The Crystal Sceptre: A Story of Adventure

by Philip Verrill Mighels

Before we reached the camp, the glow of fires shone brightly through the trees. The Links had learned the use of a lively blaze in keeping off the beasts of prey. I wondered how they had first started their fire, admitting that I should doubtless find no end of trouble if I were obliged to kindle one myself, without a match.

We were met by a large and enthusiastic band of the males, with Fatty in their midst. His capers, at seeing me whole and hearty, were enough to shake an ordinary individual to pieces. He made me ponder on another peculiar thing. How did it happen that he, being black, was not only living among the Reds, but was also at feud with the fellows of his colour? I made up my mind that he was either a freak, like the albino, born in the tribe, or else that he had been captured when a baby, and reared away from his kind. It was certain the black Links recognised a foe in the fellow, whatever his pedigree and blood.

Having conceived an idea, I was glancing about at the trees revealed by the glow of the fires, when I discovered a growth of stuff wherein there was a large portion dead and dry. Going to this, amid evident protest and questionings on the part of many Links, I took out my knife and cut away some likely looking branches. The wood I found to be exceedingly tough. It was hard work to get what I wanted. On bending it over, in an effort to break it off, where my cut had been made, I found it to be exceptionally elastic and stubborn, although I could see it had been dead and seasoned for many months. Getting out a long straight shaft, half as large as my wrist, and several other straight pieces a trifle larger than a pencil, I brought it all to the circle about the fire.

The Links, who were much excited over recent events, watched my every movement with the gravest concern. I faced them and attempted to convey, by signs and pantomime that I intended to make a bow and several arrows with which I could kill six of the number in the briefest time. They understood enough to be highly amused and delighted. There were an incredible number of things they did and said of which the meaning was clear, and with comparative ease I made Fatty understand that I wished him to boil me a dinner in the way he had seen me do already.

Fatty, I believe, was one of the most intelligent of all the Links. He made blunders enough in doing what I wished, while I tried to keep at work on my bow, yet he was insanely anxious to do me any favour and crazy with delight at being considered worthy of employment. Dinner cooking went forward again in the same desultory manner I had noted before, but a large majority of the Links sat or stood about me in the semidarkness, seeming more than ever like apes as they glanced about with their nervous, round eyes, chattered their monkey-like language, and released the muscles of their long, uncanny arms. The glow that was tossed from the fire, making silhouettes of many an astounding red statue, painted a weird picture that night beneath the trees.

As I looked in their faces, many of them drawn with the first vague efforts of thinking, I beheld strange, fleeting promise of things to be, dim lights, as it were, of ambitions—desire to grasp a something just beyond their mental capacity. Many seemed awed by the simple sight of that knife, cutting away the stubborn wood in thin, smooth shavings, as it flashed in the light.

I put my finger on the blade. “Knife,” I said, “knife.”

A few, including Fatty, attempted to repeat the word. A chorus of peculiar laughter followed and the spell of awe was gone. As I worked, then, I pointed to various things and gave the name in English. There was not even one of the Links who failed to comprehend that I was making an effort to establish a means of communication between us, but a very few only tried my easy lessons. Fatty, however, was quite willing to “make a fool of himself,” for he essayed everything, manfully. But better than this, the fellow attempted to reciprocate the favour. Thus when I had given a name to the blazing pieces of wood he waited a moment and then pointing to it earnestly said, distinctly:

“Ouch.”

Then he pantomimed burning his finger, and jerked it back, saying “Ouch” again. He made it plain that the fire would hurt if touched, that a Link would cry “ouch” at the smart, and that therefore a fire was named for this cry. When I proved that this much Link language was mine beyond a doubt, the ecstasy of my fat friend was most extravagant. Gratified with his effort, he soon made me acquainted with the names of a number of articles. These names were invariably chosen in a manner analogous to the one by which they had arrived at “ouch” for fire. For instance, a gurgle, impossible to set down in letters, was the name for water; a sound like a thud meant a club; an audible breath through the lips, (wind), signified a tree. Manifestly such “words” as these defy all efforts at spelling. I found them difficult to imitate, for the throat was largely employed to make the noises and my tongue seemed to be very much in the way. I tried my best, as I worked out my first crude bow, and when I had finished my dinner I felt that no little progress had been made toward a better understanding all around.