Chapter OneThe pain in Mikhail’s left side and the shock of what had just happened floated upon the sea of his confusion.
He could not walk upright and he could not see through the blood streaming across his face and flooding into his eyes. Without the help of his uncle, he would certainly be crawling on his hands and knees.
Without my uncle, I would be dead.
Ah, our carriage.
The coachman helped Mikhail into the coach, not asking what happened; a good thing. Neither Mikhail nor his uncle dared to answer that one.
Speaking to the coachman in Russian, his uncle said, “Take us to the waterfront with the utmost urgency.”
Mikhail winced, the pain of his uncle pushing him across the front bench of the enclosed carriage so he might sit close enough to examine him.
The heavy coach swayed from the weight of the coachman climbing up. The whip cracked in the crisp night air and the coach jolted forward, a painful flight.
Flight from what? Why?
Steel rimmed wheels hummed that high pitched song flying down the cobblestone road. Hooves from his uncle’s four horses thundered, charging fast, gaining distance from the wartime palace of Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaievich.
What had so angered the grand duke?
Ooh!
Every cobblestone in Vladivostok was speaking to the pain in his left side.
His uncle turned up the wick of the interior lantern and opened the sable coat he had presented to Mikhail earlier that same evening, January 6, 1855, Mikhail’s thirtieth birthday. By Eastern Orthodox tradition, it was also Christmas Eve, intended as an evening of celebration. It had become an evening of conflict, confusion and pain, an evening he would never forget.
Ha, if I live long enough for memories.
Mikhail’s uncle unbuttoned and spread his tunic, gasping then nodded toward the coachman above them, being cautious, speaking in English. “You need a doctor.”
Mikhail wiped tears, blood and sweat from his eyes and looked. His white blouse was saturated with bright red blood, a very bad sign.
His uncle moved to shout instructions to the coachman but Mikhail stopped him, pulling him back and looking into him. No, do not stop. “He will find us and kill us both.” Mikhail was certain of this. “I cut off his hand.”
“My God. Why?”
Mikhail left brow and upper cheek were still bleeding, is face hot where the grand duke’s sword had slashed him. Mikhail had reflexively drawn his sword to defend himself, disarming the grand duke, then, “He shot me and would shoot again.”
His uncle thought about this then shouted up to the coachman, speaking Russian. “Take us to the ChaWhay Docks.” He spoke quietly to Mikhail in English. “Silent Mistress is an American Yankee clipper. She will sail with the tide.” His uncle knew these tides. “It would have been better had you killed him. He will hunt you wherever you go. Did you . . .”
“He will survive.” Colonel Preslova had immediately applied a burning log to the grand duke’s blood spurting wrist. That would have sealed and sterilized the wound.
Nobody had been paying attention to Mikhail and his uncle. They could not have otherwise escaped.
The coach slowed, horses plodding onto wood, the waterfront docks of Vladivostok. The coach jerked upward and the pain in Mikhail’s side burned into his neck.
Major, the Count Mikhail Diebitsch-Zabalkansky remembered nothing after this.
That deep, dark place took him.
* * *
Huddled near the open ladder in the cargo hold where the air was fresh, Chiang SuLin and her father, Chiang Po, waited with nearly a hundred other Chinese for Silent Mistress to weigh anchor. They had all been anxious to be underway and the tide was finally running out. Pigs, goats, dogs and chickens, community food for the long voyage eastward to this new world called America left little room for all of these slaves to move about. Her and her father were the only two who had paid for passage.
She already missed their home down in Canton.
From somewhere off the ship, maybe a nearby sampan, a man shouted, “Captain Rawlings, I need some help here.” Someone else shouted from the deck above, “Look, it’s that Chancellor, that Igor fella.”
“Get a rope around that,” the gruff, unmistakable voice of the captain.
Chiang SuLin climbed the ladder high enough to see across the deck, something they had been told not to do without permission. Her curiosity was too strong.
Two crewmen helped a well dressed man climb aboard at the portside rail. Two others pulled a rope and raised another well dressed man, this one in a fur coat and cap. This one looked dead.
The first man to board turned back and helped untie the other, making sure he was well supported by crew members. He bent over, looked closely into the unconscious man’s face then turned to the captain. “When do you sail?” He spoke in English but he was Russian.
“We’re preparing to weigh anchor now.”
The Russian pulled a purse from his inside pocket and handed it to the captain. “This is my nephew, the Count Mikhail Diebitsch-Zabalkansky. This should more than pay for his passage.”
Captain Rawlings took the purse and felt its weight. “What’s wrong with him? Is he drunk?”
The Russian pulled the captain away from the other men and closer to the hold, speaking quietly. “He’s been shot. He needs a doctor.”
“Ours is still ashore or we’d already be gone. He smokes the oriental pipe.” The captain shook his head, disappointed. “I’ve waited till the last possible minute. We need to leave now or wait till morning.”
The Russian said, “You must leave immediately. The less you know, the better is it for you.” He raised a hand to the captain’s shoulder. “He is very important to me. Do for him the best you can.” These two were friends.
“There’s a Chinee below deck, calls himself a pharmacist.”
“This is Chinese doctor.” The Russian motioned to those holding up his nephew. “Hurry, we must carry him below.”
Chiang SuLin backed down the steps quickly, clearing a path for the captain, showing him where her father was sitting.
The captain said, “Clear away here.”
Two crewmen shoved and pulled Chinese slaves out of their places and laid the unconscious man on Chiang SuLin’s mat.
Her father did not speak English. She told him the man had been shot. Her father looked at the cut on the man’s face then opened his coat. Inside was very much blood. Speaking Mandarin, her father ordered one of the slaves to boil some water.
That man ignored him. He wanted to watch.
A woman picked up a clean pot and rushed up the ladder past the captain and his Russian friend.
The Australian sailor she did not like stood behind the captain. He had pressed into her when they boarded the day before, his eyes shifting about, looking for bad business. He looked at her now, licking his lips.
Turning up the ladder with the Russian, the captain shouted, “Mr. Preston, take us out.”
A voice from on deck shouted, “You heard the captain. Get the chancellor off and pull anchor. Watkins, get that steering jib up.” The Australian’s name was Watkins, rushing up the ladder past the Captain. The captain stepped back down. He wanted to watch.
Chiang Po told another woman to bring a bucket of clean seawater. She carried an empty bucket up the ladder and disappeared on deck. Chiang SuLin pulled out her father’s satchel and opened it, his store of powdered herbs, roots and antitoxins.
Her father selected a bottle of yellow powder and set it near the unconscious Russian’s face. The woman returned with a bucket of clean seawater and Chiang Po washed his hands, taking particular care with the very long fingernail on the fifth finger of his right hand. He rinsed a clean rag and dabbed blood from the Russian count’s eyes. He tore off a small piece of the rag, rinsed it, rung it out and dusted it with yellow powder. He closed the cut over the eye and turned the dusted rag over it, smoothing it into a plaster. This would keep the wound closed. She handed him one of the long bandages and her father wrapped the man’s head quickly, keeping the plaster tight, keeping the wound pressed shut. After three wraps, he made a long tear and tied the bandage to keep it in place.
Satisfied with the head wound, her father opened the man’s tunic wide and cleaned the area around a more serious looking wound, swollen purple around a small hole over his ribs, still bleeding bright red.
The captain pulled two lanterns from the ladder, handed them to nearby slaves and motioned for them to hold the light close to Chiang Po’s work. They both wanted to watch anyway.
Chiang Po motioned and the woman went for more fresh seawater, the other woman just coming down with the pot of steaming hot water.
Chiang Po stuck his long fingernail in, churning hot water with it, very clean now. He pressed around the outside of the wound with his left hand, squeezing near the hole, pushing out more blood. He pushed the skin away now, opening the hole wider, poking his long fingernail into the hole and probing. He pulled out a round metal ball and let it fall to the inside of the man’s tunic. He went back in, probing deeper, pulling out a small piece of fabric and a chip of bone. He rinsed both in seawater and studied them. The small piece of blood soaked fabric had once been white.
He washed the whole area with the boiled water, not steaming anymore, and placed a yellow plaster patch over the hole. The wrap around the man’s head was already dry, no more bleeding there.
Father is a very good pharmacist.
Some of the British officers down Canton way had preferred him over their own military doctors. Had the boxers not forced them to flee north, she and her father would still be living in comfort near the headquarters of the British colonials.
Chiang Po flooded the tunic with clean seawater and found the bullet hole. No fabric was missing. Good thing, it was the wrong color. He rinsed the white blouse and found the hole, missing fabric, a perfect match for the shard he’d just recovered. He smiled up at the captain, he may recover.
The captain nodded and grinned, relieved and grateful. He turned up the ladder and stood on deck. “Mr. Preston, get these main sails up. Set your course east, nor-east.”
Sails slapped, the clipper heeled and the wind pulled them toward the new land, a magical moment.
SuLin and two older women undressed the man, cleaned his body and wrapped him in a warm blanket.
Her father placed his ear to the man’s chest, listening, not happy.
This man was important to the captain. What would happen if he was already dead?
She could not see him breathing.
