Earth Abides

“It is from one of the little round things. They have faces on them. The old men have a name for them, but I do not remember exactly. It is something like corns.”

The young man paused, as if to be told the right word, but when he had no reply, he went on again, being obviously eager to show off his knowledge about arrowheads.

“We find these little round things in the old buildings. Often there are many—many—of them in the boxes and drawers. Sometimes they are rolled up together in bundles like short round sticks, but heavier than sticks. Some are red and some are white, like this one, and there are two kinds of the white. The one kind of white—the one that has the picture of the hump-backed bull—we do not use those because they are harder to pound.”

Ish considered, and thought that he understood.

“And this white one here?” he asked. “Was there a relief—picture—on this one?”

The young man took the arrow from Ish, and looked at it, and then handed it back.

“They all have pictures,” he said. “But I was looking to see if I could still make out what picture was on this one. It has not quite all gone because of the hammering. This was one of the littlest ones, and it had the picture of the woman with the wings growing out of her head. Some of them have pictures of hawks—but not real hawks.” The young man was talking very happily. “Others have men; at least, they look like men—one with a beard, and one with long hair hanging behind him and another with a strong-looking face, without a beard and with short hair, and heavy-jawed.”

“And who—who do you think—were all these men?”

The young man glanced both ways, as if a little nervous.

“These—oh, these—yes! These, we think—as you yourself, Ish, well know—these were the Old Ones that were before our Old Ones!”

When there was no thunder from heaven and when the young man could see that Ish was not displeased, he went on:

“Yes, that must be it—as you yourself, Ish, well know. These men, and the hawks, and the bull! Perhaps the woman with the wings growing from her head sprang from the marriage of a hawk and a woman. But, however it is, they do not seem to mind our taking their pictures and hammering them up for arrowheads. I have wondered about it. Perhaps they are too great to care about little things, or perhaps they did their work a long time ago and have now grown old and weak.”

He stopped talking, but Ish could see that he was pleased with himself, and liked to talk, and was thinking quickly of something more to say. He, at least, had imagination.

“Yes,” the young man continued, “I have an idea. Our Old Ones—they were the Americans—made the houses and bridges and the little round things that we hammer out for arrowheads. But those others—the Old Ones of the Old Ones—perhaps they made the hills and the sun, and the Americans themselves.”

Then, though it was a cheap trick to play on the young man, Ish could not resist talking in double meaning.

“Yes,” he said, “I have heard it said that those older Old Ones produced the Americans—but I rather doubt that they made the hills and the sun.”

Though he could not have understood, perhaps the young man caught the irony in the tone, and so said nothing.

“But, go on,” Ish continued then. “Tell me more about the arrowheads themselves. I am not interested in your cosmogony.” He used the last word in good-humored malice, knowing that the other would not understand it, but would be impressed by its length and strange sound.

“Yes, about the arrowheads,” the young man said, hesitating a moment, and then regaining confidence. “We use both the red and the white. The red are good for shooting cattle and lions. The white are for deer and other game.”

“Why is that?” Ish asked sharply, for he felt his old-time rationalism stirring at the thought of all such magic and hocus-pocus. The question, however, seemed only to surprise and confuse the young man.

“Why?” he asked. “Why? How could anyone know why? Except you yourself, Ish! This matter of the red and white arrowheads is merely something that is. It is like—” He hesitated, and then the sunlight seemed to catch his attention. “Yes, it is like the sun that keeps on going round the earth, but naturally no one knows why, or asks why. Why should there be a why?”

Having said these last words, the young man was obviously very pleased with himself as if he had propounded some great philosophical dictum, although undoubtedly he had spoken only in great simplicity. But when Ish turned the matter over in his mind, he was not sure. Perhaps even in this simplicity there was a depth. Was there ever an answer to “why”? Did not things just exist in the present?