Excerpt from BENEATH THE CROWN: THE LAST DUCHESS
by Sharon Stewart
|
“Look out!” I shouted, just as the crest of the wave broke over her, pulling me under, too. Spluttering and coughing, I struggled to the surface. The ebb was pulling me farther from shore. I trod water. Where was Anastasia? Far away on the shore I could see tiny figures running . . .
I took a gulp of air and I plunged under the surface, opening my eyes against the salty sting of the water. I saw nothing, only shafts of sun slanting down. I had to surface. Another gasp of air, another plunge. Still nothing, then . . . something waving like seaweed below me. Anastasia’s hair!
My lungs bursting, I kicked deeper and grasped a handful of it. I tried to tow her upward, but, oh, she was heavy, heavy. I saw light glinting on the surface far above me, and knew I’d never reach it. Then that watery sky shattered and another body plunged past me. I felt myself grasped around the waist and carried to the surface.
Coughing and gasping, I opened my eyes. It was the Tsar, with Anastasia under one arm and me under the other. More swimmers had caught up with him now, and one of them seized me, while the Tsar set out for shore towing Anastasia.
People were shouting and running around on the beach. The gentleman-in-waiting who had brought me to shore wrapped a huge towel around me and carried me up to the umbrellas.
A silent crowd had gathered around the Tsar and Anastasia. I struggled free of the towel, pushed through the throng and knelt beside them. Anastasia was lying face down. The Tsar was trying to revive her. “She was under so long,” someone in the crowd murmured.
But moments later she gasped and shuddered. Instantly the Tsar turned her over and sat her up. Water gushed from her nose and mouth, and she began to retch.
“God be praised!” said the Tsar, wrapping her tenderly in a towel. He lifted her in his arms and started back up to the palace. “Someone carry the other little one,” he called over his shoulder.
And so I was scooped up from where I knelt on the rocky shingle, and carried away, and it was just as well, for I had suddenly begun to shiver and couldn’t stop.
That night they let me see Anastasia, though only for a few moments. The Tsar was there, and the Tsarina. Alexandra Feodorovna got up from Anastasia’s bedside and came over to where I stood in the doorway. She stooped and kissed me on the forehead. “Thank you, dear child,” she murmured.
“That’s right,” the Tsar said to Anastasia. “You owe your life to Dunia, you know. It was she I saw bobbing to the surface. When I dove for you there she was, hanging onto you by the hair. Otherwise I’d never have found you.”
Anastasia turned her head on the pillow and gazed up at me. She had a great bruise and scrape on her forehead where the wave had dashed her against the bottom. She raised her hand to her hair and frowned, her eyebrows drawing together almost into a line. “Did you have to pull my hair so hard?” she complained. “My whole head hurts!”
But that wasn’t what her eyes said, my Anastasia.
From Beneath the Crown: The Last Duchess. Text copyright © 2006 by Sharon Stewart. All rights reserved.
|
|
