Chapter One

 The pair of thugs thrashed in their ropes when the bucket of foul, icy water drenched them. I grinned tightly because the water had the double blessing of being both frigid and rancid. But that was the state of most standing water in the Lower East Side slums of New York, in the “Roaring Twenties”. Frigid and rancid described the state of many things in this new land.  As I slipped off my heavy wool coat, I made sure to hang it where it would not be soiled by my next endeavors. The dark blue coat was worn, frayed slightly, and no longer had the gold threads and bright brass buttons of its former glory.

  “You're no beauty, but you still get the job done.” I thought to myself as my thoughts roamed back in time. I saw my coat the way it once was, proud and bold, worn by my father.

 Hmm, my father...last of a proud, bold group of men, The Great Black Sea Army. The Cossacks; Kuban-Cossacks, who rode to war against the hated Turks. The giants who drove back the Ottoman hordes, who’d protected Mother Russia's southern border from the Black Sea to the Caspian. The men who strode through the dark forests of the Caucuses and hunted the Wolf, the Bear and the tusked Boar.

The thugs groaning against their gags drives my memories back into the mists.

“So Fritz, you're awake.” I grab a fist full of greasy blonde hair and pull the kraut's head back so he can see my eyes. Eyes like ice on the sea, my grandmother would say, hard and cold, so cold.

 “You two kraut bastards think you can handle any woman you want, push the oldsters around and steal from us? Because you pay off those little Jewish gangsters? They let you come down here because they're afraid of us. And because you krauts are stupid and arrogant.”

My left fist drives the air from Fritz's lungs. I step back and gaze at my two guests. The basement of this empty tenement is low enough that my 6 foot 4 inch frame is cramped and I must appear a giant to them. Just like all the men in my bloodline, I'm built for battle; wide shoulders, thick necked, massive hands on the end of heavy muscled arms. All of my sires looked like they were built from the great logs that they would cut and send down the Kuban River to the sea. No thoroughbreds us, no, draft horses was more the case. Oh well, I didn't ask to big and strong, but God is good, eh?

 These two little German hoods were just one issue we Orthodox Cossacks were dealing with. We are a minority among minorities here. We scrape by, cow-towing to the same dirty little shopkeepers who would've trembled at our passing just a few years ago.

  “Damn them, damn these krauts and damn the bastard Bolsheviks who drove us from our mountains.”

My rage manifests as trip hammer blows to the face of first Fritz, then his partner. The crunch of their facial bones is very satisfying. Standing here with my feet spread wide, I can get all of my power into every punch, aiming not at the bloody ruins of their faces; but at a point 12 inches past. Just like chopping wood, swinging through.
 

I can hear the front legs of the chairs I've tied them to, “CLOP-CLOP” against the dirt floor. My blows causing them to rock back.

  “Good thing I tied you side by side and together, Fritzie” I think to myself.

My blows fall as steady as the spring rains of home. I can feel the sweat begin to dampen my hair and run down into my black beard, so I pause to drink from my flask and grimace as the vodka burns down my throat.

“Haagh,” wiping my face; “Now Fritzie, what do you have to say for yourself? Will you be staying out of this neighborhood? Will you be keeping your grimy kraut hands off our women,...OFF MY SISTER!!?!!”

  “Fritz?”

  “WAKE UP!!” I yell, dousing the two hoods with a second bucket kept just for this purpose.

 It's then I realize that neither of my guests is moving....or breathing.

  “Pathetic. Can't take one little beating. Oh well. Mama will not be happy.”

 She was definitively not happy. The broom stick across my skull was proof of that. Her screaming was also a clue.

  “PAVEL YOU IDIOT!!”

I try to duck the next swing. WHACK!!! Not low enough.

 “Mama wait!” I cry, grabbing the broom in one hand. “I’ve taken care of it.”

 “How?” she hisses. regaining some composure, “How did you take care of two dead krauts!”

 “Simple Mama, a few bags, a few bricks and the East River.” I shrug; “No problem.”

Mama stares at me as if deciding whether or not to spit or swallow.

 “A few bags.”

 “Yes, Mama. I have an ax. It works on krauts too. And how can you identify a body if all the parts are in different places?”

 “Fine Pavel Andreovich, your father would approve. Krauts deserve no better than the oily Turks.”

I shake my head in resignation.

 “Mama, what did I say? We are Americans now, no more Pavel, I am Paul Gregory. American.”

 I watch Mama's shoulders fall as she sweeps our apartment.

  “Yes Son, I know. But don't forget your past. It is all we have left to us, our memories.”

It took two days longer than I had figured. The three German bully boys were almost my size. Almost.

I watched them enter through the door of Mr. Sheminov's cabinet shop and make their way back to my work space.

  “Hello Ivan.” the bald one in the middle snarled. “Word is you were dumping several bloody bags into the river last week.” Bullyboy on the right looks nervous, but his hands are empty. New maybe?

“O'hara told us, he saw a big, black-bearded Russian at the docks last Tuesday night.

  I hate it when a cop won't stay bought. I also hate when I'm outnumbered. And they way Bullyboy #2, on my left, was keeping one hand in his coat pocket; these fellows were not looking to go for a bare-knuckles approach.

   A little info, the aprons we wear in the shop aren't just for keeping the sawdust out. As Bully #1 begins to reach towards the back of his belt, my sawed off double-barrel roars. The buckshot pellets catch him in the bread basket and he begins to topple. Another roar and Bully #2 never gets to find out if the vest-gun in his pocket would've been enough. Bully #3 was fresh meat. His hands never move as my left comes around in a vicious arc that chops the broad-bladed hatchet half into his neck. My apron catches most of the mess.. It only takes three dozen seconds for him to bleed out on the wooden floor.

 Poor Mr Sheminov had to replace the boards. The stain was deep.

Mama cries while I shave. I feel like I'm cutting the history out of my soul with each swipe of the razor.

 “Where will you go, Pavel?” she whimpers, as she packs my suitcase. My sisters weep quietly in the kitchen. We are Russian. We know grief. But we are Cossack and we also know how to survive, and how to conquer. And now I am American, so a pioneer, an explorer.

 I hear there is a city to the west. It sits on a lake almost as big as the Caspian. There is a river.

And trees, tall trees.

 “Mama”, I say, drying my face, my clean shaven face. A stranger looks back from the mirror.

 “Mama, don't worry. I will go west and find a gold mine. This is America. I will send you money soon. It will be good.”

  The train station was small compared to the one in New York. I easily find a cab to take me down to the waterfront. The lake is big and choppy. A knife-edged wind blows across it and chills my face.

  Still not used to that.

   I can see into Canada across the river. Trees, trees and whiskey; liquid gold.

   Back downtown after my quick tour.

“A city not so big as New York.” I think, “Not so dirty or crowded.” I walk up the street, hunting in a new forest; “A city with plenty of room to grow.”

  A new forest it is; and with new predators here also. I spot the lean, blonde doll strutting towards me, a bodyguard obvious and yet oblivious as well, following her. She's got those hunter's eyes.

 “Mama must be prayin' for her boy,” I think as the blonde closes the distance.

A revving motor half a block back is a dead giveaway. I grab the dame and hit cover as the gunfire opens up. An hour it seems, but really only seconds later; I have a card and a path to follow.

 Sipping my vodka, I consider the card on the desk in front of me. From my window in this hotel, I can see a long way. The lake, the river,...the future.

 “Yes sir, I think Detroit just might be my gold mine.”

My cousin Mikhail's telegram catches my eye again.

“Stay away” >Stop< “Krauts looking for Big Paul the Axe”>Stop<

 That gets a laugh. I like that name. Fear Me, fear my wrath, fear the Axe.  Father would be proud.