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Chapters (54)
  1. Cover
  2. The Summer Queen
  3. Dedication Page
  4. Family Tree of King George III
  5. Family Tree of Queen Victoria
  6. PART ONE
  7. Chapter One
  8. Chapter Two
  9. Chapter Three
  10. Chapter Four
  11. Chapter Five
  12. Chapter Six
  13. Chapter Seven
  14. Chapter Eight
  15. Chapter Nine
  16. Chapter Ten
  17. Chapter Eleven
  18. Chapter Twelve
  19. Chapter Thirteen
  20. PART TWO
  21. Chapter Fourteen
  22. Chapter Fifteen
  23. Chapter Sixteen
  24. Chapter Seventeen
  25. Chapter Eighteen
  26. Chapter Nineteen
  27. Chapter Twenty
  28. Chapter Twenty-One
  29. Chapter Twenty-Two
  30. Chapter Twenty-Three
  31. Chapter Twenty-Four
  32. PART THREE
  33. Chapter Twenty-Five
  34. Chapter Twenty-Six
  35. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  36. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  37. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  38. Chapter Thirty
  39. Chapter Thirty-One
  40. Chapter Thirty-Two
  41. PART FOUR
  42. Chapter Thirty-Three
  43. Chapter Thirty-Four
  44. Chapter Thirty-Five
  45. Chapter Thirty-Six
  46. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  47. Chapter Thirty-Eight
  48. Chapter Thirty-Nine
  49. Chapter Forty
  50. Chapter Forty-One
  51. Acknowledgements
  52. Select Bibliography
  53. The Summer Queen
  54. By Margaret Pemberton

My dear Martyr, give me thy blessing that it may follow me always on the sad and dreary path I have yet to follow here below. And remember us from on high in your holy prayers.

And when she had sealed the envelope with a kiss, she laid it on his mutilated breast.

As she had reached the graveside, Anastasia slid her hand in hers. ‘What mattered, Mama,’ she whispered in an effort to bring comfort to her mother, ‘is that we were lucky enough to have had him in our lives for a little while, and that he loved us and we loved him.’

The coffin was lowered into the grave. A lone priest conducted the Requiem Mass and, when it was at an end, she and Nicky each threw a handful of earth onto the coffin.

‘Here, my darlings.’ Beneath her thick veil, Alicky’s tears flowed freely as she handed a rose to Nicky and Alexei, and then to Olga, Tatiana, Marie and Anastasia. ‘May we always remember him, and may he never be far from us.’

Stepping up to the edge of the grave, she kissed the rose she was holding and then gently dropped it on the coffin. Solemnly and in turn, Nicky, Alexei and the girls each did the same.

It was over. Their goodbyes had been said, but as Alicky walked unsteadily away from the graveside, her heart told her that it was not the end – only the beginning of the end. For without Rasputin the future was a yawning black abyss; an abyss that would need every last drop of her iron determination and courage, if she was not only to face it, but survive it.

Chapter Forty

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MARCH 1917, ALEXANDER PALACE, TSARSKOE SELO

‘Alexei has measles,’ Alicky said on the telephone to Nicky, who was at the Stavka. ‘Botkin says it will be three or four weeks before he begins to get over it. Olga woke up with a rash on her head and a sore throat this morning and, as measles are so infectious, I think Tatiana, Marie and Anastasia will also soon be showing symptoms.’

Nicky had been lovingly sympathetic, but nasty as measles were, with his mind focused on the war effort, he could see no reason for returning to Tsarskoe Selo. Alicky was a trained nurse, and Botkin had always shown himself calmly efficient when it came to dealing with the children and their illnesses.

The first intimation at Tsarskoe Selo of more-than-usual unrest in Petrograd was when a senior member of the palace staff, who had been given a day’s leave to attend his mother’s funeral in Petrograd, failed to report for duty.

More snippets of information came in during the morning. Women had taken to the streets, protesting at the lack of bread. Men had walked out of several factories. Crowds were surging into the city, carrying Bolshevik red flags and banners. Trains had stopped running.