"
He motioned with his hand to the boiling pot. There was not a ficker of
animation in his splendid face. There was something godlike in his
immobility, something that was awesome in the way he moved and breathed.
His voice, too, it seemed to Roscoe, was filled with the old, old mystery
of the beginning of things, of history that was long dead and lost for all
time. And it came upon Roscoe now, like a flood of rare knowledge
descending from a mysterious source, that he had at last discovered the key
to new life, and that through the blindness of reason, through starvation
and death, fate had led him to the Great Truth that was dying with the last
sons of the First People. For the half of the last fish was brought to
him, and he ate; and when the knowledge that he was eating life away from
these people choked him, and he thrust a part of it back, the girl herself
urged him to continue, and he finished, with her dark, glorious eyes fixed
upon him and sending warm floods through his veins. And after that the men
bolstered him up with the bear skin, and the two went out again into the
storm. The woman sat hunched before the fire, and after a little the girl
joined her and piled fresh fagots on the blaze. Then she sat beside her,
with her chin resting in the little brown palms of her hands, the fire
lighting up a half profile of her face and painting rich colour in her
deep-black hair.
Pages:
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219