Before us rose a wall of thin, straight palm-logs standing on end in the water. The posts stood close together, yet not too close to let the water flow through between them. They were lashed to one another by loop after loop of tough woody vines and bush-rope, and the whole wall looked firm enough to last for a lifetime. It extended up the steep banks on either side, rising to a height a little above the topmost flood mark. In it we could see no gate, and no path showed around either end. It seemed made to let water in but keep all else out.
"Por Deus!" Pedro said softly. “This is a queer thing to find in uninhabited jungle. No dolphin-woman made this, nor any other woman. It is the work of a strong man."
"I do not like it,” I muttered. “It looks like a trap."
He nodded. But instead of answering he held up a hand for silence. Beyond the barrier sounded splashing.
Softly, silently, we stroked our canoe up to the poles. Pedro, in the bow, leaned forward and peered through one of the narrow openings.
"Nossa Senhora!" I heard him whisper. Then, turning his head and shielding his mouth with one hand, he added, “The Bouto!"
Quickly but quietly I worked my end of the boat around until I too could look through. And there in the water, some distance away but unmistakable, I saw the woman who had beckoned to me in the moonlight.
In truth, she seemed a dolphin woman. She was swimming and playing about with the smooth ease of a fish, disappearing sometimes below the surface, staying under until it seemed that she must have drowned, then gliding into sight again at some place a long way from the spot where she had vanished.
After floating quietly a moment she would splash water upward with both hands and go down backward, her feet kicking a white lather as they sank. And then we would see her pink toes peep out somewhere else, followed by her hands and then by her flushed face, above which her black hair was piled in a cone resembling a dolphin's snout.
She turned over with a gleam of sleek arms; she swam on her right side and then on her left; she even went feet first, her toes held above water. And we clung to the poles and marveled.
"She is better than the dolphin itself,” Pedro murmured. “I have never seen a fish that could swim backward as she is doing."
It was not only her skill that held me quiet, however, but her fearlessness. Neither of us, though we could swim if we had to, would think of sporting about as she was doing—there are too many perils waiting for a swimmer in our waters. Alligators, huge water snakes, bloodthirsty piranhas, barb-tailed araya devil-fish, electric eels which shock and stun, and other deadly creatures too foul for me to speak of—all these lurk under the surface that looks so harmless to a stranger, and we were too old in the ways of the jungle streams to expose ourselves to them. Yet this dolphin woman seemed to give them no thought, and she suffered no harm.
At length she tired of her play and came swiftly toward us in a final dash. Swerving toward the left bank, she reached upward and caught at something we had not noticed—a little platform on poles, like the moutás which our Indians set up in the waters of the jungle pools when shooting turtles. One of the posts supporting this was notched to form a ladder, and up these notches she climbed to the platform.
There she sat breathing a moment. Then she arose, unbound her cone of hair, pressed the water from it, and shook it loose to dry.
Senhores, that hair was longer than she herself. It hung down below the moutá on which she stood, and her head tilted backward a little as if drawn down by the weight of it. Against its blackness her face and figure glowed far more clearly than when I had last seen her, back in the dark jungle under the wan light of the moon. Plump, smooth-skinned, unclothed except for a tight-drawn tanga, glistening with the water-drops rolling down her shapely form, she still seemed the Bouto Woman of the old tale—a dolphin such as Pedro had mentioned, black of back and fair of body.
Yet her face, as she stood with chin upward and gaze fixed on the jungle beyond, did not seem that of a woman nimble-witted enough to lure men to destruction. Somehow it looked rather blank, and the eyes seemed to stare as unwinkingly as those of a fish.
A choking sound from Pedro drew my attention away from her. He was struggling to hold his breath. His effort failed. He burst into a snorting sneeze.
Muttering a curse, he looked again through the palm wall. So did I. The woman turned sharply toward us, watched the logs a moment and probably saw our canoe through the openings. With a leap she cleared the space between her platform and the land. There she stood still again, frowning. Then, instead of running away, she calmly came toward us.
While she was balancing herself along the abrupt slope we pushed the canoe to shore and waited. Her head rose over the wall and hung there, peering down.
"Boa dia, senhorita," Pedro greeted her. “I hope we have not disturbed you."
She made no answer. Her steady stare rested long on his face, then passed to mine. A slow smile came on her full lips, and I knew she recognized me. But still she did not speak. Presently a hand rose over the wall and beckoned. And the invitation was not to Pedro but to me.
I sat still, for this was most astonishing. Never before had a woman ignored my handsome partner for me. As you senhores can see for yourselves, I am so plain that women are not likely to notice me at any time, and certainly not when I am with such a tall, graceful fellow as Pedro. Now, with this attractive woman preferring me to him, I was as much surprised as if our canoe had suddenly grown legs and started to walk up the slope.
Watching me, she laughed quietly and continued to beckon. Pedro turned to me.
"Why do you not go?” he demanded. “Must your lady come down here and carry you? Use your legs."
I stepped out on the bank. But there I stopped, glancing again at the wall.
"Come with me,” I said in an undertone. “As I said before, this place looks like a trap. Perhaps no harm is near, but we had best make sure. Here you are walled in on three sides, and the way out is not easy."
"So you think there may be a reason for trying to separate us?"
"I do not know. But I do know that two men can be killed more easily when apart than when together. And, as you have said, no woman built that barrier."
He nodded, fastened the boat to a post and followed me, rifle in hand. The woman frowned, but still said nothing. After a slippery climb up the bank we crossed the wall at the point where the last and shortest stakes joined the steep earth. By that time the woman had started away, and we trailed in her footprints, balancing ourselves with difficulty on the wet clay. When we came above the moutá, however, we found a path where the soil was packed into a narrow shelf, and from that point we trod more easily and could look at other things besides the ground.
The woman, I noticed, had again looped her hair around her waist. Then, as I glanced beyond her, I noticed something else. A couple of hundred yards farther along the ravine the top of another wall of poles showed above the water. Now I understood why the woman could swim here without fear.
These barriers would keep out araya, piranha and all other evil creatures except those so small that they could do no serious injury. True, a great snake or alligator might come into the place from the land, but this was hardly probable. Walled in at both sides by abrupt declivities, barred at both ends by the posts, it formed a long pool where a good swimmer could play unharmed.
The path twisted upward and began to zigzag back and forth. We dug in our toes and mounted to the top. There, under big trees, the ground was nearly level and almost free of undergrowth. Still silent, we three walked onward to the base of a great prostrate massaranduba tree which at some time had come smashing down and which, though lying on its side, still loomed high over our heads.
We had seen such prone giants often before, and now we only glanced at it and would have passed on. But at a spot some ten feet beyond its towering roots the woman halted, pointed and stepped straight into the tree itself.
"Por amor de Deus!" exclaimed Pedro. “A house cut in t
he virgin wood!"
It was so. We stared at the strangest house we had ever seen. Above us that huge trunk rose for nearly twenty feet, and from its lower side had been hollowed a home about eight feet high and fifteen feet long. The enormous weight of the tree had driven its underside solidly into the soil when it struck, and the space between its lower curve and the ground had been filled in with smaller logs and clay, forming a nearly straight wall at each end of the cavity. From the roof to the earth an outer wall of small palm-logs had been built, with a window and a door. The inside of the place was very dark.
"No woman made this,” I mumbled. “It took more than one man and many days of chopping."
"Perhaps not,” he disagreed. “See how black the bark is at the ends and up above. It was not chopped out, but made as we make our canoes—burned out and then finished with the ax. One strong man could do it easily."
"True. But let us look at the man who made it."
Then, raising my voice, I called gruffly:
"Ho there! Come out!"
No one came out. The woman appeared in the window and stood there, a question in her face. No other creature showed itself.
"Is no man here?” I asked.
With her slow smile she shook her head. Her beckoning hand appeared at the window. And, as before, she motioned to me, not to Pedro.
"The strangeness grows,” said my partner. “A woman who swims better than a fish is rare. A woman who lives alone in manless jungle is unheard of. But a woman who will not talk—it is a miracle!"
Without reply I walked in at the door, rifle ready. But no man lurking in the shadows menaced me. She had told truth—no man was there. Yet, as my eyes grew accustomed to the dimness, I saw that a man had been there. Not only one man, but three.
From pins in the wood wall hung the clothing of three men. And in a corner stood rusty rifles and machetes.
"Where are those men?” I demanded, pointing.
With a wave of the hand she signed that they had gone away.
Peering again at the rusty weapons, I thought their owners must have been gone for some time. And they had left clothes and guns behind.
"Are they dead?” I snapped.
She nodded.
"How? What killed them?"
Her cool brown eyes did not waver—nor did she speak. Another calm movement of both hands and a shake of her head told me that she did not know how they had died.
Her unbroken silence irritated me. I asked rather sharply whether she had no tongue. Smiling again, she stuck out her tongue and wriggled it impudently at me. It looked as good as my own. I growled, seized her shoulder with my left hand and tried to scare her into speech.
"Talk, or I will thrash you!” I threatened, trying to look ugly and brutal.
It did no good whatever. She laughed in my face, lifted a hand, raised my fist with a smooth strength that astonished me—and then drew my arm down around her waist.
I twisted my hand free and stepped back hastily.
"Pedro!” I yelped. “Come in here!"
His chuckle sounded at the door.
"I have been watching,” he told me. “But why call for me? She is yours without a struggle."
"Er—ah—look at those things!” I stammered, hot-faced, jabbing a thumb toward the weapons and clothes.
"Yes, I saw them. That was what brought me to the door—your question about men."
His face sobered and his eyes narrowed as he looked from the guns to the woman.
"What killed those men?” he barked.
She pouted, shook her head again and then motioned for him to go.
"Very well,” I said. “We shall both go. Adeos, senhorita."
But she caught my arm again and held it, and once more I was surprised by the power of her grip. As I paused she moved her mouth as if eating, then nodded to each of us in turn.
"Yes, we will eat with you if you like,” I consented. “But I stay in no place where my partner is unwelcome."
She released my arm, pointed to a hammock slung against the far wall and motioned for us to rest there. Then from a stool under the window, where we had not observed them, she picked up a pair of trousers with belt and machete. Stepping into these, she buckled the belt around her and started out.
"A queer way to prepare a meal for visitors—to strap on a machete and leave them,” Pedro remarked.
"This whole matter is too queer to suit me,” I said. “I am going with her to watch her. Stay here and look over those guns—and anything else you see. Our tongues and ears are useless, so we must depend on our eyes."
And out I went after her.
She was walking along the trunk of the massaranduba. I made no attempt to sneak and spy, but followed openly. She looked back, waited until I reached her, then went on toward the head of the tree, glancing at me now and then in a way which was neither bold nor shy but very friendly. As I usually do when with women, I kept my mouth shut. And thus, wordless, we passed around the great sprawling treetop and walked on into the forest beyond.
Past other tremendous trees, towering so high that their heads were lost beyond the roof of branches above us, we went. Around a dense mass of thorny bamboos we made a circuit, and then we came among trees of medium height, corded and draped with vines, which hung from above and mingled with other vines matted on the ground. Here the woman slowed and looked searchingly at the vines. Presently she stepped to a liana, drew her machete and cut off a piece about a yard long. With this in her hand she turned toward the enseada.
Down the bank, which here was far less steep than at her swimming place, we went to the edge of the water. There, concealed in a small hollow, lay a short canoe in which was one paddle. Entering this and lifting the paddle, she motioned for me to squat in the bow. I did so, facing her.
She pushed the craft out, turned it to her left and sent it gliding down the inlet. Around a double curve we floated. Looking over one shoulder, I saw that the enseada now became wider and straighter; and a gunshot beyond us I spied a tree lying far out in the water, its butt on shore. Studying it, I knew it was the trunk on which I had walked out that morning, trailing this woman.
We did not reach that tree. She swung the canoe into a small cove at the left, and we got out on shore. There she held the piece of vine against a tree, pounded it with her machete until it was well mashed up and threw it out into the still water of the cove. After that she sat down at the base of the tree and motioned for me to sit beside her.
More puzzled than ever, I scowled at her and at the crushed vine. The vine floated almost motionless, and the dark water around it looked slightly milky, as if some whitish juice from the wood were soaking out of it. As I looked back at her she raised a hand toward the sun, moved it a little westward, dropped it and pointed at the drifting vine, lowered it again to the place beside her. I took this to mean that in about half an hour the vine would do something, and that meanwhile I was to keep her company.
So I squatted against the tree—not so close to her as she had indicated—and made a cigarette, which I offered to her. She took it, and when I had rolled another I lit them both. She puffed at hers as if she had smoked before, but not recently. And then for a while we sat there burning tobacco.
While I sucked smoke I remembered that we had not given her any account of ourselves. Perhaps if I did so she would break her stubborn silence. So I told her my name, where we worked, and as much of our recent history as seemed best. Her eyes showed interest, but she never spoke. And when I questioned her as to who she was, whence she came, and how long she had lived here, into her face came that blank look I had noticed before, and she stared straight before her.
Then she leaned forward, looking at the water. There on the placid surface was something more than the vine—the glistening side and light belly of a small fish.
Its gills were wide-open, and it seemed dead. I was quite sure that it had not been dead long—some other creature would have devoured it. And in another few minutes I became cer
tain of this. Without splash or struggle, three more fish came drifting up from the depths. And, one by one, others appeared here and there on the surface. And not one moved so much as a fin.
The woman rose and stood looking them over. None was large, but there were enough to make a meal—if they were fit to eat. Yet she stood quiet as if waiting. And before long the water showed its first sign of life. Wriggling weakly, a fine big pescada came up, gasped a few times and was still.
At sight of that creature I sprang up, thinking only of getting him before he should give a twist of his tail and disappear. Then I stopped short as the meaning of it all flashed on me. The woman was fishing with the timbo.
I had heard of this before, but never had seen it. The timbo is a poisonous liana, and if it is crushed and thrown into still water its juice will stupefy and kill the fish near it. Yet the flesh of the fish is unhurt—the creature seems to be stifled rather than poisoned—and it can be eaten without harm. And there was no need for me to hurry about capturing that pescada, for he never would move again. He was as dead as if his backbone had been severed.
With a motion of the head the woman stepped into the canoe, and I followed. A few strokes brought us to the pescada, and I lifted him in. The dugout moved around among the other fish, and I spied a couple of rather small tucunarés. These also I gathered up. The rest we left behind us.
Around the double twist in the winding water we returned, to the little cove and thence to the dug-out house. When we entered it Pedro was lying lazily in the hammock, seeming half-asleep.
"Our friend is a witch,” I told him with a slight wink. “She dropped a vine on the water and the fish arose to feed us. It is magic."
The woman looked pleased. He winked back to me. As she picked a small knife from where it stuck in the wall and went out again to clean the fish he swiftly arose.
"The men who died had money,” he whispered in my ear.
Somewhat surprised, I glanced at the clothing on the wall. It looked as poor as our own. And my surprise almost became disbelief when he added—
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