The Thinking Rocks

by Butkus, C. Allan

  She smiled at him with her eyes and said, "And I promise to be truthful with you."

  Neither of them wanted to leave the other, but they couldn't think of anything to say. They stood smiling at each other.

  Dola came running back and called "Gennos is making a den for the pups. I heard Koonai talking with Gennos, he said that all the hunters would leave camp tomorrow to hunt mammoth. Can I go Ceola? I'm big now," he asked breathlessly.

  Ceola looked away from Cano reluctantly, "No, not this time. However, you are getting to be big. Maybe you can help Gennos with the pups. Would you like that?" He was disappointed, but the pups where a major attraction. Besides he knew they wouldn't let him go on the mammoth hunt. "Okay, I'll help with the pups." He turned and ran back toward Gennos and the pups.

  "I must go now." Cano said as he picked up the meat from the ground. "I will bring you something special from the hunt tomorrow."

  She smiled shyly back at him "I may have something for you when you return. Something very special." She turned and walked away with a provocative sway to her hips.

  The Mammoth Hunt

  The six hunters left the camp early the next day. They carried their weapons and some water in skin bags. Moki had found fresh mammoth tracks and was leading them to where he thought a small herd would be feeding. All where experienced hunters and moved over the uneven ground and rocks as quietly as a gentle breeze moves across the water on a pond. By the time they had reached the freshest tracks, the sun was almost overhead. It was hot and still and they were all sweating heavily. The only signs of life they saw were an occasional vulture or a lizard. As they moved down the gentle slope into a valley, the leader of the party, Hedra motioned that he heard something. The group came to a quiet halt and they all listened. The faint sounds of mammoths feeding soon came to their ears.

  Hedra motioned them to gather around him and he began speaking in hushed tones. “Menla, I want you and Cano to move down and separate a calf from the herd. We will hide on each side of these trees. You will drive the calf this way; we will kill it as it tries to escape.”

  “Bana, I want you to strike the first blow, go for the throat and strike deep. We need to bring it down quickly. The herd will come to the aid of the calf.”

  “Moki, it will be your job to have fire ready to keep them away. Have a small fire on each side of the trees. When the calf passes, light the fires and then join us in killing it.”

  The plan was a good one and had worked before with minor variations. The mammoths were predictable. They were huge and a man alone stood no chance of killing one. The calves were not only smaller they were also inexperienced. Usually they could be separated from the herd if the hunters were skillful and they could be surprised. If they survived youth, they learned that there was safety in the herd. The problems the hunters faced were how to approach the mammoths without being detected and how to separate a calf from the herd without being killed.

  Hedra, Bana, Moki, and Loki worked quietly to gather tall grass for their fire. They were out of sight of the mammoths and there was no wind to carry their scent. There were tall trees on each side of their ambush site. They piled the dry grass so that it could be ignited quickly, but also it would serve as a place to hide until the fire was lit.

  In the mean time, Menla and Cano had moved off to the entrance of the valley where they could see the mammoths grazing. Cano liked Menla, because not only he was Ceola’s father, but also because he was treated like an equal when they were together. He was an effective hunter and understood the way of the woods and animals. When he talked people listened. If he did not have anything to say, he kept quiet. Some said he should lead the clan, but he showed no interest in becoming its leader. He cared for his family and provided for its needs with a quiet competence. Since his mate Tayla had been killed at the river, he had lost his ready smile.

  “Cano, if we are to separate a calf from the herd we must be careful.”

  Cano knew he was not talking to hear his own voice. The message was clear, move like a shadow and make no fast movements or noise.

  They crawled through the tall grass at the edge of the large meadow. It was a large area, which was mostly grass, but with a few small bushes scattered across it. The herd of mammoths was at the far end of the valley, almost as far away as a man could see. The leader appeared to be a huge female. The animals were too far away to be certain of their sex or their status in the herd. However, the biggest was usually a female. They were spread out over a large area as they grazed.

  Menla motioned Cano to move closer. Speaking in a whisper he said, “They have poor eyesight, but their long noses can pickup our scent easily. To get close to them we must not be there.”

  Cano looked at him questioningly. “Are you saying that we must be there, but not be there?”

  Menla smiled, “Yes, I’m glad you understand.”

  Cano was bewildered “Understand? I feel like Loki in a turkey fight. Please tell me how I can be there and not be there.”

  “If we are there and they know we are there we are in trouble. If we are there and they do not know we are there, then we are not in trouble. What we must do is to appear not to be there.”

  Cano slowly began to smile and to understand. “I think I know what we must do, but I’m not quite sure how.”

  Menla nodded “Our problem is not with the mammoths, but with ourselves. We must understand what is to be done, and then determine how to do it. Tell me what you think and if you are on the right track, I will help you with how to do it.”

  Understanding was a faint glimmer in Cano’s eye, but it was getting brighter as they talked. "They cannot see as well as we can, but their sense of smell is better than ours. We must not let them see us. That will be the easy part. Next, we must not let them smell us; that will be more difficult."

  Menla smiled “You are right on both points. Now let us break the problem down. How can we have them not be able to see us?”

  Cano was enjoying this process. “The easiest way not to be seen would be to look like something they are not afraid of, something that they know is not dangerous.” An idea came to his mind, “Like a bush.”

  “Very good, we can cover ourselves with small branches and leaves. This will solve the first part of our problem. But what of the smell? How can we get rid of a smell?”

  Cano thought about it but could not see a way to get rid of something that was always there. He shrugged his shoulders, “I don’t know,” he confessed.

  “Good” Menla said. “You will make a great hunter; it takes a good man to say ‘I don’t know’. It is good to look at the problem and try to determine the best course of action. Usually it is plain to see what must be done, but sometimes you must ask for help. Today I am here and I can help. Sometimes you will think you are by yourself and there is no solution to the problem. Nevertheless, remember there are many ways to do anything. Some are better than others are. Even if you cannot see a way to solve a problem that does not mean there is no way to do it. Look at the different ways there are to do a thing and let your mind look at the different ways it can be done. But, and this is important, the perfect way to do what we need to do may not be practical.” Menla paused and surveyed the positions of the mammoths before continuing. “The perfect way to get that calf would be to have it walk back to our camp and die at our fire. We know that’s not going to happen. We must look at another way to get the food we need. We hunt and kill. To do this we must get closer to them without them knowing we are there. You solved the first problem about hiding from their sight.” Menla continued, “We can’t get rid of our scent, that is a problem. However we can cover up our scent with one that is stronger.” A smile crept over his face. “Any idea of how we are going to do it?”

  Cano thought for a few moments before shaking his head. Menla pointed to a nearby pile of mammoth dung. Cano looked at the pile and then back to Menla before shaking his head no again.

  Menla’s smile got bigger as he nodded his
head, yes. Menla crawled slowly over to the pile and motioned Cano to follow. He reached in, scooped up a handful of the dung, and began rubbing it on his skin. “Don’t worry; I’ll leave plenty for you.”

  The scent was so strong that it made Cano’s eyes water. As he moved up to the pile of dung, he looked over at Menla and said, “I was enjoying this hunt up until now.” He thought for a moment before adding, “You know, there is a lot to be said for ignorance.”

  Menla gave him a smile and then a long look before answering. “Most animals like things that smell good. The problem is that different animals like different smells. It is true that if you didn’t know about rubbing dung on your body, that you would smell better to us, but not to the mammoth. Today we fool the mammoth with his own smell, and in return, we get to eat. We trade one thing for another. We can choose to smell better to ourselves, but then we do not eat. This is not one of the fun parts of being a hunter.” He stuck his hands deep into the dung and brought out a handful, which he rubbed into his hair and face, then to the bottoms of his feet. Next, he applied it to his knees and arms. Cano thought he was done, but he reached in, got another handful, and applied it to his armpits. “Now I smell like a mammoth and should not frighten them with my scent. He smiled at Cano through a brown stained face and then said, “Your turn.”

  Cano held his breath as he applied the dung as Menla had. When he was done, he noticed his companion’s smile had grown.

  Menla motioned him closer, “Another suggestion, before you see Ceola again, take a trip to the river. I don’t think she would agree with the mammoths about what smells good.”

  Cano could not help himself; his smile grew to match Menla’s.

  Menla said “We must now cover ourselves with some branches that have large leaves.

  They crawled around and shortly Cano found what he thought was a suitable bush. He held a branch up for Menla’s approval, but Menla shook his head and gestured for Cano to crawl over to him.

  “The bush you picked is good, it would hide your shape, but it is the kind of leaf the mammoth like to eat.” He pointed to another bush, “This has a strong scent and the mammoth don’t eat it.”

  Menla used his hand ax and Cano used his new cutting tool to quietly cut some branches and tie them to their bodies with strips of rawhide. Cano also had a strip of braided snakeskin that Ceola had made for him. He used it hoping it might bring him luck.

  As they worked, Menla continued to explain his actions. “We must not look like danger; we will be out there when they see us. They should not see men, only bushes.”

  After they had disguised themselves, they slowly crept toward the herd for a better look. Cano had to smile to himself as he followed Menla along the edge of the meadow. This is not at all what he had in mind when he was younger and dreaming about being a great hunter. The smell of the dung was so strong that he had to breathe through his mouth. A swarm of small flies seemed to enjoy the stench and Cano had trouble keeping still when he swallowed some. They moved only when the mammoth on watch duty was looking away from them. Soon they were close enough to determine the makeup of the herd.

  The leader was the huge female they had first seen. She was at least double his height at the shoulder and had yellowed tusks longer than he was tall. There was a large slow moving male with a broken tusk and a smaller male whose tusks had just started to push out from beneath his trunk. Another female appeared to be about the same age as the young male. Most important of all, there were two calves that appeared to belong to the big female.

  They moved down the gentle slope until they were in a shallow hollow at the edge of the meadow where the herd was grazing. From their vantage point, they could observe the entire herd. There were as many animals in the herd as he had fingers on one hand. He touched Menla’s leg, when he turned to see what Cano wanted, Cano held up one hand and pointed toward the animals. Menla shook his head slowly and then held up one hand and one finger. Cano frowned and then looked at the herd again and saw the last animal, which had been behind the large female. He nodded and held up one finger and then his hand. Menla smiled and made a motion like a snake crawling forward and then started creeping forward again.

  As was normal with mammoths, not all of them fed at the same time. By some innate law, one mammoth was usually watching for danger, as the others fed. When the watcher was ready to feed, it would start and another assumed the duties of the watcher. Cano could not see or hear any signals but they seemed to know when it was time to change watchers. Cano and Menla knew they could only move safely when the watcher was looking the other way.

  One of the calves was grazing alone. The huge female was watching, but no danger was apparent to her. There were few animals that would attack a mammoth and live to tell the tale.

  In a land where survival was measured by strength, the mammoth herd appeared safe. The mammoths lived by this rule of strength. What they did not realize is that there are other rules. The two crawling men were an example of another rule, deception. They were something other than what they appeared to be. The mammoths did not have the same mental capabilities as the men. They survived by instinct, as did most animals. The men used instinct too, but they survived by using their brains and by learning from others. Fools do not learn from mistakes, the wise do. The very wise learn from the mistakes of others. The mammoths were coping with something they thought they understood, but did not. They had their strength and instinct. The men had their brains and the ability to communicate on a level far superior to that of the mammoths. Unfortunately, there are random factors, which can complicate or defeat the best of plans. These factors are the great equalizers in all situations.

  It seemed to Cano they would never be able to get in between the mother and the wayward calf. Suddenly there was a commotion on the far side of the herd. The young male decided that he wanted to graze where the old male with the broken tusk was feeding. The old male explained in detail to the young one that this was a bad idea by charging and knocking him over. The commotion caught the attention of the watcher. The men had been hoping for this chance.

  With no watcher on duty, Menla sprinted ahead after motioning Cano to follow. They were able to get into position to move ahead with their plan. With one of them on each side of the calf, they leapt to their feet and rushed at it, screaming as loudly as they could. The startled calf was surprisingly fast for an animal its size and it reacted in the expected way; it ran away from the threat. Quickly, they chased it toward the ambush where the others where waiting. Both men ran as fast as possible in an effort to reach the safety of the ambush and the other men. The calf was trumpeting a call for help from its mother.

  The huge female, the leader of the herd, answered the call. She saw her calf across the meadow racing away from the herd, into the woods. She bawled to her calf and set out at a lumbering gait to rescue it. Her speed increased with each step and soon she was four tons of motherhood thundering across the meadow. Her trunk was straight out, as was her tail, her tusks jutted forward as twin lances and her hair flew back in gray waves. With ears spread wide she ceased to be an animal and became a specter of impending doom.

  The calf was much faster than the men chasing her and she reached the woods well in front of them. As she swept past trees on both sides of her she felt a sharp stabbing pain in her side, then another in her other side. She screamed to her mother for help, but the pains got worse. There was pain in a back leg and then she fell to the ground. Strange figures came rushing forward and stabbed her with sticks. She tried to scream again, but there was pain in her throat and blood gushed from her mouth and trunk. It began getting darker and the pain began to go away. Slowly, she slipped away into the deepest sleep of her short life.

  Moki, seeing the calf fall knew she was nearly dead. He had dropped the glowing embers from his fire horn into a pile of tender before she had come through the trees. The fire was burning strongly when he tossed it to the second pile of tinder on the other side of the ambush area. The t
inder was dry and the fire spread rapidly. Loki tossed him a tall bundle of burning grass, which he flung into the opening between the trees. They both tossed bundle after bundle on the fire, and it was soon an inferno; they hoped it would frighten the mother away. If she knew the fire was only a thin screen, she could crash through it and destroy the men with a mother’s fury.

  In the meadow, the race was narrowing. Menla was much closer to the fire, but Cano was inspired to proceed at a rapid rate by the ground shaking thunder of the hoofs behind him. It became evident to him that he would not be able to make it to the safety of the fire. Menla might make it, but he knew he was too far behind to make up the distance before the mother decorated her tusks with his body. He decided to try something desperate. He turned sharply to the left and continued running.

  The outraged mother saw one of the figures turn away. She could go after it or she could keep going in the direction where her calf had gone and trample the small figure in front of her. She choose to give a final burst of speed and continued straight ahead. She was closing rapidly on the small figure when she saw one of the only things that she feared, Fire. There was a wall of it in front of her. The small figure in front of her rushed into the flames and was gone. She skidded to a halt in a cloud of dust and torn grass and bushes. She screamed her rage at the fire. Digging her tusks into the ground, she ripped up huge chunks of dirt and grass. With rage boiling in her blood she attacked a small tree and broke it to pieces, her eyes where red with rage and frustration, foam dripped from her mouth. She pounded the ground with her tusks and charged around in small circles looking for something to destroy. Suddenly she stopped, standing with heaving sides she remembered the figure that had turned away. She spun around and began to retrace her steps.