Suddenly in the Depths of the Forest

29

But you see, I didn't take the animals, Nehi said. Certainly not all of them. One night, they all simply got up and left the village and followed me to the highest mountain forests. Even animals that loved their homes and couldn't decide whether to stay or go — like Zito, Almon the Fisherman's dog, and Emanuella's tortoise-shell cat and her kittens — even they decided in the end to go up with me, together with all the others. Not because I cast a spell on them and not because I wanted to take revenge, but because even animals have the fear that you know so well, the fear of not being like everyone else, of staying behind when everyone is going, or going when everyone is staying. None of them wants to be without its flock or be thrown out of the herd. You edge a little bit away from the swarm just once or twice, and they won't let you back in. Because you already have whoopitis.

At first, Na'aman built himself a small shack from branches in a forest clearing on the mountaintop, and every day, his friends, the animals, supplied him with everything he needed: the sheep and goats let him milk them, the chickens gave him eggs, the bees made honey, the river brought him snow water, the squirrels gathered fruit and berries for him, and the little moles dug up potatoes. Long, long processions of ants even carried grains of wheat from the fields in the valley so he could bake himself some bread. The wolves and the bears watched over and protected him. And so he lived for years and years, far from all humans and surrounded by the love of live creatures, big and small. The frogs shortened his name from Na'aman to Na'ai, and in the accent of the jackals and night birds, Na'ai became Nehi.