The Great Alone (5 page)

Woven grass mats hung from the timbers, dividing the hut into compartments. Luka moved carefully toward them, pushing one after another open with the muzzle of his musket. There was no one hiding inside.

Partially relaxing his guard, he studied the items left behind. A burning moss wick floated in a pool of whale oil contained by the basinlike stone lamp. It sat on its own stand, providing heat for cooking and warming the interior. He found a child’s cradle, cooking utensils, wooden dishes and stone pots, many implements made from bones, but no pottery. There were many baskets of sizes varying from very tiny, which contained needles made out of bone, to very large. All were made from grass and woven so tightly, they were like cloth. Most were fitted with lids woven from the same material. Luka picked up one that was half finished, the thin strands of grass sticking out like fringe, then he tossed the unfinished basket aside. Immediately he began scavenging, turning over baskets in search of food.

“Luka Ivanovich.” Shekhurdin called to him from the hatch opening in the roof. “Did you find anything?”

“No.” He moved to the crude ladder. Then he spied a large basket sitting in the shadows that he’d overlooked. When he lifted the lid, he discovered a quantity of seal blubber inside. Carrying the basket, he climbed the notched log to the top. Emerging from the hole, he shoved the basket onto the sod roof. “This is all there was,” he told Shekhurdin.

“We will camp here tonight,” Shekhurdin declared. He took no more than passing interest in the contents of the basket. “In the morning, we will signal the shitik to send the boat ashore.”

During the remaining light of the cloud-covered afternoon, they filled the water casks at the stream and carried them to the village site, then combed the beach for driftwood. When dusk came, a fire blazed in the cooking pit on the leeward side of the barabara. They hunkered close to its warmth and chewed on the blubber.

Taking the first watch, Luka sat with his arms folded around the musket and studied the darkened landscape from his vantage point halfway up the mound. Below him, the firelight flickered, and he listened to the first snores of sleeping men. The sea glistened, ridged with whitecaps, and the wind ran through the grasses, the sound accompanying the rush of the waves. Occasionally he heard the flapping wings of some night bird or the strange laughing calls of the storm petrel.

Overhead, the clouds parted to give him a glimpse of the brilliant dusting of stars in the sky. He sat in silence—his mind turned inward to those private thoughts that come to a man alone. At twenty-eight those thoughts had molded him and made an inner world filled with visions and dreams of tomorrow. His mind wandered, recalling disconnected things—the song of the wind in the shitik’s sails, the sizzle of a snowflake on hot ash, the warmth of the long summer sun—and the sound of that native woman’s voice lifted in alarm.

He shifted position, briefly irritated by the thought, then pondered its cause. He felt the loneliness surrounding him and guessed that it was natural for the thoughts of a man alone to turn to a woman. He saw her again in his mind and wondered why that image remained with him.

He’d slept with native women before, giving release to the hot urges inside him and some of the hatred, too. He knew no other kind of women, except his mother, who was a dim memory of someone soft and warm. Soft. There was nothing soft in his life now except for furs—the deep, shining darkness of sea otter pelts. That was the softness he sought now.

In the morning, they spotted the shitik, moving under half sail near the mouth of the bay, and signaled for the boat. They waited on the beach with the filled water casks as the dinghy was rowed to shore and nosed aground on the sand. The barrels were quickly loaded and Shekhurdin climbed aboard. Luka and two others shoved the boat off the sand, then waded ashore to wait for the boat to return with additional men. Shekhurdin intended to capture the natives they’d seen.

A misting rain fell, driven by the wind. Luka checked the powder in his musket pan to make sure it was still dry and sat with the others on the sand to watch and wait. There was nowhere to seek shelter from the miserable weather on this exposed stretch of beach—no shielding trees anywhere on the island, nor any rocky windbreak—so they endured in silence. In the bay, Luka spotted a sea otter floating on its back and feasting leisurely on a shellfish held between its paws. He smiled the smile of a cat that watches the mouse at play, knowing how short-lived its freedom will be.

Within an hour, the dinghy loaded with promyshleniki headed back toward the beach. Luka scanned the boat’s occupants and located Shekhurdin. The landing brought an end to the idle wait. After the scouting party, now doubled in size, had assembled on the beach, the rowboat set out once more for its mother craft. Shekhurdin led his armed force inland, striking out in the direction the fleeing natives had taken.

Yesterday’s trek had prepared Luka for the rigors of the morning walk, but the newcomers from the shitik had to struggle on their sea legs over the rough terrain.

Shortly after midday, they sighted a band of natives on a bluff along the seacoast. There appeared to be as many as fifteen, but it was difficult to determine whether this was the same band they had seen the day before. Again Shekhurdin ordered the men forward, confident of trapping the natives on the bluff and taking captives.

“No one fires unless I give the order,” the Cossack instructed. “We want hostages, not bodies.”

The wind covered the sound of their approach, and the attention of the natives was directed seaward, apparently absorbed by some object, possibly the shitik on its explorations along the coast. They were almost on them before a warning was shouted. Instantly, the adult males grabbed their weapons and formed a rear guard to cover the retreat of the women and children.

As Luka rushed forward in the attack, he saw a native woman scoop a boy child into her arms and flee before him. A second later, he was confronted by a native brandishing a spear. Gripping the long barrel of his musket like a battle staff, he knocked the oncoming spear aside, then immediately slammed the curved shoulder butt into the man’s stomach. As the native doubled over, he laid the barrel alongside his head and knocked him to the ground. Instinctively, the native rolled away from him and managed to stagger to his feet, swaying drunkenly while looking for his weapon.

Luka took a step toward him, intent on finishing his opponent and smashing the hated features. At the last second he saw the spearhead coming at him from the side and dodged its sharp point, then turned and grappled with its owner. The rush of battle was in his veins, a good, hot feeling that made all his senses come alive. The man’s upper body strength was too much for Luka, and he gave way, seeking a better leverage by tumbling backwards to the ground and spilling the man over his head. Scrambling to his feet, he saw the native spring to his and immediately run after the women and children. Luka started to give chase.

“Let him go!” The shouted order came from Shekhurdin. “We have our hostage.”

While his lungs labored for breath, Luka turned and saw a young male, a youth not much more than fifteen, struggling wildly in the hold of two promyshleniki.

The skirmish over, the promyshleniki regrouped around the hostage. Luka took a step to join them as the youth’s arm was twisted behind his back and he grimaced silently in pain. A sudden cry from somewhere to his left startled Luka. He swung toward the sound, leveling the barrel of his musket.

An old woman stood beside a tumble of boulders where she must have hidden during the attack. She held her shoulder as if it hurt. Advanced years had bent her once tall frame and turned her hair the color of the clouds, but her tanned face was relatively unlined except for the crevices fanning away from her eyes. Luka stared at the string of dots tattooed across her cheeks and the parallel lines running down the center of her chin. Two button-sized pieces of bone projected from the skin below the corners of her mouth. Lastly, his glance fell on the long coat made from the pelts of sea otter.

“Where did that old woman come from?” Shekhurdin’s demand put everyone on guard, her sudden appearance making them wonder if more natives were hidden nearby, perhaps waiting to leap on them and catch them unaware.

“I turned around and there she was,” Luka said. “She must have been hiding in those rocks.”

Shekhurdin motioned for two hunters to check the area and see if there were any more. Meanwhile the cordon of guards around the hostage closed ranks. The old woman, instead of running from them, hurried toward them. Luka frowned at her actions. The youth yelled something, his tone seeming to warn her away. The nearest promyshlenik silenced him with a restrained clip of his musket butt alongside the head. The boy fell to the ground, dazed by the blow. Again, the old woman cried out and pressed a hand to her head as if she had felt the blow, then rushed toward the boy. Shekhurdin stopped her before she reached him and shoved her backwards.

“Go!” He waved his hand, directing her to follow the other members of her fleeing band. She simply stared at him, taking no advantage of the opportunity he gave her to escape. “Go! Go with the others!” Impatience roughened his voice and made wild the swing of his arm. The old woman looked past him at the boy, then said something to Shekhurdin in that strange tongue and gestured toward the youth. “Stand him up and let her see that he isn’t hurt,” he commanded the men guarding the hostage. They hauled him to his feet and let him stand on his own. “You see,” Shekhurdin said to the old woman, accompanying his words with hand gestures in an attempt to make her understand him. “He is unharmed. Go tell your people that.”

She stood silently, apparently comprehending nothing. Taking her by the shoulders, Shekhurdin turned her around and pushed her in the direction the natives had gone. The impetus carried her a few steps forward, but she stopped and turned back. Exasperated by her stupidity, the Cossack swung away from her and dismissed her with a wave of his hand.

“Everyone move out,” he ordered.

Before falling in line with the other promyshleniki, Luka took one last wary look at the old woman. He was inclined to believe she was being obstinate rather than stupid, although he didn’t know why he had that impression. Somehow he wasn’t surprised when she started following them.

“Maybe she is his mother,” someone suggested.

“She’s too old,” another insisted.

Several times they tried to drive her off, but on each occasion she retreated a few steps and stopped, then started following when they resumed their march. Finally they simply ignored her, all except Luka. It made him uneasy to have a native behind him—even an old woman. She was still tagging along after them when they arrived at a stretch of coast where a boat could land. While they waited for the shitik to appear, she remained a little apart from them, always—it seemed to Luka—watching the youth. He guessed that she wanted to learn where they were taking him.

When the shitik hove into view, Shekhurdin signaled for the boat. Luka was not included in the first boatload of promyshleniki to return to the vessel with the hostage, and he stood to one side while the young male was forced into the boat. When the old woman saw him getting into the wooden dinghy, she ran toward it.

“Get away, you old fool!” Shekhurdin roughly pushed her backwards, and she stumbled onto the sand. Glaring at her, the Cossack took his position at the prow of the boat to accompany his hostage and gestured to the men remaining ashore to shove them off.

The woman scrambled to her feet, but Luka caught her before she could run into the water after the dinghy. She jabbered something to him and pointed at the bare-masted shitik anchored offshore. He shook his head and firmly set her away from him, admonishing her to stay with his upraised hand. He noticed the determined set of her mouth, but she made no further attempt to go after the boat. He watched her for a minute, then satisfied it wasn’t some ploy, left her and wandered over to stand with the six other promyshleniki waiting for the dinghy’s return trip. While they discussed the excellent hunting prospects on the island, he kept an eye on the old woman.

As the dinghy approached the beach again, Luka walked to the water’s edge to meet it. Its nose had barely entered shallow water when the old woman darted past him and scrambled into the boat before anyone could stop her. She plunked herself down on one of the seats and folded her arms in front of her, rigidly asserting her refusal to budge.

Luka surveyed her grimly. “If you are that determined to go aboard the shitik, old woman, we will take you.” He motioned for the other promyshleniki to let her be.

With the help of another man, Luka pushed the boat into the water, then climbed in. There was space on the seat beside the old woman and he settled himself onto it. He glanced at her, puzzled by the lack of fear she showed. But she kept her eyes to the front, looking to neither side and centering all her attention on the shitik where the youth had been taken. Luka assessed the glossy dark garment of sea otter skins she wore. The fur showed wear in places, but the pelts were prime.

As soon as the dinghy was tied up to the shitik, Luka climbed aboard and waited by the rail to haul the old woman aboard. When Shekhurdin saw her, he exploded. “What is she doing here? Why didn’t you leave her on the island?”

“She insisted on coming,” Luka replied. “And I thought”—Luka went on, pushing the old woman forward so the others could see her—“the men might like to have a look at her coat, made from the pelts of sea otter.”