A Dream in Polar Fog

by Yuri Rytkheu

  This was the life of Enmyn in the winter of 1912 – 13. They lived calmly, without worry, knowing that the larders were filled with walrus meat and whale blubber. In the middle of a snowstorm, inside the pologs it was warm and light.

  One day, John came across his notepad in the little room, which he barely used anymore. Smiling, he read his old entries, took up a pencil and wrote:My dear diary! I haven’t seen you in a long while, and if I hadn’t accidentally found you, I would have forgotten you completely. What can I tell you? Not much. Life goes on, man breathes, loves, feeds, savors warmth in this realm of freezing cold and burning winds. A simple warm flame, the warm air inside a dwelling, they take on a value here that is unmatched in any other place on earth. A person is drawn toward heat as toward a celebration. And so, long live good warmth and good spirit!

  John put down the pencil and was lost in thought. Lately, he’d been worried about little Yako’s health. The boy looked drawn and thin, didn’t eat well. John ascribed it to the lack of fresh air; because of the blizzard, Yako was spending almost all of his time indoors. And today, the child had not left his bed, just lay there, moaning quietly from time to time.

  Pyl’mau, anxious, tempted the little boy with the choicest morsels, even took out some of the sugar she’d saved away, but Yako shook his head and kept his yellow-tinged eyes on the blue iris of the smoke-hole.

  Two days passed like this. On the third, Pyl’mau timidly asked her husband:

  “Let’s call Orvo, ask his advice.”

  “Yes, of course,” John immediately agreed, himself at a loss for what to do. He went to fetch the old man and told him about the boy’s illness.

  As though mindful of the humans’ misfortune, the wind died down toward evening and the sky cleared. When John came out to feed the dogs, the entire northern half of the sky was awash in the Northern Lights, and large stars trembled in the polar sky.

  Orvo came with some strange implements. The old man was taciturn and grave. He barely spoke to either John or Pyl’mau, addressing only the sick boy, encouraging him and asking after his health.

  Finished with the preparations, Orvo asked John and Pyl’mau to go outside to the chottagin.

  “What does he intend to do?” John whispered, straining to hear the sounds inside the polog.

  “Heal him,” Pyl’mau said hopefully. “Orvo is an enenyl’yn, you know. Only he doesn’t like it if people come to him over small things, like when they have a bellyache or something like that. He only tries healing if the person is in danger of dying.”

  So Orvo was also a shaman, on top everything else . . . John could only marvel at the man’s many facets. He was the head of the hunting club, the skilled carver of walrus tusk, the high judge, the one who remembered all the laws, the leader of the settlement, and now it turned out that he was also a healer . . .

  But it so happened that nobody elected or appointed Orvo to be these things, and he was not really Enmyn’s leader at all. It’s just that people respected him and valued his advice. And this too – almost all the inhabitants of Enmyn were some sort of relation of his, and in the scrambled genealogies that they had tried fruitlessly to elucidate for John, the old man held a place of honor, as the eldest and most experienced among them.

  A quiet singing was coming from inside the polog, accompanied by a rhythmic tapping on a drum. Orvo’s slightly hoarse voice was interspersed with an indistinct chanting, and no matter how hard John tried, he couldn’t make out the words.

  “What’s he saying?” he asked his wife.

  “I can’t understand any of it, either,” Pyl’mau answered. “He is speaking with the gods. It’s not for plain people to understand their speech . . .”

  The singing and drumming grew louder and louder. The words of the incantation rumbled across the chottagin, echoing off the walls. The voice of the enenyl’yn moved inside the polog, came into the chottagin through a ventilation hole, and rang out behind John, making him turn around. The human voice was suddenly being drowned out by shrill bird cries, the growl of strange beasts. A keen mimic was at work inside the polog, and were it not for the frightened and pious expression on Pyl’mau’s face, John would certainly have drawn back the curtain to get a glimpse of the old man’s exertions.

  “Pyl’mau!” The voice came from the yaranga’s smoke-hole, descending from the starry sky.

  “Toko!” Pyl’mau exclaimed, covering her face with a sleeve.

  John looked up, but there were only stars looking down at them through the hole. Strange! But Toko’s voice continued:

  “My longing for my son has taken root inside Yako. I know that I am causing you sorrow, but will you not have pity on my sufferings? Pyl’mau, my wife, where are you?”

  Pyl’mau was overcome with spiny terror. Her voice shook as she shouted up into the smoke-hole:

  “Toko! If it is you, then come to us!”

  “How can I join you, when you have buried me? No more breath and body have I got in this world . . . O, Yako, my only son, my beloved son! Only in you am I still living, but my longing consumes me, and I want to see you!”

  Pyl’mau thrashed about, hysterical. Inside the chottagin, the dogs started howling. The ghostly shimmer of the Northern Lights radiated over the yaranga’s smoke-hole.

  “O Yako, come to me!” howled Toko’s voice.

  John knew that all this was the product of Orvo’s uncanny skill, but even so, he too was covered in cold sweat. He remembered a book about primitive religions that he’d read in his student days, which described a shamanic trance. Some of the shamans had such hypnotic abilities that they were able to make crowds obey them; researchers fell sway under the illusions the shaman created. Orvo was being coy when he wouldn’t agree that he was a great shaman, and John now realized that Orvo’s shamanic talents were not least in the sway he held over the people of Enmyn. John had to concentrate all of his willpower not to fall under Orvo’s spell, and it cost him great effort to make himself approach the polog.

  With a lunge, John launched himself at the polog’s curtain-door and snatched it open. By the light of the dying oil lamp, Orvo lay prone on the leather-strewn floor, staring upwards with unmoving eyes. John bent over him.

  “Orvo? What’s with you?” He grabbed the old man’s wrist, feeling for a pulse. There was almost none.

  “Orvo! Orvo! What have you done here!” John cried, and rushed to the sick boy. He was stunned: Breathing steadily and easily, Yako was fast asleep.

  Orvo stirred and let out a pained sigh. John filled a ladle with cold water and pried open the old man’s tightly clenched teeth.

  “Is that you, Sson?” Orvo asked weakly.

  “It’s me. What a show you’ve put on! Lie still and rest now. I’m going to go see to Mau.”

  Weak from tears and shock, Pyl’mau made it over to the polog with John’s help. Her hands shook as she righted the lamp’s flame.

  Orvo sat up and gathered together his shaman’s tools.

  “The boy will get well,” he said in a practiced physician’s tone. “Don’t give him anything fatty, let him stick his head out into the chottagin and breathe the fresh air as much as possible . . . As for Toko, I’ve convinced him that the boy is happy here, and that Sson is like a real father to him. And I also told him not to bother you two anymore because you’re expecting a child. I’m tired now, and I must go home.”

  And it was true, the boy was quickly on the mend and John would not soon forget Orvo’s shamanic seance.

  At winter’s peak, when the red sliver of the sun was beginning to appear over the horizon, the little boy started venturing out of the yaranga again. One day he ran into the chottagin and shouted:

  “A sled coming in from the west!”

  At that time they were not expecting any guests from that direction. It was midwinter. Hard days, when they had to go far from the shore for nerpa. And the day itself so short, not a lot of daylight to be had – no sooner does it dawn than the sky darkens again and the shadows
thrown by the shoreline crags creep up over the ice hummocks and the tundra.

  John went outside and joined the other men, gathered by the outermost yaranga. Orvo’s binoculars passed from hand to hand. Each man was trying to guess who the visitors might be.

  “Not just one, but two sleds!” Armol’ informed them, lowering the binoculars.

  “Who could it be?” Orvo mused. He brought the binoculars to his eyes and studied the sleds for a long while. “Going slow . . . From afar. They’ve got a heavy load. A white man sitting on one of the sleds, that’s for sure. Wearing far too many clothes. Look!” and he thrust the binoculars at John.

  There were two sleds. They were indeed traveling slowly, but even trying hard John could not distinguish the white man, and returned the binoculars to Orvo.

  “A white man on the way, right?” Orvo asked.

  “Maybe,” John said evasively. “I couldn’t make him out.”

  “If it’s a white man, then it’s definitely a visitor for you, Sson,” said Armol’. “Could be tidings from your homeland.”

  Meanwhile the sleds had come so near that their passengers could be distinguished by the naked eye.

  “An important guest coming,” Orvo concluded, and told John:

  “Tell your wife to put on a big kettle.”

  The sleds wended their way toward the outermost yaranga. A thoroughly fur-swaddled man sprang lightly from the second dogsled and headed for John.

  “Hello, John!” he shouted as he approached. “Don’t you recognize me?”

  The guest threw back his wolverine fur-lined hood and John immediately recognised Carpenter’s balding head.

  “Mr. Carpenter! Where could you be going to in such a season?”

  “To pay you a visit, dear John! To see you!” said Carpenter, shaking hands first with John, and then with the rest.

  “Kakomei, Poppi!” the hunters were saying to him. “Yetti!”

  “Ee-ee!”32 Carpenter answered with a smile, patting the men he knew on the shoulder and looking into their faces, greeting each by name. It seemed that a long-awaited guest had arrived at Enmyn, a guest everyone was pleased to see.

  Truth be told, that’s how it was: Carpenter hadn’t come with empty sleds, and the people of Enmyn had enough to trade with the American.

  “Sson,” Orvo said, “go and welcome your guest, and we’ll take care of all the others.”

  Carpenter gave orders for the goods to be unpacked and brought to John’s yaranga.

  “You must excuse me,” John was mortified. “It’s just that I really wasn’t expecting anyone. Prepare yourself for an ordinary Chukcha yaranga. I haven’t got any of the comforts of your own cozy home in Keniskun, least of all a bath . . .”

  “No need to stand on ceremony!” Carpenter broke in. “I’m delighted to find you in good health and spirits. I see that your Arctic residency and simple life among the natives is doing you good.”

  On entering the chottagin, Carpenter shot John a reproachful look:

  “You really are a modest one! You’ve turned this yaranga into a dream, and in such a short while, too. Forgive me, but for a man without hands this is rather a feat!”

  “Oh but I had the help of many here, Mr. Carpenter! The captain of the hydrographic vessel, the Enmyn people, and, above all, my wife . . .”

  Pyl’mau walked out from the polog and into the chottagin. She had had time to comb her hair and slip on a new bright kamleika, an American silver dollar hanging around her neck from a thin deer-tendon lace.

  “Allow me to introduce my wife, Pyl’mau,” John said.

  “A pleasure!” Carpenter exclaimed. “Robert Carpenter, Bobby to my friends, or even more plainly, Poppi, as the Chukchi and Eskimo call me!”

  The visitor wanted to have a closer look at the yaranga’s interior, and finding himself in John’s little nook, he couldn’t conceal his admiration:

  “You’ve set yourself up in style, it’s like the Prince Albert Hotel in here!”

  While Pyl’mau was busy preparing the feast, Carpenter suggested they have a drink together. Digging in his voluminous luggage, he extracted something resembling a traveling bar, which anticipated every need – from an elegant corkscrew to a set of silver shotglasses.

  “To your health!”

  Making sure that John emptied his glass, Carpenter moved closer to his companion and began a somewhat flowery speech:

  “My visit here, dear John, was motivated by my feelings of friendship for you and also by my business concerns. Don’t think that you live apart from the rest of the world. Even in these parts, where human settlements are divided by enormous distances and where there is neither post nor telegraph, still there exist invisible and at times incomprehensible channels that direct information to the right address. In this case I mean your unprecedented fortune – the whale, and the excellent fox trapping. I even know certain details,” Carpenter giggled and gave John a conspiratorial wink. “It was you who found the whale, and I cannot deny myself the pleasure of congratulating you on such an unheard of piece of luck! I say we drink to that and leave our chat about the whale until tomorrow. As for today, I’d like to distribute a few gifts to the people of your Enmyn. Will you allow me to use your chottagin for that purpose?”

  “Of course,” John answered affably.

  Pyl’mau served them boiled deer tongues, jellied seal flippers, and a thick nerpa meat soup.

  Carpenter ate heartily and praised the dishes.

  “You manage without salt?” he asked John.

  “It happened somehow that I quickly got used to unsalted food,” John replied. “At this point, I don’t feel a yen for it at all. When I had lunch with the captain of the Vaigach, everything I ate there seemed to me to be terribly oversalted.”

  “Oh, I feel for you,” Carpenter nodded his head, “I also suffer when circumstances demand I switch to European cuisine.”

  Pyl’mau cleared the table and sent Yako to spread the news that the visitor wanted to hand out gifts.

  Carpenter set to unpacking his bags.

  Upon a tarpaulin, he laid pieces of brick tea, sugar, two-pound bags of flour, bricks of chewing tobacco, tobacco for smoking, brightly painted hard candy, lengths of cloth, beads, colored paper thread . . .

  Pyl’mau’s eyes watered from such an abundance of goods, and she stared open-mouthed at the wares on display. John had to remind her to go about her business, quietly, so that their guest wouldn’t hear.

  The closest neighbors were the first to arrive. Carpenter greeted them kindly. He handed a bag of flour, some tea and tobacco to the head of the family. The wife received a handful of beads and colored thread. Carpenter had exactly enough gift packets for every family in Enmyn. Not a single person was left out. Carpenter remembered not only who preferred what tobacco, but also who needeed beads and what kind.

  To Orvo, Armol’, and Tiarat he announced:

  “For you, I’ve brought something special. If you’ll be as kind as to wait until I’ve finished with the other gifts.”

  The men sat down by a low table and began the tea drinking.

  Orvo was wondering anxiously whether John would help them to trade with Carpenter, or stand aside. John’s face was difficult to read. He remained silent, sipping his strong tea, also watching Carpenter’s movements.

  Finally the last fortunate, overjoyed with his free gifts, departed. Only John, Carpenter, Orvo, Armol’, and Tiarat remained inside the chottagin. Pyl’mau brewed some fresh tea and filled their cups.

  “Before the tea, we’ll have some of the bad joy-making water,” the trader announced solemnly, and he took out the bottle. “I know Orvo is fond of this beverage.”

  After a drink, Carpenter handed out the personal gifts. Orvo got a pipe with pipe tobacco, plus a length of cloth for a kamleika. The others also received some cloth, and there was a bag of flour and of sugar for each. These were generous gifts.

  “Now, let’s get to the business talk,” said Carpenter. He moved the c
ups aside and laid a thick and greasy leather-covered notebook on the table. “I know that your settlement has got ten twenties and fourteen white-fox tails. Beside this, eight twenties of red fox, not counting the rabbits and wolverines. I’m prepared to take all that fur immediately and give a partial payment with the goods I’ve brought. The rest you can order from me, and I’ll note everything down here,” Carpenter slapped the notebook, “then I’ll drive it over in midsummer, when the American ship arrives. Right now I’ve got flour with me, tea, sugar, tobacco, sugar, cartridges and two 60x60 Winchesters. This way, you won’t have to wait for summer. The goods have traveled to you,” Carpenter shut the notebook and grinned broadly.

  Armol’, Orvo, and Tiarat looked at John.

  “What do you say?” Orvo addressed him.

  “It’s hard for me to advise anything,” John mumbled. “It’s the first time I’ve been at such a trade, I’m not familiar with the prices . . .”

  “Prices are the usual ones,” Carpenter put in, “allowing, of course, for transport costs.”

  “We need many things,” Orvo said, thinking. “So we will need to talk amongst ourselves, first.”

  “Fine,” Carpenter assented. “Have a talk. But I must warn you, I haven’t much time, and the day after tomorrow I intend to set out for Keniskun.”

  “We’ll think about it for tomorrow,” Orvo promised.

  “And take this with you, so your noggins work better,” Carpenter held the unfinished vodka bottle out to Orvo.

  “Velynkykun!” the old man thanked him courteously and tucked the bottle in his waistband. All three rose and walked out together. Carpenter shook his head and gave John a suspicious look.

  “They’ve gotten finicky all of a sudden . . . Could that be your doing?”

  “I have no influence here,” John answered him. “Although it is my great hope that they will come to a sensible decision.”

  “What do you mean?” Carpenter pricked up.