McKean 02 The Neah Virus

by Thomas Hopp

  Tleena shrugged. “Maybe it’s not the totem he wanted you to see.”

  “What else, then?”

  She moved farther along the fence and we followed her to look at the short post, which was made from a round log standing about four feet tall. Its top was beveled at a 45-degree angle with a bronze plaque set onto it, which bore the tribe’s thunderbird-and-whale emblem. Above the emblem was an inscription in raised bronze letters:

  IN MEMORY OF OUR ANCESTORS

  LAID TO REST IN THIS MASS GRAVE

  FROM SMALLPOX - 1850’S

  “I had no idea,” McKean said. He leaned his thin body far over the fence and glanced to the left and right, scanning the park as if reading data from a book. “Right in the center of town,” he murmured. “I see why Makahs are never far from thoughts of plague and mass death.”

  “It’s a part of our history,” said Tleena. “I teach it at the grade school.”

  “A sad history,” McKean remarked. “Do you know how many people are buried here?”

  “Nobody knows for sure. Maybe a thousand or two.”

  “Two thousand people!” I exclaimed. The realization that a long-forgotten tragedy lay beneath this small plot of grass put a fresh chill in my bones.

  “Maybe more,” said Tleena. “It depends on how deep they’re piled.”

  “Ninety percent of our people died then,” Archawat called from his seat in the pickup’s cab. He got out, leaving the truck idling, and came to join Tleena. He was dressed in blue jeans, a black leather vest, and a tan T-shirt with a logo across the front that read, “Tradition.” Beneath the logo, basket-weave designs depicting canoes, harpooners and whales stretched across his wide pectoral muscles. His dark hair was tied back in a ponytail that blew over one shoulder in the shore wind. His expression suggested he disdained being Tleena’s driver on this mission. Despite the exception I took to his gruff attitude, I had to admit to myself that he was a good-looking fellow - tanned, strong-jawed, and compellingly handsome. I could see the attraction he presented to Tleena.

  “Smallpox was the first way babalthuds killed us,” he muttered. “They brought the disease with them on their ships.”

  “True,” McKean responded. “The disease no doubt arrived here from Hong Kong, Singapore, Honolulu and San Francisco, as a stowaway inside the bodies of sick sailors and passengers. It came on the hands of played-out Forty-Niners and on the bodies of Chinese coolie laborers.”

  “Yeah,” Archawat agreed. “And on lumberjacks, hustlers, and thieves who didn’t give a shit about our people.”

  “But there must have been some newcomers who tried to help,” said McKean.

  “That’s true,” said Tleena. “Missionaries and store owners helped us dig the graves and lime the bodies to keep down the stink. When the disease was at its worst, there weren’t enough ablebodied Makahs to bury the dead, so it was up to the Americans who were immune to the disease to clean things up. They brought the corpses out of the longhouses, piled them here in long lines, and then buried them with sand.”

  “It’s awful to think of so many people dying all at once,” I said.

  McKean shook his head slowly. “In the eighteen hundreds smallpox was the great annihilator of many tribes. The Makahs were victims of foreign diseases for which their bodies had no inherent resistance.”

  “It’s horrific,” I said, “to think of an entire population defenseless against an invading virus.”

  “Nature knows no horror,” McKean replied. “A virus is as much a part of the web of life on earth as is a human or a whale. The smallpox virus was participating in globalization in its own way. It was pioneering new lands, expanding from the Old World to the New.”

  “That’s a cold way to put it,” I said. “Those were real people dying.”

  “Logic is a cold thing, Fin, but compelling nonetheless.”

  “It wasn’t just smallpox,” said Archawat. “Gordon says it was the missionaries, too. Just when we were all sick and weak and scared they came and said all our troubles were our own fault for worshiping animal spirits. They said our spirit guardians were demons and devils. That’s when we gave up our old ways. But Gordon says the animal spirits were really our angels. So we lost our own souls, too. And that’s when we signed away our lands to Governor Stevens for nothing but a promise that we could hunt whales. Now even that promise has been taken back. Babalthuds are the Indian-givers, not us. Now Makahs are left with nothing that was our own, unless Gordon can bring it back.”

  “A moment ago, Fin,” McKean said pedagogically, “I was asking myself why old Steel seemed so bitter. But I believe Mr. Archawat here has explained it all quite nicely. To the traditional Makah the protestors, DNA tests, and other manifestations of mainstream culture are continuations of the sordid history of their tribe’s degradation and ruin.”

  “That’s right,” Archawat confirmed. “We call it the Caucasian Invasion, and it isn’t over yet. Babalthuds keep bringing trouble here.” Archawat’s jaw muscles clenched like he was biting back on much more than what he said.

  “I see your point,” McKean acknowledged, “but I’m still concerned about what Gordon Steel meant when he told us we’d see our fate here. Is this what he meant? That we’ll all end up in a hole in the ground?”

  “Let’s go, Tleena,” Archawat growled. “I don’t wanna be seen talking to these guys.” He eyed us coldly and folded his arms across his chest.

  “Just a minute Andy,” said Tleena. “I have more to say.” She turned to McKean. “I wanted to explain that my father is not really mean, he’s just bitter. Even some Makah people think he’s a crazy old coot - but there’s a lot more to him than that. He’s the closest thing we’ve got to a real shaman. He knows more than anybody about the old ways.”

  “Although he’s not very inclined to share,” McKean replied sourly.

  “True,” Tleena agreed. “But shaman’s cures have always been secret. I’ll try to get him to tell me about the medicines you want.”

  Archawat rankled. “Your father doesn’t want to help them. They’re outsiders, just like those Eco-Nazis out there.” He pointed toward where two divers had just surfaced between the Coast Guard boats and were hooking a recovered body into a sling. “They deserve what’s happening to them. They’re trying to kill us off. If we save them, then more rich white people will come and wreck our way of life. Maybe if they die off, that’s the best thing that can happen for us. Makahs are good fighters. It won’t be the first time we outlasted our enemies.”

  “But Makahs sometimes lost.” McKean gestured at the grave marker.

  Archawat stiffened. “The ships that came here in the 1850s brought smallpox. Now they bring protesters. It’s all part of the same thing.”

  McKean looked out over the harbor. “It’s never too late for understanding to prevail. Knowledge is power, and shared knowledge is more powerful. There might be some common ground between whale lovers and whale hunters.”

  Archawat snorted derisively. “We’ll agree with babalthuds when they leave us alone. Until then, they deserve what they get.”

  Tleena sighed. “Andy, these aren’t protesters we’re talking to.”

  “They want Gordon’s medicine to help keep protesters alive. I say, babalthuds started this fight, not us. Let them die.”

  “But there are many Americans who support your right to hunt whales,” McKean countered. “I do.”

  “Where were you when the protesters broke Billy Clayfoot’s arm? You go back to Seattle! Let the disease kill off all the protesters. Then things will be like they were before babalthuds came here!”

  “How will it sit on your conscience,” McKean asked, “if thousands of people die? Or millions?”

  “Why should I care about them any more than they care about me? This is just getting-even time. Now it’s their turn to die.”

  “Andy!” cried Tleena. “Stop being so cruel!”

  Archawat wasn’t in a conciliatory mood. He asked McKean brazenly, �
�You know what I’m going to do when the babalthuds are gone?”

  “What?” McKean asked.

  “I’m gonna go catch me a whale!” He grinned vindictively.

  At a loss, McKean turned to Tleena. “Please tell your father we really need his help.”

  “Okay,” she agreed. “I’ll try again.”

  He turned to me. “We’d better get going, Fin. We’ve gotten precious little help here, so I’ll have all the more work to do in the lab tonight.”

  A few seconds would see me parted from Tleena again. I looked into her beautiful dark eyes. “Tleena - ” I said, but Archawat interrupted by putting a hand on her shoulder and leading her toward the truck.

  “C’mon, Tleena,” he muttered. “Leave these babalthuds to their fate.” As he helped her step up onto the truck’s high running board, he glared back at me darkly. Angered by his possessive behavior, I wanted to demand of the sullen Makah, just what is your relationship with this woman? You don’t own her, do you? But the words froze in my throat.

  “Goodbye, Fin,” Tleena called as she got into the passenger seat. Her gaze lingered on me for a moment. Then she closed her door as Archawat gunned the engine and tore away in the direction of Spirit Cove, his tires clattering gravel at our feet.

  A cold drizzle fell as we walked back to the Mustang. McKean muttered, “This certainly has been a fruitless trip.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed as Archawat’s taillights and thumping music faded around a corner in the Spanish fort. “It sure has been.”

  Chapter 15

  Night fell as I drove out of Neah Bay on the coast road. A heavy rain began pounding my windshield with a staccato roar like automatic weapon fire. Despite the wipers on high speed my vision was blurred by water. The swerving cliffside highway was made more treacherous by the lack of one headlight and my determination to put as much distance between us and Neah Bay as I could. The Mustang verged on four-wheel drifts around some turns but I gripped the wheel tightly, gritted my teeth, and kept the gas pedal down. “You don’t have to be drunk to go off this road,” I muttered.

  McKean seemed not to notice. He watched the raindrops battering the windshield with an air of Zen-like calm. No matter to him that the cliff-like road cuts were alive with cascades of white froth, or that the ditches were clogged with tangles of branches and mud, or that sheets of water spilled across the road. I charged through these, throwing out sprays on either side. Signs urging me to WATCH FOR FALLEN ROCK brought an ironic smile, given that whole sections of the fern-choked embankment had slumped off the soggy rock wall and into the ditches.

  McKean took a cell phone from a pocket of his overcoat. “I should call Janet,” he murmured absentmindedly. “I’d like an update on her progress.” He tried to make the call but turned the phone off after a moment. “No service,” he said.

  After a dozen miles of white-knuckled driving, I passed the reservation boundary. The protesters and cops had disappeared. As the highway smoothed out and went through a series of wide farmstead clearings, I relaxed my grip on the wheel and breathed easier. We rolled into the coastal hamlet of Clallam Bay where the houses and little tourist shops were dark and shuttered against the storm and the streets were deserted. Approaching a well-lit gas station and convenience store, I noticed that my gas gauge needle was near empty. I turned in and stopped beside a pump, pulled the hood of my squall jacket up, and got out to brave the rain that was slanting under the gas island roof. As I began filling my tank, McKean got out and, holding his hat against the lashing wind, jogged across the lot to a phone booth.

  As the gas pumped, I pocketed my hands to get them out of the chilly mist. I kept a wary eye on my surroundings. In a forested area across the road, once logged bare but regrown into a tangle of Douglas firs, bigleaf maple trees, and blackberry brambles that were dimly lit by the glow from the gas station lights, I heard a noise. Somewhere within the tangled vegetation a raven called deeply, “Hrock! Hrock!” I peered among the dark branches and could just make out the form of the bird perching high on a limb of a bigleaf maple. It crouched low as I spotted it and called out again, “Hrock! Hrock!” The notion that it had been watching me sent a tingle along my spine. That tingle was followed by another when I heard a new noise. It was a low mournful moan that came, not from the raven, but from a human throat somewhere in the dark woods.

  I glanced at the pump, hoping it might soon be finished, but it had scarcely pumped the first quarter tank. I glanced at McKean. He was busy inside the telephone booth, engaged in a conversation with Janet. I peered again into the darkness under the maple tree and saw something thrashing among the blackberry brambles. The eerie moaning continued.

  The raven called out another loud “Hrock!” and took wing. It disappeared into the woods just as a man lurched out of the undergrowth. My jaw dropped when I got a look him. He was naked except for a soaked pair of short underpants. He was smeared from head to foot in muck and brown leaves as if he had been crawling on the forest floor. As he splashed across the rain-swollen gutter and lurched up to the street, I saw that his body was crisscrossed with bleeding scratches from blackberry vines. His wet, dark hair was plastered to his head with leaves and mud. He made a noise that will haunt me forever. “Ngahhh!” he called in a throaty howl that was a combination of a mountain lion’s roar, a reptile’s hiss, and a mournful human voice. There was a maniacal urgency to it that set my heart racing.

  “Ngahhh!” he roared again as he spotted me and lurched straight at me in stiff, zombie-like strides. Although barefoot, he crossed the sharp gravel of the street shoulder oblivious to any pain, fixating on me in a way that made my blood run cold. As he came into the glare of the station lights, I got a look at his face. His muddy, bloodied lips were parted, baring his teeth. His eyes were wide and bloodshot, with the same purplish circles around them as Pete Whitehall’s. His pupils gleamed like those of a mad soul lost in the pits of hell. Even more terrifying, his ghostly white skin had been torn by more than blackberry brambles. Sets of three or four parallel gashes marked where he had raked himself with his fingernails so deeply that the marks bled. Scratches covered his arms, legs, body, neck and face - and from that horrific bleeding face his eyes glared at me so piercingly that they shook me to the core.

  Peyton McKean cried, “Look out, Fin!” and raced back toward the car. I was uncertain how to react as the madman came to the rear of the Mustang, but I was certain he intended to bite me. As he circled the rear of the car and came at me, I grabbed a wooden-handled windshield squeegee from a tub of soapy water near the pump and raised it high. The man paused where the gas hose intervened between us and clutched at me with hands whose clawed fingers were red with his own blood. I took a long, high swing and brought the squeegee down hard on the top of his head. There was a loud crack! as the handle shattered across his cranium and the pieces flew out of my hand. He reeled backward, howling in pain. I raised my arms high and shouted, “Ya-a-ah!” The blow, and my shout, froze him in place. He began gibbering an unintelligible, whining protest. He swatted at the air around him as if it were filled with unseen flying demons. A fresh gout of blood ran down his forehead from the wound I had made on the top of his head.

  “Hang up the pump!” McKean called across the Mustang to me as he opened his door and got in. “Let’s get out of here.”

  The pump was still running, so I reached for the handle. But the maniac instantly recovered and came at me. I shouted again and he stopped short, but now we were in a standoff on opposite sides of the gas hose. I was poised with my hand outstretched to grasp the nozzle, and the maniac was ready to pounce if I did. Blood flowed heavily from the split on his brow and dripped from his chin.

  “Forget the hose,” McKean called from the passenger seat. “Get in and drive away.”

  I turned and quickly sat into the driver’s seat, slammed the door, and twisted the key in the ignition. As the engine roared to life, I glanced around to see the madman tug the still-pumping gas nozzle free of the f
ill port, splattering gasoline around himself. I put the Mustang in gear and drove quickly out of the fueling spot. As I did, the maniac came after me, holding the nozzle out and spewing gasoline onto the rear of my car, all the while baring his teeth like an enraged animal. The station’s lot was small, forcing me to circle and go out the way I entered. As I steered around the gas island, the maniac raised the nozzle high over his head, splattering the pump island and himself with gas. He tried to come after us but the hose stretched tight and stopped his lurching charge. Further enraged, he turned his anger on the pump. Howling ferociously, he aimed a series of heavy blows at it with the still-running nozzle.

  “Drive!” McKean shouted when I slowed to gape at the spectacle. Snapping into action I pressed the accelerator down too hard and spun my tires on the wet pavement.

  The maniac pounded the nozzle down on the pump again. As my tires gained traction and the Mustang began to move, several things happened at once. The manager of the gas station, a hefty man in khaki coveralls and a hunting cap, ran out of the convenience store and shouted, “Hey! What’s going on - ?” His words were cut short when a spark from the madman’s blows ignited the gasoline-soaked pump, from which flames quickly spread over the maniac and the ground around him. The manager ducked back inside the store as the maniac shrieked in pain and crumpled to the ground, his body a blazing torch.

  The Mustang fishtailed and gained speed slowly with tires spinning on slick pavement. The madman’s agonized scream was lost in the roar of a massive explosion that burst from the pump island. The fireball nearly swallowed the Mustang, but we escaped by a matter of inches. I kept the accelerator floored as the explosion engulfed the whole gas island in a colossal ball of fire. I tore away on a straight stretch of road, keeping one eye on the rear view mirror. The madman had vanished in flames, which swirled around the pumps and rose into a towering mushroom-shaped billow. The store manager crept back to the door and helplessly watched with his face lit by the hellish orange glow.