Black White/Chapter 4

HREE well-grown young Indians were in the dugout, paddling lustily and laughing at some joke among themselves. We had been working quietly along beside the bank, expecting no such meeting, and the abrupt appearance of that boat startled us.

They were more astounded than we. Their arms stopped in air as if paralyzed. My men stood like statues. The current took us both and carried us slowly down-stream together.

“Buen’ dia’,” I said then.

The three watched us a couple of minutes, saying no word. Then, seeing that none of us made a threatening move, they slowly grew more loose of muscle. After another minute one answered—

“Buen’ dia’.”

The others looked as if they did not understand. But since one of them could speak Spanish it made no difference to me whether his mates could or not. I asked where they went.

“To shoot fish,” the first told me.

Glancing back, I saw that we were nearing a playa which we had passed a few minutes before. So I drew out a paper of cigarrillos and suggested that we stop at the sand and smoke. They seemed doubtful, but when I lit a cigaret and they caught the smell of the tobacco they decided to accept. Keeping their distance, they grounded a little below us. But they would not land until I told them that if they would have their smokes they must come and get them. Then the one who spoke Spanish slowly got out and came forward. The other two stuck to their canoe, keeping their hands on their bows and fish-arrows.

I gave the brave one three cigarets, and a little box of matches, which are very precious to an Indian. Then I told my own men to take a bath at the other end of the playa. A fine breeze was blowing, so that the mosquitoes were not at all bad, and they jumped at the chance. As I expected, the Indians gained confidence in me when they saw my men leave their guns behind and go bathing at a distance. And when I walked unarmed to their canoe, they took their hands from their weapons and settled down to enjoy their smokes.

With one eye on my mestizos, I questioned them. The one who could talk to me did not know much Spanish, but I learned that they were Macos, lived at the head of the caño from which they had come, and were much afraid that we were men of Funes. I had heard something of the Macos; that they were a small tribe, living on a few caños of this river, who hardly ever came out to the Orinoco; that they were lazy and peaceable, and would much rather run than fight; but that they were one of the two poison-making tribes of Amazonas, the other being the Piaroas, who live in the rough country between the Ventuari and the Orinoco.

They were not very good men for my use, but if I could persuade them to work for me until I could come among the Maquiritares higher up the river, I should at least be free from my loose-mouthed mestizos.

So I told them who I was. My name meant nothing to them, though, and I knew that if they had not heard about me from the Maquiritares it would be worse than useless to say I was hunting for balata. That would only set them against me, for they would think I planned to come in with an armed gang and make slaves of them to work the gum, as has been done many a time along the upper Orinoco.

Saying nothing of rubber, therefore, I told them I went to visit my friends the Maquiritares, but that I did not trust my men, who might be spies of Funes. It would be much better for the Macos, for the Maquiritares, and for me, if these men were sent back here; but I must have men to take me on. Now if the Macos would go with me, I said, a danger would be removed from their country. Also, the Macos could trade some of their curare poison to the Maquiritares, who would be glad to get it. And I, on reaching the Maquiritares, would pay each Maco of my crew with a fine new machete, with its red paint, still on the blade.

They watched me like cats. Then they talked it over and shook their heads. The one who could speak to me said they worked for no man. They did not need to take curare to the Maquiritares, for the Maquiritares would come to them for it. I said no more. I walked to my canoe, picked up my machete—a new one, little used—and brought it back. I stuck it in the sand, squatted, and smoked a new cigarrillo.

My mestizos were in no hurry to come back—they were having too good a bath. So there was plenty of time. The Macos could not take their eyes off that machete. Presently they talked more among themselves. Then I added that to each man who went with me and served me well I would give also five boxes of matches.

That was enough. They said they must go and talk with their capitân—chief—about it. They would meet me at this same time and place tomorrow. I told them to bring with them one more man, as I wanted four. Without reply, they pushed out and returned to their caño.

When they had disappeared I called my crew, told them I had decided to take a holiday, and pointed out what seemed to be a good little port just below the raudal, across the river from the creek of the Macos. It proved to be as good as it looked; and there we stayed, napping in our hammocks, smoking, and listening to the musical whistle of the pajaro minero birds, which were many and kept calling to one another across the stream.

The next morning the Macos returned, bringing with them the fourth man—an older, heavier, and stronger-looking fellow than any of the first three—and I saw at once that they were ready to go with me; for they carried big-game arrows as well as those for fish, a lance, a couple of blowguns, and a large basket full of the little bottle-shaped gourds in which the curare poison is carried by hunters.

After some more talk I bought their curial from them, paying in knives. This canoe I loaned to my surprized mestizos—who had not suspected what I meant to do—and, after giving them an order on a San Fernando trader for their pay, I sent them away in it. When they were gone the Macos looked relieved, and I felt more relieved than they looked.

Now that they had decided to go, my Indians proved willing enough. They were not good polers, but with the paddle they seemed tireless. We crawled on up the river for several days more, passing through small raudales at times, but finding none which gave us much trouble. Then we met one which stopped us dead.

It was more than a rapid—it was a fall, fifty feet or more in height. Its name is Quencua, or Tencua, and it is the real beginning of the bad country of the Parimas. From shore to shore runs a wall of rock, and over the wall plunges the river in roaring white. Below the fall is a long sluice of jagged rocks and raving water. The only way to pass this place is to go around it, over steep ground and through dense forest.

Now my Macos told me that from this place upward they never had traveled by water, and that only one of them—the fourth one—had ever been beyond here by land. The Maquiritares, they said, sometimes came down in canoes, but not often, as they found it easier and safer to walk for days through the open sabana country which lay behind the tree-grown shores.

From what the Maquiritares had told them, they knew that the river above Quencua was very bad. It was divided up by many islands, among which were channels full of jagged rocks, any one of which would split a dugout like an ax; and the currents were swift and treacherous, snatching any man wrecked among them and dashing him to death on the stony fangs awaiting him.

If one should pass safely up through this place, he then would meet the cataract of Oso, higher and worse than that of Quencua; for this is three falls, one above another. Beyond this was raudal after raudal, with the greatest and worst one in all the river higher up—that of Monoblanco. And beyond that—they did not know.

Since that time, señores, I have passed all the way up and down the Ventuari by canoe, in flood time and in the season of low water. By that I do not mean that I have gone over those falls; nothing goes over them and lives. But I have traveled the river between fall and fall, from source to end. And it is even worse than the Macos told me. He who rides on the waters of the Ventuari rides with Death.

So it was no place for me to attempt forcing a heavily loaded curial onward just then, especially with a crew which did not know the river and feared it. I was just deciding to have my men build a house in which I could store my supplies, and then to go on by land, when the Spanish-speaking one let drop some words about balata near by. Pretending not to be interested, I laughed at him. No balata grew here, I said; this river was good for nothing but fish and game. In his mild manner he insisted that he spoke truth. And finally, when I bet him a long bright belt-knife that he could show me no balata worth looking at, he was eager to prove that he was no liar.

He won his knife. And in winning it he gave me the price of many knives. The place where the balata grew was on a little caño about three hours’ paddling down-stream, which we had passed without a word and with scarcely a look. It took us a full day’s traveling from Quencua to reach the trees, which were among rocky hills well back from the river. But when I had spent another day in scouting around among them, I knew that this was the place I had been seeking.

Not only was the balata very rich, but near it was the little caño, which in the time of heavy rains would become deep enough to float out the crop with ease. The river then would carry my boats swiftly to the Orinoco, and from its mouth to San Fernando would be only a short trip. I could make a fine little sitio, too, at the mouth of the caño, and, though the mosquitoes were rather troublesome, this would be a far better place to live than in the jungles of the Padamo region. And when this tract was worked out I could undoubtedly find more gum in the rougher country above the falls.

But all this depended on one thing—men. I must have men to work my new-found balata; and I did not want those men to be San Fernando mestizos, who surely would be spies and also might knife me some night while I slept. As always, I wished to work with Indians, and now the problem was to find the Indians. The Macos, I felt sure, would not make good steady workmen, even if they would consent to work at all. The Maquiritares were far up the river. I wondered whether any others could be found nearer at hand.

Of these things, though, I said nothing. Back at the mouth of the caño, I told my men to clear away a little space in the forest which grew thickly there, and to put up a stout hut well thatched with plataní.. When they had done so I had all my supplies moved into it. Then I told them that since the river above was muy maluco, I had decided not to use the canoe for the rest of the trip, and that when we went on we should travel by land. But, I said, my supplies were much too heavy for them to carry overland on their backs. They very quickly agreed that this was so. My friends the Maquiritares, I told them, would come and get these things for me after I reached their country, but I did not like to leave the boxes and bags here so long. Were there any other Indians nearer to us than the Maquiritares?

There were. They were on the Rio Manapiare, a day farther down-stream—a river entering the Ventuari from the north. I remembered it well, for it was the largest stream I had seen coming into this one. They said it was made up of three rivers farther back in the sabana—the Manapiare itself, the Paré, and the Guaviarito. And who lived there? I asked. Good people or bad? Both, I was told.

On the Guaviarito were men of the Piaroas and of the Curachicanos, who were good people. On the Paré lived the Yabaranos, who were peaceable if let alone but fierce fighters if bothered; and the Guayciaros, who were always bad. These Guayciaros lived nearest to a range of hills beyond which was the Caura. Between them and the Ventuari were the Yabaranos.

Thinking this over, I saw that only two of these four tribes could be relied on, if any of them could; the Yabaranos and the Curachicanos. The Piaroas there would be few, for the Piaroa country is farther west, nearer to the Orinoco; and they are not reliable people. The Guayciaros, who were bad and lived near the Caura

Suddenly the name “Caura” brought to me the memory of White. I wondered where he was, and what fortune he had met.

Then I forgot him again as I thought about the two tribes who might be useful to me. I asked whether they would help the Macos carry my supplies to the Maquiritares—knowing that if they would do such work they probably would also work my balata. But the Macos said, “No.” None of them would do any work for any man—unless, perhaps, the Yabaranos happened to like me. In that case it was just possible that they might.

I decided to visit the Manapiare.

The Macos were slow in consenting to go there, for they did not like the idea of going into the country of people who were known to be fighters and who might be angry at our coming. But neither did they like the thought of burdening themselves with the heavy weights which I let them think they must carry otherwise. So I won them over. The next morning we started, riding light in my empty curial and leaving the boxes and bags in the hidden hut.

We traveled fast down to the mouth of the Manapiare, and at night we slept some distance up the new river. The water here was very shallow now, and we had to twist along among playas, with steep banks on either side. The day-flying mosquitoes were worse here than on the Ventuari, as the breezes went by over the trees; but nothing else troubled us. At dawn the next day we were up, and at sunrise we were off. And we paddled onward until nearly noon before anything happened.

Then, ahead of us, broke out rifle-shots.