It was in the early fall of
the following year that it happened.
After his failure to get the
Swift One, Red-Eye had taken
another wife; and, strange to
relate, she was still alive.
Stranger still, they had a baby
several months old--Red-Eye's
first child. His previous wives
had never lived long enough to
bear him children. The year had
gone well for all of us. The
weather had been exceptionally
mild and food plentiful. I remember
especially the turnips of that
year. The nut crop was also very
heavy, and the wild plums were
larger and
sweeter than usual.
In short, it was a golden year.
And then it happened. It was
in the early morning, and we
were surprised in our caves.
In the chill gray light we awoke
from sleep, most of us, to encounter
death. The Swift One and I were
aroused by a pandemonium of screeching
and gibbering. Our cave was the
highest of all on the cliff,
and we crept to the mouth and
peered down. The open space was
filled with the Fire People.
Their cries and yells were added
to the clamor, but they had order
and plan, while we Folk had none.
Each one of us fought and acted
for himself, and no one of us
knew the extent of the calamity
that was befalling us.
By the time we got to stone-throwing,
the Fire People had massed thick
at the base of the cliff. Our
first volley must have mashed
some heads, for when they swerved
back from the cliff three of
their number were left upon the
ground. These were struggling
and floundering, and one was
trying to crawl away. But we
fixed them. By this time we males
were roaring with rage, and we
rained rocks upon the three men
that were down. Several of the
Fire-Men returned to drag them
into safety, but our rocks drove
the rescuers back.
The Fire People became enraged.
Also, they became cautious. In
spite of their angry yells, they
kept at a distance and sent flights
of arrows against us. This put
an end to the rock-throwing.
By the time half a dozen of us
had been killed and a score injured,
the rest of us retreated inside
our caves. I was not out of range
in my lofty cave, but the distance
was great enough to spoil effective
shooting, and the Fire People
did not waste many arrows on
me. Furthermore, I was curious.
I wanted to see. While the Swift
One remained well inside the
cave, trembling with fear and
making low wailing sounds because
I would not come in, I crouched
at the entrance and watched.
The fighting had now become
intermittent. It was a sort of
deadlock. We were in the caves,
and the question with the Fire
People was how to get us out.
They did not dare come in after
us, and in general we would not
expose ourselves to their arrows.
Occasionally, when one of them
drew in close to the base of
the cliff, one or another of
the Folk would smash a rock down.
In return, he would be transfixed
by half a dozen arrows. This
ruse worked well for some time,
but finally the Folk no longer
were inveigled into showing themselves.
The deadlock was complete.
Behind the Fire People I could
see the little wizened old hunter
directing it all. They obeyed
him, and went here and there
at his commands. Some of them
went into the forest and returned
with loads of dry wood, leaves,
and grass. All the Fire People
drew in closer. While most of
them stood by with bows and arrows,
ready to shoot any of the Folk
that exposed themselves, several
of the Fire-Men heaped the dry
grass and wood at the mouths
of the lower tier of caves. Out
of these heaps they conjured
the monster we feared--FIRE.
At first, wisps of smoke arose
and curled up the cliff. Then
I could see the red-tongued flames
darting in and out through the
wood like tiny snakes. The smoke
grew thicker and thicker, at
times shrouding the whole face
of the cliff. But I was high
up and it did not bother me much,
though it stung my eyes and I
rubbed them with my knuckles.
Old Marrow-Bone was the first
to be smoked out. A light fan
of air drifted the smoke away
at the time so that I saw clearly.
He broke out through the smoke,
stepping on a burning coal and
screaming with the sudden hurt
of it, and essayed to climb up
the cliff. The arrows showered
about him. He came to a pause
on a ledge, clutching a knob
of rock for support, gasping
and sneezing and shaking his
head. He swayed back and forth.
The feathered ends of a dozen
arrows were sticking out of him.
He was an old man, and he did
not want to die. He swayed wider
and wider, his knees giving under
him, and as he swayed he wailed
most plaintively. His hand released
its grip and he lurched outward
to the fall. His old bones must
have been sadly broken. He groaned
and strove feebly to rise, but
a Fire-Man rushed in upon him
and brained him with a club.
And as it happened with Marrow-Bone,
so it happened with many of the
Folk. Unable to endure the smoke-suffocation,
they rushed out to fall beneath
the arrows. Some of the women
and children remained in the
caves to strangle to death, but
the majority met death outside.
When the Fire-Men had in this
fashion cleared the first tier
of caves, they began making arrangements
to duplicate the operation on
the second tier of caves. It
was while they were climbing
up with their grass and wood,
that Red-Eye, followed by his
wife, with the baby holding to
her tightly, made a successful
flight up the cliff. The Fire-Men
must have concluded that in the
interval between the smoking-out
operations we would remain in
our caves; so that they were
unprepared, and their arrows
did not begin to fly till Red-Eye
and his wife were well up the
wall. When he reached the top,
he turned about and glared down
at them, roaring and beating
his chest. They arched their
arrows at him, and though he
was untouched he fled on.
I watched a third tier smoked
out, and a fourth. A few of the
Folk escaped up the cliff, but
most of them were shot off the
face of it as they strove to
climb. I remember Long-Lip. He
got as far as my ledge, crying
piteously, an arrow clear through
his chest, the feathered shaft
sticking out behind, the bone
head sticking out before, shot
through the back as he climbed.
He sank down on my ledge bleeding
profusely at the mouth.
It was about this time that
the upper tiers seemed to empty
themselves spontaneously. Nearly
all the Folk not yet smoked out
stampeded up the cliff at the
same time. This was the saving
of many. The Fire People could
not shoot arrows fast enough.
They filled the air with arrows,
and scores of the stricken Folk
came tumbling down; but still
there were a few who reached
the top and got away.
The impulse of flight was now
stronger in me than curiosity.
The arrows had ceased flying.
The last of the Folk seemed gone,
though there may have been a
few still hiding in the upper
caves. The Swift One and I started
to make a scramble for the cliff-top.
At sight of us a great cry went
up from the Fire People. This
was not caused by me, but by
the Swift One. They were chattering
excitedly and pointing her out
to one another. They did not
try to shoot her. Not an arrow
was discharged. They began calling
softly and coaxingly. I stopped
and looked down. She was afraid,
and whimpered and urged me on.
So we went up over the top and
plunged into the trees.
This event has often caused
me to wonder and speculate. If
she were really of their kind,
she must have been lost from
them at a time when she was too
young to remember, else would
she not have been afraid of them.
On the other hand, it may well
have been that while she was
their kind she had never been
lost from them; that she had
been born in the wild forest
far from their haunts, her father
maybe a renegade Fire-Man, her
mother maybe one of my own kind,
one of the Folk. But who shall
say? These things are beyond
me, and the Swift One knew no
more about them than did I.
We lived through a day of terror.
Most of the survivors fled toward
the blueberry swamp and took
refuge in the forest in that
neighborhood. And all day hunting
parties of the Fire People ranged
the forest, killing us wherever
they found us. It must have been
a deliberately executed plan.
Increasing beyond the limits
of their own territory, they
had decided on making a conquest
of ours. Sorry the conquest!
We had no chance against them.
It was slaughter, indiscriminate
slaughter, for they spared none,
killing old and young, effectively
ridding the land of our presence.
It was like the end of the
world to us. We fled to the trees
as a last refuge, only to be
surrounded and killed, family
by family. We saw much of this
during that day, and besides,
I wanted to see. The Swift One
and I never remained long in
one tree, and so escaped being
surrounded. But there seemed
no place to go. The Fire-Men
were everywhere, bent on their
task of extermination. Every
way we turned we encountered
them, and because of this we
saw much of their handiwork.
I did not see what became of
my mother, but I did see the
Chatterer shot down out of the
old home-tree. And I am afraid
that at the sight I did a bit
of joyous teetering. Before I
leave this portion of my narrative,
I must tell of Red-Eye. He was
caught with his wife in a tree
down by the blueberry swamp.
The Swift One and I stopped long
enough in our flight to see.
The Fire-Men were too intent
upon their work to notice us,
and, furthermore, we were well
screened by the thicket in which
we crouched.
Fully a score of the hunters
were under the tree, discharging
arrows into it. They always picked
up their arrows when they fell
back to earth. I could not see
Red-Eye, but I could hear him
howling from somewhere in the
tree.
After a short interval his
howling grew muffled. He must
have crawled into a hollow in
the trunk. But his wife did not
win this shelter. An arrow brought
her to the ground. She was severely
hurt, for she made no effort
to get away. She crouched in
a sheltering way over her baby
(which clung tightly to her),
and made pleading signs and sounds
to the Fire-Men. They gathered
about her and laughed at her--even
as Lop-Ear and I had laughed
at the old Tree-Man. And even
as we had poked him with twigs
and sticks, so did the Fire-Men
with Red-Eye's wife. They poked
her with the ends of their bows,
and prodded her in the ribs.
But she was poor fun. She would
not fight. Nor, for that matter,
would she get angry. She continued
to crouch over her baby and to
plead. One of the Fire-Men stepped
close to her. In his hand was
a club. She saw and understood,
but she made only the pleading
sounds until the blow fell.
Red-Eye, in the hollow of the
trunk, was safe from their arrows.
They stood together and debated
for a while, then one of them
climbed into the tree. What happened
up there I could not tell, but
I heard him yell and saw the
excitement of those that remained
beneath. After several minutes
his body crashed down to the
ground. He did not move. They
looked at him and raised his
head, but it fell back limply
when they let go. Red-Eye had
accounted for himself.
They were very angry. There
was an opening into the trunk
close to the ground. They gathered
wood and grass and built a fire.
The Swift One and I, our arms
around each other, waited and
watched in the thicket. Sometimes
they threw upon the fire green
branches with many leaves, whereupon
the smoke became very thick.
We saw them suddenly swerve
back from the tree. They were
not quick enough. Red-Eye's flying
body landed in the midst of them.
He was in a frightful rage,
smashing about with his long
arms right and left. He pulled
the face off one of them, literally
pulled it off with those gnarly
fingers of his and those tremendous
muscles. He bit another through
the neck. The Fire-Men fell back
with wild fierce yells, then
rushed upon him. He managed to
get hold of a club and began
crushing heads like eggshells.
He was too much for them, and
they were compelled to fall back
again. This was his chance, and
he turned his back upon them
and ran for it, still howling
wrathfully. A few arrows sped
after him, but he plunged into
a thicket and was gone.
The Swift One and I crept quietly
away, only to run foul of another
party of Fire-Men. They chased
us into the blueberry swamp,
but we knew the tree-paths across
the farther morasses where they
could not follow on the ground,
and so we escaped. We came out
on the other side into a narrow
strip of forest that separated
the blueberry swamp from the
great swamp that extended westward.
Here we met Lop-Ear. How he had
escaped I cannot imagine, unless
he had not slept the preceding
night at the caves.
Here, in the strip of forest,
we might have built tree-shelters
and settled down; but the Fire
People were performing their
work of extermination thoroughly.
In the afternoon, Hair-Face and
his wife fled out from among
the trees to the east, passed
us, and were gone. They fled
silently and swiftly, with alarm
in their faces. In the direction
from which they had come we heard
the cries and yells of the hunters,
and the screeching of some one
of the Folk. The Fire People
had found their way across the
swamp.
The Swift One, Lop-Ear, and
I followed on the heels of Hair-Face
and his wife. When we came to
the edge of the great swamp,
we stopped. We did not know its
paths. It was outside our territory,
and it had been always avoided
by the Folk. None had ever gone
into it--at least, to return.
In our minds it represented mystery
and fear, the terrible unknown.
As I say, we stopped at the edge
of it. We were afraid. The cries
of the Fire-Men were drawing
nearer. We looked at one another.
Hair-Face ran out on the quaking
morass and gained the firmer
footing of a grass-hummock a
dozen yards away. His wife did
not follow. She tried to, but
shrank back from the treacherous
surface and cowered down.
The Swift One did not wait
for me, nor did she pause till
she had passed beyond Hair-Face
a hundred yards and gained a
much larger hummock. By the time
Lop-Ear and I had caught up with
her, the Fire-Men appeared among
the trees. Hair-Face's wife,
driven by them into panic terror,
dashed after us. But she ran
blindly, without caution, and
broke through the crust. We turned
and watched, and saw them shoot
her with arrows as she sank down
in the mud. The arrows began
falling about us. Hair-Face had
now joined us, and the four of
us plunged on, we knew not whither,
deeper and deeper into the swamp.
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