The Chukchi Bible (11 page)

The travelers stopped to rest in the camps of the nomad deer herders, which were strewn across the Arctic shore on shingled spits and high promontories. The landscape they passed through practically never changed, yet it differed from Uelen in some ineffable way.

The guests were met with a warm welcome and given the best beds, while their dogs were fed from the hosts' own stores. The women beat the guests' clothes free of snow and mended them; they would replace the grass insoles with fresh new ones.

Some of the frozen water that had penetrated deep into the continent had to be crossed on bare ice, and they clambered over ice hummocks, threading their way through agglomerations of broken ice. From time to time they stopped to hunt and every so often managed to harpoon a nerpa. Once Mlerintyn even speared a polar bear.

The dogs had scented the animal from afar. Mlerintyn unstrapped four of his dogs from their harness and they immediately bolted for the crags along the shore, through the rearing ice hummocks. This was the time of year when pregnant she-bears were getting ready to give birth in their snow-cave lairs. But here was an old male, whose yellowing fur was starkly visible against the pristine snow. The dogs harried the animal as it attempted to flee,
tearing at it each time it tried to break through their circle and run for its life. Calmly, unhurriedly, Mlerintyn took out his spear, checked the edge against his thumb, and, instructing his son to hold the reins tight, approached the bear. Two of Mlerintyn's companions stood ready, in case the hunter should need help. Seeing the approaching human, the bear made a last effort to get away, but two of the dogs literally hung from its rear, refusing to unlock their jaws. Mlerintyn came closer and threw his spear, which found its target expertly. With a roar, the bear collapsed onto his front paws, then fell sideways, on top of the spear that protruded from underneath his left front paw. Only now did the dogs let go. Waggling their fluffy tails, they ran back to their master and nuzzled him.

The men hurried to butcher the bear, knowing that in this cold the carcass would freeze quickly and then no blade would be able to hack through the stone-hard flesh.

They stopped for the night at the nearest camp – only five yarangas strong – and held a feast not just for humans but for dogs too.

The tiny settlement had been set up on a shingled beach, which had virtually disappeared beneath a thick cover of snow. The people in the small yarangas lived poorly and seemed not to have eaten their fill in a long while. They were ecstatic at the prospect of fresh bear meat.

Mlerintyn and his son were lodged in the last yaranga in the row, which was slightly larger than the others. It housed a family of three: a husband and wife plus an adolescent daughter, who shyly cast curious, sympathetic glances Tynemlen's way.

“We've weathered a hard winter,” their host confided at the end of the late, copious meal. “First, the red disease
¹⁰
came to visit us. Half the village
died straightaway. Right after that, more trouble: chest coughs. Our shaman was one of the first to die, so we were left without any help. You could only rely on yourself. But the men were weak from sickness and couldn't go far out to sea . . . We have no old people or children left. I lost my parents, and so has my wife. Our two younger sons also left for the clouds . . .”

The yaranga's inhabitants greedily fell on the meat. Having eaten their fill, they each had yet another large slice of meat before going to bed.

Tynemlen lay awake for a long time, tossing and turning on his worn deer-hide pallet, sinking into sleep, then starting awake again. In the middle of the night he suddenly awoke to a smacking, slurping sound, and at first thought that one of the dogs had gotten inside and into the vat of boiled bear meat. In the weak light that seeped through the balding, patchy fur polog, Tynemlen made out the figures of his hosts. Clustered around the vat, they were devouring the remains of the cold meat, greedily, noisily.

After that Tynemlen did not manage to sleep at all, but simply lay with his eyes tightly shut. Only toward morning did he finally drift off, awakening to the joyful face of a sated young girl, who gazed at him with tenderness and affection.

Tynemlen often recalled that face later in life: the look of a person who was utterly happy, despite her name: Iyo-o, Stormy Weather.

The path itself dictated the journey's pace. They normally set off at dawn, and if they had not managed to reach a camp or a shoreside village before nightfall, they would sleep on the sleds, ringed by their dogs. The main thing was not to lose your nose to frostbite during the night; if the frost was especially hard, they would get up during the night and walk about, to get the blood pumping into their numbed toes. Once every day, without fail, they would have a hot meal, making camp on the shore amid piles of
driftwood. Fire was obtained by drilling a fire-hole into a special wooden plank: they would light a large circle of flame and sit inside the blazing ring, drying out, warming up, melting snow in the cauldron and boiling fresh nerpa meat. Every so often they had the gift of a deer carcass. Deer meat was not as filling or fortifying as kopal'khen, but it did make for a wonderfully tasty broth.

The people in every camp along the length and breadth of the stretch between Uelen and the Kolyma River spoke the native, familiar language of the Luoravetlan. All that changed were the intonation and cadence. The farther they went, the more musical the language sounded, and at times Tynemlen imagined he was hearing not regular, everyday speech, but a wondrous song.

Despite the travelers' efforts to take good care of the dogs, ensuring they always had enough food and rest, toward the end of the journey the animals were visibly tired. It was harder and harder to get them going each morning, especially after a blizzard, when they would awaken buried in snow. From time to time, digging out a pack, the men would find frozen carcasses.

“At this rate we won't have any dogs to bring us home,” opined Tynemlen.

“The best sled dogs are bred on the Kolyma,” his father said. “I want to buy a few pairs there.”

Sometimes they traveled by night. If the ground was level, Tynemlen would lie face up on his sled and peer at the night sky, remembering his father's stories about the lives of the celestial bodies. Connecting the constellations with imaginary lines, he took real pleasure in recognizing the Constellation of Sadness near the star Unpener, where fabled heroes and those fallen in battle dwell in eternal peace. Mlemekym, Mlakoran, Kunleliu,
and others, Tynemlen's own ancestors, also resided there. There were deer grazing by the shore of the Sandy River. And just there, the Fleeing Maidens

. . . Tynemlen thought of Iyo-o. The farther back they left the famished camp, the more often that joyful girlish face came to mind, and the thought of seeing her again on the way back to Uelen warmed his heart.

Before they reached the mouth of the Kolyma, they veered from the seashore and into the tundra.

There they spent several nights among their nomadic kinsmen. It was the first time Tynemlen had seen such wealthy and powerful chauchu. Some of the tents, sewn together from sheared deerskin, had three or four hanging pologs, such as in the yaranga of Kymykei, who owned several large deer herds, and who long had dealings with the Russians and knew their customs well. The travelers had their fill of deer meat and reveled in their hosts' largesse. The arrival of a sudden blizzard forced them to extend their stay with their hospitable Kolyma brethren.

Inside a warm, fur-lined polog that still smelled of fresh snow (during the day the pologs were carried outside, spread out on the clean snow, and beaten with special antler implements to banish the damp of night), they would listen to ancient tales of war against the Tangitans and the Yakuts, stretching out in a sated semi-doze. The brave Luoravetlan were always the victors in these tales, and they excelled at torturing their Tangitan captives. It was here, within the fur-lined polog, that Tynemlen heard a new version of the exploits of his tribesman and ancestor Kunleliu.

When good weather returned, they continued on their way. The chauchu joined up with the men of Uelen, harnessing their deer into the long caravan.

The travelers' sensitive nostrils picked up the scent of an unusual smoke a
long while before the Tangitan camp came into view with tall blue pillars of smoke that seemed to prop up the clear, congealing light of the evening sky. The smoke was coming from strange dwellings, ringed by a high, densely packed, wooden palisade.

Luoravetlan from all parts of Chukotka, marine hunters and deer herders, were already gathered around the fortress. The groups camped at a distance from one another, so the dogs would not attack the deer.

Kymykei announced that they would make offerings to the Russian god before the market fair could begin.

The Russian shaman's ritual was going to take place inside a specially-built wooden prayer-yaranga, topped by a little tower with a cross, which was visible from beyond the palisade. Beneath the cross hung a bell larger than any deer could wear.

Kymykei explained to Tynemlen that the Russian shaman used the bell to wake up the sleeping Russian god, and to call people to this ceremony.

If it had not been for Kymykei, Tynemlen and his father could hardly have managed to attend the Russian worship, so great was the number of those assembled. Arrivals included not only Luoravetlan from near and far camps, but also wide-faced Yakuts, spindly-legged, elegant Lamut-Kaaramkyn, the Chuvans, and even the Koryaks – who were always warring with the Luoravetlan, despite being closest to them on account of shared ancient bloodlines. The wars between the Chukchi and the Koryaks and other neighbors had only ceased by the order of the Russian Empress Catherine; in exchange, the Luoravetlan were excused from the compulsory tribute – the
yasak
– and allowed to live on their own lands according to their customs and only convert to the Russian faith of their own free will.

“I was baptized three times!” Kymykei boasted. “And each time the
Russian shaman gave me a cloth louse trap which they call a shirt, and a metal cross-amulet, which I used to make hooks for my fishing rods, the ones for grayling.”

“Did anything change within your soul after you accepted the Russian faith?” Mlerintyn inquired tentatively.

“Not at all!” came the cheery reply. “My belief in our own spirits has not weakened a bit, even though I'd put the image of the Russian god, whose name is Nikolai, alongside our own idols.”

“So it's possible to convert to the Russian faith many times?” asked Tynemlen.

“Well, according to their custom you should only do it once,” Kymykei replied, “but when there are lots of people, and it's murky inside the Russian shaman's yaranga, all Luoravetlan look the same to him. I have a feeling he can't even distinguish between a Koryak and a Kaaramkyn. He might be able to recognize a Yakut, but only by his wide face.”

As part of the group selected to participate in the Russian shaman's ceremony and be baptized, Mlerintyn and his son, accompanied by Kymykei, went through a special gate in the wall and into the fortress.

The Tangitan camp was very different from a Luoravetlan one. All the dwellings here were made of wood. There was a smoking pipe sticking up from each roof, and some roofs had two or three. There were openings set into the wooden walls to admit daylight, covered with an icy sort of material, which glinted in the sun.

The Tangitans as well as some of the natives would stare at the cross atop the prayer-yaranga, then draw their right hand down their chest and then from shoulder to shoulder as they approached the building. The expression on their faces would change, as though they were nearing something
unearthly and uplifting. Tynemlen thought he saw their lips move in a soundless whisper.

The sight made the young man recall how he and his father made dawn sacrifice to their own gods, bribing them with choice morsels of deer flesh and asking for good fortune in trading with the Tangitans.

The crowd slowly seeped through the outflung doors of the shaman's house, whose depths seemed to be flickering with the yellow candle light. It glimmered dully in the gilded ornaments and the ceremonial vestments of the priest and his assistant.

Kymykei and his companions were led forward as honored guests. Tynemlen and his father found themselves directly before a gilt-framed picture of a long-haired, bearded man, rather thin, with enormous eyes that bulged like a flounder's.

“This is the chief God of the Tangitans,” Kymykei whispered, with a nod at the picture, “Jesus Christ.”

“But why is he so thin?” Tynemlen asked quietly.

“Because he suffered,” Kymykei answered, before the Russian shaman cast a stern glance their way.

Tynemlen found Kymykei's explanation confusing in the extreme: how could an all-powerful god suffer? If you looked closely at his image you could perceive traces of bitter suffering and pain in his big, round eyes. Such an expression was appropriate for a human, not for a mighty god.

Compared to the usual Tangitan talk, the Russian shaman's speech was drawn out and plaintive, like a dog's sad whine. Tynemlen caught a Russian word he knew – “bread,” a kind of food they made from white dust – in the stream of unfamiliar language.

Meanwhile, the Chuvan interpreter translated into barely recognizable
Luoravetlan: “Our Father-God lives high in the sky. Let his name be widely known and let his kingdom come. Let him give us food,
kavkav
(a flatbread fried in fat) every day, and if we owe something, let him forgive us these debts . . .”

Every so often, the Russian shaman glanced at a thing speckled with marks and propped open on a special stand. Tynemlen realized that this was the Holy Book where the Russian shaman got the necessary incantations. There were several Holy Books of a similar sort lying atop a table covered with a colorful cloth.