Zane shook his head and mumbled, "It wouldn't have mattered. The disease would've eventually broken out of the forest. It's just like AIDS:"
"What do you mean?" Kelly asked, turning in her seat.
"AIDS started after a highway was built into the African jungle. We come disturbing these ancient ecosystems, and we don't know what we stir up:"
Kelly pushed out of the camp chair. "Then it's up to us to stop it. The jungle may have produced AIDS, but it also offered our best treatments against the disease. Seventy percent of AIDS drugs are derived from tropical plants. So if this new disease came out of the jungle, why not the cure, too?"
"That's if we can find it," Zane said.
Off to the side, Manny's jaguar suddenly growled. The great cat swung around and crouched, ears pricked, eyes fixed on the jungle behind them.
"What's wrong with him?" Zane asked, backing a step away.
Manny squinted at the shadowed rain forest as Tor-tor continued a deep warning growl. "He's caught a scent . . . something's out there:"
Nate crossed down the narrow trail toward the small Indian village, which consisted of a single large roundhouse, open to the sky in the middle. As he approached the structure, he heard none of the usual noises coming from the shabuno. No arguing huyas, no women yelling for more plantains, no laughter of children. It was ghostly quiet and unnerving.
"The construction is definitely Yanomamo," Nathan said softly to Kouwe and Anna Fong. "But small. It probably houses no more than thirty villagers:"
Behind them marched Private Camera, her M-16 held in both hands, muzzle pointed at the ground. She was whispering into her radio's microphone.
Anna stared wide-eyed at the shabano.
Nate stopped her from continuing through the roundhouse's small doorway and into the village proper. "Have you ever been among the Yanomamo?"
Anna shook her head.
Nate cupped his mouth. "Klock, klock, klock," he yelled. Then softer to Anna, he explained, "Whether it seems deserted or not, you never approach a Yanomamo village without first announcing yourself. It's a good way to get an arrow in your back. They have the tendency to
shoot first and ask questions later."
"Nothing wrong with that policy," Camera mumbled behind him.
They stood near the entrance for a full minute, then Kouwe spoke. "No one's here:" He waved an arm behind him. "No canoes by the river, no nets or fishing gear either. No yebis squawking in alarm."
"Yebis?" their Ranger escort asked.
"The gray-winged trumpeter," Nate said. "Sort of an ugly chicken really. The Indians use them like feathered guard dogs. They raise a ruckus when anyone approaches:"
The Ranger nodded. "So no chickens, no Indians:" She turned in a slow circle, surveying the forest around them. The woman refused to let down her guard. "Let me go first:"
Lifting her weapon higher, she paused near the short entrance. Bowing low, she ducked her head through. After a moment, she slid through the bamboo-framed entrance, sticking close to the banana-leaf wall, then barked to them, "All clear. But stick behind me:"
Camera moved toward the center of the circular structure. She kept her weapon ready, but as Nate had suggested, she kept the rifle's muzzle pointing at the ground. Among the Yanomamo, an arrow nocked and aimed at a fellow tribesman was a call to war. Since Nate didn't know how familiar these particular Indians were with modern weapons, he wanted no misinterpretations on this point.
As a group, Nate, Kouwe, and Anna entered the shabano.
Around them, the individual family units were sectioned off from their neighbors by drapes of tobacco leaves, water gourds, and baskets. Woven hammocks, all empty, hung from the roof beams. A pair of stone bowls lay toppled in the central clearing beside a grinding stone, manioc flour spilled onto the dirt.
A sudden burst of color startled them all as a parrot took wing. It had been roosting atop a pile of brown bananas.
"I don't like this," Kouwe said.
Nate knew what he meant and nodded.
"Why?" asked Camera.
"When the Yanomamo migrate to a new site, they either burn the old shabano or at least strip it of all useful items:' Kouwe pointed around him. "Look at all these baskets, hammocks, and feather collections. They wouldn't leave these behind."
"What could make them leave so suddenly?" Anna asked.
Kouwe slowly shook his head. "Something must have panicked them."
"Us?" Anna stared around her. "Do you think they knew we were coming?"
"If the Indians had been here, I'm sure they would've been well aware of our approach. They keep a keen watch on their forest. But I don't think it was our party that made them abandon this shabano so quickly"
"Why do you say that?" Nate asked.
Kouwe crossed around the edge of the living sites. "All the fires are cold." He nudged the pile of bananas upon which the parrot had been feeding. "They're half rotten. The Yanomamo would not have wasted food like this:"
Nate understood. "So you think the village was abandoned some time ago:"