In about three hours, when I was ready to leave, they packed some food for us, all they could spare. While I prayed with the nuns, I was seized by a most extraordinary feeling. Three times I felt a breeze flying over my shoulders. My lips froze, I turned around and sensed nothing. In my mind I saw my family in the church in Tsarskoe Selo, entering through the small side door the Feodorovsky Sobor where we prayed with our beloved escort. The choir in the Feodorovsky Sobor with its beautiful voices sang throughout with such perfection that one wished it would never come to an end. I also saw my loved ones in Tobolsk in the winter church. Coming back to present surroundings, I realized that I stood alone among a few humble women. There was only a murmur of voices within these sacred walls. I thanked God for the kindness I had received in this convent. My heart found peace and I felt refreshed. I often wondered if they knew who their guest was. As I came out of the convent, I was horrified to see Alexander approaching, his face pale, grief-stricken and excited. He said, “There is no use going to the Crimea. I have just heard from responsible sources that your Grandmother, both aunts, their husbands, and all their children have been killed. We also learned from a relative that Vostorgov (a high clergyman in Moscow), together with a great many others, were assassinated last month. Among them were the young Ministers Maklakov and Khvostov, who had replaced the old Minister Goremykin, Minister of the Interior.” That Khvostov’s wife, Anastasia, had been shot in Moscow, I had learned previously. I could not cry but shook as if in a state of fever. All this distressing news pointed out our own danger. I had hoped that in a week I would be in the Crimea with my relatives. We heard, too, what had happened in Sevastopol. The revolutionists had killed and tied stones to the feet of the young cadets and thrown them into the Black Sea. Their disappearance was a mystery until a young woman on her way to market saw some bodies and reported them. She was turned away from the scene and was not allowed to enter the street where the bodies were seen. Later a diver went down and came up screaming. “They are alive and walking on the bottom of the sea,” he claimed. He had lost his mind. A second diver discovered the bodies were upright; heavy stones were tied to their feet and the waving motion of water made them look as if they were walking. Only fate helped me to listen with fortitude to this heartrending news about my relatives. Later I learned that the report about them was not true. Alexander had also heard that late one night in June, 1918, Uncle Misha and his English secretary, Nicholas Johnson (who thought his presence might help the Grand Duke), were taken away into the woods near Perm, and mysteriously disappeared. Unfortunately they had been executed, as I learned much later. Father was right, the taste of blood begets an epidemic.