The Trek: Darwin's World, Book II (The Darwin's World Series 2) (25 page)

"You sent Marc and Piotr with Tex, Matt?"

"I did. Is there a problem with that?"

"I'm not sure." Lilia looked away. "It's just that Tex was talking to Marja. I got a funny feeling about it. I don't think she wanted to talk to him. Piotr was off helping Colin at the time. But Marja didn't say anything, so maybe it was nothing."

"Let's not borrow trouble, Lilia, OK? It could be nothing. If there's a problem, she'll tell us about it."

"Well, she didn't mention it to me. I hope she didn't say anything to Piotr."

"If it happens again, let me know. I'll talk to her."

"I will, Matt." Lilia went back to working at the fire.

#

The hunting party came back late that afternoon. The three had indeed found a stag-moose. They'd also found a large doe and two pigs. The animals had all been field-dressed and the heavily loaded cart groaned under the weight. Piotr and Marc pulled the cart, one to each of the poles. Tex followed behind, arrow nocked on his bow.

Matt looked on and approved. There were plenty of dangers around. Even the stag-moose was dangerous, although it appeared they'd had no problems bagging this large male.

Matt congratulated the three and helped push the cart to the kitchen fire. Colin was there and reached for his butcher tools. There would be fresh meat for tomorrow, enough to feed the entire tribe even with the new additions.

#

Matt found Lee and asked if he'd talked to the rescued captives.

"What do you think about the people we picked up, Lee?"

"Matt, they're mostly from Spain, wherever that is. They speak Spanish but they all have some English. They learned it from the slavers; if they misunderstood, the slavers used those whips. So they learned enough words to be understood. They're all from one village, the last one the slavers captured.

"These weren't fighters but I think we need them anyway. The fighting men were killed when the raiders took their village. The others are craftsmen, but not like Sal. They work with things like our spear points."

"They work with iron, you mean?"

"Right. They had a small deposit of some kind of ore, I didn’t understand the term they used. They were using charcoal to heat it. It took a lot of fuel, but they got the ore hot enough to get the iron out. I didn't understand everything they were talking about, but we could sure use more of that iron stuff."

"Will they fight if we teach them, make weapons for them?"

"I'm sure they will, Matt. They just don't know much, but once they learn, I don't think they'll hang back."

"I'll talk to Colin and see what he thinks. If he agrees, we'll offer them membership in the tribe. You'll be responsible for teaching them, you know. I'll put Piotr in charge of making weapons, he'll need some help."

"Marc can help Piotr. I've got others too."

"Not Tex, Lee? He made the bow he’s using, and it's a good one."

"No. Not Tex. Matt, did you see the bruise on Piotr's cheekbone?"

"No. I pushed on the cart and I didn't see anything unusual. Did Piotr say how he got it?"

"He said he walked into a limb in the dark this morning, right after they left camp."

"You think he's hiding something, Lee?"

"Matt, I don't know. He's usually pretty careful. Walking into a limb...well, that's not like Piotr."

Matt nodded thoughtfully; it was just one more possible issue.

But if Tex caused problems within the tribe, Matt would indeed have to deal with it.

Chapter 22

"Anyone seen Tex this morning?"

"Not this morning. He talked to Lee last evening. Maybe he knows where Tex is."

"Thanks, Colin. Lee's out with his security guys right now but I'll check with him when he gets back. How's Sal doing with the ferry?"

"He figures today or maybe tomorrow at the latest, if the rope's ready. That's the drawback, having a rope cable that's long enough and heavy enough. We've only got one chance to test the cable when it's done, and if it snaps we'll lose the ferry. Maybe the people on the ferry too."

"It might be best if no one's on the ferry the first time we try the rope, Colin. We can push it out into the stream and use a kind of rope tether attached to the bridle we talked about. Have people ready who can pull on the rope and change the bridle angle to bring the ferry back. It doesn’t have to be as strong as the main rope."

"Simpler to just tie the rope to the ferry, Matt. Let it swing out, leave it there for a few minutes, then bring it back with the tether rope."

"You're right. Do it that way. The tether rope needs to be almost as strong as the main rope but maybe only half as long."

"We'll see to it, Matt."

"Thanks, Colin."

With Lee and Tex both gone, Matt decided to talk to Elizabeth the Wise Woman. He found her camp south of the kitchen fire, but she was nowhere around. Perhaps she was off looking for herbs. Matt thought for a moment, then realized that Lilia had vanished too. Bella had probably gone with Elizabeth. Shani was helping Sandra with the little ones, not yet teaching so much as getting to know them better. The oldest child, Bear, looked like he would be a handful. Sandra would deal with him, likely with a quick slap on the butt. If she had problems, she could get immediate help from the boy's mother; it helped that the tribespeople were rarely more than a few minutes away from each other.

Piotr was working, chipping at a flint core. This one came from an outcrop just down the ridge from where the tribe had fought the slave raiders. Matt wandered over to see how the project was going.

"You're making progress, Piotr. Have you finished anything yet?"

"I've got a leather bag of arrowheads, Matt. They're not as nice as the ones you made, but they'll do. I'm still getting the hang of using that antler tip to flake the edges. I tried making a knife blade, but it broke, so I made it into another arrowhead."

"I did that too, Piotr. Knife blade, spear blade, if they broke I just converted them to the next smaller tool. They can always be scrapers or bits for boring holes. I didn't waste much after I learned how to flake edges instead of chip them. Have you tried making a bow or spear yet?"

"Just my own, Matt. José is working on weapons for his people. He'll do the wood part, I'll provide the flints, Marja is learning to make bowstrings. Lilia's teaching her."

"Good, the more people who know how to do things, the better. Eventually we'll have paper and can start writing things down before they're forgotten. But for now, just spread the knowledge as wide as we can and hope for the best. Anyway, I'll stop interrupting you. I'm going to have a look at what everyone else is doing."

"See you later, Matt."

A larger group was working just upstream, so Matt went to see if they needed help. As he got closer, he saw that most of the tribe's women and a few of the men were working on the main rope for the ferry. Dominick and two other men had dragged the end into the woods, then wrapped the heavy rope around a large tree. They now adjusted the rope as the women worked, sliding more of it around the tree periodically to take up the slack.

Lilia was there, directing a group of women as they assembled smaller strands into the larger cable. She watched them plait the smaller strands, then twist them together to make the main rope. With each twist the heavy cable grew an inch or two.

Other women waited with replacements for the strands that were being plaited. When one grew short, another was fed in to replace it and the plaiting continued without a pause.

The cable was obviously heavy and it would likely be very strong. Perhaps it would stretch in use; at the moment, even with the tensioning going on at the far end, the cable was almost as thick as Matt's wrist.

The group was busy working and most failed to notice Matt's arrival. He watched quietly before spotting Millie in the shadows, bow in hand and arrow ready on the string. She had selected a position where she could protect the plaiting group as well as the ones tensioning the cable at the far end. Reminded, Matt looked around and spotted weapons stacked near each worker. He nodded his satisfaction, an unconscious gesture. The tribe understood the importance of security nowadays.

Matt found Lee at the cook-fire when he walked back through camp. He was drinking a kind of tea made by Antonia, one of the women freed during the raid on the slavers' village. Mixed with enough honey, the teas were tasty, and according to knowledgeable women good for various ailments.

Lee had already found a bee tree and he thought there was another farther upriver, so honey wasn't likely to be in short supply.

The tribe could raid the bee trees after they established a better camp on the western bank. Crossing the river in either direction would become simple once the ferry began operating.

Someone was turning out new pottery dishes too. Matt didn't know who was doing it, but the products had begun appearing and they didn't look like the ones made by Sandra and Millie back at the cabin. Matt picked up a pottery cup and filled it with tea.

"Lee, Colin said you talked to Tex and no one's seen him today. You didn't send him packing, did you?"

"Not yet, Matt. That's your decision. He's a good fighter, but he's not one to take orders. I asked him to work with the guards, but he said he was going scouting. I think he's across the river."

"Well, at least he's doing something. Did he say what he was looking for?"

"I think he just wanted to see what was over there, Matt. I might be doing that too if I wasn't responsible for the tribe's security."

"I know the feeling, Lee. Maybe you can train a couple of people to handle security and you and I can take off for a few days. Colin's running the camp most of the time and he's doing a good job. All he needs is more experience. We could turn things over to Colin and your assistants and go hunting for a few days."

"I'd like that, Matt. It's been too long. Laz and Marc are almost ready to take over too. Each of them now runs a shift during the night and it gives me a break. If Colin keeps an eye on them, they could handle security. Just you and me, or were you thinking of taking others along too?"

"We can check with Sandra and Lilia, Lee. I don't know if they can drop what they're doing. If they think they can be spared, the four of us can go. I saw animals off to the west, but it was too far to make out what they were. I was looking from the top of the ridge and whatever I saw was a few miles away."

"Some of those mammoths, maybe?"

"Could be. But I think they're bison, what Tex calls buffalo."

"I wouldn't mind a buffalo hunt, Matt. It's dangerous, hunting them on foot, but we could do it. We got a lot of meat last time we did that."

"That's what I was thinking, Lee. When Tex gets back we can ask him what he saw. How'd he cross the river?"

"He said he would swim. I get the idea he's crossed rivers before, swimming."

"I might try it if I were alone, but not with women and kids. And we've got all the tools and things we've made; they're too heavy to carry while swimming."

"Sure, Tex only has Tex to worry about. He can do things we can't."

"So he can. Well, if he's useful and not causing trouble, he can stay. Or he can go, if that's what he wants to do. We're providing safety for the people in camp, but we don't keep anyone here by force."

"That's how I saw it, Matt. There was no reason to bother you with it. Anyway, he's being useful so far. About not causing trouble..."

"You know something I don't, Lee?"

"Not really. It's just a feeling. I'm watching, but I haven't seen anything yet."

"Don't try to handle it yourself, Lee. If there's a problem, bring it to Colin and me. The three of us can decide what to do."

Lee nodded, and Matt left. Continuing downriver, he found Sal and Miguel wading hip-deep in the river. Between them floated the ferry. A quick estimate put the length at almost thirty feet and the width somewhere between ten and fifteen feet. Miguel was wrapping a kind of rope made of thin roots, plaited together, to secure one of the side rails. Another was already finished and standing above the ferry's cross-log deck.

Matt inspected the lashings that held the logs together but found no faults. He congratulated Sal, and while they were talking two men brought up the completed tether cable. A beaming Sal soon had it attached to the nearest end of the ferry and gestured to Matt.

"Want the first ride, Matt?"

Matt grinned back and said, "Sure. Think this thing is safe?"

"Why don't we find out? We'll push the raft into the stream, and a rope crew can control how far out we go, drag us back after we've reached the end. I'll tell them what we're doing. We'll need a couple of push-poles, I think."

Matt nodded and went off to cut two poles. Half an hour later he returned, handing one of the arm-thick poles to Sal.

"You understand that if the rope breaks, we're going to have a very interesting ride?"

Sal grinned back. "It's been interesting since I got here, Matt. But I think we can be careful and use the poles to take some of the strain off the rope. Just let me talk to a couple of the guys first. I want them to wrap the line around a tree and pay it out as we push away from the shore, not try to hold us by muscle power alone. I don't think we should try to cross the river yet, do you?"

"Not unless that river is shallower than it looks, Sal. The current doesn't look fast, but it could be anywhere from six to sixty feet deep in the middle."

"I doubt it will be more than ten feet at the most. The poles you cut are twenty-five feet or so, plenty of reach, thick enough for us to push against. Let's just see what the river looks like after we're away from the bank."

Matt nodded and jumped onto the raft, pole held overhead. He felt the raft rock as Sal boarded. Matt took up a post where he thought he could best control the front of the raft, leaving Sal to handle the rear. He would position himself, with his pole angled to resist the current when the raft drifted downstream. Matt nodded his readiness and Sal placed the butt end of his pole against the bank. He held the smaller end with his arms wide apart for leverage, knees flexed to add power.