The Minister of Evil | Page 5

a widely popular figure had the Starets become, and so deeply impressed had been the people of Moscow and Warsaw, where he had performed some mysterious "miracles," that there were hundreds of thousands of all classes who, like the two Ministers of the Crown who sat in that room, really believed that he was possessed of Divine power.
As we walked in the Nevski, people, mostly women, would rush to him and kiss his dirty hand, or raise the hem of his greasy kaftan to their lips, asking for the Father's blessing. By the enlightened Western peoples the ignorance and superstitions of our great Russian people cannot be understood. You, who have travelled in our Holy Russia, know our trackless country where settlements are to distances, as one of our writers has put it, as fly-specks upon window-panes, where whole villages are the prey of disease, and where seventy-nine people out of every hundred cannot read or write. You also know how in the corner of every room hangs the ikon, how the gold or blue-domed basilica strikes you in every street, the long-haired priests chanting in their deep bass, the passer-by ceaselessly crossing himself, the peasantry crushed and down-trodden, and the middle and upper classes lapped in luxury and esteeming good manners more highly than morals. Such is Russia of to-day--Russia in the age of my employer Rasputin, the era of the downfall of the Imperial Romanoffs, and the fierce struggle with the barbaric Hun.
In accordance with the plan formed by Boris St��rmer I next day accompanied the Starets by rail direct to Nijni Novgorod, by way of Moscow, thence taking steamer down the great Volga, a twelve-hour journey, to that city where they make bells and ikons, Kazan.
Rasputin had put on his oldest and most ragged monk's habit, and carried a staff. Over his threadbare dress he wore another of finer texture which it was his intention to discard ere entering before the shrine, in order to appear most lowly and humble in the eyes of the shrewd Tsaritza. We left Petrograd at night, that our departure should not be known and commented upon, but ere we did so I received a note from the General to the effect that the director of Secret Police at Tsarskoe-Selo had telephoned that Her Majesty was not leaving till the following day.
Hence we were travelling a day ahead of the Empress.
Kazan is a city full of the odour of sanctity if judged by the number of priests and monks one meets in its streets. It is situated about seven versts from the river, an old-world picturesque place wherein one rubs shoulders with people in all sorts of curious costumes, especially in the Tartar suburb where the low houses border upon narrow unpaved streets dotted here and there with mosques.
On arrival we drove up the hill to the great Preobrazhensky Monastery where Rasputin, as became a holy man, sought hospitality and was immediately very warmly welcomed, while I afterwards went on to the Hotel Frantsiya, in the long busy Vozkrensenkaya, where I took a room in order to watch the arrival of Alexandra Feodorovna, who would travel incognita, and of whose coming I was to give warning to Grichka.
For two days I waited, ever on the alert, and, of course, interested in the adventure. It is not always that one waits in an hotel in expectation of the arrival of an empress. Meanwhile I had made friends with the hotel clerk, without, of course, explaining my business, and he had promised to tell me of all new arrivals.
The Frantsiya is a very comfortable hotel, conducted upon French lines, and the two days I spent in Kazan were certainly quite enjoyable ones.
On the evening of the third day my friend the hotel clerk sent a message to my room, and in response I at once descended to the bureau, when he informed me that the ladies had just arrived, a Madame Strepoff, and her maid Mademoiselle Kamensky. He described the first-named, and I at once recognised her as the Tsaritza herself, though, of course, the tall, pale young man had no idea of her identity. I had merely told him that I expected the arrival of a lady whom I had met in Moscow some time ago.
"Madame has taken the best suite of rooms in the hotel," the clerk said. "She is evidently an aristocrat though she is only Madame Strepoff. I have just sent their passports to the police."
The hour was immediately before dinner, therefore I lounged about the entrance hall awaiting the appearance of the two travellers who, the clerk had told me, had not ordered dinner in their rooms, so evidently they intended to dine in the public restaurant.
Just after half-past seven they descended the broad staircase. There was but little