As he expected, his servant drank a glass, and within half-an-hour he expired in terrible agony, with Rasputin jeering at him in his death-throes.
It is computed that during 1916 no fewer than twenty persons lost their lives in consequence of visits to that sinister house within the shadow of the Winter Palace. Armed with those secret Chinese drugs, the pious assassin could administer baneful doses which proved fatal hours afterwards, with symptoms which completely deceived the doctors.
Knowing his own danger, he one day hit upon a new plan for his own protection, and when at dinner at the Imperial table he, addressing the Empress, said:
“A vision of the fixture hath to-day been revealed unto me! It is a warning—one that thou surely shouldst heed! When I die, Alexis will live but forty days longer. Surrounded as I am by those who seek my downfall and death, I know not what plots may be formed against me. I only know that assuredly Alexis will only survive me through forty days. If God wills it, my end may be to-morrow!” he added, raising his eyes piously.
At this the Empress betrayed terrible distress. But the ruse of the wily scoundrel worked well, for the personal protection at once afforded him by order of the Tsar was as complete as the surveillance upon the Emperor himself.
Chapter Four.
The “Hidden Hand” of Berlin.
Rasputin, though revealing himself constantly as a blasphemous blackguard, had by the middle of 1916 become the greatest power in Russia. Through his good offices Germany hoped to crush the Empire.