THE BATTLE OF THE BARRIERS.
While Ab had been occupied by home affairs trouble for him and his people
had been brewing. By no means unknown to each other before the tiger hunt
were Ab and Boarface. They had hunted together and once Boarface, with
half a dozen companions, had visited the Fire Valley and had noted its
many attractions and advantages. Now Boarface had gone away angry and
muttering, and he was not a man to be thought of lightly. His rage over
the memory of Ab's trophy did not decrease with the return to his own
region. Why should this cave man of the West have sole possession of that
valley, which was warm and green throughout the winter and where the wild
beasts could not enter? Why had he, this Ab, been allowed to go away with
all the tiger's skin? Brooding enlarged into resolve and Boarface
gathered together his relations and adherents. "Let us go and take the
Fire Valley of Ab," he said to them, and, gradually, though objections
were made to the undertaking of an enterprise so fraught with danger, the
listeners were persuaded.
"There are other fires far down the river," said one old man. "Let us go
there, if it is fire we most need, and so we will not disturb nor anger
Ab, who has lived in his valley for many years. Why battle with Ab and
all his people?"
But Boarface laughed aloud: "There are many other earth fires," he said.
"I know them well, but there is no other fire which chances to make a
flaming fence about a valley close to the great rocks, and which has
water within the space it surrounds and which makes a wall against all
the wild beasts. We will fight and win the valley of Ab."
And so they were led into the venture. They sought, too, the aid of the
Shell People in this raid, but were not successful. The Shell People were
not unfriendly to those of the Fire Valley, and had not Ab been really
the one to kill the tiger? Besides, it was not wise for the waterside
dwellers to engage in any controversy between the forest factions, for
the hill people had memories and heavy axes. A few of the younger and
more adventurous joined the force of Boarface, but the alliance had no
tribal sanction. Still, the force of the swarthy leader of the Eastern
cave men was by no means insignificant. It contained good fighting men,
and, when runners had gone far and wide in the Eastern country, there
were gathered nearly ten score of hunters who could throw the spear or
wield the ax and who were not fearful of their lives. The band led by
Boarface started for the Fire Country, intending to surprise the people
in the valley. They moved swiftly, but not so swiftly as a fleet young
man from the Shell People who preceded them. He was sent by the elders a
day before the time fixed for the assault, and so Ab learned all about
the intended raid. Then went forth runners from the valley; then the
matron Lightfoot's eyes became fiery, since Ab was threatened; then old
Hilltop looked carefully over his spears, and poised thoughtfully his
great stone ax; then Moonface smote her children and gathered together
certain weapons, and then Old Mok went into his cave and stayed there,
working at none knew what.
They came from all about, the Western cave men, for never in the valley
had food or shelter been refused to any and the Eastern cave men were not
loved. Many a quarrel over game had taken place between the raging
hunters of the different tribes, and many a bloody single-handed
encounter had come in the depths of the forest. The band was not a large
one, the Eastern men being far more numerous, but the outlook was not as
fine as it might be for the advancing Boarface. The force assembled
inside the valley was, in point of numbers, but little more than half his
own, but it was entrenched and well-armed, and there were those among the
defenders whom it was not well to meet in fight. But Boarface was
confident and was not dismayed when his force crept into the open only to
find the ordinary valley entrance barred and all preparations made for
giving him a welcome of the warmer sort. There was what could not be
thoroughly barricaded in so brief a time, the entrance where the brook
issued at the west. This pass must be forced, for the straight, uprising
wall between the flames and across the opening to the north was something
relatively unassailable. It was too narrow and too high and sheer and
there were too many holes in the wall through which could be sent those
piercing arrows which the Western cave men knew how to use so well. The
battle must be up along the bed of the little creek. The water was low at
this season, so low that a man might wade easily anywhere, and there had
been erected only a slight barrier, enough to keep wild beasts away, for
Ab had never thought of invasion by human beings. The creek tumbled
downward, through passages, between straight-sided, ruggedly built stone
heaps, with spaces between wide enough to admit a man, but not any great
beast of prey. There was no place where, by a man, the wall could not
easily be mounted and, above, there was no really good place of vantage
for the defenders.
So the invading force, concealment of action being no longer necessary,
ranged themselves along the banks of the creek to the west of the valley
and prepared for a rush. They had certain chances in their favor. They
were strong men, who knew how to use their weapons well, and they were in
numbers almost as two to one. Meanwhile, inside the valley, where the
approach and plans of the enemy had been seen and understood, there had
gone on swiftly, under Ab's stern direction, such preparation for the
fray as seemed most adequate with the means at hand.
The great advantage possessed was that the defenders, on firm footing
themselves, could meet men climbing, and so, a little further up the
creek than the beast-opposing wall, had been thrown up what was little
more than a rude platform of rock, wide and with a broad expanse of top,
on which all the valley's force might cluster in an emergency. Upon this
the people were to gather, defending the first pass, if they could, by
flights of spears and arrows and here, at the end, to win or lose. This
was the general preparation for the onslaught, but there had been
precautions taken more personal and more involving the course of the most
important of the people of the valley.
At the left of the gorge, where must come the invaders, the rock rose
sheerly and at one place extended outward a shelf, high up, but reached
easily from the Fire Valley side. There were consultations between Ab and
the angry and anxious and almost tearful Lightfoot. That charming lady,
now easily the best archer of the tribe, had developed at once into a
fighting creature and now demanded that her place be assigned to her.
With her own bow, and with arrows in quantity, it was decided that she
should occupy the ledge and do all she could. Upon the ledge was
comparative safety in the fray, and Ab directed that she should go there.
Old Hilltop said but little. It was understood, almost as a matter of
course, that he would be upon the barrier and there face, with Ab, the
greatest issue. The old man was by no means unsatisfactory to look upon
as he moved silently about and got ready the weapons he might have to
use. Gaunt, strong-muscled and resolute, he was worthy of admiration.
Ever following him with her eyes, when not engaged in the chastisement of
one of her swart brood, was Moonface, for Moonface had long since learned
to regard her grizzled lord with love as well as much respect.
There were other good fighting men and other women beside these mentioned
who would do their best, but these few were the dominant figures.
Meanwhile, Boarface and his strong band had decided upon their plan of
attack and would soon rush up the bed of the shallow stream with all the
bravery and ferocity of those who were accustomed to face death lightly
and to seize that which they wanted.
The invaders came clambering up the creek's course, openly and with
menacing and defiant shouts, for any concealment was now out of the
question. They had but few bows and could, under the conditions, send no
arrow flight which would be of avail, but they had thews and sinews and
spears and axes. As they came with such rush as men might make up a
tumbling waterway with slipping pebbles beneath the feet and forced
themselves one by one between the heaped stone piles and fairly in front
of the barrier there was a discharge of arrows and more than one man,
impaled by a stone-headed shaft, fell, to dabble feebly in the water, and
did not rise again. But there came a time in the fight when the bow must
be abandoned.
The assault was good and the demeanor of the men behind the barrier was
good as well. Not more gallant was one group than the other for there
were splendid fighters in both ranks. The boasted short sword of the
Romans, in times effeminate, as compared with these, afforded not in its
wielding a greater test of personal courage than the handling of the
flint-headed spear or the stone knife or chipped ax. There, all along the
barrier, was the real grappling of man and man, with further existence as
the issue.
The invaders, losing many of their number, for arrows flew steadily and a
mass so large could not easily be missed even by the most bungling of
those strong archers, swept upward to the barrier and then was a
muscular, deadly tumult worth the seeing. To the south and nearest the
side where Lightfoot was perched with her bow and great bunch of arrows
Ab stood in front, while to his right and near the other end of the rude
stone rampart was stationed old Hilltop, and he hurled his spears and
slew men as they came. The fight became simply a death struggle, with the
advantage of position upon one side and of numbers on the other. And Ab
and Boarface were each seeking the other.
So the struggle lasted for a long half hour, and when it ended there were
dead and dying men upon the barrier, while the waters of the creek were
reddened by the blood of the slain assailants. The assault now ebbed a
little. Neither Ab nor Hilltop had been injured in the struggle. As the
invaders pressed close Ab had noted the whish of an arrow now and then
and the hurt to one pressing him closely, and old Hilltop had heard the
wild cries of a woman who hovered in his rear and hurled stones in the
faces of those who strove to reach him. And now there came a lull.
Boarface had recognized the futility of scaling, under such conditions, a
steep so well defended and had thought of a better way to gain his end
and crush Ab and his people. He had heard the story of Ab's first advent
into the valley when, chased by the wolves, he leaped through the flame,
and there came an inspiration to him! What one man had done others could
do, and, with picked warriors of his band, he made a swift detour, while,
at the same time, the main body rushed desperately upon the barrier
again.
What had been good fighting before was better now. Lives were lost, and
soon all arrows were spent and all spears thrown, and then came but the
dull clashing of stone axes. Ab raged up and down, and, ever in the
front, faced the oncoming foe and slew as could slay the strong and
utterly desperate. More than once his life was but a toy of chance as men
sprang toward him, two or three together, but ever at such moment there
sang an arrow by his head and one of his assailants, pierced in throat or
body, fell back blindly, hampering his companions, whose heads Ab's great
ax was seeking fiercely. And, all the time, nearer the northern end of
the barrier, old Hilltop fought serenely and dreadfully. There were many
dead men in the pools of the creek between the barrier and the entrance
to the valley. And about Ab ever sang the arrows from the rocky shelf.
There was wild clamor, the clash of weapons and the shouting of
battle-crazed men but there was not enough to drown the sound of a scream
which rose piercingly above the din. Ab recognized the voice of Lightfoot
and raised his eyes to see the woman, regardless of her own safety,
standing upright and pointing up the valley. He knew that something
meaning life and death was happening and that he must go. He leaped
backward and a huge Western cave man sprang to his place, to serve as
best he could.
Not a moment too soon had that shrill cry reached the ears of the
fighting man. He ran backward, shouting to a score of his people to
follow him as he ran, and in an instant recognized that he had been
outwitted, at least for the moment, by the vengeful Boarface. As he
rushed to the east toward the wall of flame he saw a dark form pass
through its crest in a flying leap. There were others he knew would
follow. His own feat of long ago was being repeated by Boarface and his
chosen group of best men!
It was not Boarface who leaped and it was hard for a gallant youth of the
Eastern cave men that he had strength and daring and had dashed ahead in
the assault, for he had scarcely touched the ground when there sank
deeply into his head a stone ax, impelled by the strongest arm of all
that region, and he was no more among things alive. Ab had reached the
fire wall with the speed of a great runner while, close behind him, came
his eager following.
The forces could see each other clearly enough now, and those on the
outside outnumbered those on the inside again by two to one. But those
leaping the flames could not alight poised ready for a blow, and there
were adroit and vengeful axmen awaiting them. There was a momentary pause
for planning among the assailants, and then it was that Ab fumed over his
own lack of foresight. His chosen band who were with him now were all
bowmen, and about the shoulder and chest of each was still slung his
weapon, but there were no more arrows. Each quiverful had been shot away
early in the fight and then had come the spear and ax play. But what a
chance for arrows now, with that threatening band preparing for the rush
and leap together, and, while out of reach of spear or ax, within easy
reach of the singing little shafts! Oh, for the shafts now, those slender
barbed things which were hurled in his new way! And, even as he thus
raged, there came a feeble shout from down the valley behind him and he
saw something very good!
Limping, with effort, but resolutely forward, was a bent old man, bearing
encircled within his long arms a burden which Ab himself could not have
carried for any distance without stress and labored breathing. The lean
old Mok's arms were locked about a monster sheaf of straight flint-headed
arrows, a sheaf greater in size than ever man had looked upon before. The
crippled veteran had not been idle in his cave. He had worked upon the
store of shafts and flintheads he had accumulated, and here was the
result in a great emergency!
The old man cast his sheaf upon the ground and then sank down, somewhat
totteringly, beside it. There needed no shout of command from Ab to tell
those about him what to do. There was one combined yell of sudden
exultation, a rush together for the shafts and a swift filling of empty
quivers. It was but the work of a moment or two. Then something promptly
happened. The great fellows, though acting without orders, shot almost
"all together," as the later English archers did, and so close just
across the flame wall was the opposing group that the meanest archer in
all the lot could scarcely fail to reach a living target, and stronger
arms drew back those arrows than were the arms of those who drew
bowstring in the battles of mediæval history. With the first deadly
flight came a scattering outside and men lay tossing upon the ground in
their death agony. There was no cessation to the shot, though Boarface
sought fiercely to rally his followers, until all had fled beyond the
range of the bowmen. Upon the ground were so many dead that the numbers
of the two forces were now more nearly equal. But Boarface had brave
followers. They ranged themselves together at a safe distance and then
started for the flame wall with a rush, to leap it all together.
There was another arrow-flight as the onslaught came, and more men went
down, but the charge could not be stopped. Over the low flame-crests shot
a great mass of bodies, there to meet that which was not good for them.
The struggle was swift and deadly, but the forces were almost evenly
matched now and the insiders had the advantage. Boarface and Ab met face
to face in the melée and each leaped toward the other with a yell. There
was to be a fight which must be excellent, for two strong leaders were
meeting and there were many lives at stake.