This shore was higher than that which they had left, higher and less heavily wooded. They found a shelving place up which they lifted and hauled Ko-te-lo. Then, as they rested, sitting around Ko-te-lo, they praised their collective prowess, and one among them said that the Great Turtle had helped them across. But Amru said that before they started he had gone into the forest with Haki and that Haki had sung and danced to One Other who lived in the sun. And then, because Amru felt very bold this morning, he said that One Other was like a man and not like a woman, and that he thought with Haki that it would be One Other who helped with the boat. That was natural, said Amru, since men made and used boats and not women. The Great Turtle was like a woman and helped women. Men wanted some one like men. One Other had a long house in the sun, and spears and clubs and boats—many boats.
The eleven listened, attracted but doubtful, somewhat awed and alarmed. “But he cannot make children—One Other cannot make children!”
Amru felt anger. Having been bold he must become bolder yet—that seemed a necessity in the case. Having entertained the idea of One Other, he must turn the idea away or make of it an inmate, clothe it, and give it powers. He wished to keep authority with the eleven, and it seemed to him that that could not be done if there was retraction. He must yet further aggrandize One Other. “He makes them with his hands,” he said. “He cuts them out of trees and sings to them and they come alive!”
The eleven pondered that. Possibly it might be done. Amru’s words made them see a hugely tall, strong, much-decorated man, a great hunter and spear-thrower, cutting shapes out of trees that presently came alive and stood and walked. Had they not themselves fashioned Ko-te-lo out of a tree? The eleven did not greatly care for Haki, but for Amru who seemed to agree with Haki they did care. They had for Amru a sentiment of admiration. He was treading firmly the unrolling path to chieftaincy. And all the long house men desired claims with which to set off woman’s claim. Their hearts began to lean away from the Great Turtle, toward the big hunter in the sun—he who could make persons.
The sun came up over the hills. They looked at the great ball with a freshened interest. But the landscape grew brighter and gayer and they turned toward more familiar explorations. If they climbed a hill they might see afar. Amru proposed that course and lifted from the boat his spear of tough wood with well-sharpened flint head. The others were content to follow him. They saw that Ko-te-lo was well placed above the water, then, armed with spear and club and flint knife, they took their way up the waves of earth. They might meet serpents and four-footed enemies. They did not look for foes who walked on two feet, and yet these were the ones they met.
Out of a ravine between hills rose a hunting band as well armed as themselves and outweighing them in number. There was some parley, but it led nowhere. The stronger party flung a spear—in a moment began a conflict that grew more and more fierce and red. When it ended four of the twelve lay slain. The eight, whelmed by numbers, lost spear and club and knife, had at last only naked bodies. The eight were captives. They glared, and Amru more redly than any, baring his teeth.
The victor group was one, it seemed, somewhat advanced in the notion of warfare everywhere, upon one’s own kind no less than other kinds. The settlement to which the eight were borne had that aspect. The people were fiercer, wilder than those who dwelled by the great river.
One of the eight died from a spear wound. Another had his brains beaten out one day by an infuriated giant of the tribe. The six in captivity saw three moons appear, wax and wane. Then they escaped—Amru the planner and leader.
A storm came up and blew between them and the tribe among the hills. They got down to the river—they found Ko-te-lo where they had hidden her. The people behind them knew naught of boats or boat-making. The six put off and poled for the other side of the river. A current caught them, carried them down, dashed them against a rock, the storm howling around. Ko-te-lo overturned—one of the six was drowned. The five got their boat righted, entered her again and came at last to their natal side of the flood. They put Ko-te-lo where she could not run away, then they lay down in cane and mire and slept like the dead. The storm beat the woods and roared and howled for a day and a night. They lay close until it was over and the sun shone out and the earth sent up steam. Then the five and Ko-te-lo turned homeward.
They had adventures, but not great adventures, poling down the stream, poling down the stream as fast, as steadily, as the five could go. Between the north bank and the south bank, between the sunset and the morning red, Amru thought of Gata.—Ko-te-lo and the five came in sight of the long houses.