Constance Bolkonsky was a Russian duchess and anarchist. Bolkonsky was an associate of the Bonnot Gang and the mistress of Jules Bonnot until his death in a shootout with the law in 1912; that same year, after assassinating her husband, Duke Aleksandr Bolkonsky, she was convicted of conspiracy to overthrow the government, conspiracy to stir up civil war, falsification of private accounts, and complicity in premeditated murder and extradited to the Russian Empire.
Biography[]
Bolkonsky at Jules Bonnot's hideout
Constance Bolkonsky was born in Paris, France to an aristocratic family, and she married the Russian duke Aleksandr Bolkonsky, becoming a duchess. However, upon becoming aware of her husband's true nature - oppressive, corrupt, and cold-hearted - Constance fell out with her husband and instead sympathized with those who would fight against the corruption of the aristocracy, as she believed Czar Ivan the Terrible had done. As a result, she became involved with the anarchist movement in Paris, becoming the lover of anarchist and crime boss Jules Bonnot. In 1911, she helped to set up Bonnot's robbery of a SGDE wagon carrying a ledger from banker Casimir Cagne which would implicate Cagne, her husband, and several French politicians in the embezzlement of fifteen million people's savings in Russian bonds; this, in turn, would cast a negative light upon Duke Aleksandr and sabotage Russia's planned "Triple Entente" alliance with Britain and France, which Duke Aleksandr was expected to sign.
In April 1912, the two Russian royals were received at President Raymond Poincare's palace for a reception celebrating the signing of the Triple Entente pact; Cagne and English dignitary Lewis Hollingworth were also present. As the Russians arrived, an anarchist emerged from a crowd of Russian protesters and threw a severed dog's head at the aristocrats, referencing Ivan the Terrible's gifting of dog heads to the boyars on his coronation to warn thm that they would also be beheaded like dogs. Bolkonsky and her husband traveled to Choisy that same month to join several other onlookers in watching Bonnot's final shootout for entertainment, although Constance was mournful of Bonnot's death.
At the same time, Bolkonsky attempted to recruit the police chief inspector Paul Valentin - whom she knew held democratic principles from their conversation at the reception - to help her expose Cagne's corruption through the ledger, which she revealed that she possessed, also revealing that she had been Bonnot's lover. Valentin worked with inspector Gustave Pujol to entrap Cagne, having Gustave's lover Lea Dupuy secretly return Cagne's ledger after seducing him and sleeping with him. This gave the police cause to arrest Cagne, but the Paris Police Prefecture chief Louis Lepine discovered this trickery after interrogating his mole in the "Tiger Brigades", Achille Bianchi. Lepine had Dupuy tortured into withdrawing her statement, and he secured Cagne's release. Rather than let Cagne get away with his crimes, Bolkonsky had the last free member of the Bonnot Gang, Piotr Hernienko, interrogate Cagne at his mansion, discovering the meanings behind the codes on the ledger before killing Cagne. Bolkonsky then planned to deliver the deciphered list to socialist deputy and journalist Jean Jaures for publication, which would bring shame to the French government, scupper its alliance talks with Russia, and possibly even lead to a revolution. However, Hernienko insisted that a scandal would not be enough to ruin Duke Aleksandr, whom Constance privately wished dead, and he forced Constance to agree to assassinate her husband at the opera performance. Constance showed her support by (reluctantly) helping Piotr kill Bianchi when Bianchi came to her dressing room to ask her about Piotr.
Bolkonsky on trial
Valentin and Pujol, who had resigned and been fired from the police, respectively, after the fiasco of Cagne's arrest and release, privately aimed to thwart Hernienko's plans and ensure that the Russian bonds conspiracy was unearthed the legal way. They discovered from Constance and Piotr's fellow anarchist, Raymond Callemin, about Piotr, who was working as an electrician for the play. The two policemen were captured by Duke Aleksandr's guards, as Aleksandr intended to stop them from revealing his role in the bond embezzlement, but they escaped during the theater performance. Valentin went to rescue Constance as Pujol went to stop Piotr; they were able to shoot Piotr dead, but not before a mortally wounded Piotr shoved Pujol against a lever which activated a bomb hidden in the lightbulb atop the Duke's box. The Duke was killed in the ensuing explosion, while Constance was lightly injured and arrested. She was then convicted of conspiracy to overthrow the government, conspiracy to stir up civil war, falsification of private accounts, and complicity in premeditated murder, charges which would usually merit the death penalty, but she was granted a reprieve due to her nationality and rank. Instead, she was deported back to Russia, where the czarist authorities would deal with her as they saw fit. While Valentin was in jail with Bolkonsky, Valentin failed to persuade Bolkonsky to lie about her revolutionary convictions in order to gain a reprieve, and Bolkonsky confessed that she had murdered Bianchi. However, the two then kissed through the bars, and Valentin gave Constance a blood-stained love letter from Bonnot which Bonnot had written in his last moments before being shot.