Maid of Baikal: A Novel of the Russian Civil War

“Tell me, is it true that the S-Rs arranged Zhanna’s capture?” Ned asked the cleric, rising from the table to pour each man a glass of tea.

“Most decidedly so,” Timofey replied. “And I will always regret not having known in time to warn her.”

“Do you know then who betrayed her?” Ned demanded, moving forward onto the edge of his chair. “Was Ivashov mixed up with the plot in any way?”

“Ivashov? How could you presume such a thing?” Timofey replied in disbelief. “Igor Ivanovich loved Zhanna like his own sister. And besides, he rode with her during the attack, did he not, and suffered injury while attempting to save her.”

“I know it sounds unbelievable, but Kolchak’s people have accused him of it,” Ned informed him. “Their brutes are holding him now in some vile cellar on suspicion of treason.”

“Then it is not only Zhanna upon whom the S-Rs have taken their revenge,” Timofey observed. “You see, Savinkov and Zhelezin consider Ivashov a turncoat for having left the party to join Kolchak’s Stavka in Omsk. In Russia, old affronts are rarely forgotten.”

“Do you have any idea then who did give away her movements that morning?” Ned asked.

“It could have been anyone sent to watch the approaches to your camp,” Timofey replied. “After the S-R assassins failed to kill Zhanna within your perimeter, the next step would have been to try and catch her outside.”

“Does anyone in particular come to mind?”

“No,” Timofey answered, shaking his head. “But wait. A Siberian woman claiming to be a friend of Zhanna’s came to the city hall the evening before her capture. The woman was told how to enter Zhanna’s camp and was never seen again. Perhaps she might have had a hand in it.”

“Do you remember a name, or what she looked like?” Ned pressed.

“No name, but I remember she was tall, well dressed, around thirty and very pretty. Fair-skinned and blonde, though she took pains to keep her hair covered.”

Upon hearing the description, Ned’s blood ran cold. Could it have been Yulia, who had property in Kazan she wished to sell, as in Samara? He quickly changed the subject lest Timofey suspect that he knew the woman.

“Tell me, Timofey, do you know anything about a monastery near Nizhni Novgorod where Zhanna might have been taken after she was abducted?”

“I do, but I can tell you she is no longer there. She has been moved, to Ryazan,” Timofey declared.

“You’re sure of this?” Ned demanded, his eyes wide with excitement.

Timofey delayed answering long enough to allow a broad grin to spread across his bearded face.

“Absolutely,” he replied. “I saw her there the day before I left to meet you here.”

“You saw her! How is she? Tell me everything you know!” Ned urged.

“She is being held at the Spassky Monastery, within the walls of the Ryazan Kremlin, in a barren cell that she shares with two or three Cheka guards, ruffians of the lowest sort.”

Here Ned held up his hand to interrupt Timofey’s account.

“Wait, you say she is held at a monastery, yet you speak of Cheka guards. Who, then, is holding her?”

“The monastery at Nizhni Novgorod and the one at Ryazan are no longer in church hands. The priests and monks have been cast aside and their fortress-like buildings are being used by the Cheka as secret interrogation prisons. But while the Cheka operates these prisons, the keys to Zhanna’s cell are held by a bishop, which permits the fiction that she is under church custody.”

“Why make such a pretense at all?” Ned inquired. “What do the Bolsheviks plan to do with her that they would want to blame it on the church?”

“They plan to put the Maid on trial,” Timofey said with a troubled expression. “Not a political trial before a revolutionary tribunal, but a clerical trial so as to distance the Bolsheviks from the verdict. By having the Holy Church condemn her, the Maid will be seen as rejected by her own kind. Of course, what remains of the Holy Orthodox Church inside Sovdepia is under state control. But the Chekists are masters of illusion and will commit any fraud to make it appear that God’s faithful have turned against her.”

“But where would the Cheka find bishops and priests so depraved as to participate in such a travesty?” Ned asked, shaken by the cunning of the Bolshevik plan. “What man of God would risk his soul to condemn the Maid in exchange for the Bolsheviks’ momentary favor?”

“You would be surprised at how many faithless bishops and priests have succumbed to Cheka intimidation during the Red Terror,” Timofey replied with a deep sigh. “Still others are only too happy to curry favor with the Bolsheviks to seek advancement in today’s corrupt and hollowed-out church.”

“For men of God to sink so low…” Ned reflected, his face contorted into a grimace.

“I know exactly how you feel, my friend,” Timofey agreed, reaching across the table to put a hand on Ned’s shoulder. “It’s revolting. And I felt the same revulsion when I agreed to serve as one of Zhanna’s trial examiners.”

Ned looked up with gaping eyes and watched the former priest’s lips twist into a sideways smile.