by RB Schalin
Chapter 16
"Just look at that," says Julia.
John Kerry leans over her and looks out the window of the Boing they are in.
"The Amazon River, big isn’t it, " he says.
"Yeah, and jungle as far as the eye can see."
"And somewhere, north of here is what we are looking for, " he says and pats her arm.
She continues to look out the window and Kerry turns to the man next to him in the isle seat.
"Hey Paul, time to wake up we are here."
The dark haired, muscular man stretches his long, big body and moans. Then he opens his eyes and looks at Kerry.
"Are we there?"
"Yep, we are landing in twenty minutes."
They will land in the town of Leticia in North Western Brazil. They had flown from Chicago to Brazilia, then on to Manaus and now they are finally there. From here they will travel downriver on the Amazon for what Kerry hopes is two days, but could be as many as four depending on the weather. After that they will find a smaller river and travel north for another three days, and then hike the rest of the way.
His two companions are undergrad students from the university, Kerry teaches at, Julia Camps is half Brazilian but moved to Washington State when she was five and Paul Hogan. Hogan is old for being an undergrad. At thirty five he is more than ten years older than Julia and five years younger than Kerry. He was in the army and after two tours abroad, he joined the DEA. After three years with them he got shot in the shoulder and his wife told him to choose, either the DEA or her. The choice was easy. He had been stationed in Bogotá for almost a year before being shot and there he found the pre-Colombian civilizations very interesting. He decided to get a degree and maybe even become an archeologist, and that’s how he met Kerry.
Julia wanted to study Archeology, but she hasn’t decided what era to focus on, but as Kerry’s assistant and speaking Portuguese it was natural he would ask her to come along.
"Where to now?" asks Hogan picking up his big backpack and handing Julia hers.
Kerry points to the river and says, "we need a boat, and I figure the harbor would be a good place to start."
They get their bags and begin the walk down towards the harbor where they can see several canoes and some motorboats bobbing in the surf. The heat is almost unbearable and Hogan looks back at his professor and wonders if Kerry will make it all the way. He is severely overweight and sweat is already pouring down his face.
"Are you OK, Dr?"
"Yeah Hogan, I’ll be fine, just give me a day or two to get used to the heat. Anyway, I look at this as a way to lose some pounds while doing something fun."
Julia shakes her head; she is also worried about Kerry. She is in great shape thanks to the campus gym and hours on the track. Her sleek body is firm and her muscle's play under her skin. She is not even close to Hogan's massive build, she looks at his back walking a few yards ahead of her and wonders what the man has been through. In Manuas he took his T-shirt off, while they were waiting for the flight to come here, and changed into another. His back and torso was crisscrossed with scar tissue and she looked away. Apart from that he is a pleasant looking man. Who is she kidding, she thinks, he is gorgeous.
Kerry and the others find their way down to the harbor and Julia asks around if there is anyone who could rent them a boat for a few days. She gets direction to one of the last boats on the old pier and when they get there Kerry doesn’t like what he sees. It’s an old barge, flat, and square, with a small cabin in the back, and just big enough for one man. There is no one on board so Julia calls out. There is some shuffling from behind them and when they turn around a small man with a mustache comes off another boat opposite the barge.
"Yes?" he asks, looking up at them under an old CAT cap.
Julia clears her throat and says in her best Portuguese, "we was wondering if you could take us downriver, we think three to four days would do it."
The man peers at her and spits on the ground. Then says something in a dialect Julia doesn’t understand, so she says, "sorry, I didn’t understand."
The man sighs and says in surprisingly good English, "I said what do you want to go downriver for, and why so far?"
Kerry steps up and says, "we are looking for a lost city or town, and the only way to get there is by river."
The man lifts his hand towards Kerry and waiving it in the air he says, "my name is Ortega, and I can tell you, there is no lost village or town or anything else around here."
"Well Mr. Ortega, we do believe there is, and we are willing to pay you for your service."
Before Ortega has a chance to answer the other man in the canoe says in English, "take the Gringos, Juanita is looking for you, and you know how she gets when she thinks you have been with someone else. This will give her time to cool down."
Ortega looks up at Kerry and nods his head slowly, "my friend is right, Juanita is no fun when she is upset, last time she came after me with a rusty machete, almost killed me, and for what? She thinks I run after every skirt in town."
Hogan laughs quietly and Ortega turns to him, "hey Mr. that is no joke, I don’t. I just run after her sister, she is much better looking." He laughs and it turns into a cough attack. When he has his breathing under control he says, "OK, all on board, let’s go."
Kerry and the others jump down onto the barge and soon they are moving into the big river. The water is muddy and it’s impossible to see how deep it is. Some children run along the shore shouting something.
"Juanita’s children, they are telling their mother, I’m leaving," says Ortega and spits overboard.
Kerry, Hogan and Julia sit down on the barge's flat deck, but after a while the heat is unbearable and Hogan takes out one of the tents which he ties between the cabin and the railing. They sit down under it in the shade and Kerry pulls out a map from his backpack.
"OK, we are on the way. It’s not the most comfortable way to travel, but it will get us where we need to go."
Hogan uses his backpack as a pillow and lays down, "how sure are you about this?" he asks with his eyes closed.
Kerry knows full well that neither Hogan nor Julia are convinced about his claim there is a hidden town in the middle of the jungle. They came along to get away from the boredom of university life and get a paid vacation. He is OK with that; the cost of the expedition comes from his own bank account. He has used all his savings and part of his inheritance from his parents who died a few years back.
From deep inside his backpack he pulls out a leather bound notebook and opens it.
"We know the Conquistadors heard about the city of El Dorado, where supposedly the streets were lined in gold."
"Sure, and what did they find, nothing? Only insects, and death, but no gold. They would have been better off staying in the costal towns and pillage from the Indians," says Hogan.
"True, and almost all of them did. The few that came back, told of horror and several of them never recovered from the ordeal."
"Where did you say you found that letter?" asks Hogan.
Kerry takes out a folded paper from the notebook and opens it. "This is a copy of the letter I found when my wife and I were in Cadiz in Spain last year. I was doing research in that city because from there the Conquistadores left to the new world and they came back the same way. The letter was included in a collection of things left to the museum years ago. It turned out that it belonged to a woman whose long dead relative had received in 1565 from her cousin. The cousin had arrived in Malaga very ill, but before he died he sent the letter to her where he told her about an adventure that lasted almost a year. He and his fellow travelers found a town deep in the jungle. He never said how he got there, but there was a hand drawn map and comparing it to the general area I concluded the spot the man was talking about is north of the river we are heading to."
Hogan shakes his head, "sounds like a bedtime story, how do we know the letter is not a fake, someone needing beer money could have written it and sold
it to the museum?"
Kerry laughs and says, "the people in the museum said it was real and I got permission to have it dated myself, and it showed the letter was real."
"Let’s assume everything in the letter is true, and the letter itself is authentic, how are we going to find a small old town with thousands of square miles of jungle?" asks Julia.
"We ask for directions," says Kerry with a grin.
"What do you mean?"
"Where we are going the local indigenous people still carry on with their old customs, they tell stories. I’m sure a story about an old civilization will still be around. All we have to do is ask them, and with a bit of luck, they will lead us right to it."
Julia and Hogan stay quiet and Kerry follows their example and lies down, soon they are sleeping. The barge glides down the river slowly passing fishermen and children playing in the water.
Ortega stands by the helm and wonders what these crazy Americans are after, a town in the jungle, nonsense, there is no such thing.