The Romanov Conspiracy

by Glenn Meade

  25

  MOSCOW

  Two thousand miles away it was blustery and threatening rain that same afternoon as the olive green Fiat truck pulled up outside a shabby tenement building at the southern end of Kolinsky Prospect.

  Built a century previous, it housed twelve families in sixteen rooms, with no electricity and dilapidated, stinking communal toilets on the ground floor.

  Yakov climbed out of the Fiat, carrying a bulky brown-wrapped parcel tied with string. He wore his leather jacket, cap, and high boots, his holstered Nagant pistol by his side. “Wait here and keep an eye on the truck. I want to speak with Andrev’s wife alone.”

  In the driver’s seat, Zoba smiled, the Georgian’s dark eyes slanting at the corners. “You really think they’d steal a truck belonging to the Cheka around here?”

  “In desperate times like these, people will do anything.”

  When Yakov knocked, she came to the door.

  She carried an armful of washing and looked strained, wearing a frayed dress, stitched in places, her blond hair down around her shoulders.

  “Hello, Nina. May I come in?”

  Beyond the door Yakov saw a shabby room sparsely furnished with a rickety table and a pair of wicker chairs, the peeling wallpaper speckled with mold patches. In one corner was a woodstove, some blackened pots on top. An ancient wrought-iron bed was pushed against one wall and she’d obviously done her best to decorate the room, the rotting sash windows draped with blue curtains, a handful of white lilies in an old vase.

  She appeared tired and ran a hand anxiously through her hair. “Sergey’s asleep. I’d ask you to be quiet.”

  Yakov saw the boy sleeping in the bed, covered in old coats and blankets, his blond curls damp on his forehead. He was a handsome child who bore a strong resemblance to his father. He gave a hacking cough and turned over in his sleep. Yakov saw he had a sickly pallor. A bottle of medicine and a teaspoon were near the bed, next to a kerosene lamp.

  “How have you been, Nina? How’s the boy?”

  “Sergey’s been ill. His chest has always been weak, ever since he was born. But the damp here doesn’t help matters.”

  “What does the doctor say?”

  She pushed a strand of hair from her face. “What doctor? The best ones have fled the country, and you Reds have conscripted most of the others. For the last six months I’ve had to deal with a quack who barely knows what he’s doing and charges a fortune.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  Nina plucked a frayed child’s sweater from the washing and laid the rest by the back window.

  It overlooked a communal rear garden, a patchy grassed courtyard filled with rows of clotheslines flapping in the breeze. She sat at the table clutching the sweater, beside her a darning needle stuck in a roll of wool.

  Yakov removed his hat and laid the bulky parcel on the table. “Some food and condensed milk for you and the child. And some clothing for him. I know it’s a struggle.”

  She fixed him with a resolute look. “I told you before, I want nothing from you, Leonid.”

  “Can’t you forget your stupid pride? If not for you, then take it for the boy.”

  “Nothing,” she replied fiercely. “I’ll take nothing from you and your kind, not while my parents are rotting in prison. They did no wrong yet they’re accused of being enemies of the people. What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Yakov saw the bitter resentment in her face and said, “I told you I’m working on it. These things take time. But that’s not why I came.”

  “No doubt it has to do with Uri. I told you all I know. The last time I saw him for only a few minutes before he had to leave. You and your men were watching the house. You know the rest. Uri escaped. I have no idea where he went. And if I did I wouldn’t tell you—surely you must know that?”

  Yakov considered her reply and looked over at the child, then back at her. She noticed the look in his eyes. “Accept my word and don’t even think about asking Sergey; he has enough to deal with, missing his father. It’s difficult. He used to talk about Uri a lot; now he just cries if his name is mentioned.”

  Yakov stood and peered out into the street as the rain started. “A revolution is difficult for everyone. It can’t be won without sacrifice and suffering.”

  “And what’s yours, Leonid? You seem to thrive on all this drama.”

  He didn’t answer for a moment, and then he said, “No one escapes this war’s hardships unless they’re clever enough to flee.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Yakov joined her at the table. “Uri’s gone. Escaped to France or Britain, most likely. Somewhere White émigrés can find a shoulder to cry on, or murderers escape their punishment.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “Deduction. If he were still here he would have contacted you by now. But I know Uri. He’s not the kind of man who’s going to leave you and your son alone in squalor. Whatever your differences, at some point he’ll try to rescue you from this, if only for Sergey’s sake. And once he does, this time he won’t escape, I promise you that.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t believe that Uri committed the crime you accuse him of.”

  “That’s your opinion. War changes people. It changed you; it changed him. What he did to Stanislas I wouldn’t have done to a dog. Besides, there was a witness.”

  “Uri loved Stanislas like a brother. He wouldn’t have harmed him. Not ever.”

  “Do you know the horror I carry around in my mind day and night? Of Stanislas, his broken, bloodied body lying in the snow. He was sixteen, for pity’s sake, still a child.”

  “For heaven’s sake stop it, Leonid. Let things rest in peace and end this madness before it destroys you.”

  A savage expression lit Yakov’s face and he got to his feet, scraping back the chair, hatred erupting in him like a storm. “Never. That won’t happen, not while I have a breath in my body.”

  The child shifted in the bed, cried out before he fell back to sleep.

  Nina rose from the table. “You won’t listen to me, will you? I’m wasting my time. If you have nothing else to say I’d ask you to leave before you wake my son.”

  Yakov picked up his cap. “Do you still love Uri?”

  “What I feel for Uri is none of your business. No more than our differences are. He and I were once man and wife, now we’re not, that’s all there is to it.”

  Rain lashed the window. Yakov studied the shabby room before he looked at her. Something close to pity stirred in him.

  Nina didn’t speak as he stepped toward her, cupped her face in his hand, and said, “Don’t look at me as if you despise me.”

  Nina stared back at him. “I’ve never despised you. I’ve always liked you, Leonid. But you’re not the person I once knew. That Leonid was decent and had a good heart. This one is bitter and merciless. What’s changed you? It’s not just Stanislas’s death. It’s more than that, isn’t it?”

  He looked into her eyes but didn’t reply.

  She went to turn away but he pulled her toward him, his lips moving hungrily on hers. She fought him, pushed him away, and slapped him across the face, blood appearing on his lips. “No, Leonid … !”

  Yakov wiped the streak of crimson from his mouth, stared at it. He glared back at her with a kind of tortured smile. “It only proves what I’ve always known. The poor can’t possess beautiful things.”

  “I was never beautiful, Leonid, if that’s what you mean.”

  “You sell yourself short. Sometimes at night I used to close my eyes tightly and imagine what it might be like being married to you. To love you and be loved by you in return. But of course, I had no hope. Someone like me could never dream of possessing someone like you. I was too poor and ugly to ever hope for that.”

  “Leonid … you mustn’t speak that way.”

  “Why not? The first time I saw you the night Stanislas was born, I could have curled up at your feet like a puppy. A childish love, an infat
uation, of course, but to me it was love nonetheless. Do you know what’s sad? I’ve never felt that way about another woman. Not even my daughter’s mother.”

  Nina flushed.

  Yakov dabbed his bloodied mouth with the back of his hand. “This revolution will change everything. People like you and your kind won’t be safe. Life will be harsh for you. Cruel even. But someone like me can be your protector. I can make sure you and your child come to no harm.”

  The child stirred again in his sleep and coughed. Nina picked up his parcel, thrust it at his chest. “Please, leave now.”

  “Take it, for the child’s sake.”

  “I want nothing from you, Leonid. Nothing.”

  He regarded the shabby room. “It doesn’t have to be like this. It doesn’t have to be grim and hopeless. I could have you assigned better living quarters, proper food. But most of all I can give you something you desperately want.”

  “What?”

  “Your life back. Just tell me the moment Uri contacts you again.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  “Then I’m certain Lenin will exile you and your child to a Siberian prison camp.”

  She heard his boots clatter down the stairs moments later.

  She crossed to the window and looked out, saw Yakov climb into a truck before it drove away. She watched it go and let the curtain fall back into place, and then she went to stand over her son, Yakov’s threat fresh in her mind.

  She looked down at Sergey’s sleeping face, at the tiny beads of perspiration on his brow, his plump cupid lips and delicate skin, the damp blond curls she loved to run her hand through. She stroked his face gently with the back of her hand as she heard his labored breathing.

  When she could bear it no more, she turned her face away, her eyes welling up with tears as she stumbled over to one of the wicker chairs.

  Then, with her head cradled in her arms on the table, she cried: for her parents, for her child, for the secret she kept and had promised never to tell, for the husband she’d forsaken, and for the whole sorry mess her life had become.

  26

  LONDON

  The carriage turned into Hyde Park and the horses trotted toward one of the fountains. The sun was out, the day hot, and Cockney vendors on bicycles sold ice cream from boxes of crushed ice.

  The carriage halted and Hanna Volkov climbed down, hoisting her sun umbrella over her head as she approached the fountain.

  A sickly-looking man in his sixties stood smoking a cigar and staring at the surge of water as he leaned on his cane. He was dressed in a formal suit and hat and looked an odd figure with his bug eyes, pasty face, and fat nose.

  He turned as Hanna approached, and tipped his hat to reveal his balding head, his accent unmistakably American southern. “Why, Hanna, it’s wonderful to meet you again.”

  “And you, Mr. Ambassador.”

  Walter H. Page replaced his hat and looked out at the sun-drenched grounds busy with strolling couples and playing children. “Would you mind if we walked? This old man needs to stretch his legs.” He gestured with his walking cane to the path that led past the fountain.

  Hanna saw a beefy man in a bowler hat and mustache follow in their footsteps twenty yards behind. He looked uncomfortable in his brown suit. She guessed that he was the ambassador’s bodyguard.

  “I take it you put our proposition to Mr. Andrev?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  Page tapped his cigar. “Then before I ask the all-important question, I’d like your opinion, Hanna.”

  “Mr. Ambassador?”

  “Having met Mr. Andrev, would you trust him? I mean, completely trust him never to breathe a word about our scheme to a soul, at risk of his own life?”

  She hesitated for just a second before she said, “Yes, I would.”

  “Forgive me, but I sense a slight doubt, Hanna.”

  She looked toward the fountain. “It’s not a doubt, more a concern.”

  “Tell me.”

  She told Page some of the details of her meeting in the church that morning. “I think Uri Andrev has been through some kind of personal hell. Something awful happened to him after he escaped from the camp.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s obvious to me that he’s suffered a shock of some kind. If you want my opinion, he’s hurt and he’s confused, maybe even close to broken.”

  A worried look flashed on Page’s face. “Broken?”

  “Not quite. But I think he’s a man on the edge. And yet, he’s got strength about him that you can almost touch. It’s most strange.”

  “What exactly happened to him?”

  “He wouldn’t say. But I sense he’s been deeply affected by something other than the problems with his family.”

  Page considered before he sucked on his cigar, blew out smoke. “I’m old enough to recall as a boy seeing General Sherman’s troops march into our town and torch our family home. It affected me greatly. Civil war’s a brutal experience, one that leaves deep scars and divides families and friends….”

  “You’re going to ask me if I think Andrev’s been too deeply affected by the war to be of use to us?”

  “I simply wondered if his distress would impair his ability to carry out his tasks.”

  “I honestly don’t know, Mr. Ambassador. But I don’t think we have much choice at this late stage, do we?”

  Page took another puff of his cigar, and Hanna could almost hear his mind whirring as he weighed her answers. “I suppose not. So, Boyle is still in Ireland, working on Miss Ryan?”

  “He hopes to have her answer by today.”

  “Then I guess only a single question remains. Is Mr. Andrev with us or not?”

  Five minutes later Hanna Volkov’s carriage turned out of Hyde Park and joined London’s busy traffic.

  Walter H. Page stood there a minute longer, watching the carriage go, lost in thought as he finished his cigar, then crushed it with the heel of his shoe. He walked a short distance to his own waiting coach, climbed in, and the driver snapped the reins and the horses trotted toward the park exit.

  A hundred yards away a thickset, middle-aged man with a coarse peasant face sat on a bench, leaning against the crossbar of his bicycle, sweating as he licked the remains of an ice cream.

  He observed the coach belonging to the balding, odd-looking little man move out into the traffic after Hanna Volkov’s. Next to the woman with striking good looks, the little fellow looked ugly. “Beauty and the Beast,” he called them, smirking to himself.

  The thickset man finished the ice cream and tossed away the remains of the wafer cone, wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve, and mounted his bicycle. Sweat prickled his face as he tried to decide whom to follow from now on—the Beauty or the Beast?

  And then he made up his mind and started pedaling like mad.

  27

  DUBLIN

  Across the Irish Sea it was raining that same day, a summer downpour that drenched the city’s streets.

  Rivers of water pelted the windows as Boyle sat by Lydia’s bed in the Mater Hospital. Perspiration bathed her face and she muttered something in her sleep.

  The doctor said to Boyle, “She’s going to need a few more days before she gets her strength back, so try not to tire her too much.”

  “I’ll do my best. And otherwise?”

  “She’s young and healthy, and ought to fully recover.” The doctor left, closing the door softly.

  A little later the rain stopped and sunlight flooded the windows. Boyle waited patiently and saw Lydia’s eyes flicker. She blinked drowsily, took in her surroundings, and then her confused gaze settled on her visitor.

  “How do you feel, Miss Ryan?”

  Her voice sounded slurred. “Tired and sore. Who are you?”

  Boyle smiled and fetched a wheelchair left in a corner. “You’ll be glad to know that the doctor says you’ll be fine. Here, let me help you into the chair.”

  Lydia came fully awake. “Why? Where ar
e you taking me?”

  “For some fresh air. You and I need to chat.”

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m the man who’s going to save your life.”

  The tiny park behind the hospital was filled with flower beds and overlooked a row of eighteenth-century Georgian houses. Boyle halted the wheelchair by a wrought-iron bench.

  The granite watchtowers of nearby Mountjoy Prison poked their heads above the hospital walls. Boyle produced a packet of Player’s Navy cigarettes and said good-humoredly, “I hear smoking’s all the rage among women ever since Mrs. Pankhurst threw herself under those Derby horses for the sake of equality. The suffragette newspapers are calling cigarettes ‘the torches of freedom.’”

  “Is that meant to be a joke?” Lydia asked.

  “No, just my way of saying that I won’t be offended if you’d like a cigarette.”

  “I wouldn’t. Are you going to tell me who you are?”

  “The name’s Joe Boyle.” He lit his cigarette, cupping the flame in his hand before he shook the match and tossed it away. “A terrible habit, one I’ve begun to indulge in only occasionally recently. Perhaps it helps me over the hurdles. You’re giving me a mighty suspicious look, Miss Ryan.”

  “It’s your accent that confuses me. What are you doing working alongside British intelligence murderers?”

  Boyle took a drag. “Now that’s where you’d be wrong. But I am a colonel in the Canadian army, unofficially. Just don’t ask me to explain; my story’s complicated.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Let me keep it simple. I want your help, Miss Ryan, and I want it badly.”

  “To do what?”

  Boyle took another drag and blew out smoke. “You really are a remarkable young woman, do you know that? There aren’t many with your background. Your father ran a successful horse-breeding business in St. Petersburg, where you were educated at St. Benedict’s Convent and learned to speak Russian like a native.”

  “I fail to see what any of that has to do with you.”