by Ann Hood
She focused her attention back on the trunk and found a piece of delicate white lace inside. Unsure what its real purpose was, Maisie took it out and wrapped the egg in it, tying the corners together to form a little bundle. At least it would be safer that way.
Again she turned her attention to the white stone palace.
Had she landed back in Florence?
But no, she decided. Although the enormous white mansion with the columns and balconies looked like it might be in Florence, there was also something very different here. For one thing, Maisie could smell the ocean in the slight breeze. For another, she could just make out high posts topped with gleaming gold eagles off in the distance. And there was so much land stretching out in every direction that Maisie felt certain the city of Florence was nowhere nearby.
In fact, as she dragged the heavy trunk toward the white mansion, she was confident there wasn’t a city anywhere around here. The place felt serene, isolated . . . royal, Maisie thought.
“Would you like some help with that?” a girl asked.
Maisie looked around but saw no one.
The girl laughed.
“Up here!” she shouted.
Maisie turned her gaze upward until it landed on a girl with strawberry blond hair and a dirty white dress sitting on the high branch of a tree.
“Hello!” Maisie called to her.
“Hello yourself,” the girl said, cheekily.
Maisie knew that the royal family had loads of servants, and this girl in the dirty dress must be a servant’s daughter. Or perhaps a servant herself.
“So, would you like some help?” the girl asked.
“Yes!” Maisie said.
Maisie watched as she moved to a lower branch and swung from it to another and another until she dropped to the ground, almost directly in front of Maisie.
The girl’s cheeks were pink and her blue eyes shiny.
She bowed dramatically.
“At your service,” the girl said.
“Thanks,” Maisie said. “This thing is heavy.”
The girl looked around. “Where’s your carriage?” she asked.
“Gone,” Maisie answered quickly.
“The footman left without helping you with your trunk?” the girl said, disapprovingly.
Maisie shrugged.
The girl took the handle on the other end of the trunk and hoisted it up, grunting.
“What do you have in here? A body?”
“Just enough clothes to last a while,” Maisie answered.
“You’re here for the opening party, I assume,” the girl said.
“Yes,” Maisie said, searching her mind for where she might be. Not St. Petersburg, she decided. It would be colder there. The Finnish coast? No. There would be a yacht, not a mansion.
She smiled to herself.
Crimea. Definitely. On the Black Sea.
“People are coming from everywhere,” the girl said, and Maisie detected a bit of awe in her voice.
“I’ve come from America,” Maisie said, boastfully.
“America!”
The girl paused to study Maisie.
“They don’t have royalty there, do they?” she asked, as if that was a very strange thing.
“No. We have a president.”
“Does he live in a palace?” the girl asked.
“Not exactly. He lives in the White House,” Maisie told her. “But the White House is big.” Maisie laughed. “Though not as big as this white house.”
The girl was delighted with that. “Yes!” she said. “This white house has one hundred and sixteen rooms!”
She pointed to the palace.
“All four facades are different,” she said. “Isn’t that creative?”
The girl took up her end of the trunk again, and she and Maisie continued toward the palace.
“What happened to your king when the government changed?” the girl asked Maisie.
Maisie shuddered, remembering what was going to happen to this royal family.
“We never had a king,” she told the girl. “When we became independent from England, we decided to have a president.”
“How odd!” the girl said.
When they reached the palace, the girl put down the trunk, motioning for Maisie to do the same.
“I’ll get someone to take it from here,” she explained.
They walked through a large rose garden, the smell of the flowers so heavy and sweet that it was almost too much to breathe in.
Glass doors led into a large, blindingly white dining room.
Almost immediately a beautiful woman with red-gold hair piled on top of her head and a loose, flowing white dress with lace at her throat and hem swept into the room. At the sight of the girl, she looked horrified.
“Why, you’re filthy!” the woman exclaimed.
The girl grinned at her.
“I’ve climbed almost every tree in the south grove,” she said proudly.
“The priests are arriving soon,” the woman said. “You must get a bath immediately.”
The woman’s gaze swept over Maisie.
“And who are you?”
“Maisie Robbins,” Maisie said politely, and surprised herself by curtsying.
Maisie produced the letter of introduction and handed it to the woman.
“Yes, yes,” she said, barely glancing at it. “We’ll get you and your . . .”
Her eyes settled on something written there.
“You and your brother settled,” she said.
“You’ve got a brother?” the girl said happily.
“Felix,” Maisie said.
“And where is he?” the woman asked.
Maisie had practically forgotten about Felix. Where was he?
“On his way,” she said.
“Fine, fine,” the woman said, tossing the letter on the long dining-room table. Above it, an elaborate chandelier glittered in the bright sunlight.
Something caught the woman’s attention.
“Is that for me?” she asked, her eyes widening.
Before Maisie could answer, the woman had taken the lace-wrapped Fabergé egg from her.
Slowly, she untied the knot that held the corners together and let the lace fall away to reveal the egg.
“It’s lovely!” the woman gasped, holding it up so that the sunlight caught the shine of all the jewels. “And . . . it’s made by Fabergé, isn’t it?”
Maisie nodded.
“You Americans do bring the most decadent hostess gifts,” the woman said. “Thank you. And thank Mr. Pickworth for us.”
Who’s us? Maisie wondered.
She thought this woman might be the head of the household, in charge of the servants and the kitchen. Surely she should not have the egg.
“Does it have a surprise inside?” the woman was asking Maisie.
Maisie swallowed hard. She didn’t know whom the egg was for, but the treasure was never for an adult. This woman, whoever she was, couldn’t take the egg.
But she was already sweeping back out of the room, saying, “I must show Nikki.”
The girl left with her, skipping out the door, and leaving Maisie very much alone.
Someone who clearly was a maid showed Maisie to her room, which was small and plain and disappointing. It did have a little balcony that looked out to the sea, and Maisie stood out there taking in the beautiful view and wondering where Felix had landed. She watched as two footmen carried her trunk inside, and soon enough they knocked at her door and deposited it in her room. Before she’d even finished unlatching it, a maid appeared to unpack for her.
“Oh, that’s all right,” Maisie said. “I can do it.”
She glanced around, and not finding what she needed, asked shyly, “But if you could point me t
o the ladies’ room?”
“Of course, of course,” the maid said, and bustled Maisie through a door and into an adjacent bathroom.
When Maisie went back into the bedroom, she found the maid fussing with her clothes after all.
“Shall I prepare your clothes for this evening?” she asked.
“Sure,” Maisie said, amused that someone was taking these old clothes so seriously.
The maid gathered a velvet gown and the tiara in her arms, and promised to return to dress Maisie.
“In the meantime,” she said, “you should get dressed and meet the others downstairs for the blessing of the house.”
Maisie combed her hair, trying to tame it as best she could before going downstairs. She paused on her way at a door that was ajar, revealing several rooms all done in mauve-and-pink chintz. Outside the windows, Maisie saw the ocean and snowcapped mountains.
“Stunning, isn’t it?” a man dressed in military clothing asked, startling her.
“Oh!” Maisie said, letting out a little squeal.
The man smiled beneath his big droopy mustache.
“Have you been to this part of the world before?” he asked her.
Maisie shook her head no.
“Unspoiled land,” he said, his voice dreamy. “It’s been the summer residence for the royal family since the 1860s. But this palace is new, of course.”
“It’s beautiful,” Maisie said.
“Construction took seventeen months, so you can imagine how exciting it is to have it finished at last. And in time for Olga’s sixteenth birthday in November, too.”
He pulled the door shut and offered his elbow to Maisie.
“Shall we?” he asked.
She felt very grown up and special entering the main rooms below on the arm of this gentle, dashing soldier, dressed in a soft white gown with an empire waist and a satin sash. Maisie hoped that somehow Felix had found his way here and would be downstairs, too.
Everyone’s attention was on a group of priests assembling in the dining room. Dressed all in black, with gold cloths over their tunics, very long beards, and very tall hats, the priests stood two by two with the oldest alone at the front. They each held large gold cylinders with holes in them, and even larger crosses. One of the priests set about lighting the incense inside the cylinders, and very quickly the room filled with pungent smoke.
The priests began to sway, swinging the incense back and forth as the leader chanted prayers.
As the priests moved from room to room, leaving a trail of scented smoke behind them, all the guests followed. Maisie kept an eye out for Felix, and for any of the royal family. But the crowd was big enough, and the smoke thick enough, that it was difficult for her to see everyone.
The priests blessed every single room. All one hundred and sixteen.
Maisie thought she might scream with boredom after a while, and as soon as she could, she ducked away from the crowd, backtracking to be sure to avoid running into anyone.
She went through the glass doors she had entered earlier that day, and stepped into the rose garden.
As soon as she did, she heard someone whisper to her.
The same girl who’d been up a tree that afternoon was up another tree here.
“You do like climbing trees,” Maisie observed.
“I am going to get in so much trouble if they notice I’ve slipped away,” she said gleefully.
“I guess you like getting in trouble, too,” Maisie said.
“I do,” the girl agreed. “I’m the naughty one of OTMA,” she added proudly.
Maisie smiled politely. OTMA? she thought. The word must not be Russian, or with the shard on she would have understood its meaning.
“It’s an acronym, you know,” the girl said.
“An acronym?” Maisie repeated.
“A word created from initials,” the girl explained.
“O. T. M. A.,” Maisie said out loud.
“The first letter of each of our names!” the girl announced, climbing even higher in the tree.
“Oh!” she gasped. “From up here I can see the mountains. You should come see!”
Maisie hesitated. She wasn’t much of a tree climber.
The girl scampered down far enough to extend her hand and help Maisie onto the lowest branches.
“I don’t know,” Maisie said, staring up through the leaves into the girl’s chubby face.
The girl wiggled her fingers for Maisie to take them.
With a sigh, Maisie relented.
She grabbed on to the girl’s hand and let her pull her upward until Maisie got her footing.
Maisie did not like it up there.
“Come on,” the girl said, climbing higher.
“I . . . ,” Maisie began, but the girl wasn’t listening.
Maisie clumsily put her foot into a knot on the bark of the tree, and tried to lift the other foot onto the next branch.
But her foot slipped, and in a second she was dangling from a branch, both legs swinging free.
“Help!” she called.
The last thing she heard was the girl exclaiming, “Hold on!”
Then Maisie’s hands let go of the branch, and she plummeted to the ground below.
Chapter Six
ANASTASIA
Maisie lay on her back, staring up at the dappled fading light coming through the leaves of the trees. She was aware of distant voices and footsteps approaching. She was aware of the sharp, constant pain in her right arm. And she was aware of the roses surrounding her, their thorns pricking her cheeks and hands. Maisie had fallen directly into a rosebush.
“Look what you’ve done now!” a man was saying in a loud stern voice.
The girl with the strawberry blond hair and blue eyes appeared above Maisie.
“She’s not dead!” the girl announced, happily.
“That’s a relief,” came another girl’s voice.
Now a second face appeared.
This girl was very pretty, with pink cheeks and brown hair and the biggest blue eyes surrounded by the longest eyelashes that Maisie had ever seen.
“It would be very exciting if she were, though, wouldn’t it, Mashka?” the girl asked her.
A third face joined the others.
“Papa has sent for the doctor,” she said.
She patted Maisie’s hand. “Once,” the girl said in a confidential tone, “she put a rock inside a snowball and threw it at me. It hit me right here, in the face, and practically knocked me out.”
The girl seemed like a fairy-tale princess to Maisie. Very tall and regal looking, with thick auburn hair and high cheekbones.
“It did knock her down,” the first girl said.
“You cried,” a fourth voice said, and another face appeared above Maisie.
“No I didn’t!” she protested. Then she laughed. “Maybe a little.”
The fourth girl was blushing. “What an embarrassment,” she said. “To drop a guest out of a tree. Mama had to go lie down she was so upset.”
“Hey!” said the first girl, the one whom Maisie had met earlier.
Her face came closer to Maisie’s.
“Remember? OTMA?” she asked.
Maisie nodded.
“That’s us!” the girl said.
“Olga—” she pointed to the blushing girl.
“Tatiana—” she pointed to the regal one.
“Maria—” she pointed to the pretty one.
The girl grinned impishly.
“And me! Anastasia!”
At that, Maisie burst into tears.
The four Grand Duchesses looked surprised.
“There, there,” Olga said.
But Maisie couldn’t stop crying. Yes, her arm hurt. A lot. But much worse was the realization that these were
the Grand Duchesses, the daughters of Tsar Nicholas and Tsarina Alexandra, and that someday in the near future, they were all doomed to be murdered in the most horrible way.
She thought of the message inside the egg, held out by this very girl in front of her: Anastasia. She had said: HELP ME.
“I do have some good news,” Anastasia said, bursting into Maisie’s room.
Maisie lay propped up in bed, many pillows behind her head, and her arm resting on even more. After poking it and turning it and moving it every which way, the doctor had declared her arm sprained, not broken. He’d washed the blood from her cheeks and hands where the thorns had pierced her, and then several footmen had lifted her out of the rosebush and up the stairs into bed.
“Your brother has arrived,” Anastasia said, flopping onto the bed beside Maisie.
“Don’t bounce,” Maisie moaned as sharp pains shot through her arm.
“He’s very handsome,” Anastasia said.
“Where is he?” Maisie asked, eager to see Felix at last.
“The Big Pair has swept him away,” Anastasia said unhappily.
“What’s the Big Pair?”
Anastasia laughed. “Olga and Tatiana, of course! Mashka and I are the Little Pair because we’re the youngest. Except Alexei, of course. But he’s a boy.”
“Do you think you could bring Felix here?” Maisie asked.
“I suppose,” Anastasia said.
She cleared her throat.
“He arrived on horseback with three Tartars. It was so exciting!”
Maisie frowned. Tartars?
“The local people,” Anastasia explained when she saw the confusion on Maisie’s face. “They invaded Russia hundreds of years ago, but of course we conquered them under Catherine the Great, and now their allegiance is to Papa instead of their khans.”
Before Maisie could answer, Anastasia smiled. “I love them,” she said. “The women are beautiful. They cover their faces with veils and look so mysterious. And the men are so dashing!”
Unsure of how to respond, Maisie smiled back.
“So? You’ll get Felix?” she reminded Anastasia.
“Happily!” Anastasia said, and bounced off the bed, sending new sharp pains through Maisie’s arm.
Before Maisie could reprimand her, Anastasia was out the door, running down the hallway and shouting, “Olga! Tatiana!”