The killers came just after midnight.
The old woman knew they would. She had lain awake most of that hot July night, listening to the guards outside, drinking and swearing and boasting of their prowess with the local whores. She had half guessed all this was leading up to savage murder.
Now as the trucks, which had brought the killers, braked to a stop outside, she rose from her bed, fully dressed save for her boots. She tugged them on swiftly. Silently she walked over to where the boy slept. She placed her hand over his sweet mouth to stop him crying out and whispered into his ear, ‘Serge, get up. At once. They’re here.’
The little boy, with the startling blue eyes of his father, rose immediately. He, too, was fully dressed. She slipped on his shoes. On tiptoe they went down the dark stairs. Outside, an ominous silence had fallen, as if the guards had suddenly realised, drunk as they were, that what was soon to happen would mean the end of an era. But the killers were still there, the old woman knew that all right. Through the windows of the house that had been whitewashed as soon as they had been imprisoned here, she could see their dark shapes outlined by the trucks’ headlights. Perhaps they were smoking or more probably drinking, she told herself, giving themselves courage for the dastardly deed soon to come.
‘Is it them, Babuska?’ Serge whispered.
‘Da,’ she hissed. She crossed herself and then opened the door of the big wall cupboard which led to their hiding place. It had been the ‘Little Father’s’ idea. Two days before, he had come to her while the others were having their afternoon nap, as was their custom even in captivity. ‘Elena Feodorovna,’ he had said a little sadly after she had kissed his hand and risen from her knees, ‘I am afraid that we will not survive. Now my cousin will not let us go to England, the Reds will slaughter us in due course.’
She had attempted to protest, but he had silenced her and said, ‘The Tsarevich is dying already – poor boy. But one male child must survive. You will ensure that he does.’
‘Serge, Your Majesty?’ she had asked.
‘Yes, he is of good, healthy stock. He is my son and has not inherited the – er – tainted blood of the Tsarina. So let us plan how you will escape.’ Together that afternoon they had moved the heavy cupboard in front of the door to the little closet room. When they had finished, he had said to her, ‘Elena Feodorovna, wait till the business is finished and they are all gone. Then try to reach safety, though God knows where that is today in my poor accursed Russia. Use these.’ And he had handed her a leather washbag filled with uncut gems.
Now with the gems concealed beneath her underskirt, she ushered the little boy through the wall cupboard and into the dark little room, bare save for two stools and the bucket which she had placed there for emergencies.
Outside there was sudden movement. She placed her mouth close to Serge’s left ear. ‘They are coming. No noise whatsoever. It doesn’t matter what you hear or see. Pomeya?’
‘Da, da Babuska!’ Serge whispered obediently.
Suddenly, startlingly, the front door was wrenched open. There was the sound of heavy boots in the hall. Someone said harshly, ‘The royal bitches are upstairs, lads.’
‘I hope they’re naked,’ a coarse voice chuckled. ‘I don’t like to waste time.’
‘None of that,’ a harsh voice commanded. ‘You know why we’re here. Davoi.’
The old woman pressed the boy’s head into her apron, covering his ears. Now it was going to happen, she knew that. She didn’t want her beloved little prince to suffer more than necessary. She held her breath as she heard their boots pass the cupboard in the corridor.
Minutes passed in tense expectation.
Suddenly there was a scream: a woman’s scream, high-pitched and hysterical. ‘No,’ the woman shrieked. ‘Please… please… not that… Please!’
The old woman bit her bottom lip till the blood came. At her lap, the little boy started to whimper.
Now the night turned into a nightmare. Shots broke out. Someone started to cry in absolute agony. The old woman was sure it was the Tsarevich. Even the slightest blow and the sick boy would bleed to death if the flow wasn’t stopped immediately. The old woman began to pray.
Heavy boots clattered down the steps from above. A drunken voice proclaimed loudly, ‘I can die a happy man… I’ve had the Empress… I’ve had her!’ The rapist ran outside.
Now the firing had stopped. But the screams and shrieks continued. A woman came staggering down the stairs, moaning, ‘No more… no more! I can’t stand any more.’
The old woman risked a peep through the chink in the cupboard. It was Tatiana, Grand Duchess Tatiana Nicolaevna. She was totally naked, savage blue marks on both her plump breasts, with blood trickling down the inside of her legs. Like a blind person she reeled down the stairs, sobbing hysterically, feeling her way with one hand. Behind her came a pockmarked giant.
Five minutes later they brought down the Tsarina. She was naked, too. Her hair was tousled and dishevelled. Already a dark green bruise was beginning to appear on the right side of her noble face. The old woman thought she, too, had been raped by the killers. Still she bore herself with dignity. Her face revealed no emotion as she stared back at the killers, who jeered and made obscene threats, while others fumbled with their revolvers.
Then the pockmarked one snarled, ‘That’s enough. Let’s get it over with.’ He raised his big revolver. ‘Here you are, you royal bitch. Try this one on for size!’ He pulled the trigger. The revolver exploded. Scarlet flame stabbed the gloom of the hallway. As if by magic, a bright red hole appeared in the Tsarina’s plump right breast. She screamed but didn’t go down. The pockmarked killer lowered his aim. He fired again. The second bullet slammed into her stomach just above the patch of black pubic hair. The Tsarina gave one last scream and sank to the ground, dying.
That second shot seemed to act as a signal for the killers. A couple started to thrust their bayonets into the writhing, twisting body of the Grand Duchess, sticking them into the dying girl in animal frenzy until she lay dead and they were gasping wildly with the effort.
From above came the voice of the Tsar. The old woman could hear it all too clearly. ‘Please don’t shoot,’ he said. ‘Pl—’ His words were drowned by a burst of firing and he spoke no more.
For what seemed an age to the woman hiding in the cupboard, the firing went on. Then the shots petered away and she could hear the killers running up and down the stairs, smashing china and glasses, overturning furniture in their greedy search for loot, some of them yelling out in triumph when they found something of value, while others cried angrily, ‘Hey, you greedy swine, I saw that first!’
In the end they finished looting. Outside, the engines of the trucks started up and the old woman guessed they would take away the bodies of the murdered royal family. She was right. Two of the killers came staggering down the stairs, bearing the dead body of the Tsar, the blood dripping from it as they did so. Hurriedly the old woman crossed herself as the corpse passed.
The Tsarevich followed. His frail, dead body was cradled in the arms of a big, one-eyed rogue of a fellow, so that he looked as if he might only be asleep. The old woman felt the tears well up in her eyes at the sight. Then came the women, dragged carelessly down the hall by their hands, their heads bumping up and down, lolling from side to side cruelly.
The door crashed shut. Someone shouted to the guards on the perimeter fence, ‘All right, you men, you can go off to your homes now! They’re all dead. You won’t be needed any longer!’
‘Yes, comrades,’ the guards shouted back. ‘Thank you. You’ve rid us of the royal swine at last!’
The first truck started to move away. A few moments later it was followed by the second. There was the sound of the men’s boots on the road outside that led to Ekaterinburg. Slowly the night silence fell over that house of death. Carefully, very carefully, the old woman released the boy from her grip. ‘I think the bad men have all gone,’ she warned him in a taut whisper. ‘But don’t say anything. I shall have a look.’
Heart beating like a triphammer, she opened the door. Her hand shot to her mouth. With a sheer effort of will she stopped herself from crying out. There was blood everywhere. On the floor, on the bullet-marked walls. A woman’s patent-leather shoe lay on the stairs. The cuddly dog toy which the little Tsarevich always took to bed with him sat next to it. ‘Bozhe moi… bozhe moi,’ she whispered to herself and reeled with shock. Still she forced herself to go on, stepping over the pools of blood and heaps of broken glass.
Cautiously she peered out of the door.
In the yellow light cast by the summer moon, she could I see that the perimeter fence, which had been manned by Red Guards day and night ever since they had been brought to this prison, was deserted. Far off down the j road, which led to the town, there were half a dozen dark figures. They were guards. Otherwise nothing.
Using the last of her strength, she went inside and picked up the boy, holding his face pressed tight to her ample bosom so that he could not see the blood and devastation. Outside she put him down once more and leaned against the wall to recover.
Serge looked at her solemnly. For a little boy of six he was strangely composed. The screams, the shouts, the shots seemed to have had little effect upon him. Quite calmly, he asked, ‘What now, Babuska?’
The old woman licked her dry lips. Suddenly she was overcome by the great responsibility that had been thrust upon her this night. ‘Serge Nicholai,’ she choked, ‘you will come with me to my village. There you will be safe.’
‘When will that be, Babuska?’ he asked, looking at her with those piercing blue eyes of his.
‘I don’t know.’ Her voice broke for a moment, then she continued, ‘But you must be saved for Russia.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you are now the last of the Romanovs.’ Then without another word she took his hand and they set off, a little boy and a bent old woman. Minutes later the yellow night had swallowed them up…