Northern Lights Trilogy (129 page)

L
earing off a chunk of jerky with his teeth, Kadachan leaned against a black pine. He ignored their collective grumbling as he observed the group of six men that James Walker had hired. It was unheard of, hiking through the mountains of Alaska in the dead of winter. Only doubling their salaries and promising them a portion of any gold strike kept them moving when most miners were holed up for the winter and didn’t come out again until May’s ice break. But they were almost at the claim.

They were a rough lot, but sturdy. James had chosen them well. And he had firmly stood behind Kadachan when he announced his requirements to them all. “You will obey this man’s orders as if he were me. If you do not, you will not collect on your pay. And if he doesn’t return with you come ice break, I’ll have all your heads.” The thought of obeying an Indian on a work site was so disagreeable to two that they had left, muttering under their breath about “filthy injuns.” But the rest had remained, willing to earn a buck through the winter rather than spend it on poker. Two of the men were Inuit, which helped Kadachan. He doubted that James had chosen them on a whim. As with most things, James knew exactly what he was doing. James Walker was a careful man.

Except when it came to Kaatje Janssen.

Kadachan agreed with James that Soren was not all he appeared to be. But he also knew that James’s love for the woman was bound to cloud his thinking, alter his perspective on things. Kadachan hoped, for James’s sake, that he was right—that Kaatje’s mine would produce a small fortune and drive the true Soren to the surface like a hungry salmon after a fly.

“It’s time to move again,” Kadachan stated, pushing his back off the tree. He began walking, not waiting for the others to follow.

“When you think we’ll get there?” called one of the miners, a shiver in his voice. It was cold in the wind coming off the river’s ice. The man was obviously feeling it too.

“Ten, eleven days.”

“If we’re not caught in a blizzard,” called another.

“If it begins to snow, we will build shelter. We have provisions.” Kadachan knew this land, these woods, the water. A change in weather did not frighten him.

“For the whole winter?” grumbled the fattest man, already huffing from the exertion of walking in snowshoes.

Kadachan paused and eyed the whole group. “It will be enough.”

Joseph Campbell had arrived in Saint Michael five days prior, exactly as Trent Storm had requested. It had been a long journey from the Montana Territory to Seattle and northward to Alaska, but it had been undertaken with impressive speed. Between rail and sea, travel these days was certainly efficient. He hoped he could accomplish this latest mission for Mr. Storm and return as speedily to his family.

It was always financially worthwhile, seeing to Mr. Storm’s requests. And gratifying. Why, who would have ever guessed that the woman he trailed through Montana and Washington would later become Mrs. Trent Storm? It made him feel as though he had a hand in the matchmaking. He hoped marriage would not make Trent less…fiscally
generous. Keeping a woman—and presumably a family at some point—in fashion and comfort took resources these days.

Donning his hat and raising the collar of his wool coat, he left the small hotel yet again, determined to follow up the latest lead in finding Soren Janssen’s castoff lover. A Catholic priest had approached him after services on Sunday and told him he had heard that Joseph sought information about a woman and child who had recently lived with a white man off the Yukon River.

“It is not an uncommon occurrence,” the priest had said, his English thick with a Russian accent. “There are many lonely white men who take Indian brides and then abandon them when they decide to return to the cities of their birth.”

“He never married this woman. And I believe she had a son.” He had gathered that much, if she was the right woman, from correspondence with others along the Yukon. He motioned toward his own head. “She is said to be tall for an Inuit. And beautiful. A princess once.”

The priest shook his head, his eyes conveying his sorrow. “It pains me to see such things.”

Joseph respectfully waited for the priest to go on.

“There is one woman that could match such a description. A nun here found her on the streets, her child almost frozen with the first snows. I believe the nun found her a job as a washerwoman a block west.” The town was only two blocks long by three short blocks wide; it would not be difficult to find it. In fact, Joseph remembered seeing the sign for washed shirts for five cents.

“I appreciate your help, Father,” Joseph said with a curt nod. “I shall be adding to the offering plate this Sunday.”

“That is not needed, but appreciated. What is needed is that you care for the lost, my son, and that woman sounds as if she is in need of help. Go with God.”

“Thank you, Father.” He departed and went back to the hotel. A finicky man, Joseph had few soiled shirts, but after a few minutes’ search, he found one that was reasonably dirty. He bent and rubbed
it along the face of his boot sole. Then he left again for the washerwoman’s place of business.

In five minutes, he was there. All around were shirts drying on lines. Four Indian women peeked at him from amongst them as they stood beside wooden tubs, scrubbing against washboards. “I have a shirt to be laundered,” he stated, still looking at the women. None of the four were what he would call striking. They stared at him through slitted eyes in wide, bland faces. A movement to his right caught his eye, and he realized there was yet another approaching him.

She was beautiful, worthy of her royal heritage, if she was indeed the woman he sought. Somewhere, some father was ready to kill Soren Janssen for stealing her away. “Shirt?” she asked. She quickly met his eyes and then looked away. Joseph knew then that he would never forget those obsidian orbs—they were filled with sorrow.

“Here. You see? It is soiled.”

She took it from him, and he noticed long, slender fingers with broad nails. He could tell that she wondered how a shirt could get dirt like that on it, and yet she said nothing.

“Does the name Soren Janssen mean anything to you?” Her quick glance cut him off. She knew Soren, all right. “Listen, I need some information. Some help. Can you take a short break?”

She shook her head. “No. I cannot leave my work. They will not pay me.”

“You can bet a pig’s nickel on a butcher’s table I won’t pay her.” A big man emerged from a back room, apparently drawn by the lull in the washerwomen’s chatter. Instantly all four women began scrubbing again. He neared the counter and snapped at the woman attending Joseph, “Get back to work! Or you can leave and never come back!”

“I beg your pardon,” Joseph began. “There’s been a misunderstanding. It was I who detained—”

“You here to get your shirt washed?”

“Yes, but—”

“We have your shirt?”

“Yes, but—”

“Your name?”

“I’m Joseph Campbell,” he said loudly. “I’m staying at the Hawk’s Eye Inn.”

“Very well, Joseph Campbell of the Hawk’s Eye Inn,” the man said with a smirk. “Your shirt will be ready tomorrow noon.” His eyes narrowed, and he leaned over the counter. “These girls are not for sale. But you can find your whore over on the next block. At least that’s what they tell me.”

Joseph stepped away, feeling defiled. There was no use explaining the situation to an idiot like that. He would wait and simply hope that the woman came to him with the information he sought. He walked outside and took a deep breath of the frigid air. “Alaska, Land of Opportunity,” he muttered under his breath. “Even the worst can make a living here.”

He was eating supper, just finishing a half-decent meal of roast beef and potatoes, when he caught a glimpse of her outside the window. She was looking in, as if searching for him. In a rough-and-tumble town like this, he decided he had better hurry. A beautiful woman like that wouldn’t be alone for long.

Joseph wiped his mouth with the cloth napkin and quickly laid it and a coin beside the tin plate. After a quick swig of coffee, he rushed outside. “Come, come in,” he invited. “Let us go to the hearth where you can get warm.”

“No,” she said, her eyes conveying real fear. He guessed that more than Soren Janssen had abused her. It had taken courage for her to come to him.

“Fine. Where shall we go? I want you to feel comfortable.”

Wounded and afraid, her eyes searched his. After a brief moment, she turned and walked away, apparently assuming he would follow. She led him to a row of shanties, behind the second block of ramshackle shops and houses—a pitiful line of tiny homes for those less fortunate
than the rest in town. Joseph swallowed hard and entered the dirty hovel, right behind her. It took his eyes a moment to adjust to the darkness. Shortly, a movement by the fire caught his attention, and he saw an old Indian woman holding a small child, perhaps a year old. A half-breed.

“You seek Soren Janssen,” said the woman.

He turned back to her and sat down on the dirty blanket at his feet. “Yes.”

“I was his companion for the last several years.”

“I see.” He waited for her to go on. When she didn’t, he said, “And then?”

“And then he left me here one night while I was asleep.” “You do not sound surprised.”

“It was his intention from the start. As soon as we heard at the fort that his wife was there, seeking him, offering a reward.”

“I see,” he said again. The wounds were deep in the tiny shack. The child moved but made no sound. What terrible thing had transpired that this child uttered no sound? He thought of his own rowdy, noisy boys back at home.

“He knew she had come into some money, which was the star he always sought.”

“You know English well,” Joseph said, momentarily distracted.

“I attended a school in Juneau for some years. My father knew the coming of white men would make a difference to our lands. My brothers and I all attended a Catholic boarding school there. My father … my father thought it would help. Instead….”

Joseph did not push her, feeling as if he were prying. “Tell me your name.”

“Natasha Dances by Moonlight.”

Joseph paused again, thinking on the combination of an obvious Russian name—probably bestowed upon her by some Orthodox nun—and the Indian sounding name given to her by her father. “Natasha.…” The name seemed so incongruent and wrong for her! “When did you arrive in Saint Michael?”

“Just as soon as Soren could get us down the river. He told me that he wasn’t leaving, but I knew. I knew from his eyes.”

“Your son… Is Soren the father?”

“Yes.”

He paused, measuring his words. “Natasha, I am prepared to pay you a large sum for the following information. I know this might be painful, and I do not wish you harm. But my employer is looking out for Kaatje Janssen, Soren’s wife. He fears that Soren is not all he claims to be.”

She snorted a laugh in response, the first semblance of humor he had seen in the woman. Then the smile left her face. “I have nothing. Anything you give me will be used to help my son.”

“I will give you enough money to purchase lumber and build a decent house. Enough money to begin your own laundry business and give your … employer some competition. You have already given me lots of information, but I need more. You said Soren never mentioned his wife until she came looking for him?”

“Yes. I had seen her picture, but he left it behind at the cabin. I thought it meant she was dead to his heart, too.”

He swallowed hard at her visible pain. “And it was the promise of a financial reward that caught his attention?”

“Yes. He said that if she had enough money to pay for guides and a reward, she had come into some money.”

“So he emerged again because he thought she was rich?”

“He told me that he would get his share and come back for me. I do not believe I will ever see him again.”

“Because you refuse to?”

“Because he will never come back. Soren is out to care for himself. He wants to do more, care for my son.” She paused and glanced at the child. “But eventually it always comes back to Soren.”

“One last thing.” He pressed his lips together, hating to cause her any more pain. “He told his wife that he saved you. That you were falsely accused by your tribe of … lying with a man out of wedlock.

That you were being beaten for it. That he took you away to save you. Is that true?”

Her eyes did not leave his. “I was with another man. It is true. But the man was Soren Janssen. And my father was so angry he threatened to take me home and beat me. But it was Soren Janssen that tore me from my tribe, from my…honor.” It was only at the last word that her gaze dropped. “Soren was betrothed to my sister, but he wanted me. I was a fool and went to him. I was weak. He never asked for my hand.”

Joseph rose. “You will have three hundred dollars waiting for you at the hotel desk tomorrow.” She gasped.

“It is good information that you gave me, Natasha. I want you to use the money to get back at Soren Janssen. To do what he could never do. Take care of yourself and your son. You will do so?”

“Yes. I will. I will do as you say. Build a home and another laundry. There is more than enough work, and it will be much better than working for.… I deeply appreciate it, Mr. Campbell.”