His fingers were not yet those of a corpse, but soft, and still warm. For a moment, the fear and anger of these past few months slipped from my heart like a thief in the night. I kissed his hands and breathed in his familiar scent of tobacco, ink, leather, and the perfume tincture that was blended in Grasse for his sole use.
I took the scroll from his hand. It was easy enough to slide it out, although my blood thickened with fear and my veins were coated with frost and rime like branches in our Baltic winter. It was important to show everyone that I alone was entitled to do this – I, his wife, and the mother of his twelve children.
The paper rustled as I unrolled it. Not for the first time, I was ashamed of my inability to read. I handed my husband’s last will to Feofan Prokopovich. At least Menshikov was as ignorant of its contents as I. Ever since the days when Peter first drew us into his orbit and cast his spell upon us, we had been like two children squabbling over their father’s love and attention. Batjuschka Tsar, his people called him. Our little father Tsar.
Prokopovich must have known what Peter had in mind for me. He was an old fox with a sharp wit, as comfortable in earthly as in heavenly realms. Daria had once sworn that he had three thousand books in his library. What, if you please, can one man do with three thousand books? The scroll sat lightly in his liver-spotted hands now. After all, he himself had helped Peter draft the decree that shocked us all. The Tsar had set aside every custom, every law: he wanted to appoint his own successor and would rather leave his empire to a worthy stranger over his own, unworthy child. Alexey . . .
How timid he had been when we first met, the spitting image of his mother Evdokia, with his veiled gaze and high, domed forehead. He couldn’t sit up straight because Menshikov had thrashed his back and buttocks bloody and sore. Only when it was too late did Alexey grasp his fate: in his quest for a new Russia, the Tsar would spare no one, neither himself, nor his only son. You were no blood of my blood, Alexey, no flesh of my flesh . . . And so I was able to sleep soundly. Peter, though, had been haunted by nightmares from that day on.
My heart pounded against my lightly laced bodice – I was surprised it didn’t echo from the walls – but I met Prokopovich’s gaze as calmly as I could. I clenched my toes in my slippers as I could not afford to faint. Prokopovich’s smile was as thin as one of the wafers he would offer in church. He knew the secrets of the human heart; especially mine.
‘Read, Feofan,’ I said quietly.
‘Give everything to . . .’ He paused, looked up and repeated: ‘To . . .’
Menshikov’s temper flared; he reared as if someone had struck him with a whip, like in the good old days. ‘To whom?’ he snarled at Prokopovich. ‘Pray tell, Feofan, to whom?’
I could hardly breathe. The fur was suddenly much too hot against my skin.
The Archbishop shrugged. ‘That’s all. The Tsar didn’t finish writing the sentence.’ The shadow of a smile flitted across his wrinkled face. Peter had liked nothing better than to turn the world on its head: and, oh, yes, he still had a hold on us from beyond the grave. Prokopovich lowered his gaze. I snapped back to life. Nothing was decided. Peter was dead; his successor unnamed. But that didn’t mean I was safe. It meant quite the opposite.
‘What – that’s it?’ Menshikov snatched the paper out of the Archbishop’s hands. ‘I don’t believe it!’ He stared down at the letters, but Prokopovich took the scroll from him again.
‘Oh, Alexander Danilovich. That’s what comes of always having had something better to do than learn to read and write.’
Menshikov was about to give a stinging reply, but I cut him off. Men! Was this the moment for rivalry? I had to act fast if I didn’t want to live out my days in a nunnery, or be forced aboard a sledge to Siberia, or end up face down in the Neva drifting between the thick floes of ice, my body crushed and shredded by their sheer force.
‘Feofan – has the Tsar died without naming his heir?’ I had to be sure.
He nodded, his eyes bloodshot from the long hours of keeping vigil at his lord’s bedside. In the manner of Russian Orthodox clerics, he wore his dark hair plain; it fell straight to his shoulders, streaked with grey, and his simple, dark tunic was that of an ordinary priest. Nothing about him betrayed the honours and offices with which Peter had rewarded him; nothing apart from the heavy, jewel-studded cross on his breast – the panagia. Feofan Prokopovich was old, but he was one of those men who could easily serve many more Tsars. He bowed and handed me the scroll. I thrust it into the sleeve of my dress.
He straightened up. ‘Tsarina, I place the future of Russia in your hands.’ My heart skipped a beat when he called me by this title. Menshikov, too, raised his head, alert, like a bloodhound taking scent. His eyes narrowed.
‘Go home, Feofan, and get some rest. I’ll send for you when I need you. Until then, do not forget that the Tsar’s last words are known only to the three of us,’ I said. ‘I hope you will serve me for many years,’ I added. ‘I bestow upon you the Order of St Andrew and an estate outside Kiev with ten – no, twenty – thousand souls.’ He bowed, looking content, and I thought quickly about whom to send into exile, whose property I would have to sequestrate, in order to reward Prokopovich. On a day like today, fortunes were made and lost. I gestured to the servant standing guard next to the door. Had he understood our whispers? I hoped not.
‘Order Feofan Prokopovich’s carriage. Help him downstairs. No one is to speak to him, do you hear?’ I added in a whisper.
He nodded, his long lashes fluttering on his rosy cheeks. A handsome young boy this one was. His face suddenly recalled that of another. One I’d thought the most beautiful I’d ever known. Peter had put a brutal end to that. And afterwards, he’d ordered that the head, that same sweet head, be set at my bedside, in a heavy glass jar of strong spirit, the way apples are preserved in vodka in winter. The wide eyes stared sadly out at me; in the throes of death the lips, once so soft to kiss, now shrivelled and drained of blood, had pulled back from the teeth and gums. When I first saw it and, horrified, asked my lady-in-waiting to remove it, Peter threatened me with the convent and the whip. And so there for a time it had stayed.
Feofan Prokopovich laughed softly, his face splitting into so many wrinkles that his skin looked like the parched earth after summer. ‘Don’t worry, Tsarina. Come, boy, lend an old man your arm.’
The two of them stepped out into the corridor. The footman’s pale, narrow-legged silk breeches clearly showed the outline of his muscular legs and buttocks. Was there any truth in the rumour that Prokopovich liked young men? Well – each to his own. I blocked the view of the Tsar’s bed with my body. Pale, frightened faces turned to gaze into the room: both noblemen and servants sat there like rabbits in a snare, craning their necks, awaiting their destiny. Madame de la Tour, my youngest daughter Natalya’s scrawny French governess, was hugging the little girl close. I frowned. It was much too cold in the corridor for her and she’d been coughing since yesterday afternoon. Her elder sisters Elizabeth and Anna were there beside her, but I avoided their eyes. They were too young; how could they understand?
Nobody knew yet whether I was the one they had to fear. I searched the crowd for young Petrushka, Peter’s grandson, and the Princes Dolgoruki, his followers, but they were nowhere to be seen. I bit my lip. Where were they . . . busy hatching plans to seize the throne? I had to lay hands on them as soon as possible. I snapped my fingers and the closest guard leapt to attention.