Alexander II_ The Last Great Tsar - Edvard Radzinsky [169]
Another letter that same day:
“… One of your windows has to be unsealed so that you can open it. I beg you to indicate to me precisely which window. In the event that the young tsarevich cannot go, matters shall be greatly complicated.… Would it not be possible, an hour or two before the time, to give the tsarevich some kind of narcotic? Let the doctor decide. Rest assured, we will not undertake anything unless we are assured of success.”
It was an escape conceived in the style of a Dumas novel.
But how to open the window? Suddenly, as if at the holy man’s behest, the window was opened.
Nicholas’s diary:
“10 [23] June. Whitsunday.… Marked by various events: one of our windows was opened this morning.… The air in the room became clean, and by evening even cool.”
The former commander-in-chief sent another message in a milk bottle, as if it were a disposition of battle.
“Second window from the corner on the square has been open for two days and even at night. Windows 7 and 8 by the main entrance are also always open. The room is occupied by the commandant and the assistants who make up the inner guard at any given moment. There are 13 men armed with rifles, revolvers, and bombs.… The commandant and his assistant come in to see us whenever they like. The guard on duty makes the rounds of the house at night twice an hour.… There is one machine gun on the balcony and another under the balcony—in the event of a disturbance. Opposite our windows on the other side of the street the guard is staying in a little house. There are 50 men. From each guard post there is a bell to the commandant’s room and a wire to the guard quarters and other points.”
These bells … they would ring that night, their last night.
“Inform us,” concluded Nicholas, “as to whether we shall be able to take our people with us.”
As always, he carefully recorded everything, revealing the secret of this plot.
Nicholas’s diary:
“14 [27] June. Our dear Marie turned 19 .… The weather was the same, tropical. 26 degrees [79°F] in the shade, and 24 [75°F] in the rooms. It is even hard to bear!… Spent an uneasy night and kept vigil fully dressed. All this because a few days ago we received two letters, one after the other, telling us to prepare to be abducted by some loyal people! The days have passed, though, and nothing has happened, and the waiting and uncertainty have been very trying.”
Now in his diary he testified before the entire world “about a monarchist plot for the purposes of the family’s escape and liberation.”
Alix was more cautious: her entry for June 27 does not say a word about the letters or a plot. But she was waiting. Oh, how she was waiting—for the next night. She listened to the nighttime silence.
As if someone were mocking them, instead of the rustle of plotters stealing up, through the open window:
“June 15 (28). Friday. At night we heard under our windows the guard strictly ordered to watch every movement in our window.”
WHO WROTE IT?
Seventy years later I am sitting in the Central State Archive of the October Revolution.
The archive file on my desk: “The Family of the (Former) Tsar Nicholas the Second 1918–1920.”
For a very long time—seventy years—this thin little file has not been released. I am one of the first (the very first perhaps) to see it upon its declassification. We shall return to its astonishing contents more than once. I will spend many hours alone with this bloody file!
In the middle of it I find the same letters signed “An officer” and once sent to the Ipatiev house in a milk bottle. They would become one of the grounds for the execution of the Romanov family.
Here is the last letter. Written neatly, in a student’s hand, in French:
“We are a group of Russian army officers who have not lost our conscience, our duty before our tsar and fatherland. We are not informing you about us in detail for reasons you can well understand, but your friends D. and T. [Dolgorukov