Gisco reaches the floating log and scrambles out of the water. I follow along ten feet behind him, expecting at any second to feel a caiman’s jaws snap closed like a bear trap on my ankles. Fear turns my kicking legs into propellers and gives my one-handed lifeguard stroke turbospeed. I make it to the log ahead of the ravenous reptiles and give the boy a shove out of the water.

He grabs what remains of a branch and hauls himself up. I follow him, slipping and sliding onto the sludgy, slippery, mossy mound of decaying wood.

The caimans come on implacably through the water like the three fates. If they know that we’ve clambered out, they don’t seem at all fazed.

And why should they be? It’s their swamp and we have nowhere to go, no place to hide. Still, it feels good to be out of the murky water, standing in sunlight. Air is my element, and at least now I won’t be eaten by something that I can’t see.

Gisco, maybe we can kick them away.

Or wedge branches into their jaws, the dog suggests.

Maybe we can even find branches with points, which we can use as spears!

We search the floating log. There are no spearlike branches. Nothing that resembles a weapon of any kind. This was once a mighty tree but the massive trunk has been worn smooth by the water, and the branches and smaller limbs have been softened and stripped away.

The caimans are now less than twenty feet away. Six reddish yellow eyes glint hungrily.

The boy is trembling. I pick him up and hold him protectively in my arms. But of course I can’t protect him, and we both know it.

Goodbye, Gisco. You were right, I should have left this poor fellow on the mountainside.

Farewell, Jack. You did the best you could. We were none of us dealt lucky hands. When we die, your Amazon is condemned to stumps and sawdust, and my future will gasp its last rattling breaths. Kidah’s out there somewhere in the forest, but we’ll never find him.

The lead caiman opens its jaws, and I see a dark, tooth-edged tunnel leading into oblivion. I pray to God that the pain ends quickly.

And then drum music starts up! A deafening snare drum cadence. Ka-cha, ka-cha, ka-ka-cha! Wood chips fly, water sprays, and in half a second the top predators of the Amazon learn that there’s a higher rung on the ladder.

One of the caimans turns to face the hail of bullets and snarls wildly. I watch as its scaly hide is shredded by dozens of bullets. Its two companions quickly dive down and sink out of sight.

The drum cadence stops.