“He says that there is some unrest in the town, and it will be safer for us if we are not on the upper story.”
All four of the girls hastily exchanged looks, wondering what this really might portend, but Anastasia prayed that it was the first news of their deliverance. Sergei had said telegrams had been flying back and forth from Moscow and that something was afoot. Maybe the White Army was indeed within reach. Even now, the night wind carried the faint rumble of distant guns.
The girls sprang out of bed and had no sooner started dressing than their mother appeared and reminded them to put on their special corsets—the ones with the royal jewels so laboriously sewn into all of the linings.
“We have to be ready for anything,” Alexandra said. But there was a note of hope in her voice, too, a note that Ana had not heard for so many months of their captivity. “We might not be coming back to these rooms.”
Even though they had spent countless hours working on the corsets, the girls had never actually worn them yet, and Ana found that hers weighed much more than she might ever have imagined. It was hard to get on, and with the emerald cross from Father Grigori hanging around her neck, too, she felt like a walking jewelry box.
Like her sisters, she put on a long dark skirt and a white blouse, and by the time they were out in the hall the family’s companions in exile had also assembled there—Dr. Botkin, polishing his gold-rimmed glasses; her father’s valet, Trupp; her mother’s personal maid, Demidova; Kharitonov the cook. Tatiana asked what time it was, and Dr. Botkin consulted his pocket watch.
“Nearly one o’clock.”
Her mother came out next, clutching one of the pillows that also contained a cache of jewels inside it (Demidova had the other), then her father emerged, carrying a sleepy Alexei in his arms. Her father was not a tall man, but he had a broad chest and strong arms, and somehow he always managed to carry his son as effortlessly as if the boy were made of feathers. Ana carried Jemmy, who was strangely, but blissfully, silent for a change.
With Nicholas leading the way, the family trooped down the creaking stairway to the foyer. Yurovsky was waiting at the bottom, stroking his black goatee and wearing a long overcoat far too warm for the July night.
“This way,” he said, guiding them out into the courtyard—Ana was so glad of the chance to see the stars and breathe the fresh air, perfumed with lilac and honeysuckle, that she almost cried aloud for joy—then back down a set of stairs that led to the cellar. “You will please wait in here,” he said. “It won’t be long.”
The room was not much bigger than the girls’ bedroom upstairs, and the walls were covered with peeling wallpaper in a pattern of yellow stripes. There wasn’t a single piece of furniture in the room—Ana wondered if Yurovsky hadn’t already started his looting of the place—and a single electric bulb, with no shade, hung from a string, casting a harsh white light around the barren space. Just before the commandant closed the double doors behind him, Alexandra said, “May we not have some chairs?”
Ana knew that her mother’s back was very bad, but she also knew that it was Alexei she was most concerned about.
“Of course,” Yurovsky said, and closed the doors. Ana assumed that they would never see the chairs, any more than they saw the powdered sage or anything else that the commandant promised, but to her surprise, he kicked the doors open a minute later and dragged in two wooden chairs.
Alexandra sat down on one of them, casually placing the pillow behind the small of her back as if for comfort, while Nicholas sat down on the other with Alexei cradled in his lap.
“The capitalist newspapers have been circulating stories,” Yurovsky said. “They claim that you have escaped, or that you are not being kept safe. We need to take a photograph to put an end to these rumors once and for all. You will please arrange yourselves so that you may all be seen.”
Having had their portrait taken a thousand times, the royal family obligingly fell into their customary spots, with the parents and Alexei in the middle and the girls spread out on either side.
“Yes, yes,” Yurovsky said, directing Dr. Botkin and the others into a single file against the wall behind them. “Exactly. Everyone stay right where you are.”
Then, he popped back out the door again. There was nothing to look at and nothing to do. Ana fidgeted in her corset, stifling not only from the weight but the heat of it. Who knew that diamonds and rubies could be so heavy? Olga put a hand on her mother’s shoulder, and Alexandra kissed and squeezed it hopefully.