Prologue.
My name is Chris and I’m fourteen years old. I live with my grandmother and my brother in a big beautiful house with pillars in Scotland. My family emigrated here during the abolition of the Russian Empire. The estate emanates antiquity and austerity, which is why my ancestors chose this place. My grandmother’s name is Evgenia, but everyone here calls her Eugena. She’s very old-fashioned. I have already come to terms with this fact, but sometimes it still annoys me. She has no special sympathy for me and loves my capricious nineteen-years-old brother John more than me. He is very emotional, probably because grandmother allowed him too much as a child. I can’t say I’m happy with it, but I hope it changes.
Our hired workers also live with us, although for me they are almost family. I was more friendly with some, less with others. I don’t remember the first ten years of my life well. But when I told our housekeeper, my friend Anne, that I wanted to write all this, she found some notes from one of our maids, who told about my childhood. And perhaps my story will seem boring to some, but this is my story.
But we’ll start in order.
