"Perhaps I was just afraid to be left alone," she said with some embarrassment. "I may have been entirely selfish."
"I don't believe that," I remonstrated.
The truth was that I didn't want to believe it. Another implication was far sweeter to me.
"Anyhow," remarked Duare, "we found out what made the trail up the escarpment."
"And that our beautiful valley may not be as secure as it looks," I added.
"But the creature was going out of the valley up into the forest," she argued. "That is probably where it lived."
"However, we had best be on our guard constantly."
"And now you have no spear; and that is a real loss, for it is because of the spear that you are alive."
"Down there a little way," I indicated, pointing, "is a winding strip of wood that seems to be following the meanderings of a stream. There we can find material for another spear and also water—I am as dry as a bone."
"So am I," said Duare, "and hungry too. Perhaps you can kill another basto."