The Kremlin Games(133)
Then they were speeding through the village that provided support for the Dacha. The peasant inhabitants were just starting to wake up. Once through the village they were on one of the roads built by the scrapers over the last three years. Roads that led to Moscow to the west, to Murom and the Gorchakov estates to the east, to Ivanovo to the north and many other places. The road they were taking, as it happened, was the road to Murom and the Gorchakov estates. They could have carried more if they had taken a steam barge, but a steam barge would have had to travel either to Moscow or to Murom, which would have told Sheremetev where they were simply by knowing where they weren’t.
* * *
Bernie, of course, was in the driver’s seat, Natasha in the front passenger seat. Father Kiril and Gregorii were squeezed into the back seat along with Filip, and Anya was seated on Filip’s lap. Given Natasha’s slenderness, that probably wasn’t the most efficient placement. But even in the Dacha community, squeezing the princess into the back seat just because Father Kiril had a fatter ass wasn’t going to happen.
* * *
By four hours later, they’d gotten a hundred miles away. So the speedometer said, anyway. That was far enough to stop and rest for a bit, while they considered their plans. Up till now, their “plan” could pretty much be summed up as get the hell out of Dodge.
In a Dodge. Bernie started laughing.
“What is so funny?” Natasha demanded, a bit crossly. There were disadvantages to having a slim build while riding in a car crossing bumpy roads and driven by a lunatic up-timer. Less padding.
Bernie shook his head. “Ah . . . never mind.” Even for Natasha, the cultural references were too complicated to explain under the circumstances. “What do we do now? You realize we can’t pass any guard checks.”
While their artist, Gregorii, had made himself a set of papers for travel when Anya requested a set for herself and Natasha, none of them had considered that Bernie, Filip, or especially Father Kiril, would have to run.
“Where do we ditch the car?” Bernie asked. “It’s the only one in Russia, so there’s no way it’s not going to get noticed.”
“The car will get us to my estates faster than any other possibility,” Natasha said. “Certainly faster than any pursuit. We’ll pick up armsmen and decide where to go and what to do from there.”
“You know what I’d really like?” Bernie asked.
“No. What?”
“I’d like to break out the czar.”
“Impossible!”
“We can’t!”
“Are you mad?”
The uproar that caused just about caved Bernie’s head in.
“Stop and think. Why is it impossible?”
“It is.”
“Too many armsmen.”
“We don’t even know where they are.”
“Stop!” Bernie shouted. “Think, dammit. One at a time.”
Natasha, being the person who outranked everyone else, said, “We don’t know where they are.”
“How many places can they be?” Bernie asked.
“Hm. Not all that many,” Father Kiril said.
“So we get to your place,” Bernie said, “we call around on the radio and try to figure out where the czar is likely to be.”
“Are we sure the czar wants to be rescued?” Father Kiril asked. “At the very least, he and his family are safe where they are.”
“Are they really?” Anya asked. “Does Sheremetev really need them? Remember the Time of Troubles. No one worried about the various czars then, did they?”
They spent the rest of the trip talking about how and whether they should attempt to rescue the czar.
* * *
Bernie had been to Natasha’s home before. It was more a palace than a castle, though some of the older parts had a significant castle influence. It was a large, walled compound on the south side of Murom. And it was quite improved over the last four years. It had indoor plumbing of a sort, at least in a few places. It had a water-wheel generator that kept charged a fairly large room full of lead-acid batteries. There were a few light bulbs, though they were neither all that bright nor all that long-lasting. Mostly the electricity was used for heating elements. Heating elements that could be turned off and on quickly and efficiently, for cooking and the heating of rooms while using little wood and producing less smoke. Still, it was an example of conspicuous consumption but about the least that a princess who was also the head of the Dacha could get away with.
Even the Dodge had been there before. Once. To show off its existence to the citizens of Murom, with weeks of preparation and hoopla leading up to the visit. Now, about two-thirty in the late fall afternoon, the Dodge came roaring up the road, raising enough dust for a company of horse. If a company of horse could possibly move that fast, which it couldn’t.