City of the Whispering Forest

By Leo Eaton

David is an ordinary ten-year-old American boy accompanying his archeologist father on an expedition to a previously undiscovered Mayan city deep in the rain forests of Central America. Here among the ruins he meets the Mayan god of children and is carried back a thousand years in time to save the city from being destroyed.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Jul 15, 2019
• ISBN: 9781543978278

Book preview

For Dianna

CITY OF THE WHISPERING FOREST

By Leo Eaton

© 1972 & 2019 Leo Eaton. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

ISBN (Print): 978-1-54397-826-1

ISBN (eBook): 978-1-54397-827-8

Contents

PREFACE (2019)

INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER ONE — ARRIVAL

CHAPTER TWO — CONVERSATIONS WITH A GOD

CHAPTER THREE — THE CITY IN THE FOREST

CHAPTER FOUR — HOSTILE FORCES

CHAPTER FIVE — DEFEAT & CAPTURE

CHAPTER SIX — THE HALLS OF ITZAMNA

CHAPTER SEVEN — SLAVERS

CHAPTER EIGHT — TRIALS OF MAGIC

CHAPTER NINE — VICTORY

GLOSSARY

The first men to be created and formed were called the Sorcerer of Fatal Laughter, the Sorcerer of Night, Unkempt, and the Black Sorcerer. Each were endowed with intelligence, they succeeded in knowing all that there is in the world. When they looked, instantly they saw all that was around them, and they contemplated in turn the arc of heaven and the round face of the earth. Then Itzamna, Lord of Creation said: They know everything; what shall we do with them now? Let their sight reach only to that which is near; let them see only a little of the face of the earth! Are they not by nature simple creatures of our own making? Must they also be gods?"

(Popol Vuh – the Creation Story of the Quiche Maya)

PREFACE

(2019)

This book is now half-a-century old and so much more is known about Mayan civilization and culture today than was known then. Much of the information in the story is now either wrong or out of date. Like most works of fiction, City of the Whispering Forest is a product of its time.

I started writing the story soon after I first arrived in San Miguel d’Allende in Mexico from England at the end of 1969, leaving behind a failed love affair and the disgrace of being fired from a major British TV series. Having said goodbye to the British film industry, I hoped to become a ‘Great British Writer’ and make my fame and fortune with words instead of images on screen.

The inspiration for City of the Whispering Forest came partly from living in Mexico but also from the meticulous and beautiful drawings of Mayan ruins by Frederick Catherwood, the 19th Century English artist who, with John Lloyd Stephens, journeyed through the Yucatan and Central America in 1844 and first brought Mayan Civilization to the attention of America and Europe. I first saw Frederick Catherwood’s drawings at the Instituto Allende early in 1970 and one of my favorites is on the cover of this book.

Between 1970 and 1972, while moving between Toronto, Canada, Los Angeles & San Miguel d’Allende, I completed City of the Whispering Forest. Through the good offices of Dave Van Arnam, a good friend and science-fiction writer also living in San Miguel d’Allende, the legendary NY literary agent Robert P. Mills agreed to represent my novel. This was unbelievable luck as Robert Mills was one of New York’s top agents at the time, representing Isaac Asimov, Richard Brautigan, Jim Thompson, Pauline Kael and Langston Hughes, among many others. When Robert Mills informed me that three publishers were interested in City of the Whispering Forest and one had already put in an offer, I thought my future was set.

It was not to be. In January, 1973, the US stock market entered one of the worst bear markets in history, losing 45% of its value over the next two years. With America in deep recession, publishers were cutting back drastically on their lists, the existing offer was withdrawn and no further interest was expressed.

Robert Mills told me not to be concerned; the recession would end, I’d write other books, he would keep representing me and my next story, or the one after that, would succeed in finding a publisher.

Just persevere, he said, a lesson all successful writers quickly learn. But he expected me to write in the same genre as City of the Whispering Forest, and I was already hankering to get back to the film industry, whether in America or Britain. And when I did settle down again to write seriously, during the three years in the late 1970s when we lived on the Island of Crete, my new stories didn’t fit what Robert Mills thought he could sell and we gradually lost touch.

It seems I was destined to be a documentary filmmaker rather than a writer and I have no regrets about the way my life turned out. But I sometimes wonder what would have happened if the American stock market hadn’t crashed in January, 1973, and City of the Whispering Forest had been published at that time. Would it have made a difference to my life? Would I have ended up a writer instead of a filmmaker? Who knows, but here is the original story, half-a-century later.

INTRODUCTION

Hidden deep in the impenetrable rain forests of Southern Mexico and Guatemala lie the remains of beautiful stone cities. Although almost choked by the surrounding jungle, they still retain much of their old glory. The temples and palaces, bleached white by sun and rain, look out over the jungle and forests that they once ruled.

Who were the great people who built these monuments to man’s endeavor and what made them abandon the cities at the height of their glory?

The people who built the cities were the Mayan Indians, a race who reached their zenith of civilization between 400 and 800 A.D. Their skill in stonework, building, mathematics and astronomy was far in advance of anything that existed elsewhere in the world.

Even today, their construction methods and designs rival the best that can be found in many twentieth century cities. Their knowledge of astronomy and mathematics equaled that of the Arabians and Egyptians, the people from whom we ourselves obtained the basis of our present-day knowledge.

Yet around 900 A.D., at the peak of their power, they abandoned the cities of the forest. Why they did this is not known, for there is no evidence of war or natural disaster. Except for the ravages of time, the cities remain just as they were left, untouched and perfect.

Whatever the reason, the secret is now lost in the mists of time, covered by a thousand years of jungle growth. A small number of the Mayan race trekked northwards to Yucatan, where for a few hundred years their civilization flowered again in the cities of Chichen Itza and Uxmal. This ‘New Empire’ as it is called came nowhere near to the splendor of the old cities of the forest. Eventually, they were conquered by a more war-like race, the Toltecs, who blended in with them and absorbed much of their culture and their history. The Toltecs, in their turn, were conquered by the Aztecs, who were still in power in Mexico when Cortex and the Spanish Conquistadores made Mexico part of the Spanish Empire.

By 1600 A.D., very little remained of the Mayan civilization. The Spanish Bishop of Ucatan, Bishop Landau, destroyed the few written records that still existed, believing them to be the work of the devil. However, it was this same Bishop Landau who must be thanked for what little knowledge we have of the ancient Mayans and their history. He made a record of their language and written hieroglyphics, a record that has enabled archeologist to understand many of the symbols carved on the walls of the jungle temples.

Maybe one day scientists will discover why the cities were abandoned but until that time, there are only theories.

This novel is a work of fiction and does not intend to be accurate in all its assumptions, although it can be said that every event recorded in the book is possible according to the facts known at this time. It is set in a land of magic and enchantment where gods walked the land and helped the people in their struggles.

The Mayans felt very close to the gods, believing them to be in every object that they saw. Whether such a god as the Liffy ever existed is open to doubt, but certainly there is every reason to expect that the Mayan children had their own god to look after them. If the city Uantel exists, it has yet to be found, but with so many cities still lying hidden in the jungle, this is not outside the bounds of possibility.

During the course of this book, the reader will come across many terms and expressions that may be unknown, for I have thought it better to use the Mayan terms where applicable. Therefore, I have included a glossary of Mayan words at the back where anything unfamiliar will be explained.

The study of the great lost civilizations of the world remains one of the most interesting subjects open to man and with City of the Whispering Forest I have tried to give the reader some idea of the splendor and beauty of the Mayan world.

CHAPTER ONE

ARRIVAL

The air was still and quiet, the heat hanging like a heavy cloud over the river. The only sound to break the silence was the putter of the small motorboat as it pushed its way through the swirling waters. Up at the bow, the bronzed body of the Indian guide shone with sweat as he stood poised to push aside the low-hanging branches that threatened to halt the boat’s passage.

The white boy sitting behind him gazed round with unconcealed wonder at the dense rain-forest that bordered the river. For David Leyland, just turned twelve years old, the whole journey was a dream come true. All his life he had wanted to go with his father on one of the archaeological field trips he was always making into the jungles of Southern Mexico and Guatemala. Now at last he had been given the chance. He would listen spellbound to his father’s stories of the beautiful cities he had seen, the great lost civilization of the Mayans that he was helping to uncover.

Sometimes David felt that if he just closed his eyes, he could open them to find himself standing in one of the old cities of the forests. There were times when the feeling was so strong that he could picture the brightly dressed people milling around him in the temple courtyards, talking the strange language that he could somehow understand. He could never describe the way he felt to his father, it was almost a sense of belonging, of being one with the Mayan people.

Once he’d tried to explain the feeling to some of his friends. They’d laughed, unable to understand, so he’d never mentioned it to anyone again. It had taken all his persuasion to be allowed to come on the latest trip but his father had finally given way. David looked out at the tangled forests that spread away from the river as far as he could see and felt a great sense of content. It was as if he was coming home.

David’s father, the archaeologist Doctor Leyland, had been on his way to join a party working among the Mayan ruins of Piedras Negras in Northern Guatemala. He and David had stopped overnight in Tenosique. They had been sitting under the trees in the jardine, eating an early dinner when the Doctor overheard a conversation that was to completely change their plans. Some days before, a tribe of Lacandon Indians had apparently come across the ruins of an unknown city deep in the jungle to the South, ruins that had never before been seen by any white man.

The Doctor had joined the conversation, learning that the city was ten days journey by boat south from Tenosique, situated in a part of the jungle that had never been completely explored. The following day he set out to find some of the Indians who had reported the discovery, hoping to be able to persuade them to act as guides.

The Indians were found camped just outside the town and at first they refused to guide the Doctor back to the old city, telling stories of ghosts living in the jungle. They said that the spirits of the dead kept watch over the ruins.

Finally the Doctor found two younger members of the tribe who were less afraid than the others. The offer of fifty dollars down and another fifty when they got back to Tenosique proved to be the lever that overcame any fears that remained.

It took a week for all the preparations to be made, but finally David and his father set out from Tenosique, with their two guides, heading south into the unknown. David’s first glance at the boat that was to carry them made him almost wish he wasn’t going. It was nothing more than a carved-out tree trunk with a small outboard motor attached but, when he saw the skill with which the Indians guided the frail craft through the eddies and currents of the treacherous jungle river, he stopped feeling scared and settled down to enjoy the trip.

For nearly three weeks they travelled on down the river. The only signs of life that David ever saw were occasional plumes of smoke that rose high above the jungle from the campfires of wandering tribes of Lacandon Indians. Sometimes, straining his eyes out across the forest, David thought that he could see the remains of great buildings almost totally concealed by the trees.

The trip was