The Story of Ab Part 5

For days the two labored earnestly together, and when they came again into the open they bore a stronger bow, one tapered at the end opposite the natural tapering of the branch, so that it was far more flexible and symmetrical than the one they had tried before. They had abundance of ash and yew and these remained the good bow wood of all the time of archery.

And the shaft was straight and bore a miniature spearhead at its end. The thought of notching the shaft to fit the string came naturally and inevitably. The bow had its first arrow.

An old man is not so easily affected as a young one, nor so hopeful, but when the second test was done the veteran Mok was the wilder and more delighted of the two who shot at the tree in the forest glade. He saw it all! No longer could the spear be counted as the thing with which to do most grievous hurt at a safe distance from whatever might be dangerous.

With the better bow and straighter shaft the marksmans.h.i.+p improved; even for these two callow archers it was not difficult to hit at a distance of a double spear's cast the bole of the huge tree, two yards in width at least. And the arrow whistled as if it were a living thing, a hawk seeking its prey, and the flint head was buried so deeply in the wood that both Mok and Ab knew that they had found something better than any weapon the cave men had ever known!

There followed many days more of the eager working of the old man and the young one in the cave, and there was much testing of the new device, and finally, one morning, Ab issued forth armed with his ax and knife, but without his spear. He bore, instead, a bow which was the best and strongest the two had yet learned to fas.h.i.+on, and a sheaf of arrows slung behind his back in a quiver made of a hollow section of a mammoth's leg bone which had long been kicked about the cave. The two workers had drilled holes in the bone and pa.s.sed thongs through and made a wooden bottom to the thing and now it had found its purpose. The bow was rude, as were the arrows, and the archer was not yet a certain marksman, though he had practiced diligently, but the bow was stiff, at least, and the arrows had keen heads of flint and the arms of the hunter were strong as was the bow.

There was a weary and fruitless search for game, but late in the afternoon the youth came upon a slight, sheer descent, along the foot of which ran a shallow but broad creek, beyond which was a little gra.s.s-grown valley, where were feeding a fine herd of the little deer. They were feeding in the direction of the creek and the wind blew from them to the hunter, so that no rumor of their danger was carried to them on the breeze. Ab concealed himself among the bushes on the little height and awaited what might happen. The herd fed slowly toward him.

As the deer neared the creek they grouped themselves together about where were the greenest and richest feeding-places, and when they reached the very border of the stream they were gathered in a bunch of half a hundred, close together. They were just beyond a spear's cast from the watcher, but this was a test, not of the spear, but of the bow, and the most inexperienced of archers, shooting from where Ab was hidden, must strike some one of the beasts in that broad herd. Ab sprang to his feet and drew his arrow to the head. The deer gathered for a second in affright, crowding each other before the wild bursting away together, and then the bow-string tw.a.n.ged, and the arrow sang hungrily, and there was the swift thud of hundreds of light feet, and the little glade was almost silent. It was not quite silent, for, floundering in its death struggles, was a single deer, through which had pa.s.sed an arrow so fiercely driven that its flint head projected from the side opposite that which it had entered.

[Ill.u.s.tration: AB SPRANG TO HIS FEET, AND DREW HIS ARROW TO THE HEAD]

Half wild with triumph was the youth who bore home the arrow-stricken quarry, and not much more elated was he than the old man, who heard the story of the hunt, and who recognized, at once far more clearly than the younger one, the quality of the new weapon which had been discovered; the thing destined to become the greatest implement both of chase and warfare for thousands of years to come, and which was to be gradually improved, even by these two, until it became more to them than they could yet understand.

But the lips of each of the two makers of the bow were sealed for the time. Ab and Old Mok cherished together their mighty secret.

CHAPTER XIV.

A LESSON IN SWIMMING.

Ab and Oak, ranging far in their hunting expeditions, had, long since, formed the acquaintance of the Sh.e.l.l People, and had even partaken of their hospitality, though there was not much to attract a guest in the abodes of the creek-haunters. Their homes were but small caves, not much more than deep burrows, dug here and there in the banks, above high water mark, and protected from wild beasts by the usual heaped rocks, leaving only a narrow pa.s.sage. This insured warmth and comparative safety, but the homes lacked the s.p.a.ciousness of the caves and caverns of the hills, and the food of fish and clams and periwinkles, with flesh and fruit but seldom gained, had little attraction for the occasional cave visitor. Ab and Oak would sometimes traffic with the Sh.e.l.l People, exchanging some creature of the land for a product of the water, but they made brief stay in a locality where the food and odors were not quite to their accustomed taste. Yet the settlement had a slight degree of interest to them. They had noted the buxom quality of some of the Sh.e.l.l maidens, and the two had now attained an age when a bright-eyed young person of the other s.e.x was agreeable to look upon. But there had been no love pa.s.sages. Neither of the youths was yet so badly stricken.

There came an autumn morning when Ab and Oak, who had met at daybreak, determined to visit the Sh.e.l.l People and go with them upon a fis.h.i.+ng expedition. The Sh.e.l.l People often fished from boats, and the boats were excellent. Each consisted of four or five short logs of the most buoyant wood, bound firmly together with tough withes, but the contrivance was more than a simple raft, because, at the bow, it had been hewed to a point, and the logs had been so chosen that each curved upward there. It had been learned that the waves sometimes encountered could so more easily be cleft or overridden. None of these boats could sink, and the man of the time was quite at home in the water. It was fun for the young men whose tale is told here to go with the Sh.e.l.l People and a.s.sist in spearing fish or drawing them from the river's depths upon rude hooks, and the Sh.e.l.l People did not object, but were rather proud of the attendance of representatives of the hillside aristocracy.

The morning was one to make men far older than these two most confident and full of life. The season was late, though the river's waters were not yet cold. The mast had already begun to fall and the nuts lay thickly among the leaves. Every morning, and more regularly than it comes now, there was a spread of glistening h.o.a.r frost upon the lowlands and the little open lands in the forest and upon every spot not tree-protected. At such times there appeared to the eyes of the cave people the splendor of nature such as we now can hardly comprehend. It came most strikingly in spring and autumn, and was something wonderful. The cave men, probably, did not appreciate it. They were accustomed to it, for it was part of the record of every year. Doubtless there came a greater vigor to them in the keen air of the h.o.a.r frost time, doubtless the step of each was made more springy and each man's valor more defined in this choice atmosphere.

Temperate, with a wonderful keenness to it, was the climate of the cave region in the valley of the present Thames. Even in the days of the cave men, the Gulf Stream, swinging from the equator in the great warm current already formed, laved the then peninsula as it now laves the British Isles. The climate, as has been told, was almost as equable then as now, but with a certain crispness which was a heritage from the glacial epoch.

It was a time to live in, and the two were merry on their journey in the glittering morning.

The young men idled on their way and wasted an hour or two in vain attempts to approach a feeding deer nearly enough for effective spear-throwing. They were late when, after swimming the creek, they reached the Sh.e.l.l village and there learned that the party had already gone. They decided that they might, perhaps, overtake the fishermen, and so, with the hunter's easy lope, started briskly down the river bank. They were not destined to fish that day.

Three or four miles had been pa.s.sed and a straight stretch of the river had been attained, at the end of which, a mile away, could be seen the boats of the Sh.e.l.l People, to be lost to sight a moment later as they swept around a bend. But there was something else in sight. Perched comfortably upon a rock, the sides of which were so precipitous that they afforded a foothold only for human beings, was a young woman of the Sh.e.l.l People who had before attracted Ab's attention and something of his admiration. She was fis.h.i.+ng diligently. She had been left by the fis.h.i.+ng party, to be taken up on their return, because, in the rush of waters about the base of the rock, was a haunt of a small fish esteemed particularly, and because the girl was one of the little tribe's adepts with hook and line She raised her eyes as she heard the patter of footsteps upon the sh.o.r.e, but did not exhibit any alarm when she saw the two young men. The ordinary young woman of the Sh.e.l.l People did not worry when away from land. She could swim like an otter and dive like a loon, and of wild beasts she had no fear when she was thus safely bestowed away from the death-harboring forest. The maiden on the rock was most serene.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE YOUNG MEN CALLED TO HER BUT SHE MADE NO ANSWER. SHE BUT FISHED AWAY DEMURELY]

The young men called to her, but she made no answer. She but fished away demurely, from time to time hauling up a flas.h.i.+ng finny thing, which she calmly b.u.mped on the rock and then tossed upon the silvery heap, which had already a.s.sumed fair dimensions, close behind her. As Ab looked upon the young fisherwoman his interest in her grew rapidly and he was silent, though Oak called out taunting words and asked her if she could not talk.

It was not this young woman, but another, who had most pleased Oak among the girls of the Sh.e.l.l People.

It was not love yet with Ab, but the maiden interested him. He held no defined wish to carry her away to a new home with him, but there arose a feeling that he wanted to know her better. There might,--he didn't know--be as good wives among the Sh.e.l.l maidens as among the well-running girls of the hills.

"I'll swim to the rock!" he said to his companion, and Oak laughed loudly.

Short time elapsed between decision and action in those days, and hardly had Ab spoken when he flung his fur covering into the hands of Oak, and, clad only in the clout about his hips, dropped, with a splash, into the water. All this time the girl had been eyeing every motion closely. As the little waves rose laughingly about the man, she descended lightly from her perch and slid into the stream as easily and silently as a beaver might have done. And then began a chase. The girl, finding mid-current swiftly, was a full hundred yards ahead as Ab came fairly in her wake.

A splendid swimmer was the stalwart young man of the hills. He had been in and out of water almost daily since early childhood, and, though there had never been a test, was confident that, among all the Sh.e.l.l People, there was none he could not overtake, despite what he had heard and knew of their wonderful cleverness in the water. Were not his arms and legs longer and stronger than theirs and his chest deeper? He felt that he could outswim easily any bold fisherman among them, and as for this girl, he would overtake her very quickly and draw her to the bank, and then there would be an interview of much enjoyment, at least to him. His strong arm swept the water back, and his strong legs, working with them, drove his body forward swiftly toward the brown object not very far ahead. Along the bank ran the laughing and shouting Oak.

Yard by yard, Ab's mighty strokes brought him nearer the object of his pursuit. She was swimming breast forward, as was he--for that was his only way--she with a dog-like paddling stroke, and often she turned her head to look backward at the man. She did not, even yet, appear affrighted, and this Ab wondered at, for it was seldom that a girl of the time, thus hunted, was not, and with reason, terrified. She, possibly, understood that the chase did not involve a real abduction, for she and her pursuer had often met, but there was, at least, reason enough for avoiding too close contact on this day. She swam on steadily, and, as steadily, Ab gained upon her.

Down the long stretch of tumbling river, sweeping eastward between hill and slope and plain and woodland, went the chase, while the panting and cheering Oak, strong-legged and enduring as he was, barely kept pace with the two heads he could see bobbing, not far apart now, in the tossing waters. Ab had long since forgotten Oak. He had forgotten how it was that he came to be thus swimming in the river. His thought was only what now made up an overmastering aim. He must reach and seize upon the girl before him!

Closer and closer, though she as much as he was aided by the swift current, the young man approached the girl. The hundred yards had lessened into tens and he could plainly see now the wake about her and the occasional up-flip of her brown heels as she went high in her stroke. He now felt easily a.s.sured of her and laughed to himself as he swept his arms backward in a fiercer stroke and came so close that he could discern her outline through the water. It was but a matter of endurance, he chuckled to himself. How could a woman outswim a man like him?

It was just at the time when this thought came that Ab saw the Sh.e.l.l girl lift her head and turn it toward him and laugh--laugh recklessly, almost in his very face, so close together were they now. And then she taught him something! There was a dip such as the otter makes when he seeks the depths and there was no longer a girl in sight! But this was only a demonstration, made in sheer audacity and blithesome insolence, for the brown head soon appeared again some yards ahead and there was another twist of it and another merry laugh. Then the neat body turned upon its side, and with quick outdriving legstrokes and the overhand and underhand pulling-forward which modern swimmers partly know, the girl shot ahead through the tiny white-capped waves and away from the swimmer so close behind her, as to-day the cutter leaves the scow. From the river bank came a wild yelp, the significance of which, if a.n.a.lyzed, might have included astonishment and great delight and brotherly derision. Oak was having a great day of it! He was the sole witness of a swimming-match the like of which was rare, and he was getting even with his friend for various a.s.sumptions of superiority in various doings.

Unexhausted and st.u.r.dy and stubborn, Ab was not the one to abandon his long chase because of this new phase of things. He inhaled a great breath and made the water foam with his swift strokes, but as well might a wild goose chase a swallow on the wing as he seek to overtake that brown streak on the water. It was wonderful, the manner in which that Sh.e.l.l girl swam!

She was like the birds which swim and dive and dip, and know of nothing which they fear if only they are in the water far enough away from where there is the need of stalking over soil and stone. It was not that the Sh.e.l.l girl was other than at home on land. She was quite at home there and reasonably fleet, but the creek and river had so been her element from babyhood that the chase of the hill man had been, from the start, a sheer absurdity.

Ab lifted himself in the waters and gazed upon the dark spot far away, and, piqued and maddened, put forth all the swimming strength there was left in his brawny body. It seemed for a brief time that he was almost equal to the task of gaining upon what was little more than a dot upon the surface far ahead. But his scant prospect of success was only momentary.

The trifling spot in the distant drifts of the river seemed to have certain ideas of its own. The speed of its course in the water did not abate and, in a moment, it was carried around the bend, and lost to sight.

Ab drifted to the turn and saw, below, a girl clambering into safety among the rafts of the fis.h.i.+ng Sh.e.l.l People. What she would tell them he did not know. That was not a matter to be much considered.

There was but one thing to be done and that was to reach the land and return to a life more strictly earthly and more comfortable. There is nothing like water for overcoming a young man's fancy for many things. Ab swam now with a somewhat tired and languid stroke to the sh.o.r.e, where Oak awaited him hilariously. They almost came to blows that afternoon, and blows between such as they might have easily meant sudden death. But they were not rivals yet and there was much to talk of good-naturedly, after some slight outflamings of pa.s.sion on the part of Ab, and the two men were good friends again.

The sum of all the day was that there had been much exercise and fun, for Oak at least. Ab had not caught the Sh.e.l.l girl, manfully as he had striven. Had he caught her and talked with her upon the river bank it might have changed the current of his life. With a man so young and st.u.r.dy and so full of life the laughing fancy of a moment might have changed into a stronger feeling and the swimming girl might have become a woman of the cave people, one not quite so equal by heritage to the task of breeding good climbing and running and fighting and progressive beings as some girl of the hills.

It matters little what might have happened had the outcome of the day's effort been the reverse of what it was. This is but the account of the race and what the sequel was when Ab swam so far and furiously and well.

It was his first flirtation. It was yet to come to him that he should be really in love in the cave man's way.

CHAPTER XV.

THE MAMMOTH AT BAY.

It was late autumn, and a light snow covered the ground, when one day a cave man, panting for breath, came running down the river bank and paused at the cave of One-Ear. He had news, great news! He told his story hurriedly, and then was taken into the cave and given meat, while Ab, seizing his weapons, fled downward further still toward the great kitchen-midden of the Sh.e.l.l People. Just as ages and ages later, not far from the same region, some Scottish runner carried the fiery cross, Ab ran exultingly with the news it was his to bring. There must be an immediate gathering, not only of the cave men, but of the Sh.e.l.l People as well, and great mutual effort for great gain. The mammoths were near the point of the upland!

The runner to the cave of One-Ear was a hunter living some miles to the north, upon a ledge of a broad forest-covered plateau terminating on the west in a slope which ended in a precipice with more than a hundred feet of sheer descent to the valley below. On rare occasions a herd of mammoths invaded the forest and worked itself toward the apex of the plateau, and then word went all over the region, for it was an event in the history of the cave men. If but a sufficient force could be suddenly a.s.sembled, food in abundance for all was almost certainly a.s.sured. The prize was something stupendous, but prompt action was required, and there might be tragedies.

As bees hum and gather when their hive is disturbed, so did the Sh.e.l.l People when Ab burst in upon them and delivered his message. There was rus.h.i.+ng about and a gathering of weapons and a sorting out of men who should go upon the expedition. But little time was wasted. Within half an hour Ab was straining back again up the river toward his own abode, while behind him trailed half a hundred of the Sh.e.l.l People, armed in a way effective enough, but which, in the estimation of the cave men, was preposterous. The spears of the Sh.e.l.l People had shafts of different wood and heads of different material from those of the cave men, and they used their weapons in a different manner. Accustomed to the spearing of fish or of an occasional water beast, like a small hippopotamus, which still existed in the rivers of the peninsula, they always threw their spears--though the cave people were experts with this as well--and, as a last resource in close conflict, they used no stone ax or mace, but simply ran away, to throw again from a distance, or to fly again, as conditions made advisable. But they were brave in a way--it was necessary that all who would live must have a certain animal bravery in those days--and their numbers made them essential in the rare hunting of the mammoth.

When the company reached the home of Ab they found already a.s.sembled there a score of the hill men, and, as the word had gone out in every direction, it was found, when the rendezvous was reached, which was the cave of Hilltop, the man living near the crest of the plateau, and the one who had made the first run down the river, that there were more than a hundred, counting all together, to advance against the herd and, if possible, drive the great beasts toward the precipice. Among this hundred there was none more delighted than Ab and Oak, for, of course, these two had found each other in the group, and were almost like a brace of dogs whining for the danger and the hunt.

Not lightly was an expedition against a herd of mammoths to be begun, even by a hundred well-armed people of the time of the cave men. The mammoth was a monster beast, with perhaps somewhat less of sagaciousness than the modern elephant, but with a temper which was demoniacal when aroused, and with a strength which nothing could resist. He could be slain only by strategy. Hence the everlasting watch over the triangular plateau and the gathering of the cave and river people to catch him at a disadvantage.

But, even with a drove feeding near the slope which led to the precipice, the cave men would have been helpless without the introduction of other elements than their weapons and their clamor. The mammoth paid no more attention to the cave man with a spear than to one of the little wild horses which fed near him at times. The pygmy did not alarm him, but did the pygmy ever venture upon an attack, then it was likely to be seized by the huge trunk and flung against rock or tree, to fall crushed and mangled, or else it was trodden viciously under foot. From one thing, though, the mammoth, huge as he was, would flee in terror. He could not face the element of fire, and this the cave men had learned to their advantage. They could drive the mammoth when they dare not venture to attack him, and herein lay their advantage.

Under direction of the veteran hunter, Hilltop, who had discovered the whereabouts of the drove, preparations were made for the dangerous advance, and the first thing done was the breaking off of dry roots of the overturned pitch pines, and gathering of knots of the same trees, with limbs attached, to serve as handles. These roots and knots, once lighted, would blaze for hours and made the most perfect of natural torches.

Lengths of bark of certain other trees when bound together and lighted at one end burned almost as long and brightly as the roots and knots. Each man carried an unlighted torch of one kind or another, in addition to his weapons, and when this provision was made the band was stretched out in a long line and a silent advance began through the forest. The herd of mammoths was composed of nineteen, led by a monster even of his kind, and men who had been watching them all night and during the forenoon said that the herd was feeding very near the edge of the wood, where it ended on the slope leading to the precipice. There was ice upon the slope and there were chances of a great day's hunting. To cut off the mammoths, that is, to extend a line across the uprising peninsula where they were feeding, would require a line of not more than about five hundred yards in length, and as there were more than a hundred of the hunters, the line which could be formed would be most effective. Lighted punk, which preserved fire and gave forth no odor to speak of, was carried by a number of the men, and the advance began.

It had been an exhilarating scene when the cave men and Sh.e.l.l People first a.s.sembled and when the work of gathering material for the torches was in progress. So far was the gathering from the present haunt of the game that caution had been unnecessary, and there was talk and laughter and all the open enjoyment of an antic.i.p.ated conquest. The light snow, barely covering the ground, flashed in the sun, and the hunters, practically impervious to the slight cold, were almost prankish in their demeanor. Ab and Oak especially were buoyant. This was the first hunt upon the rocky peninsula of either of them, and they were delighted with the new surroundings and eager for the fray to come. All about was talk and laughter, which became general with any slight physical disaster which came to one among the hunters in the climbing of some tree for a promising dead branch or finding a treacherous hollow when a.s.sailing the roots of some upturned pine. It was a brisk scene and a lively one, that which occurred that crisp morning in late autumn when the wild men gathered to hunt the mammoth. All was brightness and jollity and noise.

Very different, in a moment, was the condition when the hunters entered the forest and, extended in line, began their advance toward the huge objects of their search. The cave man, almost a wild beast himself in some of his ways, had, on occasion, a footfall as light as that of any animal of the time. The twig scarcely crackled and the leaf scarcely rustled beneath his tread, and when the long line entered the wood the silence of death fell there, for the hunters made no sound, and what slight sound the woodland had before--the clatter of the woodp.e.c.k.e.rs and jays--was hushed by their advance. So through the forest, which was tolerably close, the dark line swept quietly forward until there came from somewhere a sudden signal, and with a still more cautious advance and contraction of the line as the peninsula narrowed the quarry was brought in sight of all.

Close to the edge of the slope, and separated by a slight open s.p.a.ce from the forest proper, was an evergreen grove, in which the herd of monster beasts was feeding. A great bull, with long up-curling tusks, loomed above them all, and was farthest away in the grove. The hunters, hidden in the forest, lay voiceless and motionless until the elders decided upon a plan of attack, and then the word was pa.s.sed along that each man must fire his torch.