Duncan Kyle - The King's Commisar

He gave a little roar of eagerness and together we dragged the box out. When I lifted the lid, I thought he would explode with joy.

'A king's ransom, here,' he purred.

'A king's treasure,' I told him. 'To be used, as His Majesty insisted, in the general cause.'

'General damned nonsense,' said Dutov dismissively, his hands in the chest and coins clinking merrily.

'There isn't a general cause.'

'There's an anti-Bolshevik cause,' I said, 'and that will do.'

He was suddenly roaring with laughter. I for one had certainly never seen the like of the fortune in gold which lay in that chest, and I doubt if Dutov had either. Then suddenly the laughter stopped, and he was regarding me with suspicious eyes. 'How much did you take?'

'None,’ I said.

¦\AA'None!' he yelled. 'You're a damned liar! I bet you've taken -'

'Close the lid, man,' I said. 'And you'll see that the chest is full to the top. I have this -' and I took from my pocket a crucifix encrusted with sapphires, and lied to him - 'a gift from the Tsarina which I would not exchange for a moment. Not for all of that!'

He didn't know whether to gape at me or at the gold; his eyes were not still for a second. Perhaps a minute passed before he said, with a wonderful air of cunning: 'Think what I can buy with this!'

'Exactly,' I said.

So now my train could push ahead along a clear track, for Dutov did not remain long after the gold came to him. It was an easy and uninterrupted run through empty country that brought us at last back to Tyumen, and by then my mind was made up concerning the treasure. I left the faithful Koznov and his men to guard it at the station and made my way to the river quay. There was ice on the water still, and plenty of it; but it was broken now and the edges smooth as it melted. There was a building containing an office or two, and behind that, a warehouse of good size. A brass plate on the door of the offices proclaimed this to be premises of the West Siberian Steamship Co. The door was locked, and repeated banging on it produced no answer. It was probable, I thought, that the workers in this place would hibernate in the winter. But the winter was over now. I set out to find the responsible men.

The manager I found without trouble, in a house no distance away. He was a man in some difficulty, for the winter had changed his world. When in October the frosts had rendered the river unnavigable, there had still been a Provisional Government, and the company's owners, though far away in London and Oslo, were at least known. Now he knew only what the local Bolsheviks had told him: that everything belonged to the people. So, with spring upon him and a steamship company to manage, he was looking round for instructions very keenly.

'That steamer over there -' I pointed - 'is she fit to sail?'

'Oh yes. We keep a fire going through the winter months so-'

'How long to get steam up?'

'What are you proposing, Comrade?'

'CommissarYakovlev,' I said, and produced my paper.

He goggled at it.

'I intend to requisition that steamer for a journey to Tobolsk.'

'Of course, of course. We can have steam up in three hours.'

'Good. And I shall need horses and wagons.'

There was surprisingly little trouble: Tyumen was once again merely a town along the track, for the men from Ekaterinburg had gone. Carts and horses were rapidly assembled and it was perfectly clear that the relationship between the steamer manager and the carters was both long-standing and amiable. So all was done with fair ease and proper care. I stood by the rail carriages to make sure there was no attempted theft. One might imagine that men like those carters, who could never in their lives have come across such things before, might be at the least curious and at worst fiercely acquisitive; but they were not. In their placidity and capacity for work they much resembled their own horses. By mid-afternoon all was aboard the Rus, for that was the steamer's name, and I was ready to depart. The boat's master, one Meluik, was at the wheel and Koznov's men were below, ready to feed the boiler from the stacks of corded wood.

So we sailed. What I remember from that journey aboard the Rus is a sense of peace. Tyumen is itself a small town and Tobolsk hardly bigger and there is little between them save the waters of the river and a few villages along the banks. So the steamer nudged along through the ice, thrusting it aside; and on either bank the farmland was green with the spring thrust of young corn. There came a point when Captain Meluik pointed to a village as we passed and said, That is Pokrovskoe, Commissar.' His tone suggested I should know its name.

'Pokrovskoe?' I repeated, snapping my fingers. 'Ah, that's where -?'

'Rasputin,' he said eagerly. 'The mad monk came from there. Last year when the Tsar and Tsarina made this journey on my ship -' and then he caught himself. 'Your pardon, Commissar, the ex-Tsar and ex-Tsarina, that's what I meant.'

'Tell me.'

'I pointed out the village to the ex-Tsarina. She wept and fell to her knees on the deck and prayed.'

'You knew him?' I asked.

'He travelled on the Rus. I spoke to him.' Meluik gave a little shudder. 'A man to fear. Such eyes!'

So I was regaled with stories of Rasputin, the ship and the region, as Rus drove steadily north, and came at last, on the next day, to the great bend of the Irtysh River where stands Tobolsk. From the bridge of the steamer the Governor's House was clearly visible, and through my binoculars I could discern that there were figures sitting outdoors on a kind of balcony which caught the afternoon sun. I regarded them with a profoundly guilty feeling.

For it is here that I must make a most dreadful confession. The peace of mind of which I spoke lasted only the first half of the Rus's journey. It happened that I lay that night, so Meluik told me, in the bed occupied the previous year by Nicholas. Somehow that knowledge made me, for a time at least, quite unable to sleep, so that my mind ran hither and yon over the events of the immediate past and possibilities for the future. It was then, listening to the water and the bumps of ice, that I pictured my own King, whose first mysterious summons had set me upon this road, and who was so desperately anxious to save the Imperial Family. And I realized that I must endeavour by all available means to carry out my Sovereign's dearest wish, whatever the risks. But I had almost no money. You may have guessed already the nature of the temptation to which I succumbed. The truth is that at dead of night I entered the hold of the Rus where all the Romanov possessions were stored, and searched among them for small and valuable things, portable and easy to exchange. I came up with a good handful of items, loose jewels, brooches, earrings and the like. Their value cannot possibly be guessed at, but must have been substantial. It was an unforgivable crime: I see that now. But at the time, as I searched among the belongings for suitable items, the thought dominant in my mind was that if the necessity should arise to bribe an official, or purchase services for the Tsar's sake, it would be unthinkable for me to fail to have the wherewithal when the wherewithal was available. And so, a thief in the night, I stole. Next afternoon, when the Rus had been tied up at the West Siberian Steamship Co.'s quay at Tobolsk and I strode off to greet the royal children, my pockets contained their things.

At the gate of the Governor's House I put on a bold manner and called for Colonel Kobylinsky. He came quickly, but with the air of a man looking over his shoulder, and led me, without speaking, inside to his quarters. Once there and with the stout door closed, he asked me at once, 'What of the Tsar?'