As his body had begun to heal, Quinn added exercise to the chores — push-ups, pull-ups, skipping rope, and a run up Azachorok Mountain above the village at least once a day. After he was well enough, Perry sparred with him in a makeshift boxing ring in the family living room. The matches were good natured but fast paced. Ukka’s wife rooted for him, while his daughters cheered for Quinn. Invariably, at least one of the men got a bloody nose. At first, it had been Quinn, but as time progressed and he began to regain his legs and at least part of his reach, Ukka felt the sting of his gloves more and more.
Firearms and fighting were both perishable skills. Perry hand-loaded .45 ammo so they were able to practice shooting out at the dump a couple of times a week during all but the coldest days of winter. More than anything, the training helped Quinn’s mood.
Less than fifty meters out, Quinn eased back on the throttle, pointing farther upriver to let the current push him toward the crowd of milling boats that jockeyed for position at the fishery plant. Everyone on the beach at the present moment held a commercial permit. Their own fish, they’d take to fishing camps up and down the river, away from the village itself, where they’d cut, smoke, and dry it for the winter. Even now, the smell of burning alder from their smokehouses hung along the crumbling riverbank, mingling with the fog.
Closer now, he could see the round faces of the villagers, family groups working to offload their boats. Colorful kuspuks, the thigh-length hooded blouses favored by Eskimo women, peeked out from blood-smeared rain gear and fleece jackets. Some were dressed in rubber boots and gloves, while others wore soaked cotton hoodies and muddy tennis shoes. Many worked with bare hands, pinked by the frigid water. Wet and cold, they all smiled because the fishing was good.
The single wiper blade thwacked back and forth on the small windscreen atop the steering post of the open boat. The wiper did little to stay ahead of the rain and spindrift blown off the great river. Quinn peered over the top as he drew closer to land, scanning for threats as much as picking where to dock.
“I wouldn’t mind seein’ a fat seal out here,” James Perry said from the stern. Quinn glanced back to see the big Eskimo aim his spear at an imaginary target in the wake of the skiff. It was not unheard of for seals or even the occasional beluga whale to make the seventy-five-mile journey up the Yukon from the Bering Sea, as far as Mountain Village or even beyond.
At five feet long, the harpoon was relatively short, not nearly as heavy as the big ones used to catch bowhead whales. Yup’ik Eskimos rarely said they’d “shot” a moose or “killed” a whale — preferring to describe the act as “catching.” A length of half-inch steel rod was fixed into the business end with a polished brass barb that toggled at the point. The barb was sharpened to a razor’s edge and as big as a crooked thumb.
Ahead, eight other skiffs jockeyed for position along the muddy gravel, lining up for their turn at the wooden docks. Bowlines crossed. Aluminum gunnels banged into one another in a happy riot of mud, rain, and the beautiful catch of salmon — the lifeblood of the Yukon.
Beyond the thick stands of willows, the new airplane’s engine gunned as the pilot taxied to the parking apron. Ukka stepped to the steering console beside Quinn, passing him the harpoon as he grabbed the wheel. “Better let me take over,” he said. “People here like you, but they won’t be so quick to let us in if a gus-sak ’s drivin’ the boat.” His face darkened as he looked at Quinn, squinting over round cheeks. “You’re armed, right?”
“Of course.” Quinn let his elbow tap the Colt 1911 in the holster over his right kidney. As an agent with OSI, there had been very few times he didn’t have a sidearm. Lately, as a fugitive, those times were fewer still. Opposite the pistol, a Severance hung from a Kydex sheath on his left side. It was as much a tool as it was a weapon; Quinn found uses every day for the heavy seventeen-inch blade.
Ukka leaned around the windscreen of the steering pedestal to shout at his two daughters. Both in their teens, the girls sat on Yamaha ATVs halfway up the bank, waiting to accept the load of salmon. They were dressed in blue cotton hoodies that bore the “Strivers” mascot of their school. Their forest-green Hellys hung unbuttoned to vent the heat while they worked.
“You girls bring your Hondas down here closer to the boat,” the big Eskimo said, eyes darting back toward the airstrip. Quinn had learned early on that in the Alaska bush, all ATVs were “Hondas” no matter the brand, just like every soft drink was a “Coke” in the South.
“We’ll give the girls the fish,” Ukka said. “They can take care of getting them weighed and recorded while I go see what’s up.”
Quinn hated hiding in the shadows while someone else did his dirty work. But they had planned for this — going over and over the possibilities during the long winter nights in the Perry home while they listened to Molly Hatchet on Ukka’s vintage stereo system. Quinn had always known he couldn’t hide out forever — and in reality, had never planned to.
Up the bank, the girls gunned their engines and began to slosh their way down the steep gravel.
Quinn stowed the harpoon along the side rail of the skiff and took several deep breaths of the chilly air to clear his head. Logic said this new aircraft was likely nothing to worry about. Unscheduled planes had sometimes landed in Mountain Village over the course of the last five months. But his gut told him this was different. And if he’d learned anything in his thirty-seven years, it was to trust his gut.
His parking spot assured, Ukka passed control of the skiff back to Quinn and then hopped off the bow into the shallows by the bank. No sooner had his feet hit the gravel than the throaty burble of a boat prop in reverse caught Quinn’s attention. He turned to find a shiny new aluminum riverboat bearing down on them from upstream.
“Gussaks,” Ukka hissed. He gave the bow of his skiff a mighty shove, turning it outward, toward open water.
Three men crowded under a canvas cover peered out through a foggy windshield. Quinn could see at least one of them had a gun — and if one did, they all would.
Quinn kept the skiff at idle. Parallel to the bank now, it was still nearly beached. The hull crunched softly against the gravel bank, nudged by the waves.
The driver of the new boat appeared to be unaccustomed to maneuvering a boat at all, let alone working a river as large as the Yukon. He struggled in the strong current, constantly throwing the engine in and out of reverse in an attempt to bring it under control. Too far downriver on his first attempt, he gunned the motor and made a quick circle to try again.
On the banks, people stopped with fish in their hands to watch the debacle, grinning at the hapless driver’s problem of simply bringing the boat to shore.
He was finally able to bring it to heel in a small eddy of slower current thirty feet out. The swinging door in the center of the walk-through cabin swung open and a middle-aged man stepped to the bow. Baggy rubber knee boots covered half his khaki slacks. A tight, muscle-mapping turtleneck showed he spent a good deal of time in the gym. The skiff’s bow dipped in the water at the added forward weight and the man had to grab the brow of the canvas cover to steady himself. Dark eyes that had surely seen plenty of the world methodically scanned the crowd.