Russian Amerika Read Online Free PDF Page A

she is going to leave me for another man."

    "Oh."

    Grisha made a show of checking his charts. He glanced at his watch and immediately powered up the radio.

    ". . . move across the Alexandr Archipelago by nightfall. Thirty-knot winds increasing to forty to fifty knots by morning. Seas two to three meters. For the outside waters, Dixon Entrance to Christian Sound, smallcraft warning. Seas two to four meters. West winds forty knots increasing to fifty-five by morning-"

    Grisha snapped off the radio and peered at the horizon. A dark line rapidly moved out of the west, staining the abnormal blue sky back to familiar tones.

    "We're in for some rough weather," he said.

    Her eyes widened. "Are we in any danger?"

    He tried to laugh, but even to him it sounded more like a bark.

    "One is always in danger in Russian Amerika, one way or another."

    "Is this one of your pithy Native American sayings?"

    "It's truth, like my boat."

    "How can a boat be truth?" she asked with more than a hint of angry sarcasm.

    "How can it be a lie?"

    Karpov emerged from the cabin, vodka bottle in hand. "I'm hungry."

    A gust of cold wind heeled the boat over to starboard. The temperature dropped ten degrees in as many seconds.

    Karpov braced himself and stared out at the rapidly advancing weather.
    "Storm?" he said in a small voice.

    Grisha started to smile at their discomfort but stopped himself. It would not do to laugh at the wind.

    " Da ," he said.

    Karpov hastily drank from the bottle. He peered at Valari.

    "You will go below with me, now."

    She scowled back. "In the Amerikas they have the perfect expression for someone like you. Would you like to know it?"

    Karpov quietly stared at her, eyes hidden in wrinkled folds of skin.

    "Go fuck yourself, is what they say. I think you should do that now."

    With surprising speed he lunged forward and slapped her open-handed. Her head smacked against the bulkhead with a solid thunk and she emitted a startled yell.

    "Hey!" Grisha shouted. "What do you think you're doing?"

    Karpov turned to face him. His English had gained polish. "This is none of your concern, Captain Grigorievich. You are being well paid. You will drive the boat and mind your own business."

    Grisha clenched his teeth and said nothing. Karpov gathered Valari in one arm and hauled her down the companionway as if she were a sack of oats.

    Then the storm caught them and Karpov started his last fight.

    3

    Tolstoi Bay, Prince of Wales Island

    Pravda danced and jerked on the anchor line. The small cove on Prince of Wales Island sheltered them from the brunt of the storm. Grisha took a firm grasp under Karpov's shoulders.

    "Ready?"

    Valari nodded sharply.

    "Hup!"

    They swung the stiffing body off the deck and up onto the gunwale at the stern, balancing it carefully. The memory of butchering hogs flashed through his mind.

    "Okay, I'll hold him, put the box on his chest."

    She bent over and grabbed the box tied to the corpse with a short line, sat it in the middle of Karpov's chest.

    "Push!" Grisha ordered.

    The body splashed into the water and, spinning in a slow circle behind the heavy box of weapons, sank rapidly out of sight.

    Numb lassitude spread over him, and he relaxed for the first time in three days. Suddenly Valari pressed against him, her hands moving over his face, chest, groin.

    "I need you," she said. "Right now."

    With a tired smile he pulled her into the cabin.

    The bright sky held no wind when he woke. For a long moment he lay in the bunk beside the woman and collected his thoughts. He tried to figure out how he could have changed the outcome.

    This charter was set up by the government, even he knew that. Would the Okhana believe their concocted story about the loss of one of their agents?

    "What's the matter, Captain Lover?"

    Grisha turned his head and looked at her. The now-familiar mouth smiled, lips parted slightly as if anticipating a kiss. But Valari's eyes held a hardness unaffected through