Natural Selection (A Free Spider Shepherd short story) Read Free Page A

oblivious to the thought of the snakes, scorpions and other venomous creatures that he knew roamed the forest floor.
    For five days they followed the same hard routine, sleeping on the ground, eating cold rations and drinking water collected from small tributaries of the river system. They kept up their silent patrols from dawn to dusk, following Pilgrim through the jungle. As Shepherd watched him, learning from his actions, he became convinced that if he wanted to, Pilgrim could probably walk on water - he seemed to be able to do everything else.
    A couple of hours before sunset on the fifth day, Pilgrim called a halt in a space where a fallen hardwood had created a temporary clearing. Nothing was said, but Shepherd had the feeling that all four of them had passed the test Pilgrim had set. ‘You’ve earned a hot meal so we’ll cook tonight,’ he said, his voice sounding unnaturally loud after so many days of communicating in whispers. ‘Jimbo, gather some dead standing wood - dead branches still on the trees.’
    Jimbo worked his way into the forest and snapped off several long, dead branches. ‘Now we have to feather it,’ Pilgrim said. He stripped off the damp bark from the smallest pieces, then feathered the wood by shaving a ring of fine flakes away from the branch. He set Geordie and Liam to do some more. ‘We need about fifteen of those; no shortcuts if you’re going to light it with one match - or one strike of the flint if your matches are wet.’
    When they’d prepared enough wood feathers, Pilgrim pulled a few tufts of cotton wool from the medical kit and handed it and a flint to Shepherd. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘Now all you have to do is light it.’
    Very aware of Pilgrim’s eyes on him, Shepherd flinted it, blew gently on the spark, and then began feeding in the wood feathers one at a time as the cotton wool burst into flame. He added sticks and larger branches as a thin column of blue smoke drifted upwards and the sticks crackled as the fire caught hold.
    ‘Not bad,’ Pilgrim said. ‘Boil up some water in a mess tin, Geordie, and make a brew while Shepherd and I find us something to eat.  You’ll never starve or die of thirst in the jungle; the one thing that will kill you is disease.’
    ‘Or drug-traffickers or Guatemalan soldiers,’ Shepherd said.
    ‘Or those,’ he said. ‘But food’s no problem. Not if you know what to look for.’
    They walked into the jungle and Pilgrim found a standard palm tree. He pulled out his bush knife and gave it to Shepherd. ‘Shin up the trunk and cut off the top growth.’ Shepherd climbed a few feet up the trunk and hacked off the pale green top growth. He dropped it down to Pilgrim and slid back down the trunk. Pilgrim carried it back to the clearing, stripped off the outer layers and threw them on the fire and then passed the tender heart of the palm to Geordie. ‘That’s our vegetable, I’ll go and get the meat. There’s a softwood tree in Belize, softer than birch - you can cut it down with a parang - your jungle knife - strip off the bark and the heartwood looks and tastes like chicken.’
    ‘What if the tree doesn’t grow in this area?’ asked Liam.
    Pilgrim gave an enigmatic smile. ‘Then we’ll be needing the curry powder.’ He returned a while later with his supplies wrapped in an attap leaf and announced ‘I’ll cook it. It needs a special knack to bring the best out of it.’
    He chopped up the meat, roasting it until it was brown, then made a curry and served it up with the palm heart, using more attap leaves as plates. Shepherd and his mates fell on it like starving men, the first hot food they’d had in a week.
    As they sat eating, Pilgrim glanced around the circle of faces. ‘Any of you done a jungle survival course yet?’
    All four shook their heads.
     ‘I used to train pilots - they all have to do the course in case they have to eject from their aircraft and E & E through enemy territory. The biggest problem is always a