The only person who would fight the Grand Duchess, and not give in to her caprices, was Madame Wyroubieva, and perhaps this was one of the reasons why Alexandra Feodorovna grew so fond of her. The poor Empress wanted some one to fight her battles for her and felt grateful to any person capable of doing so. She had encountered so few willing to do it. The Emperor Nicholas was very fond of his sister-in-law. She represented to him what he called the only real Russian element in the Imperial family, in the sense that he thought her so infeodated to the old Muscovite traditions which his uncles and cousins, and even his own brother and sisters, had renounced, and he fancied she would be better able than any one else to understand the wants as well as the idiosyncrasies of the Russian nation. He always listened to her with deference, and, bigoted as he was himself, felt ready to believe her when she assured him that the Almighty would always protect him, provided he kept faithful to the principles of that Orthodox Church which required from him the destruction of everything and every one that showed any antagonism to this autocracy of which he was the chosen representative. The Czar belonged to that class of people who only listen to those who agree with them, and he had never learned anything, or profited by the lessons that one had tried to teach to him, no matter in what direction. He was a tyrant by character and by temper, whilst weak and irresolute, and this is a combination which is more often to be found than one would imagine. At the time I am talking about my mistress was very unhappy. For one thing, she had very little hope left of the recovery of her son, and apart from the exaggerated love which she bore him, she felt that the difficulty of her own position would increase should the boy die. She had an almost morbid wish to hear people assure her that such a misfortune was not going to overtake her, and she eagerly caught at the assurances which Rasputin used to give her that so long as he remained at her side no harm could happen to little Alexis. She sincerely thought that this common peasant, by reason of his ignorance, would be better able than a more cultured person to come into touch with the Almighty, founding her belief on the words of the Gospel, that He “revealed himself to simple and ignorant people.” The fact was that she had grown tired of all the false protestations with which her ears were saturated, and she thought that perhaps a humble Russian mougik would at least show himself faithful to her as well as to her dynasty. How terrible was her mistake the future was to prove. CHAPTER XVI THE CZARINA’S FRIENDS