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All debates in the Duma were forgotten. Unity, unity! All discord in the large Romanov family was forgotten.

To his joy, now, during this national war, Nicholas gained the right to pardon—and his brother Misha returned to Russia. Only to perish there a few years later. Unity, unity!

The story of his great-grandfather flickered before him: like the war with Napoleon, this would be a patriotic war. The entire people. Unity, unity! He set out for Moscow, the ancient capital, the symbol of the Fatherland.

The Kremlin. The emperor and the family entered the white marble St. George Hall, Alexei (as usual he was sick, having hurt his leg) carried by his sailor-companion; alongside the tsaritsa was her sister Ella.

Maurice Paléologue recorded the emperor’s inspired words: “A magnificent impulse has gripped all Russia, without distinction for tribe or nationality. Hence, from the heart of the Russian land, I send my valiant warriors fervent greeting. God is with us!”

Outside Assumption Cathedral, by the bell tower of Ivan the Great, there were immense crowds. The bell chimes drowned out their ecstatic cries, and the marshal of the court, Count Benckendorff, gazing at the smiling crowd, spoke triumphantly and mockingly: “Here’s the revolution they promised us in Berlin!”

Yes, warnings had come from Berlin: if there is war, it may well end in revolution in Russia. Actually, there had been many such warnings earlier as well, at the very start of Nicholas’s reign. But now all was forgotten: smiling shouts—the people were greeting the tsar’s family. There was joy on Alix’s face, for the first time in many months. Her dream had come true. How unexpectedly it had been achieved, this long-awaited unity—the people and the tsar!

In the golden dusk of the ancient Assumption Cathedral, the trembling flames of candles, court singers in silver garments from the sixteenth century, the source of the Romanov dynasty. The Divine Liturgy was read, and the precious stones on the brocade of the clergy’s vestments flickered in the candlelight.

In just three years, lost in wintry Siberia, they would recall this ringing of bells, this ecstasy of the people at the sight of their emperor.

“Official and private information reaching me from all over Russia is one and the same. The same popular exclamations and reverential zeal, the same rallying around the tsar.… No dissent whatsoever. The difficult days of 1905 seem to have been crossed out of their minds. Holy Russia’s collective soul has not expressed such power since 1812,” wrote the French ambassador.

On what a triumphant note this epilogue began.

“Everything has been closed up, all the revolutions have hidden themselves away, everyone’s thoughts are of common service to the Homeland. One breathes very easily in this pure atmosphere, which has become almost unknown among us,” wrote a Duma deputy.

In 1914 sadness bordering on despair reigned among the Bolshevik revolutionaries.

The Bolshevik leaders were scattered across the world: Lenin, Zinoviev, and Trotsky were in hopeless emigration. Actually, no one in Russia gave them the slightest thought now, except maybe the police.

Apathy and hopelessness had gripped the exiled revolutionaries. A most curious company gathered that year in Turukhansk exile: a certain young Georgian spent entire days on his cot, his face to the wall. He had stopped taking care of himself, had even stopped washing his dishes, and the dog licked his plate. His name was Joseph, and one of his party names was Stalin. In just four years he would be living behind the Kremlin Wall, right where the tsar and his family were now.

Here was another resident of Turukhansk exile. He too had fallen into a severe depression. Then, in September 1914, another exiled Bolshevik, Sverdlov, ran into him here. Sverdlov was linked with him not only by a commonality of views but also by an old and fond friendship. It was with chagrin that Sverdlov wrote his wife: “I spent a few days with George. He’s not