She stared down at him, her expression a mixture of amusement and concern. ‘Are you hurt?’ she asked.
Stefanov knew that the correct response when in the presence of a Romanov was to take off his cap and hold it in his hand and to look at the ground before answering any question. But his cap had fallen off and it seemed foolish to be staring at the earth when he was already lying upon it. So he stared at Olga, eyes wide in awe and fear. ‘I’m not hurt,’ he finally managed to say.
‘What is your name?’ asked the Princess.
‘Stefanov. I am the son of the head gardener, Agripin Dobrushinovich Stefanov.’
‘Well, Stefanov, son of the head gardener, you should be more careful in future.’ She smiled at him, then closed the windows and from somewhere in the room came the sound of men and women laughing.
Too ashamed to feel his pain, Stefanov retrieved the shears, found his cap and, with sweat stinging in his eyes, carried the ladder back to the work shed, where the implements for gardening were stored.
Along the way, Stefanov pondered the repercussions he felt sure would follow soon. No doubt, he thought, the Princess would not hesitate to tell the story of him lying there in the dirt, and fumbling with his words as he identified himself. The Tsar himself would hear of it. Or worse. The Tsarina. Perhaps they already knew. Maybe it was their laughter he had heard after Olga closed the window. But now what? Would they punish him? Would they punish his father? And what would the punishment be? Would the Emerald Eye be summoned?
For days, Stefanov lived in terror of the moment when Pekkala himself would come knocking on the door to his family’s cottage.
But it never happened. Gradually Stefanov transformed from being certain of disaster to being only reasonably sure and from there he went to suspecting and finally, at the end of this strange journey, he arrived at a state of relieved confusion where he had been, more or less, ever since.
He would see the Princess Olga only once again, on a bitterly cold night in March of 1917.
Petrograd had fallen to the revolutionaries. Rumours reached Tsarskoye Selo that an 8‚000-strong mob of soldiers, deserters from the army, was heading towards the estate with the intention of destroying the palaces and murdering anyone inside them.
With the Tsar still en route by train from the military headquarters at Mogilev, the Tsarina Alexandra summoned all troops still loyal to the Romanovs, including the Garde Equipage, the military escort of the royal yacht, to take up defensive positions around the Alexander Palace, which was the residence of the Tsar and his family when they were staying at Tsarskoye Selo. In all, these soldiers numbered some 1,500 men, including Stefanov’s father, who had brought along his son to offer their assistance.
Confronted with the old gardener and his son, who was too awestruck by the ranks of uniforms and bayonet-fixed rifles even to speak, the soldiers turned them away. Hearing this, Stefanov’s father threw himself at the mercy of the troops, pointing out to them that he had nowhere else to go and stood little chance of survival if thousands of armed hooligans came swarming across the estate.
After a brief consultation among the officers, Stefanov and his son were allowed to remain, provided they kept out of the way.
All day, with fingers on the triggers of their guns, the loyal soldiers waited for the revolutionaries to arrive. But the mob never materialised and, by that evening, the nerves of the men were frayed almost to breaking point.
Throughout that night, the soldiers kept their watch.
Although several of the Tsar’s daughters had come down with measles, the Tsarina emerged several times from the Palace, drifting through the courtyard in her black fur cloak and pleading with the soldiers to remain vigilant. No fires were lit, in order to deny the enemy the advantage of illumination.
It was on one of these visits that the Tsarina, accompanied by her daughter Olga, chanced upon Stefanov and his father, who were sitting on the steps with only a piece of cardboard to insulate them from the stone. They were, by then, so frozen, that it was only with difficulty that the old man and his son were able to get to their feet.
‘What are you doing here?’ asked Olga, having recognised the gardener’s son. In spite of the cold, her face was glistening with sweat brought on by sickness.
‘Who is this?’ demanded the Tsarina‚ before either of them could reply. Her face, framed by the fur of her hooded cloak, looked pale and haggard.
It was Olga who answered for them. ‘It’s the gardener, Agripin, and his boy.’ In spite of her illness, Olga smiled at Stefanov.
‘And what are you doing here?’ the Tsarina asked. Her voice sounded harsh and impatient.
‘Majesty,’ explained Agripin, ‘we came to help.’
The Tsarina’s tone changed suddenly. ‘But the soldiers are here. Your duties do not lie with them. There is nothing you can do.’
Agripin drew himself up to his full height, which was not considerable. ‘There would be if I had a gun,’ he said.
Overhearing this comment, some of the soldiers began to laugh.
‘Perhaps you would do better with a shovel,’ said one.
‘Or a rake!’ added another.
Seeing his father mocked by the soldiers, the young Stefanov felt ashamed. Helplessly, he looked down at his feet.
Agripin glared at the soldiers. Then he faced the Tsarina again. ‘Majesty,’ he said solemnly, ‘I would rather help you now than spend the rest of my life knowing that I could have and didn’t.’
For a moment, the Tsarina said nothing. Then she turned to the soldiers. ‘Get this man a rifle,’ she commanded.
Two weeks later, on the orders of the Tsar himself, Stefanov and his father loaded their belongings on to a cart and left the grounds of the estate‚ bound for the home of a relative. But they did not stay long. In the years that followed, Agripin and his son made their way from town to town, working in fields, repairing walls, doing any job that would guarantee a meal and a roof over their heads. Fearing reprisals from the revolutionary committees that maintained a choke-hold on every village in Russia, Agripin never mentioned his years of service to the Tsar and, likewise, his son remained silent.
Now, deep within the deserted hallways of the Catherine Palace, Ragozin shoved Stefanov out of the way, opened the door, and the three men piled into the room.
Ragozin turned on his torch. The weak light played across a high ceiling and smooth, bare walls which were the same pale blue green as a duck’s egg.
‘But this is the Amber Room!’ gasped Stefanov.
‘You must have it wrong,’ whispered Barkat. His footsteps echoed in the empty space
‘This is the Amber Room‚’ insisted Stefanov. ‘I’m sure of it.’
‘Maybe it was‚’ quipped Ragozin. ‘But it isn’t any more.’
Then, from the main entrance, they heard a voice call out, ‘Who’s there?’
‘That’s Commissar Sirko!’ Barkat hissed. ‘If he catches us in here. .’
The three men panicked. They ran to the window, opened it and jumped down into the garden. It was a hefty drop, but their falls were broken by the same ornamental hedge which Stefanov had trimmed that summer day, already lifetimes ago.
‘Is anyone there?’ Sirko called out.
Stefanov, Ragozin and Barkat sprinted across the Alexander Park, their long shadows, lapis blue in moonlight, pursuing them across the grounds. By the time they reached their gun emplacement, all three were out of breath. Looking back, they saw the blade of a torch splashing across the empty walls of the Portrait Hall, as Commissar Sirko continued his hunt for intruders.