The iron weapons captured by Iolande were examined and discussed. Like the earlier news that the tortugas were, in fact, animals, this was seen as merely another example of True Human perfidy. It did not present any immediate danger. At close range, an iron dagger was little more effective than ironwood or obsidian. The weapons did not cause anything like the furor which occurred when the remains of Rayo were found to contain metal bearings.…
«When we rule the Canton,” El Tigre had roared, «The Examples will be law! The kindling of the Wrath of Agni will be punishable by death!»
So the discussions continued, and as night deepened the grupos crept among the houses, infiltrating the barricades and scaling the walls. Every so often a muffled gurgle would be heard, as some True Human guard fell and bled his life away; and sometimes a screech startled the night when a felina’s enthusiasm overcame her caution; but El Tigre thought little of this.
He was more concerned about the situation in the delta. He’d heard no news from Manoso since the morning.
Torpad
Shocked, they regarded the carcass of the llama.
«That’s a jaguar did that,” said Tonio. «I’m going to kill the brute, you’ll see.» The excitement was in him again, and he looked alert and refreshed after the night’s sleep. «Today I’ll go hunting.»
Astrud said dully, «The Examples.» Her dream was still vividly in her mind; Tonio and the cats, hunting together. «Of course you can’t hunt. Don’t be stupid, Tonio.»
He glanced at her. «Survival,” he said. «You’re going to have to change your ideas, Astrud. We don’t have time to plant crops up here. It’s primitive, violent — don’t you feel it?»
Raoul had been examining the remains of the llama. «This wasn’t a jaguar’s kill, father. Look at the way the thigh bones have been bitten through. A jaguar couldn’t do that.»
The smell of blood, the smell of death, the smell of decaying vegetation, and the monkeys chattering in the trees overhead. Astrud suddenly clapped her hands to her ears.
«I can’t stand it! Take me home, Tonio! Anything is better than this!»
Ignoring her, Tonio bent to examine the carcass. It was an unusual kill. The llama had been forcibly dismembered and the bones chewed. Very little flesh remained; the few shreds were crawling with ants.
«Can I come with you, father?»
«No. You stay behind. Somebody has to look after your mother.»
After a breakfast of dried fruit, Tonio climbed to the signal light and detached a hemitrex from its mounting. Then he found a patch of forest floor where the sun slanted through the trees and used the shell to focus the rays onto a little heap of tinder. Soon a fire was burning, the smoke curling up among the branches.
By now, Astrud was past speaking, huddled against the ladder, eyes wide with shock.
«See it doesn’t go out,” said Tonio to Raoul and, taking up his crossbow, headed off into the forest.
As he walked, he wondered at the sense of well-being which flowed through him. He felt as though he was one with the jungle; a predator just as much in his element as the jaguar. He moved quietly through the trees and soon reached the barren ridge he’d seen the previous day. He climbed into the morning heat and, arriving at the crest, sat down on a rock.
More jungle lay before him, a forested valley very similar to the one he’d left, sandwiched between saw-edged ridges and ending on the seaward side in a sheer escarpment. He could hear a waterfall and, through the trees, he caught a glimpse of a small lake. There would be fish.
Some time later he came to a clearing in the valley floor and the tiny lake lay before him, sparkling in the sun. He knelt and peered into the water. Sure enough, small fish swam there, each about as long as his forearm — easy targets for his crossbow. He slipped in a bolt, took aim and shot.
Thunk! As the ripples cleared, he could see a fish transfixed, thrashing on a bolt which pinned it to the mud. He reached in and drew it out, removed the bolt and laid the fish on the bank.
«What are you doing?»
Startled, he looked up. A girl stood there. She wore a long black dress and her hair was drawn back from her face and fastened above her neck. He found himself staring. There was an unearthly beauty about her, and something touched a memory from the past. There was no trace of expression on her face, and this he remembered, too.
But it couldn’t be. This girl was no more than twenty years old.…
«I said, what are you doing?» she repeated without impatience, as though she had all the time in the world.
«Well, fishing. We’re staying over the ridge — you know, the old sailway track? We’re living in the signal cabin — well, it’s not very comfortable, but we’ll soon have it fixed up.… Haven’t I seen you somewhere before?»
«You can’t fish in this valley.»
«But there aren’t any pools in our valley — just a small stream. Drinking water, that’s all we’ve got. You live here, do you? Surely you can spare some of your fish — there are plenty. I saw them.»
«I can spare them. But the animals who live here can’t spare them. Neither can the big fish, Torpad, spare them.»
«Listen, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Fish are fish. They’re there to be caught.» He wound up the crossbow, took aim and shot.
He missed.
The fish darted away as the bolt hit the water. He shot again, and missed again. Sweating and becoming annoyed, he looked up at the girl. «Go away, will you! You’re scaring the fish!»
She didn’t move.
He unleashed shot after shot into the pool, and now his bolts were disappearing into the mud so that he could not retrieve them. The fish were still there but they could not be caught. Finally, hot and enraged, he was out of bolts.
«So now you’d better go back to the signal cabin,” said the girl placidly.
«But I’ll be back!» he blustered, a beaten True Human around thirty-five years physical, too ready to submit, feeling an odd need to weep as he strode away.
Now, as he walked with empty bow, the game abounded. Deer wandered across the trail, fat birds perched on nearby branches and watched him. Soon he came to a stream and a huge fish was there, just idling in the current, begging to be shot. He regarded it for some time, and as he stood there in the suddenly-silent forest a name came into his head.
Torpad.
The fish was gigantic. It would provide food for days, and all he needed was just one bolt. Again he felt a compulsion to weep. Everything was against him. He jumped into the water after the fish, but it evaded him easily. He walked on empty-handed and by the time he arrived back at the cabin it was late afternoon.
«Did you get anything?» Raoul asked.
«No.»
Now Astrud spoke for the first time in hours. «Good.»
«There was a girl.»
«A girl?» Astrud showed dull surprise.
«Over in the next valley, a girl living alone. She was … strange. She scared me, in a way.» The beaten look was back; the crowsfeet, the sudden feeble grin.
«How old was she?»
«Oh.… Twenty, maybe. It wasn’t easy to tell.»
«Was she pretty?»
«And there was this fish — it was huge. We could have fed off it for days, but I had no more bolts left. She didn’t want me to catch fish, or anything else. She wanted the whole valley to herself. I’ll show her. Tomorrow I’m going right back there and I’m going to get that fish.»
«I don’t want you to go back there,” said Astrud.
It was at that time that Raoul began seriously to consider the possibility that the stress of recent events had driven his father insane.
That night Astrud relived the strangeness of her day; the hours in and around the tower, the terror of the Wrath of Agni in the glade, the queer threatening noises from the forest, the sudden scuttlings nearby. She’d cleaned out the cabin and fixed part of the roof with branches and overlapping leaves. Raoul had helped her, saying little. In the forest close by Raoul had found a relic of the past: an old sailcar, overgrown but still intact, lying on rotting rails. He’d gone inside, disturbing a sounder of peccaries which scampered off into the jungle, scaring her — she must remember to tell Tonio about it in the morning, take his mind off that girl — and she and Raoul had sat in the tiny forecabin, remembering the past, imagining phantom rails flying by, the tramping of the crew on the deck above, Tonio’s quick warm smile when something pleased him.…