Part 18 (1/2)

There was coolness such as he had never known before, but nightfall was not long past. There were smells in the air he had never before experienced,--green things growing, and the peculiar clean odor of wind that has been bathed in suns.h.i.+ne, and the oddly satisfying smell of resinous trees.

But Burl raised his eyes to the heavens. He saw the stars in all their glory, and he was the first human in two thousand years and more to look at them from this planet. There were myriads upon myriads of them, varying in brightness from stabbing lights to infinitesimal twinklings.

They were of every possible color. They hung in the sky above him, immobile and unthreatening. They had not descended. They were very beautiful.

Burl stared. And then he noticed that he was breathing deeply, with a new zest. He was filling his lungs with clean, cool, fragrant air such as men were intended to breathe from the beginning, and of which Burl and many others had been deprived. It was almost intoxicating to feel so splendidly alive and unafraid.

There was a slight sound. Saya stood beside him, trembling a little. To leave the others had required great courage, but she had come to realize that if Burl was in danger she wished to share it.

They heard the nightwind and the orchestra of night-singers. They wandered aside from the cave-mouth and Saya found completely primitive and satisfying pride in the courage of Burl, who was actually not afraid of the dark! Her own uneasiness became something which merely added savor to her pride in him. She followed him wherever he went, to examine this and consider that in the nighttime. It gave her enormous satisfaction at once to think of danger and to feel so safe because of his nearness.

Presently they heard a new sound in the night. It was very far away, and not in the least like any sound they had ever heard before. It changed in pitch as insect-cries do not. It was a baying, yelping sound. It rose, and held the higher note, and abruptly dropped in pitch before it ceased. Minutes later it came again.

Saya s.h.i.+vered, but Burl said thoughtfully:

”That is a good sound.”

He didn't know why. Saya s.h.i.+vered again. She said reluctantly:

”I am cold.”

It had been a rare sensation in the lowlands. It came only after one of the infrequent thunderstorms, when wetted human bodies were exposed to the gusty winds that otherwise never blew. But here the nights grew cold after sundown. The heat of the ground would radiate to outer s.p.a.ce with no clouds to intercept it, and before dawn the temperature might drop nearly to freezing. On a planet so close to its sun, however, there would hardly be more than light h.o.a.r-frost at any time.

The two of them went back to the cave. It was warm there, because of the close packing of bodies and many breaths. Burl and Saya found places to rest and dozed off, Saya's hand again trustfully in Burl's.

He still remained awake for a long time. He thought of the stars, but they were too strange to estimate. He thought of the trees and gra.s.s.

But most of his impressions of this upper world were so remote from previous knowledge that he could only accept them as they were and defer reflecting upon them until later. He did feel an enormous complacency at having led his followers here, though.

But the last thing he actually thought about, before his eyes blinked shut in sleep, was that distant howling noise he had heard in the night.

It was totally novel in kind, and yet there was something buried among the items of his racial heritage that told him it was good.

He was first awake of all the tribesmen and he looked out into the cold and pallid grayness of before-dawn. He saw trees. One side was brightly lighted by comparison, and the other side was dark. He heard the tiny singing noises of the inhabitants of this place. Presently he crawled out of the cave again.

The air was biting in its chill. It was an excellent reason why the giant insects could not live here, but it was invigorating to Burl as he breathed it in. Presently he looked curiously for the source of the peculiar one-sided light.

He saw the top of the sun as it peered above the eastern cloud-bank. The sky grew lighter. He blinked and saw it rise more fully into view. He thought to look upward, and the stars that had bewildered him were nearly gone.

He ran to call Saya.

The rest of the tribe waked as he roused her. One by one, they followed to watch their first sunrise. The men gaped at the sun as it filled the east with colorings, and rose and rose above the seemingly steaming layer of clouds, and then appeared to spring free of the horizon and swim on upward.

The women stared with all their eyes. The children blinked, and s.h.i.+vered, and crept to their mothers for warmth. The women enclosed them in their cloaks, and they thawed and peered out once more at the glory of suns.h.i.+ne and the day. Very soon, too, they realized that warmth came from the great s.h.i.+ning body in the sky. The children presently discovered a game. It was the first game they had ever played. It consisted of running into a shaded place until they s.h.i.+vered, and then of running out into warm suns.h.i.+ne once more. Until this, dawning fear was the motive for such playing as they did. Now they gleefully made a game of suns.h.i.+ne.

In this first morning of their life above the clouds, the tribesmen ate of the food they had brought from below. But there was not an indefinite amount of food left. Burl ate, and considered darkly, and presently summoned his followers' attention. They were quite contented and for the moment felt no need of his guidance. But he felt need of admiration.

He spoke abruptly:

”We do not want to go back to the place we came from,” he said sternly.