"Above all, pay no attention to their women.
"Now we go. I lead."
He turned and strode away into the fog as easily and surely as if cat-eyed and cat-footed. Pedro swung nonchalantly after him. The others followed in order, hitching at their backstraps.
The ghostly haze about them now was paler, but through the interstices overhead came no glint of sunshine, nor even the glow of a clear dawn. The whole sky evidently was overcast, and around the marching men the gloom still lay thick. Yet Lourenço's eyes seemed to bore through the shades and the dark shroud blurring the trunks, for his steady gait did not falter. The little file hung close together, for all knew that any man straggling would be instantly lost.
Worming around gigantic columns, crawling over rotting trunks long laid low, changing direction abruptly when blocked by some great butt too high to be scaled, sinking ankle-deep in clinging mud, the venturesome band wound along through the wilderness. Repeated glances at his compass showed McKay that the general trend of the march was southeast; but the impassable obstacles encountered at frequent intervals necessitated not only detours, but sometimes actual back-tracking.
"Walk four miles to advance one," was his thought. And for some time it seemed that such was the case. But then the ground changed, the light improved, the trees thinned, and the undergrowth became more dense—and, paradoxically, the rate of progress improved.
This was because the smaller growth gave the two leaders a chance to cut their way straight onward instead of dodging about; and cut they did. Their machetes swung with untiring energy, opening a path through what seemed an impenetrable tangle. Now every yard of movement was a yard gained. But the ground was rising and the struggle up some of the sharp slopes winded more than one man.
Then the slope dipped the other way, and they slipped down into a ravine where water gleamed darkly. Here a halt was called while the leaders sought for a fallen tree. Tim squatted and mopped his face for the hundredth time.
"Gosh! This is what I call travelin'!" he panted. "Flounderin' round in mud soup, bit to death by skeeters and them what-ye-call-'em flies—piums—sweatin' yerself bone dry and totin' forty thousand pounds, on yer back, not to mention hardware slung all over ye—this ain't no place for a minister's son or a fat guy, I'll tell the world. And this is only the start!"
A call from Pedro forestalled any answer. The trio struggled along to the spot where the guides waited at the butt of a slanting tree trunk spanning the gulf. As they reached it Pedro walked carefully up the trunk, carrying a long slender sapling, which he lowered and fixed in the bottom of the stream. Then, steadying himself with the upper end of this pole, he continued his journey to the other side, where he flipped the sapling back to Lourenço. One by one the others crossed, slipping, almost losing balance, but managing to evade a fall. Tim, walking the precarious bridge and looking down, saw that the surface of the water was dotted with the heads of venomous snakes.