Except I wouldn’t have known he was sneaking out to the Tamms’ party if I hadn’t run into the boys. As much as I didn’t want to believe it, there was no escaping the possibility that Miles was the one behind the brochures. My stomach turned over.
“Lottie, you look like you’ve seen a ghost!” I heard Papa’s voice, but it sounded far away. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing, nothing,” I choked out. I got up, bumping into the chair in my haste to get out of the room. “I need a drink of water and I want to check on the twins. You don’t need me for this.”
As soon as I was in the hall, I ran into the sitting room. Only Miles and Hap were still there. “Miles, I have to talk to you!”
He’d moved over to a desk and was writing. “All right. Talk,” he said, putting down his pencil.
“No! Not here. Dmitri will be back up soon. Come to my room.”
He got up and I grabbed hold of his arm, dragging him up the stairs and ignoring his complaints. When we got to my room, I pulled him in far enough to shut the door.
“What—” he started to say.
“Don’t tell me you’ve been writing flyers calling for the overthrow of the czar!”
He blinked a few times. “I won’t tell you if you don’t want to know.”
“How could you!” I yelled, and then realized how loud I’d been. “You’re not a child anymore, even though you act like one.”
He clenched his fists together. “How could I? Don’t you see? Russia is falling apart! People are starving; soldiers are deserting. If we continue as we are, the Germans will win. We won’t have a czar, and we won’t have anything else, either.”
My head began to pound. “How are flyers going to do any good, besides getting you arrested?”
“What else can I do?” He hit himself on his chest with his fist. “I know what’s going to happen to me. I’m not going to spend the time I have left watching everyone else out there actually doing something!”
The headache hit me full on. We never talked about the future. We always pretended there would be a cure. Hearing him say it meant we couldn’t pretend. I wrapped my arms around myself, the headache bringing on such nausea I thought I would throw up. I wished I’d never said anything.
“And what about you?” he said. “You don’t think of the danger to yourself with your little black-market arrangements!”
I sank down on the bed.
“Oh, you didn’t think I knew?” Miles gave a harsh laugh. “I see you out the window. It wasn’t that hard to figure out why Ivan would come to the house and park his cart right by the door of the carriage house and then have to carry the wood all the way across the courtyard to stack it. And I’ve seen you go into the carriage house with an empty basket and come back out with it covered and obviously heavy. You aren’t out there just chatting with Yermak. Why do you get to do something important and I don’t?”
I didn’t have an answer for that.
“I hope you haven’t involved Hap in this,” I said, trying to shift the subject away from me.
He looked down at the floor. “No, not really.”
I had hoped he would say no, but that vague answer told me I needed to know more. “What does that mean?”
“He knows what I’m doing, but I’ve never let him go with me to any meetings. He cares too, Charlotte, so don’t go and yell at him.”
“Meetings? You’ve been going out to meetings?” I was horrified. People could identify him.
“A few. Nobody uses their real names. It’s not that dangerous.”
Except for someone with bright red hair, who spoke Russian well but would never be mistaken for a Russian.
“How are you even getting the flyers printed? If you are the one who is taking them to someone with a printing press, then someone has seen you and can report you.” I paused, suddenly realizing what I’d been missing. “Raisa has been helping you, hasn’t she?” I put my hand to my head, though it did nothing to stop the throbbing. “She still has access to her father’s printing press.” I couldn’t believe my best friend had kept such a secret from me and put my brother in danger at the same time. Was she even my friend at all?
“Yes, I asked her to help,” Miles said. “She was glad to be able to do something. The sooner revolution comes, the sooner her father will be let out of prison. Don’t go yelling at her, too.”
I had to think. No matter how much I wanted to yell, I knew it wasn’t going to help. And the more I knew, the better I’d be able to find a way out of the mess.
“How did the playwright at the Tamms’ get hold of one of your flyers?” I asked. “The baron showed us one today.” I told him about the baron’s visit, trying to keep my voice steady. Panicking wouldn’t do us any good.
“I don’t know the playwright and he doesn’t know me,” Miles said. “It’s an arrangement. I leave them at the Tamms’ and someone picks them up during one of their parties. I don’t know who. Peet has seen the man but doesn’t know his name.”
I remembered the package I had assumed was a present for Peet. The pain in my head increased. “So Peet is involved too?” I didn’t even really need to ask.
“Yes,” Miles said before he began to cough—deep, wracking coughs that he couldn’t get under control.
I got up and tried to help him to the bed, but he pulled away from me, waving me off. Hap burst into the room and wrapped his arms around Miles, supported him so that he stayed upright. He said something to Miles, but I couldn’t hear what it was over the sound of the coughing. I lost track of counting the seconds. I thought he’d never stop.
When the coughing finally eased, Miles sagged a little and closed his eyes. “Come on, Miles,” Hap said. “You and Lottie can talk more tomorrow.”
Miles nodded, not looking at me.
I sat back down on the bed after they left. If I knew anything about my brother, it was that it wouldn’t be easy to convince him to stop with the flyers. But if he was caught, being Papa’s stepson wouldn’t help him. Just like Papa had tried to warn me that morning, even the children of prominent people could be charged with crimes against the state. The lucky ones managed to bargain or bribe their way to exile, but the rest were imprisoned like ordinary people. I couldn’t bear the thought of Miles being dragged out of the house, beaten and bloody like Samuel.
I realized we’d have to take a drastic step to keep him safe. Miles had to leave the country. There was no other good option.
Chapter Ten
I WENT TO bed and slept for small stretches of time, my mind too busy running through different possibilities to stay asleep for long and my head still gripped with pain. If Miles left, Hap would have to go with him, in case Miles got sick along the way. With the war on, it would be a long and difficult trip. And if Miles fell ill, they’d have to stop wherever they were and stay until he was better, and he would need to be under a doctor’s care.
I knew he wouldn’t want to leave. He and Raisa were so sure revolution was coming—and so sure it would be a good thing—but I feared their hopes weren’t based on reality. I’d heard about the attempts at revolution that had happened before we’d come to Russia. They’d all been crushed easily. Even if a new revolution came, there was no guarantee everything would immediately get better.