Текст книги "The Romanov Cross"
Автор книги: Robert Masello
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Текущая страница: 20 (всего у книги 35 страниц)
Chapter 35
Russell had sat in the hut for hours, nursing the last beer he’d carried in his pocket, and waiting for Harley and Eddie to come and get him. Did they really expect him to find his way back through the woods – much less locate that shitty little cave they’d been hiding out in – all by himself?
He had exhausted the entertainment possibilities of the hut in the first half hour. There were old animal skins – otter, beaver, bear – covering some unfinished headstones, and an assortment of rusty old shovels and axes leaning up against the walls. The leather-bound book on the table was written in Russian, but Russell could tell, from the way that the names and dates seemed to be lined up on most of the pages, that it must have been the sexton’s ledger. A record of who was getting buried where, and when. For a while, he tore out one page at a time and tried to keep a fire going with his Bic lighter, but each page simply vanished in a puff of smoke without generating more than a second of heat. He stuck the remainder in his pocket, just in case it might prove to be worth something to some nutcase at one of those antique shops in Nome.
It was only after the last daylight had gone, and the northern lights suddenly appeared in the sky, that he realized he was on his own, that nobody was coming to get him or offer a lick of help. He could slowly freeze to death in this hut, or he could try to make his own way back to the cave. The wind whistled through the spaces between the timbers and rattled the staves of the door so hard they sounded like castanets.
Cursing Harley, cursing Eddie, and cursing his luck, Russell stood up and instantly regretted it. He’d twisted his ankle in that pothole in the graveyard, and although he’d thought the pain would pass, the ankle had continued to swell. Rolling his sock down, he could see that the skin was a deep shade of purple already. The throbbing, too, was getting worse all the time. Slowly, carefully, he hobbled to the door, where he ripped one of the staves loose to make a crutch he could lean on.
He hated to think how much it was going to hurt when he really tried to walk with such a bad sprain.
Outside, the sky was still alight with the shimmering glow of the aurora borealis. He’d seen it a million times in his life, so the effect had definitely worn off, but he hoped that the light at least would stick around. He had a flashlight in his free hand – Harley had made sure they carried the essentials – but even among this dense brush and overhanging trees, the aurora lent enough illumination to help him pick his way through the woods. The snowy branches were tinged with the alternating colors in the sky – green and yellow and a pale dusky rose – that made the whole forest look fake and strange, like a scene from some movie. A movie Russell did notwant to be in.
A strong wind was blowing, too, with flakes of snow and ice spinning through the air. He had only the most general sense of where he was. He knew the colony was off toward the sea, and the cave was somewhere to the west, but when he had heard the voices approaching and run wildly into the forest, he had lost all sense of direction.
The beers probably hadn’t helped on that score, either.
As he hobbled along, the flashlight beam trained at his feet to keep from tripping over any uneven ground, he told himself that if the Kodiakhadn’t been refloated on the tide by now, he was going to call the mainland, admit that they were stranded on St. Peter’s, and somehow get the hell back to Port Orlov. Even if there werejewels inside those coffins, this guy Slater, and the Coast Guard, had gotten there first by now, so what was the point of sticking around?
When the northern lights were suddenly extinguished – it always reminded Russell of the way his grandfather would pinch a candle flame between his thumb and forefinger – the forest went almost black all around him. Only the moon and stars offered a little help to navigate by.
Trying to ignore the pain in his ankle, Russell focused on what he’d do once he got back home – he imagined himself hoisting a brew in the Yardarm and maybe shooting some pool – when he heard a bustling in an alder thicket. He stopped, expecting a covey of quail to fly out, or maybe a squirrel to scamper underfoot, but nothing did. He waited silently – if it was a bear, it would want to avoid him as much as he wanted to avoid it – and then he said, with as much bravado as he could muster, “Hey, asshole, I’m coming through.” It was always best to give a bear fair warning.
But there was no more noise, and no sign or smell of anything lingering in the brush, so he forged on. Not that he didn’t wish he could trade his flashlight for a can of that mace Harley carried. He knew there were wolves on the island, but wolves never attacked humans. They looked for herds of elk, and cut the young, or the feeble, ones from the pack. He kept going, leaning on the stave with one hand and using the other one, clutching the flashlight, to bat low-hanging branches out of his way. He never thought he’d miss driving the propane truck, but right now even that was looking good. He just hoped his boss would let him slide for missing a few days of work; he’d told him he had to visit a sick relative, but if the truth got back to him, or even worse if it got back to Russell’s parole officer, it’d mean big trouble.
The rustling came again, and this time out of the corner of his eye he saw a flash of movement behind a moss-covered tree trunk. He rubbed the back of his glove across his eyes to clear his vision – the snow was starting to come down faster now – and swept the flashlight beam across the brush. But everything was suddenly still.
Too still … as if the usual woodland creatures had fled, or were lying low.
He felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. His feet weren’t moving, but he knew it was no time to stand still. Should he retreat to the hut, he wondered, where he could grab one of those old rusty spades and at least have some kind of weapon if he needed it? The stave he was holding wasn’t going to be much help.
But when he turned around, he realized that he had no more idea how to get back to the hut than he did to find the cave. The trees were so tightly spaced, the ground so covered with moss and leaves and damp muddy snow, he’d have to be one of the native Inuit to thread his way back. And the prospect of getting marooned in that freezing, spooky shack overnight was way too scary to think about.
He turned back in the direction he’d been going and, as stealthily as possible, hobbled on. Even if he could just keep to a straight line, he figured, he’d eventually hit the cliffs on the other side – the whole friggin’ island wasn’t that big – and from there he could just hug the cliffs until he spotted the boat down in the cove. It couldn’t be that hard, or take that long. He told himself that all he had to do was keep his wits about him, ignore the pain in his ankle, and keep making progress.
And then something skittered across the path ahead of him.
Jesus Christ. He stopped dead, wondering what it had been. It had moved like a shadow, black and fast. He’d heard all the native legends about the otter-men, but who ever believed in shit like that? That old totem pole in town, the one that had fallen halfway over, supposedly told the story. His third-grade teacher had tried to tell the class about it one day, but Russell hadn’t paid any attention.
Now, he sort of wished he had.
He debated about whether it was better to keep quiet and get the hell out of there, or make some noise and try to bluster his way through. But that would all depend on what he was up against, and so far he hadn’t actually seen anything well enough to know.
A twig snapped behind him, on the other side, and he whipped around. A gust of wind blew the snow off a bough and into his face, but even as he blinked to clear his vision he saw a pair of eyes – yellow and intent – peering out from the brush.
Instinctively, he jabbed the stave at the bushes, but hit nothing. The eyes were gone as suddenly as they had appeared.
But Russell wasn’t about to wait around. Clawing his way through the woods as fast as he could, the anguish in his ankle overwhelmed by the adrenaline surging through his veins, he plowed ahead, knocking branches out of his way, clambering over the trunks of dead trees, slipping on wet moss, and once, on a brackish coil of goose droppings. His boots were slick with the shit when his toe caught on something hard, jutting up from the ground, and he was thrown flat, his head colliding with a rotten log. The flashlight went flying from his hand.
He lay there, stunned for an instant, but he could sense that he was still being tracked, that something was still watching him, waiting him out. First, he heard a sound on his right – snow crunching under a foot or paw – then he heard a sound on his left, like panting. There was more than one of them. He felt like he was being studied, like his infirmity had been noted, and now the stalkers were just awaiting the right opportunity to bring him down … like a wounded animal separated from the herd.
The way that wolves would do it.
He took a hurried breath and struggled to his feet again, leaning on the stave. The more he gave the impression of weakness and fear, the more he would embolden the attackers. If a bear threatened you, it was best to stand your ground, pump yourself up to look as big as you could manage, and make a lot of racket. But if it was wolves, that was something else. They never tired of the game … and to them it wasa game. They would shift responsibilities, one running the animal down, then resting, while another picked up the chase. They would harry and harass their prey, nipping at its heels, barking in its face, racing in circles so that the creature got dizzy just trying to keep the many wolves in its sights. Russell had once gone hunting with his uncle and watched as a pack of them surrounded a starving coyote that had had the nerve to scavenge one of their kills. They had neatly spaced themselves out to cover any possible escape route, then crept closer, until the coyote, suddenly looking up from its feast, found itself with nowhere to run.
And then the wolves had descended all at once, in a bristling fury of fangs and claws.
Russell was so disoriented – and panicked now – that he hardly knew which way to turn. But he did know that the cave was still far off, while the old Russian colony was close. He could give himself up to the Coast Guard, claim he was just some stupid kayaker that the storm had washed up on the shore. Maybe that guy Dr. Slater could even take a look at his ankle, and better yet, give him something for the pain.
The colony, as best he could make out, was off to his left, in the direction of the strait. Keeping a close eye on the brush, and moving as quickly, but as cautiously, as he could, he cut a trail through the trees. The snow was swirling more thickly than ever. Remembering something his uncle had once told him, he thought of breaking the end of a branch here and there as a way of marking his progress, but he knew it was too dark for him ever to find the broken bits again. It would only be possible the next day … and he was beginning to doubt he would live that long.
Something leapt over a fallen trunk on his right, and he caught a glimpse of sleek black fur.
And then, from his other side, he heard a yip.
A short one, a signal to its mate.
Which was responded to with the same sound.
He picked up his pace, his heart pounding in his chest. He clenched the end of the stave, his only weapon. His eyes strained to see ahead, to catch sight of the colony. His breath was coming in bursts, and he told himself to breathe more evenly, more deeply. The essential thing was to keep moving. They would only move in for the kill if they thought he was helpless and had given up … or if they had already acquired a taste for human flesh.
Focus, he told himself, forging ahead. Focus. And through the trees, down a slope, he saw a spot of something bright green. And glowing.
A tent! One of those colony tents!
It was behind what was left of the stockade wall. Christ, it felt like a hundred years ago that he had first seen this damn place. He swung the stave through the brush, clumsily trudging down the hillside, and then exulting as he shimmied through a gap in the timbers.
He was behind that old church, but when he turned, he saw that the wolves – and there were four of them, not two, all black, and their yellow eyes gleaming – were slinking between the logs, too. Their heads were lowered, their hackles raised, and they showed no signs of quitting their hunt.
He swung the stave in a wide arc, but only one of them backed off. The others stood their ground, snarling now, saliva dripping from their jaws.
“Help!” he shouted, but the wind was roaring in his ears. “Somebody help me!”
He could feel the wolves spreading out around him, cutting off any retreat. He swung the stave again, and this time the alpha wolf, in front of the pack and with a blaze of white on its muzzle, snapped at the end of the stick, nearly managing to yank it from his hands. He could feel the heat of its body; he could smell its rank breath.
Whirling around, he saw a hole in the foundation of the church, not much bigger than a manhole cover, but big enough. He backed up toward it, poking the stave at whichever wolf got closest. When the alpha lunged at it again – and gripped the stick between its teeth – he suddenly let go, turned around, and scrambled into the hole. The wood was jagged, and splinters cut through his gloves, but he was pulling himself in with all his might, wriggling his body in after. He was jackknifed into the gloomy interior when something snagged the bottom of his boot. He pulled the leg harder, praying he had caught his shoe on a shard of wood, but the foot was only jerked back even harder.
And now he could feel the bite, the fangs sinking right through his boot and heavy woolen sock … and into his skin.
He pulled again, but to his amazement he felt himself being hauled backwards. His hands scrabbled at the thick wood of the wall, trying to find any purchase, but all he got was a handful of splinters and sawdust. He shook his leg, and kicked his foot out. He heard his pants ripping, and felt his own hot blood soaking through his sock.
He screamed again, his cry echoing in the empty church.
And then there was another set of fangs, fastened like a vise on his other foot.
Like a snake being yanked out of its den, he slithered backward, out of the hole, and flopped onto the ground. Turning over to punch at their snouts, he saw above him a frenzy of yellow eyes, black fur, and open, dripping jaws. He tried to lift his hands to fight back, but the alpha had already nuzzled its head under his chin, seeking, and swiftly finding, his jugular. Its teeth felt as long and fine as knitting needles as they sank into his neck.
Chapter 36
The electric chandelier was ablaze with light, and Jemmy, who usually slept soundly on her feet, was stirring. Anastasia rubbed her eyes and said, “What’s going on?”
Her father was standing in the doorway in his nightshirt. “The commandant has asked us to dress and go down to one of the lower rooms.”
“Why?” Olga asked from her cot.
“He says that there is some unrest in the town, and it will be safer for us if we are not on the upper story.”
All four of the girls hastily exchanged looks, wondering what this really might portend, but Anastasia prayed that it was the first news of their deliverance. Sergei had said telegrams had been flying back and forth from Moscow and that something was afoot. Maybe the White Army was indeed within reach. Even now, the night wind carried the faint rumble of distant guns.
The girls sprang out of bed and had no sooner started dressing than their mother appeared and reminded them to put on their special corsets – the ones with the royal jewels so laboriously sewn into all of the linings.
“We have to be ready for anything,” Alexandra said. But there was a note of hope in her voice, too, a note that Ana had not heard for so many months of their captivity. “We might not be coming back to these rooms.”
Even though they had spent countless hours working on the corsets, the girls had never actually worn them yet, and Ana found that hers weighed much more than she might ever have imagined. It was hard to get on, and with the emerald cross from Father Grigori hanging around her neck, too, she felt like a walking jewelry box.
Like her sisters, she put on a long dark skirt and a white blouse, and by the time they were out in the hall the family’s companions in exile had also assembled there – Dr. Botkin, polishing his gold-rimmed glasses; her father’s valet, Trupp; her mother’s personal maid, Demidova; Kharitonov the cook. Tatiana asked what time it was, and Dr. Botkin consulted his pocket watch.
“Nearly one o’clock.”
Her mother came out next, clutching one of the pillows that also contained a cache of jewels inside it (Demidova had the other), then her father emerged, carrying a sleepy Alexei in his arms. Her father was not a tall man, but he had a broad chest and strong arms, and somehow he always managed to carry his son as effortlessly as if the boy were made of feathers. Ana carried Jemmy, who was strangely, but blissfully, silent for a change.
With Nicholas leading the way, the family trooped down the creaking stairway to the foyer. Yurovsky was waiting at the bottom, stroking his black goatee and wearing a long overcoat far too warm for the July night.
“This way,” he said, guiding them out into the courtyard – Ana was so glad of the chance to see the stars and breathe the fresh air, perfumed with lilac and honeysuckle, that she almost cried aloud for joy – then back down a set of stairs that led to the cellar. “You will please wait in here,” he said. “It won’t be long.”
The room was not much bigger than the girls’ bedroom upstairs, and the walls were covered with peeling wallpaper in a pattern of yellow stripes. There wasn’t a single piece of furniture in the room – Ana wondered if Yurovsky hadn’t already started his looting of the place – and a single electric bulb, with no shade, hung from a string, casting a harsh white light around the barren space. Just before the commandant closed the double doors behind him, Alexandra said, “May we not have some chairs?”
Ana knew that her mother’s back was very bad, but she also knew that it was Alexei she was most concerned about.
“Of course,” Yurovsky said, and closed the doors. Ana assumed that they would never see the chairs, any more than they saw the powdered sage or anything else that the commandant promised, but to her surprise, he kicked the doors open a minute later and dragged in two wooden chairs.
Alexandra sat down on one of them, casually placing the pillow behind the small of her back as if for comfort, while Nicholas sat down on the other with Alexei cradled in his lap.
“The capitalist newspapers have been circulating stories,” Yurovsky said. “They claim that you have escaped, or that you are not being kept safe. We need to take a photograph to put an end to these rumors once and for all. You will please arrange yourselves so that you may all be seen.”
Having had their portrait taken a thousand times, the royal family obligingly fell into their customary spots, with the parents and Alexei in the middle and the girls spread out on either side.
“Yes, yes,” Yurovsky said, directing Dr. Botkin and the others into a single file against the wall behind them. “Exactly. Everyone stay right where you are.”
Then, he popped back out the door again. There was nothing to look at and nothing to do. Ana fidgeted in her corset, stifling not only from the weight but the heat of it. Who knew that diamonds and rubies could be so heavy? Olga put a hand on her mother’s shoulder, and Alexandra kissed and squeezed it hopefully.
Ana wondered where Sergei was, and if he knew what was going on. There was only one window, crossed with iron bars, opening onto ground level, but it was placed high in the wall and she couldn’t see anything outside. How many officers, she wondered, were riding to their rescue even now?
Time seemed to stand still in the airless cellar as they held their positions and waited for the photographer to come in with his tripod and his camera and his black cloth. Jemmy squirmed in her arms, but she didn’t want to put him down for fear he’d get into some trouble. The commandant had made plain, on previous occasions, that he had no use for dogs.
When the doors did open again, Yurovsky came in, with his long coat unbuttoned and nearly a dozen guards jostling to join him inside. Reading aloud from a sheet of paper he held high in his hand, Yurovsky announced that “in view of the fact that your relatives and supporters have continued their attacks on Soviet Russia, the Executive Committee of the Urals has decided to execute you.”
Ana thought she could not have heard him correctly, and her father, after looking quickly at his family assembled around him, turned back to Yurovsky in disbelief and said, “What? What?”
The commandant quickly repeated the sentence, word for word, then drew from his belt a revolver and shot the former Tsar directly through the forehead. Ana saw her father pitch backwards in the chair, dropping Alexei to the floor. She saw her mother fling up a hand to cross herself, and her sisters shrink back against the wall. She heard Demidova cry out and Botkin protest, then everything became an awful blur.
The Red Guards pulled out their own guns and all Ana remembered was a deafening roar as the shots rang out and the room filled with choking smoke and screams for mercy and the hot splash of blood, blood flying everywhere. Jemmy turned into a limp soaking rag in her arms, and as the bullets clanged and ricocheted off the gems in her corset, Ana toppled over and fell beneath the crush of dead and dying bodies … and still the firing continued. The lightbulb in the ceiling exploded, and the last thing she saw, as she clutched at the emerald cross beneath her blouse, was the looming phantom of Rasputin himself rising before her, as if his black beard and cassock were fashioned from the swirling smoke and gunpowder. In her ear, she heard the deep rumble of his voice whispering, as he once had done at the Christmas ball, “I shall always be watching over you, little one.” Malenkaya.
