Andrew Williams - To Kill a Tsar

Only small quantities could be taken at a time because he was obliged to hide the explosives in his boots and the lining of his coat, but the police patrols knew him and trusted him and he had managed to build up a supply of almost 300 pounds. ‘He sleeps in the cellar with the other workmen,’ said Zhelyabov, picking up the narrative. ‘He used to hide the explosives in his pillow but the fumes were too much for him so now he keeps the stuff in a box with his clothes. The cellar’s directly below the tsar’s dining room, so when we have enough… boom!’ and Zhelyabov flung his arms theatrically into the air.

‘Satisfied?’ asked Mikhailov.

‘I will be when it’s done,’ Anna replied.

‘No one must know,’ Mikhailov said, looking at her intently with his small brown eyes. ‘They found drawings of the palace in Kviatkovsky’s apartment. They’ve searched the cellar more than once since.’

Anna stiffened again, struggling to control her temper. Mikhailov’s pointed ‘no one’ meant ‘someone’, someone in particular.

‘Surprised?’ Zhelyabov asked, as if to draw the sting from Mikhailov’s words. She was surprised and excited and Zhelyabov must have seen it in her face. ‘To kill the tsar in his own palace will show the people that the party has a long arm,’ he added.

‘But when?’

‘Soon. Very soon. We’re almost there. The new year will be a new dawn for the Russian people.’

Two Christmas days had passed and one new year before Frederick Hadfield received word from her again. For a time he could not enjoy an idle moment without being tormented by the tune from Mozart’s aria Amore un ladroncello , and he would hum it as he dressed, in the droshky to the hospital and even on the wards. Love, the thief of time and of liberty that chains the soul, and he would hold his head and curse under his breath for an incurable romantic. He had celebrated a Protestant Christmas at his uncle’s gloomy table, then thirteen days later an Orthodox one. The festive season had not been without cheer. There had been a succession of extravagant parties and balls and he had escorted his cousin to a glittering affair at the Nobles’ Club, where the heir to the throne was the principal guest of honour. And he was to welcome the Russian New Year with the Glen family at the mansion of their neighbour, the immensely wealthy banker, Baron von Stieglitz. The general was insisting on a carriage to collect his nephew at nine o’clock. He was not to be late.

Frederick was dressing for the Stieglitz Ball when the dvornik knocked at his door. Anna’s note — as peremptory as before — proposed a meeting at precisely the same time. It was the height of bad manners, of course, and he risked causing the sort of offence that could damage his position in embankment society irreparably, but he felt only joy at the prospect of seeing her. In the end he wrote simply that he was suffering from a fever. It did indeed feel close to the truth — and who was going to argue with his diagnosis?

By nine o’clock he was waiting before the west front of St Boris and St Gleb. It was snowing hard and he was grateful for his old student coat and hat. New Year’s Eve, it was below freezing, and instead of sipping champagne in the baron’s opulent drawing room he was stamping his feet in an empty square in one of the poorest parts of town.

‘What is so funny?’

‘Where did you spring from?’ Walking quickly towards her, he held her tightly before slipping the scarf down from her nose and mouth to give her a long, tender kiss, her lips soft and warm. Then he took off his gloves and held her face in his hands. ‘It seems so long.’

‘Three weeks.’

‘So you’ve been counting too?’

She smiled weakly, pushing him gently away. ‘Come on — this is no place to celebrate the new year. We’re going to a party.’

She led him through the streets by the arm. From time to time they could hear the sound of happy and drunken voices through the thin glass of the poorer houses, and rough carousing from the basement taverns. They said very little to each other, he was content holding her little hand tightly, turning sometimes to catch her eye, a prickle of excitement just walking at her side. He was disappointed when they stopped at the corner of a street and she announced they were almost there. Lifting her chin, her eyes searching his face, she asked in a quiet voice: ‘Do you love me, Frederick?’

‘Yes,’ he said, and he bent to kiss her once more.

She put her hands against his chest and held him at bay. ‘So I can trust you?’

‘Of course you can.’

‘Then you must be careful what you say to my…’ she hesitated for a moment ‘…to my friends. They must know they can trust you too.’

Her ‘friends’. He felt a flutter of alarm.

‘Well?’ she asked sharply, her brows knotted together in that peculiar frown of hers.

‘They can trust me.’

‘Good.’

But he felt ill at ease as he followed her down the street and into the yard of a mansion block. The servants’ entrance was unlocked and she led him quickly up the back stairs. On the third landing she turned before a door to give him a reassuring smile, then knocked sharply twice. After a few seconds it was opened by a broad, handsome man with a full beard, unruly hair and warm brown eyes.

‘So this is your doctor,’ he said to Anna with a robust chuckle. ‘My name is Zhelyabov, Andrei Ivanovich at your service.’

‘He is not my doctor!’ said Anna, blushing hotly.

Zhelyabov chuckled again and placed an affectionate arm about her shoulders: ‘Come in and let me take your coats.’

The living room was heaving with people, flushed with alcohol and good humour, draped over the furniture and sitting on cushions. In the centre was a round table and upon it a large tureen. A group of men and women were busy preparing some sort of punch with rum and wine and sugar and spices. No one seemed surprised to see Hadfield.

‘The punch is ready,’ an earnest-looking man in his twenties shouted from the table. ‘Out with the candles.’ A hush fell on the room and everyone crowded round the punch bowl. Anna touched Hadfield’s arm: ‘Come on.’

Zhelyabov struck a match and put it to the punch and a flame began to dance about the bowl. The earnest fellow who had called the room to order pulled out his dagger and laid it across the bowl. Zhelyabov did the same, and then another man and another, as if enacting a pagan blood ritual, gold and red shimmering on their blades. Then one of the men began to hum a lively folk tune.

‘It’s a song from the Ukraine,’ Anna whispered, her eyes shining with pleasure.

The candles were lit again and the strong rum punch served to all.

‘Here.’ A petite young woman soberly dressed in black offered him a glass. ‘Dr Hadfield, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ He seemed to tower over her.

‘My name is Sophia Perovskaya. I’m glad to make your acquaintance.’

So, this was the daughter of the former governor general of the city. She was rather plain, with an oval face and high forehead. There was a girlish innocence in her expression that was difficult to reconcile with her reputation. He had heard her name spoken at the best parties, invariably with a disapproving and incredulous shake of the head.

‘Anna says you love our country and that you’re a socialist,’ Sophia said, her blue eyes wide, her gaze uncomfortably intense.

‘Yes, yes, I am.’

‘Let us hope Russia changes for the better in the year to come.’

‘Yes.’

‘Perhaps you will play a part in that transformation.’

He gave a slight nod, hoping this would satisfy her. One of the comrades called for music to general approval, and for a while Hadfield was spared awkward questions by some hearty folk-singing. At midnight there were kisses and they drank to freedom for the homeland. The earnest young man who had been the first to place his dagger over the punch — his name was Nikolai Morozov — predicted the new year would bring an end to ‘slavery’. Then, from the edge of the circle, the man Hadfield knew as ‘Alexander’ spoke. He must have slipped into the apartment just before midnight because he was wearing his heavy black overcoat, wet with melting snowflakes.