Judgment at Alcatraz by Dave Edlund (best historical fiction books of all time txt) 📗

she carried herself with confidence and handled the aircraft like a seasoned professional. With a chiseled jaw, pronounced cheekbones, and eyes that matched the blackest obsidian, Sacheen Crow Dog was from the Raven Clan of the Tlingit tribe. She had learned to fly a fixed-wing aircraft before she’d learned to drive.

The tribal elders taught the traditional ways in what seemed a doomed effort to preserve the clan’s heritage and culture, including the Tlingit language. Sacheen had benefited from the passing of knowledge, and like all First Nations people, she sought to live in harmony with Nature.

Her father was a fishing and hunting guide, and he eventually earned enough to buy a small Cessna bush plane. He taught her to fly—initially, fixed-wing aircraft. And later, helicopters. Sacheen worked for her father for thirteen years, before he died from bone cancer. It was during those guided outings that she was first exposed to life outside the limited world of her extended family and clan.

Her father’s customers were mostly well-heeled white men who came to the far north in search of adventure—or so they said. Without exception, they were arrogant men who did not appreciate Nature, and expected to be waited upon like royalty.

She and her father rose early every morning, and were the last to retire at the end of each long day. She cooked the meals, and cleaned up camp, while her father prepared the horses, guided the parties, field dressed the game they shot, and skinned out their trophies. All the while, the pompous rich white men would boast about their skills and accomplishments. At night, they’d drink whiskey until they were intoxicated, which amplified their rudeness and disrespect.

Although her father urged her to have patience with the ignorance of his clients, she soon tired of their behavior. Wasn’t their lack of knowledge that grated on her, but their unwillingness to admit their ignorance and to seek understanding and enlightenment. It was all too clear to her that the effort she and her father put forward for their clients was not appreciated. Regardless of how hard they worked to satisfy their patrons, it was never sufficient.

Unlike her father, who was one with the creatures that inhabited the untamed forest and wild rivers, the men who booked hunting and fishing trips knew next to nothing about the natural world. They did not understand or appreciate the moose and caribou they hunted, or the salmon they fished from the rivers. They saw the animals as merely objects to be taken and counted. And later, once the stories had lost their luster, the objects were to be forgotten.

Sacheen appreciated the gifts of Nature and all that Mother Earth offered to her people. Millenia ago, her people had learned to survive and thrive through the sacrifices of the sacred herbivores and omnivores that roamed the forests, and from the fish that swam the rivers and coastal bays. Each life that was taken had to serve a purpose—that is how the spirit was honored. To waste any part of the sacrifice was to dishonor the spirit, to devalue the life that had been taken.

Sadly, the white men neither shared, nor honored, her cultural heritage and values. They came to her ancestral lands with the singular goal of taking—not because of need to survive, but simply because they could.

Once the propeller on the nose of the Beaver came to a stop, Sacheen opened the cabin door. She pointed to the two sleds left by Natan and Duane.

“There’s your project,” she said. “We don’t have much time. Only a couple hours before the sun sets. I want to take off while we still have at least a sliver of daylight to see the length of the runway.”

“No problem,” said one of the men.

He was of average height and build, like the other two passengers. They all appeared unkept, as if they hadn’t shaved or washed their hair in days.

Sacheen had hired them from Dutch Harbor. They were commercial fishermen, but were lured by the promise of a big payoff for what she’d described as a few days’ work. All three men were flown on a commercial airline to Yellowknife, which is where she’d picked them up in the de Havilland Beaver.

They unloaded their tools and a portable generator, and set to work.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a contraption like this before,” Jerry said. “What is it?”

“A special type of generator,” Sacheen said. “They don’t make them anymore, and I’ve been hired by the government to decommission these two so they don’t rust and contaminate the land and water.”

She was satisfied with telling the men part of the truth, but they didn’t need to know everything.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. You didn’t say anything about toxic shit.”

“Just relax, Jerry. Your job is only to cut open the outer shell. Inside is a cannister about this big.” She used her hands to indicate the size. “It’s gray, about the color of pencil lead, and it contains the chemicals the government doesn’t want to corrode and leak out. According to the Ministry of Environment, there’s nothing to worry about. They just want me to turn in the cannisters.”

“You’re sure?”

“Look, if there was a health risk, do you think I’d be standing here next to those machines?”

Jerry held her gaze for a long moment.

“No, I guess not.” He faced his two colleagues. “Come on. Let’s get the generator fired up. Looks like the shell is steel, so that means we gotta use an abrasive blade on the angle grinder to cut through. Let’s make four cuts from top to bottom, then see if we can peel the sides away like an orange.”

One of the men said, “You mean, like a banana.”

Jerry rolled his eyes. “Whatever. Orange, banana—what difference does it make?”

The racket from three grinders’ spinning abrasive discs cutting through the steel drowned out the rumble from the portable generator. As the orange sparks flew, the men focused through clear plastic face shields, careful not to cut too deep. Fortunately, the outer