‘But we can’t do that,’ objected Hal. ‘Don’t they have any respect for their women?’
‘Not much.’
‘Why, there must be fifty women in that line. Tell them we won’t do it.’
‘That would be a serious mistake,’ Ted replied. ‘They would be insulted. Think how you would feel if you wanted to welcome someone to your home and he refused to shake hands with you. You would be surprised and offended. We can’t afford to make these people angry just when they are doing their best to be friendly. Walk over the women.’
‘You go first,’ Hal said. ‘I bet you can’t do it.’
‘I can, because I must. So must you.’
The captain took off his shoes and carried them in his hand. He hesitated a moment - then he stepped gingerly on the first brown body. A little cry came out of it, for the captain was heavy. He stepped as lightly as possible on the second, and on the third. Each time there was a little squeak of pain, but the bodies lay still.
Roger prodded Hal. ‘You’re the next one to be honoured.’
‘Why me? You go ahead.’
‘Not on your life. I know my place. I wouldn’t be so impolite as to go ahead of my honourable big brother.’
Hal said, ‘Look out that your honourable big brother doesn’t punch you in the nose.’
He removed his shoes and socks, gave his feet a quick wash in the river, then stepped out carefully on the human bridge. He hated every step, but he tried to look pleased. After all, he must seem to enjoy this fine welcome.
It was Roger’s turn. He didn’t need to take off his footgear for he was already barefoot, as always on the deck of the Flying Cloud. He had a boy’s dislike of bathing, but his feet needed washing even more than Ted’s or Hal’s. He gave them a quick dab.
Then he ran, not walked, over the brown pavement to the spirit house. By running, he hoped to put as little weight as possible on each body. Not only were there no squeaks of pain this time, but the women actually smiled up at him as he passed.
Chapter 3
The witch doctor
At the door of the tambaran a guard stood aside and invited the three to enter.
‘Now, that’s the nicest thing they could possibly do for us,’ the captain said. ‘Usually no stranger is allowed in the spirit house. If he should sneak in without permission he would probably be killed.’
‘What colours!’ said Hal. ‘See all those paintings on the front wall.’
‘But wait until you see the inside,’ said the captain.
They entered. At first they could see nothing plainly. There were no windows. The thatch roof came straight down to the ground. Hal took out his flashlight.
The place was full of people - all in wood. Carved wooden figures stood all about. They were painted in red and yellow. Some wore terrible masks. Others wore no masks, but their faces themselves were terrible. Savage teeth projected from their mouths, their noses reached to their chins and were pierced by the horns of animals, their great eyes, vividly coloured, seemed to bore through you.
They are supposed to be devils - or gods. That’s all the same. To these people the gods are devilish and the devils have the power of gods. The witch doctors use these figures to scare the people and make them do as they are told.’
But the most remarkable exhibits in the spirit house were the hundreds of skulls, lined up in rows on shelves. They all screamed with paint, red, blue, yellow, purple.
‘Heads of enemies they have killed,’ said the captain. ‘As I told you before, there is supposed to be an evil spirit hiding in every one, ready to do you harm if you don’t behave.’
Roger squirmed as if ants were running over his back. This place gives me the creeps.’
That’s what it is supposed to do. That’s how the witch doctor keeps control of the people - by giving them the creeps.’
They came out of the tambaran to find all the people of the village assembled. They were listening to the witch doctor, who stood high on the end of the great wooden drum so that all could see him. The sun had set. Torches made of faggots and straw lit the scene. Some of the audience booed the speaker because the three strangers had proved they were better witch doctors than he was.
Captain Ted explained. ‘He’s trying to get them under his thumb once more. He’s telling them about his great powers - how he can kill people without even touching them. All he needs to do is to say to a man, “You will die,” and the man dies.’
‘Baloney!’ exploded Roger. ‘Does he really expect them to believe that?’
‘Yes - and they do believe it. They have seen it happen many times. They believe it so completely that when a magician puts the curse of death on them, they are very likely to give up and die.
‘After all, our own doctors can do something like that. Suppose you don’t feel well. You go to the doctor and he examines you. Perhaps he says, “You’re in fine shape. Don’t worry. You will be all right.” What effect does it have on you? Why, you feel better right away. It’s a relief to know that there is nothing wrong with you. Thinking you are well helps you to be well. Your mind tells you “You’re well” and your body answers “I am well.”
‘But suppose your doctor examines you and then looks very serious and shakes his head and says, “You’re a very, very sick man.” “How long have I got doctor?” ”A few weeks at the most.” You go home feeling worse than ever, both in mind and body. If you really believe in your doctor, you may just get weaker and weaker until you quit altogether.’
‘Luckily, most of us don’t think our doctors know everything. But most savages have complete faith in their witch
doctors.’
‘What’s lie saying now?’ asked Roger.
‘He’s talking about us. He says he will prove that he is a greater magician than any of us.’
Now the sorcerer faced them directly and said, ‘Hear what I say. I call upon all-the powers of evil. I place a curse upon you. You will sleep tonight in the tambaran. Every one of the hundred spirits in that house will look down upon you and wish your death. At midnight you will die. I have spoken.’
The guards pushed Hal, Roger and the captain back into the spirit house and closed the great carved door. A beam used to lock the door fell into place. Now the tambaran was a prison.
Hal flashed his light around. Wooden figures and skulls seemed to come alive and their large, brilliantly painted eyes stared, ugly and cruel, upon the three condemned to death.
‘If looks can kill,’ Roger said, ‘we’re dead already.’
‘Not by a long shot,’ said Captain Ted. ‘Keep your nerve up. As for me, I’m going to go to bed.’
But the flashlight revealed no bed or couch of any kind.
‘Okay,’ said Ted. ‘We’ll sleep on the floor. But we ought at least to have pillows.’ He looked about for something that would do for a pillow. There might at least be a block of wood. None could be seen. His eyes lit on the rows of skulls.
‘Perfect,’ he said. He gave the two boys a pair of skulls and took one for himself. They lay down and tried to make their heads comfortable on the hard bone.
Roger couldn’t get rid of the idea that every skull was the home of a demon. His demon seemed to be staring up straight through his head. He turned the skull upside down with its eyes in the dirt. Now he felt a little more comfortable.
A healthy boy doesn’t lie awake worrying and Roger was soon asleep. But after a few hours he woke up with a start. He thought he had heard a voice say, The time has come.’
But his brother and Ted were snoring softly. Otherwise, the place was as silent as a tomb. Tomb - that was a bad thought. If there was anything to the sorcerer’s curse, this was their tomb. He looked at the luminous dial of his watch.
It was ten minutes before midnight. What would happen in ten minutes? Nothing, he told himself. Nothing at all. He would just go to sleep again. He adjusted his head as comfortably as possible on his bony pillow and closed his eyes. But the eyes of all the demons around
him bored through his eyelids. He could imagine that the sorcerer was standing over him, repeating the curse, ‘At midnight you will die.’
He didn’t feel well. He had a headache. And a stomachache. He put his fingers on his wrist. His pulse was too fast. He felt too warm, yet he was shivering. Should he wake Hal? Hal would call him a fool for getting the jitters over nothing.
But the sorcerer might have more power than he gave him credit for. After all, Americans didn’t know everything. Almost everything, perhaps, but not everything. Science was just beginning to learn about waves - electrical waves, radio waves, sonar waves, X-rays, light rays, laser rays, cosmic rays, atomic rays. There were probably thousands of other kinds. Why not death rays? He had seen enough of the world to know that civilized men had much to learn from savages. Perhaps the sorcerer was awake and sending out thought waves that could kill. Some sort of rays seemed to be burrowing into Roger’s own brain. Or was that just his headache?
Now he understood how a native who had been told by a sorcerer that he would die might really die. He felt like crying out. But no - if he had to die he would die with his mouth shut.
What was all this about dying? He knew he wouldn’t die.
But he felt very faint and tired. He fell into a troubled sleep. He dreamed that he was dead and his skull was on the shelf.
When he woke the sun was glinting in under the big door. Hal and Ted were stirring. There was the sound of many voices outside; then the scrape of the locking beam as it was drawn out, and the door opened.
The sorcerer stood in the doorway. Behind him were the people of the village, straining their necks, trying to see if his death curse had worked.
‘Play dead,’ whispered Hal. The three closed their eyes.
The sorcerer came in. To see if they were only asleep, he kicked each one cruelly in the ribs. They did not budge. It was quite evident that they were stone dead.
Some of the men shouted in praise of their sorcerer. But the women groaned in sympathy for the strangers they had welcomed the day before.
The sorcerer went out and gave some sharp orders. ‘He’s telling them to build a fire,’ Ted whispered. There was the sound of stone axes whacking down brush; then the scrape of the brush being dragged to a central spot; then the sputter of fire.
‘Are they going to burn us alive?’ whispered Roger.
‘Not alive,’ replied Ted. ‘Don’t forget - you’re dead. Don’t let them get a squeak out of you. Then we’ll give them a surprise.’
Another sharp order, then men entered, laid hold of the three corpses, and dragged them out into a circle of brush. There was already the crackle of small fires that had been started all around the circle. They gradually burned higher and higher and joined until there was a perfect ring of fire around the three bodies.
The fire began to eat in towards the centre. A little more, and it would burn their clothes - and then themselves. It had rained during the night and the damp brush sent up huge volumes of smoke, It was beginning to be uncomfortably hot within the circle of flame.
‘Now,’ said Captain Ted, ‘we get up and walk out.’
The people gasped in terror when they saw three ghosts appear in the smoke. They must be the spirits of the three dead strangers.
The ghosts stepped quickly over the flames and out into the open - and changed into living men!
A cry went through the crowd. Here was greater magic than their own sorcerer had ever performed. The sorcerer himself could not believe what he saw. He stood frozen, speechless, Iris jaw hanging in wonder. Probably it was the first time his murder method had ever failed.
A moment before he was a man of power and every man, woman and child in the valley was afraid of him. Now his authority was gone, he was no better than the next man, and the crowd was screaming that he himself should be thrown into the fire.
He took to his heels and escaped into the woods. Perhaps he would climb over the mountain into the next village and try there to set up again in the magic business. At any rate, this village was rid of him.
Chapter 4
Roger and the crocodile
Roger saw the monster lurking in the reeds just off shore.
But he wanted to wash the smudge of smoke from his face. He was not afraid of crocodiles. He had even made pets of them on his father’s farm.
This one was twice as big as any he had ever seen, but what did that matter? It was just a croc, and would behave like other crocs. He had learned that, usually, no wild animal would attack a man unless the man attacked it first. He wasn’t going to attack this beast. He only wanted to wash his face and go in peace.
He leaned over the water. The villagers standing nearby began to babble excitedly. The captain came up behind him and said, ‘Watch out. That fellow has his eye on you. These people say he’s a devil. He has killed more than a hundred of their people.’
Roger looked up and said, ‘They’re putting you on. If it had killed just one, they wouldn’t have let it live.’ He thought to himself, What does Ted know about crocs? He knows the deck of a ship, but he’s probably never studied animals.
The reason they let it live,’ said the captain, is that they think it’s a devil. Killing it would only make the devil that lives in it angry and it might destroy all the people in the village.’
‘Well,’ said Roger, ‘I don’t have any such superstition. May I wash my face now?’
‘Wash your face, you stubborn little brat,’ said Ted angrily. ‘You think you know crocs. You don’t know these. The crocs along this coast are the biggest and worst in the world. If anything happens, you asked for it.’ He turned on his heel and walked away.
Roger looked again at the crocodile. It did look like a mean customer. It was huge - at least thirty feet long and seven or eight feet around. Its big reddish eyes were fixed upon him. Its jaws were wide open. The inside of the mouth was a bright yellow, and small fish attracted by the colour swam in. Then the jaws snapped shut and the fish were swallowed. When the jaws opened again Roger made a rough count of the teeth. There were about seventy, and the largest teeth were as big as his hand.
A bird flew into the mouth. This time the jaws did not close. There was a secret understanding between the bird and the beast. The bird set to work picking the particles of rotten meat from between the monster’s teeth. The bird was the croc’s toothbrush, or toothpick. After it completed its job, it flew away.
If the giant could be so friendly with the bird, what did Roger have to fear from it? So he thought.
The crocodile was putting on his goggles. That meant he was going to go underwater. A crocodile has two sets of eyelids. One pair is thick, and shuts out all light when the animal wants to sleep. The other pair is transparent and is used to keep water out of the eyes when the animal is swimming beneath the surface. These were the eyelids that were now closing, and Roger knew that the big fellow was about to submerge.
Roger assumed it would go down and quietly swim away.
There was a rushing sound as the crocodile took a deep breath. With this air in its lungs it could stay down ten or fifteen minutes. Now the head began to sink and the great staring eyes were the last to disappear.
Roger hoped-the captain was looking. It would teach him that if you don’t bother a wild animal it will not bother you.
He leaned over and washed his face in the cold water, fresh from the snows on the mountain-tops. He did not notice the ripple on the surface that would have told him that the monster was coming straight towards him. He did not know anything was wrong until something or somebody gave him a terrific blow in the back and he toppled into the water.
Gagging and gasping he came to the surface. What had struck him? There was no one on the bank.
Then, too late, he remembered the favourite method of attack of the crocodile. When its victim is on the shore it may not try to seize it in its teeth, but uses its tail. It whips its tail through the air with terrific speed and knocks its victim into the water. The tail is al
l muscle, with the strength of a pile-driver, and even a horse or a lion is unable to keep its footing when struck by it.
The crocodile took him in its mouth, one three-foot-long jaw across his stomach, the other across his back. The seventy teeth bit into his hide. He had just time to take a deep breath before he was pulled down beneath the surface.
He knew what would happen next. Since the crocodile’s teeth were not adapted for chewing, but only for holding, he would be held tightly and carried somewhere below and left there until his drowned body decayed enough to be tender. That would take several days. When he was well tenderized the crocodile could easily pull him apart and swallow each part separately.
That was how a crocodile managed to consume any large animal, even a cow or an ox. In Africa he had seen a ten-ton elephant come to a pond and put in its trunk to drink. A crocodile seized the end of the trunk and pulled. The elephant braced itself but since the bank was steep and slippery it lost its footing and with a mighty splash disappeared under the surface.
Roger was no elephant and he was quite powerless in that terrific grip. He tried to dig his thumbs into the monster’s eyes, but both pairs of eyelids closed and were thick enough to withstand all the pressure he could apply.
Part of the air he had taken in had been squeezed out of him, and the rest would not keep him alive for more than two or three minutes.
Something else was squeezed out of him - his self-conceit. He wished now that he had listened to Captain Ted. It was too late now to ‘live and learn’. He had learned, but he wouldn’t live.
Perhaps the crocodile would push him under a sunken log or rock to hold him to the bottom. Then it would go away and leave him. Perhaps he could wriggle loose and come up.
But it would have to happen very quickly. His lungs felt as if they would burst. A minute more, and there would be no wriggle left in him.
The crocodile seemed to be carrying him back towards the bank. Perhaps it was going to put him ashore. It probably didn’t like the taste of him because he was a foreigner.
12 Cannibal Adventure Page 2
