The Thirty Gang/Chapter 5

N SENDING away my mestizos I had, of course, relied on the Indians to carry me onward to their settlement. For any other blanco than Loco León, this would have been a very poor time indeed to hope for aid from the Cunucunuma men; and, in spite of my well-known friendship toward all the Maquiritare nation, not even I should have been sure of a welcome just then if I had not known that those men had seen and heard what took place before they broke from the bush.

As it was, they had convincing proof that I was no friend of Rodriguez and that I had stood ready to defend the girl from him. And now, without waiting for me to ask them, they manned my curial as coolly as if they had come there for that purpose.

We got away at once; for I had lost my appetite—perhaps because the black zamuros had already dropped from the sky to attend to what remained of Ramón—and the Indians, having completed the little job for which they had come there, saw no sense in lingering. There were about a dozen of them, and half entered my canoe, while the rest, with the girl, disappeared into the bush. First, though, every man bathed himself and his machete, scrubbing off the blood of Rodriguez as if it were pollution.

A few rods up-stream we found, among rocks on the eastern shore, the two canoes in which the avengers had followed the woman-stealer until they smelt his smoke. We did not pause; the others would bring the boats on. With paddle and pole, my new men forced the curial northward far faster than my mestizos would have moved it; for they knew every current and every channel among the raudales, and they were determined to reach their tribe-house before night.

In all that afternoon I said no word. To try to give them orders about the work would have been foolish, and they spoke of nothing else. At first they were moody and silent, but after a while the river-work drove all other thoughts from their minds, and they became such good-humored fellows as Maquiritares usually are.

Whenever one of them slipped and fell into the water, as happened more than once in a raudal, the rest laughed at him like a crowd of boys. And when the following canoes appeared at times behind us there was railing back and forth between crews. To any man not well acquainted with their ways it would have seemed impossible that those merry young men could show such ferocity as they had vented on Rodriguez.

Sunset brought us to the paragua of Yaracuma, capitán of the Maquiritares of the Cunucunuma. As we drew up at the bank, another canoe came driving down-stream and swung in to tie beside ours. In it were several Indians, all of whom looked curiously at me but seemed undisturbed by the coming of a new white.

One of them, older than the rest, had a quiet air of authority which told me he was the chief; and the bodies of several baquidos (wild hogs) in the canoe showed that he had been on a hunt. I began to understand now something which had puzzled me—why Yaracuma had not led his men when they chased Rodriguez. He had been away when the crime of Ramón took place.

This proved true. My paddlers at once told him of what had come about, and for a minute he glared like an angry tigre. But then, learning that the girl was safe and Ramón cut to pieces, he gave a grunt of satisfaction. When he was told who I was he grunted again, and studied me sharply. Then the other two canoes from downstream arrived; he asked the girl a few questions, which she answered quietly; and in the first darkness of night we all climbed the slope to the tribe-house.

There I was led into the big central room where the men always gather. And there Yaracuma called a couple of names. Two young fellows came forward, grinning at me, and. I recognized them as men who once had gathered my balata on the Padamo.

"Como 'stá uste', Loco León?" they greeted me. "How are you?"

"Bien," I answered. "Y ustedes?"

"Bien."

They kept on grinning, but said no more. I looked at Yaracuma, and we both smiled, for we understood each other. Although he had been told who I was, he wanted to see with his own eyes that I was recognized as Loco León by men who knew Loco León. There was no longer any chance of doubt.

Soon we ate, and then we talked. As the killing of Rodriguez was the most important subject, we talked first of that; and now I learned more about how Ramón had captured his woman. In their tale to the chief his men had spoken their own dialect, which is so queer that I never have learned more than a few words of it. But Yaracuma spoke fair Spanish, and he told me what he knew of the matter.

Ramón had not taken her from her people in the bold way he wanted me to believe. He had stayed at the tribe-house several days, saying he came to make sure that the Maquiritares would be ready to work again for Rivero in the next wet season.

There was nothing strange about that, except that it was very early for him to make such a trip. He had tried several times to talk to the young woman, but she had avoided him; and he had laughed loudly, as if it were only a joke; so, though the men kept an eye on him and hoped he would go soon, none was disturbed about it.

This morning she and several other girls had gone, as usual, to the plantation, half a mile away, in order to dig yuca roots for the making of cassava. Ram6n had suddenly decided to return to the Orinoco, and he had gone down-stream in his canoe. But while the girls were busy at their work and the one who had taken his fancy was a little away from the others, he suddenly jumped out from the trees, grabbed her, stopped her mouth, and dragged her away.

The other girls did not see this done, and it was some time before they succeeded in puzzling out what had taken place. Then they returned to the paragua, where they found that most of the men were out hunting and fishing. Before the pursuit could start, Ramón had time to travel a long way. But the pursuers went fast after they did start, and Ramón's own foolishness in stopping ended whatever chance he might have had.

I smoked awhile after hearing this, and I saw something which, I knew, must be also in the mind of Yaracuma. The two crews—mine and that of Rodriguez—would travel fast down the river to San Fernando, and there they would tell of what the Indians had done. And Rivero and all his friends would be enraged—not at Rodriguez, but at the Maquiritares.

To most men of the wild Territorio de Amazonas an Indian is a dog, to be beaten or shot or outraged at will; he has no rights and no protection, and he is a creature made only for the use and abuse of the "white man." And for him to defend himself and avenge his wrongs is a crime calling for death—and not always a quick death. So now, with the town full of men who delighted in murder, it would be odd if an armed gang did not soon appear on the Cunucunuma to teach the "Indian dogs" a lesson.

It was quite likely, indeed, that those killers would start even before the crews should reach San Fernando; for if the mestizos should meet Paco, the Butcher—which was not at all improbable—they would tell him all they knew, and Paco probably would come up the Orinoco at once. It would be just such work as he and his gang would like: a chance to kill me for pay, to butcher the Indian men for sport, and to enslave the maidens for pleasure.

Yaracuma did not yet know about Paco, and I decided not to tell about him for awhile. It might not be necessary to speak of him at all. I was quite sure I knew what thought was in the chief's mind, and I was willing to let that thought grow without forcing it too much.

"Do you come to work the balata here?" he asked after a time.

"No. This is not so good a place as my own river. I come to visit the Cunucunuma men and then go on to my Ventuari."

"It is a long journey."

"Not so long for Loco León, the rover. I do not go back by the Orinoco, if my friends here will help me overland."

He looked thoughtfully at me.

"How do you go?" he asked.

"I have heard that there is a pass through the mountains from the Cunucunuma to the Iurebe," I explained. "Down the Iurebe to the Ventuari is not far. So I reach the Ventuari well above the boca and go on to my sitio near the fall of Quencua. And I have seen new country."

"It is so," he said, and thought awhile longer. It was well known that in the dry time I was a rambler of the wilds, always seeking something new; so it did not seem very odd to him that I proposed this overland journey.

"But the way is hard," he added, "and you have much weight to carry."

"Si. I have just come from down the great river, and I bring many things. There are good presents among them for all my Maquiritare friends who help me across."

He was silent for several minutes. I decided to help him think.

"How long have the people of Yaracuma lived on the Cunucunuma?" I asked.

"Many moons."

"Ever since I was on the Padamo?"

"Yes."

"Is it not a long time for Maquiritares to live in one place?"

"A long time."

"Is not this a good time to move to some other river?"

He agreed so quickly that I knew my guess as to his thoughts had been right.

"It is so. We have lived too long on the Cunucunuma. It is no longer a good place for us."

"The Ventuari is a good river," I suggested. "It has much game and fish. There are other Maquiritares on the Ventuari. The people of Yaracuma are too much alone here. And now there will be no more balata work on the Cunucunuma. If the men of Yaracuma would like to bleed the balata another year and have new knives and machetes, beads and cloth, matches and fish-hooks and other things, they can get them all on the Ventuari. I, Loco León, can give all those things."

The men squatting around or sitting in hammocks gave a murmur. They knew as well as Yaracuma and I that they must move, or live in dread and die in hopeless battle; for, fight as they might with arrow and blow-gun and spear, they could not win against the bullets of the merciless men who almost certainly would come.

And here was Loco León, friend of all Maquiritares, arriving at their time of need to point out the way to a safer land and treat them well after they entered it. It was great luck for the people of Yaracuma. They did not know it was greater luck for Loco León.

Yaracuma considered it awhile, however, in his deliberate Indian way, and I knew better than to expect an immediate answer. He was still thinking about it when I curled up in my hammock and went to sleep. Or perhaps he had already decided and was thinking about the travel-plans. At any rate, I heard nothing more from him about it until morning.

Then, as calmly as if the abandonment of home and crops and the passage of his whole tribe over the mountains were things done every day, he said:

"The people of Yaracuma go to the Iurebe."

"It is good," I said, as if it meant nothing to me.

Every woman was put to work at once in making cassava. Every man made the necessary preparations for the journey. And three days later, with everything worth carrying packed in the canoes and everything else destroyed—except the house itself—we pushed away up the Cunucunuma. Behind us the big paragua stood empty of all life, never again to be used by the men of Yaracuma. Yet, though the house itself would tell nothing to those who should come later, it held a message for the Butcher.

One of the Indians had killed a big red areguato the day before we went. And when it was brought in a foolish idea came to me. So, telling the Maquiritares that we would leave a monkey to plague our enemies, I had them stuff the skin with leaves, sew it up, and fasten one of its hands in a position which, in our country, is a mortal insult from man to man. Then, as we were leaving, we hung that ribald thing in the doorway facing the river. And from its neck I slung a slip of paper on which I had written: