Leonglauix saved the day with several chopping cuts of his sharpest skinning blade. With each hacking slice, I felt the strength of the snake’s coils loosen. We did not escape entirely unscathed, however, for as we sloshed ashore, Gertie spied another snake which had already swallowed their family dog. Before we could butcher the snake and perhaps effect a rescue, the black-and-brown giant slithered into the reeds and disappeared.
“Tell it again,” Kaikane groaned when I arrived for my last shift. “The snake story, tell it again.”
TRANSMISSION:
Jones: “What songs you guys planning on singing tonight?”
Bolzano: “Care to make a request?”
Jones: “The one about the river, the waters that never stop. Like that one.”
From the log of Maria Duarte
Chief Botanist
We carried Paul’s limp body from the tent about an hour prior to sunset. The uncharacteristically calm afternoon had been sultry, perhaps the first real hint that summer was here to stay. Somehow, it was decided we would mark the occasion with a bonfire on the beach. Jones and Sal used a stretcher made from two spears and a deer skin to transport Paul, without too much jouncing, down to a place of honor on the wide semicircle of sand, shells and driftwood.
When we inquired if he would like anything to eat, he cracked everybody up by comically rolling his eyes and asking if we had any more oysters. I didn’t feel at all guilty as I reclined in the sand by Paul’s side, enjoying the sunset, while everybody else labored to collect an impressive pile of driftwood. The boys teamed up to carry and roll some massive logs to the growing flames. I see the new boy, Greemil, understands the power of the fulcrum. That is a new, positive addition to the Green Turtle Clan’s tool kit–one hopefully not introduced by either Salvatore or Jones.
Flames were shooting 50 feet into the night sky when Bongo and Conga knelt by our furs and invited Paul to join them on the drums. I began to defer when Paul replied with the Green Turtle equivalent of, “Sure, why not.” Helping him to his feet, they led him slowly to the opposite side of the fire where they had arranged their hollow logs, rows of large shells and other percussion instruments. Hanging from the limb of an overhanging tree were two flat, oblong hoop drums. The deer skins stretched tightly over curved willow frames were anchored to the ground by heavy stones. They elicited booming sounds as opposed to the higher-pitched notes of the logs, shells, gourds and the rattles of pine cones.
Gray Beard handed me a square of honeycomb as he settled into the sand beside me. Launching into a lesson on protocols, he was going on and on about how I needed to not stare at people, or something to that effect. I could barely hear the words, let alone process them. My attention was riveted on Paul as the two homosexual cousins seated him on a rock in front of the biggest hollow log. Each holding a hand, helping Paul control the pair of two-foot-long sticks clinched in his paws, they taught him a basic rhythm. The cadence was one we had heard many times over the past two years.
“You are not listening to me!”
The angry tone snapped my attention back to my native mentor and friend.
“Let him make his own way for a while. You and I have done all we can do. He needs to be a man, not a boy who has his chores done for him!”
Though I knew I needed this talk, knew that I absolutely needed to learn how to get along within the framework of the clan, to find a way to keep peace with the women, this was not the time. The fact that I had been neglecting Gray Beard in favor of trying to rehabilitate Paul was not lost on me. I suppose I may have been a selfish bitch, I really couldn’t say definitively. I was so caught up in my own problems, I had become oblivious to the world.
“Wise father,” I replied. “Please forgive my wandering eyes and disrespectful ways. Perhaps I have grown wild after being so long away. May we continue this lesson tomorrow when I can promise you my full attention?”
“Your man, he stands straight.”
Made wavy by the heat of the fire, wearing a wide, even-sided smile upon his broad, handsome face, Paul was standing before one of the hoop drums, banging his sticks for all they were worth. When Bongo and Conga broke in with a driving native rhythm on the hollow log, Paul quickly adjusted his beat to match theirs. Though swaying on his feet, his dance steps showed no hint of paralysis.
Gathering Gray Beard in a tight embrace, sobbing into his shoulder, I thanked him for this and every other thing he had done for us. Without our native father, where would we be? Hiding in a cave somewhere, and probably not more than five miles from where we started–or, more likely, dead. We owed him for so many things.
“This is what I am talking about,” he hissed in my ear. “You should not do this.”
“I am sorry, Father, you make me so happy I forget my manners.”
Taking a secondary position, seated slightly behind him, I wiped away my tears as Sal and his chorus assembled in the light of the fire. Tooting on a flute to set the key, Bolzano raised one arm to signal his singers to match the pitch. When they were all humming, more or less on key, and the drums were pounding in proper syncopation, he spread both arms to signal the start of the song. I recognized it as one of Salvatore Bolzano’s original native creations, a lament for a river that will never stop to smell the flowers or hunt the plains.
Arranged directly in front of Bolzano were Tomon and Gertie, their wide-eyed baby slung low on the diminutive wife’s hip. To their left stood a pair of hand-holders, the young lovers Lanio and Greemil. As the song repeated its second refrain, I caught wind of other voices in the air, ones off in the darkness. Slowly craning my neck, I spotted Jones and Fralista in the shadows. Our West Point Captain had his left arm slung over the shoulders of his Cro-Magnon companion. From what I could hear of his deep, bass voice, Sal has found himself another singer.
Later that night, when Paul and the rest of our clan had walked up the trail and settled into their fern beds, Gray Beard and I found ourselves alone by the glowing coals of the fire. Deciding I had nothing to lose by trying, I asked him the million Norte Americano question, point blank.
“Wise father, why do you not tell us the truth about our friends to the north? We know you have left out important details in your stories.”
“They are not your friends,” he said abruptly in hand sign.
“You said they had a sea house like ours. That they had jumpsuits and sticks that shoot flames and death.”
“Yes, these are all true things. But the memories of those days make my head ache. I become confused of what I heard, of what is secret and what is true.”
“Are we not clan, Leonglauix? Do we keep secrets?”
“Do not play me for a fool. Everyone keeps secrets.”
“Tell me, wise father.”
To my chagrin, he began with a story about a rabbit. Not just any rabbit, but a certain breed of black bunny that is very difficult to catch. He said the rabbit has learned to circle behind his pursuer so he is always in the place where the predator has just been–never where it is. I bit my tongue and listened until the point had been made sufficiently for him to move on.
“The men from your clan, the ones to the north, the two older men were not very bad. The younger one, the top man, he was very bad. I did not trust that man. He made me promise to do something that I did not like. I did not do it. He now wants to use his thunder sticks to kill me and my clan.”
“What was it he told you to do?”
“I am glad I did not do this bad thing.”
“Father, please, tell me, what is the thing?”
“No. Not yet. Bald-zano must have shared my descriptions by now, do you know who they are?”
“Herr-Franz and Tam-Tam, we think we recognize them. The younger man does not sound familiar.”
“The two you name are probably dead. Or very, very old. I have not heard new stories about them for a long time.”
“Heard stories? You told Bolzano that–”
“I told Bald-zano many things. Some were
even true. We needed to move fast across the land in silence. He wanted to slow me down with questions.”
Explaining that I had heard about Babeck and the awful problems he had caused, I said I understood his fear of the young warrior.
“I do not fear Babeck,” he scoffed. “That snake froze to death. Or, if he made it back to the caves, he was poisoned by Karloon. That was One-Leg’s plan. I know, because I helped him pick the toadstools.”
“Why did you tell Bolzano and Jones that Babeck was following with his angry clan? Why are we hiding on a coastline where man does not hunt?”
“Babeck does not track us. Someone else.”
“Who?”
“The young stranger from up north, would you like to know his name?”
“Bolzano said you would not tell the name.”
“The man is called The Hunter. He was at the volcano, I think, stuck on the northern side of the flow. Two of his men found us. I hope our trick worked and he swam the river to meet us. I hope he drowned! I do not think that would happen, though. The Hunter is a very powerful man. The Hunter does not grow old.”
Gray Beard went on to claim he’d had interactions with The Hunter at least 10 times since their first meeting long ago. He insisted that while he himself had aged through the years, the other man’s appearance, strength and vitality remained static. In native sign language, he described how the ageless man hunts with two of the long-range pistols and often utilizes a jumpsuit that must be an advancement of at least one generation over the prototypes we occasionally wear. Gray Beard says unlike our suits with their telltale shimmer, The Hunter’s suit is truly invisible.
He claimed The Hunter’s visits came in two varieties–dangerous and extremely dangerous. In the latter, a jumpsuited man would unexpectedly appear out of thin air beside the storyteller, usually timing it to catch him in a compromised position. Once he was hunched under a tree moving his bowels when The Hunter punched him in the ear so hard he lost consciousness. A lovers’ tryst was broken up by the poke of a burning stick on his bare ass.
Resistance was met by thunder and lightning–death. Clench a fist or lift a spear and you would die, or in Gray Beard’s case, people he cared about would die. The Hunter had plans for the storyteller.
Face hidden inside his suit, the man’s moods were impossible to gauge as he conducted a familiar interrogation. “Have you seen the girl? How about the tall men? During your travels have you heard any stories about the girl or tall men? Have you heard this sound?” The final question was always followed by a thunderous bang and some poor person or animal toppling over dead.
Encounters were a bit calmer and more predictable when The Hunter arrived in native buckskins. Though he still did not show proper respect to elders, and would invariably pick a fight with one or two of the younger lads to exert his dominance, most of those social calls were conducted within standard Cro-Magnon protocol–sniffing and boasting, sharing news and food. The Hunter could be an interesting traveling companion when he cared to make the effort.
Wary Gray Beard said he knew better. Beneath The Hunter’s smiles of white teeth, his tricky native riddles and tales of great hunts, lurked a snap temper and fondness for inflicting pain.
Twice The Hunter used the Green Turtles as quarry in sadistic hunts that pitted the tenacious skills of his Neanderthal trackers against the clan’s will to survive. As outlandish as his story sounded, I believed Gray Beard when he said The Hunter threatened to slay all of the clan’s dogs and at least two of its children if it did not lead a good chase. Jumpsuit psychosis? Sounds like it to me. Though The Hunter gave the Green Turtles long head starts, his Neanderthal “dogs” caught them both times.
“His Flat Heads are not fast, and they are not good spear throwers, but they do not stop,” the storyteller explained. “We led them down rivers, over mountains and through swamps. It was possible to shake free for a hand or more of days, but then off in the distance, the sound of their calls would echo out of a valley or across the plains to send us moving again. Once the Flat Head dogs finally ran us to ground, he would appear.
“The first hunt, I will not speak of. It was very bad. The second hunt came many turns of the moon calendar later. I had learned a few things as clan leader. We led them for more than 10 moons, killing a hand plus two fingers of his Flat Heads along the way. Green Turtles know how to fight!”
This time, when The Hunter caught the Turtles bedded down in a strange land of tall jungle ferns and gray, hairless mammoth, far toward the rising sun, he took mercy upon the weary people. Though disappointed at losing seven of his precious, hand-raised trackers, The Hunter was so pleased with the Turtles’ effort, he shot only two dogs and one sick girl before blinking from sight and leaving them to find their own way home.
Gray Beard said it was rumored The Hunter kept wives and camps in several remote, far-flung lands. The man spent his time roaming between the homes, leading his loyal pack of Neanderthals in a never-ending search for yellow stones and pretty crystals. Along the way, he also tended an extensive network of “watchers”– hunters, clan leaders and storytellers who served as his “eyes.” Gray Beard said all “eyes” had been on the lookout for me for years.
“The Hunter told me long ago that you and I would cross paths. It made him angry he did not know when or where it would happen, but he knew we would meet. He made me promise on the honor of my clan and my name to do something. In return, he promised not to kill me and my family.”
“And what were your orders, this bad thing you promised to do?”
“I promised to kill you. I promised to kill Doo-Art and help Mertoon-elly and Bald-zano.”
Stunned to silence, I sorted through the many ramifications as my swirling brain struggled to process it all. Why would The Team choose Martinelli over me? Did the Einstein IV bring rescuers or hit men? Either way, why weren’t they waiting for us when we first landed? What about Paul and Jones?
Looking up to see my native father waiting expectantly, I asked, politely as I could, if he had promised to do anything else.
“I promised to take Mertoon-elly and Bald-zano north to the great drum. The Hunter said even if I knew he was dead, I was to lead them to the drum. If they refused to go, I was to say The Hunter had buried gifts for them.”
“Gifts?” I asked.
“Weapons and treasure.”
“What is it you propose we do, wise father?”
“I suggest we act like little black rabbits and travel north to the land The Hunter left behind. If we find those weapons before The Hunter finds us, Jones will know how to use them.”
Allowing a moment for his revelations to settle in, he circled the fire with a charred tree limb, nudging the last smoldering nubs of wood into the embers. When things were to his liking, he tossed the branch into the flames and motioned for me to follow him into the moonlight.
Powdery sand cool on my bare feet, I trailed him between nesting sea turtles and snoring seals to stop just beyond the lapping waves’ reach. As I knew he would, Gray Beard turned to check our back trail. Scanning the ridgeline, listening to the night sounds around our hideout, he went through the routine even though he knew Jones was hidden uphill somewhere pulling first watch. There is no breaking the habits of a lifetime.
After waiting what I hoped was an appropriate interval for my elder to ascertain all was right with our world, I posed a question.
“How long before The Hunter finds this camp?”
Shrugging an age-old gesture, he raised his palms in the silver light and sighed. “One moon or one day, I do not know.”
“Please, wise father.”
Another sigh, another long pause.
“Two or three hands. He will arrive before the next big moon.”
“This Hunter, what does he look like?”
Picking up a stone, he gave it a halfhearted heave over the shimmering surface. We stood in silence watching the rings caused by the splash slowly fade away. I knew better than to apply pre
ssure for an answer. Eyes now fully adjusted to the dark, I passed the time by tracing the flights of night birds and bats hunting for bugs. As the crescent moon dropped closer and closer to the horizon, I feared it was to be one of those queries he just does not acknowledge.
Finally resigning myself to defeat, the suggestion that we head up to our fern beds was on the tip of my tongue when Gray Beard’s weary voice cut through the night.
“He looks just like Bald-zano.”
“The Hunter looks like Sal?”
“And talks the same. They could be brothers.”
The End
(The 30,000 B.C. Chronicles continue with Book Four, Galway, scheduled for release in 2015.)
DEDICATION
This book is dedicated to men and women who labor to preserve and protect our oceans and waterways around the globe. With so many species and habitats being pushed swiftly toward extinction, their hard work is beyond vital. Best wishes also to my friend from Cape Trafalgar, Spain, Colette Bastin, who strives to save earth’s dwindling shark and tuna populations. Sharks are being hunted to the brink, often just for sport or for their fins, yet they play an extremely important role in maintaining the ocean ecosystem. Mahalo nui loa for all the work you do.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Major thanks to editor Kelsey Sadler and artist Darko Tomic for their continued commitment to the 30,000 B.C. Chronicles. Their outstanding efforts are most appreciated. Mahalo nui to Dr. Pierre Langeron, Dr. William Bloedon and Dr. Diane Shepherd for their willingness to answer my questions and share knowledge on a variety of subjects–including a brief how-to course on Caesarean sections. Thanks also go out to the opinionated and loyal proofreaders who not only found nagging typos, but also provided insights that moved the story forward. They include: Frank Hackett, Cindy Moorhead, Lindsay Alexander, Ron Youngblood and David Hoff. Mahalo to Darrell Orwig for his help with nautical terms. Last but certainly not least, thanks to my wife Kelly and our family for putting up with me when I am lost in the world of 30,000 B.C..
Gibraltar Page 33