Urubu Again
With the first crackle of Nara’s rifle, Mr. Brewster shouted, “Down
everybody—and get ready for them!” That, Biff knew, could be more than
just a shower of spears. The warriors themselves would be arriving next,
with other weapons. The only hope would be a few more pole thrusts, but
while that might save some of the party, it wouldn’t help Joe Nara.
It happened though, that Nara had helped himself. Those crazy shots that
peppered the sandbars without coming near a canoe, unleashed a terrific
force that took the native warriors by complete surprise. As they poised
their spears, the sandbanks sprang into life before their eyes.
Roused by the blasts of Nara’s guns and the ping of the bullets in their
sandy sunning spot, the anacondas lashed their way straight downstream
in a broad horde of writhing fury that seemed to stretch like a
monstrous ribbon, two hundred feet in length.
The stampede of mighty boa constrictors swept everything from their
path. Their thick bodies and lashing coils spilled the canoes and
plunged the native warriors into the canal, spears and all.
The snakes didn’t stop their mad rush. They whacked natives as well as
boats when they passed them and left the canoes drifting in a churn of
foam that made the canal look like a rapids clear beyond the bend. Then
the living tidal wave was gone as quickly as it had begun. But Mr.
Brewster wasn’t waiting for the natives to reclaim their canoes and
spears so as to return to action.
“Back to the poles!” he ordered. “Heave away—away, everybody—and you,
too, Nara!”
Old Joe, his face gleaming in happy surprise at the thing he had touched
off, now laid aside his rifle and helped pry the barge from its sandy
perch. By the time the hostile tribesmen were wading up on the sandbars
that the anacondas had left, Nara’s boat was free. Outboards roared anew
as the flotilla plowed its way to the main channel and on to the
junction of the Casquiare and the Orinoco, where they headed downstream.
The rhythmic beat of distant tom-toms could still be heard that evening,
when the motors were stopped and the boats allowed to drift down the
river under a brilliant tropical moon. By morning, the drums had ceased,
indicating that the Maco tribe had either given up the chase or that the
flotilla was beyond the danger zone.
From then on, the expedition traveled mostly by day and picked suitable
campsites overnight. Biff and Kamuka fished frequently and replenished
the food supply by catching huge river turtles as well as a tasty
species of catfish called _cajaro_. Biff landed one that measured well
over three feet in length.
Some nights, the boats were lashed side by side and moored near river
settlements where they formed what Hal Whitman termed a “floating
mansion,” complete to the kitchen. At one village, Joe Nara bought
stacks of huge cassava cakes. These measured two and a half feet across,
but were only a half-inch thick. They had been brought upriver wrapped
in plantain leaves.
These formed the main food for the Wai Wais accompanying Nara, and
Jacome and Kamuka liked them too, though Biff found them rather
tasteless. In contrast were some cayman eggs, which the boys dug up on a
sandy shore while hunting turtles with Jacome. The Indians, Kamuka
included, found them tasty indeed, but they were too strong in flavor to
suit Biff.
Caymans were the great menace of the Orinoco, so the boys were duly
warned against them. Closely resembling alligators, they were supposed
to measure twenty-five feet or more in length. But when Kamuka called,
“There’s a big one!” and Mr. Brewster promptly drilled it with a rifle
shot, the cayman measured only twelve feet, when it was hauled on board
the kitchen _monteria_.
“When you see a creature in motion,” Mr. Brewster told the boys, “and
particularly a bird, or its cousin, a reptile, you always gain an
exaggerated idea of its length.”
“Eggs-aggerate?” Kamuka repeated the unfamiliar term. “You mean eggs
look long too?”
“Not eggs-actly,” put in Biff, with a smile, “but if we’d looked much
longer at those cayman eggs, they would have hatched.”
Mr. Brewster smiled at the jokes, then became serious.
“You must learn what it means to gauge speed in terms of distance,” he
declared. “When we reach the rapids where the Ventuari flows into the
Orinoco, you boys can take the boat down through.”
When they reached the rapids, Mr. Brewster gave the helm to Biff, then
told Kamuka to mind the bow and watch for rocks. Mr. Brewster went into
the thatched cabin, but from there, he kept a sharp lookout in case the
boys ran into trouble.
Biff realized that his dad was standing by in case of emergency, but
unless something of the sort developed, Biff knew he would be on his
own. What a thrill it was!
Kamuka watched like a cat, to copy any move made by Jacome and the
stolid natives who were warding off rocks from the bows of the other
boats. Biff kept an eager eye on Whitman, Joe Nara, and the Wai Wai who
was piloting the kitchen barge. When Biff saw that they were watching
the man in the bow, he did the same.
Time and again, Kamuka would raise his paddle to jab at a threatening
rock. Always, Biff handled the helm accordingly. Kamuka nodded his head
admiringly. He was crediting Biff with being a wonderful pilot, never
realizing that he was furnishing the tip-off that enabled his friend to
demonstrate such skill.
Twice, though, it was Kamuka’s quick work with the paddle that staved
off a crash on the rocks before Biff could bring the helm about. When at
last they were drifting in the calm water below the rapids, Biff sprang
forward over the thatched cabin and grabbed Kamuka’s hand, exclaiming:
“Great work, Kamuka! We make a perfect team!”
Kamuka smiled solemnly as he repeated:
“We make—perfect team.”
Mr. Brewster came from the cabin and clapped a hand on each boy’s
shoulder.
“You do make a perfect team,” he complimented. “Just remember it.”
They remembered it, several nights later, when they sat around the
campfire after a _cajaro_ dinner.
“Tomorrow,” stated Mr. Brewster, “we come to the Maipures Rapids.”
“Can we take the boat down through them?” queried Biff. “I mean, Kamuka
and I?”
“None of our boats will shoot the Maipures,” said Mr. Brewster. “They
are impassable. So are the rapids of the Atures, forty miles below. A
road has been built around both rapids, so that trucks can transport us
with our boats.”
Joe Nara gave a high-pitched snort.
“That’s where Serbot will be waiting for us,” he declared. “That’s for
sure.”
“I’m not so sure,” put in Hal Whitman. “After he sold us out to those
Indians on the Casquiare, he probably headed back the other way, down
the Rio Negro.”
“Not if he figured we’d be coming down the Orinoco.”
Whitman and Nara both turned to Mr. Brewster, to see if he could settle
the argument. As he lighted his pipe, Mr. Brewster stated calmly:
“It’s about an even chance that Serbot came this way. If he did, he will
probably be watching the road to see if we come through.”
“That’s right,” declared Nara. “We’d better keep a sharp lookout when we
reach that portage.”
“Serbot may be watching for us,” agreed Mr. Brewster, “but he won’t be
able to make trouble for us there.”
“After what he’s already done,” argued Nara, “he might give us trouble
anywhere.”
When they reached Sanariapo, the tiny village at the head of the upper
rapids, Biff and Kamuka noticed some natives watching Igo and Ubi carry
sacks of ore up over the sloping rock between the river and the highway,
where transport trucks were waiting to load the boats as well as the
cargo.
The boys reported this to Biff’s father, who talked with the truck
drivers and learned that the hangers-on were simply hoping to pick up a
few _bolivars_ in Venezuelan money by helping load the trucks. But that
didn’t satisfy Joe Nara.
“If they can’t make a _bolivar_ one way,” he argued, “they may try
another. Like telling people about our gold ore.”
“Here at Sanariapo,” stated Mr. Brewster, “there is no one for them to
tell.”
“They might pass the word along to Puerto Ayacucho, below the lower
rapids,” returned Nara. “I’ll go ahead on the first truck with Igo and
Ubi, so I can check on any rumors.”
It took most of the day to make trucking arrangements, and to transport
boats as well as cargo over the modern highway that spans the
intervening streams on big steel bridges. Biff found the trip
interesting, with stretches of open country and barren hills as well as
wooded slopes and forested areas.
The highway followed the right bank of the Orinoco, which belongs to
Venezuela, while the land on the other side of the river is part of the
Republic of Colombia. At Puerto Ayacucho, they found Igo and Ubi waiting
to load the ore sacks into Nara’s _monteria_, when it arrived. But there
was no sign of Nara.
According to Igo and Ubi, Nara had gone somewhere immediately after
arriving in Puerto Ayacucho. But Mr. Brewster, inquiring at stores,
hotels, and elsewhere, was unable to find anyone who had even seen the
old white-haired prospector.
“The only place left,” Mr. Brewster declared, chuckling, “is the
governor’s office. Maybe Joe Nara is having lunch with His Excellency.
Should we try there?”
“I don’t think so,” returned Hal Whitman dryly. “From the way Nara looks
for trouble, we might do better if we asked at the local calaboose.”
Mr. Brewster smiled at that reference to the town jail.
“I’ve already asked there,” he said. Then, turning to the boys, he
added, “Look around for Nara, and if you don’t have any luck, I guess
we’ll have to call on the governor’s office to help us find him.”
Kamuka noticed some natives lounging near an old shack on the high bank
of the river.
“Maybe they have seen Senhor Nara,” Kamuka said to Biff. “But you will
have to ask them. They do not speak Portuguese as I do. They talk
Spanish, which you understand.”
When they approached the group, Biff addressed the nearest native, who
was huddled by the wall, his chin buried deep in his red bandanna
neckerchief and his gaze turned toward the river.
“_Oiga, amigo_,” began Biff. “_Soy buscando un viejo son pelo bianco_—”
Biff was saying that he was looking for an old man with white hair, but
he got no further. The slouchy native came to his feet and spun about
with a snarl.
As Biff dropped back, he found himself staring into the vicious, hawkish
face of Urubu!