Under the N-Ray
(Continued from page 218)
Crude weapons he carried—a short javelin in the right hand and a long bow and quiver of arrows swinging from the shoulder. His features suggested rude material from which might be chiseled the well-shaped lineaments of Jack Hodge.
I was hard put to it to place the period of time represented in this picture. Something told me the era was not many centuries advanced from the Stone Age. Prehistoric I at once classified it. What caused this conviction I cannot say, unless it was that the whole atmosphere of the picture seemed newer and the sunshine brighter, cleaner, than any I have ever seen. Surely this was a younger sun than ours.
The hunter came to a stand at the head of a steep declivity. Some hundreds of feet below lay a little green valley, through which wound the silver thread of a river. Nearer at hand I could glimpse through the tops of giant conifers the deep blue of a mountain lake. Toward this the huntsman for a moment directed his gaze. Having apparently located something on the lake shore too far distant for me to recognize, he uttered a grunt of satisfaction and turned away.
Unslinging his quiver, he selected an immense, red-tipped arrow. This he bore to the base of a pine tree, where he plunged it repeatedly into a great lump of oozing pitch. After smearing the end well with the sticky substance he brought the shaft to the edge of the cliff and laid it down. Next he busied himself at rubbing two splinters together until they had produced a smoking spark and, with many great distendings of rough cheeks, blowing the spark into a tiny flame. With this he ignited the pitch-smeared end of the arrow. Fitting the arrow to the rawhide string, he drew it back—back until it seemed the mighty bow must break. Now he looked once more at the spot on the lake shore, raised the bow a little and released the fiery shaft.
Up and up it sped, leaving as a wake an immense arc of brown smoke. Up, and still higher, until reaching its limit it began to drop. It fell slowly at first; but by the time it had dipped from view behind the farthest treetop its speed was that of a meteor. One moment the youth stood with folded arms, watching the course of the flight. Then, apparently satisfied that the arrow would hit its mark, he suddenly wheeled and darted into the forest.
There came a view of a group of rude, thatched huts on a beach by a lake. On the right side of the screen was a sharp upslope surmounted by a little bluff easily recognizable as that from which the hunter had loosed his quarrel. Swarms of rough warriors could be seen toiling up the slope, while in the village nothing was left but a few women who stood with shaded eyes watching the progress of their protectors. An arrow stood still burning and untouched where it had plunged into the ground at the center of the compound.
To the screen sprang a closeup of a hut I had seen standing a little apart from the rest. In the doorway stood a broad woman holding a wooden platter in her hand. On her face was an expression of helpless fright. Following her line of vision to a near-by thicket, I beheld our archer of the cliff. Apparently realizing he had been seen, the youth now
