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THE INDIAN TRIBE OF immediate concern was the Gayapos. While they lived farther north along the Xingu basin, rivers were their highways, and they often paddled down the Paranatinga to raid the local Bakairi. They were distinguishable by their large lip plates, the reddish-black body paint they applied to mimic insects, and the long clubs they used to break the bones of those they captured. For this reason, after taking photographs of the canoes in use and horned bullocks swimming across the river, Alexandra put her camera aside to carry her rifle. She ventured with Samuel and Jack to scout the area for a place to set camp for the night. Near a shallow pool of muddy runoff, they wandered into an anaconda hosting a tremendous bulge. Its size amazed them.
Alexandra said, “We must get pictures. Has it choked to death?”
“Maybe it ate a tapir,” Samuel guessed, “but what do I know? I’m a vegetarian!”
Jack tossed a stone at the prodigious specimen to see if it stirred. It did not.
Dyott dropped in. “It has eaten and will idle for weeks.”
Alexandra said, “I confronted a similar-serpent in—”
Dyott was already walking away.
“One of us needs to pose beside it for scale,” Jack said, readying his tripod camera.
“You go!” Samuel protested. “How about you, Alexandra?”
She reminded him, “I am not associated with this expedition and cannot be filmed.”
“We’ll decide by rock-paper-scissors,” said Jack. It was an Asiatic hand game catching fire in the Western Hemisphere. He laid out the rules. “Both losers kneel beside it for posterity.”
They all agreed to the plan. Alexandra plotted her strategy. Jack yelled, “Ro-sham-bo!” and she put out a flat hand, beating his rock. It was time for round two with Samuel. “Ro-sham-bo!”
Samuel cheered, having stoned her scissors. He then beat Jack.
Alexandra passed Samuel her Leica-1 camera, informing him she wanted a picture of Jack alone for the NANA folks and one of herself for her office wall. They approached the twenty-foot monstrosity. She volunteered to be the first to take the end with the head. They settled next to it. She put her hand on it and smiled. The snake did not seem to mind. It felt very reptilian.
“Muenster cheeeeese!”
Dyott dropped in again. “Very nice. Just be cautious of the second one slithering behind you.”
—‡—
THE FAWCETT RELIEF Expedition arrived at Bakairi outpost in one week. It was a government reservation hoisting the Brazilian flag that dealt with all three classifications of Indians in the Mato Grosso. For the assimilated Bakairi, it gave them land to raise cattle and grow crops, a schoolhouse for their children to learn Portuguese, and medical care for the invasive diseases that had decimated their people dating back to the conquistadors. Those warier of foreigners periodically visited to trade food for trinkets and cutlery. Alexandra attained excellent photographs of hunters of the Mehinaku interacting with members of the team. They were sturdy men with bowl-cut hair who had walked out of the jungle stark naked, carrying seven-foot bows.
Barbed wire surrounded the twenty scantily built structures to deter attack from more hostile elements, of which there were many. As explained to her, most of these little-known tribes lived where the team was heading. The cannibalistic Morcegos were “bat-people” who sheltered in tree trunks and only emerged at night. Macahirys were likewise people-eaters only four days’ march to the north. The Suyá and Xavantes were the most warlike, but the greatest threat remained the Gayapos. A small garrison of soldiers dissuaded their attacks and safeguarded against non-Indians taken to banditry.
It was agreed that Alexandra would return with the cattlemen once the expedition took to the rivers. She had taken enough first-rate photographs that it would not be tragic if her departure came now. Upon the first sight of the Mehinakus, the vaqueros were fearful to go any deeper into the wilderness, but Dyott was insistent they continue. He had gained critical intelligence from a Bakairi named Bernadino, who had been among Fawcett’s local guides in 1920. Bernadino’s front teeth ended in sharp points, and he wore scant clothing. He spoke some Portuguese and had confirmed that Dead Horse was near the headwaters of the Rio Batovi, which was at 14º south latitude.
After two days’ rest, the cowboys agreed to stay on. Bernadino and four companions joined the party, and the expedition set off into thicker forest toward the tributaries of the Rio Xingu.
It was the land from which no white man returned.
Alexandra had learned early in life how to navigate the openness of Montana. Since Buriti, she had mapped their route so she might retrace her steps back to civilization. It had been a simple process along the open chapada, but now, descending into the muggy basin, trees a hundred feet tall blotted out the sunlight. To circumvent this handicap, jungle explorers carved symbols into tree trunks. Alexandra chose an exclamation point as her mark. While carving this sign, she detected an etched Y in a tree off the footpath. She recruited Samuel to tag along. Insects swarmed as they used machetes to cut through dense vegetation.
A capybara scurried into the brush. They soon found a trail that held anthills and large trees felled by termites.
Human footprints marred the moist forest bed.
“Gayapos,” Alexandra hissed, unslinging her rifle. They followed the prints, which led to a decomposed body. Samuel threw up. The dead were recycled quickly in the bush. Ants were having a feast and little flesh remained. “Go get the commander.”
Samuel retreated down the trail. He soon returned with Dyott.
Alexandra lowered the kerchief covering her nose and mouth to better investigate. Two opportunistic creatures had staked their claim: a venomous pit viper coiled inside the ribcage, waiting for vermin to ambush; a pink-toed tarantula, plotting the same. It was what death in the Amazon looked like.
Alexandra raised her camera and took photographs. “I’d guess three days ago, Commander.”
Dyott stepped forward. “I concur.”
Alexandra lifted her goggles. She spotted a club under the body and pulled it free. It was a four-foot-long borduna—the weapon of choice of the Gayapos. “Shall we alert the others?”
“The vaqueros will flee,” Dyott warned. “What I like about you, Miss Bathenbrook, is—”
“I can be one of the guys without being any less of a lady?” she finished for him.
“—that you’ll be departing soon,” Dyott finished for himself. “Not a single word!”
Alexandra and Samuel nodded. She led Dyott to another tree etched with a Y. They debated if Fawcett had carved it during his 1925 expedition. If it were, they could follow such signposts the entire way.
She said, “The colonel’s aim. What comes after Y?”
It brought a rare smile to Dyott’s pursed lips. “Zed!”
They rejoined the armada struggling through the dense green landscape and kept a lookout for the markings over the coming days with mixed success. A long week removed from Bakairi outpost; Bernadino had guided them to the spot near the Batovi he stated was Dead Horse. Several days later, they reached the Rio Arame—the end of the line for land travel. As they pitched camp along its bank, it grew apparent that surreptitious shadows hiding within the jungle were now monitoring their every movement.
Imperceptible, yet everywhere.
—‡—
IF THERE WAS ONE THING Alexandra had learned during her previous jungle explorations, it was that good orifice management was crucial. In her everyday life, careless gatekeeping that allowed a lemon squirt to sting her eye, a sophomoric finger to pick her nose, or the welcoming of the occasional penis was survivable. Most people who fell in the Amazon did so rife with fever, and outside of ingestion of dirty water, it was due to poor cavity oversight. Many in the expedition were wearing down and feeling sickly. Dyott’s order to set up camp upon reaching the Rio Arame granted everyone time to attend to cleaning themselves up and resting before dinner.
Ever since leaving Bakairi outpost, Alexandra sensed a cold turn toward her. The vaqueros did not want her company when they returned, fearing the temptation to capture a white woman would encourage Indian attack. The camaradas resented she brandished two guns, and they were armed only with machetes. She didn’t know why the technical men were giving her the icy mitt. They had even stopped teasing about her anti-bug attire and lemon concoctions. She hoped time off the trail might allow for tensions to subside.
Alexandra slept most of the day, swinging in her shaded hammock without too much bother from garrapatas, piums, or tiny wasps; the latter having an affinity to infiltrate the eyes, nose, and ears. Arising before sunset, she visited José as he prepared dinner. He planned to serve beans and rice rather than rice and beans because it was the Sabbath. As she did every night, Alexandra retrieved a bucket of boiling water, filled her canteen, and spiked it with lemon juice. To what remained, she added the rind, a sprinkle of cinnamon, and drops of eucalyptus oil. She tossed her satchel over a shoulder and walked with her steaming bucket for the river.
Many of the men were also washing up; their bodies riddled with blotches and eyes puffy from intruders. They had scratched some of their bites to the point of open wounds, which created yet another portal for parasites and disease.
Dusk was the only time pests were not rampant, as if man and insect agreed to a brief ceasefire. Thereafter, all treaties were off, and voracious mosquitos would report for the night shift.
Alexandra found a dry spot offering privacy and tended to her cleaning rituals. She stripped out of her dirty clothing and frowned upon noting a tear in her khaki breeches. Despite wrapping puttees to seal her boots, bugs always fell out, and they invariably infiltrated her camisole and panties. Squatting to pee invited the nasty critters to seize opportunity, thus she had voided in water at every chance to keep them away from her privates.
Her goggles, gloves, and the cotton swabs filling her ears were last to go before wetting a cloth to wash up with. The bugs melted right off to her citrusy mix, which stung when applied. It was a recipe she had heard of in Java and first tried along her swampy passage from Corumbá to Cuiabá aboard the ferry Iguatemi. Foot care came next. Dry socks were a must, so she rinsed and squeezed them out so they might hang her hammock line for use tomorrow. She slopped liberal amounts of petroleum jelly to insulate any open cuts to her skin.
Alexandra heard the crunch of a twig and removed her revolver from its holster. To calm down, she started talking to herself, waiting for cause to turn and fire. “Armpits hairy...? Check. Left bosom still swelled from fire ant bite...? Check. No botfly larvae wriggling under my skin...?”
“Check!” Dyott moseyed out of the foliage.
“You should take caution,” Alexandra said, lowering the gun. She shimmied back into her shirt. “I might have taken you for something other than a ‘peeping Tom’ and shot you.”
“Everyone appears on edge,” he said tiredly. Dyott passed her a crumpled pack of cigarettes she had dropped in camp. He settled at the riverbank, tossed bated fishing lines into the water, and tied them to an exposed root. Bugs did not seem to care for him much.
Two colorful macaws flew by, and the jungle started singing.
The more the others soured on her, the kinder he had become. Alexandra lit up a smoke. After taking a puff, she used the cigarette to burn off three ticks and two leeches latched onto her left thigh.
“Pedro is very ill. He must travel tomorrow if he is to survive. I want you to take him.”
She assumed Dyott was eager to get rid of her, his millstone. The government agent was a decent man who had not fared well in the wilderness. “Just us two?”
“I would also send two Indians,” Dyott said. “I suggest you leave after breakfast, ride without sleep for the first two days to clear the worst of it, and then find your way back to the outpost. As Colonel Fawcett wrote in his journal, ‘The exit from Hell is always difficult.’”
Alexandra sighed. They were three weeks in, and it was already over. “It will please everyone to be rid of me.”
Dyott stated emphatically, “If we’ve been brusque, it’s because you’ve humbled us with your goggles, cotton, and secretive insect repellants. The lads feel foolish over their jibes and are irritable for being chewed upon with no impunity. You have not affected this mission as I feared. Cursing, belching, and untoward flatulence have been well below the norm. I want it known I’m sending Pedro with you because you’re his only hope. Your map to the outpost is spot-on and your instincts and conduct have been as keen as mustard!”
She gave him a brief but appreciative smile. “You will say ‘hello’ to Colonel Fawcett for me?”
Dyott raised a skeptical eyebrow, betraying his unspoken doubts about Fawcett’s survival. “I shall.”
Alexandra looked downriver and snickered. Some men were getting a head start on reverting into Neanderthals, waving their hoses side to side while urinating into the river. “You may have spoken prematurely, Commander, but boys will be boys.”
“They are just guarding against the candiru.” Dyott started back for camp, whistling.
“What is the candiru?” she hollered, needing to know.
He said, “It is a native fish, thinner than a pin, which can swim up a flow of urine to lodge itself in the urethra. There, it latches in and grows, unremovable. A most insufferable way to die.”
Alexandra felt faint. “Can it swim up a woman’s submerged, you know, when she pees?”
Dyott rubbed his chin, having no prior experience with a female in the Amazon to have given it any thought. “From an anatomical standpoint, I suppose it could just swim up, you know, any ole time.”
Yes, it is overdue that I vomit. “When did you plan to share this knowledge with me?”
Dyott held up his palms and shrugged. “One cannot think of everything... and I just did. So, check!”
—‡—
THE NIGHTS WERE NOISY and pitch-black, less the campfires. Though they remained far removed from the deepest of rainforest, the roar of howler monkeys served as frequent lullabies. Bill and Gerry were night owls, attempting to touch base with the outside world via their wireless set, which functioned better in the evening hours. They occasionally pulled in static-marred news reports from New York or a music station. The camaradas always sang around a firepit, and the cattlemen dealt with their beasts. Dyott wrote in his journal to close out each day. He had informed the vaqueros they would depart when the team headed downriver for the Kuluene—a large tributary to the Rio Xingu. The rapids would lead into the thickest of rainforest.
Once upon the water, there was no turning back.
It rained much of Alexandra’s final night. She awaited the sunrise rocking in her hammock, calculating her retreat back to civilization. She had seen Dyott leave camp. As he was yet to return, she worried.
“Pssst. Sam! Where did Commander Dyott go?”
“Probably to toilet,” Samuel grumbled from his hammock, “but what do I know? I’m still asleep!”
She unsealed herself from her mosquito netting. “Get a flashlight, and your gun, and let’s go!”
They departed into the darkness.
It was easy to track Dyott’s steps in the moist soil. As Alexandra suspected, he had headed for the spot they had chatted the previous night to check on his fishhooks. It was a quarter mile down the river and the trail was now fraught with mudholes and swampy pools. The forest pulsated with the clamors that sound before dawn. Among them was the guttural cry of a jaguar. Alexandra stepped around a stretch of muck, thinking Samuel would do the same, but he walked right into the bog, and she needed to extricate him.
“What if the commander is dead?” he asked. “Killed by Gayapos or in the belly of a snake?”
“Stop being such a nervous Nellie!” she snipped. Her adrenaline was high, and her heart pounded furiously. They continued forward another fifty paces. She clicked off her flashlight. “Wait!”
From her crouch, Alexandra could see something protruding from the ground. Five minutes of silent inspection followed, with the mass moving occasionally. There was rustling amidst the trees ahead. The first glimmer of sunlight reflected off the river, and she waited for it to expand enough to allow for a clearer assessment of things.
Shadows emerged from the trees. Indians carrying weapons.
Alexandra tightened her grip on her rifle. She reported, “The commander is caught in quicksand.”
Samuel begged for orders. “Do we rush forward, guns ablaze?”
“What do I know?” Alexandra diddled. “I skipped forest ranger class that week!”
It was clear that Dyott, trapped thigh-deep in the muck, had also spotted the Indians. As they carried bows, they were not Gayapos, but that brought little relief, as they could be members of a tribe equal in savagery. There were six, no seven—wait, nine—materializing from the haze; no different from images upon a blank piece of photographic paper once dipped in a stop bath.
Everything in the Amazon was big, except its people. The men wore feathered headdresses colored yellow and red. Shaved sticks impaled their cheeks, noses, and earlobes. Their bows were up, but the six-foot arrows they used to hunt were yet drawn back.
To Alexandra, they seemed to be more curious about Dyott’s predicament than hostile toward his presence. As they would detect her once the sunlight crept forward, the decision to fight or flee was approaching its apex.
She chose option three. “Hold my rifle.”
Samuel tried to grab her as she stood and trudged ahead. In measured steps, she approached them, hand near her revolver.
The Indians’ attention shifted from Dyott to her. They whispered among themselves, offering curious gazes. Alexandra had not believed the tales of a race of tall, fair-skinned women ruling in these lands, but by the natives’ reaction, one would venture they did. The Indians studied her as inquisitively as she studied them, then lowered their bows and disappeared into the jungle. She proceeded toward Dyott. It was clear he had tried to skirt the sludge and slid in.
He was too cemented to pry free by hand.
“Good morning, Commander. Quite a peck of pickled peppers you have picked.”
“Did you see them? They are of the Kuikuro tribe.”
“Very hearty men, indeed,” Alexandra commented. She turned to Samuel, who emerged from the brush to join them. She reclaimed her rifle. “Get back to camp and retrieve Jack and some rope. I am rather handy with a lasso and will take great satisfaction in corralling the commander for rescue.”
Dyott tried to free himself. “I beseech you to find another way.”
Alexandra continued with her instructions. “Say nothing of this to anyone. It would reflect poorly on the commander. I’ll remain here. If you hear gunfire, send everybody.”
Samuel nodded and headed off. It would take him at least thirty minutes to return with help.
Alexandra squatted down and rested the rifle across her thighs. The fresh sunlight heating her damp clothing felt luscious. “Should I try to retrieve the Kuikuro so we can get a group photograph?”
Dyott asked, “Have you ever considered seeking psychiatric consult, Miss Bathenbrook?”
“I am shed-uled for August if I make it back,” she freely related, casting a mischievous grin. “I recall during our dinner in New York, you snubbed my discussion of Papua. As we have time together, I’ll start from the beginning... So, there I was on a raft, drifting down the Fly River, whence—”
“When,” Dyott corrected. He desperately struggled to break free of the slop, but his efforts were futile.
“—whence spotted were ferocious cannibals of the Marind-Anim. They looked quite hungry!”
Dyott sighed and dipped his head. “Have you no mercy?”
“It might seem odd,” Alexandra continued, “but my first thought was ‘would I taste better grilled or boiled?’ Anyhoo, we’ll revisit that theme later. Now, back to Papua!”
As Commander George Dyott listened, he could only lament that it had not been Gayapos who had found him helpless and gone about crushing his skull with their bordunas.
One can but dream.