The Wanderers

by Mary Johnston

“Then none will hunger,
Though the fish go away!
Then none will hunger,
Though the men kill no meat!
Then those who laugh,
Saying, ‘What do you do,
Scratching there in the earth?’
They will creep to us softly,
They will cry, ‘Give us Yuba!’”

Far off, in the deep woods, the men of the long houses were hunting Big Trouble, hunting him far and wide. Big Trouble had chosen to make such a path to the river as brought him into close quarters with the houses. Moreover, on more occasions than one, he had strayed aside from the path; he had come brushing and trampling and ruining against the place itself, all in the dead of night, waking and terrifying! So now Big Trouble was to be killed. To that end, for many days, they had been digging a pit in the wood, deepening and widening the mouth of a gully near to old haunts of Big Trouble. When it was deep enough and sharply shelving enough, they set at the bottom pointed stakes and then they covered all with a net of vines, artfully made to look like the very floor of the forest; strong enough, too, not to give beneath the weight of any slight forest creature. But let Big Trouble try it—! For days, also, they had been talking and training, exercising their muscles, trying their spears and clubs, asking help of the Great Turtle who was mysteriously their especial friend—the Great Turtle at the mouth of the great river, who came from the water and laid her eggs upon the sand. Now they were all in the deep wood, driving Big Trouble, disturbing him with flung club and spear, getting him to go toward the pit. Big Trouble was so big, and covered with such a fell of shaggy, red-brown hair that a flung club or spear troubled him little, and on the whole he was good-natured, and since he did not eat flesh, would not hurt them in turn—not unless they mightily angered him. Then, indeed, he would hunt with a vengeance, filling the air with trumpetings, tearing down the forest, shaking the earth, seizing the unlucky with his trunk and trampling them into an awful pulp! To hunt Big Trouble was to hunt in peril and excitement and with a fearful joy—a hunting that needed beforehand rites and ceremonies, and when it was accomplished, rites and ceremonies.

Women as well as men hunted Big Trouble, though not anything like so many women as men. But when a woman wished to hunt, she hunted; hunted for food now as long since, hunted for joy in activity, danger, and excitement. It was a dwindling custom, but they hunted yet. Half a dozen now stalked Big Trouble with the men and threw their spears against him.

By the time the sun was high, Big Trouble had rolled his bulk very near the hidden pit. He was growing angry. The hunters had now to act with extreme wariness. Just before he reached the pit, he turned. He would go no farther. He stood trumpeting and all the hunters got behind thick trees and crouched trembling. Big Trouble glared with his small, red eyes. Shaggy, with red-brown hair, with hugely long, curving tusks, vast and dusky, the mammoth stood swaying from side to side, growing angrier and angrier, searching with those now vicious, deep-sunk, red eyes. The hunters shrank to be smaller and smaller behind the trees. Their hearts grew small within them. Big Trouble did not mean to go on, had stopped definitely short of the snare! He would stay there for hours, watching, and if any one moved he would make his fearful, trampling rush.... Time passed, much time. The sun that had been up in the plains of the sky began to travel down the sky, down and down the sky. Big Trouble kept as he was; only now and then he trumpeted.

A young man and woman left the screen of a wide-girthed tree. They darted into the open. Big Trouble saw them out of the red corner of his eye. He swung his bulk about and, trumpeting, charged. Immediately the two were behind a greater tree than the first. Big Trouble passed, trumpeting, and the wind of him shook the leaves. Baffled, he stopped and stood swaying, angrier than before, angrier every moment. The two left the second tree and fled before him. He followed, darkness and weight arush through the forest. The man and woman gained the third tree. Big Trouble passed, then he turned. The two left their tree and raced before him, racing straight now to the pit. Big Trouble came after them, and he shook the earth and air. The two took life in their hands, made themselves light, bounded upon and across the roof of vine and leaf. It gave a little beneath their feet, but only a little. As near skimming as might be, they won to the farther side, and with a long cry of triumph rushed to shelter. On, after them, thundered and trumpeted Big Trouble. His forefeet came down upon the roof of the pit; he felt it break beneath him, but could not stop himself. Over and down he plunged, down with a frightful noise. The stakes caught him, the steep sides wedged him in. Big Trouble was not going any more to trouble the long houses.

The two who had toled Big Trouble into the pit marched in triumph back to the houses, at the head of the hunters. The two were big and strong, young, and according to the notions of their people, well-favoured. Back they and all the hunters came, shouting and chanting, through the leafy world with the red sun sinking behind them, and borne along, slung over a pole, the seven-feet-long curved, ivory tusks of Big Trouble. Out to meet them came the too old to hunt and the too young, came the man with the thorns and the gourds, came the women, all who had not hunted. Singing and shouting, the two tides met in the red sunset, beneath the black trees.

“Big Trouble is dead!
He will plague us no more!”

The sun was going down—the hunters were tired, tired! They ate what was given them, fell upon the earth and went to sleep. But the next day the long houses made a feast of commemoration—Big Trouble being gone forever.

Gata, who had hunted Big Trouble and raced over the roof of his pit, left the feasting ring about the council tree. The sun hung low, the river flowed, a crooked brightness. Most of the folk of the long houses were hoarse with singing and shouting, and drowsy with food and drunk with dancing and with a brew that they made out of forest fruits. Many were asleep, others noisy with no reason, others grunting and dull-eyed. Gata had danced, but she had not eaten and drunken to disorder and heaviness. Now she rose and left the feast, for she was tired of it. She expected one to follow. She had been watching Amru where he sat under the tree. Neither had he eaten and drunken and danced to stupidity.

Here and there in the fen were higher places, islands as it were, covered with a short grass. She took a path that led to such a spot. On either hand the reeds stood up, and they waved and sighed in the evening wind. The long houses disappeared from sight. Looking back she saw Amru upon the path.