“Who are you to question me?” Ivan Borisovich said. “You’re supposed to be in your dacha.”
“Arrest him,” the princess said. “And the other one, while you’re at it.”
The princess’ men immediately leveled their guns at Tim and his cousin.
Ivan Borisovich was an idiot when times were good. He was an even greater idiot when times were bad. Tim was grateful that he was being held in a separate cell, even though he could still hear his cousin’s blustering, if dimly.
Unlike Ivan Borisovich, Tim was a popular young man. Due to his actions at Rzhev, for one thing, and his much nicer nature, for another. So Tim wasn’t entirely surprised when the young Streltzi of Murom, Pavel, brought him some food and stayed for a bit to talk. He’d had long talks with Pavel before, while they were pulling guard duty.
“It’s a terrible thing that happened to the princess,” Pavel said.
“She seemed fine when she had me arrested,” Tim pointed out.
“She barely escaped! That outlander-the other one, not Bernie-he attacked her! In her own bedroom!”
Tim found himself interested, as the story continued to pour out of Pavel. Pavel wondered what Director-General Sheremetev was thinking putting a man like Cass Lowry in charge of the Dacha. Especially when it was doing so much for Russia under Princess Natalia.
Tim knew precisely what Director-General Sheremetev was thinking. His great uncle had told him. The Gorchakov family was becoming dangerous. Princess Natalia Gorchakovna had been using her position in the Dacha to garner support among the great houses. After four years, she had garnered quite a lot. Cass Lowry was the Sheremetev family’s way of saying to the other great houses “if you want high tech in the future, you apply to the Sheremetev family not the Gorchakov family.” At the same time, Tim had met Lowry and didn’t like the man. Pavel’s description of the attempted rape of a princess seemed quite believable.
“How can you work for Director-General Sheremetev,” Pavel asked, “when he’s doing what he’s doing? Putting people in prison right and left? Killing all those people in Moscow in his purges?”
Tim had begun to wonder about that himself.
“And what about Czar Mikhail? Taken out of Moscow! What kind of man does that, imprison the czar?”
“No one is imprisoned. The czar and his family are just at a hunting lodge, to get away from the troubles in Moscow. He even took his up-time nurse and her family with him,” Tim said.
“How do you know that?” Pavel sneered.
“We get radio messages from him,” Tim said. “The hunting lodge he’s at isn’t on the normal network, so they radio through here.”
Russia had set up radio stations just within range of one another. Each one had a high antenna placed on a high hill or at the top of a tall building. There were normally two or three radio stations within range of each antenna, not that there were all that many yet. When a message was sent, it would be tapped out in the Russian version of Morse code and would be heard by the station the transmitter was tuned to. That station would then resend the same message up the line. This would repeat until the message arrived at the proper place. So the fact that they were getting messages directly from the hunting lodge meant that the czar had to be somewhere within twenty-five or thirty miles. Tim knew all that, but he didn’t think about it when he told his friend Pavel that the czar’s messages traveled through Murom.
“So, he has to be somewhere near,” Pavel told his boss. His boss, in turn, told the princess. And the princess, of course, told Bernie and her other friends.
“But Sheremetev doesn’t have any lands within thirty miles of here,” Natasha said. “Not one village, not one house. Nothing.”
“Do you have a hunting lodge within thirty miles of here?” Filip asked.
“Yes, just west of Tatarovo.” Natasha stopped. “You don’t suppose
…”
“So we go get him?” Bernie asked.
Vladislav Vasl’yevich, restored for now to his post of captain of the Murom Streltzi, said, “Not the princess.” Then looking at Natasha, “You should stay here where it’s safe.”
“No, my good and loyal Captain,” Natasha said. “I must go because it will fall to me to decide what to do if the czar is not, in fact, being held against his will.”
Chapter 77
An exhausted trooper rode into Moscow and made his way to the Kremlin. After a couple of misdirections, he reached Director-General Sheremetev and reported that Princess Natalia Petrovna had escaped in the Dodge with Bernie Zeppi, and some others. Cass Lowry had been killed, apparently by either the princess herself or one of her chambermaids. One of the guards had been killed and the other badly wounded. He’d been shot in the chest but the bullet had missed his heart. His survival now seemed likely, but so far he hadn’t told them anything very coherent.
Director-General Sheremetev and a troop of his men left immediately for the Dacha.
Sofia smiled to herself when she heard the uproar outside her quarters. She never had liked that Sheremetev brat, all puffed up and strutting the way he did. She sat quietly, waiting, knowing what was about to happen. She’d grown up in Russian politics, after all.
As she expected, there was no polite knock. Her door burst open, armed men stormed in, searched her room for what hidden dangers they imagined, then the man himself strutted in. Richly dressed, overbearing, and much too old to be doing this. Even if he succeeded, the stupid man would die, probably within a few years, as the next Time of Troubles began.
“Where is Princess Natalia?” he growled.
“That’s none of your business,” Sofia answered calmly. “Princess Natalia is Great House. You have no authority over her.”
“I’m the Director-General. I speak for the Boyar Duma,” Sheremetev said.
“The Duma has no authority over Princess Natalia,” Sofia pointed out.
“The Duma speaks for the czar.”
“Let the czar speak for himself, then.”
Balked, Sheremetev stepped back and, somewhat more politely, asked, “What happened here?”
Sofia told him of the attempted rape and of Anya coming to Natasha’s defense.
“A household servant killed two of my men!” Sheremetev was outraged and deeply offended. More by the manner of his mens’ death, than the fact that they were dead. To die at the hands of a menial! It was desecration. He turned to one of his guards. “Find that woman and bring her here.”
Sofia tinkled a little laugh. “Be my guest. If you can find her.”
“Are you saying Princess Natalia took a murderess with her?”
“She took her servant with her, yes. We are loyal to those who are loyal to us,” Sofia said, “unlike some people.”
“Take her away,” Sheremetev told his guards. “I’ll decide what to do with her later. For the moment, take me to the radio room. I need to send a message.”
Sofia started laughing.
“What do you mean you can’t fix it?” Sheremetev demanded.
“We can fix it, sir,” the technician said. “But not quickly. We will have to make new parts, which will take a couple of days.”
Sheremetev was tempted to have the man punished, but the technician was the nephew of one of his supporters. He couldn’t have him beaten with a knout like a serf. Yet.
“Back to Moscow!” Sheremetev shouted. “That’s the closest radio.”
At last, and several hours later, Director-General Sheremetev strode into the radio room in the Kremlin and ordered that a demand for Princess Natalia’s arrest be sent to all stations. The message went out, but because of the many stations it would be transmitted through, it would take still more time.