"The men are coming to buy axes," he thought. "The children have come along with them."
The men jumped into the river and swam across and went to the stone yard. But the children came swimming up around the raft like wild ducks. Some of them had long hair that floated about on the water.
"Are you Thorn, the cave boy?" one of them asked him.
Then the children came up around the raft and shook it so that Thorn almost fell off.
"Stop, or I will shoot you!" he cried, laughing.
"Oh, he will shoot us!" cried the children, and they hid behind one another, playing they were afraid.
"Is that your bow?" Clam now asked. "We heard about it. Shoot for us."
He began to paddle to the bank, but the children crowded around the raft and quickly pushed it to shore. Thorn jumped off and began to shoot at the trees. The children went along with him and watched with big eyes. One of the arrows struck a tree and stuck in the bark. The children laughed and ran and pulled it out.
Thorn did it again to shouts and the clapping of hands. Then a boy named Periwinkle threw up a piece of bark and cried, "Hit that!"
Thorn tried over and over again, but he could not. At last he grew tired of shooting. Then the children crowded round him, and Clam said, "Come home with us. Show your bow to the other children."
The children laughed and thought that very strange, but Periwinkle said, "Well, we will push you on the raft."
So Thorn told his grandfather that he was going home with the shell mound people. And when the men had bought their axes, the children all ran down to the river together.
Some of the boys quickly tied a wild grape vine to the raft. Then they cried, "Here we go!" and dived into the river and swam away, pulling the raft. Laughing and shouting and splashing, the others jumped in and followed. They came up alongside the raft and pushed it with one hand and swam with the other.
[Illustration: They dived into the river and swam away, pulling the raft]
Before long, all the children on one side of the raft shouted and waved their arms and dived. They came up on the other side of the raft. Then the rest of the children dived and came up far ahead of the raft. Thorn looked on in wonder. As they came near the other bank, the girls pulled up the yellow water lilies and tied them in their wet hair.