At Nara’s command, the Indians did the unexpected. They began replacing the packs and other equipment in the rubber boats, while Nara suggested that Mr. Brewster and his party get on board. Then the Indians brought dugouts from the bushes, and soon they were all paddling up the Rio Del Muerte, with Nara’s canoe in the lead.
The going was easy, for the current was sluggish here. After about two miles, Igo and Ubi drove Nara’s dugout to a low bank where the jungle appeared to be the thickest. With their paddles, they raised a tangle of roots as they would a curtain, and worked the boat through.
The others followed into a channel wide enough to accommodate the rubber boats with ease. When the foliage had been dropped behind the final canoe, Biff looked back and saw that the mouth of this stream was as completely hidden as before.
They emerged from the jungle near a towering rock that looked like the one from which the Indians had launched the landslide. They pulled up the boats beside the stream and took to a steep trail that brought them up behind the rock, past the far end of the blocked ravine.
The trail climbed steadily, with more slopes rising ahead. Beyond them were mountain peaks, some looming blue and cloud-capped in the distance, overlooking a vast, unexplored region. The chunky bearers marched steadily onward, crossing logs over deep ravines and following ledges hewn in the mountainsides. Biff kept his eyes fixed on the backs of the trudging Indians to avoid any dizziness from looking below.
“We are now in the Parima Mountains,” Joe Nara told them. “This part of the range is in Venezuela.”
“I know,” acknowledged Mr. Brewster. “We crossed the border from Brazil soon after we left Piedra Del Cucuy.”
“What about these Indians of yours?” Hal Whitman put in. “You say they are Wai Wais, Nara, but that tribe lives over in Guiana.”
“The main tribe does,” returned Nara, “but this one group remained here to guard the sacred mountain, where El Dorado is located. They believed that Daipurui, the Spirit of Evil, would go on a rampage if anyone found the mine.”
“And how did you get around that?”