Tears of the River

by Gordon L. Rottman

  Finding a spot of dead water, she studied the rapids. The crew looked on with concern. The river was noticeably lower since the day before. Logs, limbs, brush, and entire trees had piled up on bottom obstructions creating a massive logjam with water rushing through and over it all. Tons of debris spanned the river and stretched out of sight around the next bend. On the outside of the bend, the deepest part of the channel, the water was still flowing through. They could run it, she thought.

  As they approached the channel edging the left shore she saw it would not be so easy. It was a clear flow, but not deep enough to float the boat. Limbs and stumps thrust out of the water.

  Nuzzling the Huck Finn onto a shallow gravel ledge, Karen climbed out, letting Jay take over the oars. The strong shin-deep flow made it hard to stay on her feet as she scouted the route. There were pools clear of obstructions the boat would float in, but they’d have to drag it over parts.

  Karen was looking at Lomara when the girl cocked her head, as through hearing something over the river’s rumbling rush. The girl turned to the left and pointed steeply upward. Karen, realizing what Lomara saw before she even turned, spun around and was looking up at an airplane.

  She dove into the boat scrambling for her pack. She had placed the mirror in the top, easy to grab. The plane was high, a small twin-engine. It was about to pass them. The river’s noise had drowned the sound of its approach.

  She stretched her left arm out making a “V” with two fingers and held the plane in the point of the “V.” Holding the mirror in her right hand in front of her face she aimed the reflected sunbeam through the “V” trying to aim it toward the plane. Lowering her left arm, she wiggled the mirror hoping its flashing would attract eyes. Lomara was waving her arms and shouting, ¡El avión, el avión! —The plane, the plane! Jay was yelling at the top of his lungs.

  It was past them, its soft drone fading as its passing left them behind the flyers’ field of vision.

  She slowly lowered the mirror. The plane had not turned or wiggled its wings. It relentlessly continued on eastward. It was so high Karen doubted it was a search plane. It might be heading for Puerto Cabezas, their own destination. The disheartened crew stared at the diminishing dot until it vanished.

  Jay was the only one to say anything. “Stupid pilot, why didn’t he keep his eyes open? Why didn’t…”

  “Leave it, Jay.”

  “He should have…”

  “Leave it! He didn’t look. I bet he’s not looking for us. You’ll only upset the others.”

  He shut up, glumly staring at the logjam.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  The disappointment made a hole in Karen’s chest. They faced the logjam. A bitter string of thought skulked through her mind. There is no telling what else lies ahead of us. We have no choice. There is no turning back, no stopping. We can only keep going.

  She bit back the bile wanting simply to throw up. We are so totally alone. But the plane’s disregard of them confirmed a reality. The only way we’re getting out of this is what we do for ourselves.

  Karen broke the silence and inactivity by putting the mirror back into the pack. “Tenemos trabajo que hacer.”— We have work to do.

  Tía sadly nodded. Jay kept staring into the empty sky. Lomara looked at Karen with wide concerned eyes.

  “Está bien, Chiquita.”

  Tía said some quiet words to the girl and nodded at Karen.

  Karen shook herself mentally. She couldn’t afford to dwell on the disappointment, to think about “what-ifs.” She attached the doubled towing strap to the bow cleat.

  “Jay, you ever see an old movie called The African Queen?”

  “Never heard of it.”

  “Good.”

  He looked at her perplexed.

  “Because if you’d seen it you really wouldn’t like what we’re going to do.” She tried to make it sound light. “We’re going to pull the boat through these pools.”

  “You know I can’t swim.”

  “You don’t have to swim, just pull.”

  “I can’t believe we’re doing this.”

  Anger flashed through Karen’s mind like a lightning bolt. “You don’t believe! Just what part of starving and being stranded in the jungle don’t you believe? You don’t believe that Johnny and Jennifer and all those people are dead? You don’t believe those guys kidnapped you and were going to use you for a mule?”

  He looked like she’d just thrown scalding water in his face. “A mule?”

  “Let me know when you finally believe we’re in deep doo-doo. Now get over here and strap up!”

  “Karen, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it that way.”

  Tía glared at her.

  “Okay, look, I’m sorry. It’s just that some of the things you say set me off.”

  “Well excuse me. I’ll just keep my mouth shut!”

  “That’s not what I mean.”

  “Sounds like it to me,” he shouted.

  She lowered herself over the side. “Get in the water and cool off. We’re wasting time.”

  Side-by-side they had the strap looped around their waists and they pulled, dragging the boat through the ankle-deep shallows. It was afloat at times. Then they’d be wading waist-deep and then dragging once more. At one point they pulled a couple of logs out of the way.

  Dragging yet again and then wading through pools, Karen was intensely aware of Jay’s closeness as they pressed together bound by the strap around their waists. She felt a warming intimacy. He didn’t show any sign of…well, she didn’t know what she expected him to show. I’m getting loopy, she thought. One pool was so deep that Jay had to board the boat and row across as Karen hung onto the stern. Then they were pulling again.

  Sitting on the edge of a pool, submerged to her waist, she took a breather. Jay handed her a water bottle. They were soon back to dragging. As they pressed on, the rushing sound swelled.

  In a large pool, Karen swam ahead to find a route through the jumbled logs. She found the unexpected. A ten to fifteen-foot wide channel of whitewater gushed along the left bank. The torrent ran for two-hundred feet before it tumbled into the clear river ahead.

  She’d never run anything like this. The hurdling dirty white foam and spray was created by logs, stumps, and snags barely beneath the water. Some thrust up like broken telephone poles, any of which would shatter the Huck Finn if it dashed against them.

  Karen and Jay climbed back into the boat and sat panting. They were too weak for this amount of exertion. No one said anything of the torrent ahead, but concern showed in their eyes.

  She slumped on the seat, spent. “I can’t do this anymore,” she said aloud. “What else?”

  The crew was looking at her. Tía appeared to have understood what she said. Her eyes seemed clear. She glared into Karen’s eyes. “Sé fuerte, Karena. Sólo tu puedes salvarnos.” —Be strong, Karena. Only you can save us.

  So there it is, thought Karen. I have no choices. I’ve got to pull us through. The water gushed down the stream-like trough. There was a crack as a hung log snapped off under the water’s force.

  “Okay.”

  “What are you going to do?” asked Jay.

  Karen shook her head and eyed every foot of the trough. The rushing green foam-streaked water showed a clear path, but the ugly black wet logs jutting out of the margins scared her. The water’s surge might hurl the boat right into one at high-speed.

  They had no choice but to run it. The river-wide jam was an impassable tangle of logs, trees, limbs, and stumps, except for this trough-like channel paralleling the left shore. But it wouldn’t be they who’d run it, it’d be her. She sat thinking, knowing she was burning valuable daylight.

  If they all rode in the boat and hit one of those bone-shattering logs they’d be dashed like bugs hitting a car windshield. If the rest of the crew walked down the bank to the trough’s end and took all the gear, they’d survive even if she didn’t. Of course she tried not to think about what would become of
them if she didn’t make it. Boatless, without her help, stranded on a remote shoreline. The thought sickened her. Maybe it would be better for all of them to be dashed into the logs; a quicker end. Don’t think like that, she chastised herself.

  Looking at the torrent, she thought it was doable. The boat would be much lighter with three people and all the gear put ashore. It would draw less water and the rudder would respond quicker allowing her to maneuver better, to avoid those killer logs.

  What it really boiled down to was that she, they, didn’t have a choice. They had to make their way down the river no matter the obstacle.

  She looked at Jay. “I’m going to run the boat through this.”

  “That’s insane. Look at that!”

  “I have. It’s doable.”

  Jay stammered, “I don’t know if I can do…”

  “You don’t have to. I’m doing it.”

  She beached the boat and explained her plan using words and sign language. There was no doubt in her mind that Tía understood the consequences if Karen didn’t make it. Jay kept shaking his head. “You’re nuts, Supergirl.”

  “Probably. And stop calling me that.”

  It may have been only a couple of hundreds of feet along the shore to the far end of the channel, but with dense undergrowth on the steep sloping bank it was particularly difficult to walk on forcing them to hang onto tree trunks and branches. They hung all the bags and packs on the old carrying pole and Karen and Jay trudged off slashing a path with the machete. Their feet slipped in the matted, layered leaves and they smelled leaf mold and mildewed mustiness. Reaching the channel’s end, they grounded the pole. Karen checked out the jetting funnel from that end’s perspective. They headed back, further clear-cutting the trail.

  Jay carried the spears on the second trip and helped Tía. Clouds of biting gnats and mosquitoes, roused from their daytime slumber beneath leaves, swarmed around them. The woman made it okay, but it was wearisome. She sat against a tree, breathing hard. Everyone was sweat-drenched after the short trip. Karen had them tip up water bottles.

  “Jay, I need you to be ready to throw me the rope after I make it to this end. The current’s going to be too strong for me the row back up. ” Or to recover my body, but she didn’t say that.

  “You’re really going to do this.”

  She looked at him and shook her head. He still didn’t get it. Sometimes there was no choice.

  She tied the rope to the tree so it wouldn’t be lost and drank some water.

  Tía started the crew collecting wood to load into the boat once through the chute. Tía was exhausted, but she was still thinking ahead. Collecting firewood would keep the crew occupied and they’d not have to do it at a campsite.

  She turned to head back to the boat.

  “Karen.”

  “Yeah?”

  Jay caught her hand. Her impulse was to pull away, but she was scared and his grip felt good.

  “You better make it.” She saw it in his eyes. He was scared too.

  “I don’t have a choice.” She tugged her hand. He gripped it harder and took her other hand.

  “You come back.”

  “I will,” she said gazing into his jade green eyes. She turned away as he gave her hands a final squeeze.

  At the boat, Karen dunked herself in the big pool, then securely tied down the two oars after maneuvering the boat to position it for the run. Trying to steer with the oars over the sides would be impossible. They’d be snapped off or torn from her hands by snags. She had to steer with the stern oar, a less than ideal alternative. Karen rigged the third oar in the U-shaped notch in the transom.

  Sculling with the oar, Karen positioned the boat at the funnel’s mouth. No sense in delaying the inevitable. Her resolve was liquefying.

  “It’s a water park ride, okay?” Karen told herself. That didn’t help.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  She felt the current’s tug pulling her toward the roaring flue. With a sickening lunge she was sucked into the chute and gripped the rudder-oar for all she was worth, jamming her feet against the seat forward of her.

  There was a hard drop and sheets of spray hit her. The flat-bottom boat rode high virtually skimming the water. There were gut-jarring thumps and jolts as the boat banged into logs beneath the water. She felt the old thrill of a whitewater run, but it didn’t drown out her shrieking fear. The water’s din was reflected by the walling jungle. Water eddied around a protruding stump, broken spike-like roots jutted out. She hadn’t seen the obstacle from either vantage point. The boat plowed into the ugly menace, lunged trying to snag it, and then jolted forward with a grinding screech of wood-on-wood. There was a bump and sideways jerk like a theme park ride. Water flooded over the bow as it dipped, rose up sloshing the water back at her and dipped again taking on a sheet of green foaming water. The boat rode deeper now—not good. Jolting through the chute, ahead Karen saw the big black log and felt she was in an out-of-control car tearing toward a telephone pole. She desperately pushed the rudder right to swerve the lumbering boat left—but not so much that it would careen into the log and limb-littered left bank. As the vertical log rushed toward her she instinctively leaned left. The boat’s right bow glanced off the menacing log with a jolt and banged into a prone log on the left bank. With bumps and thumps, the boat funneled through the trough to be spit out into the broad river.

  Karen had felt thrill and fear at the same time, but there was no time to marvel or congratulate herself. The boat was scooting down the river pushed by the trough’s momentum with eddies swirling around her leaving her companions behind. She pushed the steering-oar hard to the right turning the boat left and broadside to the current slowing her to the river’s speed. Leaping forward and fumbling, everything was wet and water sloshed in the bottom; she untied the oars and jammed them into the oarlocks. Turning the boat back upstream was easy, but pulling the water-laden boat against the current proved a challenge. That’s when she saw water welling up in the flooded bottom; a bad leak.

  She had to pull hard and rapidly to make any headway. Slacking off for even a moment she was only able to hold her place. This was not the sluggish river’s current here. She was rowing into the funneled flow pouring out the trough. She had to pull into the shore below the trough’s mouth, but the flood was jetting out parallel with the shore.

  Struggling against the flow and facing downstream, it was difficult to gauge her progress. She was to the point of giving up hope of making it all the way back to the crew as the flow strengthened with each frantic sweep of the oars. Now she faced the problem of beaching. The current pushed the boat away from the shore and she was unable to ground it.

  Low trees overhung the riverbank. A limb brushed her and there was a bustling sound in the leaves. A snake slithered over her shoulder sending her leaping sternward with a screech, swatting wildly at the squirming creature.

  “¡Hermana, el mecate!” The shout came from the brushy bank.

  Rolling onto her back and frantically flailing her arms, Karen realized Lomara had shouted something about a rope. The snake was magically vanished replaced by a rope thrown by Jay.

  Feeling silly, Karen turned the rope around the bow cleat with shaking hands. Jay tugged on the rope with Lomara lending her tiny hands. A happy thrill flooded through Karen, the girl had called her hermana—sister!

  She leaped over the bow and helped pull the boat onto the bank’s lip. Tying off the rope they secured the stern to a tree with the towing strap.

  Jay suddenly grabbed her around the waist and pulled her to him.

  Oh gosh!

  “You scared the daylights out of me!”

  “That makes two of us.” She brought her hands to his chest. “You’re shocking Lomara.”

  “So.”

  “Jay, not a good idea.” And I don’t know what’s going on here.

  He let her go, but caught and squeezed her hands again. Her fingertips got all tingly and her mind all tangled up. Stay focused on the
job, she warned herself.

  “Lomara and I ran down here to get the rope to you.”

  They pulled the boat almost a hundred feet back to where Tía sat against a tree with the gear.

  Tía was in pain, but she started with, “Fuiste valiente…” —You were brave…

  Karen held up her hand shaking her head, “No, no fui valiente, Tía.”

  Jay and Karen carried the gear to the boat and returned for Tía and the girl.

  The leak had to be dealt with before they could go on. They bailed out the Nuestra Esperanza and beached her. It was a quarter-size hole splintered around its edge. Karen chose a soft wood limb of the right diameter and cut a tapered dowel three inches long. Turning the boat on its side, she gently tapped in the dowel until it was solidly lodged. Drying the inside, she taped around the plug; sloppy, but it looked solid. It only took twenty minutes.

  With everyone and everything reloaded, Karen tossed the rope and strap into the boat and came aboard over the bow shoving off. Jay took over the oars, for which Karen was grateful. Her arms were like jelly and her tummy still fluttered—the boat ride or Jay? Both, she guessed.

  Karen took her place in the stern on the rudder-oar. Everyone settled into their places. It had taken them four hours to negotiate the logjam, a third of the day’s daylight, a waste they couldn’t afford. Keep an eye on the plug, she reminded herself.

  She muttered to herself, “Just let it go. I…we, made it. There’s too much ahead of us for me to worry about what could have happened. Keep thinking ahead. Be ready for whatever’s coming next.”

  Tía was gazing at Karen with a puzzled look, no doubt wondering why she rambled to herself.

  Jay squinted his eyes at her. “What did you say?”

  “Just a note to myself.”

  “Una sanguijuela, Karena,” Tía said.

  That was something to do with blood. “¿Mande?”