McKean 02 The Neah Virus

by Thomas Hopp

  Tleena intervened. “But if you know something that can help, father - “

  “I know what I know. And I know the babalthuds’ turn to suffer is coming. Maybe they’ll die off and leave Makahs to hunt whales in peace.”

  “But,” McKean persisted, “surely it’s not right for you to sit by and keep the secret of the old cures when people are dying.”

  “Babalthuds are dying. That’s the same folks that destroyed our way of life, poisoned us with alcohol, blocked our whaling with their money and courtrooms and damn protest ships and kept good food from our children. They don’t care if a Makah baby is healthy or not. So why should I care if they live or die? Let them evolve!” He folded his arms on his chest and his whisker-bristled mouth turned down in a disdainful arc. It was clear the conversation was at an end.

  McKean looked at Tleena bleakly, signifying he was out of arguments. We rose silently and followed her out the curtained door. As we withdrew along the corridors of the longhouse, we could hear old Steel burst into loud rasping laughter. At the front of the longhouse Tleena silently waved goodbye to Jerry Tibbut and led us out through the Raven-mouth doorway. We paused outside listening to the roar of the surf.

  “I’m sorry,” Tleena said. “I didn’t think he could be so mean.”

  McKean gave her a thin smile. “Thanks for trying, Tleena.”

  “What will you do now?” she asked.

  He shrugged. “Go back to Seattle and make do with what we know. Can you show us where klochtap grows?”

  “It doesn’t have flowers this time of year. If you pick the wrong kind, it could kill somebody.” She followed McKean and I back along the trail through the dune grass.

  “DNA man!” the old man called, having come out of the longhouse with his walking staff and a cedar-fiber shawl around his shoulders. “I think you’ll see many more people lose their souls and die. Family legend says Raven carried his plague on the wind.” He pointed to a group of ravens and crows perched on the roots of a huge overturned driftwood stump. “Ravens and their cousins are waiting to pick your bones, DNA man. Just like how you picked DNA from ours.”

  McKean said coolly, “We’ll find a cure without your help.”

  “No.” The old man gloated. “You won’t find a cure in time. The bulldozer man died like the Spaniards did. He looked like Pukwubis. Now there’s more sick babalthuds.” His unkempt gray hair blew in the wind and a frightening maniacal rage burned in the depths of his eyes. The ravens cackled as if they concurred with his judgment. The chill of the sea air sank deeply into my bones.

  Old Steel waved a scrawny arm toward the ragged tree-covered hills above us. “This disease comes from the land and the sky and the water. It comes from Raven.” He gestured at the ravens with his walking stick and they leaped into the air and flapped away over the frothing waters of Spirit Cove. The crows, too, lifted off in unison and flew after the ravens. He laughed after them as if sharing a private joke. Then he turned to glare at McKean. He pointed at the ravens as they landed on a sea stack across the inlet.

  “They can smell death on you before you die. Maybe they smell it on you right now. And they’re happy because many babalthuds will die soon.”

  “A bold prediction,” McKean countered. “But I see no real foundation for it.”

  “You will see,” the old man said, undeterred by McKean’s bravado. “You will see, DNA man. But for you and Mr. Newsman, I think you’ll live long enough to see death all around you. You will be safe, but you will not be able to help - just like our shamans couldn’t help when your babalthud diseases swept the Makahs away.”

  McKean looked at him incredulously. “If there is an epidemic coming, then why should Fin and I be spared for any length of time? That defies logic. If we were exposed first, then we will get sick first.” McKean spoke so matter-of-factly that I was as astonished by his calm as I was terrified by his concept.

  “I tell you,” Gordon Steel muttered, “you are under my protection for a while, so you can watch your babalthud world come to an end all around you.”

  “I believe we’ve heard enough of this!” McKean snapped, and turned to go. Tleena and I followed him. When we reached the base of the trail up the bluff, Steel called after us, “You will curse me for protecting you, DNA man, when you watch your family die. And I promise you this, you will live to see everyone you love dead. And then you will die, too.”

  We started to go up, but stopped again when he called, “You, newsman. You’ll have plenty of time to write the history of the end of your people. I think a lot of babalthuds in Seattle will be dead soon. You will be their last witness. You will write about them all running around like Pukwubis, newsman. But write fast. You will join them.”

  I turned to follow McKean, but as I mounted the gnarled root stairway to the first switchback, the old man let out a mocking laugh that grew louder until he seemed possessed by a demon. Across the cove, the ravens and crows set up a cawing chorus that echoed his outburst. “You think I’m an old fool now,” he called. “But death will follow you. It’s already on the wing. Hee hee! It’s coming to get you!”

  As we worked our way up the bluff trail he called after us again. “Hey, DNA man. Before you leave Neah Bay, go to Dakwas Park. You will see your fate there.”

  Chapter 14

  Tleena accompanied us up to the parking area. With the Douglas’s squirrel chiding after us, we emerged from the spruce thicket at the top of the bluff in a morose mood. The sun had sunk near the horizon and was hidden behind a fresh front of dark gray clouds coming in from the west. As we walked onto the parking area, a black and shiny Dodge Ram pickup rumbled up and pulled in beyond the Toyota.

  “The whalers,” McKean murmured as a group of young men got out.

  Among the scowling crew was Billy Clayfoot, now with a cast in his left wrist. Tall Andy Archawat got out from the driver’s seat. He eyed us sullenly as we walked toward my Mustang, angling past them as we did so. “Hey, Tleena,” he called. “What are you doing with these guys?”

  “It’s a long story,” she replied edgily.

  McKean paused and pointed at Archawat’s right wrist, exposed where the sleeve of his Pendleton shirt was rolled to the elbow. “How’s that bite wound doing?”

  Archawat glanced at his wrist. A semicircular scab covered the place where Pete Whitehall’s teeth had sunk in. “Doing all right,” he muttered.

  “Did you put any medicine on it?”

  “Didn’t need to.”

  “You haven’t felt sick?”

  “Okay, buddy,” Archawat growled. “This ain’t twenty questions.” He turned to Tleena and broke into a triumphant grin. “Did you see the Righteous go down?”

  “Yes, I did,” she replied somberly. “I saw it all.”

  “What you didn’t see was the look on Wayne MacGraw’s face. I got a good look at him in the cabin window. He looked like a crazy madman. Like Pukwubis.”

  Another whaler snickered, “Dude’s eyes were like zombie eyes.” He mimed with his eyes open wide, staring straight ahead, fixed but seemingly blind. The other men laughed darkly, suggesting they all found MacGraw’s death amusing.

  I changed the subject. “Tleena, do you need a ride home?”

  “No thanks. I’ll stay here awhile. Andy can get me home, can’t you, Andy?”

  “Sure.” He put an arm around her shoulder and gave her a familiar hug.

  “Let’s go, Fin,” McKean urged. I went to the Mustang, got in and fired the ignition. McKean got in and called a goodbye to Tleena. As I pulled away I glanced at the group in my rearview mirror. Andy Archawat still had his arm around Tleena. She threaded her arm behind his waist and hugged him back. As I rounded a huge gnarled spruce trunk, I took one last look and saw her press her cheek against Archawat’s chest. I sighed as the Mustang bounced along the rough road.

  “What?” McKean asked.

  “Oh, nothing,” I said morosely. “I’m just having a dream shattered.”

  “You and
me both,” he agreed. But his meaning was very different from mine.

  Darkness was falling, so I pushed my Mustang as fast as the rutted road and thick brush allowed. When we emerged into the clearing where the trailer house stood, Dag Bukwatch stepped out from behind a stump directly ahead of us and put out the flat of a hand. I hit the brakes and skidded to a halt.

  He scowled as darkly as a demon, peering through the windshield at me and McKean. The door of one of the small trailers opened and two other Makahs wearing camouflaged hunting gear jogged out to join him in front of us. Another man came out of the trailer home and joined the group. He was tall and heavyset with a head of dark unbound hair falling over his shoulders like a lion’s mane. Dressed all in black, he wore a dark scowl like the others but in addition, he had a shotgun slung across one elbow. He stopped ten feet from my side window.

  Bukwatch circled to the driver’s side. I rolled the window down.

  “Why’d you come here?” he demanded.

  “To talk to Gordon Steel,” McKean replied, leaning across from the passenger side.

  “He’s got nothing to say to you,” Bukwatch muttered.

  “So we found out.”

  “We won’t be back,” I added.

  “Damn right.” Bukwatch moved nearer and brought his left hand out from behind him to reveal a wooden club. Carved ornately in the form of a seal, it looked like it could deliver a blow equivalent to a baseball bat. “Come here again,” he hissed, “and somebody’s gonna get his head knocked off.”

  “Or get his head shot off,” the big man behind Bukwatch said in a thick, dimwitted voice. He hefted his shotgun as if he were bouncing a baby in his arms.

  “Now get outta here,” Bukwatch muttered, “before we decide not to let you to go.” The men in front of the car stepped aside, clearing the Mustang’s way. As they did so, Bukwatch raised the club high. “Here’s a little something to remember us by!” He swung the club in a long arc and brought it down on the Mustang’s left-front headlight, shattering it. I jammed the shift knob into first gear, gunned the engine and dumped the clutch. The Mustang leaped forward, clipping Bukwatch at thigh level just as he raised his club for another strike. He tumbled across the hood and rolled off the fender onto the driveway. He got to his feet quickly but by then the Mustang was beyond the house and racing past the junked cars. I glanced in the rear view mirror and saw the big man tracking us with his shotgun. Bukwatch raised a hand to stop him from firing as we skidded around the first turn in the road. I expected a peppering of buckshot but instead a loud shout came through the forest from Dag Bukwatch. “If you come back here, you die!”

  I drove the Mustang hard through the growing darkness, bumping through potholes and accelerating on every straight stretch. I constantly checked my rear view mirror but we weren’t followed. As soon as we were back on the gravel road and headed for town, I glanced at McKean. He was brooding, deep in thought. I asked him, “I wonder if he really meant that he’d kill us if we came back?”

  “I don’t know,” McKean replied. “And I don’t intend to find out.”

  Darkness closed in completely as we retraced the route from Spirit Cove. I drove through town on Bayview Avenue with my heart rate decreasing in proportion to the distance between us and Dag Bukwatch. I noticed a faint scraping noise and reluctantly pulled into a little parking area on the shore side of the road. Getting out to investigate, I looked around where Bukwatch had put the light out and spotted the problem. The force of his blow had loosened a piece of fender sheet metal sufficiently to cause it to rub on the tire. I knelt and tugged at the bent metal until I managed to get it clear of the tire.

  “Let’s go,” I called to McKean, who had gotten out and wandered along a low cyclone fence that paralleled the parking area.

  “Look at this,” he said, pointing at a sign attached to the fencing. “This is the place Gordon Steel mentioned. Dakwas Park, The Place of Rest. I wonder why he wanted us to stop here?”

  “I don’t know and I don’t care. I just want to leave this town and never come back.”

  “Give me a moment, Fin.” McKean wandered farther along the fence, looking the place over. The little park was a simple semicircular patch of ground between the road and the bank of the bay. About seventy-five feet long, it was surrounded by the cyclone fence we were walking beside. Inside the fence was a well-kept lawn that was flat and featureless except for two objects that rose from it. One was a tall totem pole standing in the center of the park and the other was a short post not far from the totem’s base. The park was deserted, as were the nearby rain-wet streets. Diffuse twilight through a bank of mist backlit the totem pole, which was about thirty feet tall - not the largest I had ever seen - but it drew McKean like a magnet. He walked along the fence until he was directly in front of it. He placed his hands on the top rail and leaned his lanky frame forward, studying the painted shapes carved on the totem. As I joined him he said, “It appears to be a copy of the central totem in the elder center. A national totem, perhaps. An eagle on top with wings spread. And under that, let’s see - ” He looked the pole up and down.

  I stood beside him, staring at the totem without much interest and wishing we were driving out of town. My attention was drawn to the roar of an engine and headlights moving toward us from the direction we had just come. A large black pickup truck raced along Bayview Avenue, thumping with the rhythm of a loud stereo on which a pugnacious rapper trolled his one-note song. When the driver saw us, he hit the brakes and the big machine skidded to a halt on the wet asphalt. “Here comes trouble,” I murmured. The Darth-Vaderesque truck idled in the middle of the street for a moment, its tinted windows veiling its occupants while the rapper droned. Then the driver revved the engine and powered the hulk into a U-turn with its rear tires screeching and throwing out blue smoke. Coming around in the near lane, it raced at us until I was about to jump the fence. It skidded to a halt in the gravel, hemming us in between the fence and its passenger side door. The door opened and every nerve jangled along my spine. But when the music cut off and the passenger stepped down from the high cab onto a sideboard I cried out in relief.

  “Tleena! What brings you here - ?” My exclamation of happy surprise choked off when the driver’s face appeared over her shoulder. A glance into Andy Archawat’s scowling eyes made me clam up. Tleena stepped down to the street and went straight to McKean, who had watched her dramatic arrival with his thin arms akimbo and a habitual look of academic curiosity on his face.

  “I came to apologize for my father,” she said. “I’ve never seen him act that badly.”

  “I suppose his reaction is understandable,” McKean replied, “given his personal animosity toward the society I’m trying to protect.”

  The noise of a chain rattling out on the dark bay attracted all our attention. At the place where the Righteous had gone down, two Coast Guard ships were anchored. One was a cutter and the other a harbor tug with searchlights rigged to look down into the water. They appeared to still be searching for bodies in and around the wreck.

  “Neah Bay is usually a peaceful place,” Tleena explained against all indications to the contrary. “People are friendly.”

  “I have no doubt of that,” McKean said. “We came here with the worst of timing.”

  “It’s all too much,” Tleena said. “First there’s the grave, then people get sick, and then a whaler gets hurt, and now those protesters are dead. Everything’s gone mad around here.”

  “Thanks for your concern,” McKean replied a little tersely. “It is duly noted.”

  “There’s one more thing you should know.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “It’s about Father’s drinking.”

  “A common Native American weakness.”

  “It killed my mother.”

  “He said that.”

  “But it’s how, that’s what’s important. My mother was Violet Parker Steel. She died when I was six and John was eight. It was a car accident. F
ather was driving, and he was drunk. She was sober. He went off the coast road and crashed down a bluff to the beach. Her neck got broken. If John and I and been with them, we might be dead too. Father’s back got hurt and his leg got shattered. It took him years to be able to walk okay. And he started drinking more. John and I were raised by Auntie Edna and Uncle Charlie Thompson, back when they lived here in Neah Bay. Father stayed drunk for years. He was crushed by grief and shame. He only saved himself by going back to the old ways. But he still sees Mother in his dreams. He talks to her sometimes - I’ve heard him, while he’s carving, while he’s working around the longhouse. Her spirit is with him.”

  She paused, and I could see the shimmer of tears in her eyes.

  McKean was silent for an uncharacteristically long moment. At last, he said softly, “I see the motives underlying his obstinacy. Although I still can’t accept it.”

  Tleena looked relieved, as if she had made her point and knew McKean had received it, albeit on his own terms.

  After a further pause, McKean gestured up at the totem. “Can you explain this to me, Tleena? What are the names and meanings of the faces?”

  Surprised, Tleena looked up at the totem for a moment. “That’s Thunderbird at the top,” she began.

  “I had guessed that much,” McKean said. “And below that?”

  “Two serpent heads.”

  “Your father’s double-headed medicine snake?”

  “I believe so. And beneath that is the whale Thunderbird has caught with the help of the snake heads. They can shoot their tongues out like harpoons.”

  “Yes, I see the whale now, complete with tail and blowhole. And beneath the whale? What’s that many-armed thing?”

  “That’s an octopus. Makahs call it tithlup. It’s also the Devilfish Father spoke about.”

  “El Pez del Diablo in the Spanish parchment. The namesake of your shaman ancestor.”

  “Right. Next comes Wolf, and finally Raven at the bottom.”

  “But why did your father want us to look at this totem? I don’t see its relevance to our concerns.”