Time's Last Gift by Philip José Farmer Read Free Book Online

fired the bullets, one after the other.
    The boulder was a heap of fragments.
    The warriors had disappeared.
    Gribardsun reloaded with explosive bullets and continued climbing. Before reaching the ledge, however, he stopped and shot three times into the overhang just underneath its edge. Several large pieces of rock fell off. Screams followed the explosions, and warriors, women, and children deserted the site. They fled in two streams down the sides of the ledge and on down the hillside, falling, leaping up again, yelling, shrilling mindlessly.
    ‘I hope they don’t hurt themselves,’ Gribardsun said.
    Their four natives were whooping with joy and slapping each other on the back or the thighs. Then Angrogrim started toward the refugees on their right. He held his spear high, shaking it, and screaming threats at them.
    Gribardsun called after him, but the giant continued to run toward the refugees. The Englishman fired into the air, and Angrogrim turned to see what he was doing. Gribardsun gestured fiercely at him to come back. Scowling, the giant obeyed. Gribardsun shook his finger at him and scolded him as if he were a child. Angrogrim looked down at him as if he thought he was very odd. But he did not protest, and when he saw the others continue their climb, he followed them.
    At the top, they looked around the deserted site. Von Billmann used his movie camera. Gribardsun looked cautiously through the tents and found an old man and woman cowering in one and a sick five-year-old child in the other. He got the child to swallow a panacea and then ran the diagnoser over his body and took a sample of blood.
    The old couple were almost toothless, and the woman was blind. Both shook so violently that they could not answer when Thammash spoke to them. Finally, the woman replied, and Thammash raised his eyebrows, shrugged his shoulders, and turned his palms upward. It was evident that he did not understand the woman’s language.
    Von Billmann made signs that Thammash should continue to elicit speech from the couple. But Thammash was more interested in loot. He and the others were busy prowling around, inspecting and appropriating flint and bone spearheads, atlatls, bone fishhooks, and needles and bone and ivory figurines.
    Gribardsun watched them carefully, and when he saw Gullshab enter the tent of the sick child, he went after him. He was just in time to stop him from plunging his spear into the boy’s solar plexus. Gullshab was somewhat resentful, but he understood that the child was not to be harmed, and he passed the message along to the others.
    However, Angrogrim did not think that the restriction applied to the old couple. He picked up a club and started toward the oldsters’ tent but stopped when Gribardsun shouted at him. He threw the club down angrily and walked off.
    Gribardsun made signs that each should pick up a piece of bear and start back. It would be dusk within half an hour. It was evident that they would have to leave at least half of the bear meat behind, so several of the men started to foul it. Gribardsun ordered them to stop, and when they pretended they did not understand him, he made threatening signs. Reluctantly, they turned away and hoisted the meat they had chosen onto their shoulders.
    ‘I just wanted to scare the strangers away so we could recover some of the meat and thus impress both parties,’ Gribardsun said. ‘I see no reason why we can’t contact these people later and perhaps conduct studies of them, too.’
    Gribardsun hoisted a hind leg of cave bear upon his shoulder and led his band back down the hill. The refugees had halted their mad flight and the two groups were now standing near the bottom of the hill and watching the strangers. The six men proceeded slowly and carefully under their burdens, unhindered by the two groups. After they had crossed the river, they did hear threatening shouts but these were mere bravado. None of the shouters ran after them to throw spears.
    Darkness