Tupahn--the Thunderstorm/Chapter 13

AR more tired than we had realized, and secure in the protection of the Bat, we four slept until long after sunrise. When at length we did awake we found the maloca almost empty of men.

The few Indian men who were there lay or sat in their hammocks as if resting after work well done. Around them women were cleaning birds or beasts and putting them into clay pots and pans over the brisk fires. We saw that the killing and cooking of meat for the great feast were under way, and that the men now resting were the first hunters to return from the forest with their game. Even as we looked around us the doorway was darkened by several other Tucunas who brought more furred or feathered prey.

They padded in, dropped their kills at their own fires, hung up their weapons, got into their hammocks, and took their ease. The women worked with unhurried steadiness, some who had nothing to cook rolling up heavy jars which the men eyed thirstily. By the time we four had eaten a hearty morning meal the house was well filled with toiling women and lolling men.

The senhorita, her eyes aglow and her lips red again after her long rest and strengthening food, watched the scene thoughtfully. Senhor Tom, still a little sleepy of eye and more than a little lame of muscle, smoked and blinked lazily at the roof. Pedro and I loafed and observed all around us.

“Those jars look horribly heavy,” said Marion, as a couple of women tugged another clay vessel into place near the silent chief. “Why don't the men move them? What's in them?”

“Booze,” yawned Senhor Tom. “There's going to be a regular party, and you can't have a regular party without joy-juice; not down here, anyway. And the men let the women roll the kegs because they're saving their strength for the heavy job of emptying them. When they once start in they'll show you some endurance that'll make your eyes pop.”

She smiled, but frowned too.

“They're just animals, aren't they? They think only of their appetites—hunting and drinking. The women do all the work.”

“Oh, I wouldn't call 'em animals,” he objected, sitting up. “Not in that tone, anyway. We're all animals, more or less—we've got to eat, and we kill weaker animals to feed us. We prowl around and fight to get things away from other man-animals, and the weak get crushed and mauled and maimed by the strong, as they do in the animal world. And real animals are a lot more respectable than a good many humans; they're not hypocrites. In the animal world you never find a skunk pretending to be a lamb, but you sure do find that very thing in the highest circles of human society.

“Same way with Indians, mostly. The more uncivilized they are, the more honest and straightforward; tricky toward enemies, of course, but pretty much on the level to folks that treat 'em right. I've known many an Indian whom I could trust to the limit, but darned few white folks—male or female.

“And as for women working, why not? Maybe you think these fellows haven't done anything today. Believe me, they've worked hard to find and kill this meat, and the women haven't done a thing while they were gone but hang around the house and talk. Now they're doing something besides clack their tongues, while the chaps who have brought home the bacon rest up.

“Up home it's different, of course. There the big idea is that a man must not only bring home the aforesaid bacon but serve it on platinum plates to some pampered doll who spends her life powdering her nose. And then he's supposed to grovel in ecstasy because she condescends to honor him by eating it as fast as he can get it.”

Again she laughed; and this time she lay watching him with a mischievous twinkle under the long lashes.

“Poor men! They have a terrible time, don't they?” she mocked. “Do you really believe all the girls up home are like that?”

“Oh, no. Only the majority of them. Some of them are real women, thank God! But the kind that will stick and carry their end of the log are mighty few. Most of 'em are bum sports, as I said once before. Me, I like the jungle idea better—everybody pulling together, male and female alike, without any idea that they're horribly abused by having to do something.”

She watched him thoughtfully a little longer. When she spoke again she did not smile.

“Yes, you are of the jungle, I'm afraid. You have the jungle ways and the jungle thoughts. You'd never be content in the States. So I suppose you'll stay here in Brazil until the jungle kills you, as it seems to kill everything in time.”

He stared at her soberly, dropped his cigaret-stub in an absent way, and looked around the maloca as if comparing it and its unclothed inhabitants with the homes and the people of the North.

“Maybe you're right,” he said soberly. “I've been up home twice since I first saw the jungle—and I've come back each time nauseated by the smugness and the smallness of the lives all my old friends were living.

“They weren't my friends any more. They tolerated me, that's all. They looked on me as a ne'er-do-well, a vagabond, a tropical tramp. The men four-flushed about their success in business—poor boobs! Most of 'em were salaried men, chained to their jobs for life—and some of the women acted as if they were afraid I'd contaminate their precious hubbies by my yarns about the jungle. They were getting smaller and narrower every day of their lives; and they looked down on me because I wasn't living the same picayune life they were.

“One chap told me right out that I'd better get back to the wilds—that I didn't fit any more in the States, but maybe I'd 'make good' down here if I worked hard enough. 'Making good,' of course, meant making money. That's the only rule they measure you by up home: 'How much have you got?'”

He glanced around again and then went on:

“And yet I'm not crazy about this jungle life. As you say, it kills. I like it only because of its freedom, its absence of nagging conventionalities—because, rough and brutal as it is, it's real! And I'd go back home gladly if I knew where I could find real things, real folks—and the right kind of a pal.”

“I've had a number of pals at one time or another—men or girls—but every one of 'em dropped away after a while. Why? Because sooner or later they wanted to be boss, and I couldn't see it that way. I'll go fifty-fifty with a partner on everything, but”

“But you must be the boss, as you term it.”

“Nope. Not unless it's necessary. The right kind of a pal, mind you, will meet you half-way, and no bossing is needed. That's the sort of partner I've wanted—and never found. So when it's come to a question of whether I was to boss or be bossed—as it always has—why, I made it clear that I wasn't going to be the under dog in the combination. So the combination busted up. I'm still my own master, and, believe I'm going to stay so.”

“I believe you,” she said—and arose.

We three also stood up. Pedro and I stretched ourselves again and grinned at Andirah, who sat as if wondering what all the talk was about. Senhor Tom, with a little laugh, added:

“Pardon the oration concerning myself. I don't often shoot off my mouth so much.”

“You're pardoned, I'm sure,” she smiled. “It was most—Oh, what is that frightful thing?”

After one look I did not wonder at her sudden question. From the rear of the maloca was advancing a great, horrible face, seeming in the smoky dimness to be a demon which had risen through the floor. But, having seen the bat-mask of the pajé, it did not take us long to realize that this was another hollow head, mounted on a man's shoulders.

“Jurupari?” asked Senhor Tom of the chief, pointing.

“Jurupari,” agreed the Bat after a look.

“That's the Jurupari, or great jungle demon of the Indians,” the explorer explained. “Or, rather, a mask representing him. Guess the Tucunas are going to have a masquerade along with their feast. If so, you'll see a weird collection of nondescripts prancing around after the booze gets to working.”

“Does the Jurupari demon drink, senhor?” I asked.

“Sure does. Gets as full as any of them, or fuller. I've seen a couple of these masked parties in other Tucuna malocas, and the Jurupari got spifflicated along with the rest of the gang. He's not such a bad demon, you know—just a mischievous rascal who gets blamed for all the little accidents that happen; they think all their mischances are caused by his playing tricks on them.”

The coming of the false-faced demon seemed to arouse all the rest of the men, and some of the women too. There was much moving about, and new heads began to appear. Some were those of huge monkeys, others were of parrots and tapirs and jaguars, and one was that of a very thirsty-looking fish—at least, the mouth was wide open. All-were so cunningly shaped and painted that in the vague light they looked surprizingly natural. And the wearers of them made them seem even more real by making noises like the calls of the birds or beasts they imitated.

From the heads, which were made of woven bark-cloth, long cloaks of the same material hung down below the knees of the men inside. Others of the Indians who wore no animal-heads appeared in loose hooded garments shaped like long sacks with eye-holes cut in them. Still others clothed themselves only with bright feathers saved from the birds now cooking in the pots.

For a little time we were busy watching the shifting forms. When we happened to glance back at Andirah we found that he too, old as he was, had blossomed out in gay colors. On his head his women had placed a gorgeous cap of toucan-feathers, from the top of which rose tall plumes of the macaw. Vivid bands of feathers also were fastened around his arms and legs. The curling lines of paint on his face had been freshened, and all in all he was a very gaudy old man. And his toothless mouth was stretched wide in a tickled grin.

“My brother the Bat looks like the noon-day sun,” Senhor Tom complimented him. “Let the young bucks beware, or the girls will forsake them for the chief.”

“The heart of Andirah is young again,” piped the chief, “yet not so young as to be foolish about women. If girls come toward me, let my mighty brother Tupahn stand between them and me, for their name is Trouble.”

“Wise words, heramuhm,” Pedro chuckled. The old man squinted at him and grinned again.

“It is you who speak, herayi?” he answered. “You talk like one who knows women. Keep them from you, my son. So shall your days be long and free from care.”

I looked at Senhor Tom and found a queer expression on his face. I snickered, then saw Marion looking at me, and coughed.

“What is the old man saying?” she asked.

“He says—er—everybody but us is all dressed up like a fire-horse, or words to that effect,” Senhor Tom dodged. “Too bad we didn't fetch along some party frocks, isn't it?”

“Most unfortunate,” she laughed. “Really I'd like to wear one of those masks. It would be fun.”

“Better not. They've been used a lot more than that bat-mask you had, and they'd be—well, smelly. But if you want to join the crowd, how about showing these boys and girls a real American waltz? I'm all out of practise and my muscles are mostly dislocated this morning, but maybe I can dance on my own feet and not on yours.”

“A waltz without music? And with these boots on? Impossible! But—I'll do it just the same!”'

And before any of us knew just what they were about, they were drifting in each other's arms around the chief's fire. At first she hummed a little air to set the step, but soon she grew silent. Around and around they swung, wheeling slowly as they went, and seeming to move like two beings blended into one. And while they stepped along their eyes clung together and a deeper color rose into their faces. When at length they stopped they stood looking silently at each other for a long minute before she turned away and sank into a hammock.

Then I looked around and found the Indians gaping in vast astonishment. And up rose the voice of the Bat, who had been peering like a real bat let loose in sunlight.

“Tupahn is too gentle with his woman. Why does he not strike her or kick her? To twirl her around the fire will do no good.”

We snickered.

“That was no struggle, heramuhm,” Pedro explained. “It was a dance.”

“A dance!” The old man's tone showed disbelief. “To clutch a woman about the middle and drag her around the floor? Truly the white men and women are a queer race. Let them learn to dance from the people of the Bat.”

And the people of the Bat, still looking queerly at Tupahn and “his woman,” drank deep of the rum and began showing them how to dance.

Their dance, of course, was no dance at all, but a trotting and hopping around in a circle, stopping often for more drink. Somewhere near by a couple of log drums boomed, and old Andirah in his hammock grinned and nodded his tall plumes, as if to say that this was dancing. Senhor Tom and the senhorita sat and laughed, Pedro and I chuckled and helped ourselves at the big jars, the Tucunas forgot us and gave their whole minds to their festival, and the house shook with the shouts of the merry-makers and the thunder of the drums. We stopped trying to talk. In that uproar it was useless.

So the time passed until the feast, which the older women tended, was ready for eating. We four squatted on the chief's mats and ate our fill. After a rest, the festa started up once more.

Tiring of the scene, Pedro and I went strolling around the place, looking at the great jars, some of which would hold twenty gallons each; at big bags knitted from fiber-twine, hides of jungle beasts, blow-guns and spears and arrows, and anything else that happened to catch our eyes. Nobody paid the least attention to us now, and we examined every sort of thing the tribe owned. While we were doing this the drumming stopped and some sort of ceremony took place at the chief's place. By the time we lounged back there it was over.

Much shouting and laughing followed. We found Senhor Tom and Marion standing before Andirah and smiling as if they did not know what it was all about but were willing to help the fun along. As the crowd swarmed again around the liquor-jars I asked Senhor Tom what had been done.

“Oh, I don't know,” he said. “Making us members of the tribe, I guess. The old boy held our hands and mumbled some stuff I didn't make out, and everybody held a hullabaloo. I never saw it done before, though I've been among Tucunas quite a bit. Hope this celebration ends today, so we can get back to camp and start on to Viciado. I'm getting tired of sticking around here.”

He yawned, turned away, and went strolling about the house with the girl.

“Tupahn and his woman are now truly the brother and sister of the Bat. Is it so, heramuhm?” Pedro asked.

“It is so, herayi. With his own hands Andirah has taken them into the tribe and put them together according to the custom.”

We looked hard at the old man and at each other.

“Put them together?” Pedro repeated.

“So the Bat has said, my son. As he has put together for life many a young man and his mate, so has he done with these new ones of our tribe, Tupahn and his woman. Let them struggle no more before me as they did.”

Again we stared. Then we roared with laughter.

“''Senhor! Senhorita!—I mean Senhora!''” Pedro shouted. “Come here!”

“Well?” boomed Senhor Tom. “Don't get fresh, old chap. Just remember this is Senhorita Marshall.”

“She is not, comrade! She is now Senhora Mack! With the proper ceremony, you two have just been married by the Bat!”