“Maldito!” shrilled the figure; “may Joseph and Mary and Jesus curse you! A million curses on you, maldito!” Pulling itself upward, the shapeless thing sank its teeth deep into the priest’s hand.
With a cry of pain the startled Josè tore himself loose, his hand dripping with blood. At the same time the figure fell over into the road and its enveloping rags slipped off, disclosing in the bright moonlight a loathsome, distorted face and elephantine limbs, covered with festering sores.
“Good God!” cried Josè, recoiling. “A leper!”
Turning swiftly from the hideous object, his brain awhirl with the horrible nightmare, the priest fled blindly from the scene. Nauseated, quivering with horror, with the obscene ravings of the leper still ringing in his ears, he stumbled about the town until daybreak, when the boat’s shrieking whistle summoned him to embark.
The second day on the river seemed to Josè intolerable, as he shifted about the creaking, straining tub to avoid the sun’s piercing rays and the heat which, drifting back from the hot stack forward, enveloped the entire craft. There were but few passengers, some half dozen men and two slatternly attired women. Whither they were bound, he knew not, nor cared; and, though they saluted him courteously, he studiously avoided being drawn into their conversations. The emotional appeal of the great river and its forest-lined banks did not at first affect him. Yet he sought forgetfulness of self by concentrating his thought upon them.
The massed foliage constituted an impenetrable wall on either side. Everywhere his eyes met a maze of lianas, creeping plants, begonias, and bizarre vegetable forms, shapes and hues of which he had never before had any adequate conception. Often he caught the glint of great, rare butterflies hovering in the early sunlight which filtered through the interlaced fronds and branches. Often when the boat hugged the bank he saw indescribable buds and blossoms, and multicolored orchids clinging to the drooping bejucos which festooned the enormous trees. As the afternoon waned and the sun hung low, the magic stillness of the solitude began to cast its spell about him, and he could imagine that he was penetrating a fairy-land. The vast stream, winding, broadening, ramifying round wooded islets, throwing out long, dusky lagoons and swampy arms, incessantly plying its numberless activities, at length held him enraptured. As he brooded over it all, his thought wandered back to the exploits of the intrepid Quesada and his stalwart band who, centuries before, had forced their perilous way along this same river, amid showers of poisoned 134 arrows from hostile natives, amid the assaults of tropical storms and malarial fevers, to the plateau of Cundinamarca, the home of the primitive Muiscas; and there gathering fresh strength and inspiration, had pushed on to the site of Santa Fé de Bogotá.
A cry suddenly rang through the boat. “Man overboard!”
The clang of the pilot’s bell stopped the clumsy craft; but not before the ragged little negro boy who had served at Josè’s table as steward had been swept far away by the rapid current.
The utmost confusion immediately prevailed. Every one of the rabble rout of stokers, stewards, and stevedores lost his wits and set up a frenzied yell. Some who remembered that there was such a thing, tore at the ropes which held the single lifeboat. But the boat had been put on for appearance’s sake, not for service, and successfully resisted all efforts at removal. No one dared risk his life in attempted rescue, for the river swarmed with crocodiles. There was vain racing, counseling and gesticulating; but at length, the first wave of excitement over, passengers and crew settled down to watch the outcome of the boy’s struggle for life, while the pilot endeavored to turn the unwieldy steamer about.