Filip could have disguised the boxcar with a little paint, if paint could be kept liquid in weather like this. Her thoughts always turned to her husband, maybe because she wanted so badly to be with him again. In the meantime, she would carry on the best she could with the cause he had once fought for. She understood why the legion had withdrawn from the civil war, but she also felt abandoned, especially now that she was with the White Army, seeing their plight firsthand. If no one would help them, how could they defeat the Bolsheviks?
The tools clanged against the track and the wheels, the noise carrying over the wind but only barely. Then the noise stopped. Maybe they were pushing it now. She was too far away to see the boxcar, and she was supposed to keep her eyes the other direction.
Shouts cut through the night, and a motor revved. The voices came from the far side of the boxcar, where Tanya kept watch. Something had gone wrong. She didn’t have a pistol, just the grenade, so she ducked into the shadows of a nearby train.
An automobile’s headlights pierced the darkness, exposing the slow-moving boxcar and Nadia’s brother. Several guards rushed toward the train, and two tackled Nikolai, dragging him to the ground.
“Stand up,” one of the men ordered. He wore a long black coat, and she recognized his voice. Orlov. Had he recognized Nikolai?
They hauled Nikolai to his feet and held him in the light. Blood trailed from his lip. One of the guards shoved him into the boxcar, hard, whipping his body into the wood. Nikolai groaned.
“Your father told me you died, Nikolai Ilyich Linsky.”
Nadia shuddered. There was little hope for Nikolai anyway because he’d been caught stealing the gold, but Orlov’s recognition sealed his doom.
“He believed me dead. I was captured, and when Russia fell apart, none of my messages made it through.”
Orlov huffed. “Fell apart? Russia is in the process of being reborn. The revolution will right the wrongs of the past.”
Nikolai spat on the ground. “Your revolution is a disaster.”
One of the guards pummeled the end of his rifle into Nikolai’s stomach, making him double over. It was all Nadia could do to stay quiet. When other agents brought Sokolov and Fedorov to stand beside her brother, Nadia’s hope sank. Had Tanya, at least, escaped? Could she help Nadia mount a rescue if Nadia could figure out what to do?
Then Tanya appeared and walked to Orlov’s side. Sokolov said something, but Nadia didn’t catch the words, only the venomous tone.
“I’m sorry,” Tanya said. “But I have to watch out for myself now. Three tsarist officers in exchange for a pardon. The Bolsheviks are going to win this war, and I want to be on the winning side.”
Nadia felt as if she’d been kicked in the gut. Tanya had betrayed them?
Nadia had to do something. She didn’t dare throw her grenade at them—she might injure the Bolsheviks, but she’d also hurt her brother.
As Orlov and Tanya spoke, Nadia tiptoed around the automobile. The ice on the river cooperated, creaking loudly enough to cover the sound of her footsteps.
“Lock them up.” Orlov’s command carried over the bitter wind.
Nadia slipped behind the steering wheel. The windshield wouldn’t protect her from a bullet, but she was behind the light—they’d have trouble seeing her. “Let them go!” she shouted through the still-open door.
Tanya said something that Nadia couldn’t hear, and Orlov laughed, making a sound that was low and cheerless. “So two of Baron Linsky’s children are in Irkutsk. This time, I won’t be commuting any sentences. You’ll be executed together, just like your parents.”
If they were going to execute her for counterrevolutionary activities, Nadia wanted to be guilty of more than a past that contained luxury, wanted to be punished for something she had done rather than something she’d been born to. “You will release them, or I’ll destroy the boxcar and you’ll lose all the gold inside.” She’d only driven once, the summer before the war, when Nikolai and Oleg had taken her driving in Oleg’s Russo-Baltique. This was a different model, but the boxcar was straight ahead. She wouldn’t have to do much steering, and the engine was already running. It might not work, but maybe the threat would be enough.
“You expect me to believe that you’d drive an automobile into the boxcar? You might kill yourself. Or the prisoners.” Orlov’s words made her pause but only for a moment.
Honor. Family. Russia. She knew what she would do. “My great-great-grandfather helped burn Moscow so Napoleon couldn’t have it. He started the blaze with his own palace. And my grandfather helped scuttle the Black Sea Fleet to keep the British out of Sevastopol Harbor. The Russian blood in my veins knows all about hard sacrifices. If you think for one moment I won’t destroy all of us to keep that gold out of Bolshevik hands, try me.” It would be only a small victory, only a small portion of the gold, but it would be a victory, nonetheless.
Orlov ignored her. Did he not believe her?