_ CHAPTER XXIII. STRATEGY
In the last light of the fast-fading day the canoes darted from the forest into the clearing where stood the Monitaya
malocas.
Long before their arrival the siren call had ceased, but there had been no lessening of speed by the racing dugouts. On the contrary, the last long mile had been covered in a final desperate spurt, the paddles swinging in swift unison to the accompaniment of a ferocious chant of one syllable: "Hough! Hough! Hough!" This explosive cadence had echoed down the stream ahead of them; and now, as the panting crews emerged from the jungle, they found themselves flanked by a long line of their fellow-warriors, bristling with drawn arrows and ready spear points. But of the enemy whose presence that great xylophone had betokened there was no sign.
At sight of the familiar feather bonnets of their own men the tense Monitayans let their weapons slowly sink. And when Tucu, leaping ashore, gaspingly demanded news of the fight, the line dissolved into a mob which rushed to welcome him and his mates. In the first few breaths it was learned that no fight had yet taken place, but that all the warriors had been brought in and ordered to prepare to march at the next sunrise; and that the sudden war call had been sent out as the result of the arrival of a stranger.
Then the crowd parted, and through it came striding two men whose appearance caused the white men to erupt into hoarse shouts of greeting. One, whose hard face swiftly relaxed into a half smile of relief, was the great chief himself. The other, whose jutting jaw suddenly dropped and whose blue eyes opened in incredulity, was Tim--Tim, once more strong and florid and aggressive, gripping his rifle, astounded at the sight of his comrades standing there alive and alert. They soon learned why.
Dropping his gun, he sprang at them with an inarticulate roar of welcome. He wrung their hands, pounded their shoulders, laughed, cried, swore, all at once. Then he burst out:
"Glory be! Ye're alive, homelier 'n ever and tough as tripe! We thought ye was wiped out sure! We was all set to start in the mornin' and pull them Red Bones to pieces. Mebbe we'll do it yet, too. How'd ye break through? Did ye kill Sworn-off and his gang?"
"Schwandorf? Gang? Haven't seen anybody but Red Bones--though we sure saw plenty of them," replied Knowlton. "What are you talking about?"
"Then ye missed him by about one point windage. When'd ye leave? Last night? I bet he's there by now. Gee! Where'd ye git them girls? And who's this guy? Great gosh! Is he the Raposy? Wal, for the love o' Mike--"
"Tim!" broke in McKay. "What's all this about? Now wait. This is the Raposa. These girls are Mayoruna women held prisoners by the Red Bones. We got them last night and lit out in the middle of a general engagement. Now open up with your news."
"Right, Cap. We got a visitor to-day--old friend of ourn--li'l' old Hozy, the only white guy in that Peruvian crew we had. He's all dolled up like an Injun--shaved face, tribe paint, and so on. He come through the Injun country that way--I dunno yet how he done it, him bein' a Peruvian and all, but he got through, and he says Sworn-off and a whole gang of bad eggs is back here to git this Raposy guy and all the girls they can lay hands on. He says Sworn-off's got them Red Bones workin' for him, and you fellers must be massacreed sure by now.
"Good thing I was here when he come, or he'd be cut up and in the stewpot. Monitaya's a good skate, but he sure is poison to anything Peruvian, and soon as Hozy begun to try to talk he got wise and dang near bumped him off. I got him to cool down some, and he believes Hozy's tellin' the truth, but even at that they got Hozy tied up like a dog. Come look at him."
But it was necessary to wait awhile for Tucu and Lourenco to tell Monitaya the tale of what had taken place; for the chief demanded immediate and full details, and not until he had them would he return to his
maloca and his hammock throne. By that time the little moon was again ruler of the sky and the keen hunger of the voyagers had grown ravenous. Followed by the rescued and the rescuers, he then stalked into the tribal house and to his usual place, where he commanded that food be brought.
On the ground, directly in front of the chief's hammock, sat a gaunt, painted Indian around whose neck was a stout noose, the other end of the cord being held by a muscular savage whose skull-smashing club was gripped loosely in his other fist. As the whites reached them the noosed man's face cracked in a grin.
"Greetings, senores," said the voice of Jose. "You will pardon me for remaining seated, yes? The man behind me is itching for an excuse to crush my head."
"Jose!" exclaimed both Knowlton and McKay. Though Tim had said Jose was "tied like a dog," they had not thought to find the expression literal truth. The sight angered them and they turned to Lourenco.
"Tell Monitaya we want this man freed!" McKay snapped. At his peremptory tone the cannibal chieftain looked oddly at him, and when Lourenco translated the demand--though in a more diplomatic manner--he scowled. But he gave the clubman the word and the rope was lifted from the prisoner's neck.
"
Gracias, amigos," he bowed. "If I still remain seated, it is because I am very weary--and I have not eaten since yesterday."
His thin face and his projecting ribs not only corroborated his simple announcement, but indicated that for more than one day his food and rest had been almost
nil. Naked, painted, minus his fierce mustache and flamboyant headkerchief, he appeared a far different man than the domineering
puntero of a short time back. But his bold black eyes, his reckless grin, and his mocking tone proved him the same swashbuckling Jose, undaunted by hunger, exhaustion, or his position as prisoner of man eaters whose enmity was implacable.
"Well, you're going to eat now, or we'll know why not!" vowed Knowlton. "We understand that you brought a warning to Monitaya. Is this his way of treating men who risk their lives to befriend him?"
Jose shrugged.
"Once an enemy, always an enemy. That is their rule. And do not think that I traveled the bush and threw myself into this snake heap from love of Monitaya. I do not care if he and all his race are blown to hell. I am here because, as I once told you, Jose Martinez never forgets. Thank you, senor, I will eat now and talk later."
Deftly he extracted a chunk of meat from a clay pot which had been placed before Knowlton and in turn tendered to him. Monitaya watched him eat, but gave no sign of disapproval; and the Americans, and even the Brazilians, made an aggressive show of friendship toward the lone Peruvian for the express benefit of the chief. They knew well that by their rescue of the Mayoruna women they had made their own position among these people virtually impregnable, and that their recognition of Jose as a friend probably would be his only bulwark. Wherefore they left no doubt in the minds of the watchers as to where he stood in their regard.
Monitaya, sitting in regal dignity, looked down upon two parties of seven feasting with famished speed--the rescued women who were not members of his own tribe, and the four Americans, two Brazilians, and one Peruvian. All the others had scattered--Tucu and his band to their own family triangles, and the four Monitaya girls to become the nuclei of feminine groups which demanded intimate accounts of their capture and treatment by the captors.
To the strange women at his feet the chief paid scant attention now, though he meant to interrogate them after their hunger was satisfied. His eyes dwelt on Rand, the strange combination of white man, Indian, and jungle demon of whom he had heard so much and on whose tanned skin the red skeleton streaks told the tale of a "mind out of the skull." Jose and Tim stared in frank curiosity at the dead-alive newcomer, whose silent composure remained totally unperturbed. But the seven new girls, though ignored by the chief and his guests, were by no means neglected by the other men of the
maloca, being thoroughly stared at by most of the young bucks--and, it must be confessed, by a goodly proportion of the married men also.
When at length the meal was finished Monitaya commanded the girls to stand before him and narrate their experiences. The men lit smokes, Jose seizing the proffered cigarette with avidity, Rand accepting his with the usual odd deliberation.
"Wal, Hozy, old feller, ye're in right with the chief now," asserted Tim. "Ye got all our gang with ye, and she's some li'l' old gang, I'll tell the world. This feller Renzo can talk cannibal so good he makes Monitaya hunt for the dictionary, and he'll tell the chief in ten seconds what I tried half an hour to say this afternoon--that ye belong. I 'ain't been here long enough to learn much o' their lingo, ye understand. If I could spout it like French, now, there wouldn't been no trouble."
McKay and Knowlton snickered. They knew Tim's French was several degrees worse than the usual American doughboy's "frog" talk.
"Good thing you couldn't," derided Knowlton. "You'd have had Jose crucified before we got here."
"That's right, gimme the razz! Course, I did have a li'l' trouble makin' some o' them frogs understand, but that was because they was so ignorant they didn't know their own language when they heard it spoke right. Anyways, ye got to admit Hozy's still with us and sassy as ever, and he wouldn't been if Timmy Ryan hadn't been round to powwow for him."
"You have it right, senor," Jose agreed, gravely. "Without you I should now be dead. I can speak the Mayoruna tongue quite well, but of what use is it to talk any language when men will not listen? It was you and your gun that saved me."
"Gun? Good Lord! Did you pull a gun on Monitaya?" ejaculated the lieutenant.
"Aw, no. That is--I guess mebbe I did wave me piece around while I was arguin'--I can always convince a guy better if I got somethin' in me hand. But I didn't git real rough."
"You are lucky to be still alive, Senhor Tim," said Lourenco. "If Monitaya were not the man he is you would not be alive. I am glad we have returned."
"Meanin' I need a guardeen? Say, lookit here now--"
"As you were!" clipped McKay. "We're all wasting time. Jose, let's hear your report. I thought you were going to put Schwandorf out of action for good?"
"And I am, Capitan! That is why I now am here. If I had reached him immediately after leaving the Nunes place it would have been done at once. But a man travels slowly when he is alone and has lost much blood, and before I met Schwandorf again I had time to think coolly. Then when I saw him I changed my plans.
"Some days down the river I met him traveling fast in a canoe paddled by hard men whom I know. He pretended to be greatly grieved when I told him you all were dead. Oh yes, senores, I told him that! I was playing with him, and it amused me to see how he thought he was deceiving me when I was really fooling him. I said we were attacked by Indians a short way above the Nunes place and that I alone escaped. Then he said something that made me decide not to kill him for a time.
"He told me he had learned that this man here--his name is Rand, yes?--that the man Rand was a bank thief who had run away from North America, and that a reward would be paid for him. He said your real reason for coming here was that you were detectives trying to earn the reward. That is false, is it not, senores?"
"We're no detectives. Rand's no thief."
"Ah, so I thought. But Schwandorf often tells truth to conceal his lies, so that it is sometimes hard to know which is true and which untrue. He went on to say he had warned you not to come into this Indian country, and he was sorry you had been killed--the snake--but since you were dead we might get the money for ourselves. If we succeeded in catching the man Rand and taking him out alive I should get half the reward, or five hundred dollars.
"I saw plainly what his plan was. I might be useful to him in catching Rand if Rand was out in the bush, for I have traveled this country alone more than once and am a far better bushman than the German. But whether I got Rand or not, I never should live to demand my part of the money. I know too much about Schwandorf--things which I shall not tell now. So when the right time should come, Jose would meet with a fatal accident, such as a bullet in the back, or a knife in the throat while sleeping. But I did not let him know I saw this. I pretended to fall in with his plan like the fool he thought me to be.
"It was not Rand alone that brought him here. You have brought back Mayoruna women from the Red Bone country, so you know the Red Bones are women stealers. And they steal for Schwandorf. You may believe me or not, senores, but I did not know this until the German told me. Oh yes, I knew he dealt in women, but of the Red Bone part of his business I was ignorant. As soon as I learned it I saw how I could put the illustrious Senor Schwandorf out of action, as you say, and at the same time try to save you.
"I sharpened my knife to a razor edge, deserted the German when we reached the right place, shaved with my knife, painted myself with the red and black plant dyes, and came overland to this place, thinking you would be here if still alive. But you had traveled faster than I expected and had gone into the Red Bone country, so my chance to save you seemed to have passed. I could only try to tell this chief the Red Bones were stealers of his women and that the German was with them, knowing that if he believed me he would go on the war trail against them and kill them all. But if Senor Tim had not befriended me I should have died too soon to tell my tale. That is all, senores. Now can you spare a little more tobacco?"
They could and they promptly did. With a new cigarette glowing he lay back and looked quizzically at the women lined up before Monitaya.
"How many men has Schwandorf?" asked McKay.
"About twenty in all, Capitan. There were eight in his crew, and they were to meet a dozen more at a place on the Peruvian side."
"All riflemen?"
"
Si. He brought many cartridges for them. They are to raid tribe houses of these people."
"Capture women and run them into Peru?"
"
Si." Jose yawned as if speaking of a deal in salt fish.
The Americans looked thoughtfully around the big house. They saw that every man near them was inspecting some kind of weapon--making sure that bow cords were unfrayed, that arrow heads and spear points were firm, that the long blowguns had received no cast from suspension, and that darts were absolutely straight and true. The strong but cruel faces of the warriors were stamped with malignant hatred of the Red Bone tribe and the Blackbeard who enslaved their women. The command to prepare for a march at dawn had not been withdrawn.
"We'll be expected to go, too, and I'd sure like another crack at Umanuh, not to mention the Schwandorf outfit," said Knowlton, "but we have friend Rand on our hands now, and our first duty is to get him out of here safely."
"Aw, Looey, have a heart! I 'ain't had no action since that li'l' scrap down the river, and I got to have some excitement before we blow. What's more, we can't beat it now, with Monitaya dependin' on us to fight on his side. He'd git sore, and I don't blame him."
His superior officers and the Brazilians frowned. Every man of them itched to close with the enemy in one final decisive battle. Yet--
"What 'll we do with Rand?" Knowlton voiced the general thought.
The green eyes of the Raposa turned to him, rested long on his, traveled deliberately along the other faces. And then, to the utter astonishment of all, the dumb spoke.
"I'll fight," said Rand.
Speechless, the men around him stared. His face was inscrutable as ever, his eyes fathomless, his voice flat and toneless. But slowly he raised his hands as if holding a bow; twitched his right thumb and forefinger in the motion of loosing a shaft; let the hands sink. His gaze calmly lifted from theirs and dwelt on the farthest wall. Not another word did he speak.
"Begorry! there's yer answer!" triumphed Tim. "He says, 'Fight!' And I bet he can sling a wicked bow and arrer, at that. Don't ye s'pose he wants a crack at them Red Bones, after the way they used him?"
"I think, comrades, that the man has settled the matter for us," Pedro seconded. "None of us wants to run away; and, as Tim says, we are expected to help Monitaya. We should be considered cowards, worse than dogs, if we refused. If we do not fight the Red Bones we may have to fight these Mayorunas, who now are our friends. We must stay."
McKay nodded, still studying the expressionless countenance of Rand.
"That's settled," he announced, crisply. "Now, Lourenco, find out Monitaya's plan of battle."
The chief had finished his examination of the women and Lourenco promptly put the question. Monitaya laconically replied.
"His purpose is not changed by our arrival, Capitao. He and his men go to-morrow to attack and destroy the Red Bones. When they reach the town of Umanuh they will surround it, and all will rush in when the chief gives his yell of war."
"About what I expected. An Indian has a single-track mind always. But his strategy is rotten. Might be good enough if he had only Umanuh to deal with, but with Schwandorf in the game it's different. Ask him how he expects to protect his women while he's gone."
"He says," Lourenco reported, "that there will be no danger to the women, because his warriors will be between the women and their enemies until those enemies are dead."
"Very simple. So simple that it's foolish. He doesn't figure on the other fellow's mind at all; doesn't realize that a man like Schwandorf is bound to outguess him on such straightaway tactics and isn't at all likely to play into his hands. But that's the exact situation. The German will outguess him, and it's up to him to outguess the German in turn. We'll do his guessing for him.
"Schwandorf goes into Umanuh's town, learns what's happened, finds the Red Bones frothing at the mouth, and is sore himself. He figures that we've returned here with the women, that Monitaya's men are blood-mad against the Red Bones, and that they'll do just what they are planning to do--march on Red Bone town and leave their women unprotected except by the old men, whose defensive power is negligible. He is in this country for the express purpose of getting girls, and with Monitaya's men away from their
malocas he has a wide-open chance to make the biggest slave haul of his life. So he plans to outmaneuver Monitaya, attack this place, capture all the young women, allow the Red Bones to massacre everyone else and burn the houses, and then move on without the loss of a man. After that perhaps he intends to find us and get Rand, or perhaps to attack other Mayoruna
malocas. At any rate, his first objective is this place. Am I right so far?"
"Dead right," Knowlton nodded.
"Very well. Now he may figure that, having found the water connection between the two creeks, the Mayorunas will come against Umanuh by the canoe route. Or he may think they'll make the overland trip. In either case, the Red Bones have to come through the bush, for the simple reason that they haven't boats enough to carry all their force. Their canoes were rather few when we were there, and we commandeered several of them for our own use. If they decide to come part of the way in canoes they'll have to work a come-and-go transport service, bringing the fighting men down in batches to some rendezvous from which they must finish the journey on foot. Chances are that they'll disregard the canoes and all march overland by some route that would dodge the Mayoruna line of march. But in either case they're coming here. And it's here, in the place where he's not expected to be, that Monitaya should meet them. Let him fortify himself and await the assault. It will come."
"And we shall be saved many weary miles of leg work," Jose smiled. "Capitan, your strategy is magnificent."
"Begorry! it ain't so bad at that!" Tim approved. "Hozy, me and you will have our hammicks slung out front here when the show starts and do our shootin' prone. Suits me fine. Put it up to the chief, Renzo."
Lourenco did. Very carefully he explained it all to Monitaya, dwelling on the fact that McKay himself was a warrior chieftain and familiar with the fighting methods of such men as the atrocious Blackbeard, and depicting graphically the horror of an attack by the barbarous Red Bones on the defenseless women. It took him some time to divert the chief's stubborn mind from the original plan, but in the end he succeeded.
To the vast astonishment and disappointment of the vengeful warriors, Monitaya curtly announced that the projected march would not take place. They stared as if disbelieving their ears, and more than one black look was given Lourenco. But not a man questioned the countermanding of orders, not a mutter was heard. The great chief had spoken, and his word was final.
Reluctantly they laid aside the weapons on which they had been toiling with such purposeful zeal. The chief watched them with a little smile of pride--pride in their zest for war, pride in their unquestioning acceptance of his dampening order. Then he coolly told them to continue their work; told them, further, that the next morning all the streams were to be poisoned, new traps set, and scouts stationed far out on every trail to await and report the approach of foes. Instantly their faces flamed again and from every quarter of the wide house rose an excited hum. They were to fight, after all!
"Tough eggs, these lads, if ye ask me," yawned Tim. "Bet ye we'll see a row worth lookin' at when she does break."
He forebore to mention the fact that in rifle power their assailants would outnumber them four to one. _