The Bully of Order (39 page)
Read The Bully of Order Online
Authors: Brian Hart
Jacob was drying their bowls with his shirt and stacked them neatly with the rest of his things. “You like to think you know what he thought, don't you?”
“I do know.”
“He's been dead fifty years, if he ever lived at all.”
“I know his spirit, so I know what he thought.”
“I like this story,” Duncan said.
“You should, it's yers.”
“Nothin like mine.”
“If you think so.”
“Go on and tell it,” Duncan said.
Tarakanov didn't offer to go ahead by himself. He concluded that the group should stay together, at least until they reached a more hospitable place to make winter quarters, if not until they met the
Kadiak.
They followed the cliffs while the tide was out. Single file they climbed over wet boulders and hopped tidepools. The weather was mild, and everyone seemed happier and full of resolve. That night, they again made camp in the trees and had a peaceful rest.
The next morning, silhouettes of men were seen on the bluff. Soon after, a rockslide nearly crushed them, and they knew it had been no accident. The tide had them pushed against the cliff walls, and with every step they were sure boulders would rain down and kill them all. Some tripped and fell because they were straining their necks, watching the sky, instead of looking where they were going. Panic began to infect the party. Bulygin suggested they wade out into the water, into the surf and the barreling current, but Tarakanov wouldn't allow it. He hurried ahead of the group with three promyshlenniki, hoping to find a way onto the cliffs above so they could engage their attackers, but they were trapped. They went on in a scattered line, full of dread. The coast went on forever.
Then fortune smiled on them. Tarakanov found a cave that could be entered by ascending a natural stone staircase, and inside it was dry and calm. Everyone agreed it was far too high to be flooded by any swell, but this was soon tested when a storm rolled in and blowing rain darkened the cavemouth. The waves shook the rocks.
The following day they stayed inside in the fireless hollow, and the waves crashed high enough to wash over the lower ledge, but that was all. In the evening the weather broke, and they could see the unbroken ocean for all its emptiness. In the golden light Tarakanov made everyone clean and oil their weapons, and he reset the seals on the kegs of powder to make certain no moisture would taint them. Some of the men played cards before they went to sleep.
The third day dawned clear, and blue skies welcomed them. When the tide was all the way out they descended the stone stairs to the shore. Not wanting to get trapped against the cliffs, at the first opportunity they went up the bank and ventured inland.
Two men were there waiting at the top. One, the elder, said he was a starshina. The other man was his son. With the help of the Aleuts and Anna Petrovna, they told the Russians that there was a good trail that went safely through the forest, and there'd be slow going following the coast without canoes, and in any case they would probably be drowned. Tarakanov slipped away from the meeting and into the woods to make sure they weren't being surrounded. As he left the din of the ocean, the forest became hauntingly quiet. He found no one, no sign at all, but he did find the trail and he followed it and it seemed the starshina wasn't lying. He hid himself beneath the towering ferns and waited. The two Indians passed first, and Tarakanov could tell they knew he was there or that something was there, but they only glanced in his direction and carried on.
Tarakanov could hear the Navigator's voice before he saw him.
“What should I do, Anna? I don't know if I should trust them.”
“We don't have a choice.”
“What if they betray us?”
“They probably will.”
“What then?”
“We'll have to fight them, Nikolai.”
“There could be hundreds of them. We could be killed.”
“But they won't have rifles, only stones and arrows.”
Tarakanov made a lot of noise so they could hear him coming toward them, and then whistled and raised his hand so he wouldn't be shot.
“Where have you been?” Bulygin asked.
“I wanted to make sure we weren't being trapped.”
Bulygin nodded. “Of course.”
“What did they say?” Tarakanov asked.
“That we have safe passage, and they weren't the ones that attacked us.”
“Did you believe him?”
“No,” Anna Petrovna said. “But we need to keep moving while the weather is clear, and there is a trail to follow.”
“I agree,” Tarakanov said. “Please permit me to scout ahead, Navigator.”
“Yes, by all means, Mr. Tarakanov. Take the lead.”
He hadn't gone very far when he caught up with the starshina. He was alone now; his son had gone.
“Your friends are far behind you,” the old man said, speaking in the Chinook Jargon, which Tarakanov understood.
“Yes, they are. Where are your friends?”
“My son left me to walk slowly because he is fast and wants to see his wife. She's a pretty woman. I don't blame him.”
“Where will you attack us?”
The old man's eyes lit up. “Why would we attack you?”
“Because we're a party of armed men moving toward your village. How far is it from here?”
“Not far.”
“You'll attack us there?”
“We've given you safe passage.”
“You should attack us soon, because if you wait, we'll be ready.”
The old man smiled and turned and continued walking. Tarakanov let him go, watched him disappear into the reaching arms of the giant coastal forest.
“They attack them, don't they?” Duncan said.
“Yes.”
“When?”
“At the river. I wish we had coffee.”
“We don't, unless you brought some,” Jacob said.
“I didn't,” Kozmin said.
“What happened at the river?” Duncan asked.
“The Hoh offered to ferry them across, and in doing so split the party, and when they were far out in the current the men in the larger of the two canoes pulled a plug in the floor and jumped overboard and swam away and left the Russians to drown.”
“What about Anna Petrovna?”
“She was in the other canoe, a much smaller one, with a boy, Filip, from the party and the Kodiak woman, Maria, and the old man Pavla. They took them hostage.”
“Where was Tarakanov?”
“He was waiting to take the next boat across. The promyshlenniki in the sinking canoe used their rifles as paddles, and one of them took off his boot and covered the holes in the boat with his bare feet. With a lucky turn of the current they made it back to shore.”
“And Bulygin?”
“He was in the canoe with the promyshlenniki, and they mutinied on him because he wanted them to follow his wife.”
“They'd have been killed if they went after her,” Jacob said.
“This is true,” Kozmin replied.
“What next?” Duncan had one of his socks off, and he was peeling hunks of skin from his feet like he was peeling an orange.
“The fog clearedâ”
“You didn't say there was fog.” Jacob laughed, and Duncan lifted his eyes to watch him and then went back to his feet.
There was fog and it cleared and they could see the village across the river and there were two hundred warriors on the banks yelling back at them. Anna Petrovna was gone. Then the Hoh warriors climbed in their canoes and paddled back across the river to finish them off, but the Russians hid behind the dead and silvered trees on the banks and fought for their lives. In the course of the battle several were wounded, and one of them had an arrow stuck in his stomach and wouldn't live. Soon the Hoh retreated to their canoes and paddled out of range and waited because they had all the time in the world.
The Russians carried their injured with them upstream. Bulygin cried and whimpered over the loss of his wife, and the men and even Tarakanov pitied him, but they had to keep going. They dragged the Navigator along by his coat. The man with the arrow in his stomach was called Sobachnikov, and he couldn't travel any farther, and they left him to spend his last moments alone. It was not an easy thing to do, but they would die if they stayed. Arrows snapped through the ferns as they ran, hissed by their ears. They hoped the mountains upstream would offer a better place to stand their attackers than against the walls of the ocean and the river.
Exhausted, under a tree as big as any of them had ever seen, with no food or fire, they huddled.
“This could be where we die,” Bulygin said through his tears.
Tarakanov went into the forest and up the hillside. There was no game sign. He climbed as high as he could, but the forest was still too thick for the elevation to offer any kind of vantage. He knew that they wouldn't make it in time to meet the
Kadiak.
He returned to his comrades and with Bulygin's tremulous permission led them upstream, and after several miles they found an abandoned lodge. They yelled to make their presence known and then entered the lodge and took the dried salmon they found and fled. In a deep streambed they sat on the ground and ate like animals.
One arrow and then dozens more came down on them, and an Aleut and Ovchinnikov were hit, but not mortally. They made haste up the stream and fired on their attackers, and Tarakanov hit one in the leg, and the rest of the war party picked him up and they were gone.
Farther upstream they found another lodge and at gunpoint robbed the people there of their food. Bulygin wanted to kill them, an old couple and several children, but Tarakanov reminded the Navigator of their orders and they left.
They made camp in a flat spot on the river, and Ovchinnikov, the man with the arrow wound in his back, tried his luck at fishing but had none.
That night two Indians boldly entered their camp. One of them, the old man, had been at the lodge they had robbed; the other was a stranger. They had a sealskin of whale oil to trade, and they asked if they wanted to buy back their woman, Anna. Bulygin was instantly on his feet, and he had the man by his throat, but Tarakanov pulled him off. The terms were four rifles, and they wouldn't agree. Bulygin begged them, but they could not. He had ceased to be their leader. Tarakanov told him that if they traded one rifle away, he would leave them and surrender to the Hoh.
“It's winter by now, isn't it?” Jacob said.
“It is. December, the middle of the month.”
“They'll freeze to death,” said Duncan.
“No, they still have their axes, and they build barracks.”
“What about the Indians? The war party?” Jacob asked.
“They don't return to fight them, and the Russians find a different group upriver and trade with them a broken rifle and nankeen cotton.”
“For what? What did they gain in trade?” Duncan asked.
“Salmon and a canoe. They could fish for themselves now, but they were no good at it.”
“How long did they stay?”
“They left in February and went downstream with intentions of rescuing Anna Petrovna and then making it to the Columbia River country, where they thought the people weren't so ruthless.”
Duncan snuck another pull off of Kozmin's bottle, shook his head at the taste. “Do they rescue her?”
“This is the part of the story that I like best.” The old man yawned and rubbed his eyes.
“Well?” Jacob said.
“I'll tell you next time,” Kozmin said.
“Fuck off and finish it,” Duncan said.
“Fuck off and make me. Good night, gents.”
The morning arrived blustery and gray, and at first the barking was hidden inside the bending and creaking of the trees, but it grew louder and louder until it escaped and filled the forest. Without a word Duncan hefted his gear and set out, bent at the waist in a flat-gaited run. Jacob had a frying pan in his hand, and he finished wiping it down with a blackened rag and then set it facedown on the rocks of the firepit to dry.
“What about you?” Kozmin asked.
“I'm goin. Give me a minute.”
The barking was getting louder, and then it suddenly went silent and a lone brown-and-white hound came crashing through the brush into camp and bayed, circled the sorry trampled mess, and went on. Kozmin whistled for the dog, but it didn't listen. Jacob picked up the pistol from where Duncan had left it and slipped on his pack.
“What're you gonna do?”
“Catch him.” And within seconds he'd disappeared into the forest.
Kozmin sat down next to the fire to wait. They'd be here directly. At least Duncan had eaten breakfast and had a good night's rest.
Chacartegui arrived half an hour later with two deputies.
“When was he here?”
“I ain't seen him.”
“The dogs tell me a different story.”
“Well, I ain't been here long, so maybe he was here before I was.”
“He's got two bedrolls, and you can see where another was sleeping,” a deputy said.
“What d'you say to that?”
“People come by. I don't keep track.”
“You still carving them toys?”
“I quit.”
“Why?”
“Goin blind.”
“That's too bad. My little girl, she loved em when she was small. Still has a few.” Chacartegui packed his pipe from a pouch in his breast pocket and puffed it to life. “Kelly, you head back with Mr. Kozmin here. We'll keep him locked up till we get this settled.”
“The hell did I do?”
“You helped a murderer escape, and I'll charge you too if you try and make a stink about it.”
“Won't change a damn thing if you put me in jail.”