Caves That Time Forgot (10 page)

13

It's Hard to Be Friends

S
omehow Dave had thought he would be welcomed by Chief Mord. After all, he had brought Ral home. It was the way he would have expected civilized people to behave. But he had miscalculated badly.

The chieftain was a fierce man, accustomed to a dog-eat-dog struggle for life. Necessity had made him suspicious, and though Ral begged him to free both Eena and Dave, he refused.

“I'm afraid it's hopeless,” Dave said to her one night after nearly everyone else had gone to sleep.

The two of them were sitting as usual near the small fire. The hunters had bad luck that day, and they were hungry—as was the rest of the tribe. Dave's stomach growled, and he slapped it. “Shut up!” he said crossly. “What do you expect me to do?”

Eena giggled, and Dave was surprised.
Why, she's just like any other teenage girl,
he thought with a flash of amusement.
No, not quite. She's really different from Sarah or Abigail.

The fire burned low, and Dave added a few sticks. The flame leaped up, casting fantastic shadows on the cave wall. All around them, the tribespeople were lying wrapped in furs. The sound of snoring rent the air, and from time to time a nightmare made someone cry out sharply.

Dave looked across the fire toward Eena who was staring into it. “We've got to get away,” he said. “We've
been here a week, and, if anything, Mord's more determined to keep us than ever.”

Eena looked up. “They watch,” she whispered. “All the time, they watch.” She nodded toward the guard standing at the mouth of the cave.

Dave looked at the tall warrior. “I've been watching him every night. He stays awake for a few hours, but then he always goes to sleep. Maybe he'll go to sleep tonight too.”

Eena glanced around fearfully at the huge man, who was known to clutch his battle-ax even in his sleep. “He kill us if we try run away.”

“He'll have to catch us first,” Dave said grimly. “Now, you get some sleep, and I'll watch. I'll wake you in a couple of hours. Then we'll wait for that guard to fall asleep.”

The night wore on, and the fire sank down until it was only a tiny blaze that Dave kept feeding with small sticks. He grew sleepy, but he knew that tonight might be their last chance. Hours passed, and he could hardly keep his eyes open.

Then Eena awakened and looked toward the guard, then toward Dave. “You sleep,” she whispered. “I watch.”

“All right,” Dave grunted. He threw himself down and fell asleep at once. It seemed, however, that he had barely closed his eyes when he felt Eena's touch on his arm.

“Dave, he asleep!”

The guard was seated and nodding with his hands on his knees. He rested his forehead against them.

Dave put a finger to his lips and got to his feet. He thought,
I sure do hope he doesn't wake up!
He was wearing a pair of soft leather shoes. He could walk quietly. Eena had nothing at all on her feet. He saw that everyone else was still sleeping. He motioned to Eena with his head and started tiptoeing toward the cave entrance.

The closer he got, the more unlikely it seemed that they could walk right by the guard without awakening him. He slowed until he was barely moving, putting each foot down softly. When they were only a few feet away, the man coughed suddenly and stirred, rubbing his eyes.

Dave froze. He could hear the soft crackling of the blaze and the guard clearing his throat.
If he looks up,
Dave thought,
we're goners!

But the warrior shoved his back against the wall, put his head down again, and soon began to snore.

Dave tiptoed past him, Eena close behind. Then they were outside, and Dave looked up. Fortunately there was a bright, full moon and a sky full of glittering stars. The whole landscape was bathed in soft silver light. Again he motioned, and the two made their way silently down the path to the trees.

Dave released a sigh of relief. “Come on, Eena. As soon as they find out we're gone, they'll be after us.”

Eena nodded. “You know way?”

“Not too well. I know we keep going due east until we hit the river. Then we follow it north. When we get to the bluffs, we turn, and then we'll be there. Now let's go.”

Dave never forgot their flight. He went at a steady trot, and Eena was right behind him. An hour later he was breathing heavily and turned to see that she was not breathing hard at all.

He tried to conceal his weariness, but she said, “You tired. We rest.”

“We can't,” he argued.

But she insisted. They sat down on a log, and he was glad for the relief.

“You think they catch?” she asked anxiously.

“No, I don't think so. I believe you'll be home safe with your tribe and your father soon.”

Eena sat silently then. The soft silver moonlight washed over her attractive face. After a while she said, “They no bad people.”

Dave looked at her with surprise. “They'll kill us if they catch us!”

“They afraid,” she said. “
We
afraid. But they no bad people.”

Dave thought about that insight, but there was little time for thinking. After fifteen minutes he arose and said, “We've got to keep going, Eena.”

They kept up the pace all night, and when morning broke they came to the river.

“We're all right now, I think.” Dave sighed again with relief. “Let's try to get to the cave before the sun gets high. We might run into a t-rex. I'd hate to get eaten by one of those things just when we got away.”

They followed the river, crossed over at a ford, and when the sun was a quarter of the way up in the sky they arrived at the base of The People's caves.

The first to see them was Wash. He was watching Reb plow with the ox, Stonewall, and he let out a shrill yelp. “Look! There they come! It's Dave and Eena!”

His yell must have roused the camp. As the pair walked in, it seemed they were surrounded by everyone in the tribe. Dave's face flushed with pleasure as his friends beat him on the shoulders, praising him for bringing Eena home.

But it was Chief Clag who was most pleased. Beaming, he took his daughter by the arm and shook her fondly. “You back!”

“Yes. Dave—he bring back.”

“Good. Dave, good.” Clag gave the witch doctor a harsh look, and the man slunk away without a single word about Greska. “We celebrate. We have feast.” He suddenly clapped a hand on Dave's back that nearly collapsed him.

Dave coughed and then said, “Well, I'm glad I was able to do something, Chief.”

Later they did have a time of feasting, for the hunting that day had been good. Dave was asked to tell the story of how he overcame all the tribesmen of Mord.

“How many you kill?” Clag demanded.

“Well . . as a matter of fact, none,” Dave said.

Disappointment washed across the Chief's face. “How many you kill?” he repeated.

“None, Chief. We ran away when the guard went to sleep.”

Lom laughed aloud. “A woman do that much,” he said. But he closed his mouth when Clag gave him a stern word.

After the feast was over, the Seven Sleepers gathered together, and Josh said, “Now, tell it like it really was, Dave. How'd you do it?”

Dave shrugged. “Nothing heroic about it. We tried to talk Chief Mord into letting us go, but he was suspicious like all these savages are. He would have kept us there forever. So when the guard went to sleep, we just ran away.”

“I got an idea we're gonna be visited,” Reb said. “Mord won't like it, your getting away with Eena like that. Probably figured she was his property.”

A murmur of assent went around.

Sarah said, “We've
got
to teach these people how to trust each other—to treat each other the way they want to be treated.”

Dave said abruptly, “Well, that's what I thought, but it's impossible, Sarah. They're just too backward. The best we can do is help them learn how to plow a little.
Maybe plant some grain.” He shrugged. “Maybe in a few years they'll learn how to stop killing each other.”

“That's why Goél sent us,” Josh said. “To teach these people how to trust him and one another and do what's right.”

Wash looked at him strangely. “Yeah, but these people are different. They don't trust very easy. Back in Oldworld, I remember growing up—white people and black people didn't always get along.” He looked over at Reb and grinned, his white teeth flashing. “Now, me and Reb, we get along fine, but it was hard to learn, wasn't it, Reb?”

“Sure was.” Reb nodded. “These people are more suspicious than I ever thought anybody could be. They just don't like anybody that's not part of them. And they never even think about treating other folks the way they'd like to be treated. You may be right, Dave.”

Dave arose the next morning with a new determination. He went to see Beno.

“The people need something to protect themselves from the wild animals. You start making arrowheads. I'll get everybody else to make bows. If we get enough arrows, we could put down a pretty good-sized dinosaur—maybe even a young T-rex.”

“The big killer with jaws? That be something. Yes, I work.”

For the next two weeks the Sleepers were kept busy, and so were any of the tribesmen that had a gift for shaping bows or whittling arrows. Soon they had a plentiful supply, and Dave trained many of the warriors to do an adequate job of shooting. All day long one could hear their cries as they practiced and either hit or missed.

One day Eena stopped by and watched Beno make arrowheads. He appeared surprised. Usually she watched
the warriors practice shooting. She sat down across from him and watched as he continued to pound off splinters of flint.

“I no see how you do that, Beno.” She herself had tried many times to make an arrowhead, but she had never succeeded. She smiled. “Without you, they no have arrows.”

Beno flushed.

She knew he was not accustomed to being praised. Certainly not by her. She also knew he had admired her from afar. And now he was looking again at her hair, her eyes, her long, straight limbs.

He mumbled, “I no hunt.”

Eena had been brought up to revere hunters above all, but somehow she had gained a little wisdom in these past few weeks. She put a hand on Beno's shoulder and smiled. “You very good man, Beno. Very smart. You make anything.” She thought a moment and said, “You most important man in tribe—except my father.”

Beno stared at her unbelievingly. He ducked his head, so embarrassed was he.

Eena laughed at him. “You make me more necklace sometime?” She touched the bone necklace around her neck that Beno had carved painstakingly. It was the only jewelry in the tribe, and she was very proud of it.

Beno smiled. “I make more. It look good on you.”

She stared at him. He was a nice-looking young man, she thought. Not as strong, of course, as the other young men, but he had attractive brown hair and brown eyes and—except that one leg was a little smaller than the other—was rather handsome, she suddenly decided.

“You come,” she said. “I show you field. Maybe you make better way to grind grain so we make bread.”

All day the Seven Sleepers had worked hard making
arrow shafts and awkwardly scraping bows with the stones Beno had formed.

That night Dave said, “I can't see that we're doing much good in this place. I don't know what else Goél could expect of us.”

The others were tired also and almost as discouraged as he was.

Sarah said, “Maybe it's time to go back. Maybe we've done what we came to do.”

Dave looked up. “I think that's right. We'd better think about leaving pretty soon.”

For the next four days all the Sleepers talked about leaving. Things seemed to be at a standstill. Then one morning, after they had washed in the creek and were sitting around talking, Dave said, “We'll give it another week. Then we'll go back.”

Josh bit his lip. “I hate to get beaten like this. Seems like we just haven't helped these people much.”

“Maybe we've helped them more than you think,” Jake said. “We taught them how to plow, and Reb taught them how to domesticate animals. They can have their own livestock now. And they can bake bread.”

“I know,” Josh said doubtfully, “but—”

He never finished his sentence for there was a loud cry and a figure emerged from the woods.

“That looks like Ral!” Dave exclaimed. He waited until the man got nearer. “It
is
Ral! Let's see what's up!”

They all ran to meet the young man, who was breathing hard.

“What is it, Ral? What's wrong?” Dave demanded.

“I come for you.” He could barely speak, and he sucked in great lungfuls of air. “Many-toothed lizards come.”

That was his word, Dave knew, for dinosaur, and at once a chill went over him.

“What about your people?”

“They in trees, in caves with stones, but lizards come! Many!” He held up his fingers twice to indicate about twenty.

“What do you want us to do?” Dave asked.

“You come! You help my people!”

By this time, Chief Clag arrived with his warriors and the medicine man. The women also gathered around.

“What
he
do here?” Clag demanded.

Dave explained the situation and ended by saying. “He wants us to help him—help his people.”

Clag looked at him as if he had lost his mind, and Dave saw at once that this was not going to be easy.

Ral walked straight up to the chief. He kneeled down in front of him and said, “You make me slave. I do anything. Only help my people.”

A murmur went over the crowd, and a strange look came into the chief's eyes. But he grasped his battle-ax and shook his head. “We no help!”

Then Eena came. She took her father's arm—a rare gesture for her—and said, “Someday maybe
we
need help. We help them now. They help
us
later.”