Chapter XXI: Sure-Dart’s Lucky Miss

But the cautious chief would not at first take anything for granted. He sent out Wing-foot and another swift runner as scouts, and it was not till they had come back and reported that there was not a Fisher nor an Islander to be found this side of the middle hills, that he finally called the news true, and safe to go by. Then was a rush down into the open ground, which was almost like getting out of prison, and a poking about among the trees and bushes, with a little dash by some eager ones after small game, and wild fruits and berries. Even the old people seemed roused by the change, and smiled contentedly as they took little walks about, or sat in the shade of the trees. The children, who were much like children some millions of years later, screamed, and ran, and tumbled over everything and into everything. As for the warriors, they had some little dignity to sustain, but just now they did not try to sustain a great deal, and some of them were not above hooting and breaking out in what we now call pigeon-wings and double-shuffles.

But then, it is something to have a narrow shave from death, and to escape, for one’s friends and oneself, an enemy’s dinner pot.

As misfortunes never come singly, so it sometimes appears to be true that bits of good luck do not. That very afternoon it rained, and this not only cooled the air, but filled the spring, and washed the stony dust and other unpleasant volcanic stuff from the trees and bushes. One party had previously cleaned out the spring, so that it was in shape for whatever addition of water it might now get; and as soon as the storm was over, a hunting and berrying party went out into the refreshed and cleansed woods. In all, notwithstanding the scouring of the hungry enemy, they found, besides some berries, small game, including lizards, rats, snails, and tortoises. The last two they ran across in a swampy place in the low ground to the south.

We should hardly call the whole a very tempting bill of fare, but the Rock-people were not so particular. Besides, they were very hungry, and even some of our latter-day folks have found hunger a wonderful remover of scruples. Once, during our Revolutionary War, two hungry fellows, escaping from the enemy, were glad to make a rattlesnake into rations; and others have eaten rats and mice; and still others--half-crazed, one would like to think--have turned cannibals.

After this first great rest and refreshing, the talk began to turn on a grand hunt, to bring in sufficient food to last a while; this Big-axe approved of. Out of prudence, the hunting party was not to be large, and the others were to stay in the fort.

As all were still pretty tired and worn, however, to say nothing of some who were sore from wounds, it was decided to put off the hunt for a week or so, meaning, of course, the time we call a week.

And now were several days of real rest, and what for the active savages was a time of laziness. They still went on short hunts, and for fruit and root gathering, and one small party went as far as a stream some miles to the south. Here they caught several fish, but other than this everybody idled and rested.

Sure-dart was fast getting well of his wound, but was still lame, and did not think it prudent to go on any of the longer hunts, or to stand long at a time on the injured leg. But he hobbled out short distances, Hop-foot and often little One-ear going with him, and managed to bring in some small game. With the boys’ help, he also gathered fruits and berries, and dug edible roots.

One day he and the boys were out like this when Hop-foot saw a small animal run out of a thicket, and make for a piece of swamp. As the creature crossed a bit of higher ground Hop-foot had a fair look at it, and saw that it was one of the huge rats that had now become rather common, and as it was not bad eating, he skipped and hopped along in chase. The creature could easily have outrun him, but Sure-dart was in the bushes near where the swamp began, and Hop-foot relied on him to turn the animal into the open again. He shouted, and Sure-dart, followed by One-ear, came out. Sure-dart instantly saw what was wanted, and ran toward the creature, dart in hand.

Rats such as we know will turn, when cornered, and show fight; and there is no reason to suppose that those primitive ones would not do the same; and so, as Sure-dart made his rush, cutting off the rat from the swamp, he was looking for a sudden change in the animal’s movements. He was thus on his guard, because a creature as big as a smallish dog, with teeth almost like a young tiger’s, and the power to jump several feet from the ground, was not a pleasant close acquaintance. But in this case the rat, perhaps not feeling that he was yet called upon to fight, turned again, and this time made a run for a patch of bushes. Sure-dart let fly his little shaft and ran forward, drawing his stone knife as he went.

His aim, usually so good, was just a thought at fault, and the dart, missing the rat by an inch, struck a small, outreaching branch of a bush, and glanced off. The rat scuttled into the brush, and when Sure-dart ran up, it darted into a tangle of bushes, creepers, and dead undergrowth, and from there, easily beating the slow progress that the hunter could now make, shot out again, and whipped over into a spur of the main woods.

Sure-dart saw that the hunt was up, and with a disappointed mumble went to look for his dart.

He thought he knew where it had gone, but when he went there he could not find it; and when Hop-foot and One-ear came up he was still poking about in the bush after it.

“Too bad you missed him,” said Hop-foot, beginning to look also after the dart, “but it was a close shot. Oh, I see it.”

He meant the dart, and started toward it. It was fully as near Sure-dart, though a branch had cut it off from his view before; but as Hop-foot spoke, he took another step, and saw it, and then reached out to take it.

Rather oddly, it had driven in between the twisted branches of a slender wild vine, and was held lightly and almost level there. As Sure-dart reached out his hand for it he pressed against the upgrowing branch of a tall bush; and this, seeming to have been caught and held back by another branch, flew free, and switched against the butt of the dart. The consequence was that the dart shot out from the vine, and flew five or six paces, striking then the trunk of a small sapling. It hit with so much force that it did not fall down, but stood straight out.

“Well, what next?” growled Sure-dart. He had been vexed at his miss, and this new little bother decidedly irritated him.

He kept on, however, and pulled the dart out of the tree. In doing this he was surprised to find that it was more than merely held up straight, but really had something of a lodgement in the wood.

“That would have given a man a good jab,” he said to himself. “If a bush could be fixed to do it on purpose it would be a pretty neat little trick.”

He looked at the point of the dart, handling it freely, for it was not poisoned, and started to put it back in the sheath. All at once, as if somebody had laid a hand on his shoulder, he stopped short.

Hop-foot saw him and asked, “Is the dart spoiled?”

With such crude tools as they had, making even a new dart was something to think of. The shafts were usually made of a sort of heavy cane, and of course only the straightest, and of a certain size, could be used, and the head was laboriously worked out of a fish-bone. There was then added a feather arrangement, something like that on latter-day arrows, to steady it in the air.

Sure-dart did not answer for the moment, but put the dart in the case, and started along. Hop-foot saw that he looked serious and thoughtful.

But here Sure-dart roused, and answered, “No, the dart isn’t spoiled. I was only--I was thinking of something.”

Now, anything like sober thinking, unless it was how to get the next dinner, was uncommon at that day, and so Hop-foot heard his friend’s answer, ending, as it did, without explanations, with surprise and a bit of uneasiness. He was a little impressed, too, by the shade of reserve and dignity that the new look on Sure-dart’s face gave him.

It was only a few minutes later, however, that they started up another rat, and in the excitement of the new hunt Sure-dart came out of his mood. A better speeding of the dart brought down this quarry, and the rest of the time Sure-dart appeared altogether like his old self.

After supper that night, when all the others had gone for better security back to their old quarters, he slipped around to the rear side of the hill. He was in a brown study again, and this time there was nobody and no happening to jar him out of it. He was not merely thinking; he was busy with his hands, as well. He was sticking a short piece of cane upright in the ground, with a cleft at the top, and a dart stuck horizontally in the cleft. When he had done this he took a broken spear-shaft. Stepping then behind the dart, he struck the end of the butt a smart blow with the piece of shaft. The dart flew a short distance, much as the one had flown from its place in the knot of vines.

He shook his head. “No,” he muttered, “that won’t do. Even with a better rig it wouldn’t go hard enough, and there’s no way of getting a good aim.”

He picked up the dart, and stood for a bit, thinking.

Unconsciously he had all but lighted on the discovery of a machine that ages afterwards was to play a great part in war, though not till simpler devices had been invented, and led up to it. It was a simpler device that he was after, and one for direct individual use. This was as far as his farthest groping went, and it was a long step beyond anything the little human world had then thought of.

He failed that night to reach any new ground, and he was gloomy and in an irritable mood when he finally went back to the shelf. He was like many another and later inventor, who finds the keenest pain in his useless thinking and trying, and perhaps one of the greatest pleasures that a human being can know, when he is at last able to cry out, like Palissy, “I have found it!”

For several following days it was the same. He did not, or as yet could not, get beyond the theory that the missile he wished to project must be held in some fixed upright support, while the impelling power must be in the nature of a stroke from behind. To bring this about, and at the same time to improve on the simple method suggested by the original accident, he branched out in a number of experiments, but all unsatisfactory.

But at last--there generally is an “at last,” for him who refuses to be beaten--at last he lighted upon the idea that led to what he wanted. It flashed upon him that he could hold the upright piece supporting the dart in one hand, and with the other could release some kind of driving power, perhaps a piece of thin wood, bent back to a point of strong resistance.

This was the germ of the thought; in time the ripe fruit came. Instead of a mere ordinary stick to hold the dart, he cut from a yew-like tree that grew near by, a flat and pliable stave that would spring to a thong of lizard hide. Finally, instead of the original dart, he made a missile a bit longer, but lighter, and with feathers differently placed at the butt. He found they did better flatwise, and upright, instead of in a kind of flange arrangement, like those on the darts. In a word, Sure-dart invented the bow!

It was only then that he told the others of it. He had managed to keep the secret, for he had been careful about it, not wishing to say anything till he was prepared to back it up with something more than a theory.

The astonishment, and then the keen interest that his final disclosure brought out, will have to be imagined. At first, as in the case of all great inventions, there was considerable incredulity, and some ridicule. Old Stone-arm, looking at the bow and the arrow, and not yet having seen them used, sniffed, and said that when a man’s arm became too feeble to throw a dart it would be time to take a stick and a string. Some others, though they said less, smiled sceptically; and a few looked wise, which in fact was a shrewd way to leave them in the right, no matter what happened. On the other hand, Big-axe, though he looked as if he should prefer to see some proof before he fully accepted the thing as a success, still came out, and unhesitatingly said that he was inclined to believe in it.

The great trial came off. Stone-arm, at the request of Sure-dart, demonstrated what could be done with one of the present missiles. He was not over skilful as to aim, but he could cast a long distance, and pride, together with the thought of what he had said, stimulated him to do his best. He made a really wonderful cast. Nothing has come down to us to show how far the dart went, but it was certainly a considerable number of yards. Then Sure-dart picked up his newfangled machine and tried.

High and swift the arrow went, and so far beyond the dart that Stone-arm’s performance looked like some little child’s play.

There was a great roar of wonder and applause, and three-fourths of the crowd rushed off to see just what had become of this most astonishing of all darts, and to measure the distance. Stone-arm stared, looked around, rubbed his nose, and posted off to pick up his dart. The sneer had gone, never, as far the bow was concerned, to come back.

It remained to see what the new affair would do as to straight shooting. Accuracy, indeed, was as important as speed and power. There was now silence and respectful waiting, instead of sniffs and sceptical jabbering. Sure-dart lashed a shield to a tree, putting it up at perhaps one-third of the distance that the other arrow had gone. In the middle of the shield he rubbed over with a piece of the whitish chalk so common in the neighborhood, a spot; it may have been of the size of one of our ordinary dinner plates.

He took some pains, this time noting the force of what little breeze there was, but at the end released the bowstring.

Then was more shouting, and even louder than before, for the arrow had clipped the edge of the ring.

This seemed almost like a miracle to the wondering observers, though, in fact, there is reason to believe that the shot did not cover over seventy yards. The long distance shot perhaps reached two hundred yards. But think what this meant to people who had never seen a missile go farther than the comparatively few paces a strong arm could send it, and even then with less accuracy than the arrow.

Nothing could be thought of then but trying the wonderful “dart-sender”--so somebody named the affair on the spot. There was disappointment at first, for bow-shooting is not to be learned off-hand; and Sure-dart had spent many hours at it before he could do what he had just done. Still, even these clumsy trials showed clearly that a new day had come, and that the dart from the hand must give way to the dart from the “dart-sender.”

As Sure-dart was trying to answer the questions that still poured in on him, Big-axe, who had been down to the target, came back. He had the shield in his hand.

“The dart not only hit the rim of the circle,” he said, “but in spite of the distance it went almost through the shield.”

He held the shield up to the light, that they might see it was so. Of course there were more murmurs of wonderment.

“But what this strange machine can do is not the thing we ought to think of,” he went on; “it is what we can now make it do. We are just at this time free of our enemies, and not in a bad state, but who can say how long it will last? Who knows when our foes will come back? Besides, this is a hard place in which to get food, and we have seen that it is dangerously near the great hills. Yet where else can we go? The great hills themselves seem to be full of perils, though of a different sort from what we may expect here. Well, what then? I will give you my answer. Sure-dart has made it plain for me. I am for feeding the Fishers and the Islanders out of their own dish. Let us make dart-senders, and learn how to use them; then let us seek our enemies, and so deal with them that always afterwards there shall be peace! When all this is done, we shall know where to go, for we can live again in our old home.”

It took the listeners a moment in which to get this new and startling idea into their heads, but when they did there was a tremendous yell of delight and approval.

“Yes, yes,” they cried, “march on the man-monsters, and with the dart-senders leave them where we left the Cane-dwellers. Then we can live again in the old home. Begin, chief, begin!”

“Back to the lake! Back to the dear old lake,” the women and children and such of the others as had not been near at the moment broke out in echo.

“It is settled,” said Big-axe, grimly smiling. “We are going back. To the woods, then, and get the stuff for the dart-senders. That is the first step.”

In almost a drunkenness of eager excitement they caught up swords and axes, and flooded out into the woods. Big-axe more quietly followed, his face nevertheless lighted up as it had not been before for more than one anxious day.