With a trembling hand, Kate reached into her purse and pulled out a cassette tape. “My grandfather left this for me.”
“I see… Now come in, my child. Come in quickly. We have much to discuss and you can’t be seen standing out here.”
The old woman, frightened by the ghosts of Stalin and the like, all but yanked Kate inside. As the woman bolted shut the door, Kate stepped into a tiny, windowless living room, no more than six feet by eight. One door led to a minute kitchen with a table and stools on one side, a bathtub on the other, while another door led to a slender bedroom with a single bed and the apartment’s only window.
Suddenly the old woman was before Kate, taking Kate’s hand, then touching Kate on the shoulder, the cheek, the forehead, all the time muttering in Russian.
“Gospodi, eto’vo ne mozhet byit…” Dear Lord, it can’t be…
And then she was crossing herself, bowing her head, and kissing not only Kate’s hand, but the cuff and next the sleeve of her sweater. When the diminutive woman started to drop to her knees, Kate took her by her thin shoulders and pulled her back to her feet.
“No,” begged Kate. “Please don’t.”
“It’s a miracle!”
Kate glanced to the side, saw an old black-and-white TV, the volume turned down but the picture still flashing. On the old couch Kate saw two magazines, which not only featured pictures of the soon-to-open exhibit of Romanov gems, but Kate’s own photograph as well.
“So it’s really you?” asked Kate.
“Yes.” And touching Kate’s wrist and finding the gold bracelet with the jade pendant, the old woman gasped. “Your grandmother gave this to you?”
“I received it upon her death three years ago.”
“Peace at last.” She crossed herself. “How did you find me?”
Kate shrugged. “After my grandfather died, I cleaned his office. I went through everything, and I was just about to empty his trash can when I found an article speculating what really happened the night the Romanovs were killed. There were several different theories, but one thing in particular struck me – it talked about some survivors from a nearby monastery.”
“Ah, I see…”
“I saved the article, and then when my grandfather’s story started to fall apart, I looked it up again. I called Esquire, the magazine that had originally published the article, and tried to track down the woman who had written it. But I couldn’t find her – she’d left the magazine years earlier – and so I started doing some research on the Internet.”
“The what?”
“I used my computer.”
“Wh… what…?” She gazed at Kate with confusion. “You have to forgive me, I so seldomly speak English.”
“I started doing some research using my computer, but I couldn’t find mention of any monks who might have survived until even as recently as the sixties. In fact, the only thing I could find about a monastery in Yekaterinburg was this.”
From her purse Kate pulled a short article, the headline of which read, “Ancient Yekaterinburg Resident Attends Romanov Funeral.”
The old woman took it and shook her head. “My eyes are no good anymore. What’s it say?”
“When the Tsar and his family were reburied here in Saint Petersburg, a British man wrote about it for a London paper. He also did a short side piece about a milkmaid who claimed to have worked at a Yekaterinburg monastery when the Romanovs were under house arrest. He wrote how she attended the Orthodox burial of the Imperial Family here in town.”
“I should never have gone. I… I… was just going to watch the procession from afar. It was right across the park, just here at the fortress. And when I saw it all, I fell to my knees and started to crying. They were ordering me away, but in my weakness I begged. One of the fathers took pity on me and allowed me to attend.”
“So it’s true, then?”
The old woman nodded. “This man, this British writer – he was there, writing about the funeral, and then he followed me back here to my apartment.”
“I know. I looked him up. He’s the one who gave me your address.”
“I knew I shouldn’t have talked to him!”
“You didn’t tell him that your father was British, did you?” pressed Kate.
“No, of course not. I only told him part of the truth.” She hesitated before confessing, “I… I told him I worked as a simple milkmaid at the monastir.”
Finally understanding how it all fit together, Kate said, “At first I didn’t quite get it. The story on the Internet said your name was Marina, and I knew right away that it was just too much of a coincidence. I kept reading and rereading the article, and then I realized I didn’t understand because he didn’t understand, this man who wrote the article. He thought you worked for some monks at a monastery, but you didn’t, did you?”
“No, of course not. I worked for the sisters at the other monastery.”
“Or as we would call it in English, the convent. And you didn’t simply work there, but you studied there, correct?”
“Da, da, da. I was a lay sister.”
“So you’re not the milkmaid Marina from the men’s monastery, but the Novice Marina from the Novotikhvinsky convent, or as you would say in Russian, the Novotikhvinsky woman’s monastery.”
“Yes, my child.” The old woman took Kate by the hand, leading her into the tiny kitchen. “Here, come sit.”
By the simplicity of Marina’s words, Kate knew she was telling the truth. And as she sat down on a small stool, Kate sensed there were but only one or two more truths in this nesting doll of deception. She was, at last, that close. Yes, thought Kate, this old woman now putting on a kettle of water for tea, now shuffling for two chipped teacups, was most certainly the daughter of an Englishman and Russian woman.
In her bones, in her soul, Kate knew the truth, but her mind, so weary of deception, threw out a test. “Who did your father work for?”
“Papa? He was a diplomat. He was posted out there in Yekaterinburg at the consulate.”
“Under whose tutelage were you at the monastery?”
“Sister Antonina.”
“What did you do first thing in the morning? What were your primary responsibilities?”
“My responsibilities?” She pulled a small sugar bowl from the shelf. “Oh, I see. You test me, do you not?”
Kate said nothing, just sat there.
“Well, sometimes they had me assist in gathering the eggs, but yes, this is truth – I always, always milked the cows because, of course, my hands were then young and nimble.”
So it was all just as Kate thought. And now that she had the truth, or the most of it, she started to cry not out of grief, but fear. Meanwhile Marina went about making tea, as any good Russian did upon the arrival of a guest. She even put out a plate of three meager biscuits.
Finally sitting down opposite Kate, Marina asked, “Who else knows? Have you told anyone?”
“No, not even my husband.”
“Excellent. And you mustn’t, my child. For your own safety you mustn’t ever. Have you any children?”
Kate nodded. “Twins, a boy and a girl. They just turned two.”
“How wonderful,” beamed Marina. “But you must protect them, do you understand? Your grandparents put snakes between you and the truth to protect you, and now you must do exactly the same for your young ones. Am I clear?”
“Absolutely.”
“I read in the magazines about you. I read that your father died in a car accident, and I wondered if you knew. How much did your grandfather tell you?”
“Not everything, of course. As I said, he told me some stories – or rather he recorded on tape what he said was the truth. And at the time I believed it all. Then something happened, which in turn caused me to doubt him, and not much later I began to look for you.” Kate looked up, looked right into Marina’s foggy eyes, and said, “You see, my son is a bleeder.”