She loved it anyway.
But all good things must come to an end.
Maria peered into the bush. “Just a little farther, Henrique, and we’ll be through.”
The down-time Europeans thought the jungle was impenetrable, hundreds upon hundreds of miles of dense vegetation. In fact, Maria suspected that all too many up-timers thought the same, their knowledge of the jungle being based primarily on vague recollections of Tarzan movies.
As she had explained to the readers of her popular travelogue, Into the Rainforest with Musket and Paintbrush, “the rainforest floor is dark, shaded by the rainforest canopy. Since it’s dark, there’s not a lot of vegetation.” To Maria with her artist’s eye, the true jungle was like a cathedral, with an emerald roof, and great open chapels for the worship of nature.
The “jungle” only looked like an up-time Hollywood movie jungle if you were on the river, where there was plenty of sunlight to make plants happy. But if you wiggled or cut your way through the “jungle wall” bordering the river, you entered the true jungle, the Green Cathedral.
Henrique da Costa raised his machete and took another swing.
* * *
Henrique and Maria first met in Fort Kykoveral, back in 1634. Henrique was a Marrano, a Jew who had practiced his religion in secret in Catholic Brazil, and Maria was a steadfast Protestant, of the Arminian persuasion. In a world divided by religion, it didn’t bode well for romance. An early flirtation had fizzled out.
Still, they were close friends, with a love of the outdoors, and so they talked as they settled into their respective hammocks that night. Henrique, who had lived in the Amazon for many years, had taught her the trick of rocking oneself to sleep. You fastened a rope to the side of the hammock, and led it off at right angles. Wrap it halfway around a convenient tree trunk and lead the free end back. Give it a couple of pulls, and the hammock would rock back-and-forth for many minutes.
But Maria wasn’t ready for sleep just yet. “Henrique, I received a very interesting proposal from the Danes. The Danish East India Company wants to set up rubber plantations in Asia. Preferably near their trading post at Tranquebar, in southeastern India, but if need be, elsewhere. We know that rubber can be grown in plantations in Malabar, Ceylon, Burma, Siam, Cochinchina, Malaya, Sumatra, Java and Borneo—it’s in the up-time books.”
“So they want us to teach them how to tap the milk of the rubber tree, huh?”
“They don’t just want tapping lessons, they want rubber tree seeds.”
“Why should we help them kill off our rubber industry? Isn’t that what the British did to Brazil in the old time line?”
“They have pointed out to David’s shareholders that it is only possible to harvest wild rubber in South America, because the South American Leaf Blight spreads too easily when the trees are close together.” An up-time book on South America had mentioned the failure of the Ford rubber plantation at “Fordlandia” and a modern edition of Encyclopedia Britannica had made more general reference to the blight. “Gustavus will get shares in the rubber plantations as compensation. And in addition, the Danes will bring us seeds and cuttings for other tropical plants: cacao, sugarcane, and perhaps even coffee. So we’ll have plantations of our own.”
“Ah. Something for everyone.”
“But the rubber tree seeds they want aren’t those of the local species, Hevea guianensis. They want Hevea brasiliensis.”
Henrique stopped rocking. “So that’s why you’re talking to me.”
“That’s right. You ran the rubber tapping operation in the Tapajós before the Portuguese discovered you were Jewish. So you know exactly where to look for good producers.”
“And I also know the ‘back door’ into the Amazon.” Henrique and his servant Maurício, with the help of the Manao Indians Coqui and Kasiri, had discovered a connection, the sometime-lake Rupununi, between the Amazon and Essequibo river basins.
“We can retrace your escape route.”
Henrique pondered this for a while. “I don’t know whether to hope for a final encounter with Bento Maciel Parente, or not.” Henrique had sought to protect “his” Indians from Parente, and it was Parente who had been Henrique’s most dogged pursuer during his flight.
“He’s not worth your taking unnecessary risks, Henrique.”
Henrique grunted. Maria couldn’t tell whether it was a grunt of agreement.
“Wait,” said Henrique. “Rubber tree seeds have to be planted within a few days or they just die. At least, the ones here do. And it will take months to pack them out of the Amazon by my ‘back door.’ And a couple more months, at least, to get them back to Europe.”