down again over the cenote with the stuff dangling on the end of the cable, I just haul it in to the side. Is that possible?'
Rider looked even more worried. 'Hauling a heavy weight to one side like that is going to have a hell of an effect on stability.' He rubbed his chin. 'I reckon I could do it though.'
'What would you reckon to do once you got down?' asked Fallon.
'If Rider will tell me how much clear ground he needs to land the chopper, I'll guarantee to clear it. There might be a few stumps, but he'll be landing vertically, so they shouldn't worry him too much. I'll do it -- unless someone else wants to volunteer. What about you. Dr. Halstead?'
'Not me,' he said promptly. He looked a bit shamefaced for the first time since I'd met him. 'I can't swim.' Then I'm elected,' I said cheerfully, although why I was cheerful is hard to say. I think it was the chance of actually doing something towards the work of the expedition that did it. I was tired of being a spare part.
I checked on the operation of the saw and the flame-thrower and saw they were fully fuelled. The flame- thrower produced a satisfactory gout of smoky flame which shrivelled the undergrowth very nicely. 'I'm not likely to start a forest fire, am I?' I asked.
'Not a chance,' said Fallon. 'You're in a rain forest and these aren't northern conifers.'
Halstead was coming with me. There was so much weight to be put into the helicopter that there could be only two passengers, and since it was going to be a job for a strongish man to attach the gear to the winch cable and get it out of the helicopter Halstead was chosen in preference to Fallon.
But I wasn't too happy about it. I said to Rider, 'I know you'll be busy jockeying this chopper at the critical moment, but I'd be obliged if you'd keep half an eye on Halstead.'
He caught the implication without half trying. 'I operate the winch. You'll get down safely.'
We took off and were over the site within a very few minutes. I waggled my hand in a circle to Rider and he orbited the cenote at a safe height while I studied the situation. It's one thing to look at photographs on solid ground, and quite another to look at the real thing with the prospect of dangling over it on the end of a line within the next five minutes.
At last I was satisfied that I knew where to aim for once I was in the water. I checked the nylon cord which was the hope of the whole operation and stepped into the canvas loops at the end of the cable. Rider brought the helicopter lower, and I went cautiously through the open door and was only supported by the cable itself.
The last thing I saw of Rider was his hand pulling on a lever and then I was dropping away below the helicopter and spinning like a teetotum. Every time I made a circuit I saw the green hillside behind the cenote coming closer until it was too damned close altogether and I thought the blades of the rotor were going to chop into projecting branches.
I was now a long way below the helicopter, as far as the winch cable would unreel, and my rate of spin was slowing. Rider brought the chopper down gently into the chimney formed by the surrounding trees and I touched the water. I hammered the quick-release button and the harness fell away and I found myself swimming. I trod water and organized the nylon cord, then struck out for the edge of the cenote, paying out the cord behind me, until I grasped a tree root at water-level.
The sides of the cenote were steeper than I had thought and covered with a tangle of creeper. I don't know how long it took me to climb the thirty feet to the top but it was much longer than I had originally estimated and must have seemed a lifetime to Rider, who had a very delicate bit of flying to do.
But I made it at last, bleeding from a score of cuts on my arms and chest, yet still holding on to that precious cord.
I waved to Rider and the helicopter began to inch upwards, and slowly the cable was reeled in. I paid out the cord, and when the helicopter was hovering at a safe height, five hundred feet of cord hung down in a graceful catenary curve. While Halstead was no doubt struggling to get the load on to the end of the winch cable I got my breath back and prepared for my own struggle.
It was not going to be an easy task to haul over a hundred pounds of equipment sixty feet sideways. I took off the canvas belt that was wrapped around my middle and put it about a young tree. It was fitted with a snap hook with a quick release in case of emergencies. There was very little room to move on the edge of the cenote because of the vegetation-there was one tree that must have been ninety feet high whose roots wore exposed right on the rim. I took the machete and swung at the undergrowth, clearing space to move in.
There was a change in the note of the chopper's engine, me pre-arranged signal that Rider was ready for the next stage of the operation, and slowly it began to descend again with me bulk of the cargo hanging below on the winch cable. Hastily I began to reel in the cord hand over hand until the shapeless bundle at the end of the winch cable was level with me, but sixty feet away and hanging thirty feet above the water of the cenote.
I wrapped three turns of me cord around the tree to serve as a friction brake and then began to haul in. At first it came easily but the nearer it got me harder it was to pull it in. Rider came lower as I pulled which made it a bit easier, but ft was still back-breaking. Once the chopper wobbled alarmingly in the air, but Rider got it under control again and I continued hauling.
I was very glad when I was able to lean over and snap the hook of me canvas belt on to the end of the winch cable. A blow at the quick-release button let the cargo fall heavily to the ground. I looked up at the chopper and released the cable, which swung in a wide arc right across the cenote. For a moment I thought it was going to entangle in the trees on the other side, but Rider was already reeling it in fast and the chopper was going up like an express lift. It stopped at a safe height, then orbited three times before leaving in the direction of Camp Two.
I sat on me edge of the cenote with my feet dangling over the side for nearly fifteen minutes before I did anything else. I was all aches and pains and felt as though I'd been in a wrestling match with a bear. At last I began to unwrap the gear. I put on the shirt and trousers that had been packed, and also the calf-length boots, men lit a cigarette before I went exploring.
At first I chopped around with the machete because the tank of the flame-thrower didn't hold too much fuel and the thing itself was bloody wasteful, so I wanted to save the fire for the worst of the undergrowth. As I chopped my way through that tangle of leaves I wondered how the hell Fallon had expected to travel half a mile in an hour; the way I was going I couldn't do two hundred yards an hour. Fortunately I didn't have to. All I had to do was to clear an area big enough for the helicopter to drop into.
I was flailing away with the machete when the blade hit something with a hell of a clang and the shock jolted up my arm. I looked at the edge and saw it had blunted and I wondered what the devil I'd hit. I swung again, more cautiously, clearing away the broad-bladed leaves, and suddenly I saw a face staring at me -- a broad, Indian face
