Secret Lives of the Tsars by Michael Farquhar Page A

became heated whenever he spoke of it, and, as none of the people around him had ever set foot in what was, by his account, a marvelous paradise, day after day he told us fantastical stories about it which almost put us to sleep.”
    Peter’s pro-German proclivities were becoming an increasing liability, particularly after Russia went to war with Prussia in 1756. Recognizing her own fortunes were inexorably tied to her foolish husband’s, Catherine began to forge secret political alliances—including one with her erstwhile enemy Chancellor Bestuzhev-Ryumin—that would better position her for the future should Peter succeed in completely destroying his own credibility, which he seemed determined to do. “It was a question of either perishing with him or through him,” she wrote, “or else saving myself, my children and perhaps the State, from the shipwreck that was foretold by every moral and physical attribute of this Prince.”
    Catherine’s concerns took on a new urgency when Empress Elizabeth suffered a series of strokes and her survivalappeared uncertain. Disaster loomed in the person of her husband, and her political maneuvering reflected the profound ambition she had long maintained to rule Russia without him, whatever the cost. “There is no woman bolder than I,” she declared to a French diplomat. “I have the most reckless audacity.” Yet it was just this quality that nearly destroyed her.
    Meanwhile, though preoccupied in the forging of her own destiny, Catherine didn’t neglect her love life. She began an affair with the young protégé of her political ally the British ambassador Sir Charles Hanbury-Williams. His name was Count Stanislaus Poniatowski, and unlike his predecessor Sergei Saltykov, he was entirely in love with his mistress, particularly since it was she who first introduced him to sex. “My whole life was devoted to her,” he wrote, “much more sincerely than those who find themselves in such a situation can usually claim.”
    The affair took a rather awkward turn when Peter caught Poniatowski, in disguise, sneaking into the palace. The cuckolded husband wasn’t in the least bit angry, however. Rather, he took a perverse delight in dragging his wife out of bed and insisting that she and her lover join him and his mistress for dinner. This was followed by more intimate soirees among the four, during which Peter developed an attachment to his wife’s bedmate—just as he had earlier with Saltykov. “Nature made him a mere poltroon,” Poniatowski wrote of Peter. “He was not stupid, but mad, and as he was fond of drink, this helped to addle his poor brains even further.”
    During her affair with Poniatowski, Catherine found herself pregnant. And once again, the paternity of the child she was carrying was in question. “Heaven alone knows how it is that my wife becomes pregnant,” Peter exclaimed. “I have noidea whether this child is mine and whether I ought to recognize it as such.” * 3
    Though Catherine’s affair with Poniatowski, and the pregnancy that may have resulted, ultimately had few consequences (save for the tedious occasions the couple had to spend with Peter), her political dabbling had far more significant ramifications when some of her allies, including Bestuzhev-Ryumin, began to topple. Trouble began when one of Catherine’s known associates, General Stefan Apraksin, commander of the Russian forces against Prussia, suddenly retreated after an impressive victory over Frederick II’s army. Treason seemed to be afoot, and, as an investigation was pursued, Catherine fell under suspicion. After all, she had written to Apraksin, despite the fact that such correspondence was strictly forbidden her.
    Feeling a noose tightening around her neck, Catherine made a bold move. She wrote a letter to the empress, “making it as moving as I could,” in which she expressed sentiments quite the opposite of what she really desired—which was to remain in Russia and ultimately