saw three men closing in from another table.
“That’s far enough,” Chekov said, his voice eerily calm. He twisted the dinner knife just a little so the bead became a trickling line. Yermilov’s three would-be rescuers stopped. Chekov took a good look, memorizing their faces. Then he looked down into Yermilov’s piss-shit eyes, which were now wide with fear.
“I want you all to hear this,” Chekov said, looking up again, voice echoing throughout the now silent mess hall. “I’m not a hero. I’m not the tsar, or the Party, or the father who knew the postman was humping your mothers. I’m just a man who has seen too much shit and wants to be left alone. Tell your friends.
“Wanna prove your manhood? Take it to the whores down at the brothel. They’ll at least pretend to be impressed for a couple more rubles or a dozen eggs. Wave it at me and I’ll chop it off and feed it to you.”
Chekov looked down at Yermilov.
“And as for you, Yermilov,” he said in a lower voice. “I’m not interested in boxing with you. You give me any more shit, I’ll slaughter you and your friends over there like pigs. Understand?”
Yermilov’s jaw worked silently for a second, but he didn’t have enough fight in him to mouth off to a man with a knife at his throat.
“Da,” he said.
Chekov applied a fraction of an ounce of pressure to the blade, just to see Yermilov’s eyes widen in terror again. Point sufficiently made, he withdrew the knife and released the man’s hair, then shoved him from the table to the floor. Setting the knife back on the table, Chekov retrieved his rifle and slung it. Without another glance at Yermilov or his friends, but with his right hand clenched on the contraband pistol in his jacket pocket, Chekov walked with an intentionally casual gait, first to clean the tip of the knife and then back to the food line.
“I’m sorry,” he said mildly to the cook. “There was an accident and my food spilled. Could I get another plate?”
“Anything you want, Comrade,” the chubby cook said, hastily ladling out another helping of kasha, some kolbasa, another slab of bread, a dollop of butter, and some salo.
His appetite was gone, chased away by the adrenaline dump, but Chekov knew he would be hungry later if he didn’t eat now. So he secured his second plate, returned to his spot at the end of the third table, and resumed eating, more slowly this time. Yermilov, helped by his cronies, made his way out of the canteen. All their eyes were firmly fixed on the floor as they went.
The previous guard shift was already off duty by the time Chekov reached Freedom House. And, of course, Dostovalov stood at the back entrance, his tall, wide frame dwarfing Olga’s slender figure. Dostovalov laughed at something the girl was saying and the smile on Olga’s face would’ve lit up Petrograd. Chekov picked up the pace, gravel crunching under his boots as he stomped up to the back door.
Well, at least he doesn’t have his paws on her.
“. . . it’s true,” Olga said, continuing their conversation as Chekov drew near. “Whenever Alexei was upset with Mama and Papa he used to pack up his toys and ‘move’ into my room and declare me his mother.”
“A handful, your little brother,” Dostovalov said.
“Yes, but you must understand he’s been denied so much because of his condition,” Olga said, earnestly.
“Indeed,” Chekov said, slicing coldly through their conversation. “A terrible condition. A peasant boy with hemophilia would almost certainly have died by now.”
Olga’s pretty face fell, Dostovalov’s darkened.
“That was unkind, Sergei Arkadyevich,” Dostovalov rumbled.
Chekov sighed.
He’s right, it’s wrong to flog a young girl with things that aren’t remotely her fault just because of her parents.
“It was unkind,” Chekov said, kicking the toe of his boot against the Freedom House’s stone steps. “I apologize, miss.”
Dostovalov glared at Chekov, clearly wanting him to offer a more elaborate apology, but Olga seemed mollified.
“It’s quite all right,” Olga said. “I know we’ve lived a relatively comfortable life; at least up until now. It’s thoughtless of me to complain when so many have suffered as much or worse.”
Oh, sure, make me feel like more of an ass by being gracious.
“Not in the least,” Dostovalov said, quickly. “Right, Sergei?”
“Quite right, indeed,” Chekov said with a small nod. “Your family has quite enough to be getting on with.”
Olga smiled again, though not without a hint of reserve.
“Anyway, Tatiana will be done helping Mama settle in for the night soon,” Olga said, with a regretful look at Dostovalov. “I should probably go back inside so she doesn’t fret when she gets back to our room.”
“Good night, Olga Nikolaevna,” Dostovalov said.
Olga smiled demurely.
“Good night . . . Antosenka. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Chekov waited until the door shut behind the girl before he rounded on his friend with an incredulous look.
“‘Antosenka’?” Chekov said. “Since when are you Antosenka?”
Dostovalov grinned and shrugged.
“Just because she’s the tsar’s daughter doesn’t mean she can’t flirt a little,” Dostovalov said. “Not everyone wants to be an ascetic like you.”
“Just keep your hands off of her, all right?” Chekov said. “In the current climate fraternizing with the tsar’s daughter could get you shot by either side.”
“You think the monarchists can pull it together long enough to be the ‘other side’?” Dostovalov said.
“I don’t know. Maybe,” Chekov said. Both men were wise enough not to ask aloud the open question of what side they would be on should a force of Tsarist Loyalists come knocking on the Tobolsk Governor’s Mansion’s front gate. “General Dutov and his Cossacks keep making noise.”
Besides, we both know we’re on the side least likely to get us killed—whichever that ends up being.
“In the meantime we’ve got plenty of problems already,” Chekov said. “No trying to sleep with the tsar’s daughter.”
Chekov related to his friend Yermilov’s challenge, his own answer to it. Dostovalov chuckled and shook his head once Chekov was done speaking.
“What’s so funny?” Chekov said, rubbing his hands together for warmth.
“You are,” Dostovalov said. “You’re mad at me for flirting when you nearly murdered another soldier twenty minutes ago. Yes, word travels that fast around here. My friend, I don’t know how you form your priorities, but you may need to reexamine what worries you and what doesn’t.”
“No one is going to shoot me for beating up a bully in the mess,” Chekov said.
“Except maybe the bully and his friends,” Dostovalov said. “New order, new rules; sometimes it seems like no rules.”
“Only one rule,” Chekov said. “It’s just us, Anton. We gotta live. If others want to help, great, and we’ll help them if we can, but at the end of the day it’s you and me.”
Dostovalov’s cheerful face grew somber as he considered Chekov’s words; after a moment he nodded.
“Da, you and me, Comrade.”
Every third night they were off and, since their sleep cycle was well and truly screwed in any event, Chekov and Dostovalov usually stayed out late enjoying the limited pleasures of Tobolsk. As soldiers in the employ of the Provisional Government, they were able to get food and liquor in exchange for their paper currency without having to barter.
Their fourth night off, they had dinner in a small restaurant, really a couple of block tables in the parlor of the butcher’s house. Rationing precluded the existence of normal restaurants. The cozy wood-floored room was sparsely furnished and lit by two flickering oil lamps. The food was good, God alone knew where the butcher was getting the meat and produce to make decent meals.
As far as Tobolsk’s night life went, Chekov thought the butcher’s little eatery about the best option available. Every other place was crammed with Red Guards or recently discharged soldiers or prison guards from the local penitentiary, all throwing their weight around, waiting for an excuse to brawl.
There were a couple of local brothels, but Chekov didn’t have much interest. He wasn’t, despite his friend’s jests, saving himself for marriage. He’d paid a whore for her services once but found the process awkward and sad and had a hard time even finishing. It had contented him from that point forward to handle pent up sexual frustration himself, in private.
Chekov noticed, though, that Dostovalov appeared to have lost his usually healthy appetite for whoring. His big friend only snorted when Chekov asked him about his apparent lack of interest.
“Have you seen the poor creatures working in the brothel here?” He said, then held up a hand in negation of his own questions. “No, of course you haven’t, you’re still vying for sainthood. Well, trust me, there’s nothing there you want to stick your prick in.”
Chekov eyed his friend suspiciously.
“Since when is there anything you don’t want to stick your prick in?”
Dostovalov shrugged eloquently and continued to shovel thick orange solyanka soup into his mouth.
“You’re not avoiding the local talent because you’re pining over the grand duchess, are you?” Chekov said.
“Well, technically, she’s not a grand duchess anymore,” Dostovalov said, leaning back in his chair and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “But I don’t pine for anyone.”
“Good to hear,” Chekov said before taking another spoonful from his bowl. “We have enough problems.”
“Right,” Dostovalov said. “What are we going to do with this mess?”
Chekov chewed up and swallowed a spoonful of pickle, sausage, and broth, then glanced around the room. The butcher and his wife busied themselves in the kitchen shifting iron pans around their wood-burning stove, well out of earshot. No other patrons filled the tables this late.
“It looks like the civil war is inevitable,” Chekov said. “In which case, we don’t have a lot of great options. I suppose we could desert.”
“Yaroslavl is a long way from here,” Dostovalov said. “And my hometown is even farther.”
“Right,” Chekov said. “They probably check the trains at every stop for deserters and travelling cross country in winter is a good way to freeze to death.”
“We could steal horses,” Dostovalov said.
“There are no civilian horses around here; they’ve already been eaten or requisitioned,” Chekov said, shaking his head. “Or they’re hidden. If we steal army horses, that just gives them more incentive to hunt us down. And let’s say we get away, I know you’re a rustic outdoorsman but I’m not at all confident about living off the land for more than a week or two, how about you?”
“I was a farmer, Sergei, not a woodsman,” Dostovalov said. “There’s plenty of wild game, but precious little shelter. Anytime we come into town looking for a place to sleep we’ll be in danger of getting pressed into one army or the other.”
“Or shot as deserters,” Chekov agreed. “We stay here for now, I think. At least we’ve got food and a warm place to sleep. We can always run later if we have to.”
“What about your friends from the mess hall?” Dostovalov said just before finishing off the last of his soup.
“Yermilov and his cronies haven’t given me any more shit,” Chekov said. “If they do, we can always arrange an accident.”
Dostovalov grunted his agreement, leaned back in his chair and held up two fingers to the butcher, indicating he should bring two servings of the local samogon, home distilled liquor that was far less legal and far more available than proper vodka. The chubby man hustled over to their table with a jug and two wooden mugs.
“Here you are, Comrades,” he said.
The home-distilled hooch gave off a pungent, burning odor as the butcher filled their mugs.
“Phew,” Chekov said, rearing back. “Are you selling us the lamp oil, Grandfather?”
“Now, lads,” the butcher protested, “This is the best samogon you’re going to find in Tobolsk!”
Dostovalov grabbed his mug and knocked back a large swig. A grimace contorted his features as his throat worked. He coughed violently and slapped his hand on the table once the liquor was down.
“Jesus, what did you ferment to make this? Your knickers?” Dostovalov said in a husky voice.
Chekov laughed, and the butcher’s brow furrowed with offense.
“Relax, Grandfather, just a jest,” Dostovalov said after he finished coughing. He laid several more rubles on the table. “In fact, leave the bottle. It’ll do just fine.”
The butcher snatched up the rubles, appearing mollified, and left them to their drinking.
“It doesn’t taste as bad as it smells,” Dostovalov said.
“That’s a low bar,” Chekov said as he brought the mug to his lips and sipped at the liquor. After the fire of grain alcohol subsided, Chekov thought he could detect a bit of the wheat. He exhaled loudly and swallowed.
“Well,” he said, choking a bit. “It’s not the worst rotgut I’ve tasted, but it isn’t exactly the pevach either.”
Dostovalov’s answer was interrupted by the door to the butcher’s house swinging open with a bang against the opposite wall. A cold gust caused the flame of the wood burning stove to flicker, and chilled Chekov’s skin, despite the warmth of the fire and the liquor in his belly. The three men who entered with the wind chilled him more.
Ensign Matveev led the trio into the dining room. He glared as he stepped inside, eyes glittering over his snow-coated beard. Chekov doubted the head of the Soldiers’ Soviet was here looking for hooch and some hot soup. Worse, Yermilov’s ugly, snaggletoothed face appeared in the doorway behind Matveev, followed by one of his cohorts from the dust-up in the mess hall. Yermilov grinned maliciously at Chekov as he stepped inside.
“Good evening, Comrade Ensign,” Dostovalov said.
Matveev nodded at Dostovalov and Chekov, then turned back to Yermilov.
“All right, Yermilov,” he said, deep voice dark with annoyance. “I am here, at one in the god-damned morning. What’s the misconduct I’m supposed to witness?”
“Comrade Ensign, take a sniff at their drinks,” Yermilov said, pointing like a schoolyard tattletale. “That isn’t tea, it’s samogon. Chekov and Dostovalov are trafficking with kontrabandisty.”
The butcher sucked in a sharp breath at the accusation of bootlegging. With food critically low across the country, the Bolsheviks had declared it illegal for anyone to distill wheat, or any other foodstuff, into the high-proof liquor. Depending on Matveev’s mood, the butcher and his wife could be fined, or they could be executed, Chekov thought furiously.
How the hell did Yermilov know we came here?
“It’s not theirs, Comrade Commissar,” Chekov blurted.
“It isn’t?” Matveev said, raising a thick black eyebrow.
“No, Comrade,” Chekov said, shaking his head. “In point of fact, we actually have had that bottle since Pskov.”
The butcher exhaled and his posture relaxed fractionally.
“It’s true, Comrade Ensign,” Dostovalov said. “We picked it up on our way back from the Front and have been waiting for a night off to celebrate. Smell it like Yermilov said and I think you’ll agree it’s Ukrainian; no Russian would brew such foul cow piss.”
Dostovalov held the bottle out to Matveev. The ensign took the bottle and sniffed from the neck. Grimacing, he recoiled from the booze.
“You’re right, that smells like a Ukrainian whorehouse on Monday morning,” he said. “Well, lads, you know you’re not supposed to be drinking contraband liquor, so I’m afraid I’ll have to tell Colonel Kobylinsky to take your next two free nights.”
Chekov maintained a firm, deadpan expression. Yermilov’s face fell at Matveev’s leniency.
“Comrade Ensign,” he protested. “This is a serious breach of discipline, surely—”
“Yermilov, if I flogged every man who got into some illicit liquor, I couldn’t muster a squad to guard Citizen Romanov,” Matveev said. “And if you ever wake me up in the middle of the night for something this frivolous again, I’ll have you flogged. Get out of my sight.”
Chekov did allow himself a small smirk over Matveev’s shoulder at Yermilov. The ugly bully and his lackey departed, their shoulders hunched against the freezing winds outside.
Matveev sighed, then turned his attention to the butcher.
“Citizen, I am not a man of mysticism but reason,” Matveev said. “Nevertheless, I prophecy that the Tobolsk Soviet will send inspectors tomorrow afternoon to ensure there isn’t any hoarding or illegal distilling happening on these premises. I trust they will find nothing, da?”
“Of course, Comrade Ensign,” said the butcher. “Thank you!”
“No thanks necessary,” Matveev said. “It is supposed to be the people’s revolution, after all,” he added in an undertone.
“As for you two,” Matveev said. “I’d watch myself if I were you. Personally, I wouldn’t piss on Yermilov’s face if his nose was on fire, and neither will Kobylinsky, but if he gets those assholes from the Soviet involved, you could find yourself subject to discipline anyway.”
Chekov nodded grimly.
“We’ll keep that in mind, thank you, Comrade Ensign.”
Dostovalov washed as best he could without inducing hypothermia in the freezing barracks bathroom. Fall had brought yet another revolution and a steep decline in temperature. Of the two, Dostovalov was far more concerned with the cold weather in Tobolsk than he was with the Bolsheviks in Moscow.
He parted his hair carefully then dragged a cold razor across his cheeks, chin, jawline, and neck, paring his facial hair down to just his thick, black moustache. Hygiene complete, he dressed in uniform and overcoat rapidly, grabbed his rifle, and hurried out into the frigid night air.
Tonight Chekov was out with some of the other lads, attempting to make some more friends to counterbalance Yermilov and his thugs. Personally, Dostovalov thought they should just proceed with Yermilov’s accident. Chekov argued, probably correctly, that Yermilov’s untimely death occurring so soon after he informed on them would certainly rouse suspicion.
That’s why he’s the thinker, and I’m the doer, speaking of which—
Dostovalov hopped a waist high picket fence—such a pedestrian barrier to the residence of what used to be the imperial family—and made his way through the snow to the back door of the governor’s mansion. Two uniformed men stood, shivering, on either side of the door. Dostovalov raised his right hand in greeting.
“Dostovalov, right on time!” the young man on the right said. This was Virhkov. The other guard, another youngster named Blokhin merely nodded his greeting.
“Virhkov, shhh,” Dostovalov said. “Wouldn’t want to wake Citizen Romanov or his family, would we?”
“No, I suppose not,” Virhkov said. “Thanks again for covering our shift.”
“Don’t mention it,” Dostovalov said, then, acting on impulse, he peeled a few rubles out of his pocket and handed a couple each to Blokhin and Vhirhkov. “In fact, buy a round for the lads on me, eh?”
Their young, unlined faces lit up.
“You’re a real pal, thanks,” Blokhin said. Virhkov nodded rapidly behind him.
“Off with you, youngsters,” Dostovalov said, grinning. “Go have fun.”
The two youngsters trudged off through the snow. With the proper guards relieved, Dostovalov settled in for another sort of vigil. He leaned against the wall, a dreamy smile curving his lips. He imagined Olga, lithe of limb and slender of figure, wrapping herself in her thick coat even now, perhaps tiptoeing her way out of the bedroom she shared with her three sisters. Was she as excited to see him as he was to see her?
What has gotten into me? Sergei was right, I am pining.
The back door creaked open and Olga, bundled in a thick black fur coat, stepped out onto the back patio of the mansion. She smiled at him, blue eyes sparkling like sapphires in the moonlight. Dostovalov inhaled deeply.
“Good evening, Olga,” he said.
“Good morning, you mean, Antosenka,” she said, her smile turning impish. “It’s almost two, I thought you’d found better company.”
Dostovalov chuckled and shook his head.
“I can think of no better company in all the Russias,” Dostovalov said.
“I bet you tell all the girls that,” Olga said, shivering against the cold night air.
“Perhaps,” Dostovalov said. “But I’ve rarely meant it before.”
Olga slapped his arm and laughed merrily.
“ ‘Rarely,’ ” she quoted. “You are an impudent scoundrel. I’ve known men like you.”
“Forgive me, Your Highness,” Dostovalov said. “But I don’t think you’ve known a man like me in your life.”
Olga blushed, but then her face fell.
“Please don’t call me that,” she said. “They hauled away Bishop Germogen just for praying for my father as, ‘the Emperor.’ I don’t want you in trouble.”
“It’s two in the morning,” Dostovalov said. “I doubt there’s anyone around to hear us, but I take your point.”
“Please do,” she said. “Say, do you have a smoke? It’s freezing out here and I could use one for my nerves.”
Dostovalov obligingly tapped out a cigarette and lit it for her. Olga took a long drag off of it and sighed. Dostovalov nodded in approval; the girl hadn’t flinched at the ration-card quality tobacco.
“You’re wrong, you know,” she said.
Dostovalov’s eyebrows shot up, and he tilted his head at her.
“Not about that. No, I mean I’ve been around soldiers—and not just the officers. Tatiana and I worked in a hospital for the wounded. That’s where I picked up this habit.”
Olga gestured with her cigarette, then took another large puff.
“I know,” Dostovalov said. “They made sure we knew about you and the empress tending the wounded.”
“It wasn’t just photographs for propaganda, you know,” Olga said. “We assisted in procedures, helped save some lives, even. And we would sit and talk with the boys while we sewed or knitted blankets. Brave, wonderful boys, most of them. Mother, Tatiana and I were exhausted all the time, but we were happy. What we did mattered. One of my favorites, Mitya, had a big black mustache like yours. Though of course his manners were so very refined.”
Olga softened the last with a gently mocking tone and a smile.
“An officer, I presume?” Dostovalov said, frowning.
“Yes, an officer,” Olga said. “Don’t be jealous, Antosenka. Once he was recovered, he went back to the front. I was very sad when he left. Then the February Revolution, and the October. I don’t even know if he’s alive still.”
Olga was quiet for several seconds, her gaze far off, her expression unfathomable.
“I know the war was terrible,” Olga said. “I saw the men maimed by it. But I think what’s coming is so much worse. I’m afraid. For my family, yes, but for all Russia as well.”
Dostovalov gently grasped Olga’s shoulder through the thick fur and drew her close. She stiffened at his daring, but then relaxed, leaning into him, and accepting the comfort he offered.
“I think they’ll let you leave eventually,” Dostovalov said. “The communists don’t want to anger Britain or the rest of Europe at this point, not while they’re so fragile.”
“They also don’t want the monarchists to have figureheads to rally around,” she said. “No, they’re not letting us leave Russia alive.”
Dostovalov squeezed Olga tighter, her body warm against him even through his coarse uniform and her furs. There, in the bitter cold of the Siberian winter, her fragility was a tangible thing, the fear coiled inside her warring with the nobility and dignity expected of her. Even with the Romanov Dynasty thrown from the halls of power into captivity, Olga and her family carried themselves upright and proud—but not with the idiotic, inbred arrogance he’d seen from so many of his officers in the Army.
Never as politically aware as his friend, Chekov, Dostovalov had simply viewed the nobility and royalty as something that, much like bad weather or pestilence, God meant to be endured. They were inflicted upon the common man to build character in the here and now and make the fruits of the hereafter all the sweeter in comparison. He neither loved nor hated the imperial family as he neither loved nor hated a snowstorm—the existence of both were mere facts of life, no sense staying mad about them. He expected the communists would be no better, and thus was unperturbed that they seemed to be fucking everything up.
The Romanovs as people, though, were nothing like what he’d expected. The former emperor was unpretentious, quiet, polite, and practically radiated integrity. His love for his children shone in every word and deed, and their adoration of him was just as obvious. After three weeks observing them around Freedom House, Dostovalov allowed himself the uncharacteristically philosophical observation that maybe they’d simply been too good a sort of people to rule Russia effectively. Except perhaps the empress, she seemed like a bit of a reclusive loon, but even she had been polite and cordial in her own clenched-jaw fashion.
And amidst them all, Olga shone brightest to the war-hardened Dostovalov. He admired her tenderness with her ailing little brother, her unabashed affection for her sisters, especially Tatiana, and the way she struggled valiantly against her own melancholy to find the joy in even simple, day to day chores. The tendrils of their shared doom seemed to grasp her more tightly than they did the serious and practical Tatiana, the affable Maria, or the incorrigible Anastasia, but still Olga shone in defiance of her blackest thoughts and feelings.
She was, he thought, simply magnificent.
I’ve enjoyed so many women in my short life, why, oh, God, would You decree I must love a deposed princess?
“Whatever happens,” Dostovalov said. “I’ll defend you.”
“And how many girls have you told that?” Olga said, drawing away enough to search his expression.
“One,” Dostovalov said. “I’ve promised one young woman in my entire life that I would defend her no matter what came.”
Olga’s eyes widened, and she took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly, creating a small cloud of smoke between them. She shifted, not out of his arms, but to face him. She tilted her head back and closed her eyes, her lips parted invitingly. Dostovalov leaned in and kissed her.
Her arms encircled his neck and she pressed herself into him with abandon. For several glorious seconds, there was no war, no impending catastrophe, even the freezing indifference of Siberia seemed to abate. When their lips parted, Dostovalov took a deep shuddering breath, Olga’s eyes shone as she smiled up at him.
“You should come inside, Antosenka,” she said. “We’ll catch our death out here.”
“Guards are not supposed to enter the mansion,” Dostovalov said.
“Unless invited to do so,” Olga said. “I’m inviting you for the reason that you will protect us more ably inside with some hot tea inside you. If anyone asks, of course.”
Olga opened the door quietly and pulled Dostovalov along with her into the Freedom House.
Rubbing his hands for warmth, Yermilov grinned crookedly as the back door of the Freedom House swung shut. Two weeks of skulking paid off—the giant oaf really was fucking one of the Romanov girls. The oldest one, the prettiest one. Some of the men talked about the second daughter, Tatiana, but Yermilov had always thought that bitch too skinny, too German-looking with her thin face and cold gray eyes. Olga looked like a Russian girl.
Yermilov had allowed room for little else in his thoughts but revenge on that bastard Chekov for the humiliation he’d inflicted in the canteen. Sadly, after the slip up with the bootlegger, Chekov had proven too clever by half. He did his duties, he ate, he drank, a lot, but never to the point of stupefaction, he slept, he rose and repeated. He and Dostovalov socialized with others from their detachment in the First Rifles, Tsarist bootlickers, the lot of them. The Romanov girls flirted with them like whores, and they curried favor with the former emperor as if he were still in charge of the country. Pathetic.
In any event, Chekov had been too smart to slip up, but his big friend was clearly nowhere near so cautious. Dostovalov was thinking with his cock, and that was going to be the death of them both. And Nikolashka’s little whore daughter might get more than she was bargaining for while he was at it.