Neanderthal

I had never felt anything quite like this level of terror before.

Just a short while ago, looking down out of the helicopter window at the unbroken jungle below, I had been ecstatic. There is nothing extraordinary about that. Every time I look at the untarnished beauty of the world I am consumed by great joy. I watched the collage of greens and imagined the multitudes of creatures that lived there. It was a living oil painting, a colossal work of art. I had been smiling to myself – thinking – here I was again – peering at the most beautiful sight in the universe, the emerald sea of leaves broken by the rippling browns of intertwining branches, all bathed in mist, all throbbing with life. I was in danger of becoming hopelessly poetic. In a short while I was going to be in the midst of it. I was rarely happier than when I was looking at nature and contemplating a challenge.

But that changed abruptly; as soon as we hit terra firma that euphoria simply dissipated, to be replaced by a dread verging on outright panic.

The helicopter dropped us off on a mud bank at the side of the river. It was the closest they could get us to our goal. The rest was down to us.

That is when the terror struck.

It was not uncommon for me to feel apprehensive, it would be strange if I did not, given the circumstances, but I had never felt anything verging on panic before. It was extraordinary. As soon as the chopper hit the mud, I felt this great dread rise up in me.

I found myself wondering what on earth I had let myself in for.

The whole scheme had seemed crazy from the start but then, that was right up my street. I thrived on crazy schemes. We were heading off into the unknown, one of the few remaining unexplored areas left on this planet – a region of uncharted Amazon rainforest. Sounds crazy but it was heaven to me.

That is what I do. I am an explorer.

Even if I say it myself, I am an expert when it came to challenges like this. I might not be good in cultured society, indeed, I can often feel awkward and out of my depth, but in the rainforests of Australia, Africa and Borneo I was known for my resilience and had pitted myself against nature, and won. It was the one thing I seemed to excel at. So I charted the unknown for a living. There were always people willing to sponsor me. I had, in a short time, amassed a bit of a reputation for being fearless, though most of the time it was merely a combination of foolhardiness, sound preparation, teamwork and luck. As far as I am concerned nothing comes close to that euphoria of being in the wild. I loved it.

When, out of nowhere, Pinosaro, the President of Brazil, had contacted me, I, perhaps foolishly, jumped at the opportunity. Even when I later found that two teams had already been lost on this enterprise it did not deter me. I had great faith in my abilities and this represented just my kind of challenge. The excitement had welled up. I had not yet tackled the Amazon. What an opportunity. Sure, I was nervous, but I had not expected to find myself feeling sick with such a surge of fear.

That unexpected dread was like nothing I had ever experienced before. A jolt of electricity. I stood next to the helicopter physically shaking. It felt as if there was something fundamentally wrong with this project. I could feel it. I knew it. I was filled with a desire to clamber back in to that whirlybird and pull out of the whole thing, to get the hell out of there. It took all of my resolve to keep my wits intact.

With an effort I pulled myself back together and had a glance round to see if anybody had noticed the state I was in. I do not think they had. They all looked as shaken as me. It looked like we had all been stricken with the same jolt of terror.

Somehow I shrugged it off and began unloading and the others joined me – all of us were fighting with our own demons.

As to why I was here, that was a bit of a story.

Pinosaro, the madman, actually believed he could carry out one of the most audacious engineering ventures in the history of mankind, even though anybody with half a brain could see that the whole enterprise was foolish. He was proposing to build a highway right through the Amazon jungle, from Bellem through Santarem, Manaus to Muto and finally connecting up to Quito in Bolivia. It was intended to open the rainforest up to mining and logging as well as promoting trade. He arrogantly claimed he could make Brazil the greatest, wealthiest country on the planet. He told his adoring acolytes that Brazil had the resources and he was the man to turn them into cash. The whole idea was ridiculous. Some of the land he was thinking of crossing was treacherous and impassable. The cost of the project was too colossal to think about. But that was Pinosaro’s problem, not mine.

I knew it was a mad idea right from the start but I was not about to tell him that. Everyone knew of Pinosaro’s legendary temper. He had no idea of the obstacles in his way. I knew the scheme would never be completed. It was a mammoth project with such huge problems that it would cost trillions to reach fruition and Pinosaro could not raise that kind of funding.

Not that any rational reasoning ever impacted on Pinosaro. His mind only focussed on power. But I suspected that he was never really interested in completing this project in the first place. His primary aim was purely political. He sold the idea to the poor Brazilian people and made them believe in it. They voted for him in droves. They were behind him. That was enough to get him elected. He had the power and that was all he cared about – well that and money. His personal wealth was growing beyond all measure.

The thing is that when you have the power the cash flows in. They might not believe in that highway but all the mining, oil and timber companies wanted a part of the action. They were eager to get their hands on all that untapped wealth. Financing the project, at least for its initial stages, was not an issue and Pinosaro was carefully squirrelling away his share of that loot.

I do not think any of the people involved with Pinosaro actually believed they would achieve the whole of the scheme, but they knew that the first stage would open up the rainforest and they would get access to some of the greatest unexploited resources on the planet. It did not matter if they had the project completed, merely starting it would be sufficient to unlock those resources. They would be long gone before the infeasibility became apparent.

As for environmental issues, well they were never a consideration – not when there was huge profit to be made.

Personally I hated the idea of the rainforest being decimated but I tried to put that aspect out of my mind. Inside I was furious with myself. By accepting the role, I was part of a project that might speed up the destruction of the very thing I loved – the wilderness.

So that is why I was here.

Neanderthal: Amazon.co.uk: Forsythe, Ron: 9798393554262: Books