After that, though Oscoon shouted with all his voice, the Indians could not hear a sound. It was dark in the pot, and, under all their coverings, rather warm. And so, since they could neither move nor hear each other if they spoke, they sensibly fell asleep.
After a very long time, Pulowech opened his eyes. Everywhere was blackness. For a moment, he thought that he must have gone blind. Then faintly, far above somewhere, he made out a tiny crack of light, and he remembered: they were in the stone pot, and the light was creeping in at the edge of the bearskin. He touched his wife. She stirred and rubbed her eyes. And there in the dark they shouted at each other,—and the stillness was unbroken. Pulowech started up, and sank suddenly back again, pulled down by the weight of his coverings. Then angrily he tried to pull them off, and could not so much as lift one of them. For they were made of hundreds of skins. There was nothing for it but to lie still.
A slow, familiar pain seized Pulowech’s insides. Greedily he remembered the apples and the deer meat, and put out his hand. There they were, close beside him. He clutched great handfuls of them, and ate eagerly. He touched his wife and made her understand too. For some time, they forgot the dark and even the silence. But gradually, as Pulowech began to care less and less about eating, his head seemed to feel extraordinarily hot and uncomfortable. His hands fumbled the wrappings and twitched at the knots. If only he could get one of them off, it might be more bearable.
Then he remembered his promise to Oscoon. But surely, he thought, the battle must be over by now. And even if it were not, what difference would one deerskin, more or less, make to hearing the ice-giant’s scream? Oscoon was too careful.
Nevertheless the promise held him. He took down his hands and lay for some time quite still. A dreadful terror came over him: suppose the battle was over, and Oscoon had forgotten them. Worse still, suppose Oscoon should never come at all; suppose he had been killed! Then they might die there, for even if they could get free of their coverings, they could never climb up the steep walls of the stone pot.
Pulowech’s wife moved. She began to pull fiercely at the bandages about her ears. It was too much for Pulowech. He put up his hands again and tore wildly at the deerskin strips. If Oscoon was dead, he decided, then they must talk together; they must plan some way of escape. They must not be found there helpless by the dreadful Chenoo.
Suddenly, something swifter, keener, shriller than the sharpest spear seemed to pierce through Pulowech. His hands dropped limp. His breath went. His whole body seemed divided, and his ears shattered by the wild, high, cruel sound of it. It was the Chenoo’s war-scream. Again it came, lower and less intense, shooting through Pulowech’s numb body like pain let loose; and then a third time, faint and far away, no longer cutting, but chill as the wind from icebergs.
When Pulowech came to himself, he was startled by the light all about him. Then dimly he made out the great face of the giantess bending over him. He was no longer in the pot. He was lying beside his wife in the hollow of the giantess’s hand, and she was rubbing them vigorously with her little finger.
“There, there, my little people,” she said. “You’re all safe, so you are. And the wicked Chenoo shall never scream again to hurt you. For he is dead, so he is. Killed, by my Oscoon and our sons. There, there, my little people, open your eyes.”
Pulowech blinked, and looked around the wigwam. All about sat the giants, binding up their cuts, and picking out the pine-trees that were stuck in their legs like splinters. For the fight had been in a forest, and the poor giants were bothered with the trees, as men would be with thistles.