Outside the rain poured down but brian lay back

Outside the rain poured down, but Brian lay back,
drinking the syrup from the berries, dry and with
the pain almost all gone, the stiffness also gone, his
belly full and a good taste in his mouth.
For the first time since the crash he was not think-
ing of himself, of his own life. Brian was wondering
if the bear was as surprised as he to find another
being in the berries.
Later in the afternoon, as evening came down, he
77

went to the lake and washed the sticky berry juice
from his face and hands, then went back to prepare
for the night.
While he had accepted and understood that the
bear did not want to hurt him, it was still much in
his thoughts and as darkness came into the shelter
he took the hatchet out of his belt and put it by his
head, his hand on the handle, as the day caught up
with him and he slept.
78

8
AT FIRST
he thought
it
was a growl.
In
the still dark-
ness of the shelter in the middle of the night his
eyes came open and he was awake and he thought
there was a growl. But it was the <wind, a medium
wind in the pines had made some sound that
brought him up, brought him awake. He sat up and
was hit with the smell.
It
terrified him. The smell was one of rot, some
musty rot that made him think only of graves with
cobwebs and dust and old death. His nostrils wid-
ened and he opened his eyes wider but he could
see nothing. It was too dark, too hard dark with
clouds covering even the small light from the stars,
and he could not see. But the smell was alive, alive

and full and in the shelter. He thought of the bear,
thought of Bigfoot and every monster he had ever
seen in every fright movie he had ever watched,
and his heart hammered in his throat.
Then he heard the slithering. A brushing sound,
a slithering brushing sound near his feet-and he
kicked out as hard as he could, kicked out and threw
the hatchet at the sound, a noise coming from his
throat. But the hatchet missed, sailed into the wall
. where it hit the rocks with a shower of sparks, and
his leg was instantly torn with pain, as if a hundred
needles had been driven into it. "Unnnngh!"
Now he screamed, with the pain and fear, and
skittered on his backside up into the corner of the .
shelter, breathing through his mouth, straining to
see, to hear. .
The slithering moved again, he thought toward
him at first, and terror took him, stopping his breath.
He felt he could see a low dark form, a bulk in the
darkness, a shadow that lived, but now it moved
away, slithering and scraping it moved away and he
saw or thought he saw it go out of the door opening.
He lay on his side for a moment, then pulled a
rasping breath in and held it, listening for the at-
tacker to return. When it was apparent that the
shadow wasn't coming back he felt the calf of his
leg, where the pain was centered and spreading to
fill the whole leg.