White Harvest by Louis Charbonneau

Author:Louis Charbonneau [Charbonneau, Louis]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-936535-96-5
Publisher: Jabberwocky Literary Agency, Inc.
Published: 1994-06-11T16:00:00+00:00

FOURTEEN

Kathy McNeely woke to a total stillness, and felt a moment’s claustrophobic panic. Blood pounded in her ears. She was in some kind of an earthen hole, walls closing in on three sides of her. The cold was a physical force, like a fourth wall.

Awareness came in a rush. She remembered stumbling upon a cave late in the day. She remembered this little nook around a corner at the side of the cave, so neatly shaped it might have been dug with a shovel. She remembered the blanketing snow that had reduced visibility to an arm’s length, forcing her decision to stay the night in a bear’s den.

Most of all, she remembered the astonishing horde of ivory. She could see a portion of it now in the dimness at the back of the cave, assorted tusks stacked and piled against the earthen wall, forming a dense bulwark several feet high and nearly twenty feet long.

She rose, stiff with cold, and suddenly realized Survivor was nowhere in sight. To her right, around a jutting elbow of rock, the floor of the cave caught a spill of light flooding in from the opening. Kathy had been afraid the heavy snowfall might completely cover the cave’s mouth.

She heard a muffled sound. “Survivor?”

White powder filtered down into the cave, whirling in the shaft of light. Stepping forward, Kathy came in sight of the entrance to the den, which was almost at eye level.

A man crouched on the flat ledge at the opening, his bulk filling the hole. His brown face hinted at distant Mongolian ancestors. It was unsmiling, the black eyes that studied her unreadable. He had a swollen lip, and what looked like dark bruises on one cheek. She was jolted by the realization that he blocked the only way out of the cave. She was trapped.

Survivor’s big head appeared beside the Eskimo, who stared down at her. The husky looked happily into the man’s face, gave a tentative lick, and accepted a pat on the head.

Kathy felt immense relief. She trusted Survivor’s instinctive judgment of a stranger. He wasn’t frightened by a difference in color or speech or clothing.

“Who are you?” Kathy asked.

“I’m a human being.” An Eskimo did not readily identify himself by name to a stranger.

“I can see that,” Kathy answered dryly. “Is this your cave?”

“This is a bear’s cave,” the man said seriously. Then, after a pause, “You’re not a bear.”

“No, I’m a human being, too.”

The native nodded. “You are a hunter of ivory?”

“No, I… I watch birds. And study sea animals.”

He was silent a moment. She wasn’t sure if he found her answer perfectly reasonable or preposterous. He was a short, sturdily built man, round-faced, wearing a mixture of native fur garments and store clothing from the Outside. His hat was typical. It was a Seattle Mariners baseball cap with wolverine fur earflaps attached. His age was indeterminable—she would have guessed anywhere from forty to sixty. He did not appear threatening, but he had not moved away from the cave mouth.

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