“Cool,” said George, and started to row.

Tom sat back against the side of the raft. The dog immediately stepped over legs and slumped down next to him, putting his head on Tom’s lap, perhaps seeing Tom as a safe haven in the midst of all that distress.

After a few seconds, Tom closed his eyes, falling into some inner peace with the dog beside him, as Nick’s screams steadied and Shen and the others moved about him, jostling the raft, and the rhythmic rowing of the oars carried them gently onward.

None of this is real, he thought. It felt like he’d imagined all of it, or maybe he’d died in that plane crash and these were the inventions of his brain’s final moments. He had not been face-to-face with a jaguar deep in the Amazon jungle, or with snakes and caimans and spiders, he had not saved people, killed people, he was not sitting here with this dog resting his head on his lap.

And yet he knew all those things had really happened, and in the light of that knowledge, it seemed like it was the real world that was a dream, and that his life before coming here had been his mind’s creation. It was the same for all of them, and whatever happened, what Kate had said to him would be true, that the tragedies and triumphs of these last few days would be the foundation of their lives from now on, the things that had happened beforehand reduced to insignificance.

He heard Alice say, “What about over there?”

“Looks good,” said George, their voices bringing Tom back to the present. He looked ahead and saw the stretch of rocky shore where the jungle was raised up and back on a steep earthen bank.

A few minutes later, they were at the river’s shallow edge and George jumped out again. They climbed ashore, secured the boat, and were mindful of the dog, watching him for signs that there might be something to worry about—the dog, for his part, found lots of interesting things to sniff but nothing to growl or bark at.

Shen stayed behind, still working on Nick in the boat, and Nick himself was quieter now, moaning but not screaming. The others stood in a huddle nearby, some watching Shen, some talking, comforting each other, still in shock.

Tom stood some way distant, looking out at the river, at the width of it, wondering how long it might be until it yielded a settlement of some kind, knowing they needed it now more than ever. After a short while, Barney walked over to where Tom was standing.