On December 31st, at 3 p.m., the Tsaritza despatched the following telegram to Nicholas II.
“Order Maksimovitch arrest Dmitri (the Grand Duke) in your name. Dmitri waited to see me to-day. I refused. The body has not yet been found.—Alec.”
To this His Majesty replied that he was taking every measure, and that he had ordered the Grand Duke Nicholas into exile to his estates.
Then, on the following day, the distracted Empress, who was grief-stricken and inconsolable at the tragedy, telegraphed “Thanks for your wire. Body found in the river.”
An abandoned motor-car soaked in blood had been found miles out of the city. It was believed to belong to a Grand Duke. The entire police and detective force of the capital had in the meantime been afoot, and raked through all the houses of ill-fame, gipsy singers’ haunts, and in fact every conceivable place, until the finding of a blood-stained galosh, proved to have belonged to Rasputin, gave evidence of a tragedy.
The ice on the river and canals was, of course, several feet thick, but it is the custom in Russia to cut openings where water is obtained and linen is rinsed by laundresses. Divers went down, but discovered nothing; eventually, however, the body was picked up near the bank, not far from where it had been thrown in.
When it was discovered the Empress saw it in secret and knelt before it, crying hysterically for half-an-hour. Anna Vyrubova standing in silence at her side.
Then, at the Empress’s orders, it was buried privately and at night at Tsarskoe-Selo.
In the meantime the Emperor had arrived post-haste from the front, and for three days extremely guarded references to an “interesting murder” appeared in the Petrograd and foreign Press. Alongside were printed some biographical notes regarding the chief actors in the tragedy. No mention, however, was allowed to be made of Rasputin.
Suddenly, however, the public were told that the notorious monk had “ended his life.” But nothing was said as to when or by what means.