Amazon Nights: Classic Adventure Tales from the Pulps

by Arthur O. Friel

  That night neither of us ate well. Our stomachs did not want the usual ration of dried pirarucu and farinha. So we devoured the rest of the fruit and were satisfied.

  Before dawn I awoke to hear Pedro moaning softly in his sleep. He had a bad dream, I thought. So I yelled and roused him, grumbled that he was disturbing me, turned over in my hammock and shut my eyes again. He said nothing, and I slept almost at once.

  When next I looked around me it was day, and my partner was sitting up and holding his head in his hands. He only grunted when I spoke.

  I got breakfast, but he would eat none. This was so uncommon that I looked sharply at him, finding his skin pale and his face drawn. But when I asked him what ailed him he said only that he had not slept well.

  We paddled away as usual, and all through the hot, sunny morning he said no word. His stroke lacked its regular power, and several times he stopped work and bent forward as if to favor his stomach. I grinned, thinking he had a touch of colic from eating too much fruit and was too stubborn to admit it. At last I snickered outright.

  "Poor little man!” I mocked. “Does his little belly ache? Perhaps he needs a little drink—"

  I did not finish. He groaned, wavered dizzily, and slumped into the bottom of the boat.

  This scared me. He was not the man to let anything overpower him as long as he had an ounce of fight left in him, and I realized that he must be very sick.

  As quickly as possible I got the boat to shore. There I found that his illness was not a mere ache of the stomach.

  He had fever. And it was not the ordinary jungle swamp-fever—which is bad enough—but a deadly sickness which burned and froze and griped and turned him inside out. When at last his spasms ceased he lay so limp that I thought him dead.

  He could not even whisper. He could not move. He lay like a corpse and he looked like one, and only the feeble throb of his heart and his shallow breathing told me that he still lived. And there was not a single thing that I could do to help him, for we had no medicine—not even a mouthful of rum to strengthen his heart.

  Squatting beside him, I tried in a dumb, dazed way to think of something I could do.

  He was more to me than anyone else in the world. He was far closer than a blood brother—he seemed a part of myself. A handsome, happy-hearted, boyish man, strong of hand and quick of thought and action, he had been my comrade in fair weather and foul, in times of merriment and times of deadly fight. Either of us would throw away his own life to save the other—yes, or endure torment worse than death, if by it the other might escape.

  And at that very moment I was in such torment of mind as I hope will never come to me again. I could not let him die, but it seemed that I could not aid him to live.

  At last I thought of a thing, though it seemed of little use. If I could find some pajemarioba, a bitter medicinal herb sometimes used by the Indians to make a sort of tea, it might start him to sweating and drive the fever out. The pajemarioba grows wild in many places, and some might be there.

  I started at once and hunted all about the spot where we were. But I found none.

  I came back to him just in time. He lay on the ground as I had left him, limp and motionless. And halfway out of the water, crawling up toward him, was a big alligator.

  I leaped at the beast in fury. It slewed and slid back under the surface. Then, lifting my partner, I laid him in the canoe and stroked swiftly away from that accursed place.

  As we went onward I watched along both sides, hoping to see a patch of pajemarioba on some point of land. The chance of finding it was poor, I knew, but it was all I could do, and at any rate I was doing something. So, hunting desperately for some sign of that herb, I kept on for I know not how long.

  At length I came into a place where the water widened out and met open shores covered with fine matupa grass, beyond which grew ferns and slim assai palms. I paddled slowly near one bank, thinking that here I might land and seek again for the pajemarioba. And while I looked around and thought it over, an astonishing thing came about.

  On the empty shore, a few feet from me, a voice spoke.

  "Ko tam baheh? What is that?"

  I started, looked at the spot whence the words had come, and saw no man. Nothing was there except thick tufts of grass, and the grass was not tall enough to conceal anyone unless he were lying down. Yet I was certain the voice had spoken at that place. Watching it steadily, I turned the canoe straight at it.

  But just as the bow touched shore the voice came again from another spot.

  "Bihpende hoh? Where are you going?"

  The question came from a small bush standing a foot or so above the grass and a few feet to my left. As before, no living thing was there—no living thing with a voice could be there. The bush was so thin that I could see through it, and beyond it was nothing except grass and trees.

  I felt a little chilly. Then I grew angry. If some man was there and making sport of me I would spoil his joke. Picking up my gun, I stepped ashore into mud that rose over my ankles, and through this I plowed straight to the bush.

  I found nothing at all. No man was there and no man had been there, for the mud held no tracks but my own.

  Then, as I scowled around me in wonder, a new thing came. It was a sound of singing.

  It seemed to be far away, yet very near—almost over my head, a clear, sweet song without words, up in the blank air above me. I stared upward, and, seeing that nothing but the sky was over me, I grew chilly again. Was I going mad? Was I, too, about to become delirious with fever? Was this a place of demons, where grass and bushes spoke and the air sang? I did not know. But I did know I wanted to get out of there. Turning, I sloshed back through the soft mud to the canoe.

  As I got into it the voice spoke once more. From the water near me rose the same question the spotted fisherman had asked:

  "Baah derekoh? What ails you?"

  For the first time I answered. With my eyes on Pedro I growled in Tupi:

  "Heraku. Fever."

  Then I shoved off. But a reply came that stopped me.

  "Ehe ahrahm. Che ahoh apuh ayuk. Wait. I will cure the sickness."

  This time the voice seemed to be heavier, more like that of a man; and it came from a place near the edge of the trees. I looked sharply at that spot, but saw no man there. For that matter, I did not expect to see anything human, after what had happened.

  But this weird voice had said it would cure Pedro, and if the great horned devil himself had risen beside me and given me that promise I would have embraced him. Holding the canoe still, I told the Thing to come to me.

  It answered that it could not come, for it had no body but was only a spirit. But if I would go and find a man who now was sleeping on the shore of a narrow neck of water beyond us, and would follow him, the fever should be driven out.

  That was all. I asked the Thing just where this man was, but got no reply. No sound of any kind came to me. The matupa grass, the bush, the water, the trees—all were vacant and silent. I drove my paddle into the water and heaved the dugout ahead.

  Pedro moaned, squirmed a little, and lay still. Looking at him, I shut my jaws and began watching along shore for any narrow water such as the Thing had told about. And soon, senhores, I found it. And I went into it, and under a tree I found a sleeping man.

  He was half-lying, half-sitting with his back against the tree trunk. His mouth hung open, and from it came a gurgling snore. But after I looked at him, I came near turning about and going away. No such creature as he, I thought, could ever cure Pedro.

  He was a greasy, bag-bellied barrigudo of an Indian. Hairy as a monkey he was, too, and the black hairs of his whole body were matted with clay, plastered on thickly to keep biting bugs from reaching his hide. The long, stringy hair of his head hung down over his face so far that I could see little of it, but what little I could make out looked blank and stupid.

  As I have said, I would have welcomed the devil himself if he had offered aid to my comrade; but the devi
l, senhores, has brains, while this creature looked as if he hardly knew enough to scratch an itch—a mere mass of fat, hair, and dirt.

  I grunted with disgust, and half-moved my paddle to push out and away. But just then the queer voice spoke again.

  "Hemba eah hy," it reminded me. “You are sick."

  It came from the tree, a little above the sleeping man. I looked first at the tree trunk, on which was nothing alive. Then my eye swerved again to Pedro. And instead of going away I drove the dugout to shore, stepped out, and prodded the human barrigudo with my paddle.

  His snoring ended. I caught the glint of eyes staring through his hair. He grunted, and the sound seemed to come from the depths of his belly. Then he sluggishly pushed himself up higher against the tree, yawned with a wheezing noise, and growled—

  "Baah derekoh?"

  "My mate has fever,” I answered, pointing at Pedro.

  He sat bunking. Then he yawned again.

  "Hembara ahreteh. I am very tired."

  And his head drooped as if he meant to go back to sleep.

  His callousness angered me. In one long stride I was at the canoe. In another I was back, with my cocked rifle in his face.

  "Get up, you filthy beast!” I snarled. “Get up and take care of my comrade, or the next alligator that comes here will find a fat feast awaiting him."

  He got up. Slowly, as if afraid he might touch the gun and discharge it, he rose and stood against the tree. When I lowered the weapon he waddled past me and stared at Pedro. Then, with a sour grunt, he pointed a thick finger and moved his head to show I was to pick up my partner and go somewhere with him. After scowling at him I did so.

  He led me for some distance back into the bush—so far that before we stopped I was breathing hard, for Pedro was no lightweight to carry. Yet I would rather carry him myself than have that dirty Indian do it, even if he had offered to.

  As I look back at that time I wonder that I followed him at all, for in spite of the promise made by the queer voice I had faint hope of any real help from him. But I kept on, and presently we entered a cleared space where were huts and people.

  The barrigudo man, striding along easily in spite of his size, went straight to a hut set off at some distance from the rest. Half-blinded with sweat, humped over under the burden of my partner's hot body, I trailed at his heels.

  We passed through the doorway into a dim room of shadows, where a tiny fire smoldered in the middle of the dirt floor. There the Indian pointed to a sort of legless bench or bed of woven sticks, which hung like a hammock but was straight and flat. On this I laid Pedro.

  Pedro squirmed again and kicked about, and for a minute I had to hold him to keep him from rolling off. When he quieted I straightened up and turned toward the barrigudo. But he was gone.

  Puzzled, I stared around. He could not have gone outdoors, for I was between him and the spot where he had last stood, and I should certainly have known it if he had passed me. Yet there was no other opening in the house except a small smoke-hole in the roof ten feet above me, and he surely could not have gone out there. But he was not in the place. The huge creature had vanished into air.

  Peering at the walls about me, I found no sign of any door except the one where we had entered. The walls were made in basket fashion of tightly woven sticks and creepers. On them hung strange and horrid things—skins of deadly snakes and huge lizards; great black poison-spiders; skulls of ugly beasts and of fish with terrible hooked teeth; a vampire bat, and other things of the sort. But all these were dead. No living thing was in the room but ourselves.

  As I gaped around I thought I heard a slight chuckle somewhere, but whence it came I could not tell—indeed, I was not sure that I really heard it. Then came a thing that made me forget it. Behind me sounded the hiss of a snake.

  I whirled, looked, and saw on the farther wall the head of a big boa. Yes, senhores, only its head—a head as dead as the skins and skulls near it. But as I looked at it its mouth slowly opened; and out of that mouth came a hissing voice that told me to go.

  The head closed again and hung silent as before. Feeling rather prickly, I stood watching it until a slight rustle near me drew me around again. There beside Pedro stood a great figure muffled in a garment of bark-cloth.

  Senhores, I was now so confused and bewildered that I recoiled and leveled my gun at the thing. If it had moved toward me or touched Pedro I would have shot it. But it did not move. It only stood there, and though I could see no eyes on it, it seemed to be watching me with no fear whatever.

  As I scowled back at it I thought it must be the barrigudo man, but then I saw that it was much taller than he had been—so much taller that it could not be he. Moreover, it seemed not even to be human. It was armless and headless.

  The cloth hanging over it showed no sign of a man's head underneath. It hung as if from a pair of shoulders whence the neck and head had been sliced off. Seven feet high, shapeless and silent and still, it loomed up in that dim and smoky room like a specter born of fog and fever and nightmare—a thing which the eyes saw but which could not exist; a thing which had taken shape as silently as the barrigudo had vanished. And again there came to me the thought that I was crazed: that I had fever or worse, and all this was delirium.

  Then the Thing spoke. Out from the folds of cloth rolled a voice, deep and powerful, unlike any voice I had yet heard here.

  "The dead live. The living die. The blind see. The seer is blind. This man dies, yet shall live. You live, but you shall die. Go, but remain."

  Without realizing it, I let my rifle sink. Stupidly I stared at the thing before me and tried to make sense of its words.

  "Go!” came the voice, deeper than ever. “Three suns shall set, two shall rise. When the third sun sinks low this man shall walk again. Until then, go and stay."

  "I will not go,” I growled. “I stay with my comrade while he lives or until he is surely dead. Whatever you are, help him if you can."

  "Go!"

  "Vive Deus, I will not!"

  The thing and I fronted each other for minutes, neither of us moving. Then it said:

  "You would help your comrade? Then take from the wall that vampire bat, which shall draw the fever from him."

  Glancing around, I saw the dead vampire bat, which I had hardly noticed before. I went to it and tried to take it down.

  But it was fastened tight. So I pulled harder, then yanked at it. Suddenly it came away, and from behind it a quantity of dusty powder fell into my upturned face.

  The dust stung my nostrils and choked my throat. I coughed and turned back toward Pedro, carrying the vampire bat. But I did not reach him.

  A swift chill ran down my back. My muscles stiffened. The house whirled. The headless figure swelled to a huge blot. I felt myself falling. Then I was floating in some place far, far down, where all was still.

  * * * *

  AFTER A long time I found myself lying on a bare dirt floor. Above me was a roof, around me were walls, beyond me was an open door; but they were not those of the house where I had fallen. The walls were bare mud, and in this house was no fire, no sick comrade, no shapeless monster—not even my rifle. As I realized that my gun was gone I reached to my belt for the machete which usually hung there. That too was gone.

  I started up. As I reached my feet I turned dizzy and nearly fell again; but soon the place stopped whirling and I became steady. At once I strode toward the doorway.

  But before I reached it, it was blocked. Two men jumped into it from outside and stood with spears leveled at my stomach. I stopped and peered at them.

  They were tall, well-muscled fellows with clean faces which looked good-humored but rather determined. Presently one of them smiled slightly. But they held their weapons ready.

  "What is this?” I grunted. “Drop those spears and step aside."

  They stood their ground. The one who had smiled answered:

  "Sit down and be still. You can not go to the House of Voices until it is time."
/>   "I do not understand,” I told him. “What house is that? And what house is this?"

  "The House of Voices is the one where the other stranger lies. You will stay here while he stays there. Make no trouble, if you are wise."

  I asked where my gun and machete were, and why I was held here. They looked at each other in a puzzled way, and one said they knew nothing of gun or knife. I was here, he added, because Pajé ordered it. I would remain here until Pajé gave the word to free me.

  Now I knew that the pajé of a tribe is its medicine man, but never before had I heard Indians speak the word with such respect. This man had used it as if it meant God. And I saw that what this Pajé had ordered would be done. Yet I growled again, told them to get out of my way, and advanced on them.

  Their faces tightened, their arms tensed, and their shoulders swayed forward a little. They were in deadly earnest. Unless I stopped they would plunge those spears into my body. So I halted, laughed as if I had only been joking, squatted, and rolled a cigarette.

  They relaxed, though they still watched me closely. Studying them through my tobacco smoke, I thought the wisest plan would be to pretend friendliness and talk of other things, meanwhile watching for a chance to spring and snatch the spear from the nearer man. For I was very uneasy about Pedro, and I did not intend to wait here longer than necessary.

  Giving no sign of my thought, I began to talk of our journey from the Jurua. They listened with much interest. When I told of the Spotted People both nodded quickly, and the taller one spoke.

  This town too, he said, was once a place of black-spotted people. He himself had been spotted from boyhood, and the black patches had grown until he was repulsive and useless. But then Pajé came to them, and with him came demons of the air who had no bodies; and by the magic of these air-devils and strange-tasting water he had driven out the black sickness and made them strong.

  I smoked up my cigarette and slowly made another while I thought about this. Their pajé was far more powerful than any I had met in my jungle wanderings. Those whom I had seen before now were good enough at healing wounds or setting broken bones, and some of them were wise in the ways of poison; but when they had to deal with a pain or sickness whose cause was not clear they all worked in the same way.