When the two started on their journey back to the Country of the Little Hills, Grom carried with him a bundle of blazing brands. He had conceived the idea of keeping the bright god alive by feeding him continually as they went, and of renewing his might from time to time by stopping to build a big fire. The undertaking proved a troublesome one from the first. The brand kept the great beasts at a distance, time and again the red coals almost died out, and Grom had anxious and laborious moments nursing them again into activity; and the care of the mysterious things made progress slow. Grom learned much, and rapidly, in these anxious efforts. He discovered once, just at a critical moment, the remarkable efficacy of dry grass. A bear as big as an ox came rushing upon them, just when the flames were flickering out along the bundle of brands. A-ya started to run, but Grom's nerve was of steel. Ordering her to stop, he flung the brands to the ground, and snatched a double handful of grass to feed the dying flame. Luckily, the grass was dry. It flared up on the sudden. The bear stopped short. Grom piled on more grass, shouted arrogantly, and rushed at the beast with a blazing handful. It was a light and harmless flame, almost instantly extinguished. But it was too mysterious for the monster to face. Grom was wise enough not to follow up his victory. Returning to the fire he fed it to a safe volume. And the girl, flinging herself down in a passion of relief and adoration, embraced his knees. After this they journeyed slowly, Grom tending the brands with vigilant care, and striving to break down the girl's terror of them. That night he built three fires about the base of a huge tree, gathered a supply of dry wood, taught the girl to feed the flames--which she did with head bowed in awe--and passed the hours of darkness, once so dreaded, in proud defiance of the great beasts which prowled and roared beyond the circle of light. He made the girl sleep, but he himself was too prudent to sleep, lest these fires of his own creation should prove false when his eye was not upon them. The following day, about midday, when he slept heavily in the heat, the fire went out. It had got low, and the girl, attempting to revive it, had smothered it with too much fuel. In an agony of fear and remorse, she knelt at Grom's side, awakened him, and showed him what she had done. She expected a merciless beating, according to the rough-and-ready customs of her tribe. But Grom had always been held a little peculiar, especially in his aversion to the beating of women, so that certain females of the tribe had even been known to question his manhood on that account.