In 1825, during a trip to the Black Sea, the All-Russian Emperor Alexander I the Blessed, the conqueror of Napoleon, a participant in the conspiracy against his own father, the murdered Emperor Paul I, died. The coffin with the body of the king was carried across the whole country. Crowds of people mourned their monarch. But when many years later the royal tomb was opened, it turned out to be empty. Popular rumor believes that the repentant emperor left the throne and went off as a simple vagabond to atone for his sins. And a few years later, Elder Fyodor Kuzmich appeared in Siberia, looking exactly like the deceased king. The people revered him as a saint during his lifetime, and the Church canonized him after his death. But was he an All-Russian Emperor in the past? The elder kept silent about this. The author of the book “The Silence of the Elder” is trying to unravel the mystery.