Of course, they had not seen the bodies on the carts, they had been too far away for that; however, they had seen him and his men and horses in the area, and most likely heard the truck as it slowly ground its way through the forest.
No, he thought, he couldn't risk it. He didn't want this lot found. Ever. And he wanted to keep his superiors guessing too, just in case they had cause to question or doubt him.
'Separate the two smallest ones,' he ordered with a bitter laugh. 'If anyone does find them, they won't find them all in this pit.'
His men did what they were told, dragging two of the naked, blood-soaked disfigured bodies to one side before they threw the remaining nine into the shallow grave.
He gave the two left behind a cursory glance; although he didn't care, he wanted to know which ones they were, just to satisfy himself once the gossip and stories started circulating.
They lay on their stomachs in the long grass, and he turned them over with the toe of his boot, to get a better look. The so-called heir, Alexey and his sister, Maria. He knew her well enough alright; it was her that had become far too familiar with some of the guards, flirting and leading them on, to the point where they could no longer be trusted to do their jobs, and had to be dismissed.
She had been beautiful in life, he thought, what they called a classical Russian beauty and probably would have made herself a good marriage had she lived. Well, she won't now, he thought wryly, she looked like a slaughtered cow.
And he had no feelings whatsoever about the death of Alexey. He could never have been allowed to live because even though Nicholas had abdicated for both himself and the boy, once Nicholas was dead, the monarchists would have rallied around the boy anyway, and that would have started off a whole new set of problems for Russia.
He had the men move the two a short distance away from the main grave. 'Burn them to ash.' He ordered, curious to see whether it was indeed possible to do so.
They obeyed, dousing the two soaking wet bodies with petrol and set them alight. The bodies smoked and hissed, and a ghastly stench filled the air, making the men who were manning the fire retch. They stoked the fire they had made with anything that would burn.
He soon discovered that no matter how hot the fire was stoked, it was going to take hours to completely burn them, hours that he just did not have. He cursed again and ordered the men to crush the partially burnt bodies with their spades and bury them there where they lay.
The remaining ashes were scattered to the wind.
Taking his notebook out of his pocket, he carefully recorded the coordinates of the two burial sites, as well as drawing a detailed map, showing the location of the main grave as it related to the Old Koptyaki Road, and likewise the smaller burial site. His insurance policy.
He felt an intense sense of relief at finally having completed the job and getting rid of these cursed people; they had inhabited his waking hours for far too long.
He looked at his watch again; it was six in the morning on 19 July. He was amazed at how long it had taken; it should have been a simple job, and once again, he cursed the circumstances that had gotten in his way. But he reasoned with himself, he had done his best, and he was positive that they would never be discovered.
His men sat on the ground, exhausted and filthy, covered in the detritus of the killings and disposals; blood, ash, mud, sweat. The overall stench of death hung over them all. He wondered if he would ever be able to get that stench out of his head.
Some were smoking, others drinking from water containers. The leader now knew for sure that a few of them had been drinking alcohol too, he could smell it, but he reckoned that they had deserved it; they had done a good job.
Despite that, though, he levelled them all with a steely gaze. 'If any of you still have any valuables from tonight in your possession, I suggest most strongly that they are placed on the desk in my office when we get back to the house. I've warned you once already, and I won't be doing it again, This is your last warning. If I find anyone has disobeyed this order, I promise, you will be shot.'
A few of the men fidgeted in discomfort, avoiding meeting his eyes, and he knew he had been right. He didn't blame them for trying; most of them had families to feed, and one of the diamonds or other stones they had access to tonight would have kept them in comfort for years. Yes, he could understand it, but not allow it.
'One more thing. None of you will speak about what you have seen over the last three days, either at the house or here in the forest. Do you understand me? No-one must ever know what we did with Nicholas.'
He watched them nod their heads or speak their affirmation.
'This remains here, with us. No-one is to know. No-one is to know of this place.'
After loading their equipment, he and his men got back in the truck, and they started to make their slow, laborious way back to the city. He sat in the cab with the driver, the tray of the vehicle was still rank with blood.
Once back at Ipatiev House, he ordered two of the men to wash down the tray of the truck, and although a large bloodstain was still clearly visible, he had the driver return it to the garage.
Once inside the house, he noticed how chillingly quiet and eerie it was.
He went down to the basement, but did not enter the murder room; instead, he just stood at the door looking in. He saw the efforts that had been made to clean up the room but noted that there were still large bloodstained areas on the floor and walls. The walls were also heavily marked with bullet holes. Some were empty where the bullets had bounced off and fallen to the floor, but many holes still contained bullets. He thought that he should probably have ordered these removed as part of the clean-up, but it was too late now. He saw where the once pretty wallpaper had been torn by errant bayonet thrusts, and wondered again about the incompetence of the men he had engaged, and the chaos that had ensued unnecessarily which had resulted in them firing chaotically into the smoke-filled room, hitting the walls and floors instead of the prisoners.
He found himself following the still clearly visible blood trail the leaking bodies had made while being carried away from the room to the truck.
Making his way wearily up the stairs, he was so exhausted that he had to physically pull himself up step by step by holding on to the handrail. Once at the top, he paused, then turned and entered the room that used to be the family's dining room, where they and their staff had taken their meals together.
The men whom he had left at the house had done an excellent job of ransacking the place in his absence; most of the family's valuable items had been removed from the room, and he saw the stove filled with still smoking articles, things that the men obviously thought were worthless and had decided to destroy. He walked over and shifted them with the poker; books, toys, half-completed needlework, and darning.
The other rooms where the family had slept were also stripped, all valuables had been removed from the girls' room, and a fire lit on the carpet in the middle of the room to burn unwanted items. Ashes and the remains of partially destroyed papers, photographs, and books spilled from the corner stove onto the bedroom floor.
His second in command was sitting at his desk when he entered, gazing morosely at the pile of valuables piled high on its surface. In addition to what he had retrieved after the bloodshed downstairs, the desk was now loaded with the things his men had taken from the rooms, amongst them more jewels; earrings and pins, precious stones and beads, watches, cigarette cases, diaries, ornamental photograph frames, and religious icons.
'It's done?' The second in command asked, and he just grunted in reply.
Reaching into his jacket pocket, he removed the sack of precious stones and jewels they had recovered at the mine after the bodies had been undressed, and the clothes burnt and added them to the pile. He weighed a pile of diamonds in his hand, guessing that there must be at least eighteen pounds there alone, not to mention anything else.
The second in command's eyes widened at the sight of the gemstones and reached ou
t to touch a large sapphire.
'So, the bitch was trying to steal from us after all. Where were they?'
'Sewn into their bloody clothes.' He threw himself down onto his cot, he was filthy and badly needed a bath, but he didn't care. He closed his eyes, and everything began spinning around, probably because he was so tired and that he hadn't eaten for days.
In the morning, he would have the men pack all this up, along with anything else they found that might be of value, such as clothing, diaries, and letters and other personal items into the family's no longer needed trunks and suitcases, and have it all sent by train to Moscow. The spoils of war, he laughed ruefully.
He knew there was still a hell of a lot of stuff in the house, but he didn't have time to collect it all up. He had done his job, now he wanted out of here. There was no way he was going to risk being anywhere near this house once the White Army arrived in Ekaterinburg.
He slept and awoke to the sound of voices at the front door below, and hearing his name, dragged himself to his feet and went to the top of the stairs to look.
Two nuns from the local convent were there asking for him. They had come to deliver their daily offering of milk and eggs for the family. Of course, they had no idea that they were no longer there.
'Go away!' the guard at the door snarled before slamming it in their faces, 'and don't come back here again!'
His name was Yakov Yurovsky, and he was forty years old. Once he had overseen the loading of the crates, chests, and trunks onto the train and seen them leave under armed guard to Moscow, he disappeared back into the city that he knew so well having lived and worked there for so many years.
He made himself invisible, carefully listening and watching as the news that Nicholas had been shot and that Alexandra and the five children had been spared and taken to safety was announced, amazed at the apparent indifference of the people around him.
'Is it true that they are dead?' his wife asked, and he told her that it was but that she didn't need to know anymore. He walked the streets of Ekaterinburg just like an ordinary everyday citizen, waiting for the inevitable moment that the Czech army arrived and liberated the city. He bided his time, knowing that he would have to flee, but his invisibility made him safe for the moment. One day he found himself standing outside the Ipatiev House, just one more person in a growing crowd of townspeople who had, following the fall of the city also gathered there, as they tended to do now daily to stare at the house and to imagine what might have gone on there.
'So, you haven't left yet either.' A familiar voice said softly, and he turned to see one of his former comrades from their time at the house standing next to him, also anonymous and part of the crowd.
'I'm waiting to see what happens,' Yurovsky replied, clasping the man's hand. 'A few more days, and I think I'll head off.'
'I suppose you heard about Alexey's dog, Joy?' The other man asked, and when Yurovsky raised his eyebrows in puzzlement, he continued. 'She must have run away that night and returned later when everything had quietened down. We found her whining outside the door to their living quarters, looking for the boy no doubt.'
'Shit. You killed it?'
'No, that young guy, Mikhail, took her back to his place, and she's there.'
'Bloody fool, she'll lead them straight to him. Everyone knows who that dog is, there are bloody pictures of her everywhere. Bloody fool.' Yurovsky repeated angrily.
'You'd just got back from the forest, and were dead out to it, no-one had the heart to wake you after what you'd been through.' The man said apologetically.
It was just another loose end that hadn't been tied up properly Yurovsky thought, can't be helped now, but his men were useless. The dog should have been killed and disposed of just as the other two had been.
He spent the next few days watching as the White army officers and investigators searched the house for traces of the family and for clues as to what had happened inside. He wasn't worried about what they would find. The murder room with its bullet-pocked walls and lingering bloodstains? So what? And a few things belonging to the family that had been overlooked and left behind? Books, clothing, toys. Again, so what? People left stuff behind all the time when they moved. Thanks to the ramblings of a couple of peasants who spoke out about what they had seen and heard during those July nights; the White Army investigators searched the forest. They found some things belonging to the family, including a large emerald that had been overlooked by his men at the Four Brothers. That made him furious, as he recalled the botched job again. But, he was confident that they would never find the bodies and that no-one who knew where they actually were would talk. And of course, they didn't.
Once he was satisfied that he was in the clear, and before things started to get too heated, he packed up his wife and children and headed south-east to Moscow. He knew that there would be further work there for him to do.
Eleven
Ekaterinburg, Russia
1991
The second exhumation took place the following morning and appeared to May to be possibly as haphazard as the first one had been. She noticed the now-familiar close look of anger on Katya's face as they were hurriedly advised that they needed to be at the gravesite within a half-hour, which gave them no time to prepare. The actual dig itself reminded May of children at a beach in the summertime, engaged in a sandcastle building competition, buckets and spades at the ready, total chaos.
'Are they really serious about this?' she asked Agni despairingly as she watched men she had never seen before jump into the grave and trample through the thick, clinging foul-smelling mud. They were using a large digger to remove tonnes
of earth, which was then washed through large sieves, and this was even taking place in areas that were a distance away from the initial grave. By the end of it, the meadow looked like it had been ploughed.
In frustration, May turned and wandered a short distance away from the grave, sitting down on an old log. She couldn't help here, couldn't change anything, she had no authority and remembered both James' and Agni's words about keeping out of trouble and making sure that she got to stay on the project as long as possible.
She didn't like being back in the forest and had hoped after her first visit that she would never have to come back again; however, today felt different, not as oppressive. She wondered if that might have been because there were so many people there and so much noise this time.
She closed her eyes, welcoming how the warmth of the slim ray of sunshine felt through her cardigan as it fell over her left shoulder. It felt so lovely and normal. She took slow deep breaths, in and out, and heard the tinkling sound of girls' voices, calling, close, yet so very far away, almost like an echo. A fingertip, brushing her cheek like the aftermath of a tear, and then the voice, soft, full of sorrow. "Two still missing." She opened her eyes and saw a flash of white, three girls in white dresses at the edge of the clearing, heading towards the forest.
May felt no surprise or fear at seeing them there. In fact, it seemed perfectly logical that the girls should appear to her like that in this very place. They had a message for her, and this time, she was open to listening. If she had suddenly developed some kind of psychic connection with Olga, then so be it. It was not going to be something that she could just ignore or make go away. It was real, and she needed to acknowledge that. She again felt the frisson of grief that she had experienced at the Ipatiev House and that first time here in the forest. Olga.
The excavation took most of the day, and it was late by the time they got back to the morgue. They all felt tired and disconsolate. A quick survey of the items discovered quickly showed them that the second exhumation had not produced the results they had all been hoping for, so they all agreed to call it a day and went back to the hotel.
Closer examination of the find the following morning showed them that they had recovered just under three hundred additional bones, along with some more teeth, small pieces of fatty tissue, bullets, rope, and more of the ceramic fr
agments.
Although she was acutely disappointed that the second dig had not produced the results they had all hoped for, May was nonetheless pleased for Katya; for her integrity as a professional. This result had proved that she had done the very best that she had been able to and vindicated her. May gave her hand a small squeeze and smiled at her, happy to see that some of yesterday's tension had been erased from Katya's face.
Nikhil called a team meeting, and they all trooped into the tea room, however, after another lengthy discussion mulling over the same options, none of them had come up with any other ideas of what might have happened to or where the missing bones might be, and they all reluctantly agreed that they had no choice but to leave it and to continue working with what they had.
The sense of loss and grief that May had experienced in the forest when she saw Olga and her two sisters had remained throughout the previous evening and this morning. At the moment, she felt more focused and attuned to that than on the missing body parts. The message she had got from Olga was quite clear; loss and separation; of something missing, and she thought that she knew what it was.
'Have we identified who is missing yet?' May asked, before grasping that she had interrupted Petya, who had been regaling the team with some theory he had regarding the missing bones, and she smiled at him apologetically. 'Two people are missing. Do we know who they are?'
'I was just going to address that very matter,' Nikhil said. 'I am expecting the American team to be here later next week, and I want to be able to appraise them of our preliminary findings as soon as they arrive, in the hope of obtaining their agreement.' He looked around the room expectantly. 'I'd like to share my thoughts with you all first if you are agreeable?'
Everyone agreed and sat expectantly, waiting for Nikhil to continue.
'My initial conclusions are that this grave is more than sixty years old, and apart from the partial excavation and removal of some parts in 1978, the bodies have been there for that long.'
The Girl With the Crystal Soul Page 10