Alexander II_ The Last Great Tsar - Edvard Radzinsky [50]
After the fall of the tsarist regime in February 1917, the “Special Commission of Inquiry on the abuses of tsarist government ministers and other high officials of the overthrown regime” was created. Assigned to it was a typical liberal figure, a comrade procurator of the Ekaterinoslav district court, a certain V. M. Rudnev. Subsequently he recalled questioning the arrested Anya: “I was … frankly speaking, hostilely inclined toward her.… I was immediately struck by the unusual expression in her eyes, an expression full of unworldly meekness.” Guileless Anya had brought to the tsar’s family sincerity, devotion, and adoration, which were so lacking in the cold court. That was the investigator’s conclusion. He added: “Mrs. Vyrubova could not have exercised any political influence whatsoever. The empress’s intellect and will were far too strong a counterweight.”
Simple-hearted, stupid, and ugly?
Vera Leonidovna:
“She was quite pretty.… A beauty but in a very Russian manner: ash blond hair, great big blue eyes, a luxuriant body.… I remember seeing her for the first time. I was walking down Nevsky after a rehearsal. Atlantis was still alive: smart carriages raced past, and coachmen in tight-fitting indigo coats drove cheap droshkies. I often hear that sound now—the sound of a vanished life.… Here was the magnificent plume of a horse guardsman dashing by. With his back to the coachman and a greatcoat draped over his shoulders, the mayor of Petersburg went flying past surrounded by bicyclists; evidently the sovereign himself was to drive through shortly. It was two o’clock, and I saw the most elegant turnouts.
“That was when I saw the carriage: a young woman half-reclining, lazily, the feathers of her hat dangling over her beautiful, rather full face, her legs draped with a fur coverlet. ‘There she is,’ said my friend. There was a great deal of talk about her then. If rumor had Rasputin for the tsaritsa, they gave the tsar to Anya as a lover as well. By the way, she always told very sweet stories about herself and always funny things. Only intelligent people know how to make fun of themselves.… She was intelligent. She was also a great actress. This woman, who participated in all of Rasputin’s political games, appointed and ousted ministers, and carried out the most complex intrigues in the court, could look like an utterly artless Russian dolt. Was it a mask? Or had the mask become her face once and for all?”
Yes, Anya immediately grasped “Sana’s” nature. Russia’s mistress was shy. Her ingenuousness clashed with the icy chill of the court. Seeing herself misunderstood, she turned inward. She mastered reserve and distance, which were perceived as arrogance. Anya found the key to Sana’s heart: ecstatic, constant, and unbounded adoration.
Could she really have remained by Alix’s side for twelve whole years playing such a monotonous game, though? Oh no, she was constantly thinking up dangerous, intriguing new games for her imperial friend.
ANYA’S GAMES
Among the papers Yurovsky brought out after the family’s execution were many letters. All through World War I, breathless with love, Alix and Nicky inundated each other with letters, letters that contained puzzling lines. For instance, once Alix added this enigmatic postscript: “Lovy, you burn her letters so as that they should never fall into anybody’s hands?”
Whose letters? Why mustn’t those letters fall into anybody’s hands? Who is this person anyway, this “she”?
Elsewhere: “If we are not both firm, we will have lovers’ scenes & scandals.… You will see when we return she will tell you how terribly she suffered without you.… Be nice & firm.… She always needs cooling down.” So “she” would dare pursue lovers’ scenes and scandals and, evidently, letters to Nicholas?
Not mincing words, Alix brands this unknown woman: “quite hardened already … nothing of the loving gentle woman.” “She is boring