Chapter 9

As I stood looking down upon that sad and lonely mound, wrapped in the most

dismal of reflections and premonitions, I was suddenly seized from behind and

thrown to earth. As I fell, a warm body fell on top of me, and hands grasped my

arms and legs. When I could look up, I saw a number of giant figures pinioning

me down, while others stood about surveying me. Here again was a new type of

man—a higher type than the primitive tribe I had just quitted. They were a

taller people, too, with better-shaped skulls and more intelligent faces. There

were less of the ape characteristics about their features, and less of the

negroid, too. They carried weapons, stone-shod spears, stone knives, and

hatchets—and they wore ornaments and breech-cloths—the former of feathers worn

in their hair and the latter made of a single snake-skin cured with the head

on, the head depending to their knees.

Of course I did not take in all these details upon the instant of my capture,

for I was busy with other matters. Three of the warriors were sitting upon me,

trying to hold me down by main strength and awkwardness, and they were having

their hands full in the doing, I can tell you. I don’t like to appear

conceited, but I may as well admit that I am proud of my strength and the

science that I have acquired and developed in the directing of it—that and my

horsemanship I always have been proud of. And now, that day, all the long hours

that I had put into careful study, practice and training brought me in two or

three minutes a full return upon my investment. Californians, as a rule, are

familiar with ju-jutsu, and I especially had made a study of it for several

years, both at school and in the gym of the Los Angeles Athletic Club, while

recently I had had, in my employ, a Jap who was a wonder at the art.

It took me just about thirty seconds to break the elbow of one of my

assailants, trip another and send him stumbling backward among his fellows, and

throw the third completely over my head in such a way that when he fell his

neck was broken. In the instant that the others of the party stood in mute and

inactive surprise, I unslung my rifle—which, carelessly, I had been carrying

across my back; and when they charged, as I felt they would, I put a bullet in

the forehead of one of them. This stopped them all temporarily—not the death of

their fellow, but the report of the rifle, the first they had ever heard.

Before they were ready to attack me again, one of them spoke in a commanding

tone to his fellows, and in a language similar but still more comprehensive

than that of the tribe to the south, as theirs was more complete than Ahm’s. He

commanded them to stand back and then he advanced and addressed me.

He asked me who I was, from whence I came and what my intentions were. I

replied that I was a stranger in Caspak, that I was lost and that my only

desire was to find my way back to my companions. He asked where they were and I

told him toward the south somewhere, using the Caspakian phrase which,

literally translated, means “toward the beginning.” His surprise showed upon

his face before he voiced it in words. “There are no Galus there,” he said.

“I tell you,” I said angrily, “that I am from another country, far from Caspak,

far beyond the high cliffs. I do not know who the Galus may be; I have never

seen them. This is the farthest north I have been. Look at me—look at my

clothing and my weapons. Have you ever seen a Galu or any other creature in

Caspak who possessed such things?”

He had to admit that he had not, and also that he was much interested in me, my

rifle and the way I had handled his three warriors. Finally he became half

convinced that I was telling him the truth and offered to aid me if I would

show him how I had thrown the man over my head and also make him a present of

the “bang-spear,” as he called it. I refused to give him my rifle, but promised

to show him the trick he wished to learn if he would guide me in the right

direction. He told me that he would do so tomorrow, that it was too late today

and that I might come to their village and spend the night with them. I was

loath to lose so much time; but the fellow was obdurate, and so I accompanied

them. The two dead men they left where they had fallen, nor gave them a second

glance—thus cheap is life upon Caspak.

These people also were cave-dwellers, but their caves showed the result of a

higher intelligence that brought them a step nearer to civilized man than the

tribe next “toward the beginning.” The interiors of their caverns were cleared

of rubbish, though still far from clean, and they had pallets of dried grasses

covered with the skins of leopard, lynx, and bear, while before the entrances

were barriers of stone and small, rudely circular stone ovens. The walls of the

cavern to which I was conducted were covered with drawings scratched upon the

sandstone. There were the outlines of the giant red-deer, of mammoths, of

tigers and other beasts. Here, as in the last tribe, there were no children or

any old people. The men of this tribe had two names, or rather names of two

syllables, and their language contained words of two syllables; whereas in the

tribe of Tsa the words were all of a single syllable, with the exception of a

very few like Atis and Galus. The chief’s name was To-jo, and his household

consisted of seven females and himself. These women were much more comely, or

rather less hideous than those of Tsa’s people; one of them, even, was almost

pretty, being less hairy and having a rather nice skin, with high coloring.

They were all much interested in me and examined my clothing and equipment

carefully, handling and feeling and smelling of each article. I learned from

them that their people were known as Band-lu, or spear-men; Tsa’s race was

called Sto-lu—hatchet-men. Below these in the scale of evolution came the

Bo-lu, or club-men, and then the Alus, who had no weapons and no language. In

that word I recognized what to me seemed the most remarkable discovery I had

made upon Caprona, for unless it were mere coincidence, I had come upon a word

that had been handed down from the beginning of spoken language upon earth,

been handed down for millions of years, perhaps, with little change. It was the

sole remaining thread of the ancient woof of a dawning culture which had been

woven when Caprona was a fiery mount upon a great land-mass teeming with life.

It linked the unfathomable then to the eternal now. And yet it may have been

pure coincidence; my better judgment tells me that it is coincidence that in

Caspak the term for speechless man is Alus, and in the outer world of our own

day it is Alalus.

The comely woman of whom I spoke was called So-ta, and she took such a lively

interest in me that To-jo finally objected to her attentions, emphasizing his

displeasure by knocking her down and kicking her into a corner of the cavern. I

leaped between them while he was still kicking her, and obtaining a quick hold

upon him, dragged him screaming with pain from the cave. Then I made him

promise not to hurt the she again, upon pain of worse punishment. So-ta gave me

a grateful look; but To-jo and the balance of his women were sullen and

ominous.

Later in the evening So-ta confided to me that she was soon to leave the tribe.

“So-ta soon to be Kro-lu,” she confided in a low whisper. I asked her what a

Kro-lu might be, and she tried to explain, but I do not yet know if I

understood her. From her gestures I deduced that the Kro-lus were a people who

were armed with bows and arrows, had vessels in which to cook their food and

huts of some sort in which they lived, and were accompanied by animals. It was

all very fragmentary and vague, but the idea seemed to be that the Kro-lus were

a more advanced people than the Band-lus. I pondered a long time upon all that

I had heard, before sleep came to me. I tried to find some connection between

these various races that would explain the universal hope which each of them

harbored that some day they would become Galus. So-ta had given me a

suggestion; but the resulting idea was so weird that I could scarce even

entertain it; yet it coincided with Ahm’s expressed hope, with the various

steps in evolution I had noted in the several tribes I had encountered and with

the range of type represented in each tribe. For example, among the Band-lu

were such types as So-ta, who seemed to me to be the highest in the scale of

evolution, and To-jo, who was just a shade nearer the ape, while there were

others who had flatter noses, more prognathous faces and hairier bodies. The

question puzzled me. Possibly in the outer world the answer to it is locked in

the bosom of the Sphinx. Who knows? I do not.

Thinking the thoughts of a lunatic or a dope-fiend, I fell asleep; and when I

awoke, my hands and feet were securely tied and my weapons had been taken from

me. How they did it without awakening me I cannot tell you. It was humiliating,

but it was true. To-jo stood above me. The early light of morning was dimly

filtering into the cave.

“Tell me,” he demanded, “how to throw a man over my head and break his neck,

for I am going to kill you, and I wish to know this thing before you die.”

Of all the ingenuous declarations I have ever heard, this one copped the

proverbial bun. It struck me as so funny that, even in the face of death, I

laughed. Death, I may remark here, had, however, lost much of his terror for

me. I had become a disciple of Lys’ fleeting philosophy of the valuelessness of

human life. I realized that she was quite right—that we were but comic figures

hopping from the cradle to the grave, of interest to practically no other

created thing than ourselves and our few intimates.

Behind To-jo stood So-ta. She raised one hand with the palm toward me—the

Caspakian equivalent of a negative shake of the head.

“Let me think about it,” I parried, and To-jo said that he would wait until

night. He would give me a day to think it over; then he left, and the women

left—the men for the hunt, and the women, as I later learned from So-ta, for

the warm pool where they immersed their bodies as did the shes of the Sto-lu.

“Ata,” explained So-ta, when I questioned her as to the purpose of this

matutinal rite; but that was later.

I must have lain there bound and uncomfortable for two or three hours when at

last So-ta entered the cave. She carried a sharp knife—mine, in fact, and with

it she cut my bonds.

“Come!” she said. “So-ta will go with you back to the Galus. It is time that

So-ta left the Band-lu. Together we will go to the Kro-lu, and after that the

Galus. To-jo will kill you tonight. He will kill So-ta if he knows that So-ta

aided you. We will go together.”

“I will go with you to the Kro-lu,” I replied, “but then I must return to my

own people ‘toward the beginning.’”

“You cannot go back,” she said. “It is forbidden. They would kill you. Thus far

have you come—there is no returning.”

“But I must return,” I insisted. “My people are there. I must return and lead

them in this direction.”

She insisted, and I insisted; but at last we compromised. I was to escort her

as far as the country of the Kro-lu and then I was to go back after my own

people and lead them north into a land where the dangers were fewer and the

people less murderous. She brought me all my belongings that had been filched

from me—rifle, ammunition, knife, and thermos bottle, and then hand in hand we

descended the cliff and set off toward the north.

For three days we continued upon our way, until we arrived outside a village of

thatched huts just at dusk. So-ta said that she would enter alone; I must not

be seen if I did not intend to remain, as it was forbidden that one should

return and live after having advanced this far. So she left me. She was a dear

girl and a stanch and true comrade—more like a man than a woman. In her simple

barbaric way she was both refined and chaste. She had been the wife of To-jo.

Among the Kro-lu she would find another mate after the manner of the strange

Caspakian world; but she told me very frankly that whenever I returned, she

would leave her mate and come to me, as she preferred me above all others. I

was becoming a ladies’ man after a lifetime of bashfulness!

At the outskirts of the village I left her without even seeing the sort of

people who inhabited it, and set off through the growing darkness toward the

south. On the third day I made a detour westward to avoid the country of the

Band-lu, as I did not care to be detained by a meeting with To-jo. On the sixth

day I came to the cliffs of the Sto-lu, and my heart beat fast as I approached

them, for here was Lys. Soon I would hold her tight in my arms again; soon her

warm lips would merge with mine. I felt sure that she was still safe among the

hatchet people, and I was already picturing the joy and the love-light in her

eyes when she should see me once more as I emerged from the last clump of trees

and almost ran toward the cliffs.

It was late in the morning. The women must have returned from the pool; yet as

I drew near, I saw no sign of life whatever. “They have remained longer,” I

thought; but when I was quite close to the base of the cliffs, I saw that which

dashed my hopes and my happiness to earth. Strewn along the ground were a score

of mute and horrible suggestions of what had taken place during my

absence—bones picked clean of flesh, the bones of manlike creatures, the bones

of many of the tribe of Sto-lu; nor in any cave was there sign of life.

Closely I examined the ghastly remains fearful each instant that I should find

the dainty skull that would shatter my happiness for life; but though I

searched diligently, picking up every one of the twenty-odd skulls, I found

none that was the skull of a creature but slightly removed from the ape. Hope,

then, still lived. For another three days I searched north and south, east and

west for the hatchetmen of Caspak; but never a trace of them did I find. It was

raining most of the time now, and the weather was as near cold as it ever seems

to get on Caprona.

At last I gave up the search and set off toward Fort Dinosaur. For a week—a

week filled with the terrors and dangers of a primeval world—I pushed on in the

direction I thought was south. The sun never shone; the rain scarcely ever

ceased falling. The beasts I met with were fewer in number but infinitely more

terrible in temper; yet I lived on until there came to me the realization that

I was hopelessly lost, that a year of sunshine would not again give me my

bearings; and while I was cast down by this terrifying knowledge, the knowledge

that I never again could find Lys, I stumbled upon another grave—the grave of

William James, with its little crude headstone and its scrawled characters

recording that he had died upon the 13th of September—killed by a saber-tooth

tiger.

I think that I almost gave up then. Never in my life have I felt more hopeless

or helpless or alone. I was lost. I could not find my friends. I did not even

know that they still lived; in fact, I could not bring myself to believe that

they did. I was sure that Lys was dead. I wanted myself to die, and yet I clung

to life—useless and hopeless and harrowing a thing as it had become. I clung to

life because some ancient, reptilian forbear had clung to life and transmitted

to me through the ages the most powerful motive that guided his minute

brain—the motive of self-preservation.

At last I came to the great barrier-cliffs; and after three days of mad

effort—of maniacal effort—I scaled them. I built crude ladders; I wedged sticks

in narrow fissures; I chopped toe-holds and finger-holds with my long knife;

but at last I scaled them. Near the summit I came upon a huge cavern. It is the

abode of some mighty winged creature of the Triassic—or rather it was. Now it

is mine. I slew the thing and took its abode. I reached the summit and looked

out upon the broad gray terrible Pacific of the far-southern winter. It was

cold up there. It is cold here today; yet here I sit watching, watching,

watching for the thing I know will never come—for a sail.