[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
interior of the cave where she lay huddled in a great pile of soft, furry pelts. Near her lay a woman, older
than herself, but still beautiful. In front of them, nearer the mouth of the cave, two men slept. One was
Tha, her father, and the other her brother, Aht. The woman was Nat-ul's mother, Lu-tan. Now she, too,
opened her eyes. She stretched, raising her bare, brown arms above her head, and half turning on her
side toward Nat-ul -- it was the luxurious movement of the she-tiger -- the embodiment of perfect health
and grace. Lu-tan smiled at her daughter, exposing a row of strong, white, even teeth. Nat-ul returned
the smile.
"I am glad that it is light again," said the girl. "The shaking of the ground, yesterday, frightened me, so that
I had the most terrible dreams all during the darkness -- ugh!" and Nat-ul shuddered.
Tha opened his eyes and looked at the two women.
"I, too, dreamed," he said. "I dreamed that the earth shook again; the cliffs sank; and the Restless Sea
rolled in upon them, drowning us all. This is no longer a good place to live. After we have eaten I shall go
speak to Nu, telling him that we should seek other caves in a new country."
Nat-ul rose and stepping between the two men came to the ledge before the entrance to the cave.
Before her stretched a scene that was perfectly familiar and yet strangely new. Below her was an open
patch at the foot of the cliff, all barren and boulder strewn except for a rude rectangle that had been
cleared of rock and debris. Beyond lay a narrow strip of tangled tropical jungle. Enormous fern-like trees
lifted their huge fronds a hundred feet into the air. The sun was topping the horizon, coming out of a great
sea that lay just beyond the jungle. And such a sun! It was dull red and swollen to an enormous size. The
atmosphere was thick and hot -- almost sticky. And the life! Such countless myriads of creatures teeming
through the jungle, winging their way through the air, and blackening the surface of the sea!
Nat-ul knit her brows. She was trying to think -- trying to recall something. Was it her dream that she
attempted to visualize, or was this the dream? She shook herself. Then she glanced quickly down at her
apparel. For an instant she seemed not to comprehend the meaning of her garmenture -- the single
red-doe skin, or the sandals of the thick hide of Ta, the woolly rhinoceros, held to her shapely feet by
thin lacings of the rawhide of the great Bos. And yet, she quickly realized, she had always been clothed
just thus -- but, had she? The question puzzled her.
Mechanically her hand slipped to the back of her head above the nape of her neck. A look of
puzzlement entered her eyes as her fingers fell upon the loose strands of her long hair that tumbled to her
waist in the riotous and lovely confusion of early morning. What was it that her light touch missed? A
barette? What could Nat-ul, child of the stone age, know of barettes?
Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
Slowly her fingers felt about her head. When they came in contact with the broad fillet that bound her
hair back from her forehead she smiled. This was the fillet that Nu, the son of Nu, had fashioned for her
from a single gorgeous snake skin of black and red and yellow, split lengthwise and dried. It awoke her
to a more vivid realization of the present. She turned and re-entered the cave. From a wooden peg
driven into a hole in the wall she took a handful of brilliant feathers. These she stuck in the front of the
fillet, where they nodded in a gay plume above her sweet face.
By this time Lu-tan, Tha, and Aht had risen. The older woman was busying herself with some dry tinder
and a fire stick, just inside the entrance to the cave. Tha and Aht had stepped out upon the ledge, filling
their lungs with the morning air. Nat-ul joined them. In her hand was a bladder. The three clambered
down the face of the cliff.
Other men and women were emerging from other caves that pitted the rocky escarpment. They greeted
the three with smiles and pleasant words, and upon every tongue was some comment upon the
earthquake of the preceding night.
Tha and Aht went into the jungle toward the sea. Nat-ul stopped beside a little spring, that bubbled,
clear and cold, at the foot of the cliff. Here were other girls with bladders which they were filling with
water. There was Ra-el, daughter of Kor, who made the keenest spear tips and the best balanced. And
there was Una, daughter of Nu, the chief, and sister of Nu, the son of Nu. And beside these were half a
dozen others -- all clean limbed, fine featured girls, straight as arrows, supple as panthers. They laughed
and talked as they filled their bladders at the spring.
"Were you not frightened when the earth shook, Nat-ul?" asked Una.
"I was frightened," replied Nat-ul -- "yes; but I was more frightened by the dream I had after the shaking
had stopped."
"What did you dream?" cried Ra-el, daughter of Kor -- Kor who made the truest spear heads, with
which a strong man could strike a flying reptile in mid-air.
"I dreamed that I was not Nat-ul," replied the girl. "I dreamed of a strange world and strange people. I
was one of them. I was clothed in many garments that were not skin at all. I lived in a cave that was not a
cave -- it was built upon the ground of the stuff of which trees are made, only cut into thin slabs and
fastened together. There were many caves in the one cave.
"There were men and women, and some of the men wereblack ."
"Black!"echoed the other girls.
"Yes, black," insisted Nat-ul. "And they alone were garbed something as are our men. The white men
wore strange garments and things upon their heads, and had no beards. They carried short spears that
spit smoke and great noise out upon their enemies and the wild beasts, and slew them at a great
distance."
"And was Nu, the son of Nu, there?" asked Ra-el, tittering behind her hand.
"He came and took me away," replied Nat-ul, gravely. "And at night the earth shook as we slept in the
cave of Oo. And when I awoke I was here in the cave of Tha, my father."
"Nu has not returned," said Una.
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
