Now, when I came back to her, she still pretended not to see me until I was close up to her, and when I held out my nose to hers she growled as if a stranger had no right to behave in that way. But I knew she did not mean it; and I was very tired and sore, with blood running from me in a dozen places. So I walked a few yards away from her and lay down. In a minute she came over to me and rubbed her nose against mine, and told me how sorry she was for having snubbed me, and then began to lick my wounds.
She told me how splendidly I had fought; and, mauled though I was, I was very proud and happy. She in turn told me all about herself. She was older than I by two years, and the bear that I had beaten was a year older than myself. She had known him for some three weeks only, having met him a few days after her husband and her two children, the first she had ever had, had been killed by a thunder-stick. That was a long way off over there—pointing eastward—and she had been moving away from the neighbourhood of man ever since.
That gave us a new bond of sympathy; and I told her about Kahwa and myself, and how lonely I had been for the last two summers. Now, with her help, I proposed not to be lonely any more. She saw that I was well able to take care of myself and of her, even though I was only three years old. If I filled out in proportion to my height and the size of my bones, there would not be a bear in the forest that would be able to stand up to me by the end of next summer. She told me that she had liked me the moment we met, and had hoped every minute of the fight that I would win, though, of course, it would not have been proper for her to show it. Altogether I was happier than I had been since the old days before Kahwa was caught.
As soon as I was fairly rested, we got up and made our way in the bright moonlight down to the river, so that I could wash the blood off myself and get the water into my wounds. We stayed there for a while, and then returned to the patch and made a supper off the berries, and later wandered into the woods side by side. She was very kind to me, and every caress and every loving thing she did or said was a delight. It was all so wonderfully new. And when at last we lay down under the stars, so that I could sleep after the strain that I had been through, and I knew that she was by me, and that when I woke up I should not be lonely any more, it all seemed almost too good to be true. It was as if I had suddenly come into a new world and I was a new bear.
[CHAPTER X]
A VISIT TO THE OLD HOME
When I awoke I found that it was indeed all true, but I was so frightfully stiff that it was not easy to be very happy all at once. I slept straight on all through the morning until late in the afternoon. My new companion had been awake, and had wandered round a little in the early morning, but without awaking me. When I awoke in the afternoon she was asleep by my side. I tried to stand up, but every bone in my body hurt, every muscle ached, and every joint was so stiff that I could almost hear it creak. The fuss that I made in trying to get on to my feet disturbed her, and she helped me up. Somehow I managed to stagger along, and we went off for a short ramble in search of food. I could hardly dig at all, but she shared with me the roots she found, and with a few berries we made a sort of a meal; and then I was so tired that we lay down again, and I slept right on till daybreak the following morning.
After that I felt myself again. It was days before all the stiffness wore off, and weeks before my wounds were entirely healed; while, as you can see, I carry some of the scars to this day.