Robert Heinlein - Tunnel In The Sky

Nor was there any formal contract to team nor any selection of a team captain; Rod continued to direct operations and Bob Baxter accepted the arrangement. Rod did not think about it as he was too busy. The problems of food, shelter, and safety for their growing population left him no time to worry about it

The arrival of Bob and Carmen cleaned out the larder; it was necessary to hunt the next day. Bob Baxter offered to go, but Rod decided to take Jackie as usual. "You rest today. Don't let Carmen put her weight on that bad ankle and don't let Jimmy go down alone to tend the fire. He thinks he is well again but he is not."

"I see that."

Jack and Rod went out, made their kill quickly. But Rod failed to kill clean and when Jacqueline moved in to help finish the thrashing, wounded buck she was kicked in the ribs. She insisted that she was not hurt; nevertheless her side was sore the following morning and Bob Baxter expressed the opinion that she had cracked a rib.

In the meantime two new mouths to feed had been added, just as Rod found himself with three on the sick list. But one of the new mouths was a big, grinning one belonging to Caroline Mshiyeni; Rod picked her as his hunting partner.

Jackie looked sour. She got Rod aside and whispered, 'You haven't any reason to do this to me. I can hunt. My side is all right, just a little stiff."

"It is, huh? So it slows you down when I need you. I can't chance it, Jack."

She glanced at Caroline, stuck out her lip and looked stubborn. Rod said urgently, "Jack, remember what I said about petty jealousies? So help me, you make trouble and I'll paddle you."

"You aren't big enough!"

"I'll get help. Now, look- are we partners?"

"Well, I thought so."

"Then be one and don't cause trouble."

She shrugged. "All right. Don't rub it in- I'll stay home."

"I want you to do more than that. Take that old bandage of mine- it's around somewhere- and let Bob Baxter strap your ribs."

"No!"

"Then let Carmen do it. They're both quack doctors, sort of." He raised his voice. "Ready, Carol?"

"Quiverin' and bristlin'."

Rod told Caroline how he and Jacqueline hunted, explained what he expected of her. They located, and avoided, two family herds; old bulls were tough and poor eating and attempting to kill anything but the bull was foolishly dangerous. About noon they found a yearling herd upwind; they split and placed themselves cross wind for the kill. Rod waited for Caroline to flush the game, drive it to him.

He continued to wait. He was getting fidgets when Caroline showed up, moving silently. She motioned for him to follow. He did so, hard put to keep up with her and still move quietly. Presently she stopped; he caught up and saw that she had already made a kill. He looked at it and fought down the anger he felt.

Caroline spoke. "Nice tender one, I think. Suit you, Rod?"

He nodded. "Couldn't be better. A clean kill, too. Carol?"

"Huh?"

"I think you are better at this than I am.

"Oh, shucks, it was just luck." She grinned and looked sheepish.

"I don't believe in luck. Any time you want to lead the hunt, let me know. But be darn sure you let me know."

She looked at his unsmiling face, said slowly, "By any chance are you bawling me out?"

"You could call it that. I'm saying that any time you want to lead the hunt, you tell me. Don't switch in the middle. Don't ever. I mean it."

"What's the matter with you, Rod? Getting your feelings hurt just because I got there first- that's silly!"

Rod sighed. "Maybe that's it. Or maybe I don't like having a girl take the kill away from me. But I'm dead sure about one thing: I don't like having a partner on a hunt who can't be depended on. Too many ways to get hurt. I'd rather hunt alone."

"Maybe I'd rather hunt alone! I don't need any help."

"I'm sure you don't. Let's forget it, huh, and get this carcass back to camp."

Caroline did not say anything while they butchered. When they had the waste trimmed away and were ready to pack as much as possible back to the others Rod said, "You lead off. I'll watch behind."

"Rod?"

"Huh?"

"I'm sorry"

"What? Oh, forget it."

"I won't ever do it again. Look, I'll tell everybody you made the kill."

He stopped and put a hand on her arm. "Why tell anybody anything? It's nobody's business how we organize our hunt as long as we bring home the meat."

"You're still angry with me."

"I never was angry," he lied. "I just don't want us to get each other crossed up."

"Roddie, I'll never cross you up again! Promise."

Girls stayed in the majority to the end of the week. The cave, comfortable for three, adequate for twice that number, was crowded for the number that was daily accumulating. Rod decided to make it a girls' dormitory and moved the males out into the open on the field at the foot of the path up the shale. The spot was unprotected against weather and animals but it did guard the only access to the cave. Weather was no problem; protection against animals was set up as well as could be managed by organizing a night watch whose duty it was to keep fires burning between the bluff and the creek on the upstream side and in the bottleneck downstream. Rod did not like the arrangements, but they were the best he could do at the time. He sent Bob Baxter and Roy Kilroy downstream to scout for caves and Caroline and Margery Chung upstream for the same purpose. Neither party was successful in the one-day limit he had imposed; the two girls brought back another straggler.

A group of four boys came in a week after Jim's shirt had been requisitioned; it brought the number up to twenty-five and shifted the balance to more boys than girls. The four newcomers could have been classed as men rather than boys, since they were two or three years older than the average. Three of the four classes in this survival-test area had been about to graduate from secondary schools; the fourth class, which included these four, came from Outlands Arts College of Teller University.

"Adult" is a slippery term. Some cultures have placed adult age as low as eleven years, others as high as thirty-five-and some have not recognized any such age as long as an ancestor remamed alive. Rod did not think of these new arrivals as senior to him. There were already a few from Teller U. in the group, but Rod was only vaguely aware Which ones they were- they fitted in. He was too busy with the snowballing problems of his growing colony to worry about their backgrounds on remote Terra.

The four were Jock McGowan, a brawny youth who seemed all hands and feet, his younger brother Bruce, and Chad Ames and Dick Burke. They had arrived late in the day and Rod had not had time to get acquainted, nor was there time the following morning, as a group of four girls and five boys poured in on them unexpectedly. This had increased his administrative problems almost to the breaking point; the cave would hardly sleep four more females. It was necessary to find, or build, more shelter.

Rod went over to the four young men lounging near the cooking fire. He squatted on his heels and asked, "Any of you know anything about building?"

He addressed them all, but the others waited for Jock McGowan to speak. "Some," Jock admitted. "I reckon I could build anything I wanted to."

"Nothing hard," Rod explained. "Just stone walls. Ever tried your hand at masonry?"

"Sure. What of it?"

"Well, here's the idea. We've got to have better living arrangements right away- we've got people pouring out of our ears. The first thing we are going to do is to throw a wall from the bluff to the creek across this flat area. After that we will build huts, but the first thing is a kraal to stop dangerous animals."

McGowan laughed. "That will be some wall. Have you seen this dingus that looks like an elongated cougar?