Part 6

We crossed the Crimson Brook and the Blue, and then at last we began to talk with our signs and our halting phrases.

"What is the tube?" I asked Dy-lee. "How did it drive off Halfspoor?"

As well as he could, he showed me. It was a whistle, of a sort, and though we men could not hear its note, he explained that the animals could. A low sound, made by barely breathing into it, brought the dogwolves barking happily to our sides; but a stronger puff caused them to howl dolefully. I had seen what a really powerful blast on it could do to even a knifetooth bear.

"And the guardians have these whistles?" I asked him, and he answered, Yes, they did, though Laq must have lost his. That was why they needed no weapons when they strode the Fearful Forest. A man would not have to slay a carnivore when he could chase it away in fright, with its ears splitting.

And yet, all I sensed when Dy-lee blew the thing was a tingling of the eardrums. Strange and new! That an animal could hear a sound which a man could not!

But still I thought a bow and a few good arrows were not to be sneered at, and resolved again to teach my friends their use, in preparation for the time, even though it be hundreds of years hence, when all the whistles shall be lost.

I pictured Halfspoor in my mind, and how he had stood off from Dy-lee and swung blows at the air when the whistle blew. I saw him run again, cuffing his own ears to beat away the tearing, bone-rending sound of the to-me-silent tube. What a host of miracles I had to tell to Lora!

We crossed the Gray Brook and came to Sunset Fields, and the sun was less than an hour from its setting in the west. There was a figure running toward us, now in the waning sunlight, now in the dappling shade of the tree ferns. I cried out joyfully, for it was my Lora.

She neared us, and seeing Dy-lee and the dogwolves, cried out with horror. "Ahmusk! Fly, or they will slay you!"

"Come here, little fearful one," I said, "and I will open your mind to a thousand new things!"

* * * * *

She stood there, regarding me, and the fear went out of her eyes, to be replaced by a vast relief. "Then this creature will not harm you?"

"Nor you either. This is my friend Dy-lee," I told her, and taking her hand, put it into his. He shook it, and she smiled uncertainly. "Ahmusk--the dogwolves?"

I patted the biggest on the head. Oh, but that was my hour! "I have made them gentle as fawns," I said, stretching the facts somewhat.

Then she knew that all was well, and she leaped into my arms and kissed me until I thought she would never be done; and yet truly I was sorry when she stopped. "What has happened, Bear-throat? Where have you been for two days, and who is this, and how does it come that the dogwolves do not bite, and why are you all blood-smeared, and--"

"Lora, Lora," I said, "I have a thousand things to tell you, but we can never begin on them if you must chatter endlessly--"

"And Halfspoor, did you find his track, and where will he spend the night, and--"

"Lora!" I shouted, enfolding her in a fierce embrace. "Listen to me, and I shall tell you! Great Halfspoor ranges the Fearful Forest, where I will meet him again one day. This is Dy-lee--"

"And _what_ is Dy-lee?" she asked, her voice rather muffled against my chest.

I gave up. "I will tell you one thing," I said, "and then I will let you babble until you run out of queries. I am like a man who has feared lightning all his life, and has now been struck; and I not only survive, but have found it a pleasant experience--"

"Where were you hit by lightning? Where did you get all the thorn scratches?" she asked.

Dy-lee put his hand on my shoulder and said, pointing to Lora, "Zheena! Zheena!"

By which I think he meant to say that females are all alike, and so, patting my girl on her shining head, I grinned across at him and replied, "How right you are, Dy-lee, how very right you are!"

"What did he say?" asked Lora.

"He said that there is nothing in all the fine green world like a woman."

"Well!" said she, "you've learnt a little wisdom in your traveling, I must say!"

"A little," said I, "a little."

And so we journeyed homeward to the glen and our people, we three good new companions, and the dogwolves went before us and gamboled with pleasure in the soft grass of the fields.

* * * * *

That night Dy-lee and I sat together on my platform, in the tawny-cream light of a full autumn moon. Much had been told that evening, at a council of all our glen-folk; much had been speculated, much had been argued over. Some men had been shocked, some elated, some hurt--those last were the guardians, most of whom could not believe my tale until I showed them Dy-lee and repeated what Laq had said as he lay dying. My shaggy comrade had dyed a picture for the folk on a big rock, and astonished them all beyond measure. Our finest singers had performed for him, and now he knew that Bear-throat was not such a marvelous being after all.

Lora and I had announced our mating time. I had three days in which to find a cave cat and make our rug. Yes, a cave cat; I had decided to give Halfspoor a rest for a while....

After the initial surprise of Dy-lee's appearance, our people had all become very much interested in him. He was laden with gifts to take home to the caves: bone tools and hatchets, metal knives, fine arrows and bows, skins of white deer and sleek owl feathers, everything they could think of which he might like.

So now we sat together on the platform of my tree, our legs covered with rugs against the chill of the night, and our eyelids drooping with fatigue. Yet must I chatter a while longer, being reluctant to see this glorious day end.

"Dy-lee," I said, "many wanings of the moon will pass before we see an end to the changes that are going to happen among our folk, yours and mine. We will all be one folk soon." He nodded and smiled, just as though he could understand me. "We have been kept a simple people, naive and guileless; and that may be good. I think it is, and I think we will not change our simplicity. We will only see things more plainly. And there will be less fear."

"Ahmusk," said Dy-lee. "Friend Ahmusk!"

I gripped his hand in the gesture I found so satisfying. "And with time, Dy-lee, we will find the answers to all sorts of questions, questions that intrigue me so that I can scarcely wait till morning to begin searching for the answers! Those whistles of yours, for instance--who made them, and how, and is the secret of them truly that their noise pierces the ears and maddens an animal with fear, or what?

"And your pictures, Dy-lee, and our music: we will trade these to each other and spend a thousand thousand contented hours with them!"

He yawned, and lying down, pulled the furs up to his chin. Still would I talk a few moments longer.

"And some day, Dy-lee, we will know what caused your folk to grow all shaggy, while we remained smooth-skinned. Maybe we will find out how the men of the far olden times moved their great stones, and why they made the tall inclosures.

"First of all, of course, we must learn to speak to one another. I shall learn your language, and you shall learn mine...."

"But," put in a grumbling voice from the next tree, "if you do not close your mouth and go to sleep, Bear-throat, I fear you will not live to see tomorrow's sun, and so will miss all the fun. Go to sleep!"

I chuckled. It was Lora's father. "Good-night, then," I said. "I shall wake you early in the morning."

"I'm sure you will. Good-night!"

I rolled over beside Dy-lee and composed myself in my furs for the night. At once a vast comfortable weariness came over me.

"Perhaps," I murmured, "perhaps we shall even discover some day why it is that the bones of Sunset Fields do not decay!"

Dy-lee answered me with a soft grunt and then a snore. I laughed to myself with happiness, and fell asleep in the light of the full tawny moon.