Sitka

by Louis L'Amour

  Across the mouth of the bay lay the Lena. At a glance, LaBarge knew the situation was hopeless. There was no other way out of the inlet, and inside, the water was not deep enough to take the schooner. She would be shot to wreckage before they could get moving.

  "Cut loose the anchor!" he yelled. "Get a jib on her!" A shell screamed overhead and lost itself somewhere in the woods. The schooner was moving slowly now. If they could get around Turn Point.. .. He had no hopes of saving the ship, what he wanted now was a chance for the crew to take to the hills. Once there, with the friendly Indians, they could hide out for weeks until they might reach the mainland.

  Pope fired their own gun again, and LaBarge had the satisfaction of seeing the shell burst amidships, smashing the whaleboat to splinters and ripping sails and rigging. Now the Lena moved closer, getting into position to rip the Susquehanna with another broadside.

  Enough of the wheel remained to swing the schooner and LaBarge started to put it over when a shell struck forward and he felt the ship stagger under a wicked blow in the hull. Then the shelling stopped. Their own gun had ceased to fire and turning he saw Duncan Pope sprawled on the deck, his skull blown half away. Noble caught his arm.

  "We'd better run for it, sir!" he shouted. "They'll be alongside in a few minutes!"

  Two boats were in the water, pulling strongly toward the wreck of the Susquehanna.

  Dazed, he glanced around. Pope was dead, and another man lay sprawled amidships. The schooner was drifting helplessly, but the current, slight as it was, was taking them deeper into the inlet. The tidal currents there, he recalled, were fearfully strong.

  The way was blocked. The Lena lay fairly across the only entrance and her boats were drawing near. There was nothing else for it. "Abandon ship," he said. "Get for shore, all of you."

  "What about you?" Noble protested.

  "I'll come," he said. "Get going!"

  He turned to the companionway and went swiftly down the ladder. For the first time he realized how badly hulled they were: water stood on the deck of the saloon. He slipped a pistol behind his belt, caught up a coat. Alongside he heard splashes and yells as the crew jumped over the side. The shore here was nowhere over fifty yards away.

  He went swiftly up the ladder and reaching the rail, turned back for a last long look. The forem'st was gone, trailing over the side in a mass of wreckage. The stern was a wreck and the deck was literally a shambles. Pope and Sykes were definitely gone, both killed in those few minutes of shelling. Luckily, most of the crew had been ashore. Yet ... the Susquehanna ... it was like deserting an old friend. He sprang to the rail.

  Below him and not twenty yards away was the Russian longboat, and in it were a dozen men, six of whom covered him with rifles. In the stern sat Baron Paul Zinnovy, smiling.

  To jump was to die, and he was not ready to die. The boat came alongside and the Russians swarmed aboard. Two men seized him and bound his hands behind him, stripping him of his pistol. Zinnovy scarcely glanced at him, walking about the ship, looking her over curiously. Other men had gone below to inspect the cargo. As he was seated in the boat one of the men spoke to the other and indicating LaBarge, said, "Katorzhniki."

  It was a word that stood for a living death, it was the term applied to hard-labor convicts in Siberia.

  May had come and gone before the news reached Robert Walker, and he acted with speed. The purchase of Alaska hung in the balance and the Baron Edouard Stoeckl was worried. He wanted to be back in Russia, or to have an assignment in Paris or Vienna, and everything depended on this mission. Now this LaBarge affair had to come up, and the man involved had to be a personal friend, a very close friend of Walker himself, known moreover to Seward, Sumner, all of them. Ratification of the treaty was not enough. The appropriation must be made. He had watched Congress in action long enough to know that the whole sale of Alaska might fail right there. And if any man could get out the necessary vote, it was Walker. Why couldn't that confounded Zinnovy have kept his ships in Sitka? He sat now, in Walker's home, and the little man with the wheezy voice glanced over at him. "Is there any news of LaBarge?" ' The Baron's face shadowed a little. He had hoped the subject would not arise.

  "We have done our best, but--"

  "Could it be possible," Walker suggested, "to arrange for the transfer of such a prisoner? Supposing he is in Siberia?"

  "There is no record of such a prisoner," Stoeckl protested, "nor of any such capture. I am sure the whole affair is the figment of someone's imagination." "Sir," Walker's voice was stiff, "the man whose letter lies on my desk is a man of honor, LaBarge's partner and my friend. Not only was an American vessel shelled but its cargo was taken. This, sir, savors of piracy." Baron Stoeckl had friends in the Russian American Company, but Baron Zinnovy was not one of these. However, he had a very good idea as to Zinnovy's duties in Sitka, and it would not do to have such news reach the ears of the Czar. Stoeckl knew that following the return of Princess Helena there had been a great fuss, which had been calmed down only after some time. At this moment orders for a complete shake-up at Sitka were carefully pigeonholed in the Ministry of the Interior. A revisor was to be appointed to investigate, but so far this had not been done.

  "I cannot see what good it would do to have the prisoner transferred if he remained a prisoner."

  Walker brushed the question aside. "I have heard, correct me if I am wrong, that some convict labor is used in Sitka?"

  Baron Stoeckl almost smiled. So that was what the fox was thinking! Maybe this man was married to Benjamin Franklin's granddaughter with some reason ... a prisoner transferred to Alaska on the evening of the sale would most certainly be freed when the Americans took over.

  It was a very sensible idea ... and this he, Baron Stoeckl, might arrange. There were people, the superiors of Zinnovy, in the Ministry of the Interior who wanted LaBarge to remain a prisoner. Yet a prisoner might be transferred without incurring the displeasure of these people. It was something that might be done without endangering his own future prospects.

  There was one thing Walker did not know and which Stoeckl had no intention of telling him. There was every prospect that Zinnovy himself would be appointed revisor at Sitka.

  "It is, as you suggest, a possibility that another shipment of convicts might be sent to Sitka. ... How do the votes stand, Mr. Walker, for the appropriation?" They talked far into the night, weighing the pros and cons and Stoeckl nursed his injured leg and cursed under his breath.

  It was bad luck that Zinnovy had gone to Siberia without putting in at Sitka, and the prisoners had been landed there and turned over to the police. Probably not even he knew what had become of LaBarge by now. It was several days before he saw Walker again. They met briefly, over a glass of sherry. "By the way"--Stoeckl was on his feet ready to go--"I understand a shipment of twenty prisoners will leave Okhotsk on the last of the month." "I shall hope for further news. Are any prisoners I know involved?"

  "At least one," Stoeckl replied, "that I am sure of." They parted and the Baron walked away. There was no reason why he should feel guilty. It was too bad for LaBarge, and the Baron felt real regret for Robert Walker. A good man, this Walker, a genius at managing things like this treaty. Seward might be the key figure, but it was Walker who lined up the vote, did the lobbying, the entertaining, and the leg work to arrange the purchase. Walker must be content with that. For the rest of it, there was no hope. Prisoner Jean LaBarge was going out of the Siberian frying pan into the Sitka fire.

  Chapter 35

  From the window of her room in Baranof Castle, Helena looked out over the city and harbor where sunlight lay bright upon the water, and gleamed from the serene loveliness of Mount Edgecumbe. The Castle was no longer the gloomy place it had been. In the capable hands of Prince Maksoutof and his wife it had become warm, comfortable, even gay.

  The same eighty cannon looked grimly over the city from the parapet below. But there was more shipping in the bay, and several of them were American ships. She had been
a fool to come, yet if Rob Walker's hint in his letter to her had been founded upon fact, Jean LaBarge might soon be arriving here. If she could not free him she could at least, through Prince Maksoutof, relieve his imprisonment a little.

  So few words had actually passed between them, yet she knew how he had felt, and she also knew, only too well, her own feelings. But what would prison have done to him? She had seen men who returned from Siberia, some of them scarcely human after the hard labor and punishments. Yet there was something about Jean that seemed indestructible.

  There had been so little. The warmth in his eyes, the pressure of his hand, their bodies close together in the bouncing, jouncing tarantas. She had loved a man for the first time, and she had lost him. Her husband had always been more like a kind father, tender, thoughtful, and considerate, and she had loved him for this. But it was nothing like her feeling for the tall, dark, dangerous-looking man with the scar whom she had loved with a love that bridged the bitter months and made them seem an age. If this was being a fool, then she was a fool, and she had come across Siberia again, and across the ocean, merely on the hope that he would be here, and that he would still care.

  Prince Maksoutof was questioning himself Kas to why she was here. Both the Prince and Princess had tried to find some clue from her conversation or her guarded replies to questions.

  The Russian American Company still operated in Sitka although its charter had not been renewed. Something was impending, some change of which she could find out nothing. So far as she had been able to discover, the plan to sell Alaska had failed at the last minute. There were rumors of negotiations and rumors of the collapse of negotiations.

  From the beginning of Jean's disappearance she had corresponded with Robert Walker. In his last letter he had hinted that Jean, as a convict, might be transferred to Sitka. She knew from here an escape might be arranged and she was perfectly prepared to do her part in making the arrangements. A schooner that had come in only last night had brought news that a Russian ship was due in today, and Murzin was down in town even now making friends. If anyone could help Jean escape it was the former thief, that wiry, narrow-faced man who had never left her service since that meeting on the trip across Siberia with Jean.

  At breakfast she had been gay, chatting cheerfully of St. Petersburg, the court, that handsome Count Novikoff, and the last ball at the Peterhof. She had told them of San Francisco and its warm green hills, sometimes misted with rain. She had talked of everything but the ship that hour after hour, minute after minute, was drawing nearer to Sitka. Even now it might be coming up the bay through those beautiful islands that resembled so much the islands of the Adriatic. A warmer sea, but never a more lovely one than this. She went down the steps slowly, not wishing to reveal her excitement. If Jean was aboard she must help him escape, and that before the revisor came on his inspection trip. Maksoutof had told her the man was coming, but nobody knew when.

  "Helena," Princess Maksoutof suggested, "why don't we go to the teahouse and watch the people land from the ship? They will come up the street and if we get in the right position we can see them leave the dock." She got up, almost too quickly. "I'd like a walk," she said. "I'd like it very much."

  Although from the teahouse they could see little, Helena forced herself to wait quietly, knowing whatever news there was would first be known here, long before it was heard on the Hill.

  The waitress was excited. "They are bringing convicts ashore! They are to work here!"

  "Irina"--Helena could wait no longer--"let's go down and watch them come in!" They came, preceded by soldiers, in a column of twos, the gray-clad prisoners marching in slow, even steps swaying as though to a soundless rhythm. The first two were a red-bearded giant and a slender man with a twisted face. They blinked their eyes against the light after standing for some time in the shadowed warehouse. There was one man, tall, whose head was bowed. It could be Jean.

  "Helena!" Irina caught her arm. "Look! Isn't he magnificent!" He stood straight and tall, and he wore his chains in this town where he was remembered as another man might have worn a badge of honor. His face was shaggy with beard and his hair was long ... he was much, much thinner! But he stood tall and he walked tall. He carried his head up and his eyes were clear. How could she ever have imagined they could break or tame him? He was one of the untamed, and so he would ever be.

  He walked beside a shorter man who was also bearded, but Helena had eyes only for Jean. She moved to the edge of the walk, hoping he would see her, hoping he would know she was here to help.

  "Jean!" She must have whispered it, for Irina turned suddenly to look at her.

  "Do you know him?" Irina's eyes were bright with excitement and curosity.

  "Yes ... yes, I know him. I know him well. I love him." "You needn't have told me that. I can see." Irina looked at Jean again. "Yes, without so much beard, and if his hair was cut--" She glanced around at Helena. "Is that why you came? Did you know about this?"

  "I came on hope," she said.

  Jean hunched his shoulders inside the thin coat. His eyes swung to the crowd, and suddenly he saw Helena.

  An instant, a step only, he paused. Their eyes met across the heads of the people and suddenly there was a great smile on his face and Helena started forward. Irina caught her arm. "Not No, Helenal You mustn't! I'll arrange--" "Whatever you arrange"--the voice was cool, amused--"do it quickly. He goes on trial tomorrow."

  Baron Paul Zinnovy was heavier, his thick neck had grown still thicker. There was in his eyes more cynicism and cruelty than Helena remembered. "What are you doing here?" she demanded. He had been ordered back to Siberia, to Yakutsk. She remembered that. It could have been only a few months after Jean was captured.

  "Why, I am the revisor," he said, "here to rectify mistakes, conduct trials and discharge incompetent officials, but most particularly, to conduct trials." "Haven't you done enough to him? And to me?"

  "To you?" His eyebrow lifted. "To you, Princess?" "You murdered my husband." She spoke deliberately, coldly, and heard Irina's startled gasp. "I shall not be able to prove it, but you murdered him, and we both know it."

  "It is a weakness of women to be overly imaginative, but if you wish to see reality, you may come as my guests to the trial of Jean LaBarge for theft, for smuggling, and for murder."

  Chapter 36

  The room was packed with spectators. As Sitka had little entertainment, the prospect of a trial conducted by Baron Zinnovy as revisor held an unusual interest. And the man on trial was as well known to them, by name at least, as the Baron himself.

  LaBarge was seated, still in chains, inside a small enclosure. He had been allowed to shave, and his clothing had been carefully brushed. Here and there in the crowd he saw familiar faces, but there was no welcome on those faces, no expression of sympathy. He was alone here.

  Yet he had seen Helena. Did that mean that Count Rotcheff had never left Sitka?

  Or had he too returned again as Zinnovy had?

  He had seen American ships in the harbor but there was no activity around them, and he had seen no Americans ashore in the town. His thoughts returned to Rotcheff. If he was here he could do nothing, for LaBarge had been long enough in Siberia to know the power of the revisor. Appeal from his judgments could be made only to the Minister of the Interior or the Czar himself, and all such appeals were reviewed by the Ministry. Siberia had made him suffer, but it had been a few months only, and this recall to Sitka had given him hope. If he could do nothing else, he could kill Zinnovy. He needed no weapon but his hands, and once those hands were on Zinnovy's throat nothing, nothing at all would stop him. He would kill Paul Zinnovy. It would be absurdly easy. He could see where Zinnovy must sit, and he, LaBarge, must rise to receive sentence. His guards would be behind him, but the distance he must travel was short and they would not dare shoot at first for fear of hitting Zinnovy. Afterwards they would shoot him, but it would be better than Siberia again. Or the knout. He kept thinking of that. Yet somewhere Rob Wal
ker would be trying. By now he would know what had happened and Rob would move swiftly. No doubt he was working even now, and had been working, but it was too late. It was up to him, LaBarge, to do what he could. He saw Prince Maksoutof and the Princess take their places, and Helena with them. Her face was pale, the circles under her eyes testifying to a sleepless night. Maksoutof had been pointed out to Jean by one of the guards. He was now the company director here, and governor of the colony. But even he could be removed by a revisor. The prison grapevine had a rumor that the Company had sent Zinnovy as revisor, appointed by somebody in the Ministry of the Interior who was a stockholder, to wipe out all evidence of the graft, cruelty and outright theft the Company officials had been perpetrating here. Jean's mouth was dry. He was tired and the room was warm. His clothing stank of prisons and of unbathed bodies. This was an end of it then, the end of all his dreams, hopes, and ambitions. Rotcheff, the only friend he might have expected here, was not present. Helena could not help him, and Busch was not present: the merchant must have returned to Siberia. He was alone ... alone. What could be done? Being familiar with Russian courts, he knew that a trial was actually no trial at all but merely a hearing to air the crimes of the accused and pronounce sentence. The very fact that a trial was called meant the prisoner had been convicted.

  The voices in the large room stilled, the clerk stood, then the spectators. Baron Zinnovy, resplendent in a magnificent uniform, entered and seated himself behind the desk. "Proceed with the trial," he said. The clerk stood, then cleared his throat. The crowd leaned forward, the better to hear. "The prisoner will stand!"