It was nice to have a place like this, where they could rest and play all they wanted and not have to move all the time. Stabber was saying so now.
“Find place like this at Big One Place,” Wise One told Stabber. “Maybe Big Ones have places like this. Go away far in flying-things to hunt, always come back to same place.”
“You think Big Ones live across mountain?”
He nodded. “Maybe across other mountains, across many mountains. But Big Ones live to sun’s left hand.”
He was sure of that. He tried to think how he knew it, but that was harder. He pointed to the sun’s right hand, to the line of mountains across the moving-water they had crossed a hand of days ago. Then he sat on the ground and picked up a stick and scratched a line with it.
“Moving-water we crossed at stony place; you remember?” Stabber, squatting beside him, did. “Goes that way, to great-great moving-water nobody can cross. Great-great moving-water goes to sun’s right hand. Some place, far-far to sun’s left hand, great-great moving-water little, like this, comes out of ground.”
Stabber agreed. All moving-waters came out of the ground somewhere, that was an everybody-knows thing. Moving-waters became big because other moving-waters flowed into them. He scratched another line to show the great-great moving water.
“Must be far-far, for great-great moving-water to get so big. Many little moving-waters come into it,” Stabber considered.
“Yes. This place a nobody-know place. Nobody ever tell about it. Big Ones come from some place nobody ever tell about before. Far-far place. And flying-things come from sun’s left hand. We know; we see.”
“Big Ones must be very wise,” Stabber said. “Go in flying-things, make thunder-death. I think flying-things made-things. Big Ones make like we make clubs, cutting-stones. I think Big Ones make bright-things too.”
He nodded. That was what he thought, too.
“Among Big Ones, we be like little baby ones,” he said. “Not wise at all. People help little baby ones, teach them. Big Ones help us, teach us. Big Ones not let gotza, hesh-nazza catch us, eat us. Make gotza, hesh-nazza dead with thunder-death.”
He looked out across the valley; he could see, far away, the ravine in the other mountain from which they had fled the hesh-nazza. Big Ones would not have fled; they would have made the hesh-nazza dead, and then cut it up and eaten it.
“But others, Big She, Other She, Stonebreaker, Fruitfinder, all afraid of Big Ones,” Stabber said. “And not want to leave this place.”
Then, he and Stabber would go alone. But he didn’t want to leave the others; he wanted them to go along too. He looked at the mountains to the sun’s right hand again.
“Maybe,” he said hopefully, “Hesh-nazza come across moving-water. Then all afraid to stay; want to go away.”
“But hesh-nazza not cross. Water too deep, too fast. And hesh-nazza not able to go around, way we did,” Stabber objected.
That was so. But he wished the hesh-nazza would come over to this side. They would all want to leave, especially Big She. If he could see it first and be able to warn them… Then a thought occurred to him.
“We go back to sleeping-place, now,” he said. “We tell the others hesh-nazza come. We tell them we see hesh-nazza. Then they all want to go.”
“But…” Stabber looked at him in bewilderment. “But hesh-nazza not here.” He couldn’t understand. “How we say we see hesh-nazza?”
It would be like the way he had told them about the long-ago People stories about the wonderful country to the sun’s left hand. It would be a not-so thing, but he would speak as though it were so.
“You want to go to Big One Place?” he asked. “You want some go one place, some go other place, never see again? Then, we make others afraid to stay here. They not know we not see hesh-nazza. You think Big She go to look? You not make foolish-one talk!”
“Hesh-nazza not here, we tell others hesh-nazza here?” Stabber thought about it, realizing that it would be possible to do it. Then he nodded. “They not know. We tell them, they think hesh-nazza here. Come.”
“Make run fast,” he said. “Hesh-nazza chase us; we afraid.”
They dashed among the others, shouting, “Hesh-nazza! Hesh-nazza come!” All the others, who were between the sleeping-place and the small moving water, sprang to their feet. They all believed the hesh-nazza was upon them. Carries-Bright-Things ran and got the three sticks with the shining things on them; Stonebreaker caught up the chopper and the knife he had made and the knife on which he was working. Nobody wasted time on argument. They all scampered up the side of the little ravine away from the sleeping-place and the little moving water. When they were out of the ravine, they all ran very fast, up the side of the mountain.
“Make hurry, make hurry!” he urged. “Not stop now. Maybe hesh-nazza come up here.”
Hesh-nazza did that. Anything they could not catch by lying still and waiting they would try to catch by circling around. That was an everybody-knows thing. The ones who had begun to slow made haste again.
They all slowed down, however, as the trees ahead of them became thinner. Finally, near the top, they stopped, and kept still to listen. They could hear birds and small animals in the brush. Everybody relaxed; the hesh-nazza was not close now. Wise One was relieved too, until he remembered that there was no hesh-nazza. He had only said there was.
They came to the edge of the mountain. It fell away in front of them, steeper and higher than the one they had come down on the other side of the river. Below and beyond were no more big mountains, only small hills and ridges, and there would be many moving-waters and woods in which to hunt. Far away, so far as to be almost as blue as the sky and hard to see against it, a high mountain stretched away on both hands until it was beyond seeing. It was from this mountain, he was sure, that the great-great river that flowed to the sun’s right hand came.
The others, even Big She, who had been complaining because they had had to leave the nice place behind, were crying out at the wonder of everything in front of them. Then he saw a tiny brightness in the sky, so small that he lost it when he looked away and had trouble finding it again. Then, directly in front, he saw another. At first he thought it was the first one, and wondered at how fast it had moved, even for a Big Ones’ flying thing. But then he saw that it was another, and he could see both of them. Two flying-things! He had never seen more than one at a time.
Now he knew that he had been right all along. The Big One Place was to the sun’s left hand, perhaps just over those high mountains in the distance.
CHAPTER TWELVE
THREE DAYS AFTER the election, Gus Brannhard landed his aircar at Hoksu-Mitto at mid-afternoon. It had been a long time — since before the Pendarvis Decisions — since Jack had seen him in anything but city clothes. Now he was the old Gus Brannhard, in floppy felt hat, stained and faded bush jacket with cartridge-loops on the breast, hunting knife, shorts and knee-hose, and ankle boots. He got out of the car, shook hands, and looked around. Then, after dragging out a canvas kit bag and two rifle-cases, he looked around again.
“God, Jack, you have this place built up,” he said. “It looks worse on the ground even than it did from the air. I hope you don’t have all the game scared out of the country.”
“For about ten, fifteen miles is all. George Lunt sends a couple of men out each day to shoot for the pot.” He picked up the kit bag Gus had set down. “Let’s get you settled and then have a look around.”
“Any damnthings?”