BLACKBEARD
"Well," said Knowlton, after a period of silent paddling, "we have met
the enemy and we are his'n. No harm done so far, though, and if old man
Calisaya, or whatever his name is, wants to act nasty we can send him
and a few others along the road to glory with our gats. We'll travel the
same road, of course, but we'll take company with us."
"_Si_, senhor," Pedro agreed. "And besides your pistols we still have
our machetes. Yet I believe Lourenço's words to the chief Monitaya will
make all well. But I cannot help wondering--" He glanced at McKay.
"I'm wondering, too, Pedro," said the captain. "It's hardly possible
that these people know why we're here, and hardly likely that they have
any interest in the Raposa. Lord knows I've nothing else up my sleeve.
It's a riddle to me."
It remained a riddle to the rest, for no explanation could be gleaned
from the Mayorunas. At the first halt, which did not come until nearly
sundown, the Americans discovered that one of the men in the fore canoe
was Yuara, who had been lying in the bottom of the craft and sleeping
all the afternoon. From him Lourenço attempted to get information as to
the reason for Suba's enmity--but in vain. The tall fellow spoke not a
word in reply, and his face remained unreadable.
Camp was made, and by Yuara's direction the packs of the adventurers
were restored to them. The rifles, however, remained under guard of
savages appointed by the subchief's son. When the night meal was out of
the way nothing remained but to seek hammocks and sleep, for further
attempts at conversation by Lourenço met with the same silent rebuff
from every cannibal addressed. None showed active hostility by either
look or manner, but it was plain that between wild and civilized men
stood a wall--a wall not too high for the jungle dwellers to leap over
in deadly action if occasion should be given. Wherefore the whites held
themselves aloof, said little, and slept early.
"I am glad Yuara is with us," Lourenço said. "As he promised, he does
not forget what was done for him. He will keep this band in control, and
unless I am much mistaken he will tell Monitaya all he knows of us,
which surely will not do us any harm. At any rate, we can sleep in
safety to-night. And since it does no good to puzzle about what is gone
by or to worry about what has not yet to come to pass, let us sleep
now."
"Ho-hum!" yawned Tim. "Renzo, ye spill more solid sense to the square
inch than any feller I seen in a long time. We're here because we're
here; to-day's dead and to-morrer ain't born yet, and li'l' Timmy Ryan
hits the hay right now. Night, gents."
So, surrounded by man eaters, the trailers of the Raposa slept far more
securely than on any night down the river when their companions had been
supposedly civilized Peruvians. Whether a watch was kept by their guards
during the night they neither knew nor cared, since they had no
intention of attempting escape.
They awoke to find the men of Suba diminished in number by half. Yuara,
deigning to speak for the first time since leaving the _maloca_,
explained that the absent men had gone hunting for their breakfasts.
Before long the hunters came straggling back, bearing monkeys and birds,
which were divided among their companions. None of this meat was offered
to the prisoners, who ate unconcernedly from their pack rations. Tim,
after watching the Indians sink their sharp-filed teeth into broiled
monkey haunches and tear the meat from the bones, snorted and turned his
back to them.
"Look like a gang o' bloody-faced devils gobblin' babies," he muttered.
"I'll believe now they're cannibals, all right."
So uncomfortably apt was his simile that the others grimaced and turned
their eyes elsewhere until the savage meal was finished. Then their
attention became riveted on a queer proceeding at the canoe wherein
Yuara had journeyed yesterday.
To the gunwales amidships two of the men fastened a couple of small
crotched posts. In the forks was laid a pole, crosswise of the boat, and
from this, by slender fiber cords, four slabs of wood were hung.
Strolling down to the canoe, the travelers found that athwart its bottom
had been laid a crosspiece supporting two shorter crotched posts,
between which stretched another transverse pole; and from this pole in
turn the lower ends of the four slabs had been suspended. Now the
savages joined the tips of each pair of slabs by carved end sections,
and the contrivance seemed to be complete--a sort of grate, its bars
sloping at an angle of forty-five degrees.
As the Americans eyed the arrangement in perplexity, one of the crew
picked up from the bow of the canoe a pair of mallets the heads of which
were wrapped in hide. With these he struck the slabs in rapid
succession. Out rolled four notes of astonishing volume--the first four
notes of the musical scale. Again and again he ran them over, then
stopped. The deep tones thrummed away along the creek and died.
"By George! a big xylophone!" Knowlton exclaimed, admiringly.
"It sure talks right out loud," said Tim. "Lot o' class to these guys,
at that. Bet this is their brass band, and we'll go rip-snortin' into
the next town like we was on parade. Oughter have some flags to hang up
in the boats, and mebbe a drum corps to help out. Wisht I had a tin
whistle or somethin' and I'd join the orchester. I can toot a whistle
fine."
"My favorite instrument is the old-fashioned dinner horn," laughed
Knowlton. "But I think you're wrong--this is some kind of signaling
apparatus."
"You have it right, senhor," Lourenço affirmed. "I have heard this sort
of thing used, though I never before saw the instrument itself. Those
notes will carry at least five miles, and the cannibals send messages by
striking the bars in different order. This run which we have just heard
is always used first, and no message is sent until a reply is received."
"Bush telegraph," nodded McKay. "First call your operator and then shoot
the message in code. Pretty ingenious for a bunch of absolute savages."
Lourenço turned to Yuara and asked a question. Yuara curtly replied.
"He says, Capitao, that this is to tell Monitaya we come. But we now are
too far off for Monitaya's men to hear. The bars are made ready before
starting so that they can be used as soon as we are within hearing. He
says also that we start now."
The Mayorunas already were entering their canoes. With cool deliberation
the whites gathered up their equipment and settled themselves for the
journey at whose end lay either life or death. The boat of Yuara
started, and once more the flotilla was on its way.
For an hour or more it swung on among the forested hills before the
telegraph instrument was put to use. Then it paused, and the sonorous
voice of the xylophone spoke to the jungle. A period of waiting brought
no reply.
The canoe moved on for a mile. Again the mallets beat the wood in the
ascending scale of the call. And then, faint, mellow, far off, sounded
the answer.
While every man sat silent the bars boomed out their fateful news. Slow,
brief, deep as a bell tolling a dirge, a reply rolled back. And with the
solemnity of a funeral cortége the canoes once more moved on, unhurried,
inexorable, the measured swing of the paddles beating like a pulse of
doom.
At length the crew of Yuara held their paddles. Yuara himself turned
toward the second canoe and talked a minute. A signal to his men, and
his boat proceeded. All the others remained where they were.
"He goes to Monitaya to speak of us," said Lourenço. "He will return. We
have only to wait."
"Yeah," grunted Tim, disgustedly. "We'll wait till night if he takes as
long to go through his rigmarole as he done yesterday. If I got to fight
I want to hop to it, not set round in the shade o' the shelterin' palm
while them guys are heatin' up the stewpot. This waitin' stuff gits my
goat."
"You might sing us a song, senhor, to pass the time," Pedro suggested,
with a tight-lipped smile.
"Say, I'll do that, jest to show these guys I don't give a rip. And
while their ears are dazzled by me melody I'm goin' to git me holster
unbottoned and me masheet kinder limbered up. Git set. Here it comes:
"Ol' Hindyburg thought he was swell,
Pa-a-arley-voo!
He made the kids in Belgium yell,
Pa-a-arley-voo!
But the Yanks come over with shot and shell
And Hindyburg he run like hell,
Rinkydinky-parley-voo!"
Under cover of his outbreak, which made the savages clutch their weapons
and glare at him in mingled suspicion and amazement, there proceeded a
furtive loosening of pistols and machetes.
"A noble sentiment, and more or less appropriate," grinned Knowlton.
"But don't give them another spasm for a few minutes, or they may rise
up and kill us all in self-defense. They're on the ragged edge now."
"Aw, them guys dunno how to appreciate good singin'. But I should worry;
I got me gat fixed now like I want it."
Time dragged past. The Americans and Brazilians smoked and exchanged
casual comments on subjects far removed from their present environment.
The Mayorunas watched them with unceasing vigilance, as if expecting a
sudden break for life and liberty. Their chief had intimated that
Monitaya would kill these men; and now was their last chance to try to
dodge death. But neither the black-bearded McKay nor any of his mates
manifested the slightest concern. And at last the canoe of Yuara came
back.
It came, however, without Yuara himself. The son of Rana had remained at
the _malocas_ ahead, whence he sent the command to advance. Closely
hemmed in by the men of Suba, the white men's boat surged onward at a
brisk pace. Around a bend in the creek it went, and at once the domain
of Monitaya leaped into view.
Two big tribal houses, each considerably larger than the one of Suba,
rose pompously in a wide cleared space beside the stream. Before them,
ranged in a semicircle, stood hundreds of Mayorunas--men, women,
children--all silently watching the canoes of the newcomers. In the
center of the arc, like the hub of a human half wheel, a small knot of
men waited in aloof dignity, four of them adorned with the ornate
feather dresses of subchiefs, backed by a dozen tall, muscular savages,
each armed with a huge war club. Before all stood a powerful,
magnificently proportioned savage belted with a wide girdle of squirrel
tails, decked with necklaces of jaguar teeth and ebony nuts, crowned by
plumes which in loftiness and splendor surpassed all other headgear
present--the great chief Monitaya.
At the shore, beside a row of empty canoes, Yuara was waiting. He
mentioned for his men to bring their dugouts to the regular landing
place, and when they obeyed he gave commands. Then he turned and walked
toward Monitaya.
"I go," stated Lourenço, rising. "You stay here until called. Yuara has
told his men to leave all weapons in the canoes."
He walked away after the son of Rana, and if any misgiving was in his
heart it did not show in his confident step. Halting before the big
chief, he began talking as coolly as if there were not the least doubt
of welcome for himself and those with him. Monitaya gave no sign of
recognition, of friendliness, or of enmity. Proud, statuesque, he stood
motionless, his deep eyes resting on those of the Brazilian.
"Sultry weather," remarked McKay.
"Just so, Capitao," agreed Pedro, narrow eyed. "We shall soon know
whether we shall have storm."
"Indications are for violent thunder and lightning soon," Knowlton
contributed. "See those husky clubmen awaiting? Looks as if a public
execution were about to be pulled off."
"Yeah. But say, ain't that chief a reg'lar he-man, though! No
pot-bellied fathead like that there, now, Suby guy. Hope I don't have to
drill him. I bet I won't, neither. He looks like he had brains."
Hoping Tim was right, but dubious, all watched the progress of the
parley. Lourenço evidently was stating his case in logical sequence,
recalling to the chief's mind the time when he had led him to revenge
against the Peccaries of Peru, then going on to tell of the arrival of
the strangers and the object of their search. Yuara's sudden, quick
glance at him showed that the Raposa had been mentioned for the first
time. A little later his face became slightly sullen, and the watchers
guessed that Lourenço was now referring in somewhat uncomplimentary
terms to the treatment received in the _maloca_ of Suba. Soon after that
the Brazilian ended his speech.
In a deep, quiet tone Monitaya spoke first to Lourenço, then to one of
his subchiefs. The bushman beckoned to his waiting companions. At the
same time the subchief stepped out and called two names. As McKay,
Knowlton, Tim, and Pedro arose and stepped ashore with the weaponless
men of Suba, out from the great human arc came two men. All advanced
toward the chief. And though the Americans were studying the central
figures as they walked, they also noticed that the pair of Mayorunas who
had been summoned were lame. One walked with a stiff knee, the other as
if a whole leg was paralyzed.
"Squad--halt!" muttered McKay. A step and a half and the four stood
aligned and alert, two strides from Monitaya.
The eyes of the chief dwelt long on McKay, and they were hard eyes.
Without shifting his gaze he grunted a few words. The two crippled
Indians stumped forward and stared into McKay's face. Through a long
minute the Americans felt a sinister tension grow in the air about them.
Then, slowly, the cripples turned about and faced their ruler. In the
tones of men sure of themselves, they spoke one word.
With the utterance of that word the tension broke. Through the long line
of watching tribesmen ran a murmur. The clubmen relaxed from their ready
poise. The subchiefs glanced at one another as if disappointed. And the
stern face of Monitaya himself was transformed by a wide, friendly
smile.
A sweeping gesture and the cordial timbre of the chief's voice told the
Americans plainly what Lourenço translated a moment later.
"We are welcome, comrades. We shall sleep in the _maloca_ of Monitaya
himself and a feast shall be made for us. Our lives have just hung on
one word, but now that the word is spoken we are safe. I cannot tell you
more now, for I do not wholly understand this matter myself as yet--but
I shall learn. Now is the time, Capitao to give presents, if you have
any for the chief."
"I have. But our packs are in the canoe, and I'll be hanged if I'll make
a beast of burden of myself at this stage of the game."
"I will have all the packs brought up, Capitao. The men of Suba took
them from us at their _maloca_; now they shall restore them before all
these people."
He addressed Monitaya affably, then spoke more brusquely to Yuara. That
young man, whose previous austerity now had dissolved into open
friendliness, uttered four words. Immediately his men returned to the
canoes and brought up not only the packs, but the rifles.
From his blanket roll McKay brought forth a cloth-wrapped package out of
which he drew a half-ax, its blade gleaming dully under a protective
coating of grease, which he swiftly swabbed off. From his haversack he
produced a heavy chain of ruby-red beads. Under the bright sun the beads
glowed like living things, and the glittering steel flashed back a
dazzling beam. The two gifts together had cost considerably less than
ten dollars in New York, but to the chieftain they were priceless
treasures; and as McKay, with a formal bow, extended them to him, his
face shone with delight. Yet he made no such greedy grab for them as had
been displayed by Suba when tendered the knife. His acceptance was
achieved with a calm dignity which brought a twinkle of approval to the
eyes of the white men.
In the same dignified manner he led the way to the _maloca_ which
evidently was the older of the two and which had always been his home.
The semicircle of his subjects broke up into a disorderly crowd which
streamed after him and his guests or surrounded the men of Suba with
holiday greetings. Within the tribal house the adventurers proceeded to
the central space where burned the chief's fire. There Monitaya ordered
certain hammocks removed to make room for those of the visitors. Soon
the travelers were seated at ease in their hanging beds, their packs and
rifles lying on the ground beneath them, while near at hand clustered
groups of Mayorunas, staring at them in naïve curiosity.
Pedro drew a long breath.
"Senhores, that was a very close call," he declared. "As Lourenço says,
our lives have hung on one word. What was that word, comrade?"
"The word was, 'No,'" answered Lourenço. "Monitaya asked those two
crippled men, 'Is this the man?' As you saw, they looked at the capitao,
giving no attention to the rest of us. Then they said, 'No.' You will
remember that the capitao was the one whom Suba also picked upon. As
soon as Monitaya finishes talking with those men I shall ask him what
all this means."
The big chief was giving directions to a score of young fellows, who
presently scattered to various parts of the house and accoutered
themselves for hunting. Thereupon Lourenço approached Monitaya with the
familiarity of former acquaintance, being received with a good-humored
smile. For a time the two conversed. As they talked the smile of the
ruler faded and his face grew dark, while into the Brazilian's voice
came a wrathful growl. Finally both nodded. Lourenço returned to his
hammock, frowning.
"Capitao, it is all because of your black hair and beard. Through all
the _malocas_ of the Mayorunas, far and near, has gone the word to watch
for a big, black-bearded man who is neither a Brazilian nor a Peruvian,
but of some country unknown to these people; and when such a man is
caught, to kill him and his companions without mercy. And the reason for
such a command is this:
"For many moons the Mayorunas, especially those of the smaller and
weaker _malocas_, have been losing women. From time to time sudden raids
have been made by gangs of gun-carrying Peruvian Indians and
_mestiços_--half-breeds--who shot down the defenders of the houses
before they could reach their weapons, and carried off girls. This, of
course, is nothing new here, for such things have happened occasionally
for many years. But within the past five years there has been a
difference in these attacks which has made them much more deadly.
"These raids used to be made always at night, and they were few and far
between. But of late they have come about also in the day, at times when
almost all the men of the small _malocas_ were far out in the forest
hunting meat and the women had little protection. Several chiefs have
been killed by the raiders, who seemed to be acting according to an
agreed plan, to be organized for this work, and to know when to strike
and how to get away quickly. And what is more, the men who did this were
not chance parties who came only to get women for themselves and then
stayed away. The same men came back time after time.
"A few of these were killed, but only a few; and all the dead were
Peruvians. Being dead, they could tell nothing. But the Mayorunas felt
that all these raids were directed by one mind. And they became sure of
this when one captured girl escaped by killing a Peruvian with his own
knife and returned to her own _maloca_. She said the raiders took her
and the other girls to the big man with the black beard, who waited at a
safe place a day's march from the tribal house.
"A few weeks later another small _maloca_ several miles from here was
attacked at night while two men of Monitaya were there, having stayed
out too late on a hunting trip and taken refuge with their neighbors
until day. Both these men were hit and crippled by bullets in the wild
shooting that opened the attack. One was struck in the knee, the other
in the lower part of the back. But both caught a glimpse of the leader's
face and saw that he was the black-bearded man himself.
"So you see, Capitao, why we have been near death. Suba and Monitaya
both thought you were the man. We were lucky to escape alive from Suba,
and still more lucky that hero were two men who knew the face of the
blackbeard."
"Schwandorf!" barked McKay.
"Yes, Capitao, it must be the German--"
"I know it's Schwandorf! And I know his game! He's a slaver!"
"A slaver?"
"That's it. Knew I'd seen that sneak before. He worked the same game in
British Guiana eight years ago on a small scale. Had a gang of tough
bush niggers from over in Dutch Guiana to do his dirty work. Stole
Macusi girls--they're the best-looking Indians in B. G.--and sold them
like cattle to gold miners. Cleaned up quite a pot before the English
got on to him, but had to get out of the country on the hot foot--didn't
have time to take his gold with him. His name wasn't Schwandorf over
there, and he had no beard; he was thinner, too, and posed as a Russian;
but he's the man. Must have made his get-away by the back door--down the
Branco to the Amazon. Now he's running Mayoruna girls into Peru. He
could sell them to rubber men or miners and make good money, eh,
Lourenço?"
"_Si._"
"Sure. And that's why he wanted to kill off his Peruvians--they knew too
much; probably were trying to bleed him for hush money. He must have a
regular slave route and a gang of border cutthroats to do his
raiding--men who don't go downriver. Murderer, slaver--wonder how many
other crimes are on his soul."
"Them two are enough," growled Tim. "And he 'ain't got no soul."
"No soul," echoed Pedro. "You have said it, Senhor Tim. And if ever
these people capture him he soon will have no body."