CHAPTER V
THE PULLER-DOWN OF TREES
On the broken hill-slope overlooking the Valley of Fire, in the twogreat caves known as the Cave of the Bears and the Cave of the Hyenas,the tribe of the Children of the Shining One now dwelt secure andbegan to recover heart. Before each cave-mouth, tended night and day,burned the sacred flame, its tongues licked upwards in gold andscarlet with a radiance from which all the tribe, with the soleexceptions of Bawr, the Chief, and Grom, his right hand and councilor,were wont to avert their eyes in awe whenever they passed it in theircomings and goings. Only from a distance would they presume to look atthe flames directly; and ever as they looked their wonder and theirreverence grew. Their trust in the protection of the Shining One cameto have no bounds, for night after night would the great red bearsreturn, prowling in the mysterious gloom just beyond the ring oflight, with their dreadful eyes turned fixedly upon their formerhabitation, only to be driven off ignominiously when Grom rushed atthem with a shout and a flaming torch above his head. And night afternight would the troops of the hyenas come back, their monstrous-jowledheads swinging low from their mighty shoulders, to sit and howl theirdevilish laughter above their ancient lair, only to slink off in cowedsilence when the Chief would hurl a blazing brand among them. When thebeasts were thus discomfited and abashed, the boldest of the warriorswould go leaping after them and bring down the hindermost with spears.So it came about that presently the great animals knew themselvesbeaten, and sullenly withdrew to the other side of the hills.
It was just this country at the other side of the hills which mostappealed to the restless imagination of Grom. Within the valley--whichwidened out, as it receded from its fiery gateway, to enclose leagueupon league of fertile plain--was good hunting, along with anabundance of roots, fruits and edible herbs. But in Grom's heartburned that spirit of unquenchable expectation which has led the raceof Man upwards through all obstacles--the urge to find out ever whatlies beyond. So the saw-toothed line of these dark, volcanic summitsdrew him irresistibly, with the promise of unknown wonders hiddenbehind them.
During these few weeks since coming to the Valley of the Fire, Gromhad been tirelessly experimenting with the bright element, trying thiskind of fuel and that, one after another, in order to learn what foodwas most acceptable to it. He learned that certain substances it woulddevour in raging haste, only to fail and die soon after; or not trulyto die, he imagined, but to flee back unseen to its dancing,flickering source at the valley mouth. Other substances he found thatit would consume slowly, but pertinaciously. While into yet others,such as dry turf and punk, it would eat its way and hide, maintainingtherein for a long time a retired but potent existence, ready to leapinto radiant life under certain provocation. His invention stimulatedby these experiments, he had made himself several hollow tubes of athick green bark whipped about with thongs, and had stuffed them withthat mixture of turf and punk which he found best calculated to holdthe furtive seeds of fire alive.
With one of these slow torches alight, and several spare ones slungover his shoulders, Grom set out to cross the pointed hills and seeknew wonders in the lands beyond. The tall girl, A-ya, went with him.This not being customary in the tribe, they gave reasons. Grom saidthat he needed the girl because she alone knew how rightly to serveand tend the Shining One in combat. It was a good reason, but he wasamazed to find in his heart so deep a desire for her that he wasill-content whenever his eyes could not rest upon her. There was noone in the tribe with whom he could discuss this strange emotion, forno one, not even the wise and subtle-minded Chief, would havecomprehended it--romantic love not yet having come openly to these menof the Morning of Time. So Grom gave the lesser reason, which all,including himself, could understand. As for the girl, she said thatwhatever her lord commanded she must needs obey, which she did with amost seemly readiness. But in her heart she knew that if her man hadcommanded her to stay behind, she would have obeyed only so long as heremained in sight, and would then have followed him.
Like Grom, the girl carried two flint-headed spears. Both wore clumsybut effective slivers of flint, for knives, in their girdles oftwisted skin. The girl, besides her weapons, carried a substantialburden of strips of meat dried hard in the sun, in case game shouldprove scarce or elusive in the land beyond the hills. But when theyhad got well out of sight of the caves, Grom turned, relieved her ofher burdens which, according to tribal conventions, it was her duty tocarry for her man, and gave her instead the light but precious tube offire.
As they ascended the ragged slopes, vegetation grew sparse, and whentoward nightfall they gained the pass which Grom was making for--adeep cleft between two steep red and purple peaks--the rock beneaththeir feet was naked but for a low growth of flowering herbs andthorn. The pass was too high for the aloe and mesembryanthemum toflourish, and the lava-bed which floored it was yet too new to haveclothed itself in any of the larger mountain-loving trees. Here theypassed the night, in a shallow niche of rock with a fire before it;and the fire being visible from a long way off, no prowlers cared evento approach it.
On the following day they traveled swiftly, but the pass was long. Itwas near sunset again when at last the rocks fell away to either side,and they saw spread out below their feet the land which they had cometo explore.
It was a vast, rolling plain, golden-green with rank, cane-likegrasses, dotted with innumerable clumps of trees, and laced with fullwatercourses which lay in spacious loops of blue and silver. Here andthere lay broad, irregular patches where the grass did not flourish,and these were of vivid emerald-green from some unknown growth.
Along the horizon to the north sparkled a great water. And half-waydown the steep, toward the right, smoked and smouldered a shallow,saucer-shaped crater from whose broken lower rim a purple-brownserpent of comparatively recent lava descended in sluggish curvesacross the intense green.
Somewhat to the girl's apprehension, Grom seemed anxious toinvestigate the smoking crater, but the only practicable path down themountain led them away from it, so he was content to leave it foranother time and another, perhaps less repellent, approach.
Descending presently into a region of ledges and ravines clothed withdense thickets, they found on every hand traces of the giant bears andthe saber-tooth tigers whom they had driven from the caves in theValley of Fire. Grom hurriedly whirled the smoldering torch into aflame, and from it lighted a couple of resinous brands, one forhimself, and one for A-ya to carry. Thus armed, they fearlesslyfollowed the broad trail of bears, which led them very convenientlydown the steep. And bear and saber-tooth alike, at sight of the flamethus apparently seeking them out, remembered their recent scorchingdiscomfiture, and slunk off like whipped curs.
Grom's immediate object was to make his way straight to the shores ofthat great water, whose gleaming on the horizon had been like aninvitation to his inquiring spirit. But when early in the forenoon ofthe fourth day they reached the lowlands, he found that his way wouldbe anything but straight. The immense grasses, a species of cane, grewso tall, so dense and so thick in the stem, that it was impossible toforce a path through them just where he would.
He saw that he must use the trails of the wild beasts, whichintersected it in all directions. There were the tracks of everyanimal he knew--the hunters and the hunted alike--and of many morewhich he did not know. But one broad trail in particular arrested hisattention. It struck such fear to the heart of the girl, whose eyeswere keen and understanding, that her knees trembled beneath her, andhad she dared she would have begged Grom to turn back from a landwhich held such monsters.
Even Grom himself felt a thrill of awe as he stared at the trail whichbespoke so mighty a traveler. Wherever it led, the sturdiest growthswere crushed flat as if some huge bowlder from the mountains had beenrolled over them. And the monster footprints, which here and therestamped themselves clearly in the trail, were thrice the size of thoseof the hugest mammoth.
Grom stooped and studied these footprints, pondering them with knitbrows. What manner
of giant it might be which moved on such colossaland misshapen members it was beyond his wits to guess. But of a suretyit was a fine roadmaker!
With a confident arrogance born of the knowledge that he was the lordof Fire, he deliberately chose to pursue this dreadful trail. And thegirl, hiding her terror lest it should diminish her credit in hissight, followed close at his elbow, her bright eyes tirelesslysearching the jungle on either side.
Suddenly behind them came a confused, terrifying noise of pantingbreaths and trampling feet. It came sweeping down the broad trail.There were grunting cries, also; and Grom understood at once that aherd of pig-tapirs--heavy-footed, timorous beasts, as tall asheifers--were sweeping down upon them in mad flight before someunknown pursuer.
Against that blind panic, that headlong frantic rush, he knew thatblazing brands would avail nothing. He clutched the girl by the hand."Come!" he ordered. And they fled side by side down the trail.
It was in their minds to climb the first suitable tree they shouldcome to, and let the rout go by. In half a minute or so, over the topsof the giant grasses, they sighted such a tree, only a few hundredyards ahead. The trail, swerving opportunely, appeared to leaddirectly towards its foot, and they raced on, the girl now laughingsoftly with excitement, and forgetting her fear of the unknown becauseof the known peril behind her. It pleased her curiously to find thather man had not grown too divine to be ready to run away on fittingoccasion; and she kept glancing at him from under her dark tangle ofhair with eyes of passionate possession.
The wild uproar behind was drawing nearer swiftly, but the refuge wasnow not more than fifty paces ahead. All at once the way to it wasbarred. Out from a little side-track on the right came lumbering agigantic rhinoceros, his creased and folded hide clothed in mattedbrown wool and caked with clay. He swung round into the trail, almostblocking it with his bulk, stared for a couple of seconds with evillittle eyes at the two slim beings before him, then lowered the hugedouble horn that armed his snout, and charged at them with a grunt offury.
Caught thus fairly between the devil before, and the deep sea oftrampling hoofs behind, Grom had no choice. A second's waving of thelighted brands convinced him that the rhinoceros was too dense ofbrain to fear the fire, or even to notice it. Once more clutching thegirl's hand, he ran back a little way, seeking to draw the two perilstogether, and give them an opportunity to distract each other'sattention.
He ran back till the flying, plunging herd of the pig-tapirs came intofull view around the curve of the trail. Then, with all his strength,he forced his way into the grass, on the left, shouldering aside theupright stems to make room for the girl to enter. She hurled herblazing brand full into the face of the rhinoceros, hoping to confuseor divert him for an instant, then thrust herself lithely in pastGrom.
The rhinoceros was diverted for an instant. The smoke and sparks halfblinded him, and in a paroxysm of fury he checked himself to tramplethe strange assailant under foot. Then he thundered forward. But thetough stems of the grass had closed up again. The two fugitives werehidden. He saw the packed herd of the tapirs bearing down upon him;and, forgetting the insignificant creatures who had first roused hisanger, he charged forward at full speed to meet this new foe.
Realizing well enough that in three or four seconds more the crashwould come, and that the struggle between the rhinoceros and themaddened herd would be little short of a cataclysm, Grom and the girlstruggled breathlessly to force themselves to a safe distance lestthey should be crushed in the melee.
The sweat ran down into their eyes, and swarms of tiny insects,breeding in the giant stems, choked their throats and nostrils; butthey wrestled their way onward blindly, foot by foot. Behind them, outin the trail, came a ponderous crash, and, then an appalling explosionof squeals, screams, grunts and roars. The next instant the rigidstems gave way suddenly before them, and they fell forward, with astartled cry from the girl, into a deep and sunless water.
They came up, spluttering and choking; but as soon as she could catchbreath the girl laughed, whereupon the grimness of Grom's facerelaxed. The water was a deep creek, perfectly overshadowed and hiddenby the rank growth along its banks. But just opposite was the treewhose refuge they had been trying to gain. They swam across inhalf-a-dozen strokes, and drew themselves ashore, and shook themselveslike a pair of retrievers. Through all the flight, the fierce effortamong the grass-stems, and the unexpected ducking, they had kepttenacious hold of every one of their treasures. But--their fire wasout! The brand was black; the precious tube, with the seeds of firelurking at its heart, was drenched, saturated and lifeless.
For a moment or two Grom looked into the girl's eyes steadily,conveying to her without a word the whole tremendous significance oftheir loss. The girl responded, after a second's dismay, with a lookof trust and adoration which brought a rush of warmth to Grom's heart.He smiled proudly, and shook his club as if to reassure himself. Then,climbing hurriedly into the tree, they stared back over the plumedtops of the grasses.
The sight that met their eyes was not one for weak nerves. The spot inthe grass which they had just escaped from was a shambles. Theforemost of the panic-stricken pig-tapirs, met by the charge of therhinoceros, had been ripped and split by the rooting of his doublehorn, and hurled to either side as if by some titanic plough. A couplemore had been trampled down and crushed before his charge was stayedby the irresistible pressure of the surging, squealing mass.
There he had stood fast, like a jagged promontory in the surges,tossing his mighty head and thrusting hideously, while the rest of theherd passed on, either scrambling clean over him or breaking down thecanes and pouring around on either side. Of those that passed over himabout one in every three or four got ripped by the tossing horn, andwent staggering forward a few paces, only to fall and be trodden outby their fellows. Close behind the last of the squealing fugitivescame the cause of their panic--two immense black lions, who hadapparently been playing with their prey like cats.
When they came face to face with the rhinoceros where he stood amonghis victims, shaking the blood from horn and head and shoulder, theystopped abruptly. Together, perhaps, they would have been a match forhim. But theirs was a far higher intelligence than his. They knew thealmost impenetrable toughness of his hide, his Berserk rage, hisimperviousness to reasonable fear; and they had no care to engagethemselves without cause in so uncertain and unprofitable a combat.
With a roar that rolled in thunder over the plain and seemed to setthe very tree-tops quivering, they leaped lazily aside and went off inenormous bounds through the grass, circling about as if to intercept,in sheer wantonness of slaughter, the remnants of the fleeing herd. Atthe sight Grom frowned anxiously, thinking how helpless he and thegirl would be against such foes, now that they no longer had theShining One to protect them.
Squealing to split the ears, the pig-tapirs came galloping past thetree, making for a piece of water some furlongs further on, wheredoubtless they hoped to evade both the lion and the rhinoceros. Butthey had yet another adversary to reckon with.
Just past the tree, at a thicket of immense scarlet poinsettias, thetrail curved sharply. From behind the poinsettias arose a giganticshape unlike anything that Grom had ever dreamed of. And he knew thatthe maker of the mysterious trail and those tremendous footprints wasbefore him.
With a trumpeting bray of indignation the monster sat upright onhind-quarters far more ponderous than those of a mammoth. Its tail, asthick at the base as the body of a bear, helped to support it, whileits clumsy frame towered to a height of eighteen or twenty feet. Itshind legs were very short, thick like tree-trunks, grotesquely bowed;and its thighs like buttresses. Its fore legs were more arms thanlegs, of startling length and massive strength, draped in long, stiffhair, and terminated by colossal hands with immense hooked claws forfingers. The whole body was clothed with rusty hair of an amazingcoarseness, like matting fiber. The vast head, flat on top andprolonged to a snout that was almost a proboscis, had the look ofbeing deformed by reason of its fantasti
cally exaggerated jowl, orlower jaw. This terrifying monster thrust out a narrow pink tongue,some three or four feet in length, stooped and turned, and gave ahurried look at something crouching behind its mighty thighs.
"Its baby!" muttered the girl, with a little indrawn breath ofsympathy.
Then the strange being sat up again to meet and ward off the rush ofthe maddened pig-tapirs.
For a moment it beat off the assault, seizing the frantic beasts andhurling them this way and that as if they had been so many rabbits.Then it was completely surrounded by the reeking squealing bleedinghorde, which paid no more personal attention to it than if it had beena mass of rock. They rolled over the little one, unheeding, and trodit flat. Its death cry split the air; and at that sound the motherseemed to sink down into her haunches. In her agony of rage and griefshe literally tore some of her assailants in halves, throwing theawful fragments impatiently from her in order to lose no time inseizing a new victim. A few seconds more and the rush was past; andpresently the mad rout was hurling itself with a tremendous splashinginto the water. The monster looked around for more victims--and wasjust in time to see the hideous vision of the rhinoceros charging downupon her. Triumphant from the encounter with the lions, he rushed backto slake his still unsatisfied fury on the pig-tapirs. At any othertime he would have given such an antagonist as the colossalmegatherium a wide berth; but just now he was in one of his madnesses.His furious little swinish eyes blinking through the blood whichdripped over them, he hurled himself straight onward. His horn wasplunged into the monster's paunch; but at the same time one of thosegigantic armed hands fell irresistibly on his neck, shattering thevertebrae through all their deep protection of hide and muscle. Hecollapsed with an explosive grunt; and the giant hands tossed himaside.
It was a frightful wound which the monster had received, but for a fewmoments she paid no attention to it, being occupied in licking thetrampled body of her young one with that amazing tongue of hers. Atlength, apparently convinced that the little one was quite dead, shebrayed again piteously, dropping forward upon all fours, and made offslowly down the trail, walking with grotesque awkwardness on the sidesof her feet. For two or three hundred yards she kept on, drawing awake of crimson behind her; and then, apparently exhausted by herwound, she turned off among the canes, and lay down, close beside thetrail, but effectively screened from it.
From their place in the tree Grom and the girl had followedbreathlessly these astounding encounters. At last Grom spoke:
"This is a country of very great beasts," he remarked, with the air ofone announcing a discovery. As A-ya showed no inclination whatever todissent from this statement, he presently went on to his conclusion,leaving her to infer his minor premise.
"We must go back and recover the Shining One. It is not well for us togo on without him."
"Yes," agreed the girl eagerly. For all her courage and passionatetrust in her man, the sight of those black lions bounding over thetops of the towering grasses had somewhat shaken her nerve. She fearedno beasts but the swiftest, and those which might leap into the lowerbranches of the trees. "Yes!" she repeated. "Let us go back for theShining One, lest he be angry at us for having put him in the water."
"But for yet a day more we will stay here in this tree, and rest andsleep in safety," continued Grom, "that we may travel the moreswiftly, till we get beyond the grasses."
Then, climbing higher into the tree, he proceeded to build a platformand roof of interlaced branches for their temporary home. In this taskthe girl did not help him, because of the great muscular strengthwhich it required. She lay in a crotch, her hairy but long and shapelylegs coiled under her like a leopard's, now gazing at her man withardent eyes, now staring out apprehensively across the sun-drenched,perilous landscape.
Suddenly she gave a cry of amazement, and pointed excitedly down thetrail. Beyond the water wherein the pig-tapirs had found refuge,beyond the lurking-place of the wounded megatherium, came three men,running desperately. Shading his eyes, Grom made out that they werenearly exhausted. They were clearly men of the type of his own tribe,light-skinned and well shaped; and the leader, who carried a longclub, was a man of stature equal to his own. Grom's sympathies wentout to them, and his impulse was to hasten to their assistance.Glancing further along the trail to learn the cause of their headlongflight, he saw two black lions in pursuit, probably the same two whichhad been driving the pig-tapirs a couple of hours earlier. They werecoming on at such a pace that Grom feared the weary fugitives would beovertaken before they could reach the tree of refuge. Instinctively hestarted to climb down. But, his eyes falling upon the girl, heremembered that he had no right to enter upon a venture so utterlyhopeless while he had her to take care of. His eager clutch upon hisspear relaxed.
"They are spent. They'll never get here!" he muttered anxiously.
"No!" said A-ya, with blank unconcern. "The lions will get them. It'sMawg, and his two cousins."
Grom growled an exclamation of astonishment. The girl's eyes--or herintuitions--were keener than his. But he saw at a second glance thatshe was right.
At this moment Mawg, running a few paces in advance by reason of hissuperior speed and stamina, passed the spot where the woundedmegatherium lay hidden. The monster lifted her dreadful head. The nextsecond the other two arrived, running elbow to elbow, with droopedshoulders of exhaustion. Through the screen of canes a gigantic handshot out above their heads and came down upon them, crushing the twotogether. They had not time for outcry; but it was clear that somesound caught the leader's ears, for he glanced back over his shoulder.He was near enough now for the keen-eyed watchers in the tree to seehis face change with horror. He ran on without a pause, but now withfresh speed, as if the sight had shocked him into new vigor. Seeingthat there was, after all, a good prospect of his reaching the tree intime, Grom swung down to be ready to help him up. As he did so he sawthe two lions approach the hiding-place of the monster.
The vast, clawed hand still lay there on the two crushed bodies in themiddle of the trail. The lions saw it, and they checked themselves ata safe distance. They knew that just behind the grass-screen lurkedanother such shaggy and monstrous member, waiting to rend them as theywould rend an antelope. They shrank, and drew back, snarling angrily.It is possible they feared lest the screen on either side of the trailmight conceal more than one of the monsters; for they sprang far asideas if to make a wide circuit of the perilous spot.
"There's plenty of time!" muttered Grom, and dropped upon his feet inthe middle of the trail. The girl came in mad haste after him, but athis sharp command "Stay there!" she contented herself with slippingout upon the lowest branch, just over his head, and holding her spearready.
"Kill him!" she cried. But Grom seemed not to hear.
Staggering, and half blind with exhaustion Mawg was within twentypaces before he noticed who was confronting him. Then his dull eyesblazed. With a snarl of fury he hurled his club straight at Grom'sface, missing him only by a hand's-breadth. But the effort, and thedisappointment at finding himself thus balked, as he imagined, on thevery threshold of escape, seemed to finish him. He stumbled on withgroping hands outstretched, and fell just at Grom's feet.
Grom hesitated, wondering how he could get this inert weight up intothe tree. The girl did not understand his hesitation.
"Kill him!" she hissed, leaning down eagerly from her branchoverhead.
"No, he's a great warrior, and the tribe needs him," answered Grom,stooping to shake the prostrate form.
Mawg stirred, beginning to recover. Grom shook him again.
"Up into the tree, quick!" he ordered in a loud, sharp voice. "Thelions are coming."
Mawg roused himself, sat up, and stared with a look of bewildermentchanging swiftly into hate.
"Up!" shouted Grom again. "The tree. They're coming!"
At this the fellow growled, but sprang up as if he had been jabbedwith a spear, and clambered into the tree as nimbly as a monkey. Gromfollowed, quickly but coolly. A-ya, who had waited
with her eyeswatchfully on Mawg, stepped close to Grom's side; and all three swungupwards into the higher branches as the two lions arrived beneath.
Glaring up into the tree with shrewd, malevolent eyes, the greatbeasts realized that, for the present at least, the tree man-creatureswere quite out of reach. Lashing their tufted tails in disappointment,they turned aside to sniff, in surly scorn, at the dead, mountainoushulk of the rhinoceros, which lay with one ponderous foot stuck up inthe air as if in clumsy protest at Fate. Comprehending readily themanner of its death, they came back and lay down under the tree, andfell to gnawing lazily at the body of one of the pig-tapirs which themegatherium had torn in two. They had the air of intending to staysome time, so Grom presently turned his attention to his rescuedrival.
Mawg was sitting on the next branch, a good spear's length distant,and glowering at A-ya's lithe shapeliness with eyes of savage greed.Grom knit his brows, and significantly passed an arm about the girl'sshoulders. Mawg shifted his attention to him.
"What do you want of me?" he demanded, in a thick, guttural voice.
"I thought you ran as if you did not want the lions to eat you,"answered Grom.
Mawg stared with a stupid brutality and incomprehension; and the eyesof the two men, meeting fairly, seemed to lock in a duel ofpersonalities.
They presented a significant contrast. Both, physically, superbspecimens of their race--the highest then evolved upon the youthfulearth--the elder man, in his ample forehead and calm, reasoning eyes,displayed all the promise of the future; while the youth, low skulledand with his dull but pugnacious eyes set under enormous bony brows,suggested the mere brute from which the race had mounted. His hair wasshorter and coarser than Grom's, and foully matted; and his neck wasset very far forward between his powerful but lumpy shoulders. Thecolor of his coarse and furrowed skin was so dark as to make theweathered tan of Grom and A-ya look white by contrast.
In no way lacking courage, but failing in will and steadiness, in adozen seconds Mawg involuntarily shifted his gaze, and looked down atthe lions.
"What do you want of me?" he demanded again, as if he had had noanswer before.
"The tribe has too few warriors left. I will take you back to thetribe!" replied Grom with authority.
Mawg curled back his thick lips from his great yellow dog-teeth in asnarling laugh of incredulity.
"You want to kill me!" said he, nodding his head.
Grom stared at him for a moment or two with a look of fatiguedcontempt, then tore off a substantial strip of dried flesh from thebundle hanging on the branch, and tossed it to him. The fellowsnatched it, and hid it behind him, being too hungry to refuse it,but too savage to eat it under his captor's eye. Grom smiledslowly, and fell to playing with a heavy strand of A-ya's hairwhich had fallen over his arm. But to this caress the girl paid noattention. She was puzzled and outraged at Grom's action in protectinghis rival. Her nostrils dilated, and a red spot glowed angrily undereach cheek-bone.
Suddenly from down the trail came a noise of cracking grass-stems. Thetwo lions got up from their meal, and turned their heads inquiringlytoward the sound. The next moment they went stalking off the oppositeway with an air of haughty indignation, ignoring all the bodies of theslain pig-tapirs. When they had rounded the first turn in the trailthey leaped into the grass, and went bounding off in a straight linetoward a large patch of wood some miles distant. The woundedmegatherium was returning.
Perhaps stung into restlessness by the anguish of that rending thrust,the monster came dragging herself back toward the tree, crawling onthe sides of her feet. Arriving at the scene of battle, she sniffedonce more at her mangled young one, and brayed piteously over it. Thenturning in an explosive fury upon the body of the rhinoceros, began totear it limb from limb as one might pull apart a roast pigeon. Whilethus occupied, she chanced to turn her eyes upon the tree, and caughtsight of the three figures looking down upon her.
On the instant her rage was diverted to them. Braying like a steamsiren, she came under the tree, reared herself against it, flung hergiant arms about it, and strove to pull it down. The tree rocked as ifstruck by a tornado; and Mawg, who had been too slow to notice whatwas about to happen, gave a yell of horror as he barely saved himselffrom falling. The girl laughed, whereupon he shot her a menacing lookwhich so enraged her that she raised her spear as if to transfix him.
But there was too much happening below for her attention to remain onMawg. Finding the tree quite too sturdy to be pulled down off-hand,the monster gripped the lowest main branch, a limb eight or ten inchesthrough, and with one wrench peeled it down like a stalk of celery.Her first effort, upon the main trunk, had set the blood once morepumping from her wound, but she paid no attention to it. Reaching tothe next great branch, she ripped that one down also, taking anothergreat strip from the main trunk. Grom saw that her purpose obviouslywas to pull the tree to pieces bit by bit, in order to get at herintended victims. Mawg apparently saw this also, and it was too muchfor him. Gripping his strip of dried meat between his teeth, heslipped around the trunk till he was sheltered from the monster'ssight, dropped to a branch which stretched far over the water, ran outalong it nimbly as an ape, and dived. The monster, her eyes fixed uponthe two remaining in the tree, never noticed his escape. Mawg swam thecreek, thrust his way through the grass-stems, darted back to snatchup his club, shook it at Grom, and, yelling an obscene taunt, racedoff to seek himself another retreat before nightfall.
Neither Grom nor A-ya had any heed to spare him at that moment. Themonster had just torn down a limb so huge that the main trunk wasalmost split in half by its loss. Grom saw that unless he could stopthis process of destruction, in a few moments more the tree would beoverthrown. The monster was just rearing herself to clutch the nextgreat bough. Spear in hand, Grom slipped down to meet her, and haltedon a branch just out of reach. The monster brayed vindictively,stretched to her full height, and then shot forth her tremendousmuscular red coil of tongue, thinking evidently to lick down herinsignificant adversary from his perch. She was within an inch ofsucceeding. Grom just eluded the strange attack by stepping asidenimbly; and quick as thought A-ya's spear slashed the dreadful redtongue as it reached flickering after her lord's ankles. The nextmoment, seeing the monster's throat upstretched and unguarded, Gromdrove his spear full force, straight into the soft hollow of it. Theweapon sank into a depth of perhaps three feet, till the ragged flintlodged in the vertebrae of the monster's neck. Then the shaft waswrenched violently from his hand; and the monster, blowing blood andfoam from mouth and nostrils, fell with a crash among the litter ofgreat branches which she had pulled down.
Grom drew a deep breath of relief, and commended the girl for hertimely and effective stroke at that terrible tongue. Then he sethimself coolly to the task of completing their shelter for the night.As he wove leafy branches into the floor of the platform to make itsoft, she contemplated his work with satisfaction. Presently heremarked:
"I'm glad we are rid of that Mawg."
"You should have killed him!" said the girl curtly.
"But why?" demanded Grom, in some surprise. In his eyes the fellow wasa valuable piece of property belonging to the tribe, a fightingasset.
"He wants _me_!" answered the girl, meeting his eyes resentfully.
Grom let his eyes roam all over her--face, hair and form--and such alook of passionate admiration glowed in their steady depths that heranger faded, her own eyes dropped, and her breast gave a happy,incomprehensible flutter. She had never seen such a look in any man'sface before, or even dreamed of such a look as possible.
"Of course, he wants you," said Grom, wondering, as he spoke, at thering of his own voice. "You are the fairest thing, and the mostdesirable, on earth. All men whose eyes come to rest on you must wantyou. But none shall have you, ever, for you are mine, and none shalltear you from me."
And at that the girl forgot her anger, and forgave him for havingneglected to kill Mawg.
That night sleep was impossible for them, though their
lofty shelterwas comfortable and secure. A vast orange moon, near the full,illuminated the spacious landscape; and beneath the tree came all thegiant night-prowlers, gathering to the unparallelled banquet which theday had spread for them. Only the two black lions, perhaps alreadyglutted, did not come. Wolves, a small pack of self-disciplined wilddogs, a troop of hyenas, and several enormous leopards, howled,snarled and wrangled in knots over the widely scattered carcases, eachgroup watching its neighbors with suspicion and deadly animosity.
A gigantic red bear came lumbering up, and all the lesser prowlersscattered discreetly but resentfully before him. He strode straight tothe chief place, under the rent, dishevelled tree, and fell to tearingat the mountainous corpse of the megatherium. He was undisturbed tilltwo saber-tooths arrived, their tawny coats spectral in the moonlight,their foot-long tusks giving their broad masks a dreadful grin.
Before one saber-tooth the bear would have stood his groundscornfully; but before the two he thought it best to defer. Slowly,and with a thunderous grumbling, he moved over to the body of therhinoceros, pretending that he preferred it. The air was split andbattered with the clamor of raving voices. Other saber-tooths came,and then another bear.
There were swift, sudden battles, as swiftly dropped becauseneither combatant wished to fight to a finish when there wasfeasting so abundant for all. And once a leopard, dodging the pawof a saber-tooth, sprang into the tree, only to fall back howlingfrom the spears thrust at him through the floor of Grom's platform.
Just before dawn the girl slept, while Grom kept watch beside her lestanother leopard should fancy to explore their refuge. An hour later,when the first pallor was spreading, she awoke with a cry of fear, andclung to Grom's arm, shuddering strongly.
"But--what is it?" he asked, in a tender voice, stroking her heavymane.
"I was afraid!" she answered, like a child.
"What were you afraid of?" asked Grom.
"I was afraid of Mawg. I _am_ afraid of him!" she answered, sitting upand shaking the hair from her eyes, and staring out fearfully over thegray transparent plains.
"Why should you fear Mawg?" demanded Grom proudly. "Am not I your man?And am not I always with you? Many such mad brutes as Mawg could nottake you from me."
"I know," answered the girl, "that he and such as he would be asstraws in my lord's hands. But--even Grom must sometimes sleep!"
Grom laughed gently at her forebodings.
"He must sleep now, indeed, for we have a long and perilous journeybefore us," said he. Laying his great shaggy head in her lap, andstretching his limbs as far as the tiny platform would allow he wasasleep in two seconds. The girl, stooping forward till her rich hairshadowed the rugged, sleeping face, with its calm brows, pondereddeeply over his inexplicable forbearance toward his rival. Herinstincts all assured her that it was dangerous; but something elsewithin her, something which she strove in vain to grasp, suggested toher that in some way it was noble, and made her glad of it. Then, allat once, the first of the sunrise, flooding into the tree-top, bathedher face with a rosy glow, and wonderfully transfigured it.
In the Morning of Time Page 5
