While the closest of them little Ooso could be encouraged to think beyond the tribe, an ape she remained, finding comfort in the very things that so chafed against Gazda. She even went so far as to suggest that he’d do better to embrace the life that was unfolding. There was food, and rest, and did he never think of starting a family of his own?
She had explained that she was close to choosing from among her many suitors.
Kagoon, the other of his closest mates, was hopeless for as he had grown larger he had become more of a blackback preferring the company of others like him. His physical size and strength had helped him to overcome the reticence that he had always felt because his brain was renowned for its slowness, but few among the other adolescent males seemed to notice.
It had been years since Kagoon had spent much time with either Gazda or Ooso, though his distance from the she-ape could be attributed to his interest in her as a mate. Ooso had tried to dissuade him after he announced his intentions, but was unable to do so without hurting his feelings.
They all remained friends, but they were growing apart.
So with his closest companions in the full embrace of tribal life, Gazda started taking longer trips away to explore Goro’s land, to hone his hunting skills and to visit Fur-nose’s—now Gazda’s—lair where he could hole up to contemplate his fortunes, sleep, or puzzle at the treasures and oddities he found inside.
Gazda felt safe within its walls for he’d noticed that all the animals gave the structure a wide berth when passing through the clearing, as though memory of its former occupant kept them away.
He knew the tree-nest had that effect upon the blackbacks of his tribe. Its history was told in tales by the older apes—especially Baho—who knew of Fur-nose and now the lair’s avoidance had been made into law by Goro’s insistence that it was not a place for apes to be—and few could forget the thunder-hand.
Especially when they were reminded.
It didn’t matter that the odd creature had been dead for years and the thunder-hand gone. Of course, Gazda understood these things better than anyone, but was happy to leave the stories in place for he did not want the other apes to know he had adopted the tree-nest as his own lair.
Sometimes he wondered if the other jungle creatures avoided the tree-nest because they felt the presence of the dark trees that Gazda had come to shun on his trips into the clearing. Their unsettling smell was always evident if the wind was right, and they were ever there at the corner of his eye.
The first time Gazda slept there had come after a noisy argument among the she-apes had brought him from his morning nap and sent him storming off through the treetops in search of peace and quiet.
He had only just arrived at the lair when the day-weakness came upon him again, so he quickly shut the door. With only a glance at the former occupant’s remains; he stretched out on the big flat structure that he had intuitively come to recognize as Fur-nose’s bed. Its soft covering against his naked skin had made his repose there irresistible.
After a brief sleepy study of the pelts, skulls and horns that adorned the wall over him, he had closed his eyes and then...
There was darkness, but sound had come to him from within it. A sad call that came again and again, seemingly from all around him as if it were generated by many creatures or had echoed from afar. No lion’s roar, or hyena’s scream to warn of danger, this was a high-pitched howl like birds or monkeys might make, but deep with feeling; a lament that had strangely soothed him.
Gazda had been drawn toward the bittersweet call in his dream, dear and familiar to him somehow, but mournfully did it linger in his heart, repeating there tragically like the cry of orphaned apes lost in the night. He awakened weeping with his eyes temporarily blinded as though a black veil set over them was slowly drawn away.
From time to time since then he had heard this in his sleep, but always the call haunted his memory—and never could he picture the beasts that gave it voice.
Gazda retreated to the lair whenever he could. He was usually inspired to visit by boredom or curiosity; but it was a place away from the group that had little in common with the other apes, so he felt at home where he was sure that they would not.
It offered some respite to the night ape’s busy mind.
On this occasion, the tribe had wandered far to the east of the tree-nest, and Gazda knew it was a full half-day’s travel or more to get there and another to return, but since his hunting had already taken him toward the clearing, he had crossed the final distance with little thought of rejoining the tribe before nightfall.
His confidence had grown as he aged, and his abilities assured his own safety. The shadows held few things he feared anymore, so for short periods he was learning to forget his ingrained need to be near the tribe after sunset. He felt safe in the dark by himself with no one close to hear his cry.
Gazda’s only concern was for Eeda, whom on several occasions he’d found near sunrise, searching the treetops for him if his hunting had ever taken him far and his mother had awakened in her sleeping tree to find him outside the range of her call.
He always took the punishment she gave him without complaint because he was more worried about her wandering the jungle shadows in search of him without his or Goro’s protection near, and he would have blamed himself if something ever happened to her.
Because of this, the night ape had many times abandoned previous plans to
