The Impossible Journey (9 page)

We passed two small villages, but I thought in a town where everyone would be known, we would stand out. At last we came to a larger town. We washed well, combed our hair, and cleaned our clothes as best we could, and holding my breath, I took Georgi's hand. We made our way into the town searching for a store where I thought no questions
would be asked. We came upon an outdoor market where people appeared to have come from all around the countryside. Georgi and I mixed easily with the crowds. I spent precious kopecks on cheese, bread, and plump raspberries. We hurried away before anyone could ask questions. That evening we had a feast.

Twice we came to large rivers that flowed into the Yenisey. Each time we found a fisherman willing to ferry us across the river for a ruble. “The crossing of the river with this east wind will be hard work,” the first fisherman said. “Just see those clouds shaped like a blacksmith's anvil,” the second fisherman said. “A storm is on the way.”

The fishermen asked no questions of us. They knew that in Siberia everyone had secrets. Only the talk of weather was safe, for the weather had no secrets and was there for everyone to see.

Mosquitoes had been bothering us for days. Though we beat the air around us with a spray of leaves as we walked, our arms and legs were covered
with red bumps. On a morning when the air was so still that not a leaf or a blade of grass stirred, the mosquitoes suddenly fell upon us like a plague, biting us everywhere. If we talked, mosquitoes got in our mouths. If we breathed, we breathed in mosquitoes. All the running and slapping and covering of our heads didn't help. We were hurrying down the river path, flailing away with our arms, when Georgi called out, “Look, Marya, there are branches standing still in the river.”

While we tried to puzzle out why the branches didn't float with the current, three reindeer heads emerged, dripping water. The reindeer were standing in the river, their branched racks poking out.

For a moment, in the magic of seeing the reindeer, we forgot the mosquitoes. I had learned in school that hundreds of thousands of reindeer roamed the plains of Siberia. Some of them would be gathered together in herds by the Samoyeds. Others, like these, migrated across the land.

“Why are they in the river?” Georgi asked. “Are they fishing?”

I knew that reindeer grazed on mosses and lichen and did not eat fish. As we swatted away the mosquitoes, I suddenly realized what the reindeer were doing in the river. They were escaping the mosquitoes. Minutes later the reindeer lifted their heads to see us slip into the water. Silently they swam away. For a glorious half hour we were free of the mosquitoes. The next morning a wind blew the mosquitoes away.

Each day I broke off a bit of twig and put it carefully in my pocket. In that way I kept track of the days. Each evening Georgi would ask for the little pieces and we would count them off. We had twenty-five pieces, but the journey seemed much longer. Each evening Georgi begged, “Marya, turn out your pocket. There have to be more pieces.”

With the hundred miles we had gained in Old Savoff's boat, and allowing for days when it rained, I figured we must have traveled nearly five hundred miles, but that was not even halfway.

The river took care of us like a mother. Each day
it fed us fish. It washed us and washed our clothes. It gave us water when we were thirsty. Always it ran ahead of us to show us the way. On the days that the path wandered into the woods and we lost sight of the river, we were sad and troubled. It was like losing Mama all over again.

There were barges and steamboats and the boats of fishermen on the river. Often the river had surprises for us: a busy muskrat or a slinky mink swimming about, and strange, long-legged birds that stalked the shore for frogs. There were huge birds overhead, some with white heads and some with white bellies, that fished the river with their beaks and talons. Often, now, we saw reindeer. I thought how Old Savoff had talked of a roasted reindeer, but I did not see how we were to hunt one and I didn't think I could get one to lie down and be roasted.

I was frightened to discover that the buying of bread and cheese to eat with our fish, and paying for being ferried, had used up all our rubles but one. I
resolved not to spend that one, though Georgi begged me for bread, saying without it he would not eat another bite of fish.

“If I get a bone in my throat, Marya, we won't have any bread to get it down and I'll choke to death. Besides, you don't cook the fish enough, and they taste slimy and they smell.”

I felt exactly like Georgi about the fish, but I couldn't say so. Because Georgi liked to fish, and because he was hungry, I could still coax him to take a few bites, but it was hard to comfort Georgi when I was so discouraged myself.

It was a morning in July when Georgi said, “Marya, I won't take another step. You said we would see Mama, but we don't see anything but water and trees.”

For the thousandth time I took out the map, which was in shreds. Measuring from the last village we had passed, I saw the next village was miles away, much farther than I had thought. Even if we spent our last
ruble in that village on food, the food would be gone long before we were anywhere near Dudinka. At the rate we were going, we would walk into winter before we walked into Dudinka.

Always before, I had been able to persuade Georgi. Always before, I had believed in our journey, but Georgi was only saying out loud what I had been thinking for days. I could not see how we could walk hundreds of miles with no food other than bony, slimy, evil-smelling fish. Our shoes were nearly worn though—each morning I had to pack them with grass. Our clothes were ripped and worn. Our faces were burned from the sun and our arms and legs were covered with bites.

Though I thought and thought, I could see no way to keep going. It might be that I could push myself a little farther, but I could not push Georgi. Either we would lie down in the woods and die or we would have to go on to the next village and give ourselves up. If we were lucky, we would be sent to an orphanage.
If we were unlucky, we would end up in a prison camp.

“Georgi, if I let you rest here all day, will you walk to the next village? It's only two or three days away, and I promise we'll spend a whole ruble on food.” I did not tell him about the orphanage or the prison camp.

He gave me a suspicious look. “Tell me what food you'll buy, Marya.”

“Bread, cheese, raisins, milk, and cake.”

“Cake? You promise to buy cake?”

I nodded. If we were going to prison, why shouldn't we have cake first? They would certainly take away any money we had.

“All right,” Georgi said.

“But Georgi, we have to eat something until we can get to the village, so you must fish.”

I tied the line with its hook onto a branch while Georgi turned over a decaying log and pulled out a large bug with more legs than anything should need.

While Georgi fished, I stuffed my shoes with handfuls of grass. As I was putting them on, I heard a crashing noise, followed by shouts. Two men rushed out of the woods and grabbed Georgi. Before I could reach Georgi, a dozen more men, all Samoyeds like the first two, some perched high on the shoulders of reindeer, came thundering through the woods.

I grabbed Georgi and began a tug-of-war with the Samoyeds. “Let him go!” I shouted. Georgi's eyes were very wide. He was too startled to say a word.

While the men hung on to Georgi, gesturing and shouting angrily in a language I could not understand, a Samoyed jumped off of his reindeer and spoke to me in Russian.

“The boy is fishing in the shaman's own fishing place. It is a holy place, and no one but the shaman can fish there.” The other Samoyeds looked very angry, but the one who spoke to us only looked worried.

Still hanging on to Georgi, I pleaded with him. “Make them let go of my brother. We didn't know the
place belonged to your whatever-you-call-him. We'll go and fish someplace else.”

Georgi was crying. “I don't even like fish,” he sobbed. “He can have them all.”

The man said Samoyed words to the others, and they let go of Georgi, but still they appeared very angry. More Samoyeds climbed down from their reindeer and gathered around us, shouting and gesturing. They argued with the man who spoke Russian.

“What are they saying?” I asked.

“I have told them to let you go on your way, but they say the shaman must decide if you are to be punished.”

One man grabbed me, and another picked up Georgi and our knapsacks. Georgi and I struggled to get away, but the men only laughed at our efforts. In seconds we were lifted onto the backs of reindeer. A man sprang up behind each of us, and we went galloping through the woods.

I was well up on the shoulders of the reindeer. A
bridle was threaded around the animal's antlers, but there was no saddle. I was sure I was going to fall off the galloping beast. I half hoped I would. If I wasn't killed first, I might escape. But what if Georgi did not fall off at the same time? I would never see him again. With one hand I grasped the reindeer's shoulder; with the other I clung to the Samoyed.

We tore though the woods, bumping along and dodging trees while all the while the Samoyeds shouted to one another. Just when I thought all my insides had been jumbled together, I saw a meadow in the distance covered with tents and, beyond the tents, hundreds of reindeer herded together. Samoyed men, women, and children hurried to meet us.

The presence of the children, some of them Georgi's and my ages, made the Samoyeds less threatening. Their clothes were fashioned from hide and trimmed with rows of brightly colored embroidery. The women wore scarfs that covered their long black braids. Standing to one side, a little apart from the
rest of the tribe, was a very old man dressed in a long robe of hide painted with a picture of an eagle. The robe was decorated with strips and braids of hide, fringes, tassels, and little bells. On the man's head was a peaked hat with long fringes that hung down over his shoulders.

With much chattering, not a word of which we could make out, Georgi and I were pulled and pushed toward the old man. I was sure he was the man who would decide if we were to be punished. I didn't know how Samoyeds punished people, but I was sure I would not like it.

As Georgi and I stood before him holding hands, the man walked around us, poking us with his finger, exclaiming as if we were haunches of meat he was considering buying. At last he called out, “Edeiko,” and the man who spoke Russian ran over to us. Edeiko, for that must have been his name, spoke rapidly, pointing to us from time to time.

At last he turned to us. He was frowning. “The
shaman is very angry with you for fishing in his holy place. Because you are only children, he will let you go, but you must give him a gift to make up for what you have taken from him.”

“All we have is this,” I said. I put my hand in my pocket and slowly brought out my last ruble. We might have to starve, but at least we would be free.

Edeiko shook his head sadly. “Money would insult the shaman. What do you have in there?” He pointed to our knapsacks.

My heart sank. “Nothing,” I answered truthfully. “Only worn-out clothes and our blankets.” Having seen the splendidly decorated clothes worn by the Samoyeds, I was sure our rags would be even more insulting to the shaman than a ruble.

The shaman was already exploring the knapsacks, tossing our things out onto the ground, making noises that sounded like disgust. When he came to Georgi's globe, he paused. He carefully took up the globe, turning it this way and that so that the snow fell onto the
little cottage. He waited until the snow settled and then shook it again, uttering cries of delight. By now half the village had crowded around the shaman, and all were exclaiming over the globe.

“What are they saying?” I asked Edeiko.

“They say it is very great magic,” Edeiko said.

Hardly daring to breathe, I said, “Tell the shaman if he will give us some food and let us go, he can have the globe.” We would have our freedom and the ruble as well.

Georgi snatched his hand from mine. “That globe is mine, Marya. You have no right to give it away.” Before I could stop him, he ran toward the shaman and grabbed the globe. “It's mine! You can't have it!”

Everyone was silent. There were looks of horror on their faces at Georgi's behavior toward the shaman.

Desperately I turned to Edeiko. “Tell them he is only a little boy and doesn't know what he's doing.” But Georgi's fiery behavior must have convinced the
shaman that the globe was even more precious than he thought. The shaman spoke to Edeiko.

Edeiko turned to me and said, “The shaman will give you two reindeer for the globe.”

We might eat one of the reindeer and harness the other one, riding it to Dudinka, but I could not imagine myself butchering a huge beast whose meat would spoil in a day or two. And how were we to climb up on the back of a strange reindeer and make it go where we wanted?

“Georgi,” I pleaded, “you have to let them have the globe or they'll never let us go. I have a ruble. I can buy you another one.”

“I don't want another one. I want this one. Anyhow, I don't believe you. You said we were going to find Mama, and where is she?” He hugged the globe to his chest. “They can't have it.”

Though he could not understand Georgi's words, the shaman must have known what he meant, for he spoke angrily to Edeiko.

Edeiko gave us a regretful look. “The shaman will not steal the globe, for stealing is forbidden, but you and your brother must travel with us, and your brother must allow the shaman to have the little cottage in his hands from time to time.”

I was furious with Georgi and wondered if I might convince the shaman that the globe was really mine and that I would gladly give it to him, but seeing the way Georgi was clutching the globe to his chest, I knew I would not be believed. Even if I were, Georgi would never allow me to give the globe away.

In a hopeless voice I said, “Where is the tribe traveling to?” I saw us wandering forever in Siberia's endless emptiness, each day taking us farther from Mama.

“We are gathering our herds of reindeer. In the winter we travel south with them. As the weather warms, we herd them north to the mouth of the river and the tundra, where they graze on the mosses and the lichen, fattening up for the winter to come.”

All I heard was
the mouth of the river
.

Holding my breath, I asked, “Do you go by the town of Dudinka?”

“We don't go near cities, but we will be one or two days' journey from there.”

Trying to hide my excitement, I asked, “How long will the journey take?”

“Three or four weeks.”

“Can you travel so fast?”

“The reindeer carry us.”

I could not believe how lucky we were. In a little over three weeks, traveling with the Samoyeds and fed by them, we would be with Mama. I tried not to show my happiness and my relief. I wanted them to think we were doing them a favor by accompanying them instead of the other way around.

“Please tell the shaman we will go with you and he may have the globe in his hands whenever he pleases.”

Georgi began to protest.

“Listen to me, Georgi,” I said. “No one is going to
take the globe from you. The shaman only wants to play with it a bit. Mama always taught you to share your toys.” I bent over and whispered into his ear, “Georgi, they will take us to Mama in Dudinka, and we'll get there on the backs of the reindeer—no more walking.”

Georgi considered all that I had said. I could have shaken him, for I could see he was getting great pleasure from being the center of attention. He meant to enjoy the attention as long as he could. “Georgi.” I gave him a little push. At last he nodded. Reluctantly he handed the globe to the shaman.

I believe Edeiko was our friend, for he looked relieved. Quickly he said a few words to the shaman. The shaman nodded his head and gestured toward the Samoyed women. Immediately the women crowded around us, exclaiming over our shoes. Before we could stop them, they toppled us and pulled off our shoes, throwing them away with disgust. One of the women disappeared into a tent. When she came out,
she was carrying two pairs of boots like those the Samoyeds wore. Georgi was given a pair to put on. With much shaking of their heads and many scolding noises, they handed me a much taller pair. I had not realized how much I had grown, and the Samoyed women gave me the impression that they considered it unseemly in a woman to show so much of her legs.

The boots were made of the softest reindeer hide, with the fur scraped off. They were covered with embroidery done with brightly colored threads. Edeiko proudly explained that the soles of the boots were made from skins taken from beneath the hooves of the reindeer, so they would wear well. While I squirmed at the thought of the poor reindeer, the boots felt so light, I might have been walking on air.