The Rasputin File (62 page)

Even now after the removal of the ‘dread uncle’, she continued to fear the tsar’s long absences — his life at Headquarters — far away from her. Since he had started taking the Heir to Headquarters, loneliness and homesickness no longer tormented him so sharply. And she suddenly began to worry that the trips would disrupt the heir’s studies. And it at once became clear that Our Friend no longer approved of the trips, either. So she was right when she wrote to Nicky on 4 September 1916: ‘I fully trust in our Friend’s
wisdom … He sees far ahead & therefore his judgement can be relied upon’.

The Ruler Of Fogs

Our Friend, however, was not only required to heal and to forecast needed ministers. He was also constantly called upon to anticipate and avert her attacks of nerves. And to guard the alliance of the tsarina and her Friend.

When Alix and the girls went to Headquarters, Anya had naturally wanted to go with them; Alix didn’t like to be separated from her Friend. But Alix’s nerves were on edge. And on 6 October she would with her former irritation write to the tsar, ‘I am sending you a very fat letter from the Cow, the lovesick creature could not wait any longer, she must pour out her love otherwise she bursts.’ And Father Grigory, whose sense of the tsarina was unerring, did not want complications in the cabinet.

And so his immediate prescription was for Anya to stay at home. ‘10 Oct. 1915 …A[nya] is very put out He won’t let her go anywhere …He finds it necessary to remain on here to watch how things are going.’

But Anya’s being ‘put out’ was merely part of the game. She had achieved her main purpose. Her dream had come true — she was a fully fledged member of the shadow cabinet that governed Russia. She entered her role so deeply that the power-loving Alix sometimes had to put her in her place. ‘3 Nov. 1915 … The tail [Khvostov] & Beletzky dine at Ania’s — a pity, I find, as though she wanted to play a political part. O she is so proud & sure of herself, not prudent enough … our Friend always wishes her to live only for us & such things,’ Alix wrote to the tsar.

Again Our subtle Friend had perceptively wanted the same thing the tsarina had.

In his
Reign of Emperor Nicholas II
, the historian S. Oldenburg has carefully counted the number of times the tsar went against Grigory. He disregarded Grigory’s advice in 1915 when he visited Galicia and convened the Duma in April. And when he did not convene the Duma in November 1915, did not end the Kovel offensive in 9 6, and did not at Rasputin’s suggestion nominate Tatischev as minister of finance, Valuev as minister of transportation, or General Ivanov as minister of war. All the other decisions you have read about in this book and will have occasion to read about many more times. In his interrogation of Olga Lokhtina, the investigator asked her to respond to the same question — to recall the times when Father Grigory had not been heeded in Tsarskoe Selo. The File, from Lokhtina’s
testimony: ‘Last time, I could not recall when Father Grigory’s advice wa: not followed in Tsarskoe Selo …but now I do. They didn’t listen to Father Grigory in regard to Count Ignatiev [the minister of education], who had been dismissed against Father Grigory’s instructions.’ That, however, wa the only time she could remember.

The tsar took action a great many times on the basis of Rasputin’s prediction or ‘instructions’, as the tsarina called them. Only they should hardly be called Rasputin’s. In the majority of cases they were her ‘instructions’. And the tsar understood that very well.

This does not mean that she was dissembling. No, she believed absolutely that Our Friend had links to heaven. And for that reason, let me repeat it made her glad whenever her intentions perfectly coincided with hi instructions. Although of course she did sometimes cross the line and for the good of the cause inform the tsar of her own wishes as if they were Our Friend’s.

But on the other hand, in those areas where she had little understanding the peasant was fully independent. And here she expected from him decisions inspired by God. And that, above all, concerned the war. In tha area his help was all-encompassing.

‘22 Dec. 1915 … Our Friend is always praying & thinking of the war -He says we are to tell him at once if there is anything particular — so she [Anya] did about the fogg, & He scolded for not having said it at once -says no more foggs will disturb.’

But the ruler of fogs was required not only to pray constantly but also to propose strategic ideas.

An ‘Unconscious Spy’?

The army at the time was becoming increasingly restive.

There is no question that German agents had been spreading rumour about the drunken peasant to whom the debauched German tsarina wa telling military secrets, which the peasant and the scoundrels surrounding him were selling to German intelligence. And those rumours had demoralized an army already dejected by defeat.

That question — was the tsarina telling the peasant military secrets? -tormented and fascinated the opposition at court. Not only was Alix openly spied on at court (as Princess Vasilchikova had done). Her letters also started to disappear, apparently with the courtiers’ help. On 20 September 1915,
she informed the tsar, ‘[Beletsky] feels sure that my long lost letter … to Ania…is in Orlov’s hands.’

Prince Vladimir Orlov (‘fat Orlov’), a lieutenant-general, was in command of the royal campaign chancery. It has not been possible to clarify the matter of the letter, but soon after the appointment of Nikolai Nikolaevich as governor-general of the Caucasus, the obese giant Orlov, who resembled the Porthos of Dumas’s novel, was requested to join the ‘dread uncle’ there.

But even those who were not part of the opposition considered Rasputin an ‘unconscious spy’, who might blurt out military secrets to the rascals surrounding him. And here we shall have to find an answer to that most important question: did Rasputin know about the military operations being planned?

‘No,’ Vyrubova decisively answers. ‘There was in the sovereign’s study a secret map, [but] the study was always locked. And not even the children were allowed in that study. The sovereign never talked about military matters with his family.’

Vyrubova, however, was perfectly aware that Our Friend knew all the secrets even without the secret map. And she was also aware who had passed the most secret plans on to him.

From Alix’s letters:

‘3 Nov. 1915 … He [Khvostov] brought yr. secret marcheroute…to me & I won’t say a word about it except to our Friend to guard you everywhere.’

‘8 Nov. 1915 …Sweet Angel, long to ask you heaps about yr. plans concerning Roumania, our Friend is so anxious to know.’

‘8 Nov. 1915 …He wanders about and wonders what you settled at the Headquarters, finds you need lots of troops there so as not be cut off from behind.’

What was to be done? Alix had little understanding of military matters, which is why she put her trust in heaven and the ‘man of God’. So, the peasant did know the plans. And it is entirely possible that he became an ‘unconscious spy’. For Manasevich, who was so fond of double games, and the banker Rubinstein, who would be accused of espionage, were a dangerous circle for someone possessing such secrets.

Those secrets, which alarmed so many, brought him closer to death.

A Vision

Our Friend had in truth changed greatly on his return. From his relations with then Prime Minister Goremykin, Minister Khvostov, and the other ‘powerful of this world’, the commonsensical peasant had learned only contempt. He knew he could do better. And now that the tsarina had undertaken to govern the country, he of course understood: his decisions would be more rational. And ever more frequently he began to express his own views.

‘4 Oct. 1915 … Yesterday we saw Gregory at Ania’s…He begged me to tell you, that it is not at all clear about the stamp [paper] money, the simple people cannot understand.’

It was then that the peasant seriously remarked to Filippov, ‘that if he should be invited to be minister of agriculture, Russia would then be “piled high with millet and wheat”‘.

A dangerous, mysterious visionary force suddenly revived in him. And his rolling eyes and wheeze and the deathly pale white face during those visions have been described by witnesses. And sometimes the visions were remarkable.

On 10 October 1915, Alix wrote to Nicky:

another subject worries him very much and he spoke scarcely about anything else for two hours. It is this that you must give an order that waggons with flour, butter and sugar should be obliged to pass. He saw the whole thing in the night like a vision, all the towns, railway lines etc. it’s difficult to give over fr. his words, but he says it is very serious…He wishes me to speak to you about this all very earnestly, severely even…He would propose 3 days no other trains should go except these with flour, butter and sugar — it’s even more necessary than meat or ammunition just now … if passenger trains only very few would be allowed and instead of all 4 classes these days hang on waggons with flour or butter fr. Siberia … the discontentment will be intense if the things don’t move. People will scream and say it’s impossible…but it’s necessary and…essential.

Of course, the intelligent peasant could have understood even without visions that both Galicia and Poland were strewn with Russian corpses. And if a famine should be added to the constant blood-letting! The capital was unused to food shortages. An empty belly would be its undoing.

One way or another, everything would happen just as he said. It was in fact with a food shortage in the capital that the empire started to collapse in February 1917.

But despite Alix’s pressure, the tsar was unable to follow the peasant’s advice, for there was no one to organize it all. The new minister of internal affairs, Khvostov, who had been entrusted with the task, was at the time occupied with quite another matter.

The Peasant Breaks His Fetters

The next session of the State Duma was approaching. ‘With dangerous speeches,’ Beletsky wrote, ‘in which Rasputin’s vastly increased influence might be touched on.’ And Rasputin learned that to avoid doing battle with the Duma over him, Beletsky and Khvostov had come up with a ‘salutary idea’. The two officials, who had been appointed through his efforts, had decided to remove him, the one who directed the decisions of the tsars, from Petrograd. As Beletsky testified, they had the idea of arranging ‘a long trip to the monasteries for Rasputin, so that when the Duma opened, he would be away from the capital’.

And Beletsky added a remarkable sentence: ‘I already knew from previous experience that speaking out against Rasputin in the Duma only increased his influence, given the peculiar personalities of the most august personages.’ So that finally he, too, understood.

And fearing that speeches against him would strengthen the peasant, they decided to ‘convince the most exalted personages that such a trip to the holy places would be useful not only for the purpose of conciliating the Duma, but also for dispelling all the unjust talk about Rasputin’s life, and bearing witness to the religious impulses of his nature in a time of war’.

Summoned to accompany Rasputin on his trip to the monasteries were his friends Bishop Varnava, Martemian, now abbot of the Tobolsk Monastery, and Archimandrite Augustin. ‘I remember Varnava’s arrival in Petrograd with Archimandrite Augustin and Abbot Martemian, two dreadful monks…Augustin wore a silk cassock and was perfumed and pomaded (Varnava called him “my nestling”), while Martemian was twice as fat as the fat man Khvostov. Both monks…produced an impression of complete mediocrity,’ Vyrubova related.

In order to predispose the monks, on their arrival they were given, as if in reimbursement for their expenses, fifteen hundred roubles apiece from a secret fund, while Abbot Martemian received an additional two thousand roubles over and above. ‘We decided not to stint any money on the trip,’ Beletsky testified. The monks were being bribed to keep track of Rasputin.

The officials had failed to realize that Rasputin’s goodwill was far more important to the monks than money. And of course the monks told everything to Our Friend. So Rasputin presumably had a good laugh while recommending that they take the police money.

Rasputin had in fact decided to see what advantage he himself could extract from the situation. He pretended that he had agreed to go. But in return he asked Khvostov to speed up the removal of an enemy of his, Governor Stankevich of Tobolsk.

From Khvostov’s testimony: ‘I agreed and received the sovereign’s consent. At the same time, the sovereign noted, “I already have a candidate for Tobolsk, a good friend of mine.” And lifting up his blotting pad, he pulled out a note on which the name Orlovsky-Taneevsky was written in the empress’s hand. Only later did I learn that he was Rasputin’s candidate.’ Indeed he was: ‘Orlovsky is the name our Friend wld. like as gov., he is the president of the Exchequer chamber at Perm,’ Alix wrote to Nicky as early as 25 August.

So even here Khvostov had, without realizing it, been carrying out Rasputin’s orders.

And then before Rasputin’s scheduled departure a festive dinner took place. At the dinner Rasputin continued to play the fool: he shared some heartfelt memories. ‘Rasputin told how still unknown to anyone he had wandered among the monasteries … and how he had been to Jerusalem … and, by bribing the custodian, had been present at an Easter service,’ Beletsky testified.

After dinner Martemian asked for a supply of Madeira, because ‘Rasputin was an immoderate drinker.’ He was ‘provided with Madeira from the stores of the Department of Police’. After which Rasputin did not mention the trip again! So one can imagine how merrily Rasputin and his monk friends drank the police wine. It was only then that Beletsky realized that Rasputin had simply been fooling them.

Of course! Why would a member of the tsarina’s cabinet want to leave the capital? But Rasputin did not forgive them their double-dealing. While continuing to make fun of the ‘Tail’ or ‘Fat Belly’ (as he now called the minister in Tsarskoe Selo), Rasputin suddenly forgot their request that petitions be passed on to them through Andronikov. And he again started flooding Khvostov with them. He sent dozens of people to him at his home and at the ministry. This time it was Khvostov’s wife who rebelled. At the same time Beletsky was also experiencing a boom in petitions, to his horror. It was as if the peasant had broken his fetters. Something had to be done quickly. Both officials were also worried about Prince Andronikov. And
not only because he had failed to deal with Rasputin. The impudent Andronikov had been exploiting the situation and coming to them with requests on behalf of his own clients. Besides that, he had been involving Khvostov and Beletsky in dubious intrigues. For example, he got them into a fight for his apartment, the place where they were accustomed to meeting Rasputin. Petrograd at the time was crowded with refugees from the territories lost in the war. A great many of those people wanted to rent apartments. And Countess Tolstaya, who owned the building in which Andronikov lived, asked the prince to vacate his apartment: she did not care for Rasputin’s visits. Andronikov demanded help. And they did the unbelievable. In order to protect the apartment as a place for meetings with Rasputin, Khvostov pushed through a new bill to protect renters during the period of the war. The prince could now stay in his apartment. But Tolstaya dragged him through the courts and eventually won her case. The court’s hatred of Rasputin overcame the law and decided the case in her favour.