It seemed that this movelessness and silence on my part
was what was expected of me. I was not to cry out in
the face of fear. It was a dictate of instinct. And
so I sat there and waited for I knew not what. The
boar thrust the ferns aside and stepped into the open.
The curiosity went out of his eyes, and they gleamed
cruelly. He tossed his head at me threateningly and
advanced a step. This he did again, and yet again.
Then I screamed...or shrieked--I cannot describe it,
but it was a shrill and terrible cry. And it seems
that it, too, at this stage of the proceedings, was the
thing expected of me. From not far away came an
answering cry. My sounds seemed momentarily to
disconcert the boar, and while he halted and shifted
his weight with indecision, an apparition burst upon
us.
She was like a large orangutan, my mother, or like a
chimpanzee, and yet, in sharp and definite ways, quite
different. She was heavier of build than they, and had
less hair. Her arms were not so long, and her legs
were stouter.
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