Michael Strogoff; Or, The Courier of the Czar

  CHAPTER X A STORM IN THE URAL MOUNTAINS

  THE Ural Mountains extend in a length of over two thousand miles betweenEurope and Asia. Whether they are called the Urals, which is the Tartar,or the Poyas, which is the Russian name, they are correctly so termed;for these names signify "belt" in both languages. Rising on the shoresof the Arctic Sea, they reach the borders of the Caspian. This was thebarrier to be crossed by Michael Strogoff before he could enter SiberianRussia. The mountains could be crossed in one night, if no accidenthappened. Unfortunately, thunder muttering in the distance announcedthat a storm was at hand. The electric tension was such that it couldnot be dispersed without a tremendous explosion, which in the peculiarstate of the atmosphere would be very terrible.

  Michael took care that his young companion should be as well protectedas possible. The hood, which might have been easily blown away, wasfastened more securely with ropes, crossed above and at the back. Thetraces were doubled, and, as an additional precaution, the nave-boxeswere stuffed with straw, as much to increase the strength of the wheelsas to lessen the jolting, unavoidable on a dark night. Lastly, thefore and hinder parts, connected simply by the axles to the body of thetarantass, were joined one to the other by a crossbar, fixed by means ofpins and screws.

  Nadia resumed her place in the cart, and Michael took his seat besideher. Before the lowered hood hung two leathern curtains, which would insome degree protect the travelers against the wind and rain. Two greatlanterns, suspended from the iemschik's seat, threw a pale glimmerscarcely sufficient to light the way, but serving as warning lights toprevent any other carriage from running into them.

  It was well that all these precautions were taken, in expectation of arough night. The road led them up towards dense masses of clouds, andshould the clouds not soon resolve into rain, the fog would be such thatthe tarantass would be unable to advance without danger of falling oversome precipice.

  The Ural chain does not attain any very great height, the highest summitnot being more than five thousand feet. Eternal snow is there unknown,and what is piled up by the Siberian winter is soon melted by the summersun. Shrubs and trees grow to a considerable height. The iron and coppermines, as well as those of precious stones, draw a considerable numberof workmen to that region. Also, those villages termed "gavody" arethere met with pretty frequently, and the road through the great passesis easily practicable for post-carriages.

  But what is easy enough in fine weather and broad daylight, offersdifficulties and perils when the elements are engaged in fierce warfare,and the traveler is in the midst of it. Michael Strogoff knew fromformer experience what a storm in the mountains was, and perhaps thiswould be as terrible as the snowstorms which burst forth with suchvehemence in the winter.

  Rain was not yet falling, so Michael raised the leathern curtains whichprotected the interior of the tarantass and looked out, watchingthe sides of the road, peopled with fantastic shadows, caused by thewavering light of the lanterns. Nadia, motionless, her arms folded,gazed forth also, though without leaning forward, whilst her companion,his body half out of the carriage, examined both sky and earth.

  The calmness of the atmosphere was very threatening, the air beingperfectly still. It was just as if Nature were half stifled, and couldno longer breathe; her lungs, that is to say those gloomy, dense clouds,not being able to perform their functions. The silence would have beencomplete but for the grindings of the wheels of the tarantass over theroad, the creaking of the axles, the snorting of the horses, and theclattering of their iron hoofs among the pebbles, sparks flying out onevery side.

  The road was perfectly deserted. The tarantass encountered neitherpedestrians nor horsemen, nor a vehicle of any description, in thenarrow defiles of the Ural, on this threatening night. Not even thefire of a charcoal-burner was visible in the woods, not an encampment ofminers near the mines, not a hut among the brushwood.

  Under these peculiar circumstances it might have been allowable topostpone the journey till the morning. Michael Strogoff, however, hadnot hesitated, he had no right to stop, but then--and it began to causehim some anxiety--what possible reason could those travelers in thetelga ahead have for being so imprudent?

  Michael remained thus on the look-out for some time. About eleveno'clock lightning began to blaze continuously in the sky. The shadows ofhuge pines appeared and disappeared in the rapid light. Sometimes whenthe tarantass neared the side of the road, deep gulfs, lit up by theflashes, could be seen yawning beneath them. From time to time, ontheir vehicle giving a worse lurch than usual, they knew that they werecrossing a bridge of roughly-hewn planks thrown over some chasm, thunderappearing actually to be rumbling below them. Besides this, a boomingsound filled the air, which increased as they mounted higher. With thesedifferent noises rose the shouts of the iemschik, sometimes scolding,sometimes coaxing his poor beasts, who were suffering more from theoppression of the air than the roughness of the roads. Even the bells onthe shafts could no longer rouse them, and they stumbled every instant.

  "At what time shall we reach the top of the ridge?" asked Michael of theiemschik.

  "At one o'clock in the morning if we ever get there at all," replied he,with a shake of his head.

  "Why, my friend, this will not be your first storm in the mountains,will it?"

  "No, and pray God it may not be my last!"

  "Are you afraid?"

  "No, I'm not afraid, but I repeat that I think you were wrong instarting."

  "I should have been still more wrong had I stayed."

  "Hold up, my pigeons!" cried the iemschik; it was his business to obey,not to question.

  Just then a distant noise was heard, shrill whistling through theatmosphere, so calm a minute before. By the light of a dazzling flash,almost immediately followed by a tremendous clap of thunder, Michaelcould see huge pines on a high peak, bending before the blast. Thewind was unchained, but as yet it was the upper air alone which wasdisturbed. Successive crashes showed that many of the trees had beenunable to resist the burst of the hurricane. An avalanche of shatteredtrunks swept across the road and dashed over the precipice on the left,two hundred feet in front of the tarantass.

  The horses stopped short.

  "Get up, my pretty doves!" cried the iemschik, adding the cracking ofhis whip to the rumbling of the thunder.

  Michael took Nadia's hand. "Are you asleep, sister?"

  "No, brother."

  "Be ready for anything; here comes the storm!"

  "I am ready."

  Michael Strogoff had only just time to draw the leathern curtains, whenthe storm was upon them.

  The iemschik leapt from his seat and seized the horses' heads, forterrible danger threatened the whole party.

  The tarantass was at a standstill at a turning of the road, down whichswept the hurricane; it was absolutely necessary to hold the animals'heads to the wind, for if the carriage was taken broadside it mustinfallibly capsize and be dashed over the precipice. The frightenedhorses reared, and their driver could not manage to quiet them. Hisfriendly expressions had been succeeded by the most insulting epithets.Nothing was of any use. The unfortunate animals, blinded by thelightning, terrified by the incessant peals of thunder, threatened everyinstant to break their traces and flee. The iemschik had no longer anycontrol over his team.

  At that moment Michael Strogoff threw himself from the tarantass andrushed to his assistance. Endowed with more than common strength, hemanaged, though not without difficulty, to master the horses.

  The storm now raged with redoubled fury. A perfect avalanche of stonesand trunks of trees began to roll down the slope above them.

  "We cannot stop here," said Michael.

  "We cannot stop anywhere," returned the iemschik, all his energiesapparently overcome by terror. "The storm will soon send us to thebottom of the mountain, and that by the shortest way."

  "Take you that horse, coward," returned Michael, "I'll look after thisone."

  A fresh burst of the storm interrupted him. The drive
r and he wereobliged to crouch upon the ground to avoid being blown down. Thecarriage, notwithstanding their efforts and those of the horses, wasgradually blown back, and had it not been stopped by the trunk of atree, it would have gone over the edge of the precipice.

  "Do not be afraid, Nadia!" cried Michael Strogoff.

  "I'm not afraid," replied the young Livonian, her voice not betrayingthe slightest emotion.

  The rumbling of the thunder ceased for an instant, the terrible blasthad swept past into the gorge below.

  "Will you go back?" said the iemschik.

  "No, we must go on! Once past this turning, we shall have the shelter ofthe slope."

  "But the horses won't move!"

  "Do as I do, and drag them on."

  "The storm will come back!"

  "Do you mean to obey?"

  "Do you order it?"

  "The Father orders it!" answered Michael, for the first time invokingthe all-powerful name of the Emperor.

  "Forward, my swallows!" cried the iemschik, seizing one horse, whileMichael did the same to the other.

  Thus urged, the horses began to struggle onward. They could no longerrear, and the middle horse not being hampered by the others, could keepin the center of the road. It was with the greatest difficulty thateither man or beasts could stand against the wind, and for every threesteps they took in advance, they lost one, and even two, by being forcedbackwards. They slipped, they fell, they got up again. The vehicle ran agreat risk of being smashed. If the hood had not been securely fastened,it would have been blown away long before. Michael Strogoff and theiemschik took more than two hours in getting up this bit of road, onlyhalf a verst in length, so directly exposed was it to the lashing of thestorm. The danger was not only from the wind which battered against thetravelers, but from the avalanche of stones and broken trunks which werehurtling through the air.

  Suddenly, during a flash of lightning, one of these masses was seencrashing and rolling down the mountain towards the tarantass. Theiemschik uttered a cry.

  Michael Strogoff in vain brought his whip down on the team, they refusedto move.

  A few feet farther on, and the mass would pass behind them! Michael sawthe tarantass struck, his companion crushed; he saw there was no time todrag her from the vehicle.

  Then, possessed in this hour of peril with superhuman strength, he threwhimself behind it, and planting his feet on the ground, by main forceplaced it out of danger.

  The enormous mass as it passed grazed his chest, taking away his breathas though it had been a cannon-ball, then crushing to powder the flintson the road, it bounded into the abyss below.

  "Oh, brother!" cried Nadia, who had seen it all by the light of theflashes.

  "Nadia!" replied Michael, "fear nothing!"

  "It is not on my own account that I fear!"

  "God is with us, sister!"

  "With me truly, brother, since He has sent thee in my way!" murmured theyoung girl.

  The impetus the tarantass had received was not to be lost, and the tiredhorses once more moved forward. Dragged, so to speak, by Michael and theiemschik, they toiled on towards a narrow pass, lying north and south,where they would be protected from the direct sweep of the tempest. Atone end a huge rock jutted out, round the summit of which whirled aneddy. Behind the shelter of the rock there was a comparative calm; yetonce within the circumference of the cyclone, neither man nor beastcould resist its power.

  Indeed, some firs which towered above this protection were in a triceshorn of their tops, as though a gigantic scythe had swept across them.The storm was now at its height. The lightning filled the defile, andthe thunderclaps had become one continued peal. The ground, struck bythe concussion, trembled as though the whole Ural chain was shaken toits foundations.

  Happily, the tarantass could be so placed that the storm might strike itobliquely. But the counter-currents, directed towards it by the slope,could not be so well avoided, and so violent were they that everyinstant it seemed as though it would be dashed to pieces.

  Nadia was obliged to leave her seat, and Michael, by the light of oneof the lanterns, discovered an excavation bearing the marks of a miner'spick, where the young girl could rest in safety until they could oncemore start.

  Just then--it was one o'clock in the morning--the rain began to fall intorrents, and this in addition to the wind and lightning, made thestorm truly frightful. To continue the journey at present was utterlyimpossible. Besides, having reached this pass, they had only to descendthe slopes of the Ural Mountains, and to descend now, with the road tornup by a thousand mountain torrents, in these eddies of wind and rain,was utter madness.

  "To wait is indeed serious," said Michael, "but it must certainly bedone, to avoid still longer detentions. The very violence of the stormmakes me hope that it will not last long. About three o'clock the daywill begin to break, and the descent, which we cannot risk in the dark,we shall be able, if not with ease, at least without such danger, toattempt after sunrise."

  "Let us wait, brother," replied Nadia; "but if you delay, let it not beto spare me fatigue or danger."

  "Nadia, I know that you are ready to brave everything, but, in exposingboth of us, I risk more than my life, more than yours, I am notfulfilling my task, that duty which before everything else I mustaccomplish."

  "A duty!" murmured Nadia.

  Just then a bright flash lit up the sky; a loud clap followed. The airwas filled with sulphurous suffocating vapor, and a clump of huge pines,struck by the electric fluid, scarcely twenty feet from the tarantass,flared up like a gigantic torch.

  The iemschik was struck to the ground by a counter-shock, but, regaininghis feet, found himself happily unhurt.

  Just as the last growlings of the thunder were lost in the recesses ofthe mountain, Michael felt Nadia's hand pressing his, and he heard herwhisper these words in his ear: "Cries, brother! Listen!"