Read Online Alexandra by Carolly Erickson - Free Book Online

my conscience.’ She told Nicky she thought it was a sin to change her belief, and
that if she were to renounce her Lutheranism, she would be miserable for the rest of her life.
    ‘I am certain that you would not wish me to change against my conviction,’ she went on. ‘What happiness can come from a marriage which begins without the real blessing of God?.
. .I should never find my peace of mind again.’ 7
    Alix’s letter was heartfelt, and full of sadness, but very firm. She could not ‘act a lie’, she could not go against her conscience. She would never abjure her faith and adopt
his. ‘I am certain that you will understand this clearly and see as I do, that we are only torturing ourselves, about something impossible and it would not be a kindness to let you go on
having vain hopes, which will never be realized.’ 8
    Nicky received Alix’s letter on a raw November day when a storm was beginning to blow. He walked out into the storm, his hands in his pockets, leaning in against the wind, his thoughts in
such turmoil that he was hardly aware of the violent weather. ‘I walked about allday in a daze,’ he wrote later in his diary. ‘It’s so hard to
appear calm and happy when an issue affecting the whole rest of your life is suddenly decided in this way!’ 9 To numb his shattered feelings,
he drank himself into a stupor, and continued to drink heavily for four days. 10
    He knew, for Ella had told him, that behind Alix’s carefully phrased, discouragingly adamant letters was a wounded, grieving heart. She loved him, with a love, Ella assured him, that was
‘deep and pure’. She was ‘utterly miserable’, indeed she had confided to Ella, when Ella was visiting in Darmstadt, that she would ‘die for her
love’. 11 Nicky wanted to meet with Alix, certain that he could sway her if only they could talk about the thorny issue of religion
together. But if they were to meet – and this Alix dreaded – word would be sure to leak out to the press, and for some time there had been speculation in the newspapers about a possible
engagement. The last thing she wanted was to endure what was certain to be a painful personal interview with Nicky, made more tense by persistent reporters stalking them, waiting for news.
    Shortly before Christmas Nicky wrote to Alix from Gatchina, asking her to forgive his long delay in responding. ‘I could not write to you all these days on account of the sad state of mind
I was in,’ he said. ‘Now that my restlessness has passed I feel more calm and am able to answer your letter quietly.’ He had been, he admitted, ‘lonely and beaten
down’, but was not without hope.
    He felt certain that if only she could learn, from an Orthodox believer, the richness and depth of his faith, her objections to entering his church would fall away. He trusted in God’s
mercy to make it so.
    ‘Oh! do not say “no” directly, my dearest Alix, do not ruin my life already!’ was his closing plea. ‘Do you think there can exist any happiness in the whole world
without you! After having INVOLUNTARILY! kept me waiting and hoping, can this end in such a way?’ 12
    So the issue rested as the new year of 1894 began.
    The transition in the grand ducal household at Darmstadt for which Alix had been preparing herself was well under way. Erniehad yielded to family and social pressure
and agreed to marry his cousin Victoria Melita, daughter of Uncle Alfred and Aunt Marie, known in the family as ‘Ducky’. She was seventeen, he twenty-five; they had a common interest in
art, and were reasonably companionable. Ernie was handsome, outgoing and flamboyant, Ducky spirited and strong-willed. Both were highly intelligent. The engagement was a compromise, and each
partner knew it. Ernie would have much preferred to remain a bachelor, while Ducky, young as she was, had already met the love of her life – her Russian cousin Cyril, son of Nicky’s
uncle Vladimir – only to discover that she