On November 14, 1581, in Alexandrova Sloboda, under unclear circumstances, the heir to the throne, the eldest son of Tsar Ivan the Terrible, Tsarevich Ivan Ivanovich, was mortally wounded. The few witnesses flatly refuse to give any evidence. Then the best detective of the Robbery Order, Trofim Pyzhov, well known to readers from the novels “The Tsar’s Affair” and “The Uglitsky Affair,” is assigned to investigate the crime. But then it was much simpler, and now Trofim is going to Sloboda as if for execution. And yet...