The Story of Ab by Stanley Waterloo

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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 twanged, 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 passed an arrow so fiercely driven that its
flint head projected from the side opposite that which it had entered.

[Illustration: 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 Shell 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 passage. This insured warmth and comparative safety, but the
homes lacked the spaciousness 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 Shell 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 Shell maidens, and the two had
now attained an age when a bright-eyed young person of the other sex was
agreeable to look upon. But there had been no love passages. 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 Shell People and go with them upon a fishing
expedition. The Shell 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 Shell People and assist in spearing fish
or drawing them from the river's depths upon rude hooks, and the Shell
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 hoar 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 hoar 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 Shell 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 passed 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 Shell 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 Shell
People who had before attracted Ab's attention and something of his
admiration. She was fishing diligently. She had been left by the fishing
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 shore, but did not exhibit any alarm when she saw the
two young men. The ordinary young woman of the Shell 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.

[Illustration: 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 flashing finny thing, which she
calmly bumped on the rock and then tossed upon the silvery heap, which had
already assumed 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 Shell 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 Shell 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 Shell 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 assured 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 Shell 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 analyzed, 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
assumptions of superiority in various doings.

Unexhausted and sturdy 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 Shell 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
Shell 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 fishing Shell 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 shore, 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 passion 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 Shell 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 sturdy
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 Shell 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 Shell 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 assembled, food
in abundance for all was almost certainly assured. 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 Shell
People when Ab burst in upon them and delivered his message. There was
rushing 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 Shell People, armed in a way
effective enough, but which, in the estimation of the cave men, was
preposterous. The spears of the Shell 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 assembled 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 Shell People first
assembled 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 anticipated 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 assailing 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 woodpeckers 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 space 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 passed along that each man must fire his
torch.

All along the edge of the wood arose the flashing of little flames. These
grew in magnitude until a line of fire ran clear across the wood, and the
mammoths nearest raised their trunks and showed signs of uneasiness. Then
came a signal, a wild shout, and at once, with a yell, the long line burst
into the open, each man waving his flaming torch and rushing toward the
grove.

There was a chance--a slight one--that the whole herd might be stampeded,
but this had rarely happened within the memory of the oldest hunter. The
mammoth, though subject to panic, did not lack intelligence and when in a
group was conscious of its strength. As that yell ascended, the startled
beasts first rushed deeper into the grove and then, as the slope beyond
was revealed to them, turned and charged blindly, all save one, the great
tusker, who was feeding at the grove's outer verge. They came on, great
mountains of flesh, but swerved as they met the advancing line of fire and
weaved aimlessly up and down for a moment or two. Then a huge bull, stung
by a spear hurled by one of the hunters and frantic with fear, plunged
forward across the line and the others followed blindly. Three men were
crushed to death in their passage and all the mammoths were gone save the
big bull, who had started to rejoin his herd but had not reached it in
time. He was now raging up and down in the grove, bewildered and
trumpeting angrily. Immediately the hunters gathered closer together and
made their line of fire continuous.

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