A Woman of the Ice Age

by L. P. Gratacap

And now the dramatic movement increased in interest. As Ogga looked the smile vanished from his eyes, a sudden keen excitement took its place, he leaped to his feet, his mouth opened as if he were about to speak, but no word or syllable or sound was heard. Moving stealthily, crouching, belly flat, upon the ground, to which in color it offered a deceptive resemblance, Ogga saw on the opposite bank towards which the disconcerted mastodon was now strenuously swimming, the hateful form of the tiger-cat, the smilodon, the sabre-toothed, the vagrant savage from the south.

Indeed the spectacle roused all the deeply seated, and through practice, exercised instincts of the hunter. He watched, and the color slowly ebbing from his cheeks again ebbed back, his hands clasping the useless spear rose and fell, the surges of his emotion broke in suspirations from his lips, the soul of the hunter realized the meaning of that animal encounter beneath the glacial skies.

The mastodon now clambered with frequent scrambles and awkward plunges up the opposite bank. Its footing, uncertain on the rolling stones and pebbles, dislodged from the terrace, hardly permitted it to make much progress. Still immersed in the water, its broad back glistening with drops of water enmeshed in its hairy hide, it stood still, rolling its long trunk between its tusks and emitting harsh cries of distress and recall.

The brown heap upon the scantily clothed upland, on the very verge of the incline up which the mastodon was endeavoring to rise, moved cautiously forward, and Ogga could see rising and falling in the long grass the sweeping tail of the cat; he could see the half opened jaws of the beast of prey exposing the murderous canine that descended from its upper jaw, curving backward, like a white stiletto; he could even discern that masked movement of the muscles which the cat so wonderfully controls and by which it slips along the ground with almost imperceptible creeping of its hidden feet. Ogga saw the whitish fur of its underside pressed out in thick folds as the animal hugged the earth with furtive malice.

And yet the mastodon was unconscious. Perhaps if he had seen the ambush, it would not have diverted him from his purpose. Again he forced his huge mass out of water up the bank. The water now rose above his hind quarters, but his shoulders were fully exposed. Again he trumpeted, turning his head slowly around. In another instant his eyes would have detected the smilodon. The latter had now abandoned concealment, it rose to its full height, then sank back upon its haunches, its whole body disappeared. The succeeding moment, as Ogga leaped to his feet, the body of the cat was launched into the air. Ogga saw its outspread legs, the extended claws, the tail stiffened outward in a line with its back; his ears caught the half stifled snarl of the descending carnivore as it rose from the bank, and immediately they heard also the thud of its impact upon the gray and brown prominences of the mastodon’s body. The crafty creature had not altogether succeeded. The great impetus given to it in its wide leap outward, and a necessary descent in a vertical line of over some twenty feet imparted an unexpected revolution to its body. It fell upon the mastodon but was propelled over it, and a confused jumble of tail, legs, head and claws met Ogga’s view, as, in the excitement of his interest, he ran forward. The terrific elastic strength of the animal saved it from falling in the water. It recovered itself, inflicting long lacerations in the hide of its host. Almost instantly as it regained its own equilibrium it dashed forward to the head of its victim.

The mastodon at first seemed shocked into immobility, the next moment its head shook violently, its trunk with leviathan energy was swung around and backwards, its evident design being to dislodge the invader. To avoid this revolving sledge the cat had sprung forward and crouching upon the frontal bones of the elephant had, with claw and tooth, attacked its eyes. The excruciating agony drove the mastodon into a demoniacal rage; the cat had torn away one cheek and the excavated orbit of the elephant’s eye was drenched in blood. The mastodon, furious and demented, turned backward into the lake, and as he turned some rolling stone beneath his feet, some inequality or sudden compression of the muddy floor threw him sideways. With an asthmatic roar, his trunk still lifted above the surface, he sank, and the imperilled cat, half immersed, clung to his head, so deeply submerged as to deprive her of all opportunity of assault.

The cat’s position was indeed unique. The elephant had now completely abandoned its first attempt to reach the other side of the lake. It turned and swam into the central current, that eddied in broad swirling vortices directly in the path of the inrushing river. The cat perched upon its living raft was plainly disconcerted. Its own irritable snarls mingled with the occasional whines of the mastodon; it stirred restlessly in its unwelcome bath, its glaring eyes and hideously distended mouth, turning upon Ogga, whose presence, no longer concealed, seemed to add a new motive or accent of ferocity to its dismay.

The exit of the water from the lake was made over a glacial dam, forming the slope Ogga had ascended. Through this wall the corrosive action of the stream had partially excavated a shallow channel. The descent was still abrupt, and the overflow of the lake, which now was excessive by reasons of the accelerated contributions from the melting ice-barriers and fluviatile discharges from the glaciers, poured down over it in a deep flood.

Towards this perilous avenue of escape the mastodon was moving, and the smilodon, tamed now by the cold and its untoward position, had abated its defiant growls. With eyes almost piteously fixed upon the shores, its cries had fainted into disconsolate moans. Erecting itself upon its unstable support, the head of the mastodon, which sensibly had risen so that the mammoth could itself discover its position, the cat seemed about to project itself upon the water and seek summary escape from its embarrassments.

Both had now more than half passed the centre of the small but deep lake, and the current which had relaxed its velocity as their distance increased to the head of the lake, began to resume its initial force as it felt the suction of the waterfall at the foot of the expanse. At this moment, a critical one for the smilodon, the elephant suddenly sank completely, his trunk and the polished tips of his tusks disappearing simultaneously. The cat, completely inundated, was swept from its high perch, and sprawling in the water, was forced to swim to safety. At this instant Ogga became a participant in the feral drama.