_11. WARM BLOOD IS A BOND_
Peculiarly enough, it was a matter of topography. The plateau whichreached above the clouds rose with a steep slope from the valley fromwhich a hunting-spider's brood had driven the men. This was on theeastern edge of the plateau. On the west, however, the highland wassubject to an indentation which almost severed it. No more than twentymiles from where Burl's group had climbed to sunshine, there was a muchmore gradual slope downward. There, mushroom-forests grew almost to thecloud-layer. From there, giant insects strayed up and onto the plateauitself.
They could not live above the clouds, of course. There was not foodenough for their insatiable hunger. Especially at night, it was too coldto allow them to stay active. But they did stray from their normalenvironment, and some of them did reach the sunshine, and perhaps someof them blundered back down to their mushroom-forests again. But thosewhich did not stumble back were chilled to torpor during their firstnight underneath the stars. They were only partly active on the secondday,--if, indeed, they were active at all. Few or none recovered fromtheir second nights' coldness. None at all kept their full ferocity anddeadliness.
And this was how the dogs survived. They were certainly descended fromdogs on the wrecked space-ship--the _Icarus_--whose crew had landed onthis planet some forty-odd human generations since. The humans of todayhad no memories of the ship, and the dogs surely had no traditions. Butjust because those early dogs had less intelligence, they had moreuseful instincts. Perhaps the first generations of castaways bred dogsin their first few desperate centuries, hoping that dogs could help themsurvive. But no human civilization could survive in the lowlands. Thehumans went back to the primitive state of their race and lived asfurtive vermin among monsters. Dogs could not survive there, thoughhumans did linger on, so somehow the dogs took to the heights. Perhapsdogs survived their masters. Perhaps some were abandoned or driven away.But dogs had reached the highlands. And they did survive because giantinsects blundered up after them,--and could not survive in a properenvironment for dogs and men.
There was even reason for the dogs remaining limited in number, andkeenly intelligent. The food-supply was limited. When there were toomany dogs, their attacks on stumbling insect giants were more desperateand made earlier, before the monsters' ferocity was lessened. So moredogs died. Then there was an adjustment of the number of dogs to thefood-supply. There was also a selection of those too intelligent toattack rashly. Yet those who had insufficient courage would not eat.
In short, the dogs who now regarded men with bright, interested eyeswere very sound dogs. They had the intelligence needed for survival.They did not attack anything imprudently, but they also knew that it wasnot necessary to be more than reasonably wary of insects ingeneral,--not even spiders unless they were very newly arrived from thesteaming lowlands. So the dogs regarded men with very much the sameastonished interest with which the men regarded the dogs.
Burl saw immediately that the dogs did not act with the blind ferocityof insects, but with an interested, estimative intelligence strikinglylike that of men. Insects never examined anything. They fled or theyfought. Those who were not carnivorous had no interest in anything butfood, and those who were meat-eaters lumbered insanely into battle atthe bare sight of possible prey. The dogs did neither. They sniffed andthey considered.
Burl said sharply to his followers:
"Stay here!"
He walked slowly down into the amphitheatre. Saya followed himinstantly. Dogs moved warily aside. But they raised their noses andsniffed. They were long, luxurious sniffs. The smell of human kind was agood smell. Dogs had lived hundreds of their generations without havingit in their nostrils, but before that there were thousands ofgenerations to whom that smell was a necessity.
Burl reached the object the dogs had been attacking. It lay on thegrass, throbbing painfully. It was the larva of an azure-blue moth whichspread ten-foot wings at nightfall. The time for its metamorphosis wasnear, and it had traveled blindly in search of a place where it couldspin its cocoon safely and change to its winged form. It had come toanother world,--the world above the clouds. It could find no properplace. Its stores of fat had protected it somewhat from the chill. Butthe dogs had found it as it crawled blindly--.
Burl considered. It was the custom of wasps to sting creatures like thisat a certain special spot,--apparently marked for them by a tuft of darkfur.
Burl thrust home with his lance. The point pierced that particular spot.The creature died quickly and without agony. The thought to kill was aninspiration. Then instinct followed. Burl cut off meat for histribesmen. The dogs offered no objection. They were well-fed enough.Burl and Saya, together, carried the meat back to the other tribesfolk.On the way Burl passed within two yards of a dog which regarded him withextreme intentness and almost a wistful expression. Burl's smell did notmean game. It meant--something the dog struggled helplessly to remember.But it was good.
"I have killed the thing," said Burl to the dog, in the tone of oneaddressing an equal. "You can go and eat it now. I took only part ofit."
Burl and his people ate of what he had brought back. Many of thedogs--most of them--went to the feast Burl had left. Presently they wereback. They had no reason to be hostile. They were fed. The humansoffered them no injury, and the humans smelled of something thatappealed to the deepest well-springs of canine nature.
Presently the dogs were close about the humans. They were fascinated.And the humans were fascinated in return. Each of the people had alittle of the feeling that Burl had experienced as the tribal leader. Inthe intent, absorbed and wholly unhostile regard of the dogs, evenchildren felt flattered and friendly. And surely in a place whereeverything else was so novel and so satisfactory, it was possible toimagine friendliness with creatures which were not human, sinceassuredly they were not insects.
A similar state of mind existed among the dogs.
Saya had more meat than she desired. She glanced among the members ofthe tribe. All were supplied. She tossed it to a dog. He jerked awayalertly, and then sniffed at it where it had dropped. A dog can alwayseat. He ate it.
"I wish you would talk to us," said Saya hopefully.
The dog wagged his tail.
"You do not look like us," said Saya interestedly, "but you act like wedo. Not like the--Monsters."
The dog looked significantly at meat in Burl's hand. Burl tossed it. Thedog caught it with a quick snap, swallowed it, wagged his tail brieflyand came closer. It was a completely incredible action, but dogs and menwere blood-kin on this planet. Besides, there was racial-memoryrightness in friendship between men and dogs. It was not hindered by anypast experience of either. They were the only warm-blooded creatures onthis world. It was a kinship felt by both.
Presently Burl stood up and spoke politely to the dog. He addressed himwith the same respect he would have given to another man. In all hislife he had never felt equal to an insect, but he felt no arrogancetoward this dog. He felt superior only to other men.
"We are going back to our cave," he said politely. "Maybe we will meetagain."
He led his tribe back to the cave in which they had spent the previousnight. The dogs followed, ranging on either side. They were well-fed,with no memory of hostility to any creature which smelled of warm blood.They had an instinct without experience to dull it. The latter part ofthe journey back to the tribal cave was--if anybody had been qualifiedto notice it--remarkably like a group of dogs taking a walk with a groupof people. It was companionable. It felt right.
That night Burl left the cave, as before, to look at the stars. Thistime Saya went with him matter-of-factly. But as they came out of thecave-entrance there was a stirring. A dog rose and stretched himselfelaborately, yawning the while. When Burl and Saya moved away, hetrotted amiably with them.
They talked to it, and the dog seemed pleased. It wagged its tail.
When morning came, the dogs were still waiting hopefully for the humansto come out. They appeared to expect the people to take another nic
elong walk, on which they would accompany them. It was a brand-newsatisfaction they did not want to miss. After all, from a dog'sstandpoint, humans are made to take long walks with, among other things.The dogs greeted the people with tail-waggings and cordiality.
The dogs made a great difference in the adjustment of the tribe to lifeupon the plateau. Their friendship assured the new status of human life.Burl and his fellows had ceased to be fugitive game for any insectmurderer. They had hoped to become unpursued foragers,--because theycould hardly imagine anything else. But when the dogs joined them, theywere immediately raised to the estate of hunters. The men did notdomesticate the dogs. They made friends with them. The dogs did notsubjugate themselves to the men. They joined them,--at firsttentatively, and then with worshipful enthusiasm. And the partnershipwas so inevitably a right one that within a month it was as if it hadalways been.
Actually, save for a mere two thousand years, it had been.
At the end of a month the tribe had a permanent encampment. There werecaves at a suitable distance from the slope up which most wanderers fromthe lowlands came. Cori's oldest child found the chrysalis of a giantbutterfly, whose caterpillar form had so offensive an odor that the dogshad not attacked it. But when it emerged from the chrysalis, men anddogs together assailed it before it could take flight. They ended theenterprise with warm mutual approval. The humans had acquired greatwings with which to make warm cloaks,--very useful against the eveningchill. Dogs and men, alike, had feasted.
Then, one dawning, the dogs made a vast outcry which awoke thetribesmen. Burl led the rush to the spot. They did battle with a monsternocturnal beetle, less chilled than most such invaders. In the graydawnlight Burl realized that the darting, yapping dogs kept thecreature's full attention. He crippled, and then killed it with hisspear. The feat appeared to earn him warm admiration from the dogs. Burlwore a moth's feathery antenna again, bound to his forehead like aknight's plumes. He looked very splendid.
The entire pattern of human life changed swiftly, as if an entirerevelation had been granted to men. The ground was often thorny. One manpierced his foot. Old Tama, scolding him for his carelessness, bound astrip of wing-fabric about it so he could walk. The injured foot wasmore comfortable than the one still unhurt. Within a week the womenwere busily contriving diverse forms of footgear to achieve greatercomfort for everybody. One day Saya admired glistening red berries andtried to pluck one, and they stained her fingers. She licked her fingersto clean them,--and berries were added to the tribe's menu. A veritableorgy of experiment began, which is a state of things which is extremelyrare in human affairs. A race with an established culture and traditiondoes not abandon old ways of doing things without profound reason. Butmen who have abandoned their old ways can discover astonishingly usefulnew ones.
Already the dogs were established as sentries and watchmen, and asfriends to every member of the tribe. By now mothers did not feelalarmed if a child wandered out of sight. There would be dogs along. Nodanger could approach a child without vociferous warning from the dogs.Men went hunting, now, with zestful tail-wagging dogs as companions inthe chase. Dor killed a torpid minotaur-beetle alone, save for assistingdogs, and Burl felt a twinge of jealousy. But then Burl, himself,battled a black male spider in a lone duel,--with dogs to help. By thetime a stray monster from the lowlands reached this area, it was dazedand half-numbed by one night of continuous chill. Even the black spidercould not find the energy to leap. It fought like a fiend, yetsluggishly. Burl killed this one while the dogs kept it busy,--and thedogs were reproachful because he carried it back to the tribalheadquarters before dividing it among his assistants. Afterward, herealized that though he could have avoided the fight he would have beenashamed to do so, while the dogs barked and snapped at its furry legs.
It was while things were in this state that the way of life for humanbeings on the forgotten planet was settled for all time. Burl and Sayawent out early one morning with the dogs, to hunt for meat for thevillage. Hunting was easiest in the early hours, while creatures thatstrayed up the night before were still sluggish with cold. Often,hunting was merely butchery of an enfeebled monster to whom any effortat all was terribly difficult.
This morning they strode away briskly. The dogs roved exuberantlythrough the brush before them. They were some five miles from thevillage when the dogs bayed game. And Burl and Saya ran to the spot withready spears,--which was something of a change from their former actionson notice of a carnivore abroad. They found the dogs dancing and barkingaround one of the most ferocious of the meat-eating beetles. It was notunduly large, to be sure. Its body might have been four feet long, orthereabouts. But its horrible gaping mandibles added a good three feetmore.
Those scythelike weapons gaped wide--opening sidewise as insects' jawsdo--as the beetle snapped hideously at its attackers, swinging about asthe dogs dashed at it. Its legs were spurred and spiked and armed withdagger-like spines. Burl plunged into the fight.
The great mandibles clicked and clashed. They were capable ofdisemboweling a man or snapping a dog's body in half without effort.There were whistling noises as the beetle breathed through its abdominalspiracles. It fought furiously, making ferocious charges at the dogs whotormented and bewildered it. But they created the most zestfully excitedof tumults.
Burl and Saya were, of course, at least as absorbed and excited as thedogs, or they would have noticed the thing that was to make so muchdifference to every human being, not only on the plateau but still downin the lowlands. This unnoticed thing was beyond their imagining. Therehad been nothing else like it on this world in many hundreds of years.It was half a dozen miles away and perhaps a thousand feet high whenBurl and Saya prepared to intervene professionally on behalf of thedogs. It was a silvery needle, floating unsupported in the air. As theyentered the battle, it swerved and moved swiftly in their direction.
It was silent, and they did not notice. They knew of no reason to scanthe sky in daytime. And there was business on hand, anyhow.
Burl leaped in toward the beetle with a lance-thrust at the toughintegument where an armored leg joined the creature's body. He missed,and the beetle whirled. Saya flashed her cloak before the monster sothat it seemed a larger and a nearer antagonist. As the creature whirledagain, Burl stabbed and a hind-leg crumpled.
Instantly the thing was limping. A beetle does not use its legs likefour-legged creatures. A beetle moving shifts the two end legs on oneside and the central leg on the other, so that it always stands on anadjustable tripod of limbs. It cannot adjust readily to crippling. A dogsnatched at a spiny lower leg and crunched,--and darted away. Themachine-like monster uttered a formless, deep-bass cry and was spurredto unbelievable fierceness. The fight became a thing of furious movementand joyous uproar, with Burl striking once at a multiple eye so the painwould deflect it from a charge at Saya, and Saya again deflecting itwith her cloak and once breathlessly trying to strike it with hershorter spear.
They struck it again, and a third time, and it sank horribly to theground, all three legs on one side crippled. The remaining three thrustand thrust and struggled senselessly,--and suddenly it was on its back,still striking its gigantic jaws frantically in the hope of murder. Butthen Burl struck home between two armor-plates where a ganglion wasalmost exposed. The blow killed it instantly.
Burl and Saya were smiling at each other when there was a monstroussound of crashing trees. They whirled. The dogs pricked up their ears.One of them barked defiantly.
Something huge--truly huge!--had settled to the ground a bare twohundred yards away. It was metal, and there were ports in its sides, andit was quite beyond imagining. Because, of course, no space-ship hadlanded on this planet in forty-odd human generations.
A port opened as they stared at it. Men came out. Burl and Saya werebarbarically attired, but they had been fighting some sort of localmonster--the men on the space-ship could not quite grasp what they hadseen--and they had been helped by dogs. Human beings and dogs, together,always mean some sort of civiliz
ation.
The dogs gave an impression of a very high level indeed. They trottedconfidently over to the ship, and they sniffed cautiously at the men whohad landed. Then their behavior was admirable. They greeted the new-comemen with the self-confident cordiality of dogs who are on the bestpossible terms with human beings,--and there was no question of anysuspicion by anybody. The attitude of a man toward a dog is a perfectlyvalid indication of his character, if not of his technical education.And the newcomers knew how to treat dogs.
So Burl and Saya went forward, with the confident pleasure with whichwell-raised children and other persons of innate dignity greetstrangers.
The ship was the _Wapiti_, a private cruiser doing incidentalexploration for the Biological Survey in the course of a trip after goodhunting. It had touched on the forgotten planet, and it would never beforgotten again.