Five small cabins fanned out behind the main log building, each with a matching red metal roof, shiny and wet from the rain. Even when viewed from over a thousand feet up, the lodge itself was impressive for such a remote location. It was built of peeled logs well over a foot in diameter with a gabled roof and a massive front porch that ran the entire length of the building. Four balconies jutted from the second floor of what the Russian guessed was the back of the building, leading him to believe there were at least four guest rooms upstairs. A wooden deck, complete with outdoor Jacuzzi, ran between the east end of the lodge and the bank of a small tributary that connected to the larger Kobuk River, two kilometers to the north. A long, slender building that Igoshin guessed was a workshop or garage separated the lodge from the runway.
There was no sign of anyone at the lodge, but they’d met another aircraft in the air a half hour before that was heading back toward Nome. Certainly this was the one that had brought Dr. Volodin and the Chukchi girl. They had strict instructions to capture the doctor or kill him and bring back some type of canisters that they were forbidden to open. Back in Nome, Orlov had pointed out that anything they were forbidden to open was likely worth a great deal of money — and all three men were considering their options as the babbling pilot slowed the aircraft on final approach.
A tall man wearing a green raincoat and a brown slouch hat stepped out of the shop building and walked through the drizzle toward the plane as it taxied onto the gravel apron at the end of the runway and stopped. A moment later an equally tall woman with her gray hair in long braids stepped out of the same building to join the man. The couple waved in unison.
“That’s Adam and Esther Henderson now,” the pilot said, peeling off his headset and hanging it over the yoke. “They’re usually not too busy this time of year, but I’ll wait around to make sure they have a cabin for you.”
“That would be most welcome,” Igoshin said. He spoke English but didn’t like the taste of it.
Igoshin pulled his rifle case from between the two back seats and climbed out the side door after the others.
Adam Henderson stepped up to shake everyone’s hand in turn. “I don’t remember when we’ve had so many people come in the same day without reservations,” he said. “We still have rooms in the main house. I’ve already winterized the cabins.”
“The main house is quite acceptable.” Igoshin brightened.
“I’ll go put on some more bacon,” Esther Henderson said, peering at the three men with narrow eyes. “You do eat bacon, don’t you?” She gave Igoshin a look that said if he didn’t eat bacon, he could get right back on the airplane.
“Bacon is also acceptable,” the Russian said looking around. The buildings seemed bunched much closer together now that he was on the ground and not a thousand feet up. “I assume our friends have arrived before us.”
“If you mean Kostya and his daughter, then yes, they have.” Henderson took off his hat and ran a hand through thick gray hair, nodding his head. “I was just calling them in for breakfast. They must have taken a walk downriver a ways because I can’t seem to locate them. We have a father and son dentist team here as well but they’re likely off fishing somewhere and won’t be back for breakfast.”
A stiff gust of wind carried in the sweet smell of wet willows and brought with it a stronger squall of rain. Esther looked at the pilot. “You can’t fly out in this. You may as well come in and have breakfast too.” She turned to make her way back to the lodge, seemingly oblivious to the rain.
Adam Henderson snugged down his hat and hunched the rain jacket up around his shoulders. “This should bring your friends back in a hurry.” He offered to help with the bags but didn’t argue when the men demurred, turning instead to scurry after his wife. Corey, the young pilot, trotted up beside Henderson, and the two men began to talk of the fat grayling and Arctic char in the nearby river.
Igoshin paused to let the two men get a few yards ahead, then leaned in so only Orlov and Gachev could hear him. “This fishermen father and son could be a problem,” he said. “Whatever the case, we will do nothing until we locate Volodin.”
Orlov raised a thick brow and stared back, as if letting the words seep in to his thick skull. “I see no sign of the doctor or the girl. This man says they have walked away.”
“They are here,” Igoshin said, nodding to the scrubby trees along the water and endless miles of tundra that stretched out beyond the woods. “There’s nowhere else for them to go.”
“And after we have Volodin?” Orlov said.
“Then—” Igoshin gave a benign smile. “Then we will kill them all.”
Chapter 20
The Cherokee Six, Lovita Air’s one and only plane, was set up to carry six passengers, two in the cockpit, two facing aft directly behind the cockpit, and two more facing those in a vis-à-vis configuration. The rear seats could easily be removed to allow space for more cargo through a small door on the left side of the airplane.
Quinn sat up front beside Lovita behind a second set of controls. He didn’t really care for small planes since they put his immediate destiny in the hands of someone else, but working in bush Alaska made flying a constant necessity. In any case, sitting next to Lovita was much more pleasant than being in the back with the spitfire Agent Beaudine, who, since the conversation with her boss, was engaged in what Jacques would have called one long hissy fit.
“No offense,” Beaudine’s voice came across the headset intercom. “Does it make you mad that they call this plane a Cherokee?”
Lovita shot a glance at Quinn. “It’s a great airplane. Fast, strong, nimble. Native name fits if you ask me.”
Beaudine nodded and sat back, lost again in her own world.
Quinn’s leg bounced in time to the Imagine Dragons song spilling out of Lovita’s green David Clark headset. Her orange hair bobbed back and forth as she mouthed the words to “I Bet My Life on You.” Quinn smiled. Mattie loved that song — and it suited all three of them perfectly.
Lovita had brought smoked salmon strips — Quinn’s favorite — and a plastic margarine tub of akutaq, also known as Eskimo ice cream. It was a blindingly sweet concoction made from whipped fat, sugar, and berries. Most people now made it with Crisco but Lovita preferred the more traditional ingredient of caribou fat. Tasting surprisingly like buttercream frosting, the rich stuff was the perfect survival food when the temperatures dipped. Beaudine turned up her nose at both treats, but Quinn had gone through a half-dozen salmon strips twenty minutes into the bumpy flight. Each strip was roughly the size of a fat fountain pen and dried to the consistency of soft jerky. A piece of silver gray skin ran up one side of the smoky, orange-brown flesh. The fish still contained plenty of its natural oil, and Quinn could feel the nutrients and energy flowing into his body with each greasy bite. Strips just like these had been carried into the backcountry by Eskimo and Athabaskan hunters for centuries. Some whites called the stuff squaw candy, but in Quinn’s experience, calling it that was a good way to earn a kick in the teeth from a Native female.
Unable to help himself, Quinn took another strip from the plastic bag between the seats and used his teeth to peel off the skin. He held the skin out to Lovita who popped it in her mouth the same way she’d done each of the earlier strips. She seemed to love the skin as much as the smoky meat — enough to make her spit out her punk ash tobacco — and chew on it like gum while she flew the plane.
As a start-up, Lovita Air had no access to the fancy navigational aids and avionics. Her console was made up of simple analog instruments that gave her measurements like oil pressure, altitude, and direction of travel. A handheld GPS attached to the dash with Velcro provided her with a moving map, but she generally navigated with a paper chart and compass, preferring traditional navigation as well as traditional food.