Konrad and Alexandra (pdf) - Rolf Gross

A telegram from Aunt Sophia drove home Konrad’s point: Uncle Mouravi had suddenly
died of a stroke. He left his embattled estate to his oldest son—and his vintage Benz to
Alexandra.
Alexandra mourned the beloved, overbearing old gentleman. She would no longer be
able to surprise him by appearing at the wheel of a car at his house. To bequeath her the old
Benz! What a charming compliment to his niece.
Alexandra agreed to spend the summer of 1907 in Tbilisi and to go to Svaneti in
September, unless she found a partner for her cooperative practice before that time.
These still vague plans were eventually firmed up by Niko. Niko wrote that he had finally
gotten the courage to ask Claudia to marry him, and she had agreed. He had finished his
doctorate, and they were planning to come to Tiflis in August to celebrate the Georgian half of
their wedding, which would not be as big as Alexandra’s. Would they both come to Tiflis for the
occasion? He had little hope of luring them to their civil ceremony in Munich in June. Claudia’s
parents would come to Tiflis too.
They would, of course, be there. Konrad smiled. "Now that Niko is coming to Tiflis, I am
sure that no partner for your medical practice will materialize."
"Oh," wrote Niko as a p.s., "I almost forgot—greetings from Katharina! They had a boy
whom they named Ingo. She asked me to tell you that he has dark hair and brown eyes, and
everyone was blissfully happy."
Alexandra looked at Konrad. "Do you realize that had he been blond I would have
considered you to be his father?"
Konrad frowned. "You mean that Katharina could have conceived this child during that
one night? I did not sleep with her again after that, as you know."
She smiled at him and told him of Katharina’s desperate appeal for her advice in the
beer garden after their night together. Konrad was taken aback, this possibility had not
occurred to him.
"Why did you not tell me?"
She quietly took him into her arms.
Alexandra wrote Niko of their coming. It would be the first family reunion since her
wedding, and would he invite Vladimir? Since their return to St. Petersburg Vladimir had
become a close and dear friend.
During a Christmas party at the German embassy, to which Herr von der Schulenburg
had invited them, Alexandra met her future medical partner. Helene von Üxküll was a tall,
gaunt, quiet, no-nonsense woman, the daughter of a Baltic nobleman with an estate just east
of the German border. They had liked each other at first sight. Yelena, as she was called in
Russian, was specializing in internal medicine, a perfect match. A year younger than
Alexandra, she had one more year of clinical work to do, which suited Alexandra perfectly.
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