The Land of Foam

by Ivan Yefremov

  “Some big animal is following us, it’s a bad thing that I don’t know what animal. Its claws are outside, like those of a dog or hyena, so that it isn’t a lion or a leopard…”

  “A buffalo or rhinoceros,” suggested Cavius.

  Kidogo shook his head energetically.

  “No, it’s a beast of prey,” he snapped with confidence. “We must find cover… no trees near us,” he whispered, looking round in alarm.

  The country ahead of them was an almost level stony stretch of open ground with occasional tufts of grass and small bushes.

  “Forward, as fast as we can!” Kidogo hurried them on, and the friends ran along carefully, trying to avoid the long thorns on the bushes and the cracks in the dried earth.

  Now the scratching of heavy talons on the stony ground could be clearly heard behind them. The increased frequency of the regular clatter of the claws told the friends that the animal had also broken into a run. Click, click, click — the sounds drew nearer and nearer.

  Pandion looked over his shoulder and saw a tall swaying silhouette, a grey phantom pursuing them.

  Kidogo kept turning his head this way and that, trying to pick out a tree somewhere ahead of them and to judge the speed of the unknown animal. He realized that the trees were too far away and that the friends would not be able to reach them in time.

  ‘The animal is gaining on us,” said the Negro stopping. “If we keep our backs to it, we shall die a sorry death!” he added excitedly.

  “We must fight it,” said the saturnine Cavdus.

  The three friends stood side by side facing the menacing grey phantom that was bearing down on them in silence. During the whole period of pursuit the animal had not emitted a single sound, and’ it was this strange fact, so unusual in the wild beasts of the plains, that disturbed the friends.

  The diffused grey silhouette grew darker, its outlines became clearer. When the animal had reduced the distance between them to no more than three hundred cubits, it slowed down and approached at a steady walk, confident that its chosen victims would not escape.

  The friends had never before seen any such animal. Its massive forelegs were longer than its hinds, the forepart of the body rose high above the spine, the back sloped away towards the croup. The heavy head, with massive jaws and a steep, prominent forehead, sat upright on the thick neck. The animal’s short light fur was speckled with darker patches. Long black hair stuck up on the back of its head and neck. It bore a distant resemblance to a spotted hyena but of a monstrous size such as nobody had ever seen before; its head was a good five cubits from the ground. The wide chest, shoulders and withers were frightening in their massiveness, the muscles stood out like hillocks, and the huge claws clattered maliciously on the ground putting fear into those who heard them.

  The beast moved with a strange irregular gait, swinging its low rump and nodding its heavy head, so that the lower jaw almost touched the throat.

  “What is it?” asked Pandion in a whisper, licking his dry lips.

  “I don’t know,” answered the perplexed Kidogo. “I’ve never heard of such an animal.”

  The animal suddenly turned; its huge eyes, directed straight at the waiting men, lit up with flickering flames. The animal sidled round the men to the right, then stopped again with its eyes fixed on them. Its rounded ears jutted out obliquely from its head.

  “The brute is intelligent; it has moved round so that the moonlight is against us,” whispered Kidogo, his breath coming in short gasps.

  A nervous shiver ran through Pandion’s body such as he always felt before a dangerous fight. ‘ The animal drew a deep breath and advanced slowly on the men. In its movements, in its malevolent silence, in the persistent stare of the big eyes under the protruding forehead, there was something that distinguished it from all other animals the friends had ever seen. The three men realized instinctively that the animal was a relic of an older world with other laws of life. Shoulder to shoulder, their spears held ready, the three men advanced to meet the nocturnal monster. For an instant it stood still, perplexed, then, uttering a short, hoarse sound, hurled itself at them. The huge jaw opened, the thick teeth flashed in the moonlight as three spears plunged into the broad chest and neck of the monster. The men could not withstand the pressure of the animal’s weight and, furthermore, it possessed enormous strength. The spears struck against bone and were turned aside and pulled out of their hands; the three of them were thrown back. Kidogo and Pandion managed to scramble to their feet, but Cavius found himself lying under the beast. The two friends rushed to his rescue. The monster sat back on its hind-legs and suddenly swung out its front paws. Blunt claws struck Pandion in the hip with such force that he fell and almost lost consciousness. The animal planted its enormous paw on Pandion’s leg, causing him terrific pain, the joints cracked, and the animal’s claws tore skin and flesh.

  Pandion, keeping his spear in his hand, lifted himself from the ground with both hands in an effort to rise and, as he did so, heard Kidogo’s spear-shaft break. Rising to his knees, he saw that the Negro was held down by the animal whose open jowl was drawing near him. Kidogo, his eyes popping out of his head, was pressing both hands under the lower jaw of the monster in an effort to turn its head away. Pandion’s trusted friend was perishing before his eyes. The young Hellene was beside himself and, feeling no pain, jumped up and thrust his spear into the animal’s neck. The animal snapped its teeth loudly and turned on Pandion, knocking him off his feet with the movement. The young Hellene did not let go the spear and, holding the spear-shaft on the ground, for a short time held the animal fast, while Kidogo managed to get out his knife. Neither Pandion nor the Negro noticed Cavius rise up on the other side of the animal. Baring his teeth in a grin, the Etruscan coolly aimed at the animal’s flank with his spear and thrust it in behind the shoulder-blade with both hands. The long blade went in a cubit deep, a roar escaped the opening mouth of the monster; it shuddered convulsively and turned left, towards the Etruscan. The latter, hunching his shoulders and pulling his head down between them, staggered but did not fall. Kidogo with a piercing yell drove his knife into the animal’s throat, and at that same moment the Etruscan’s spear reached the animal’s heart. The great beast collapsed convulsively and an unbearable stench spread around it. Pandion withdrew his spear and thrust it again into the back of the animal’s neck, but this last blow was unnecessary. The animal stretched its neck, stubbed its jowl against Cavius and stretched out its hind-legs, that were still quivering; the claws scratched the earth, the muscles contracted under the skin; but the stiff hairs on the back of the neck had fallen flat. Great was the joy of the three friends at their deliverance from the terrible monster that lay motionless before them in the moonlight.

  As soon as they had come to themselves the three friends examined their wounds. A piece of flesh had been torn out of the Etruscan’s shoulder, and the animal’s long claws had furrowed his back. Pandion’s leg was not broken, but he had a deep wound below the knee and apparently the tendons had been strained or torn so that he could not step on his foot. His side was swollen and black from the blow of the animal’s paw, but no ribs were broken. Kidogo had suffered more than the others — he had several deep wounds and had been badly crushed.

  The friends bound each other’s wounds with strips torn from their loin-cloths. Pandion was more worried than the others, for his wounded leg made it impossible for him to walk.

  Kidogo soothed his friend, assuring him that they were now out of danger, and that the body of the monster would be a sure protection against all other beasts of prey; the Elephant People would miss them and at dawn would set out to find them.

  Bearing with patience and fortitude the pain of their burning wounds, the three friends stretched out on the hard stones, but were unable to sleep in their excitement.

  Dawn came very suddenly, and the sun drove away the mysterious and ominous shadows of the night. Pandion, tormented by the pain in his leg, opened his tired eyes at the sound
of a loud shout from Kidogo. The Negro was examining their nocturnal pursuer and was explaining to Cavius that he had seen drawings of such animals in Tha-Quem amongst pictures of other animals in a tomb in the City of the White Walls. Cavius stuck out his lower lip incredulously. Kidogo swore and tried to convince his friend that the inhabitants of Tha-Quem had no doubt met with such animals in the distant past.

  The sun rose higher. Thirst tormented the three friends, and they were racked with fever from their wounds. Kidogo and Cavius had decided to go in search of water when they suddenly heard voices. Three elephants with warriors on their backs were moving across the plain below the stony slope on which the friends had met the terror of the night. The Elephant People, hearing Kidogo’s shouts, turned their elephants towards them and set them at a faster pace. The elephants were approaching the three strangers when they suddenly shied and began trumpeting uneasily, raising their trunks and spreading their ears. The warriors jumped down from their platforms and ran towards the dead monster with cries of “Gishu! Gishu!”

  Yesterday’s chief hunter gave the three friends a look of approval and said with a catch in his hoarse voice:

  “You are indeed famous warriors if the three of you alone could overcome the terror of the night, the eater of the thick-skinned animals.”

  The Elephant People told the three friends about the gishu, a very rare and dangerous animal. Nobody knew where it lay hidden by day, but during the night it wandered about in silence, attacking young elephants, rhinoceroses and the young of other big animals. The gishu was exceptionally strong and stubborn in battle. Its terrible teeth could bite off the leg of an elephant at one snap, and its powerful forepaws crushed its victims, breaking their bones.

  Cavius made signs asking the hunters to help him skin the animal. Four warriors willingly set about the task, paying no attention to the horrible stench.

  The skin and the head were lifted on to an elephant, where the three friends were also lifted by the warriors. The elephants, obedient to light blows of their drivers’ hooked knives, set out at a smart trot and in a short time covered the distance to the village, which they reached by midday. The villagers greeted them with shouts of welcome; from the height of the elephants’ backs the warriors shouted out, announcing the details of the great deed of valour.

  Kidogo, his face beaming, sat proudly beside Pandion on the wide swaying elephant platform, five cubits above the earth. The Negro had started singing several times, but each time the Elephant People had stopped him, warning him that the elephants did not like noise and were accustomed to moving in silence.

  Four days journey separated them from the village of the Elephant People. The chief had kept his word, and the party of former slaves was allowed to follow the tribe’s expedition to the west. As their wounds had not yet healed, Pandion, Cavius and Kidogo were given a place on one of the six elephants and their sixteen companions followed behind on foot. The elephants marched only half the day, the remainder of the time being required to feed and rest them. Those who were following on foot, however, could only overtake the elephants by nightfall.

  The elephant drivers did not select for their charges the way that the people would have chosen for themselves. They avoided forests with stands of tall trees and crashed their way through bush country where the undergrowth was so thick that the men would have had to hack their way through. From time to time the leading elephant was changed and sent to the rear to rest. The elephants left a path behind them along which the liberated slaves marched without a single blow of a knife full of admiration at the ease with which the impenetrable thickets were crushed underfoot. The three friends on the elephant were even better off. The platform on which they sat swayed slightly as it floated continuously over the ground with its thorn-bushes, insects and dangerous snakes, stretches of foul, stinking mud, sharp stones on rocky slopes, grass that cut the feet, and deep, gaping crevices. Only now did Pandion realize the great care that had to be exercised by a traveller on foot through the African jungles and bushlands. Constant vigilance was necessary for a man to remain uninjured and preserve his strength and fighting ability for the journey ahead of him.

  The elephants strode on through all obstacles with the reliability of granite blocks, and Pandion had ample time to drink in the beauty of this strange country, its colour, form and aromas, the magnificence of its plant and animal life. In the glaring sunlight of the glades the pure tones of the flowers attained such extraordinary brilliance that to Pandion’s northern eye there seemed to be something vaguely wrong with them. The glaring colour sequences seemed harsh and dissonant when compared with the soft, harmonious colours of his native Hellas. But whenever clouds covered the sky or the party plunged into the deep twilight of the shady forests this- galaxy of colour disappeared.

  The party cut across an outjutting spur of the forest and found themselves in open, hilly, red-soil country where they again saw the leafless trees that exuded milky sap. Their bluish-green branches stretched mournfully into the blinding glare of the sky; the tops looked as if they had been deliberately trimmed straight some thirty cubits from the ground. The thick trunks and leafless branches had the appearance of candelabra cast from some green metal. Huge blossoms, glowing red at the tips of the branches, gave one the impression of hundreds of torches burning in a sunless cemetery. There was neither beast nor bird to disturb the deathlike stillness of the tropical heat in these motionless thickets.-

  Farther on the soil was scarred by deep watercourses with dazzling white sand where the red soil had been washed away. The travellers entered a labyrinth of narrow gullies whose friable purple walls rose to a height of a hundred cubits on either side. The elephants picked their way carefully through a maze of eroded cliffs, pyramids, turrets and frail pillars. Now and again they passed through deep depressions, round like bowls, in which spurs of different soil spread radially across the level floor. These spurs formed steep sharp walls of friable earth that sometimes collapsed as the party passed by, frightening the elephants, who shied away from them. The colour of the eroded earth was constantly changing; a wall of warm red tones would give way to one of light brown which, in turn, was followed by bright yellow pyramids interspersed with strips and ledges of dazzling white. It seemed to Pandion that he had entered a fairy kingdom. These deep, dry and lifeless canyons hid a wealth of colour contrasts, the iridescence of inanimate nature.

  Again came densely wooded ridges, again the green walls hemmed in the travellers, and the elephant platform was like an island floating slowly over a sea of leaves and branches.

  Pandion noticed how carefully the drivers led their elephants, and how carefully they examined the animals’ skin at halts. When he asked one of them why they did this, the Negro placed his hand on a gourd that hung at his belt.

  “It’s a bad thing for an elephant to graze its skin or injure it in any way,” said the driver. “If he does his blood turns bad and the animal soon dies. We have medicinal pitch we always keep at hand to treat all injuries without delay.”

  The young Hellene was astonished to learn that the powerful, long-lived giants were so vulnerable, but then he realized why the wise old animals were so careful.

  The elephants took a lot of looking after. The sites of the night’s bivouac and resting places were selected with great care after a lengthy examination of the country and numerous consultations; the tethered elephants were surrounded by keen-eyed watchmen, who kept awake the whole night through. Special reconnaissance parties were sent out far ahead to make sure that there were no wild elephants in the neighbourhood, and if any were met with, they were driven off with loud cries.

  At the bivouacs the friends talked with their fellow-travellers, who answered all their questions.

  On one occasion Pandion asked the caravan leader, an elderly man of short stature, why they went so willingly to the elephant hunts despite the terrible danger.

  The deep furrows around the leader’s mouth grew even deeper. He answered unwilli
ngly:

  “You talk like a coward although you do not look like one. The elephants are the strength of our people. Owing to the elephants we live in ease and plenty, but we pay for that with our lives. If we were afraid, we shouldn’t live any better than the tribes that feed on lizards and roots. Those who are afraid of death live a life of hunger and misery. If you know that your death means life to your family, then you go boldly into any danger! My son, a brave man, in the prime of his life was killed during an elephant hunt.” The caravan leader screwed up his eyes morosely as he turned them on Pandion. “Perhaps you think different, stranger? If so, why have you journeyed through many countries, fighting against men and beasts, instead of remaining in slavery?”

  Pandion grew ashamed and asked no more questions. Kidogo, who was sitting by the campfire, suddenly got up and shuffled over to a group of trees standing at a distance of two hundred cubits from the camp. The sinking sun turned the big oval leaves to gold and the thin branches quivered in the light breeze. Kidogo carefully examined the irregular, lumpy bark of their thin trunks, gave a shout of joy and pulled out his knife. A little later the Negro came back carrying two bunches of reddish-grey bark. One of the bunches he took to the leader of the caravan.

  “Give this to the chief as Kidogo’s parting gift,” he said. “This medicine is quite as good as the magic grass from the blue plains. When he is sick or tired or sorrowing, let him crush the bark and make a decoction of it. He must drink only a little, if he drinks too much it will not act as medicine but as poison. This bark restores strength to the aged, brings joy to the depressed and new life to the weak. Take good note of that tree, you will be grateful for it.” (Corynanthe johimbe from the Rubiaceae family to which quinine and coffee trees also belong.)

  The caravan leader took the gift with pleasure and immediately ordered his men to get more of the bark; Kidogo hid the second bunch in the skin of the gishu which Cavius carried with him.