CHAPTER V
SHIPWRECK
About the middle of the morning there sounded through the still air adistant boom, which grew louder until finally it became a crashing roar.Beyond a bend in the river stretched before them a long gorge. There thestream had narrowed, and, rushing across a ledge shaped like ahorseshoe, foamed and roared and beat its way among the great boulders.The paddlers brought their craft into smooth water under an overhangingbank while they held a council of war. Professor Ditson had never beenon the Rio Negros before, nor had Pinto followed it farther thanTreasure Rock. For a long time the whole party carefully studied thedistant rapids.
"What do you think?" whispered Will to Joe.
The Indian boy, who had paddled long journeys on the rivers and seas ofthe far Northwest, shook his head doubtfully.
"Can do in a bark canoe," he said at last; "but in this thing--I don'tknow."
Pinto and Hen both feared the worst in regard to anything which had todo with Black River. It was Professor Ditson who finally made thedecision.
"It would take us weeks," he said, "to cut a trail through the forestsand portage this boat around. One must take some chances in life. Thereseems to be a channel through the very center of the horseshoe. Let'sgo!"
For the first time during the whole trip old Jud looked at his rivaladmiringly.
"The old bird has some pep left, after all," he whispered to Will. "Iwant 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 thangood management."
Under Professor Ditson's instructions, Pinto took the bow paddle, whileHen paddled stern, with Will and Joe on one side and Jud and theprofessor on the other. Then all the belongings of the party wereshifted so as to ballast the unwieldy craft as well as possible, and inanother moment they shot out into the swift current. Faster and fasterthe trees and banks flashed by, like the screen of a motion picture. Noteven a fleck of foam broke the glassy surface of the swirling current.With smooth, increasing speed, the river raced toward the rapids whichroared and foamed ahead, while swaying wreaths of white mist, shotthrough with rainbow colors, floated above the welter of raging watersand the roar of the river rose to shout. Beyond, a black horseshoe ofrock stretched from one bank to the other in a half-circle, and in frontof it sharp ridges and snags showed like black fangs slavered with thefoam of the river's madness.
In another second the boat shot into the very grip of these jaws ofdeath. Standing with his lithe, copper-colored body etched against thefoam of the rapids, the Mundurucu held the lives of every one of theparty in his slim, powerful hands. Accustomed from boyhood to thehandling of the river-boats of his tribe through the most dangerous ofwaters, he stood that day like the leader of an orchestra, directingevery movement of those behind him, with his paddle for a baton. Only acrew of the most skilled paddlers had a chance in that wild water; andsuch a crew was obedient to the Indian. In the stern, the vast strengthof the giant negro swung the montaria into the course which the bowpaddler indicated by his motions, while the other four, watching hisevery movement, were quick to paddle or to back on their respectivesides. At times, as an unexpected rock jutted up before him in the foam,the Indian would plunge his paddle slantwise against the current andwould hold the boat there for a second, until the paddlers could swingit, as on a fulcrum, out of danger. Once the craft was swept withtremendous force directly at an immense boulder, against which the watersurged and broke.
To Jud and the boys it seemed as if Pinto had suddenly lost his controlof the montaria, for, instead of trying to swing out of the grip of thecurrents that rushed upon the rock, he steered directly at its face. TheMundurucu, however, knew his business. Even as Jud tensed his musclesfor the crash, the rebound and undertow of the waters, hurled back fromthe face of the rock, caught the boat and whirled it safely to one sideof the boulder. In and out among the reefs and fangs of rock theMundurucu threaded the boat so deftly, and so well did his crew behindhim respond, that in all that tumult of dashing waves the heavy craftshipped no water outside of the flying spray.
In another minute they were clear of the outlying reefs and ledges andspeeding toward the single opening in the black jaw of rock that layahead 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 therock was a little fall, not five feet high, hidden by the spray. AsPinto passed through the narrow opening he swung the bow of the boatdiagonally so as to catch the smoother current toward the right-handbank 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. TheIndian tried to straighten his course, but it was too late. In aninstant the boat had struck at an angle the rushing water beyond, with aforce that nearly drove it below the surface. Before it could rightitself, the rush of the current from behind struck it broadside, and inanother second the montaria, half-filled with the water which it hadshipped, capsized, and its crew were struggling in the current.
It was Hen Pine who reached the river first. When he saw that the boatwas certain to upset he realized that his only chance for life was toreach smooth water. Even while the montaria was still in mid-air hesprang far out toward the bank, where a stretch of unbroken current setin toward a tiny cape, beyond which it doubled back into a chaos oftossing, foaming water where not even the strongest swimmer would have achance for life. Hen swam with every atom of his tremendous strength, inorder 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 heswam the river-crawl which he had learned from Indian swimmers. For aninstant it seemed as if he would lose, for when nearly abreast of thelittle cape several feet of racing current still lay between him andsafety. Sinking his head far under the water, he put every ounce ofstrength into three strokes, the last of which shot him just near enoughto the bank to grip a tough liana which dangled like a rope from anoverhanging tree-top. Pinto, who was next, although no mean swimmer,would never have made the full distance, yet managed to grasp one ofHen's brawny legs, which stretched far out into the current.
"You hold on," he muttered to the great negro; "we make a monkey-bridgeand save them all."
Hen only nodded his head and took a double turn of the lianas aroundeach arm. Professor Ditson was the next one to win safety, for the twoboys were staying by Jud, who was a most indifferent swimmer. As theprofessor's long, thin legs dangled out into the current like a pair oftongs, with a desperate stroke Will caught one of his ankles, and wasgripped in turn by Joe, and Jud locked both of his arms around thelatter's knees, while the swift river tossed his gray hair and beardalong its surface. As the full force of the current caught this humanchain it stretched and sagged ominously. Then each link tightened up andprepared to hold as long as flesh and blood could stand the strain.
"Go ahead, Jud!" gasped Will over his shoulder; "pull yourself alonguntil you get to shore; then Joe will follow, and then I. Onlyhurry--the professor won't be able to hold on much longer, nor Hen tostand the strain."
"Don't hurry on my account," sounded the precise voice of ProfessorDitson 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 allsteel and whipcord.
"Same here!" bellowed Hen, his magnificent body stretched out throughthe 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 handalong the living bridge until he too had a grip on one of the danglinglianas. He was followed by link after link of the human chain until theywere all safe at the edge of the bank. Hen was the first to scramble upand give the others a helping hand, and a moment later all six of thetreasure-seekers stood safe on the high ridge of the little promontoryand sadly watched the boat which had borne them so well smash into amass of floating, battered planks among the rocks and disappear do
wn thecurrent. Along with it went their guns, their ammunition, and theirsupplies.
Jud alone retained the automatic revolver which he always wore, with acouple of clips holding sixteen cartridges, besides the eight in thecylinder. Hen also could not be termed weaponless, for he still wore hismachete; while Will had a belt-ax, Joe a light hatchet, and ProfessorDitson a sheath-knife. Besides these, the Indian had his bambootinder-box and flint and steel, which he always wore in his belt. Theseand the jack-knives and a few miscellaneous articles which they happenedto have in their pockets or fastened to their belts comprised the wholeequipment of the party.
Before them stretched a hundred miles of uncharted jungle, infested bydangerous beasts and wandering cannibal tribes, through which they mustpass to reach the old Slave Trail. Half that distance behind them wasthe Amazon. If once they could find their way back to that great riverand camp on its banks, sooner or later a boat would go by which wouldtake them back to Manaos. This, however, might mean weeks of delay andperhaps the abandonment of the whole trip. As they stood upon a whitesand-bank far enough back from the river so that the roar of the rapidsno longer deafened them, it was Pinto who spoke first.
"Master," he said to Professor Ditson, "it is no time for council. Letus have fire and food first. A man thinks more wisely with his head whenhis stomach is warm and full."
"I'll say the man is right," said Jud, shivering a little in his wetclothes as the coolness of the approaching night began to be feltthrough the forest; "but where is that same fire and food goin' to comefrom?"
Pinto's answer was to scrape shavings from the midrib of a drypalm-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 carryless than a century and a half ago. Taking out from this an old file anda bit of black flint, with a quick glancing blow he sent half a dozensparks against a dry strip of feltlike substance found only in the nestsof certain kinds of ants. In a minute a deep glow showed from the end ofthis tinder, and, placing it under the pile of shavings, Pinto blewuntil the whole heap was in a light blaze. Hastily piling dry wood ontop of this, he left to the others the task of keeping the fire goingand, followed by Will, hurried through the jungle toward the toweringfronds of a peach-palm, which showed above the other trees. Twistingtogether two or three lianas, the Indian made from them a light, strongbelt. This he slipped around himself and the tree, and, gripping it inboth hands, began to walk up the rough trunk, leaning against thisgirdle and pushing it up with each step, until, sixty feet from theground, 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 peacha 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 theirbacks. Stripping off the thick husk, Pinto exposed a soft kernel which,when roasted on the coals, tasted like a delicious mixture of cheese andchestnuts.
When at last all the members of the party were full-fed and dry, thewisdom of Pinto's counsel was evident. Every one was an optimist; and,after all, the best advice in life comes from optimists. Even Pinto andHen 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 thequestion.
"Forward!" voted Will.
"Forward!" grunted Joe.
Jud seemed less positive.
"I sure would hate to go back," he said, "after old Jim Donegan hadgrub-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 onjudicially, "there's a hundred miles of unexplored forests between usand the perfesser's trail, if there is any such thing. We've lost ourguns; we've no provisions; we're likely to run across bands of rovingcannibals; lastly, it may take us months to cut our way through thisjungle. 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, whohad never done anything else all his life. "My idea is to always look atthe dangers--an' then go ahead."
"What about me?" objected Hen. "I ain't a-goin' to cut no hundred milesof 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 asour northern whip-poor-will, but Hen was much amused.
"You hear what the bird say, you John Pinto. Get busy and cut wood," helaughed, 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 inless than a week, better than the one we lost. Then we not have to cutour 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 itcurved upward into a high, dry bluff. There, on soft white sand abovethe mosquito-belt, they slept the sleep of exhaustion. It was aftermidnight 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 thatflamed green through the darkness. In the half-light of the setting moonhe saw, standing almost over him, a heavily built animal as big as asmall lion. Yet the short, upcurved tail and the rosettes of blackagainst the gold of his skin showed the visitor to be none other thanthat terror of the jungle, the great jaguar, which in pioneer days usedto come as far north as Arkansas and is infinitely more to be fearedthan the panthers which our forefathers dreaded so. This one had none ofthe lithe grace of the cougars which Will had met during the quest ofthe Blue Pearl, but gave him the same impression of stern tremendousstrength and girth that a lion possesses.
All of these details came to Will the next day. At that moment, as hesaw the great round head of this king of the South American forestwithin a foot of his own, he was probably the worst scared boy on theSouth American continent. Will knew that a jaguar was able to drag afull-grown ox over a mile, and that this one could seize him by thethroat, flirt his body over one shoulder, and disappear in the junglealmost before he could cry out. The great beast seemed, however, to beonly mildly interested in him. Probably he had fed earlier in theevening.
Even as Will stared aghast into the gleaming eyes of the great cat, hesaw, out of the corner of his eye, Jud's right hand stealing toward hisleft shoulder. The old trapper, as usual, was wide awake when any dangerthreatened. Before, however, he had time to reach his automatic,Professor Ditson, equally watchful from his side, suddenly clapped hishands together sharply, close to the jaguar's pricked-up ears. Theeffect was instantaneous. With a growl of alarm, the great beast sprangbackward 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 cockedrevolver in one hand, "he would have killed the boy and both of usbefore he died himself." And the professor lay down again to resume hisinterrupted slumbers.
It was this occurrence which started a discussion the next morning inregard to weapons, offensive and defensive.
"I 'low," said Hen Pine, making his heavy machete swing through the airas he whirled it around his head, "that I can stop anything I meet withthis '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 ofBrazil-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, shootingwithout sighting, with that
strange sixth sense of position which someof the great revolver-shots of a past generation used to acquire. Therewas a flash, a sharp spat, and the case of nuts about twice the size ofa man's fist came whizzing to the ground. Hen stared at the old trapperwith 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 hatchetwhich he always carried, poised himself with his left foot forward, and,whirling the little weapon over his head, sent it hurtling through theair toward the same Brazil-nut tree. The little ax buzzed like a beeand, describing a high curve, buried itself clear to the head in thesoft bark. Picking up a couple of heavy round stones, Will put himselfinto a pitching position and sent one whizzing in a low straight pegwhich hardly rose at all and which struck the tree close to Joe'shatchet with a smack which would have meant a broken bone for any man orbeast that it struck; for, as Joe had found out when the two werepursued 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 mostspectacular exhibition of all. Standing before them, lean and gaunt, hesuddenly reached to his belt and drew out a keen, bone-handled,double-edged sheath-knife. Poising this flat on the palm of his hand, hethrew it, with a quick jerk, with much the same motion of acricket-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 ofWill's stone and the head of Joe's hatchet.
"When I was a very young man," the professor explained, embarrassed, "Iattained a certain amount of proficiency with the bowie-knife."
"I'll say you did!" exclaimed Jud, as he worked the knife out of thetough bark. "Any cannibal that comes within fifty yards of this party isliable to be chopped an' stabbed an' broken an' shot--to say nothin' ofHen'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 withoutany noise."
Borrowing Joe's hatchet, he disappeared into the woods, to come backhalf an hour later with a nine-foot stick of some hard, hollow, lightwood about an inch in diameter, straight as an arrow, and with a centerof soft pith. Laying this down on a hard stump, Pinto, with the utmostcare, split the whole length into halves. Then, fumbling in his belt hepulled from it one of the sharp teeth of the paca, that curious reddishrodent which is half-way in size and appearance between a hog and a hareand which is equally at home on land and in water, and whose two-inchcutting-teeth are among the favorite ready-made tools of all SouthAmerican Indians. With one of these Pinto carefully hollowed out eachsection of the stick, smoothing and polishing the concave surface untilit was like glass. Then, fitting the two halves together, he wound themspirally with a long strip of tape which he made from the tough, supplewood 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 toothof a mouse, which he pressed down until only a fleck of shining ivoryshowed as a sight above the black surface of the tube. At the other endhe 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 thedeadly blow-gun of the Mundurucu Indians. For arrows, Pinto cut tinystrips from the flinty leaf-stalks of palm-leaves. These he scrapeduntil the end of each was as sharp as a needle. Then he feathered themwith little oval masses of silk from the seed-vessels of silk-cottontrees, whose silk is much fluffier and only about half the weight ofordinary cotton. In a short time he had made a couple of dozen of thesearrows, each one of which fitted exactly to the bore of the blow-gun,and also fashioned for himself a quiver of plaited grasses, which hewore suspended from his shoulder with a strip of the palm tape.
Late in the afternoon he made another trip into the forest, returningwith a mass of bark scraped from a tree called by the Indians_mavacure_, but which the white settlers in South America have named thepoison tree. This bark he wet in the river, and then pounded it betweentwo stones into a mass of yellowish fibers, which he placed in a funnelmade of a plantain-leaf. Under this he set one of the aluminum cupswhich each of the party carried fastened to his belt. This done, hepoured in cold water and let the mass drip until the cup was full of ayellow liquid, which he heated over a slow fire. When it thickened hepoured in some of the milky juice of another near-by tree, which turnedthe mixture black. When it had boiled down to a thick gummy mass, Pintowrapped it up carefully in a palm-leaf, after first dipping every one ofhis arrows into the black compound.
So ended the making of the famous urari arrow-poison, which few whitemen indeed have ever seen brewed. When it was safely put away, Pintocarefully fitted one of the tiny arrows into the mouthpiece and raisedthe blow-gun to his mouth, holding it with both hands touching eachother just beyond the mouthpiece, instead of extending his left arm, asa white man would hold a gun. Even as he raised the long tube, therecame a crashing through the near-by trees, and the party looked up tosee a strange sight. Rushing along the branches came a palegreenish-gray lizard, marked on the sides with black bars and fully sixfeet in length. Along its back ran a crest of erect spines. Even as itslong 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 pairwent 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 swiftglides of the reptile, and in a tree-top some fifty yards away theiguana turned at bay. In spite of its size and the threatening, horribleappearance of its uplifted spines, the coati made short work of it,worrying it like a dog, and finally breaking its spine. Even as its longbulk hung lifeless from the powerful jaws of the animal, Pinto drew adeep breath and, sighting his long tube steadily toward the distantanimal, drove his breath through the mouthpiece with all his force.There followed a startling pop, and a white speck flashed through theair toward the coati. A second later, the latter, still holding the deadiguana, gave a spring as if struck by something, and started off againthrough the tree-tops, the great body of the dead lizard trailingbehind. Suddenly the coati began to go slower and slower and thenstopped short. Its head drooped. First one paw and then another relaxed,until, with a thud, the coati and iguana struck the ground together bothstone-dead. The boys rushed over and found Pinto's tiny, deadly arrowembedded deep in the coati's side. Less than a minute had passed sinceit 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 abed of coals, Hen made good his words about their eating qualities. Thecoati tasted like roast 'possum, while the flesh of the giant lizard wasas white and tender as chicken.
"I feel as if I was eatin' a dragon," grumbled Jud, coming back for athird helping.
Followed a week of hard work for all. Under Pinto's directions, takingturns with Jud's ax, they cut down a yellow stonewood tree, which wasalmost as hard and heavy as its name. Out of the trunk they shaped a logsome nineteen feet in length and three feet through, which, withinfinite pains and with lianas for ropes, they dragged on rollers to thewater's edge. Then, with enormous labor, working by shifts with Joe'shatchet, Jud's ax, and Hen's machete, they managed to hollow out thegreat 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 Iwork 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 toldoff to hunt for the rest of that day. It was Jud who first came acrossgame, a scant half-mile from camp, meeting there an animal which is oneof the strangest still left on earth and which, along with the duck-billof Australia and the great armadillo, really belongs to a
past age,before man came to earth, but by some strange accident has survived tothis day.
In front of him, digging in a dry bank with enormous curved claws, wasan animal over six feet in length and about two feet in height. It hadgreat hairy legs, and a tremendous bushy tail, like a vast plume, curledover its back. Its head ended in a long, tapering, toothless snout, fromwhich was thrust constantly a wormlike, flickering tongue, while a broadoblique stripe, half gray and half black, showed on either side.
"There ain't no such animal," murmured Jud to himself, examining thestranger 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 broughtto bay, when it stood with its back against the bank, swinging its longsnout back and forth and making a little whining noise. Jud was about tostep 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 camethe fatal pop, and the next second one of the tiny arrows was embeddedlike a thorn in the side of the monster's snout. For a moment the greatant-eater tried to dislodge the tiny pointed shaft with his enormousclaws. Then he stopped, stood motionless for a while, swayed from sideto side, and sank dead without a sound or struggle. With the help ofJud's ax and his own knife, the Indian soon quartered and dressed thegreat beast and an hour later the two staggered back to camp loaded downwith a supply of meat which, when roasted, tasted much like tender pork.
"Now," said Jud, smacking his lips after a full meal, "bring on yourwork!"
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