The Treasure OfThe Sierra Madre (5 page)

With lighted matches they looked around on the ground for the best place to rest in for the night. It looked bad enough. The road was not at all clean. It was just a dirt road, rarely used, covered with small cactuses and low thorny bushes. Whole armies of huge red ants were running about, and a multitude of other insects were crawling and creeping in all directions, leaving practically not a square inch of soil uncovered in their search for food or safety or the pleasures of love.

“Didn’t that Indian here say something about tigers, snakes, and lions being at large in this section?” Moulton asked with a desperate voice on seeing the ground so uninviting.

“He said something to that effect,” Dobbs remembered. He turned to the native, who stood near by, seemingly without the slightest interest in what his companions were doing or saying. He was waiting for the two Americans to decide where and how to spend the night, and whatever they might decide, he would accept their decision and spend the night as near them as he could. Where an American could sleep and feel safe, an Indian could sleep still better and safer.

Dobbs said now to the Indian: “You’re quite sure there are tigers hereabouts?”

“Positively, senor. Hay muchos, muchisimo tigres aqui. There are so many tigers here in this jungle that whenever an American goes out hunting for a day, he never returns at night without at least four big tigers loaded on his car. I have seen them, senores, or otherwise I would not mention it.”

“Thanks for the information,” Dobbs said. “Well, partner, I wouldn’t be in the least surprised if you should find me in the morning between the paws of a tiger, half eaten up for breakfast.”

“Better don’t joke about that,” Moulton answered. “We haven’t even a flashlight with us to chase them off. Well, I think there’s nothing left now but to pray to the Lord, who is the King of all men and beasts.”

From talking and thinking and standing around they became sleepy. It was impossible to stand on their feet for the whole night, so they lay down on the ground, forgetting all about ants and beetles and reptiles.

Hardly had they settled themselves, when the Indian squeezed himself between the two like a dog. He did this very slowly, trying to disturb them as little as possible, but none the less with all the firm determination that he could muster. The two Americans might push him, kick him, try to pull him away; no sooner did they cease than he was snugly in between them once more. He felt safe only between the two. They had to give up and leave him where he wanted to sleep. He preferred their kicks and beatings to the claws of the tiger.

Moulton was awakened by a small reptile creeping over his face. He shook it off and sat up. While he was trying to realize where he was and listening to the eternal singing of the tropical jungle, he was stricken as by a shock. His breath stopped, and he could now hear very distinctly steps slowly approaching. Very soft steps they were, but heavy. No doubt they were the steps of a huge animal. Only very huge animals would make such heavy steps, and since they were at the same time very soft, they could only be those of a great cat. A tiger. A huge tiger, a tigre real, one of the biggest in those jungles he must be.

Moulton didn’t want to be afraid. He wanted not to wake the others until he was sure. So he listened again. The steps had halted. The great beast was obviously feeling his way and looking for the best place from which to jump at his victim. After half a minute Moulton heard the steps again, more slow and more cautious than before, and step by step coming closer. They were heavier now and each time he heard them set more firmly on the soft ground. When he thought a suppressed growl reached his ears, he jerked Dobbs awake.

“What is it?” Dobbs asked in a sleepy voice.

“A tiger is right behind us.”

“A what?”

“That’s what I said,” Moulton whispered. “A tiger is after us.”

Dobbs listened into the night. Then he said: “You’re right, buddy, that sure is a huge beast. I think it must be a tiger. A human being wouldn’t sneak through the bush this way. It can only be a tiger or a lion.”

It was not clear whether the Indian had been awake for some time already or whether he had been aroused by the excited talk of the two. But at the same moment the two partners stood up, he was up too, keeping as close to them as he could.

“Es un tigre, muy cierto, por la Madre SantIsima; that’s a huge tiger, so help me the Holy Virgin.” His voice trembled for fear. “He will jump at us now any minute. There he is, hardly twenty feet away. I can see the green glow of his eyes.” He stared into the dense thicket and at the same time embraced Dobbs’s whole body. Dobbs shook him off. Then he hid close to Moulton. The terror-stricken Indian, who certainly knew a tiger when he smelled one, deprived Dobbs and Moulton of the last bit of courage they had kept so far. All three now held close together.

“We can’t stay this way all night,” Dobbs said after a few minutes. “We have to do something.”

“We’d better make as few moves as possible,” Moulton advised. “Somewhere I’ve read that these huge cats jump at their prey only when they see it make a move.”

They listened again into the darkness to find out whether the animal was still near or had disappeared. For many minutes they could hear nothing but the never ceasing singing of the jungle insects. Then they heard the steps again, very distinctly. They Seemed to be at the same distance as before.

The Indian then whispered: “Best thing we can do is climb up a tree.”

“Tigers climb trees just as easily as they walk on the ground,” Moulton said.

Dobbs was of a different opinion. “That muchacho here is right, I think. It’s the safest thing we can do. Even if that beast tries to climb the tree, if we are high enough we can defend ourselves with a stick, maybe.”

Cautiously feeling around, they succeeded in finding an ebony tree. Dobbs was the first to climb up. No sooner had the Indian taken note of what Dobbs was doing than he was right after him, climbing close behind him and pushing Moulton, who wanted to be next, away from the tree. He keenly wanted not to be the last and so nearest to the ground. He considered the safest place of all exactly between the two Americans, Dobbs above him, and Moulton beneath him. He was ready to sacrifice either of them as long as he could be safe from the claws of the tiger. Anxious as he had been to climb the tree, he had nevertheless not forgotten to take along his bast bag. Not even this bag did he wish to leave to the mercy of the jungle beast.

Moulton had no choice but to climb after the Indian and be so near the ground that the tiger could easily reach his legs with one jump. He consoled himself for his precarious position by calling up to Dobbs: “That devil of an Indian has robbed me of all my chances. But bad as it looks, I am still safer here than on the ground. On the ground I could be carried away by that cat, while here I can hold on for quite a while and I may lose only one leg. Listen, Dobbs, can’t you climb up a few feet higher so that I can have a better chance?”

“Nothing doing here,” Dobbs said. “I’m already sitting on top of the tree.”

After clinging there for a quarter of an hour, they began to feel easier. They now breathed more freely and began to think of more safety. The night had still long to go. It could hardly be ten o’clock. And hanging in the tree like untrained monkeys, they were afraid of falling asleep. Then they might let go and drop to the ground, perhaps right into the open mouth of the tiger, who would surely be waiting under the tree for such a welcome accident. To avoid this they took off their belts and fastened their bodies firmly to the trunk. This done, they felt safe enough to try how one could sleep in this position.

It was a long night; it seemed to them that it would never end. The little sleep they got was frequently interrupted by ugly dreams and by all kinds of hallucinations which tortured their minds. Whole herds of hungry tigers and armies of savage Indians seemed to be after them.

At last morning came with rosy cheeks. In the bright light of the early day everything around them looked absolutely natural— not so very different, it seemed to them, from an abandoned orchard in Alabama. Even the ground beneath them looked not at all so gruesome as at night, when the flickering light of matches gave it such a ghastly impression.

Hardly fifty feet away a green pasture was seen through the trees. It spread out under the morning sun almost like a lawn in the home town. All the imaginings and visions they had had during the night appeared ridiculous by daylight.

The three sat down and had a smoke. The Indian opened his bast bag and produced half a dozen dry tortillas, which he in brotherly fashion divided with the Americans for breakfast.

While sitting there chewing the tortillas, which under these conditions tasted none too good, the three suddenly stopped, held their breath, stiffened their bodies, and listened. Clearly, without any doubt, they heard again the curious steps and the suppressed growling or mumbling they had heard during the night. These peculiar and unmistakable noises had settled in their memory so firmly that for the rest of their lives they would never forget them; they would recognize these sounds anywhere and any time. These were the same steps and sounds they had heard during the night. It was strange that a tiger should come out of his lair in bright daylight to attack men.

On hearing the sounds again, they jumped up together. They Stared between the trees in the direction from which these steps and sounds came now, as they had also come during the night.

Their glance fell upon the green pasture. And there was the tiger. The tiger was stepping lazily around and eating grass, at times letting off a sort of a grunt out of sheer content. The tiger was a very harmless one; he was a burro, in fact, an ordinary ass tied to a tree by a long lasso, the property, doubtless, of a peasant in the next village, which certainly could not be far away. Where a simple burro could pass the night and survive, there surely could be no tiger near; otherwise the peasants would not leave their animals overnight in the bush.

Dobbs looked at Moulton, and Moulton at Dobbs. Just as Moulton started to open his lips for a hearty laugh, Dobbs said to him harshly: “Listen, you, if you don’t want me to sock you, don’t laugh. What’s more, if you ever tell anybody one word about this night and make both of us the joke of the port, I— bigawd, I’ll murder you in cold blood and throw your carcass to the pigs.”

“All right by me, buddy,” Moulton said; “if you take it that way I’ll keep quiet. But I think it’s the best joke I ever heard.” As could be seen from the contortion of his face he did all in his power to keep from exploding with laughter.

Dobbs looked at him and said: “Brother, you are warned. Don’t play any tricks on me. Even the faintest smile will cost you a smashed nose.”

It was at this moment that the Indian thought it proper to speak up. He did not accept defeat. So he said: “Por Madre SantIsima and by all the saints in heaven, senores, this is not the tiger. But around us last night was un tigre real y muy grande, it was a royal tiger of the biggest sort.”

“Aw, shut up!” Dobbs interrupted him.

“You, caballeros, may think what you may. But I know mi tierra, my country where I was born, and I know well what is a tiger and what is not. I can smell it. Besides I saw his glowing greenish eyes glaring at us. And they were not the eyes of a burro.” The Indian sure was smarter than the two Americans; he knew how to stick to a good story and to avoid being laughed at.

The big village of which the Indians had spoken last night was hardly fifteen minutes away.

“Now, didn’t I tell you last night that these Indians don’t lie?” Dobbs asked when they reached the village.

“But they said it was only a short hour’s distance.”

“Well, that’s just the matter with these people, they have no conception of time and distance. They say it is one hour away, but they don’t tell you if they mean an hour run by a Tarnhumare, or walked or crawled, or an hour’s ride on a good horse. That’s what you have to figure out when an Indian peasant tells you how far away the next town is. You can’t blame those Indians of last night. They told us the truth in their own way, and that makes all the difference.”

In this village the three found fine hospitality. They had breakfast, consisting of tortillas, black beans, and tea brewed from lemon leaves.

The same day they came to the first oilcamp. No work.

The manager told them that they might stay there a day or two and have their meals, but more he could not do for them.

“I am afraid, boys,” he added, “there is no camp around here where work may be had. Tell you a secret, believe it or not, but I’m an oldtimer and I know a cat when I see one, and I tell you I’ve got the feeling oil is going on the rocks hereabouts, maybe in the whole goddamned republic. Guess we’ll have to go back home to good old Oklahoma and grow beans once more. It’s slacking down in all the camps and with all the companies. Good times are over, so it seems. The war came to its goddamned end too early, that’s the trouble; that’s what I think. There’s more oil than the world will ever need in the next ten thousand years. Nobody wants to buy oil any more, and if anybody buys, damn knock me cold, he offers you flat two bits for the barrel, take it or go to hell. I know oil and I know when the fat is gone. All right, sit down and push your spoon between your teeth. Don’t worry, the boys will stand for what you eat today, and tomorrow too, if you want to stay.”

The Indian went to his own people, to the peons of the camp, where he stuffed his belly full. The peons had their own kitchen, managed by one whom they seemed to trust better than the two Chinese who were in charge of the catering for the Americans.

Next morning Dobbs and Moulton left to try another camp. The Indian was again with them. They could not shake him off. His excuse was: “I need work, senores, but I cannot go alone through the jungles, the tigers would get me. But these terrible beasts won’t do anything to me if I am with gringos. Tigers are horribly afraid of gringos, but un pobre Mexicano is eaten by them just like nothing, going alone through the jungle.”