The Property of a Lady - Elizabeth Adler [6]
But before she died she knew she would be called upon to explain the true story to the last person left who really loved her. The one who had sold the jewels and so innocently caused an international crisis.
Missie sighed as she remembered the night her old life had ended and her new life began. It was branded into her brain so clearly that even time had been unable to dim the memory of horror and a guilt so deep that she had wished she too could die and bury her memories with her.
If she closed her eyes now, she knew the scene would unfold again, perfect in every small terrible detail, just the way it always had every night of her long life.
Russia, 1917
The night was the blackest Missie ever remembered. The old wooden troika sped noiselessly along an invisible path that wound its way through thickets of birch toward the forest. After a while her eyes became accustomed to the darkness, and she could make out the rim of white frost edging each tree and the ice crystals forming on the fur rug pulled over her mouth to stop her breath from freezing. And then the birch trees merged into evergreens and they were in the forest and she could see nothing but blackness, as thick and tangible as frozen velvet.
The enormous borzoi, Viktor, was Prince Misha’s favorite dog, with the massive head and thick shaggy coat of a true old-fashioned Russian hound, bred not merely to course foxes but to hunt wolves. Viktor rarely left his master’s side, but now he loped along in front of the sled, guiding the team of dogs through the forest along an icy track only he could see.
No one spoke. There was only the hiss of the metal runners cutting through the ice and the labored breathing of the dogs. And the blackness.
Missie thought about her eighteenth birthday celebration yesterday. Varishnya, the Ivanoffs’ beautiful country estate, had been under a cloud of fear and gloom, and despite the champagne and Misha’s brave smile, she had known what he was thinking. That this would be the last celebration at his lovely home. It might even be the last time they were together. They might never see Varishnya—or each other—again.
Most of the servants had already disappeared; only the chef and Princess Anouska’s maid, who were French and considered themselves above a “peasant revolt,” had remained. But yesterday they too, at Misha’s command, had taken the train to the Baltic port of Tallinn where they would find a berth on a ship bound for Europe. Missie had refused to go with them. She had no real home in England, now that her father was dead, and besides, she was hopelessly in love with Misha Ivanoff. And now she was running for her life, away from the Bolshevik revolutionaries who were storming the country, murdering and pillaging without mercy.
Xenia’s head drooped against her shoulder and Missie thanked heaven she was sleeping. Lost in her dreams, she would not feel their fear. Still, it was uncomfortable with the child’s weight pressing the great tiara against her ribs.
Princess Anouska had been determined not to leave her jewels behind. Her beautiful bedroom had been in chaos. Her fabulous Paris dresses were tossed carelessly across the bed and her sumptuous furs thrown impatiently onto the floor. All the gray suede drawers had been pulled from the jewel cupboard as Nyanya, the children’s old Russian nanny, hurriedly sewed the ruby rings and sapphire brooches, the diamond necklaces and ropes of pearls, into hems and bodices. Even the hem of Xenia’s little woolen pinafore had been stitched