“I had to pull hard to get you out of that tangle,” he said. “You seemed stuck to the ground.”
I tried to answer, but all I could do was to make a wheezing sound. The wind was beaten out of me. So I sat still while my breath came back and my head grew clear. I saw that the caboclos were jumping into boats and coming after us. Then we caught up with my own canoe, where the girl was crouching and Pedro was getting up and reaching for a paddle. Pedro had a surprised look, as if wondering how he had come there, but he wasted no time in talk. Scooping up a handful of water, he threw it on his head and then began to paddle hard.
I looked for a paddle too, but there was none. Deodoro was using the only one in this canoe. I still had the rifle, though; and, seeing that the maddened men behind were gaining on us, I began shooting. I did not shoot to kill, for I do not like to kill men if it can be avoided. At the same time, I shot close enough to make them think I meant death.
Aiming carefully, I sent several bullets thumping along the sides of their dugouts. They slowed up at once. Some yelled to stop, others shouted to go on, and they paddled both ways at once—some trying to keep after us and others backing water. While this was going on we drew away fast.
* * * *
The tapir swerved into the bank and up the same stream we had traveled before. Pedro followed. For some time we kept on at the same rate of speed, and then we came out into the long crooked lake. There we stopped, listened—and heard nothing.
“They have given up,” panted Pedro.
The Tapir shook his head.
“They have gone back for guns, and they follow,” he said. “But we can dodge them. There is more than one way out of this lake.”
Looking around as if to get his bearings, he pushed on again. Down around a bushy point we went, and there turned sharp to the right. A short arm of water ran that way, and we traveled down this until we seemed about to bump the shore. Then he swung to the left, and we were in a quiet, winding stream. There we stopped.
I got up with grunts and groans, for I had been sitting still and my bruised muscles had stiffened so that each one had a pain of its own. Deodoro grinned again. The grin annoyed me.
“Now,” I demanded, “tell me why you got us into all this trouble. Why did you not come back to us and wait until we were ready?”
“You said yourself that the first thing to do was to free Bellie, and that the quickest way to free her was to go ahead and do it,” he answered. “So I went and did it. And your comrade Pedro told me to be strong and bold. Have I not been strong and bold?”
His face and voice were so serious that Pedro and I laughed.
“More bold than we wanted you to be,” I told him.
“I am sorry you got hurt,” he said. “But I went and talked to Bellie and found her mad to get out at once. So I thought I had better take her before she changed her mind, and I cut a hole and pulled her through. If Gastoa and his brothers had not sneaked up just then we should have gotten away without trouble. And nobody would have thought you two traders had anything to do with it, because you were sitting in plain sight all the time.”
“I see,” I said. “And now that we are all here I think you had better take your girl and let me get into my own canoe.”
We had been holding to bushes while we talked, and now Pedro drew our canoe up beside me. For the first time I had a good look at the girl, and after that look I did not blame Deodoro for wanting her. She was very pretty. True, she looked thin and weak, and her skin seemed pale; but I remembered that she had been caged for a long time, and knew that a healthy life outdoors and plenty to eat would quickly make her plump and strong. Her eyes and mouth were beautiful, and she looked no more like the other women we had seen than a butterfly looks like a mud-worm. Remembering the evil face of Gastoa and the brutality of her father, I was glad I had gone to help her, even though I now was full of aches and pains.
Then I noticed something that was not so pleasing. She did not want to leave Pedro and come to Deodoro. She looked long at Pedro, then glanced at the tapir-man and wrinkled her nose. I too looked at both the men, and saw what a difference there was. Pedro was a graceful fellow, with merry brown eyes and curly hair; and he had not been hit during the fight, so his face was not marked at all. Deodoro, with his clumsy-looking body and lank hair and big nose, was not a beauty at any time; and now his eyes were swollen so that they peered through slits, and his whole face was bruised and bloody.
It came to me, too, that though Deodoro had given the girl her chance to escape from the house, it was Pedro who had attacked Bernardo when she was being beaten and had run with her in his arms to the water; so that she might easily feel that it was the handsome stranger who had saved her. Besides, she had not seen Deodoro’s one fight at the house, because then she was running for the river. And she probably did not know much about his battle on the bank, for then she was floating away and we were all tangled up in a lighting knot. Poor Deodoro! Everything seemed to be against him.
* * * *
Whether he saw all this I did not know, but I hoped not. When the girl made no move to change canoes I spoke gruffly to her, telling her to make room for me. She rose then though slowly, and took my place without a word.
As I settled down and picked up my paddle I heard voices out on the lake. We slipped the canoes silently downstream and looked. The Tapir was right—two boatloads of armed caboclos were passing, the men working hard and looking ahead. Others came behind them. We kept very quiet until they were gone.
“They will go down the lake to the end hunting us,” said the Tapir. “Then they will work back and search all the coves. We shall be at my house long before they have finished here. Are you not glad to be free, Bellie?”
The girl made no answer. Her eyes came again to Pedro’s face, and then she looked down into the water. Deodoro looked long at her, then at Pedro, then at me. His face grew sad. With a deep sigh he pushed his canoe against the slow current, and we passed silently up the creek.
After a time we came into a network of winding water courses without any current that I could see. Deodoro hesitated several times, but seemed always to pick the right one. At length we found ourselves again in flowing water, and now we went downstream instead of up. At length we entered the river on which Pedro and I had been traveling that morning.
There our leader turned downward, and we saw that he had brought us out above his house. Keeping near the left shore and watching sharply for caboclos, we soon reached the little inlet masked by the palms.
“Now you are safe, Bellie,” I said when we stepped out on shore. “See the fine house Deodoro has built for you up here in the tree, where you can always be dry and comfortable. It is much better than any house in your town, and you will never have to live in a cage again. He has much meat too, and you and he will have plenty to eat. You will be very happy here.”
“Do you two stay here also?” she asked.
“No,” I said. “This is Deodoro’s place. We must go on, for we live far from here.”
She glanced once more at the house in the tree. Then she cried:
“I do not want to stay here, I will not stay here! Take me away!”
We all stood silent, staring at her. I wanted to scold her, but knew that would do no good. So I said the first thing that seemed best.
“We cannot take you away today, Bellie—it will soon be night. And we two are not going until tomorrow. We shall rest and eat here. Tomorrow we shall see what is best to be done. Now go up and see what a fine house that is.”
She stood still, stubbornly, until Pedro also told her to mount the ladder. Then she obeyed, climbing as if afraid she would fall, but going upward until she got into the hut.
“Nossa Senhora!” muttered Pedro. “Now this is a pretty mess! After all our trouble she wants to go back home.”
Slowly the Tapir shook his head. His face was full of pain.
“No, it is not that,” he said. “It is as I told you before we went. She l
ikes tall handsome men, and I am not tall nor handsome.”
He swallowed hard, as if trying to keep from crying. And then, through his teeth, he added:
“She wants to—to go with you, Pedro. If she will—be happier with you, comrade, then—then you had better take her with you.”
He choked and turned away.
For an instant Pedro stared. Then he sprang and caught him by the shoulder.
“Por Deus, you are a man!” he said. “Why, comrade, I do not want your girl! I do not want any girl at all. And you are wrong—she does not want me either. She may be interested in me because I am a new man whom she has not seen before, but after I am gone she will quickly forget me.”
But Deodoro shook his head again, and so did I. I had seen women fall swiftly in love with Pedro before this—women who knew more about men than this little girl-woman knew; and I felt that Bellie would not forget him so quickly as he said, and that neither she nor Deodoro would be happy because of this. When Pedro asked me if I did not agree with him, I said no.
“There is some truth in what Deodoro says,” I told him, “If she had not seen you she might have been happy with him. I think our work is only half-done. We have freed her, but how are we to make her satisfied?”
He scowled and stood thinking. Then his eyes began to twinkle, and he threw up his head and laughed.
“Deodoro, let me talk to you,” he said. “Lourenço, climb up and talk with her so that she will not overhear us. Ask her if she would like to go away with me—but try to show her that she would be foolish to do such a thing.”
I did as he said. Up the pole I went, and in the hammock I found the girl, looking very small and sad and dissatisfied. When I came in she brightened up and glanced beyond me as if expecting someone else. Seeing that nobody followed, she seemed disappointed.
“The others will be up soon,” I informed her.
Then I sat down against the wall, grunting from the pain of my stiff muscles.
“I am very lame,” I went on. “Still, I am glad I am alive to feel lame. If it had not been for the splendid fighting of Deodoro I should probably be dead—and you would be back in your cage, to be beaten by your father and given to Gastoa.”
She turned more pale at that thought, but looked surprised too. And she asked what Deodoro had done that was so brave. So I saw that I was right—she did not realize what a fight he had made. Taking care not to praise him over-much, I told her how he had fought off the gang of Gastoa and then battled beside me so that she could get away, and how he had pulled me out when I was down. Her big dark eyes grew larger as I talked.
* * * *
Then, when her mind was full of this new fighting Deodoro, I suddenly asked her whether she would like to go away with us.
“My friend Pedro likes you,” I said, “and if you want to go with him we can fool Deodoro in some way. You might not be happy with Pedro, but—”
“Why not?” she cut in.
“Well, of course he is a handsome man,” I pointed out, “and other girls like him very well, and you could not expect him to give all his time to you. He would not stay with you as this simple Deodoro would do. And he likes his fun with men too, and so he would drink and gamble with them. And he is restless and will not stay long in one place—and you know he would not want you trailing after him everywhere. If you expected him to be as faithful to you as Deodoro would be, you might not be happy. But if you are willing to be reasonable about those things we can take you away when we go. He is keeping Deodoro down below while I ask you about this.”
Senhores, that gave her a good deal to think about. At first she looked as if she wanted to cry, and I felt sorry for her—but I did not let her see that. Then, she asked the question I expected.
“If he wants me, why does he not talk to me himself instead of sending you?”
I laughed as if that were a foolish question.
“Because Deodoro would probably fight to keep you, and Pedro knows how hard he would fight. Pedro probably would get his handsome face hurt. And besides, what is the sense of fighting over a woman? Deodoro thinks you are the only pretty woman in the world, but Pedro and I know you are not.”
She looked at me then as if beginning to dislike me. Before we could talk more we heard Pedro’s voice down below, and it was loud and ugly,
“Then if you have more cachassa, why did you not say so?” he demanded. “I want a drink and I want it now! After we have gone to that dirty town of yours and brought back that female for you, I call it shabby treatment to try to hide your liquor!”
“You can have a drink if you want it,” came the voice of the Tapir. “But do not speak so of my girl. She is not the kind of girl that a man like you ought to talk about.”
“Bah! The world is full of girls, and not one of them is worth anything. I want that drink!”
“Then come up and you shall have it.”
I stuck my head out of the door beside me and looked down. Deodoro, I noticed, had washed his face and looked much better. As he came upward and saw me he grinned. Pedro, behind him, winked at me. But when they came into the house their expressions had changed. Deodoro looked very serious, and Pedro scowled.
The Tapir lifted part of his floor again, and this time he pulled up a jar which he handed Pedro. My partner seemed to take a huge drink. When he passed the jar to me, however, I found that very little of the liquor was gone. I took as much as I wanted, and then held it out toward Deodoro. But Pedro snatched it and appeared to swallow about half of what was left, making a guzzling noise and letting some of the cachassa drip off his chin. The girl watched all this, and a look of disgust crept across her face. The thought came to me that my comrade’s actions must remind her of her drunken, worthless father.
Then Pedro slumped down beside me and rolled a cigarette. Usually he was very deft at making a smoke, but now his fingers seemed clumsy. He spilled most of his tobacco, and then he snarled. He tried again, and made a worse mess than before. Finally he ordered me to make his cigarette for him. I did so, but I took my time about it. Then he abused me because I was so slow, and growled once more at Deodoro because he had not been more free with his liquor. After the cigarette was lit and going well, though, he quieted somewhat.
* * * *
None of us spoke while he smoked, Deodoro watched us solemnly, and I saw the girl studying him and Pedro in turn. Pedro’s face grew more heavy, as if the cachassa were working on him. Presently he began to leer at Bellie,
“Think I will take you downriver with me, girl,” he said roughly. “You do not want to stay here and you do not want to go back to your cage. You have to go somewhere, so come with me.”
She looked him straight in the eyes. Then she said—
“I do not think I want to go with you.”
“What!” snapped Pedro. “Do not be a little fool!” He looked at Deodoro and grinned in a nasty way, as if the liquor had given him courage which he had lacked before. “You, Deodoro, you can stay here with your cachassa. I am going away with this woman of yours. I am going now!”
He lurched up and staggered toward the girl.
Then the Tapir moved. He swooped at the rifle Pedro had left leaning against the wall. He jammed the muzzle into my comrade’s stomach, and I heard the hammer click back.
“Stop where you are!” he ordered. “You shall not take her away. She is too good for you.”
Pedro stood very still, staring down at the gun as if stricken with fear. I got up as quickly as I could, drawing my machete, for I did not like the sound of that hammer going back. But before I could get within arm’s length of Deodoro the girl jumped at me.
She came so suddenly and swiftly that before I realized it she had knocked my bush-knife from my hands. With another lightning move she threw it out of the door, and I heard it thump on the ground below. Then, her face full of fury, she warned me—
“Keep back or I will tear your eyes out!”
I kept back. Her nails were very long, and
I had seen how quick she was. Her sudden action had taken us all by surprise, and we stood staring at her. Then Deodoro spoke again to Pedro.
“If she wished to go with you and if you would be kind to her I would let her go. But I know you have other women. You boasted about it when you first came here and drank my cachassa. You said you only played with women, and that when you tired of one you left her and got another. You will not do so with Bellie.”
Pedro made no answer. He looked at Bellie. She looked back, at him as if now she hated him. To Deodoro she said:
“You are the only honest man I know, Deodoro. I will stay with you and be your good girl. Drive these two into the river! This one is no better than the other.” She pointed at me. “He wanted me to fool you and run away with them. Drive them out!”
“Get down the pole!” grunted the Tapir savagely. “Bellie, stay here!”
Pedro glanced at me and jerked his head toward the door. We went down the pole, Deodoro still covering us.
“Do not touch that machete!” he warned, as I stepped toward my knife. “Go to your canoe.”
“Come, Lourenço,” whispered Pedro. “He will follow.”
So we got into our canoe. Deodoro came down, picked up my weapon and. stepped into his own boat.
“Out into the river!” he commanded.
Pedro, looking much afraid, splashed his paddle quickly into the water and we moved outward. Behind us came the Tapir.
As we went downstream I felt the canoe shaking. I could not understand this until I looked at Pedro.
The drunken look was gone from his face, and, though he made no sound, he was laughing so hard that he could scarcely use his paddle.
“Over to the right, where you see that massaranduba tree,” came the voice of the Tapir.
We turned to the place. Below the tree we found a little cove which twisted around like a hook. At its end, where it could not be seen from the river, was a small hut.
Adventure Tales, Volume 6 Page 16
