混凝土专业方向毕业论文--外文翻译.pdf

The Clan of the Cave Bear

Jean M. Auel


1

The naked child ran out of the hide-covered lean-to toward the rocky beach at the bend in
the small river. It didn't occur to her to look back. Nothing in her experience ever gave
her reason to doubt the shelter and those within it would be there when she returned.
She splashed into the river and felt rocks and sand shift under her feet as the shore
fell off sharply. She dived into the cold water and came up sputtering, then reached out
with sure strokes for the steep opposite bank. She had learned to swim before she learned
to walk and, at five, was at ease in the water. Swimming was often the only way a river
could be crossed.
The girl played for a while, swimming back and forth, then let the current float
her downstream. Where the river widened and bubbled over rocks, she stood up and
waded to shore, then walked back to the beach and began sorting pebbles. She had just
put a stone on top of a pile of especially pretty ones when the earth began to tremble.
The child looked with surprise as the stone rolled down of its own accord, and
stared in wonder at the small pyramid of pebbles shaking and leveling themselves. Only
then did she e aware she was shaking too, but she was still more confused than
apprehensive. She glanced around, trying to understand why her universe had altered in
some inexplicable way. The earth was not supposed to move.
The small river, which moments before had flowed smoothly, was roiling with
choppy waves that splashed over its banks as the rocking streambed moved at cross
purposes to the current, dredging mud up from the bottom. Brush close by the upstream
banks quivered, animated by unseen movement at the roots, and downstream, boulders
bobbed in ustomed agitation. Beyond them, stately conifers of the forest into which
the stream flowed lurched grotesquely. A giant pine near the bank, its roots exposed and
their hold weakened by the