"The little man!" she said, and laid her rough hand on his shoulder
gently.

Then she quickly cut off big pieces of the rhinoceros meat and ran a
long stick through them, and placed the stick over the burning fire.
While the meat was cooking, Flint was telling about Burr and her little
family; and of Strongarm's surprise at the making of fire; and of the
lion hunt; and of the sleeping tiger they had seen on the way home.

After the hungry man and boy had eaten great pieces of the roasted
meat, they went to the stone yard. There Thorn heard the sound of
stone hammers and saw a big rocky place in the hillside. Three men sat
on the ground at work. Other men sat about talking. Pointing to
these, Flint said, "They are waiting to buy axes."

There were piles of bowlders on the ground, and little piles of stone
chips around each ax maker.

Flint went up to one of them and said, "Redtop, my boy wants to make
axes. Show him how."

Redtop grinned at Thorn, and threw him a smooth oval bowlder.

"That is your hammer stone," he said. "Now take a stone about the size
you want your ax, and chip it this way."

Redtop sat on the ground. He held a flint bowlder and began chipping
it with his hammer stone. Every time he struck the bowlder, a chip
flew off. He kept on striking, first on one side and then on the
other. Thorn watched with shining eyes. Redtop worked fast and