Journey to the Hauchairi Territory Francisco Proaño Arandi (bio) Translated by Paul Hendricks (bio) The jungle they were crossing then, under Fyns's authority, was a vast and mysterious universe, as menacing and unpredictable in the physical, tangible world as in some spiritual dimension that was, or seemed to be, rooted in their psyche, in the area of affections and fears. But the landscape's difficulties were not insurmountable, if indeed there were stretches where the party was able to proceed only by the tip of the machete's blade; in fact, for the most part the terrain was more like a great savannah spread between enormous trees, beneath the canopy of gigantic leaves that barely let through any sunlight. The trees reached incredible heights, creating an ever-present shadow that was only occasionally pierced by blazing cones of light. At such fleeting, violent moments, the surroundings—the tentacular tree trunks, the thick branches, the knots of lianas and roots—took on a phantasmal and majestic quality, almost surreal, as though the vegetation spread out in every direction, like a view of great cliffs that are lost in the distance, an immeasurable distance with no horizon: in the jungle, Javier said, there was only distance, and the horizon was just an abstract notion. Otherwise, the shadow reigned and, at certain moments—even in the middle of the day—darkness fell, a resonant darkness filled with calls and songs, signals that once begun could immediately be placed, for the most part, their distance determined, their source and intended recipient identified. The crisscrossing messages created a loud, disjointed symphony, especially at night: signals of fear, pursuit, the successful hunt, the attack, the mating call, copulation, [End Page 524] deception, birth and death, all of it emitted from scattered locations and by every imaginable being: insects, birds, beasts, possibly men. At times, Javier remembers clearly, everything was silence and fear: proof that a storm might be coming, or a disaster—death, that is. Or the hauchairi, one of the porters said, fearfully. It was true: in those periods of silence the men became especially conscious that they—the hauchairi, totally and completely unknown—might be by their side, among them, stalking them, waiting for them, or else stubbornly following their progress, lurking among the trees, nestled in those caves of shadow perceptible in the distant vegetation. For weeks they had been following a course that baffled Javier and the other members of the party at every turn. The route was vexingly difficult to understand, as it never seemed to enter the territory they were supposedly going to explore, but rather followed along its outermost edges. The first suspicion arose when, upon the discovery of the unique stone monolith, Fyns did not give the order, as everyone expected, to continue forward in the exact direction that the ancient primitive statue seemed to indicate. This statue, it should be noted, appeared to be the last in a series; they reasoned that, continuing on, they would find others. The most frustrated among them was Castillo, the archeologist, who respectfully, yet fruitlessly, suggested that, seeing as they had found such an ancient piece here, they might encounter more recent ones deeper inside the territory, leading to the discovery of a culture much more advanced than they previously had supposed. The obvious artistic intent behind the monolith, he argued, suggests that in later periods, the descendants of that original creative class would have continued to perfect their techniques. It's a great opportunity, he continued, and we're going to pass it up. But Fyns wouldn't change his mind, even when the archeologist, in order to convince him, explained that in an alluvial plain such as the one they had just crossed, it was astonishing, almost unbelievable, to make such a finding. The existence of this type of stone here can only be considered a miracle. It's completely unprecedented. Who knows what else we might find in [End Page 525] the hauchairi territory, especially in other types of terrain? We should at least take a look. We might make a totally unprecedented discovery. Fyns said only: Such as? Castillo hesitated an instant before responding: Such...