(Yah-�u Nahkts)
Chapter 5
The flame shone brightly, pushing back the approaching nightfall. Voloshin ran his fingers tiredly through his once pitch-black hair that was now shrouded with a thick web of silver. The captain�s log lay in front of him, the writing left off in the middle of a sentence. Forty-five years at sea � that was a long time for any man, too long. Ever since 1777, when, as an eighteen-year-old youth, he signed up as a sailor with a merchant ship, he had been crossing the seas and oceans everywhere from Saint Petersburg to Stockholm, from Riga to Hamburg. He had served Mother Russia, having lived through a change of three consecutive emperors, and had now seen the fourth one ascend the throne a little over a year ago. Catherine the Great, Paul I, Alexander I, and, now, Nicholas I.
Pyotr Aleksandrovitch sighed again. He would be 64 this year � a fitting age to hang up his captain�s hat and spend whatever years the Lord left for him in the companionship of his dear wife Anastasiya. Naturally, he would miss the Murometz. He had been its captain for over fifteen years, sailing back and forth between the island of Great Britain and the shores of Latvia. But now he had grown tired. He wanted to go home to his wife. Anastasiya � Nastya � Nastye�ka � that sweet, darling woman, still as beautiful as she was forty years ago when he first met her. Pyotr Aleksandrovitch shook his head wearily and closed his eyes.
Last night�s storm was pretty bad. They could not risk going out into the open sea in such weather. The Murometz had to wait it out in the port of London. Several hours of delay; nerve-wrecking, wearisome delay. Nastya would be so worried.
A knock on the door interrupted his uneasy thoughts. He jerked his head up. �Come in, come in.�
A short, ruddy sailor stepped timidly inside his cabin. �Forgive the interruption, Kaptein,� he said with a heavy Latvian accent, �but the boys have just sighted a lifeboat dead in the water.�
�A lifeboat?� Voloshin stood up sharply and walked to the door.
�J?, Kaptein.�
�Anyone inside?� he asked quickly, striding over to the lantern-lit board of the ship, where a group of sailors gathered, anxiously looking down at the darkened waters.
One of the men turned to face the captain, anxiety etched on his face. �We could make out two silhouettes, Pyotr Aleksandrovitch,� he said with due reverence to his commander�s rank and years. �But they do not appear to be moving.�
Voloshin glanced down at the lifeless object near their starboard, whose contours (let alone contents) were only barely distinguishable in the thickening twilight to his no longer sharp vision.
�Haul them in,� he said calmly and then watched as four of the sailors hurried to execute his order.
In a matter of minutes, the two mysterious occupants of the raft were laid out flat on the deck of the Murometz, and Vasiliy Loganov, the ship�s doctor, bent over them, checking for signs of life.
�Well?� Voloshin asked impatiently, after the doctor had finished his examination.
�They are both alive, Pyotr Aleksandrovitch,� Loganov said, getting back up on his feet. �The woman seems to have been exhausted, more than anything else. She is breathing normally, so the water must not have gotten inside her lungs. She should come to very soon.� Loganov paused, frowning slightly. �It is the man I am concerned about. There is a fresh wound right above his temple, and I do not know how serious it is.� He fell silent, letting the words sink in.
Voloshin nodded his understanding. �Take them both down to the infirmary,� he said firmly, and, while his order was being executed, he turned back to the ship�s doctor. �You will attend to them, Vasiliy Ivanovitch?�
This was more of a statement of fact than a question, but Loganov, nevertheless, nodded in affirmation. �Certainly, Captain.�
***
Even though he has turned the young couple over into the doctor�s care, Voloshin found that he could not stay far away from the infirmary � a small cabin, where the two victims of last night�s storm (as he rightly assumed them to be) were being nurtured back to life. He quietly stepped inside the cabin, and, seeing Loganov at the bedside of the young man, he approached the doctor and looked over his shoulder.
When Pyotr Aleksandrovitch first saw him on the deck, he was puzzled by the young man�s appearance. His clothes (or, rather, the poor remnants of them) looked nothing like what he had seen in Russia, Latvia, Sweden, or England. And the man�s complexion itself was different � darker than what he had been used to seeing around him.
Voloshin cocked his head slightly, staring intently at the young man�s face, trying to read its every trait. �A boy, he is just a boy,� he thought ruefully.
�How is he, doctor?� Voloshin asked cautiously, trying to keep his voice down. The old man treated the interior of the doctor�s office with almost as much reverence as that of the church.
Loganov turned to the captain, a look of disapproval on his face. The doctor did not like anyone present in his office (as he had pointed out numerous times) beside himself, the patients, and, occasionally, his assistant � a Latvian sailor named Matiss. Before the good doctor had a chance to quietly tongue-lash the captain for disobeying his �rules�, however, he was interrupted by a slight movement on the second bed. The doctor walked briskly across the room and sat down on the edge of the bed next to the young woman. Voloshin followed closely behind.
Loganov reached over to check her temperature, but, as he did so, her eyes flew open, and she cried out in fear, bolting up on her bed. The doctor pulled back involuntarily and then smiled, whispering words of comfort.
The look of utter bewilderment in her brown-green eyes told Vasiliy Ivanovitch that she understood nothing of what he was saying. In a gesture of helplessness, he turned to the captain, who, thanks to his countless dealings in the ports of at least five countries, was much more proficient in languages than himself.
Voloshin smiled lightly at the doctor�s predicament and ventured forth in the language he thought would most likely be understood � English.
�Do not be frightened, child. The doctor meant you no harm.�