SHIPWRECK
About the middle of the morning there sounded through the still air a
distant boom, which grew louder until finally it became a crashing roar.
Beyond a bend in the river stretched before them a long gorge. There the
stream had narrowed, and, rushing across a ledge shaped like a
horseshoe, foamed and roared and beat its way among the great boulders.
The paddlers brought their craft into smooth water under an overhanging
bank while they held a council of war. Professor Ditson had never been
on the Rio Negros before, nor had Pinto followed it farther than
Treasure Rock. For a long time the whole party carefully studied the
distant rapids.
"What do you think?" whispered Will to Joe.
The Indian boy, who had paddled long journeys on the rivers and seas of
the far Northwest, shook his head doubtfully.
"Can do in a bark canoe," he said at last; "but in this thing--I don't
know."
Pinto and Hen both feared the worst in regard to anything which had to
do with Black River. It was Professor Ditson who finally made the
decision.
"It would take us weeks," he said, "to cut a trail through the forests
and portage this boat around. One must take some chances in life. There
seems to be a channel through the very center of the horseshoe. Let's
go!"
For the first time during the whole trip old Jud looked at his rival
admiringly.
"The old bird has some pep left, after all," he whispered to Will. "I
want to tell you, boy," he went on, "that I've never seen worse rapids,
an' if we bring this canal-boat through, it'll be more good luck than
good management."
Under Professor Ditson's instructions, Pinto took the bow paddle, while
Hen paddled stern, with Will and Joe on one side and Jud and the
professor on the other. Then all the belongings of the party were
shifted so as to ballast the unwieldy craft as well as possible, and in
another moment they shot out into the swift current. Faster and faster
the trees and banks flashed by, like the screen of a motion picture. Not
even a fleck of foam broke the glassy surface of the swirling current.
With smooth, increasing speed, the river raced toward the rapids which
roared and foamed ahead, while swaying wreaths of white mist, shot
through with rainbow colors, floated above the welter of raging waters
and the roar of the river rose to shout. Beyond, a black horseshoe of
rock stretched from one bank to the other in a half-circle, and in front
of it sharp ridges and snags showed like black fangs slavered with the
foam of the river's madness.
In another second the boat shot into the very grip of these jaws of
death. Standing with his lithe, copper-colored body etched against the
foam of the rapids, the Mundurucu held the lives of every one of the
party in his slim, powerful hands. Accustomed from boyhood to the
handling of the river-boats of his tribe through the most dangerous of
waters, he stood that day like the leader of an orchestra, directing
every movement of those behind him, with his paddle for a baton. Only a
crew of the most skilled paddlers had a chance in that wild water; and
such a crew was obedient to the Indian. In the stern, the vast strength
of the giant negro swung the montaria into the course which the bow
paddler indicated by his motions, while the other four, watching his
every movement, were quick to paddle or to back on their respective
sides. At times, as an unexpected rock jutted up before him in the foam,
the Indian would plunge his paddle slantwise against the current and
would hold the boat there for a second, until the paddlers could swing
it, as on a fulcrum, out of danger. Once the craft was swept with
tremendous force directly at an immense boulder, against which the water
surged and broke.
To Jud and the boys it seemed as if Pinto had suddenly lost his control
of the montaria, for, instead of trying to swing out of the grip of the
currents that rushed upon the rock, he steered directly at its face. The
Mundurucu, however, knew his business. Even as Jud tensed his muscles
for the crash, the rebound and undertow of the waters, hurled back from
the face of the rock, caught the boat and whirled it safely to one side
of the boulder. In and out among the reefs and fangs of rock the
Mundurucu threaded the boat so deftly, and so well did his crew behind
him respond, that in all that tumult of dashing waves the heavy craft
shipped no water outside of the flying spray.
In another minute they were clear of the outlying reefs and ledges and
speeding toward the single opening in the black jaw of rock that lay
ahead of them. Here it was that, through no fault of their steersman,
the great mishap of the day overtook them. Just beyond the gap in the
rock was a little fall, not five feet high, hidden by the spray. As
Pinto passed through the narrow opening he swung the bow of the boat
diagonally so as to catch the smoother current toward the right-hand
bank of the river, which at this point jutted far out into the rapids.
As he swerved, the long montaria shot through the air over the fall. The
Indian tried to straighten his course, but it was too late. In an
instant the boat had struck at an angle the rushing water beyond, with a
force that nearly drove it below the surface. Before it could right
itself, the rush of the current from behind struck it broadside, and in
another second the montaria, half-filled with the water which it had
shipped, capsized, and its crew were struggling in the current.
It was Hen Pine who reached the river first. When he saw that the boat
was certain to upset he realized that his only chance for life was to
reach smooth water. Even while the montaria was still in mid-air he
sprang far out toward the bank, where a stretch of unbroken current set
in toward a tiny cape, beyond which it doubled back into a chaos of
tossing, foaming water where not even the strongest swimmer would have a
chance for life. Hen swam with every atom of his tremendous strength, in
order to reach that point before he was swept into the rapids beyond.
His bare black arms and vast shoulders, knotted and ridged with muscle,
thrashed through the water with the thrust of a propeller-blade as he
swam the river-crawl which he had learned from Indian swimmers. For an
instant it seemed as if he would lose, for when nearly abreast of the
little cape several feet of racing current still lay between him and
safety. Sinking his head far under the water, he put every ounce of
strength into three strokes, the last of which shot him just near enough
to the bank to grip a tough liana which dangled like a rope from an
overhanging tree-top. Pinto, who was next, although no mean swimmer,
would never have made the full distance, yet managed to grasp one of
Hen's brawny legs, which stretched far out into the current.
"You hold on," he muttered to the great negro; "we make a monkey-bridge
and save them all."
Hen only nodded his head and took a double turn of the lianas around
each arm. Professor Ditson was the next one to win safety, for the two
boys were staying by Jud, who was a most indifferent swimmer. As the
professor's long, thin legs dangled out into the current like a pair of
tongs, with a desperate stroke Will caught one of his ankles, and was
gripped in turn by Joe, and Jud locked both of his arms around the
latter's knees, while the swift river tossed his gray hair and beard
along its surface. As the full force of the current caught this human
chain it stretched and sagged ominously. Then each link tightened up and
prepared to hold as long as flesh and blood could stand the strain.
"Go ahead, Jud!" gasped Will over his shoulder; "pull yourself along
until you get to shore; then Joe will follow, and then I. Only
hurry--the professor won't be able to hold on much longer, nor Hen to
stand the strain."
"Don't hurry on my account," sounded the precise voice of Professor
Ditson above the roar of the waters. "I can hold on as long as any one."
And as he spoke Will felt his gaunt body stiffen until it seemed all
steel and whipcord.
"Same here!" bellowed Hen, his magnificent body stretched out through
the water as if on a rack. "Take your time and come along careful."
In another minute the old trapper had pulled his way hand over hand
along the living bridge until he too had a grip on one of the dangling
lianas. He was followed by link after link of the human chain until they
were all safe at the edge of the bank. Hen was the first to scramble up
and give the others a helping hand, and a moment later all six of the
treasure-seekers stood safe on the high ridge of the little promontory
and sadly watched the boat which had borne them so well smash into a
mass of floating, battered planks among the rocks and disappear down the
current. Along with it went their guns, their ammunition, and their
supplies.
Jud alone retained the automatic revolver which he always wore, with a
couple of clips holding sixteen cartridges, besides the eight in the
cylinder. Hen also could not be termed weaponless, for he still wore his
machete; while Will had a belt-ax, Joe a light hatchet, and Professor
Ditson a sheath-knife. Besides these, the Indian had his bamboo
tinder-box and flint and steel, which he always wore in his belt. These
and the jack-knives and a few miscellaneous articles which they happened
to have in their pockets or fastened to their belts comprised the whole
equipment of the party.
Before them stretched a hundred miles of uncharted jungle, infested by
dangerous beasts and wandering cannibal tribes, through which they must
pass to reach the old Slave Trail. Half that distance behind them was
the Amazon. If once they could find their way back to that great river
and camp on its banks, sooner or later a boat would go by which would
take them back to Manaos. This, however, might mean weeks of delay and
perhaps the abandonment of the whole trip. As they stood upon a white
sand-bank far enough back from the river so that the roar of the rapids
no longer deafened them, it was Pinto who spoke first.
"Master," he said to Professor Ditson, "it is no time for council. Let
us have fire and food first. A man thinks more wisely with his head when
his stomach is warm and full."
"I'll say the man is right," said Jud, shivering a little in his wet
clothes as the coolness of the approaching night began to be felt
through the forest; "but where is that same fire and food goin' to come
from?"
Pinto's answer was to scrape shavings from the midrib of a dry
palm-leaf. When he had a little pile on the white sand in front of him,
he opened the same kind of tinder-box that our ancestors used to carry
less than a century and a half ago. Taking out from this an old file and
a bit of black flint, with a quick glancing blow he sent half a dozen
sparks against a dry strip of feltlike substance found only in the nests
of certain kinds of ants. In a minute a deep glow showed from the end of
this tinder, and, placing it under the pile of shavings, Pinto blew
until the whole heap was in a light blaze. Hastily piling dry wood on
top of this, he left to the others the task of keeping the fire going
and, followed by Will, hurried through the jungle toward the towering
fronds of a peach-palm, which showed above the other trees. Twisting
together two or three lianas, the Indian made from them a light, strong
belt. This he slipped around himself and the tree, and, gripping it in
both hands, began to walk up the rough trunk, leaning against this
girdle and pushing it up with each step, until, sixty feet from the
ground, he came to where the fruit of the tree was clustered at its top.
It grew in a group of six, each one looking like a gigantic, rosy peach
a foot in diameter. In a moment they all came whizzing to the ground,
and the two staggered back to the fire with the party's supper on their
backs. Stripping off the thick husk, Pinto exposed a soft kernel which,
when roasted on the coals, tasted like a delicious mixture of cheese and
chestnuts.
When at last all the members of the party were full-fed and dry, the
wisdom of Pinto's counsel was evident. Every one was an optimist; and,
after all, the best advice in life comes from optimists. Even Pinto and
Hen felt that, now that they had lived through the third misfortune,
they need expect no further ill luck from the river.
"Forward or back--which!" was the way Professor Ditson put the
question.
"Forward!" voted Will.
"Forward!" grunted Joe.
Jud seemed less positive.
"I sure would hate to go back," he said, "after old Jim Donegan had
grub-staked us, an' tell the old man that, while we're good pearlers,
we're a total loss when it comes to emeralds. Yet," he went on
judicially, "there's a hundred miles of unexplored forests between us
and the perfesser's trail, if there is any such thing. We've lost our
guns; we've no provisions; we're likely to run across bands of roving
cannibals; lastly, it may take us months to cut our way through this
jungle. Therefore I vote--forward!"
"That's the stuff, Jud!" exclaimed Will, much relieved.
"Oh, I don't believe in takin' any chances," returned the old man, who
had never done anything else all his life. "My idea is to always look at
the dangers--an' then go ahead."
"What about me?" objected Hen. "I ain't a-goin' to cut no hundred miles
of trail through this here jungle for nobody."
The answer came, sudden and unexpected, from the forests.
"John cut wood! John cut wood! John cut wood!" called some one, clearly.
It was only a spotted goatsucker, a bird belonging to the same family as
our northern whip-poor-will, but Hen was much amused.
"You hear what the bird say, you John Pinto. Get busy and cut wood," he
laughed, slapping his friend mightily on the back.
"All right," said the Indian, smiling, "John _will_ cut wood. Master,"
he said to Professor Ditson, "if all will help, I can make a montaria in
less than a week, better than the one we lost. Then we not have to cut
our way through jungle."
"Pinto," said Professor Ditson, solemnly, for once dropping into slang,
"the sense of this meeting is--that you go to it."
That night they followed the bank until they found a place where it
curved upward into a high, dry bluff. There, on soft white sand above
the mosquito-belt, they slept the sleep of exhaustion. It was after
midnight when Will, who was sleeping between Professor Ditson and Jud,
suddenly awoke with a start. Something had sniffed at his face.
Without moving, he opened his eyes and looked directly into a pair that
flamed green through the darkness. In the half-light of the setting moon
he saw, standing almost over him, a heavily built animal as big as a
small lion. Yet the short, upcurved tail and the rosettes of black
against the gold of his skin showed the visitor to be none other than
that terror of the jungle, the great jaguar, which in pioneer days used
to come as far north as Arkansas and is infinitely more to be feared
than the panthers which our forefathers dreaded so. This one had none of
the lithe grace of the cougars which Will had met during the quest of
the Blue Pearl, but gave him the same impression of stern tremendous
strength and girth that a lion possesses.
All of these details came to Will the next day. At that moment, as he
saw the great round head of this king of the South American forest
within a foot of his own, he was probably the worst scared boy on the
South American continent. Will knew that a jaguar was able to drag a
full-grown ox over a mile, and that this one could seize him by the
throat, flirt his body over one shoulder, and disappear in the jungle
almost before he could cry out. The great beast seemed, however, to be
only mildly interested in him. Probably he had fed earlier in the
evening.
Even as Will stared aghast into the gleaming eyes of the great cat, he
saw, out of the corner of his eye, Jud's right hand stealing toward his
left shoulder. The old trapper, as usual, was wide awake when any danger
threatened. Before, however, he had time to reach his automatic,
Professor Ditson, equally watchful from his side, suddenly clapped his
hands together sharply, close to the jaguar's pricked-up ears. The
effect was instantaneous. With a growl of alarm, the great beast sprang
backward and disappeared like a shadow into the forest.
The professor sat up.
"That's the way to handle jaguars," he remarked. "He'll not come back.
If you had shot him," he continued severely to Jud, who held his cocked
revolver in one hand, "he would have killed the boy and both of us
before he died himself." And the professor lay down again to resume his
interrupted slumbers.
It was this occurrence which started a discussion the next morning in
regard to weapons, offensive and defensive.
"I 'low," said Hen Pine, making his heavy machete swing through the air
as he whirled it around his head, "that I can stop anything I meet with
this 'ere toothpick of mine."
"Hen," remarked Jud, impressively, "do you see that round thing hangin'
against the sky in the big tree about fifty yards away?"
"Yassah, yassah," responded Hen, "that's a monkey-pot full of
Brazil-nuts."
"Well, boy," returned the old trapper, "just keep your eye on it."
As he spoke he raised his automatic to the level of his hip, shooting
without sighting, with that strange sixth sense of position which some
of the great revolver-shots of a past generation used to acquire. There
was a flash, a sharp spat, and the case of nuts about twice the size of
a man's fist came whizzing to the ground. Hen stared at the old trapper
with his mouth open.
"You is sure the hittenest shooter ever I see," he said at last.
Joe said nothing, but, drawing from his belt the keen little hatchet
which he always carried, poised himself with his left foot forward, and,
whirling the little weapon over his head, sent it hurtling through the
air toward the same Brazil-nut tree. The little ax buzzed like a bee
and, describing a high curve, buried itself clear to the head in the
soft bark. Picking up a couple of heavy round stones, Will put himself
into a pitching position and sent one whizzing in a low straight peg
which hardly rose at all and which struck the tree close to Joe's
hatchet with a smack which would have meant a broken bone for any man or
beast that it struck; for, as Joe had found out when the two were
pursued by Scar Dawson's gang, Will was a natural-born stone-thrower,
with deadly speed and accuracy.
It was Professor Ditson, however, who gave what was perhaps the most
spectacular exhibition of all. Standing before them, lean and gaunt, he
suddenly reached to his belt and drew out a keen, bone-handled,
double-edged sheath-knife. Poising this flat on the palm of his hand, he
threw it, with a quick jerk, with much the same motion of a
cricket-bowler. The keen weapon hissed through the air like an arrow,
and was found sunk nearly to the hilt in the bark between the mark of
Will's stone and the head of Joe's hatchet.
"When I was a very young man," the professor explained, embarrassed, "I
attained a certain amount of proficiency with the bowie-knife."
"I'll say you did!" exclaimed Jud, as he worked the knife out of the
tough bark. "Any cannibal that comes within fifty yards of this party is
liable to be chopped an' stabbed an' broken an' shot--to say nothin' of
Hen's machete at close quarters."
Pinto had watched these various performances in silence.
"This evening," he said at last, "I show you a gun that kills without
any noise."
Borrowing Joe's hatchet, he disappeared into the woods, to come back
half an hour later with a nine-foot stick of some hard, hollow, light
wood about an inch in diameter, straight as an arrow, and with a center
of soft pith. Laying this down on a hard stump, Pinto, with the utmost
care, split the whole length into halves. Then, fumbling in his belt he
pulled from it one of the sharp teeth of the paca, that curious reddish
rodent which is half-way in size and appearance between a hog and a hare
and which is equally at home on land and in water, and whose two-inch
cutting-teeth are among the favorite ready-made tools of all South
American Indians. With one of these Pinto carefully hollowed out each
section of the stick, smoothing and polishing the concave surface until
it was like glass. Then, fitting the two halves together, he wound them
spirally with a long strip of tape which he made from the tough, supple
wood of a climbing palm, waxed with the black wax of the stingless bees.
When it was finished he had a light, hollow tube about nine feet long.
At one end, which he tapered slightly, he fixed, upright, the tiny tooth
of a mouse, which he pressed down until only a fleck of shining ivory
showed as a sight above the black surface of the tube. At the other end
he fitted in a cup-shaped mouthpiece, chiseled out of a bit of light,
seasoned wood.
By noon it was finished, and Jud and the boys saw for the first time the
deadly blow-gun of the Mundurucu Indians. For arrows, Pinto cut tiny
strips from the flinty leaf-stalks of palm-leaves. These he scraped
until the end of each was as sharp as a needle. Then he feathered them
with little oval masses of silk from the seed-vessels of silk-cotton
trees, whose silk is much fluffier and only about half the weight of
ordinary cotton. In a short time he had made a couple of dozen of these
arrows, each one of which fitted exactly to the bore of the blow-gun,
and also fashioned for himself a quiver of plaited grasses, which he
wore suspended from his shoulder with a strip of the palm tape.
Late in the afternoon he made another trip into the forest, returning
with a mass of bark scraped from a tree called by the Indians
_mavacure_, but which the white settlers in South America have named the
poison tree. This bark he wet in the river, and then pounded it between
two stones into a mass of yellowish fibers, which he placed in a funnel
made of a plantain-leaf. Under this he set one of the aluminum cups
which each of the party carried fastened to his belt. This done, he
poured in cold water and let the mass drip until the cup was full of a
yellow liquid, which he heated over a slow fire. When it thickened he
poured in some of the milky juice of another near-by tree, which turned
the mixture black. When it had boiled down to a thick gummy mass, Pinto
wrapped it up carefully in a palm-leaf, after first dipping every one of
his arrows into the black compound.
So ended the making of the famous urari arrow-poison, which few white
men indeed have ever seen brewed. When it was safely put away, Pinto
carefully fitted one of the tiny arrows into the mouthpiece and raised
the blow-gun to his mouth, holding it with both hands touching each
other just beyond the mouthpiece, instead of extending his left arm, as
a white man would hold a gun. Even as he raised the long tube, there
came a crashing through the near-by trees, and the party looked up to
see a strange sight. Rushing along the branches came a pale
greenish-gray lizard, marked on the sides with black bars and fully six
feet in length. Along its back ran a crest of erect spines. Even as its
long compressed tail whisked through the foilage, a reddish animal,
which resembled a lanky raccoon, sprang after it like a squirrel,
following hard on its trail.
"It's an' ol' coati chasin' a big iguana," muttered Hen, as the pair
went by. "They're both mighty fine eatin'."
At first, the pursued and the pursuer seemed equally matched in speed.
Little by little, the rapid bounds of the mammal overtook the swift
glides of the reptile, and in a tree-top some fifty yards away the
iguana turned at bay. In spite of its size and the threatening, horrible
appearance of its uplifted spines, the coati made short work of it,
worrying it like a dog, and finally breaking its spine. Even as its long
bulk hung lifeless from the powerful jaws of the animal, Pinto drew a
deep breath and, sighting his long tube steadily toward the distant
animal, drove his breath through the mouthpiece with all his force.
There followed a startling pop, and a white speck flashed through the
air toward the coati. A second later, the latter, still holding the dead
iguana, gave a spring as if struck by something, and started off again
through the tree-tops, the great body of the dead lizard trailing
behind. Suddenly the coati began to go slower and slower and then
stopped short. Its head drooped. First one paw and then another relaxed,
until, with a thud, the coati and iguana struck the ground together both
stone-dead. The boys rushed over and found Pinto's tiny, deadly arrow
embedded deep in the coati's side. Less than a minute had passed since
it had been struck, but the deadly urari had done its work. Fortunately,
this poison does not impair the food value of game, and later on, over a
bed of coals, Hen made good his words about their eating qualities. The
coati tasted like roast 'possum, while the flesh of the giant lizard was
as white and tender as chicken.
"I feel as if I was eatin' a dragon," grumbled Jud, coming back for a
third helping.
Followed a week of hard work for all. Under Pinto's directions, taking
turns with Jud's ax, they cut down a yellow stonewood tree, which was
almost as hard and heavy as its name. Out of the trunk they shaped a log
some nineteen feet in length and three feet through, which, with
infinite pains and with lianas for ropes, they dragged on rollers to the
water's edge. Then, with enormous labor, working by shifts with Joe's
hatchet, Jud's ax, and Hen's machete, they managed to hollow out the
great log. At the end of the fourth day, Jud struck.
"I'll work as hard as any man," he said, "but I got to have meat. If I
work much longer on palm-nuts I'm liable to go plumb nutty myself."
As the rest of the party felt the same craving, Pinto and Jud were told
off to hunt for the rest of that day. It was Jud who first came across
game, a scant half-mile from camp, meeting there an animal which is one
of the strangest still left on earth and which, along with the duck-bill
of Australia and the great armadillo, really belongs to a past age,
before man came to earth, but by some strange accident has survived to
this day.
In front of him, digging in a dry bank with enormous curved claws, was
an animal over six feet in length and about two feet in height. It had
great hairy legs, and a tremendous bushy tail, like a vast plume, curled
over its back. Its head ended in a long, tapering, toothless snout, from
which was thrust constantly a wormlike, flickering tongue, while a broad
oblique stripe, half gray and half black, showed on either side.
"There ain't no such animal," murmured Jud to himself, examining the
stranger with awe.
Pinto's face shone with pleasure when he came up.
"It giant ant-eater and very good to eat," he remarked cheerfully.
Upon seeing them, the great beast shuffled away, but was soon brought
to bay, when it stood with its back against the bank, swinging its long
snout back and forth and making a little whining noise. Jud was about to
step in and kill it with a blow from his ax, but Pinto held him back.
"No get in close to ant-bear," he warned, pointing to the giant's claws.
"He rip you to pieces. You watch."
Stepping back, the Indian raised his blow-gun to his mouth. Again came
the fatal pop, and the next second one of the tiny arrows was embedded
like a thorn in the side of the monster's snout. For a moment the great
ant-eater tried to dislodge the tiny pointed shaft with his enormous
claws. Then he stopped, stood motionless for a while, swayed from side
to side, and sank dead without a sound or struggle. With the help of
Jud's ax and his own knife, the Indian soon quartered and dressed the
great beast and an hour later the two staggered back to camp loaded down
with a supply of meat which, when roasted, tasted much like tender pork.
"Now," said Jud, smacking his lips after a full meal, "bring on your
work!"