XXV

The white rain clouds, rolling as ever like a nervous intruder over the

great snow peaks behind the steep hills black with forest that rose

like a wall back of the little settlement of Sitka, parted for a

moment, and the sun, a coy disdainful guest, flung a glittering mist

over what Nature had intended to be one of the most enchanting spots on

earth, until, in a fit of ill-temper--with one of the gods, no

doubt--she gave it to Niobe as a permanent outlet for her discontent.

When it does not rain at Sitka it pours, and when once in a way she

draws a deep breath of respite and lifts her grand and glorious face to

the sun, in pathetic gratitude for dear infrequent favor, comes a wild

flurry of snow or a close white fog from the inland waters; and, like a

great beauty condemned to wear a veil through life, she can but stare

in dumb resentment through the folds, consoling herself with the

knowledge that could the world but see it must surely worship.

Perhaps, who knows? she really is a frozen goddess, condemned to the

veil for infidelity to him imprisoned in the great volcano across the

sound--who sends up a column of light once in a way to dazzle her

shrouded eyes, and failing that batters her with rock and stone like

any lover of the slums. One day he spat forth a rock like a small

hill, and big enough to dominate the strip of lowland at least,

standing out on the edge of the island like a guard at the gates, and

never a part of the alien surface. Between this lofty rock and the

forest was the walled settlement of New Archangel, that Baranhov, the

dauntless, had wrested from the bloodthirsty Kolosh but a short time

since and purposed to hold in the interest of the Russian-American

Company. His log hut, painted like the other buildings with a yellow

ochre found in the soil, stood on the rock, and his glass swept the

forest as often as the sea.

As Rezanov, on the second of July, thirty-one days after leaving San

Francisco, sailed into the harbor with its hundred bits of volcanic

woodland weeping as ever, he gave a whimsical sigh in tribute to the

gay and ever-changing beauties of the southern land, but was in no mood

for sentimental reminiscence. Natives, paddling eagerly out to sea in

their bidarkas to be the first to bring in good news or bad, had given

him a report covering the period of his absence that filled him with

dismay. There had been deaths from scurvy; one of the largest ships

belonging to the Company had been wrecked and the entire cargo lost; of

a hunting party of three hundred Aleuts in one hundred and forty

bidarkas, which had gone from Sitka to Kadiak in November of the

preceding year, not one had arrived at its destination, and there was

reason to believe that all had been drowned or massacred; and the

Russians and Aleuts at Behring's Bay settlement had been exterminated

by one of the native tribes.

But the Juno was received with salvos of artillery from the fort, and

cheered by the entire population of the settlement, crowded on the

beach. Baranhov, looking like a monkey with a mummy's head in which

only a pair of incomparably shrewd eyes still lived, his black wig

fastened on his bald, red-fringed pate with a silk handkerchief tied

under his chin, stood, hands on hips, shaking with excitement and

delight. The bearded, long-haired priests, in full canonicals of black

and gold, were beside the Chief-Manager, ready to escort the

Chamberlain to the chapel at the head of the solitary street, where the

bells were pealing and a mass of thanksgiving was to be said for his

safe return.

But it was some time before Rezanov could reach the chapel or even

exchange salutations with Baranhov. As he stepped on shore he was

surrounded, almost hustled by the shouting crowd of Russians,--many of

them convicts--Aleuts and Sitkans, who knelt at his feet, endeavored to

kiss his hand, his garments, in their hysterical gratitude for the food

he had brought them. For the first time he felt reconciled to his

departure from California, and Concha's image faded as he looked at the

tearful faces of the diseased, ill-nourished wretches who gave their

mite of life that he might live as became a great noble of the Russian

Empire. But although he tingled with pleasure and was deeply moved, he

by no means swelled with vanity, for he was far too clear-sighted to

doubt he had done more than his duty, or that his duty was more than

begun. He made them a little speech, giving his word they should be

properly fed hereafter, that he would make the improvement of their

condition as well as that of all the employees of the Company

throughout this vast chain of settlements on the Pacific, the chief

consideration of his life; and they believed him and followed him to

the chapel rejoicing, reconciled for once to their lot.

After the service Rezanov went up to the hut of the Chief-Manager, a

habitation that leaked winter and summer, and was equally deficient in

light, ventilation and order. But Baranhov in the sixteen years of his

exile had forgotten the bare lineaments of comfort, and devoted his

days to advancing the interests of the Company, his nights, save when

sleep overcame him, to potations that would have buried an ordinary man

under Alaskan snows long since. But Baranhov had fourteen years more

of good service in him, and rescued the Company from insolvency again

and again, nor ever played into the hands of marauding foreigners; with

brain on fire he was shrewder than the soberest.

He listened with deep satisfaction to the Chamberlain's account of his

success with the Californians and his glowing pictures of the country,

nodding every few moments with emphatic approval. But as the story

finished his wonderful eyes were two bubbling springs of humor, and

Rezanov, who knew him well, recrossed his legs nervously.

"What is it?" he asked. "What have I done now? Remember that you have

been in this business for sixteen years, and I one--"

"How many measures of corn did you say you had brought, Excellency?"

"Two hundred and ninety-four," replied Rezanov proudly.

"A provision that exceeds my most sanguine hopes. The only thing that

mitigates my satisfaction is that there is not a mill in the settlement

to grind it."

Rezanov sprang to his feet with a violent exclamation, his face very

red. There was no one whose good opinion he valued as he did that of

this brilliant, dissipated, disinterested old genius; and he felt like

a schoolboy. But although he started for the door, he recovered

half-way, and reseating himself joined in the laughter of the little

man who was rocking back and forth on his bench, his weazened leg

clasped against his shrunken chest.

"How on earth was I to know all your domestic arrangements?" he said

testily. "God knows I found them limited enough last winter, but it

never occurred to me there was any mysterious process involved in

converting corn into meal. Is it quite useless, then?"

"Oh, no, we can boil or roast it. It will dispose of what teeth we

have left, but that will serve the good purpose of reminding us always

of your excellency's interest in our welfare."

Rezanov shrugged his shoulders. "Give the corn to the natives. It is

farinaceous at all events. And you can have nothing to say against the

flour I have brought, and the peas, beans, tallow, butter, barley,

salt, and salted meats--in all to the value of twenty-four thousand

Spanish dollars."

The Chief-Manager's head nodded with the vigor and rapidity of a

mechanical toy. "It is a God-send, a God-send. If you did no more

than that you would have earned our everlasting gratitude. It will

make us over, give us renewed courage in this cursed existence. Are

you not going to get me out of it?"

Rezanov shook his head with a smile. "Literally you are the whole

Company. As long as I live here you stay--although when I reach St.

Petersburg I shall see that you receive every possible reward and

honor."

Baranhov lifted his shoulders to his ears in quizzical resignation. "I

suppose it matters little where the last few years left me are spent,

and I can hang the medals on the walls to console me when I have

rheumatism, and shout my titles from the top of the fort when the

Kolosh are yelling at the barricades."

"You must make yourself more comfortable," said Rezanov emphatically.

"You are wrong to carry your honesty and enthusiasm to the point of

living like the promuschleniki. Take enough of their time to build you

a comfortable dwelling, and I will send you, on my own account, far

more substantial rewards than orders and titles. Build a big house,

for that matter. I shall be here more or less--when I am not in

California." And he told Baranhov of his proposed marriage with the

daughter of Don Jose Arguello.

The Chief-Manager listened to this confidence with an even livelier

satisfaction than to the list of the Juno's cargo.

"We shall have California yet!" he cried, his eyes snapping like live

coals under the black thatch of wig. "Absorption or the bayonet. It

matters little. Ten years from now and we shall have a line of

settlements as far south as San Diego. My plan was to feel my way down

the northern coast of California with a colony, which should buy a

tract of land from the natives and engage immediately in otter

hunting--somewhere between Cape Mendocino and Drake's Bay. The Spanish

have no settlements above San Francisco and are too weak to drive us

out. They would rage and bluster and do nothing. Then quietly push

forward, building forts and ships. But you have taken hold in the

grand manner and will accomplish in ten years what would have taken me

fifty. Marry this girl, use your advantage over the entire

family--whose influence I well know--and that great personal power with

which the Almighty has been so lavish, and you will have the whole

weakly garrisoned country under your foot before they know where they

are, and the Russian settlers pouring in. Spain cannot come to the

rescue while this devil Bonaparte is alive, and he is young, and like

yourself a favorite of destiny. Those damned Bostonians inherit the

grabbing instincts of the too paternal race they have just rejected,

but there are thousands of miles of desert between California and their

own western outposts, hundreds of savage tribes to exterminate. By the

time they are in a position to attempt the occupation of California we

shall be so securely entrenched they will either let us alone or send

troops that would be half dead by the time they reach us. As to ships,

we could soon build enough at Okhotsk and Petropaulovsky for our

purpose. For the matter of that, if your gifted tongue impressed the

Tsar with the riches of California there would always be war ships on

her coast." He leaned forward and caught the strong shoulders above

him in hands that looked like a tangle of baked nerves, and shook them

vigorously. "You are a great boy!" he said with a sort of quizzical

solemnity. "A great boy. This damned, God-forsaken, pestilential,

demoralizing, brutalizing factory for enriching a few with the very

life blood and vitals of thousands that will suffer and starve and

never be heard of" (all his language cannot be recorded), "will make

two or three reputations by the way. Mine will be one, although I'll

get nothing else. Shelikov is safe; but you will have a monument.

Well, God bless you. I grudge you nothing. Not even the happiness you

deserve and are bound to have--for when all is said and done, Rezanov,

you are a lucky dog, a lucky dog! Any man may see that, even when

these infernal snows have left him with but half an eye. To quarrel

with a destiny like yours would be as great a waste of time as to

protest that California is warm and fertile, while this infernal North

is like living in a refrigerator with the deluge to vary the monotony.

Now let us get drunk!"

But Rezanov laughingly extricated himself, and sending a message to

Davidov and Khostov to come to him immediately, walked toward the tent

he had ordered erected on the edge of the settlement; only the worst of

weather drove him indoors in these half-civilized communities.

As he was passing the chapel, followed again by the employees of the

Company, to whom he had granted a holiday, he suddenly found his hand

taken possession of, and looked up to see himself confronted by a

dissipated-looking person in plain clothes. His hand became so limp

that it was dropped as if it had put forth a sting, and he narrowed his

eyes and demanded with a bend of his mouth that brought the blood to

the face of the intruder:

"And who are you, may I ask?"

The man threw back his head defiantly. "I am Lieutenant Sookin of the

Imperial Navy of Russia," he said in a loud, defiant tone.

"And I am Chamberlain of the Russian Court and Commander of all

America," replied Rezanov coolly. "Now go to your quarters, dress

yourself in your uniform, and present your report to me an hour hence."

The officer, concentrating in his injected eyes all the lively hatred

and jealousy of his service for the Russian-American Company in this

region where it reigned supreme and cared no more for the Admiralty

than for some native chieftain covered with shells and warpaint, glared

at its plenipotentiary as if calling upon his deeper resources of

insolence; but the steady, contemptuous gaze of the man who had dealt

with his kind often and successfully overcame his sodden spirit, and he

turned sulkily and slouched off to his quarters to console himself with

more brandy. Rezanov shrugged his shoulders and went on to his tent.

There was no furniture in it as yet, and he was obliged to receive

Davidov and Khostov standing, but this he preferred. They followed him

almost immediately, apprehensive and nervous, and before speaking he

looked at them for a moment with his strong, penetrating gaze. He well

knew the power of his own personality, and that it was immeasurably

enhanced by the fact that of all with whom he had to do in these

benighted regions his will alone was never weakened by liquor. These

young men, clever, high-bred, with an honorable record not only in

Russia, but in England and America, looked upon a hilarious night as

the just reward of work well done by day. Brandy was debited to their

account by the "bucket" (a bucket being a trifle less than two

gallons), and they found little fault with life. But the profligacy

gave a commanding spirit like Rezanov's an advantage which they did not

under-estimate for a moment; and they alternately hated and worshiped

him.

"I think you have an inkling of what I am going to ask you to do." The

Chamberlain brought out the euphemism with the utmost suavity. "I have

made up my mind not to ignore the indignity to which Russia was

subjected last year by Japan, but to inflict upon it such punishment as

I find it in my power to compass. It was my intention to build a

flotilla here, but owing to the diseased condition and reduced numbers

of the employees, that was impossible, and I shall be obliged to

content myself with the Juno and the Avos, whose keel, as you know, was

laid in November, and is no doubt finished long since. These I shall

fit with armaments in Okhotsk. I shall place the enterprise I have

spoken of in your charge, sailing with you from Sitka five days hence.

From Okhotsk I desire that you proceed to the Japanese settlements in

the lower Kurile Islands, take possession of them and bring all stores

and as many of the inhabitants as the vessels will accommodate, to

Sitka, where Baranhov will see that they are comfortably established on

that large island in the harbor--which we shall call Japonsky--and

converted into good servants of the Company. The excuse for this

enterprise is that those islands were formally taken possession of by

Shelikov; and although abandoned later, the fact remains that the

Russian flag was the first to float over them. The stores captured may

not be worth much and the islands are of no particular use to us, but

it is wise that Japan should have a taste of Russian power; and the

consequences may be salutary in more ways than one. I hope you will do

me this great favor, for there is no one of your tried probity and

skill to whom I can trust so delicate an enterprise. I am doing it

wholly upon my own responsibility, for although I wrote tentatively to

the Tsar on this subject before I sailed for California, it is not yet

time for a reply. However, I take the consequences upon my own

shoulders. You shall not suffer in any way, for your orders are to

obey mine while you remain in these waters."

He paused a moment, and then suddenly smiled into the unresponsive

faces before him. He held out his hand and shook their limp ones

warmly.

"Let me thank you here for all your inestimable services in the past,

and particularly during our late hazardous voyages. Be sure that

whether you succeed in this enterprise or not, your rewards shall be no

less for what you have already done. I shall make it a personal matter

with the Tsar. You shall have promotion and a substantial increase in

pay, besides the orders and Imperial thanks you so richly deserve.

Lest anything happen to me on my homeward journey, I shall write to St.

Petersburg before I leave."

The lieutenants, overcome as ever when he chose to put forth his full

powers, assured him of their fidelity and, if with misgivings, vowed to

mete out vengeance to the Japanese. And although their misgivings were

not unfounded, and they paid a high price in suffering and

mortification, they accomplished their object and in due course

received the rewards the Chamberlain had promised them.

They did not retire, and Rezanov, noting their sudden hesitation and

embarrassment, felt an instant thrill of apprehension.

"What is it?" he demanded. "What has happened?"

"Life has moved slowly in Sitka during your absence, Excellency,"

replied Davidov. "There has been little work done on the Avos. It

will not be finished for a month or six weeks."

Then, had the young men been possessed by a not infrequent mood, they

would have glowed with a sense of just satisfaction. Rezanov felt

himself turn so white that he wheeled about and left the tent. A month

or six weeks! And the speed and safety of his journey across Siberia

depended upon his making the greater part of it before the heavy autumn

rains swelled the rivers and flooded the swamps. Winter or summer the

journey from Okhotsk to St. Petersburg might be made in four months;

with the wealth and influence at his command, possibly in less; but in

the deluge between he was liable to detentions lasting nearly as long

again, to say nothing of illness caused by inevitable exposure.

He stood staring at the palisades for many minutes. The separation

must be long enough, the dangers numerous enough if he started within

the week, but at least he had in a measure accustomed himself to the

idea of not seeing Concha again for "the best part of two years," and

the sanguineness of his temperament had led him to hope that the time

might be reduced to eighteen months. If he delayed too long, only by

means of an unprecedented run of good fortune would he reach St.

Petersburg but a month behind his calculations. And the chances were in

favor of four, or three at the best! Never since the morning that the

real nature of his feeling for Concha had declared itself had he

yearned toward her as at that moment; never since the dictum of what

she called their "tribunal" had he so rebelled against the long delay.

And yet he hesitated. To leave Japan unpunished for the senseless

humiliations to which it had subjected Russia in his person was not to

be thought of, and yet did he leave without seeing the Avos finished,

the two boats supplied with armaments at Okhotsk, and under way before

he started across Siberia, he knew it was doubtful if the expedition

took place before his return; in that case might never take place, for

these two young men might have drifted elsewhere, and he knew no one

else to whom he could entrust such a commission. In spite of their

idiosyncrasies he could rely upon them implicitly--up to a certain

point. That point involved keeping them in sight until exactly the

right moment and leaving nothing to their executive which could be

certainly accomplished by himself alone. Did he sail five days hence

on the Juno one of the officers would be exposed for an indeterminate

time to the temptations of Okhotsk, the ship, perhaps, at the mercy of

some sudden requirement of the Company. His authority was absolute

when enforced in person, but it was a proverb west of the Ural: "God

reigns and the Tsar is far away." If the Juno were wanted the manager

of Okhotsk would argue that two years was a period in which an ardent

servant of the Company would find many an excuse to justify its seizure.

And here in Sitka it was doubtful if the work on the Avos proceeded at

all. Baranhov was not in sympathy with the enterprise against the

Japanese, fearing the consequences to himself in the event of the

Tsar's disapproval, and resenting the impressment of the promuschleniki

into a service that deprived him of their legitimate work. Moreover,

although he loved Rezanov personally, he had enjoyed supreme power in

the wilderness too long not to chafe under even the temporary

assumption of authority by his high-handed superior. With the best of

intentions Davidov could make little headway against the passive

resistance of the Chief-Manager, and those intentions would be weakened

by the consolidations the Company so generously afforded.

The result was hardly open to doubt. If he left Sitka before the

completion of the Avos, Russia would go unavenged for the present. Or

himself? Rezanov, sanguine and imaginative as he was, even to the point

of creating premises to rhyme with ends, was very honest fundamentally.

He turned abruptly on his heel, and calling to the officers that he

would announce his decision on the morrow, ordered the sentry to open

the gate and passed out of the enclosure.

He crossed the clearing and entered the forest. The warlike tribes

themselves had trodden paths through the dense undergrowth of young

trees and ferns. Rezanov, despite Baranhov's warning, had tramped the

forest many times. It was the one thing that reconciled him to Sitka,

for there are few woods more beautiful. In spite or because of the

incessant rains, it is pervaded by a rich golden gloom, the result of

the constant rotting of the brown and yellow bark, not only of the

prostrate trees, but of the many killed by crowding and unable to seek

the earth with the natural instinct of death. And above, the green of

hemlock and spruce was perennially fresh and young, glistening and

fragrant. Here and there was a small clearing where the clans had

erected their ingenious and hideous totem poles, out of place in the

ancient beauty of the wood.

The ferns brushed his waist, the roar of the river came to his ears,

the forest had never looked more primeval, more wooing to a man

burdened with civilization, but Rezanov gave it less heed than usual,

although he had turned to it instinctively. He was occupied with a

question to which nature would turn an aloof disdainful ear. Was his

own wounded vanity at the root of his desire to humiliate Japan? Russia

was too powerful, too occupied, for the present at least, greatly to

care that her overtures and presents had been scorned. Upon her

ambassador had fallen the full brunt of that wearisome and incomparably

mortifying experience, and unfortunately the ambassador happened to be

one of the proudest and most autocratic men in her empire. No man of

Rezanov's caliber but accommodates that sort of personal vanity that

tenaciously resents a blow to the pride of which it is a part, to the

love of power it feeds. As well expect a lover without passion, a

state without corruption. Rezanov finally shrugged his shoulders and

admitted the impeachment, but at the same time he recognized that the

desire for vengeance still held, and that the tenacity of his nature, a

tenacity that had been no mean factor in the remodeling of himself from

a voluptuous young sprig of nobility into one of the most successful

business men and subjugator of other men that the Russian Empire could

show, was not likely to weaken when its very roots had been stiff with

purpose for fifteen months. Power had been Rezanov's ruling passion

for many years before he met Concha Arguello, and, although it might

mate very comfortably with love, it was not to be expected that it

would remain submerged beyond the first enthusiasm, nor even assume the

position of the "party of the second part." Rezanov was Rezanov. He

was also in that interval between youth and age when the brain rules if

it is ever to rule at all. That the ardor of his nature had awakened

refreshed after a long sleep was but just proved, as well as the

revival of his early ideals and capacity for genuine love; but the

complexities, the manifold interests and desires of the ego had been

growing and developing these many years; and no mere mortal that has

given up his life for a considerable period to the thirst for dominance

can ever, save in a brief exaltation, sacrifice it to anything so

normal as the demands of sex and spirit. For good or ill, the man who

has burned with ambition, exulted in the exercise of power, bitterly

resented the temporary victories of rivals and enemies, fought with all

the resources of brain and character against failure, is in a class

apart from humanity in the mass. Rezanov loved Concha Arguello to the

very depths of his soul, but he had lived beyond the time when even she

could engage successfully with the ruthless forces that had molded into

immutable shape the Rezanov she knew. Her place was second, and it is

probable that she would have loved him less had it been otherwise; she,

in spite of her fine intellect and strong will, being all woman, as he,

despite his depth of intuition, was all man. Equality is possible in

no relation or condition of life. When woman subjugates man the

conquered will enjoy a sense of revenge proportionate to the meanness

of his state.

It is possible that had Concha awaited Rezanov in St. Petersburg her

attraction would have focused his desires irresistibly; but his mind

had resigned itself to the prospect of separation for a definite

period, and while it had not relegated her image to the background, her

part in his life had been settled there among many future

possibilities, and all the foreground was crowded with the impatient

symbols of the intervening time. Moreover, he well knew that the savor

would be gone from his happiness with the woman were the taste of

another failure acrid in his mouth.

As he realized that the die was cast, the sanguineness of his

temperament rushed to do battle against apprehension and self-accusing.

After all, he was rarely balked of his way, accustomed to ride down

obstacles, to the amiable cooperation of fate. He could arrive in

Okhotsk late in September or early in October. Captain D'Wolf, who had

been detained at Sitka during his absence by the same indifference that

had operated against the completion of the Avos, would precede him and

order that all be in readiness at Okhotsk both for the ships and his

journey to Yakutsk. He could proceed at once; and, no doubt, with

twice the number or horses needed, would make the first and most

difficult stage of the journey in the usual time, and with no great

embarrassment from the rains. From Yakutsk to Irkutsk the greater part

of the travel was by water in any case, and after that the land was

flat for the most part and bridges were more numerous. The governor of

every town in Siberia would be his obsequious servant, the entire

resources of the country would be at his disposal. He was sound in

health again, as resistant against hardships as when he had sailed from

Kronstadt. And God knew, he thought with a sigh, his will and purpose

had never been stronger.