There was much use for our ropes. We could tie our boats to the bank with them, needing no longer always to drag the craft ashore; huts could be bound about with them to resist the wind storms better; and there were many other uses for them. Then came the last and greatest thing, for which I gave Black Bow much credit.
In Black Bow’s cave were always ropes, for Humpback had learned to make them strong, ever getting the longest and best of the grass, and plaiting carefully and deftly, and they sufficed to buy much fish, flesh and skins, and so lessened the labours of Black Bow and Loon. A rare creature was Humpback.
It was one night, after looking at a new rope Humpback had finished, that Black Bow, handling it idly, stuck one end of the rope through a loop he had made at the other and sat holding the end in his hand, while the opening in the rope coil lay on the floor. He chanced to rise just as little Crop Ear, running across the cave floor, stepped into it. The rope came up suddenly, and closed about Crop Ear beneath her arms. She was a prisoner! She had stepped into the first noose, and it had risen and tightened about her! There were yells and laughter in the cave, and others were caught as they walked across the floor, or were lassoed with the loop thrown over their heads, and there was much sport there. And the next day, as we sat upon our little rock together, as was our custom after the hunting or the fishing, Black Bow told me of the noose, and later we talked again of the taming, and then the thought of the two things came together!
If the noose at the end of a rope could entrap and hold a child or a man, why could it not as well tighten upon and hold, alive and unharmed, any of the wild creatures, and why could we not thus capture them, and tame them? We reasoned long, and finally came upon a great resolve. We would lay the noose, and hide ourselves, and capture a wild doe, and, it might be, tame her, as the wild dogs had been tamed; for we did not reason at that time that it is only the young of the wild things that can be tamed.
There was a path through the brushwood leading from the forest to the plain, along which many of the deer, and often other creatures, were accustomed to pass to their feeding grounds, and there, we said, we would first place the gripping noose thing, and lie in wait together. So, for days, Humpback worked upon the plaiting of a rope at least seven times the length of a man, and very strong, with a loop for the noose made at one end, and with it Black Bow and I went forth together, to what happening we could not guess. It was late in the afternoon, and already the dusk was coming when we laid the noose in the pathway, and crouched hidden behind the little bushes near, with the other end of the rope wound about both our bodies, that we might pull together, and so be more certain of our capture. We did not have long to wait. There came a thudding, there was a rough brushing aside of the bushes along the pathway, and a great hoof was planted in the noose. Black Bow and I threw ourselves backward with all our force, and drew the strong rope taut.
Of what happened then, neither Black Bow nor I could afterward remember with great clearness. There was a thundering bellow, a rush down the pathway toward the open, and we who were seeking the capture of a gentle doe were torn from our hiding place in the thicket, and carried sliding, bounding, and hurtling away toward where were the rolling pastures of the eaters of grass. Our noose was gripping the hind legs of a great bull aurochs, mightiest creature of the plain, perhaps the one the wolf dogs had annoyed.
Even such huge beast, fearing little, was panic-stricken with that fearful thing grasping it.
Clumsily, because so hampered, and still bellowing, floundering rudely across the billowy prairie, the great brute plunged along; and now dragged through the swift face-cutting grass, now bounced from hummock to hummock, we were hurled along furiously at the end of the rope. I cannot forget it, though it is not good to remember. The rope was about us both; and as we tore through weeds and brush, we bumped and bounded, and, coming to earth again, sometimes Black Bow would be atop, and sometimes I, though which of us was being bruised most fearfully could not be told. Once we tore through the top of a fallen thorn tree, and there was blood upon our faces then. The rope, it seemed to me, was cutting us in twain, but I could not think at the time save in a dim way, that Black Bow and I were going to our death. Then came what was a little less terrible. The aurochs was rushing along now where the plain was more even of surface, and we were dragged smoothly through the grass, and at a lesser pace, for the strain was telling upon even so powerful an animal. Something must come soon, though, or there would be two dead men at the end of the rope. It came, and saved our lives.
There was in the way of the aurochs a little gully, and this he sought to leap in his blundering and hindered flight. His hind leg, drawn backward by the weight at the end of the rope, crippled him in the effort, and he swerved, stumbled, and rolled down upon his back into the depression. He was helpless for the moment in this struggle; and that moment we made the most of, bruised and bleeding as we were, though not insensible. There was a little slack in the rope now: and, since one of our knives still remained in its pouch, we slashed the rope between us and the aurochs, and then the coil about us. It was hard getting to our feet; but soon a little strength came, and we ran weakly together toward the village, for we did not know but the enraged aurochs, which was floundering from the gully now, might do us harm. It was a weary journey; and when we reached our homes and laid down on our skin couches, there was dried blood upon us, and many blue spots upon our skins. We cared no longer for the rope and the noose, and said that we would no more seek to entrap the wild things with it; but that was foolish. We spoke thus because we were sore, and our stomachs weak within us. It was not in us to forget the noose!
Humpback came to me, and upon my hurts bound chewed wet roots and leaves, of which she knew, and which cooled me, and very soon I was myself again, for there were no broken bones, and we strong men minded little such mauling as had come to Black Bow and me. But, as Humpback was doing this, I saw a face at the door, and it was the face of Dark Eyes, and I liked it not, for the red lips were drawn tightly, and the teeth showed. I did not like it, nor the glint in her great eyes. Then I looked up into the eyes of Humpback, and they were soft, and, somehow, curing. I do not know how eyes could be curing; but so seemed the eyes to me, and I liked them much. Long I thought then, and there came to me a great resolve. Humpback should come to me in my cave, and be my wife. Too long had I been alone.