Before Adam

e were incapable of a cooperative effort strong enough to kill him or cast him out. Rude as was our social organization, he was, nevertheless, too rude to live in it. He tended always to

ever had more than one wife at a time, but that he was married many times. It was impossible for any

ng enough to st

trooping into the open space before the caves. They dare linger no later than this, for the dreadful darkness is approaching, in

Even the cubs, still greedy for fun and antics, play with restraint. The wind from the sea has died down, and the shadows are lengthening with

ring of helpless rage. It is plain that the men resent Red-Eye's actions, but they are too afraid of him. The b

of the cliff, did we find the body of his latest wife. He had tossed her there, after she had died, from his cave-mouth. He never buried his dead. The task of c

nothing. We had not yet developed any government, to speak of, inside the horde. We had certain customs and visited our wrath upon the unlucky ones who violated those customs. Thus, for example, the individual who defiled a drinking-place would be attacked by

squeeze to get in through the entrance-crevice. This had had its advantages, however. It had prevented the larger Folk from taking o

enlarged the crevice-opening. But they never thought of it. Lop-Ear and I did not think of it either until our increasing size compelled us to make an

. This worked well. Also it worked woe. One morning early, we had scratched out of the wall quite a heap of fragments. I gave the heap a shove over the lip of the e

get in to us. Suddenly he went away. This was suspicious. By all we knew of Folk nature he should have remained and had out his rage. I crept to the entrance and peeped down. I could s

almost out of range. But by industrious poking he got us now and again-cruel, scraping jabs with the end of the stic

f the cornered rat. I caught hold of the stick with my hands, but such was his strength that he jerked me into the crevice. He reached f

a stick with which to jab back, but found only the end of a branch, an inch through and a foot long. I threw this at Red-Eye. It did no damage, though he howled

from the wall. The piece must have weighed two or three pounds. With my strength I slammed it full into Red

ht sight of me, and roared with fury. His stick was gone, so he began ripping out chunks of crumbling rock and throwing them in at me. This supplied me with a

fast as he could. Red-Eye sprang out from the wall and finished the last twenty feet through the air. He landed alongside a mother who was just beginning the ascent. She screamed with fear, and the two-year-old child that was clinging to her released its grip

s fate. Red-Eye hesitated a moment, and Marrow-Bone, shivering terribly, bowed his head and covered his face with his crossed arms. Then Red-Eye slammed him face-downward to the ground. Old Marrow-Bone did not struggle. He lay there crying with the

ngry and fairly cool. Running back and forth along the neighboring ledges, I gathered a heap of rocks at the cave-entrance. Red-Eye was now several yards beneath me, concealed for the moment by an out-j

-Eye snarled down at them, and on the instant they were subdued to silence. Encouraged by this evidence of his power, he thrust his head into view, and by scowling and snarling and gnashing his fangs

down at him and made a sheer miss. The next shot was a success. The stone struck him on the neck. He slipped back out of sight, but as he disappeared

ched on the lip of the entrance and waited. The strangling and coughing died down, and I could hear him now and again clearing his throat

arrow-Bone, hobbling and tottering, followed behind. Red-Eye took no notice of the flight. When he reached t

and quietness, we began climbing up the cliff. When we reached the top we looked back. The abiding-plac

nt, and on and on, swinging our arboreal flight until we had put miles between us and the caves. And then, and not till then, in the security of a great fork, we paus