Once we exasperated a band of wild pigs,
and they took after us. The Swift One dared a wide
leap between trees that was too much for me. I had to
take to the ground. There were the pigs. I didn't
care. I struck the earth within a yard of the nearest
one. They flanked me as I ran, and chased me into two
different trees out of the line of my pursuit of the
Swift One. I ventured the ground again, doubled back,
and crossed a wide open space, with the whole band
grunting, bristling, and tusk-gnashing at my heels.
If I had tripped or stumbled in that open space, there
would have been no chance for me. But I didn't. And I
didn't care whether I did or not. I was in such mood
that I would have faced old Saber-Tooth himself, or a
score of arrow-shooting Fire People. Such was the
madness of love...with me. With the Swift One it was
different. She was very wise. She did not take any
real risks, and I remember, on looking back across the
centuries to that wild love-chase, that when the pigs
delayed me she did not run away very fast, but waited,
rather, for me to take up the pursuit again.
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