"You see I was right about the water gods. There haven't been any more
earthquakes, and we have everything we want to eat, and plenty of warm
skins and a fine cave to live in. There is just one thing more I want.
I don't care much for society, but I should like more people to talk
to."
"I wish Grannie and the rest were here," said Firetop. "I should like
to show Squaretoes our rabbits."
"And I should like to show Robin my necklace," said Firefly.
"It's no use wishing," said Firetop. "There's all that water."
Hawk-Eye, as usual, said nothing, but all the time he was thinking hard
about the floating log that the Twins had crossed the river on, and the
raft they had made of the two floating trees.
It was not long after this that Limberleg began to notice that though he
was gone all day every day, Hawk-Eye often came home without game. One
day she heard the sound of his stone axe, as if he were cutting down a
tree, but she thought nothing more about it.
After that she heard the sound of the axe every day for many days. It
seemed to come from the bay behind the point of land. At last she said
to him: "What in the world are you doing with your axe? I hear such a
pounding everyday." Hawk-Eye did not tell her what he was making. He
only said, "Maybe some day, when I get it done, you will see."
The Twins heard the axe too, and they made up their minds they were
going to find out what was going on. The next day, as they were playing
in their cave back of their bluff at low tide, Firefly saw a little
column of smoke rising out of the woods near the place where a small
stream flowed into the bay. She also heard the axe. The sound seemed
to come from somewhere near the smoke. She pointed the smoke out to
Firetop, and the two children ran swiftly around the beach and up the
little stream for a short distance.
There they found Hawk-Eye. He was working away at the log of a
good-sized tree which he had cut down. He had made the log almost flat
on one side by chipping off pieces with his axe, and he had shaped the
ends a little. Now he was hollowing out the inside. He was doing this
partly with his axe and partly by burning it.
Hawk-Eye was working so busily he did not know that any one was near him
until Firetop called out, "What are you making, Father?"
Hawk-Eye stopped chopping. "It's a secret," he said. "If I tell you,
you'll tell."
"No, we won't. Anyway, there's no one to tell but Mother," said
Firefly.
"She's just the one I want to keep it from," said Hawk-Eye. "It's a
surprise."
"Oh, well, if it is a surprise, of course we won't tell," said Firetop.
"Do you know what it is, or is it a surprise to you too?" asked Firefly.
"Maybe it is," said Hawk-Eye. "I'm not sure yet. When I get the inside
of this log all cut out, I'm going to see if it will float without
rolling over. Maybe I can get in it and make it go where I want it to.
If I can, then all sorts of things may happen, but you must _not_ tell
Mother."
"Why?" asked Firefly. "Wouldn't she let you play with it?"
"Maybe not," said Hawk-Eye.
"You'd better be careful," said Firefly, shaking her head, "or you know
what will happen!"
Hawk-Eye laughed and went on chopping. Every day after that the Twins
followed their father to the little cove and watched him work. Every
evening they nearly burst trying not to tell. One day when they went
down to the cove, they found their father taking out the last chips from
the inside of the log.
"When the tide comes in, it backs up into the stream," said Hawk-Eye,
"and the next time it does it, I'm going to push the log into the water
and then out into the bay. If it floats right side up, I am going for a
ride."
"How will you push it?" asked Firetop. "Are you going to let your legs
hang over and hitch yourself along that way?"
"I shan't need any turtles to bite me to make me go anyway," said
Hawk-Eye. "I'm going to push it with a pole."
The pole was already in the log. The tide began to flow in. As soon as
the water was deep enough Hawk-Eye pushed the log into the water. It
floated, of course. Hawk-Eye waded along beside it into deeper water.
Then he undertook to get aboard, but he put his weight too much on one
side. It rolled over, and he rolled with it, and went splash on his
stomach right into the water! Firetop and Firefly danced on the beach
with glee.
Hawk-Eye got up all dripping wet and tried again. This time he stepped
into the middle of the boat. He got safely in, but it was still very
tippy, so he put sand in the bottom of it and made it heavier. Then he
tried again.
It was a proud moment when at last he took his pole and pushed off.
"I'm going to keep close to shore and go around the point if I can," he
said.
The children tore up the bank and over the hill to get back to the cave
in time to see him coming. Limberleg was weaving a berry basket out of
strips of bark, when the children came racing into the cave. They were
so excited they couldn't keep still.
"What in the world is the matter with you?" cried Limberleg, at last.
"You've been running to the edge of the bluff and back again ever since
you came in. What are you looking at?"
"At that! at that!" shrieked Firetop, pointing down to the water.
There, coming close to the shore around the bend, was Hawk-Eye in the
very first boat that was ever made--in that part of the world at least.
Limberleg was so astonished that she couldn't speak. She dashed down
the side of the bluff without stopping for the path, and the Twins came
tumbling after her. Of course, Limberleg got there first. She always
did. And when the Twins reached the water's edge, she was already in
the boat with Hawk-Eye. She was certainly a brave woman!
The Cave Twins--by Lucy Fitch Perkins
CHAPTER TEN.
THE VOYAGE.
After Limberleg had had a ride, the Twins took a turn, while their
mother watched them from the shore.
"It's almost more fun than our logs," said Firetop, when he took his
first ride.
They played with the boat and tried all sorts of experiments with it,
and were so happy and excited that it grew dark and the moon came out
before one of them so much as thought of anything to eat.
For days and days after that, Hawk-Eye worked on his boat. He found out
all its tricks. He even found out that he could go in deep water if he
paddled. He found it out first by using his hands for oars. Then he
chopped out a clumsy flat paddle.
All this took him some time, but by midsummer he had become quite expert
with his clumsy craft. He could keep it right side up and make it go
where he wanted it to at any rate.
Sometimes he ventured out into the deep water around the gulls' rocks.
One day he even rowed all round them. He could look down into the water
and see shoals of fish swimming about, but he could not catch them.
When he went back to the cave that day, he said to Limberleg: "I have an
idea. Why can't you weave a kind of net out of leather thongs? I can
fasten it in the water out by the rocks and catch fish in it. The water
gods may like us very much, as you say, but they haven't been throwing
any fish up on land for us since the earthquake, so I'm going to try to
catch some."
"To be sure," said Limberleg. "We snare rabbits, why shouldn't we snare
fish?"
They had made hooks out of bone and had caught river fish sometimes when
they lived back in the forest, but they had not brought any hooks with
them on their journey. They had always been more used to hunting game
than to fishing, anyway. Now with a sea full of fish right at hand,
waiting to be caught, they began to think more about it.
"If we could catch fish, we should have more food right at hand than we
could possibly eat, without ever hunting at all, if we didn't want to,"
said Hawk-Eye.
After that Limberleg spent days and days tying leather thongs together
in a coarse net, while Hawk-Eye made bone fish-hooks for himself and
Limberleg and the Twins, and fastened them to long fine strings of
leather.
By August, Hawk-Eye had taught the Twins how to fish the streams for
trout, and he himself had learned how to fasten his net between two of
the gull rocks and catch the fish that swam in deep water.
There was nothing Hawk-Eye liked so much as going out in his boat. He
went up and down the coast for miles, and it was not long before he knew
every little creek and inlet and bay on the eastern end of the island.
At last, one day in August, he said to Limberleg: "I am going to load
the boat with food to last a few days and see if I can't get over to the
mainland. It is only a short distance across to the nearest point.
I've been farther than that in my boat already."
"But I am afraid you'll be drowned," cried Limberleg, "and then what
shall we do?"
"You can take care of yourselves," said Hawk-Eye. "The children can
already fish in the streams, and there are the rabbits and the clams.
You will not want for anything while I am away."
"But we shall be lonesome," cried Limberleg; "and suppose you should
never come back!"
"But I shall come back," said Hawk-Eye. "You'll see."
Limberleg knew it was useless to say any more, and the very next day she
and the Twins helped him load his boat with deer-meat and wild plums and
acorns, and then Hawk-Eye put in his spear and his stone axe and hooks
and line, and got in himself.
The three of them stood on the beach and watched him push off from their
island and start across the channel toward the main land. They watched
him until the boat was a mere black speck in the distance. Then they
trudged slowly back to their lonely cave.
There followed many anxious days and nights. Limberleg went back to
hunting again. She took the Twins with her, and began to teach them to
hunt like men.
"If anything should happen to me, you could take care of yourselves if
you knew how to hunt and trap as well as fish," she said.
Beside getting food for their daily needs, they began to store it for
the winter. They gathered nuts by the bushel and piled them in heaps in
the corner of the cave. Whenever they were not sleeping or doing
anything else, they were always gathering wood for the fire.
In this way four long weeks went by. At last came a day when the wind
was sharp, and it seemed as if summer were nearly over.
Limberleg and the Twins had gone down to the cave behind their bluff to
get clams for supper. They had one of Limberleg's baskets with them,
and had nearly filled it with clams. They were out some distance from
the beach-line, for the tide was low.
Suddenly the water began to rise. The returning tide came in such a
flood that they had to run as fast as their legs could carry them to get
safely ashore. They had reached the bank and were just beginning to
climb slowly up the bluff, when they heard a shout behind them.
Limberleg was so startled that her knees gave way under her and she sat
right down in the basket of clams!
They looked across the cove, and there, coming in with the tide, was
their own boat, with brave Hawk-Eye in it waving his hand to them. They
could see three other heads beside Hawk-Eye's, but neither Limberleg nor
the Twins could tell whose heads they were. They left the basket of
clams on the side of the bluff and tore down to the water's edge.
As the boat came near the shore, they saw Grannie, looking scared to
death, sitting in the bottom of the boat, and holding on to each side
with all her might. Behind her were Blackbird and Squaretoes!
The moment the boat came near shore, the two boys tumbled out of the
back end of it, nearly upsetting Grannie, and splashed through the
shallow water to the shore. They butted Firetop in the stomach and
knocked him flat, and spun Firefly around in the sand to show how glad
they were to see them.
When at last the prow of the boat grated on the sand, and Grannie and
Hawk-Eye got out, the four children ran round them in circles like
puppies, screaming with joy. Even Limberleg danced. Grannie clapped
her hands over her ears.
When the noise had calmed down a little, she seized Firetop and Firefly
and shook them soundly.
"You little red-headed wretches," she cried. "Here you are alive and
well, and fat as rabbits, and all this time I've worried the heart
nearly out of me wondering what had become of you!"
It had been such a long time since the spring morning when the Twins had
stolen away out of the cave that at first they did not know what Grannie
was talking about. They had never thought how she must have felt when
she found that they were gone.
Hawk-Eye laughed. "I've brought Grannie back with me on purpose to give
you what you deserve," he said. "She told me she was going to take a
stick to you as soon as she saw you, for playing such a trick on her."
"Just you wait until I get a stick," cried Grannie. She looked fierce
as she said it, but the Twins knew very well she was just as glad to see
them as they were to see her. They seized her hands, one on each side,
and began to pull her up the hill. Blackbird and Squaretoes pushed from
behind.
"Go along with you," screamed Grannie, holding back with all her might.
"I can't run so fast; I am all out of breath."
"We'll run you, then," screamed the children, and they pulled and pushed
until they got her panting and breathless to the top of the hill.
Hawk-Eye had drawn his precious boat high up on the beach out of reach
of the tide, and he and Limberleg followed more slowly with the basket
of clams.
At the top of the hill, the Twins, with Blackbird and Squaretoes, ducked
into the hidden path that led to the cave, just like mice diving down a
mouse-hole.
Grannie was left standing alone on the hill-top. She couldn't see what
had become of the children. She could hear their voices, and down the
bluff she could see a thin column of smoke rising. She knew the cave
must be there, but she didn't know how to get to it.
When Hawk-Eye and Limberleg came up, they took her with them through the
little green alley that led to the cave. When they reached it the
children had flung a great pile of dry sticks on the fire, and the
flames were leaping high in the air to welcome them.
"See," cried Limberleg, "even the fire dances with joy at your coming."
She took Grannie into the cave and showed her the piles of warm skins,
and the heaps of nuts: then she showed Grannie how to cook clams.
The Twins had taken Blackbird and Squaretoes the very first thing to see
the rabbits. Then they came back for Grannie and made her go and see
them too, and when every one had seen everything there was to see, it
was dark, and Limberleg had a real feast ready for them to eat.
She had killed a deer the day before, and so they had broiled venison,
seasoned with sea salt. They had clams steamed with seaweed, and they
had nuts and wild plums.
When they had all stuffed themselves full, Limberleg said to Hawk-Eye:
"Now tell us all about your journey. When you went away, we watched you
from the hill-top until you were a mere speck on the water. We knew
nothing more of you until we heard your shout to-day. There were many
weary days between."
"They were not weary to me," said Hawk-Eye. "I reached the other shore
in safety, and then turned my boat toward the sunset. I kept in the
shallow water near the shore, and followed the coast around the end of
the point of land which we crossed when we came here.
"I knew our river must empty into the big water not far away, and so I
paddled up the first stream I found. I slept in the boat at night. The
first night I was awakened by the howling of wolves. But I had only to
push my boat out into the stream. They would not follow me there.
"For two days I paddled up-stream. The second day I began to see things
that I knew, and on the morning of the third I reached the river path
just as Grannie was coming down for water."
"Yes, yes," cried Grannie. "I thought I was dreaming! The boat
frightened me. I thought Hawk-Eye was dead and that I saw his spirit.
I started to run to the cave."
"Did you think we were all dead?" asked Limberleg.
"Yes," said Grannie. "I thought some cave bear or tiger had got you.
You were always so bold and venturesome. And as for these worthless
ones," she added, patting Firetop on the head, "I didn't know whether
they had gone with you, or had stolen away into the woods and been eaten
by old Sabre-tooth."
"Well, you see," cried Limberleg, laughing, "it pays to be bold and
brave." When she said "bold and brave," she looked right at Hawk-Eye.
She thought he was the boldest and bravest man in the world.
"There aren't any sabre-toothed tigers on this island, and there's
plenty to eat every day. Didn't the others want to come too when you
told them about it?" she said to Hawk-Eye.
"They all wanted to come," Hawk-Eye answered, "but the boat would not
hold so many. So I stayed to show them how to make boats for
themselves. Long Arm and Big Ear and Grey Wolf are all at work on them
now, and they will come in the spring or summer if they get them done."
"How will they know the way?" asked Firetop.
"I told them just how to follow the river and the coast, and where to
cross," said Hawk-Eye. "They can't help finding the island, and if they
find the island, they can't help finding us. I told them we were on the
side where the sun rises out of the water."
It had grown very dark as they talked. There was only firelight in the
cave, but just then Limberleg saw a bright streak on the edge of the
water toward the east.
"Look, Grannie, look," she cried, pointing to it. "We have discovered
the secret of the sun and the moon! They both sleep in the water!"
The children and Grannie and Hawk-Eye and Limberleg all watched together
until the white streak grew brighter and stretched in a silver path
across the water to the beach below. They saw the pale disk of the moon
slowly rise into the deep blue of the night sky, and the stars wink down
at them.
"I suppose no one else in the whole world knows the secret," said
Limberleg solemnly. "You see this is the end of the world. You can't
go any farther."
"Except in my boat," said Hawk-Eye.
"The spirits of the water have been good to us," said Limberleg. "We
will not tempt them too far. If there are more secrets, we will not try
to find them out."
"Some day," said Hawk-Eye, "someday I mean to go,"--but Limberleg would
not let him finish.
"No," she said, putting her hand over his mouth, "no, you are not going
any where at all, ever again! You are going to stay right here with us
and be happy."
POSTSCRIPT.
_L'envoi_.
_Long, long ago, when the Earth was young
And Time was not yet old,
Ere all the stars in the sky were hung,
Or the silver moon grown cold_;
_When the clouds that sail between the worlds
Were fanned with fluttering wings,
And over all the land there curled
The fronds of growing things_;
_When fishes swarmed in all the seas,
And on the wooded shore
There roamed among the forest trees
A million beasts or more_;
_Then in the early morn of Time,
Called from the formless clod,
Came Man, to start the weary climb
From wild beast up to God_,--
_Oh, bravely did he dare and do,
And bravely fight and die,
Or you to-day could not be you
And I could not be I_.