‘Long anticipated by many, I’d say,’ Rupert interrupted. ‘Half Europe and Asia wished the man ill. And there are dozens of stories circulating about his death. I know at least …’ he put his head on one side and appeared to be counting, ‘seven … no, eight, chaps who claim to have pulled the trigger. Or wielded the axe. Or pushed him in the river. Depends who’s bending your ear and how much he’s had to drink.’
‘Ah, yes. Well, there are indeed several versions of the events of that night circulating, you know,’ said Edward. ‘And I too have had my ear bent. But I say it’s always interesting to hear from a chap who was on the spot.’ His blue eyes sparkled with mischievous invitation.
Gustavus smiled. ‘In the end, it took a company of us to dispatch the terrible old ox. He had survived previous assassination attempts, that was well known. The man was indestructible, it was rumoured, and rumour further had it that his strength came from a source beyond the natural. We took no chances. He received and accepted an invitation to a drinking party at the palace of Prince Yussupov on the river in St Petersburg. A merry, unbuttoned evening among like-minded chaps. First we poisoned him — three times — then we shot him — four times — and finally we clubbed him about the head, seized him and threw him into an ice-hole in the freezing river Neva. We watched as he sank under.’ He smirked with secret knowledge. ‘At least, that’s how the story goes.’
This was hardly dinner-table talk, but the audience was eager for more. The death of the Tsarina’s sinister influence had taken on a quality of dark farce that made it an acceptable topic of conversation. Rasputin, the much-feared and meddlesome evil genius, had been reduced, in death, to a pantomime villain.
‘The pathologist.’ Gustavus gave a rumbling laugh. ‘You have to feel for the poor chap. He must have been puzzled indeed to come up with a cause of death amongst so many possibilities. Stomach full of poisoned cake and red wine, body riddled with a mixture of Russian and English lead, skull cracked, lungs full of river water and the whole body frozen stiff! I do believe your revered Spilsbury would have been somewhat challenged.’
‘English lead?’ Connie Beauclerk protested. ‘What are you suggesting? The man was shot by a fellow Russian. Prince Yussupov. Everyone knows that. The Tsarina had him put under house arrest. Poor Felix! My brother was up at Oxford with him. A sweetie! Did the world a favour is what my brother says …’
Gustavus paused, making a show of filtering the information he could safely allow an English lady to hear. ‘Rasputin was, indeed, shot by Prince Yussupov, Miss Beauclerk. Shot, but not mortally wounded. His Highness is not one of nature’s assassins. Willing enough but, as you probably know, he has the reputation of being — as you remind us — Oxford educated and something of a fop. And the rumours are true. The revolver he chose for the task proved not to be of a calibre sufficient to fell the monster. When Yussupov approached what he assumed to be a corpse to check on his handiwork, Rasputin reared up, bellowed and seized his would-be murderer by the throat. The prince was extricated from the situation by another gentleman who happened to be at the scene. A gentleman wielding a higher calibre weapon.’
‘Ah,’ said Rupert, nodding his head sagely, ‘the good old Enfield revolver.’
‘No. A Webley. Of the kind used by … well, you know who uses them, Fanshawe. A.45 unjacketed bullet fired by the steady hand of an Englishman, an Englishman who rid the world of a meddling villain. One bullet in the centre of the forehead.’ Gustavus drilled an imaginary hole in his own head with a forefinger. ‘One bullet which changed the course of the war-’
‘Well, well,’ Rupert interrupted loudly. ‘A word of advice, Your Highness: ladies present. Not too keen on hearing about the war, you know. We try to avoid any mention. More wine?’
‘Oh, don’t be a killjoy, Rupert!’ Connie complained. ‘It’s a jolly good story. I love a bit of Grand Guignol! Prince Gustavus, I’ve got one more question. There are those who say’ — her voice took on a tentative tone — ‘that Rasputin — or his spirit — did in fact survive even those extremes of punishment. There was a hideous scene, I’ve heard, and one reported by many reliable men who were present at his cremation?’
‘You’re right, Miss Beauclerk,’ the Serbian assured her. ‘His funeral pyre was set ablaze in public so that all might see with their own eyes that the beast had at long last been annihilated. I was unfortunate enough to be of the company that witnessed the spectacle. The horror! Many swooned.’
He glanced around the table, gathering the earnest expressions silently urging him to reveal more. Sure of his audience, he lowered his voice and went on: ‘In the middle of the flames, the corpse began to sit up. Rasputin drew his knees to his chin and then, slowly, his torso began to rise upright.’
‘Golly gosh!’ breathed Connie, clutching her bosom. Edward leaned over and patted her shoulder, throwing a concerned and warning look at the Serbian.
‘Perfectly understandable,’ said Tuppy drily. The Navy man seemed to have taken a dislike to this dark foreigner whose eyes were as wintry and unfathomable as the ice holes he conjured up. ‘Clearly some careless funeral parlour operative forgot to cut the tendons. In the heat, they shrink, you know, and pull the limbs about in a disturbingly life-like movement.’ He gave a hearty bellow. ‘Ha! I’ve seen corpses get up and dance!’ Enjoying the surprise, he added: ‘Not just a matloe! I was a medic with the Navy before I inherited my father’s London practice. Travelled a lot, saw a lot of strange burial customs. Oh, I say — have I ruined your story, old man?’
Gustavus turned to glower at Tuppy. The sailor’s cheery confidence deflected the look, unaffected, but Lily, catching it, had to repress an instinctive shudder. The Serbian’s reaction to the set-down was one of anger barely held in check. He had enjoyed the fencing with Rupert but a trip-up by a medical man had fired his wrath. He breathed deeply, chewed his lips and, mastering himself, decided to reclaim the attention of the table. He raised his glass and admired the colour of the red wine against the candlelight. ‘It was such a strong wine as this that he was given the night he entered the trap we’d set for him at the palace on the waterfront,’ he recollected. ‘A wine laced with enough fast-acting poison to kill ten men.’
‘What on earth was the poison?’ Tuppy asked. ‘Rat poison? Digitalis? Arsenic? Strychnine? Forgive my curiosity — a physician is always interested in extending his knowledge.’
The Serbian paused for a tantalizing second, apparently quite aware that Tuppy had offered him a test: a menu of poisons from which to choose the correct one. Finally, he replied: ‘None of those. It was potassium cyanide.’
‘Makes sense. Not difficult to get hold of, and a minuscule amount will kill a man. Less than a gram would do for a twelve-stone chap. I understand that one gram is standard issue in the glass suicide capsules we dole out to our secret servicemen.’ His cheery gaze, which had been taking in the whole company at the table, skipped lightly past Rupert, Lily noticed, at the mention of the service. Another man in the know, she concluded. ‘Though for an ox of a man — as you describe him — perhaps you’d need a little more,’ Tuppy added sagely. ‘And a little research might have told those amateurs that baking it up in a cake is a pretty feeble way of going about things. It’s the heat, don’t you know. It vaporizes the noxious element. It’d take more than a slice of Victoria sponge to lay low a chap like Rasputin.’
‘Well, I’ve never heard of the stuff, and I read all the whodunits,’ said Connie. ‘I bet you couldn’t just stroll into Boots the Chemist and ask for an ounce, as you can with arsenic.’
‘Anything is obtainable. Anywhere. If one has the right connections,’ Gustavus told her. Judging, rightly, that his listeners were ready for some relief from the drama, he raised his glass again and proposed a further toast. ‘Let us repeat the word that was on every Russian’s lips on hearing of his death. In the street, strangers shouted it to each other in their joy and relief that justice had been done. Ubili! Ubili! “They have killed!”’
Lily’s palms were beginning to sweat with fear. It seemed a cold draught was blowing on the back of her neck. She told herself that the male members of the gathering were not her responsibility. She told herself that a six-foot Serbian sporting a duelling scar and brazenly imposing himself on the company was hardly the elusive Irish woman they were seeking. But the feeling of dread would not leave her. With a surge of relief, she saw the imposing figure of Sandilands passing with a full plate some yards away. She screwed up her courage and called out to him.
‘Joe! What ho, Joe!’
He spun around, concerned, alerted by the intimate use of his name.
Almost crushed by the sudden attention she was attracting, she managed an encouraging: ‘Won’t you come and join us?’
He stood surveying the group until Rupert took over, inviting him to sit next to the Serbian in the remaining place. He introduced Sandilands to his neighbour.
‘You’ve just missed an amazing tale of derring-do,’ Edward commented.
‘Oh, yes!’ Lily added. ‘A chapter from John Buchan, you’d swear! Do you realize you’re sitting next to an assassin, Joe?’ Her voice sounded improbably girlish to her own ears but Sandilands’ presence was giving her confidence and she knew he was receiving her message. ‘A self-confessed assassin! An expert in poisoning, shooting, clubbing and drowning.’
‘Great heavens! Your Highness is not, I trust, about to demonstrate any of these skills this evening? Perhaps someone should tell him whom he’s sitting next to?’ Sandilands said calmly, shaking out his napkin.
‘A Scotland Yard detective, I understand?’ Gustavus nodded. ‘But off duty tonight, I’m presuming? No cause for concern on either side. I perform no lethal tricks where there are ladies present.’
‘And, speaking of ladies — where is your own beautiful new wife?’
‘You are acquainted with Zinia?’
‘No, I haven’t yet had the honour, but I read the society pages of the Tatler,’ Joe said happily. ‘May we expect her to join us?’ He leaned towards Lily and remarked: ‘I think you’d admire her, Lily. I hear she is a dark-haired beauty with a profile to give Cleopatra a run for her money. I’ve been looking out for her all evening without a single sighting.’
‘Zinia has retreated to the powder room to perform some small task — she caught the hem of her dress on a heel, I believe.’
Lily tried not to jump to her feet too eagerly. ‘But she’s missing the fun! I shall go and find her. Perhaps I can be of assistance. I’m a jolly good needlewoman … though there’s usually a woman in attendance down there with needle and thread.’ She tilted her head to the guests and made off before anyone could call her back, glad to escape the demands of her assumed role for a few minutes.
The prince — her prince — was surely safe enough guarded by Sandilands and Rupert. But what of the assas-sin’s wife? Was she another weapon in Gustavus’s armoury? Lily reversed her thinking. Was Gustavus a weapon in the armoury of the mysterious dark lady skulking down below away from public view? Lily didn’t believe she’d caught sight of any such woman since she’d entered the hotel. Could anyone possibly be hiding in the cloakroom all this time? Ladies’ cloakrooms, she remembered from her briefing, were her responsibility. Sandilands would expect her to take action.
Lily found there were two vast and ornate powder rooms in the basement. She was directed away from the farther one by the attendant, who seemed, Lily thought, rather distraught.
‘Can you help me?’ Lily asked her. ‘I’m looking for a friend of mine who came down here some time ago. She’s having problems with the hem of her dress.’
The attendant’s relief was instant. ‘Oh, thank goodness someone’s come for her. She’s in a right state. I’ve offered her assistance but she just screams and yells at me to leave her in peace. I didn’t know who to call for. She’s commandeered a whole room for herself. What am I meant to do, miss, when the after-supper surge comes down? She’s in there.’
Lily went through the padded door into a lavender-scented space lit by discreet electric light bulbs. ‘Zinia? Are you there?’
Her only answer was a stifled snuffle and ‘Didn’t I tell you to go away?’ from the armchair placed in one corner for swooning ladies who needed to take the weight off their feet. Lily approached, watchful and prepared for action, though the pitiful bundle curled in the depths of the chair seemed to offer no challenge.
‘Hello. My name’s Lily Wentworth. I hear you could do with some help with your dress.’ As there was no reply she added: ‘I was just talking to your husband upstairs. He’s wondering when you’re going to re-join him at the party.’
A howl of anger greeted this offering. A flood of Russian — oaths by the sound of it — and then: ‘Never! Swine! Evil, loathsome man! I’m sitting here trying to get up the courage to find a back way out of this place. I shall walk away and never see him again.’
‘Seems a bit drastic. Do you have somewhere to flee to? Always a good idea to have an exit strategy.’ Lily’s tone was exaggeratedly light.
‘I’d rather sleep on the streets than next to him. I’d rather sleep in the zoo! In the reptile cage!’ The vehemence of the replies was not abating. This display of overheating rage was the last thing Lily wanted to encounter. Any woman with the bad luck to be married to Gustavus deserved her sympathy, but something had to be done to deflate this swelling emotion.
‘May I ask you to stand up, madam, put your hands on your head and turn round slowly?’ Lily asked abruptly in a police voice.
‘I beg your pardon? Why on earth should I? Who are you to ask such a thing?’ The girl was sufficiently startled to raise her head and stop sobbing.
‘I’ll answer both questions when you’ve done as I ask.’
‘Oh, very well! Strange English ways! One is obliged to humour one’s hosts, I suppose.’ Zinia sighed, stood up, lifted her arms and turned around.
‘A beauty,’ Sandilands had said. It was difficult to see loveliness in a face that was wrecked by tears that had channelled through her powder and smudged her lip rouge. Mascara was no more than large black smudges under her eyes. And yet the features had the strange attractiveness of a pug dog’s squashed face. The eyes were large, dark and lustrous, the nose straight and short above an upper lip that was slightly too long for perfection. The mouth below was well shaped, but over generous in Lily’s estimation. Lily was reassured to see that the girl was shorter than herself and very slightly built. And it was clear that, in her clinging silk, Zinia was not concealing a weapon.
‘Thank you — just making quite sure you’re not carrying a pistol.’
‘A pistol?’ The astonishment could not have been faked. ‘Why would I be carrying a pistol?’
‘Wife of a self-confessed assassin — one can’t be too careful,’ Lily said lightly.
‘Assassin!’ The word was spat out in disgust. ‘He was never closer than a hundred miles to Rasputin, if that’s the yarn he’s been spinning. And ask yourself this — what sort of man has to brag about being a killer to get the admiration of the crowd?’
‘Soldiers sometimes do,’ Lily said equably. ‘And your husband would appear to be every inch the soldier. The military bearing … the scar-’
‘Pouf! The scar was incised by a surgeon’s scalpel in Vienna. Under anaesthetic. False. Like everything about the man. He is an … impostor.’
‘That’s a very melodramatic word. I beg your pardon. This is all a bit hard for me to understand. Listen, Zinia, and I’ll spell out my concerns. Your husband was just a few minutes ago introduced to the heir to the British throne, in whose company I find myself this evening … Gustavus is even now sitting at the Prince of Wales’s table. Surely-’
Zinia cut her short. ‘My husband has been tracking him for weeks. Wheedling invitations. Currying favour. So he’s managed it at last. The fiend has got within range of h
is prey.’
Chapter Twenty-One
As the last of the guests trickled through and some began to return to have their plates filled again, Charles Honeysett quivered with the effort of concentration. This was a tricky moment. The dishes had to be replenished and the food kept flowing, but above all the wine glasses had to be continually topped up.
He cast an eye on the table of greatest significance to check that all was well. The pretty girl in the green dress who seemed to have taken the prince’s eye had apparently deserted her royal escort for the moment but HRH was in full flow, chattering, laughing with his friends and sinking quite a bit of wine. Egged on by that foreign blighter in the black uniform. That one didn’t have the manners to wait for the footman to circulate and pour the wine — he’d commandeered the bottle and called for two more. Where did he think he was — in an officers’ mess? Outlandish behaviour! No table manners to speak of either. The steward had never seen a fork wielded like that … held in the right hand and used like a spoon … kinder to look aside and take no notice. Honeysett thought HRH, who was a stickler for good behaviour, must be deeply offended by this louche way of going on, but he had probably got used to all sorts and conditions of men in his travels.
And, anyway, if a drunken scene were to develop, it would be the fault of that fair-haired man with the big shoulders. Honeysett had marked him down as one of the hush-hush brigade but perhaps he’d read it wrong. Joining in the spirit of the evening, the fellow had reached over and grabbed a bottle himself, strolled round the table and poured out at least two — Honeysett had been distracted and might have missed one — glasses for the foreign blighter. It was no business of the steward’s but he couldn’t shake off a feeling of foreboding. Something was brewing.
He decided to keep a wary eye on the bloke in black. He didn’t like the cut of his jib. He had to remind himself that this class of Russkie was no threat. They were all related to the English aristocracy up at that level. Most of them claimed Queen Victoria for a grandmother. He’d had all this laid out for him by Anna who seemed to know her aristos; he suspected that she was one of them, or had been in a previous life. It was the other bunch, the Reds — the Bolsheviks — you had to watch out for. Murdering scum, according to Anna.
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