The Story of Ab: A Tale of the Time of the Cave ManWaterloo, Stanley
Science
The Story of Ab: A Tale of the Time of the Cave Man
Waterloo, Stanley
Prehistoric peoples -- Fiction; Science fiction
The fleeing girl was fortunate in stumbling upon her friend as soon as she
came into the open space about the cave. Moonface was enjoying herself
lazily that afternoon. She was leaning back idly in a swing of vines to
which she had braided a flexible back, and was blinking somnolently in the
sunshine as the visitor leaped from the wood. Moonface recognized her
friend, gave a quavering cry of delight and came slipping and rolling
recklessly to the ground to meet her. Lightfoot uttered no word. She stood
breathless, and was rather carried than led by Moonface to an easy seat,
moss-padded, upon twisted tree roots, which was that young lady's ordinary
resting-place. Upon this seat the two sank, one overcome with past fear
and present fatigue, and the other with an all-absorbing and demanding
curiosity. It was beyond the ordinary scope of the self-restraining forces
in Moonface to await with calm the recovery of Lightfoot's breath and
powers of conversation. She pinched and shook her friend and demanded,
half-crying but impatiently, some explanation. It was a great hour for
Moonface, the greatest in her life. Here was her friend and dictator
panting and terrified like some weak, hunted-down thing of the wood. It
was a marvel. At last Lightfoot spoke:
"They are fighting at the foot of the hill!" she said, and Moonface at
once guessed the whole story, for she was not blind, this wide-mouthed
creature.
"Why did you run away?" she asked.
"I ran because I was scared. One of them must be dead before this time. I
am glad I am alive myself," Lightfoot gasped. Then the girl covered her
face with her hands as she recalled Ab's face, distorted by passion and
murderous hate, and Oak's equally maddened look as, before the onrush, he
had grasped her so firmly that the marks of his fingers remained blue upon
her arms and slender waist and neck.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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