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Americans were foreigners they had brought wheat to Sitka, and their plight
found sympathy among the people of the town. Baron Zinnovy was already
unpopular, and the fact that he had impounded the wheat had won him no
friends. The wheat would have been lost to them but for an unexpected show of
firmness by Count Rotcheff, who refused to permit the impounding and took the
matter out of Zinnovy s hands. Rudakof, straddling the fence on most issues,
met this one head on from necessity. Reluctantly, he backed up the Count, who
was, after all, in authority.
Rotcheff s words were repeated all over the settlement. I am afraid, Baron
Zinnovy, he had said sternly, you have exceeded your authority. Your mission
is to protect Russian trade and traders, not to enforce your arbitrary
decisions in matters of no concern to you. I must remind you, sir, to restrict
yourself to your duties and cease interfering with the civilian authorities.
Helena, who had been present, was suddenly bursting with pride for her
husband. The Baron had stood at attention, ramrod stiff, his eyes straight
forward, his body fairly trembling with repressed fury. He saluted, made an
abrupt about-face, and strode from the room, heels clicking on the hard floor.
Yet all knew it was but one battle in a campaign and the decision was not
yet. Helena realized that there was more to the search for the American ship
than the personal animosity Zinnovy bore for Jean LaBarge. If the Susquehanna
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could be captured with a cargo of furs Zinnovy could claim she had been
trading with the secret connivance of Rotcheff, and trading illegally. More
than ever she appreciated the danger of their position, for had Rudakof failed
to back up her husband, Zinnovy might have taken drastic action to free
himself from interference, and orders were of no importance if they could not
be enforced. Scarcely more than a child when she had married Count Rotcheff,
she had not been unhappy. He was thirty years older than she, but an
intelligent, attractive man, respected for his genuine ability and his
sometimes biting wit. She had grown up listening to talk of politics and
intrigue, a game at which her husband was a master.
A door closed behind her and she turned to greet her husband. I am glad you
are out of that stuffy office.
It is nice here. He inhaled deeply, then glanced at her. Do you believe
they will catch him?
No ... no, I don t.
Nor I. They walked a few steps together. He is clever, this American of
yours. Busch tells me he has friends all through the islands, and what Busch
has learned of LaBarge s dealings convince him that LaBarge is extremely
astute. Somewhere out among those dark, mysterious islands he might even now
be fighting, dying. The air was growing colder but she felt no desire to go in
... this was the same air that he was breathing; even now he might be
standing on his deck, watching the dark water slip past.
I like it here, she said suddenly.
Sitka? He was surprised.
I mean all of this, as it is now, young and free.
And barbaric.
Of course ... and I like even that.
There is something primitive in all women, I suspect. Women think in terms
of the basic. Love, marriage, children.
What better things to think of?
Of course. It is as it should be and lucky for us males, God knows. You are
coming in?
Soon.
He paused near the door, watching the dark serrated edge of the pine forest
against the night sky. Somewhere down in the town someone dropped a piece of
iron and it rang loudly on the pavement. He glanced at Helena, feeling his age
now in the growing chill of the evening. This bout with Zinnovy might be his
last. He must move shrewdly ... the man had influence, damn him! And he was
vindictive, which Rotcheff was not. It was a pity, he reflected, that the men
of good will are so poorly armed, for at times it was a handicap not to hate.
It took a fanatic to win, a fanatic believer or one utterly ruthless. He,
Rotcheff, thought too much of the other man s point of view, he could always
see both sides of an argument. That would not do in a world where there were
Zinnovys. Yet Zinnovy was a Russian and they talked loudest when they faced
weakness. We are basically, he thought, a race of tyrants and poets, and his
own fault was in being too much the poet, too little the tyrant. He looked
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again at Helena, standing by the stone parapet. In the world from which they
had come it would be considered an absurd thing, but he loved his wife. He had
not married for love. Helena was beautiful, she was wealthy, and her family
was powerful in his world of intrigue and politics. Theirs had been a marriage
of purpose. Yet he had been a lover once, and a successful one, with many
conquests behind him. He knew all the little things that please a woman. He
smiled thoughtfully. The best lovers were those who did not really love, for
if one became too emotional there was in the place of eloquence a stumbling
tongue, in the place of charm, awkwardness.
The surprise had been his. He found Helena, even though he was sure she did
not love him, a thoughtful, attentive, and considerate wife. Had he met her
twenty-five years before she might have loved him ... but then he could not
have afforded her!
Their life had been singularly happy, and if she did not love him she did
respect and admire him. These last years had been his happiest. He was not
sure when he fell in love with his wife; nonetheless, it had happened, and now [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
