The shelters of stone - Jean M. Auel [472]
The young mother was very nervous at first when the animal singled out her child for his solicitous attention, but when his eager licks made her giggle with delight, and he showed gentle restraint, even when she grabbed handfuls of fur and pulled, everyone was surprised.
The other children were eager to touch him, and before long Wolf was playing with them. Ayla explained that the wolf had grown up with the children of Lion Camp, and probably missed them. He had always been especially gentle with the very young, or the weak, and he seemed to know the difference between the unintentional overzealous squeeze from a toddler and the purposeful pull of a tail or ear by an older child. He allowed the former with patient forebearance, and he repaid the latter with a warning growl, or a gentle nip that did not break skin but showed that he could.
Jondalar mentioned that they had recently left the Summer Meeting, and Rutan told them that necessary repairs to their earthlodge had delayed their departure or they would have been there. He asked Jondalar about his travels and about Racer, with many people listening. They seemed more reluctant to question Ayla, and she didn’t volunteer much, though the mamut would have liked to have taken her aside for private discussions of more esoteric subjects, but she preferred to stay with the Camp. Even the headwoman was more relaxed and friendly by the time they headed back to their own camp, and Ayla asked her to pass on her love and remembrances to Lion Camp when they finally reached the Summer Meeting.
That night, Ayla lay awake thinking. She was glad she had not let natural hesitation about joining the Camp that had been less than welcoming stop her. Given the opportunity to overcome their fear of the strange or unknown, they had been interested and willing to learn. She had learned, too, that traveling with such unusual companions was likely to inspire strong reactions from anyone they might happen to meet along the way. She had no idea what to expect, but there could be little doubt that this Journey was going to be far more challenging than she had imagined.
An Interview with Jean M. Auel
Random House: While your novels focus on a civilization of the past, there is a very modern theme that runs throughout, of Ayla struggling to achieve equality with her peers. When you first created this dynamic character, how much thought did you put into giving her modern sensibilities?
Jean M. Auel: The reason there is a modern sensibility to my characters is that those Cro-Magnon “cavemen” were modern people, the first modern humans in Europe. I researched my characters as much as every other aspect of this early culture. My information is based on the knowledge of today’s scientists, not the antiquarians of the nineteenth century whose views, unfortunately, are still held by too many. I have traveled to many of the locations where those early humans lived and have become acquainted with many professionals who study them, some of whom have shown me remarkable sites, including extraordinary painted and engraved caves.
Those early modern humans called Cro-Magnon were the first people who not only had skeletons like ours but were like us in many other ways, which can be convincingly demonstrated by the archaeological record. They were our many-times-great-grandparents; whatever qualities we claim for ourselves, we must grant them. They had the same range of intelligence that we do, the same emotional responses and psychological reactions, the same ease and facility with language, the same talents, skills, and abilities. And they had a remarkable creative impulse. I’ve seen it, and it certainly convinced me. Neanderthals are still unknowns, but they were far more advanced than most of us imagine; they were also human with brains larger than the average today. There were differences between us, but