He drifted into our camp one night about 3 years ago; easily the tallest and thinnest man for his height that any of us had ever seen. Standing well over 7 feet and wearing a midnight black cloak, he was quite a frightening vision in the flickering light of the campfire which none of us would ever forget. When he extended his hands in an apparent good will gesture implying he meant no harm to us; we were relieved, slightly. Despite his apparent malnourished condition, his limbs were larger than any of ours and the tallest man among us still stood beneath his shoulders! He made his way over to the fire with an awkward gait and was given a very wide berth. The dark stranger remained there for quite some time as we continued on with our nightly campfire conversation; somewhat distracted by the immense presence and dark eyes which had invaded our sanctuary. I watched him suspiciously from the corner of my eye to make sure he remained where I could see him. Everyone had probably decided the intimidating giant was a mute until he proved us wrong with his slow, deep, deliberate speech. His voice was so low that it caused the horses to bray in fear and the ground almost seemed to shake. Those first thunderous words will remain burned in my mind forever. “I wish to warm myself by your flame and get something to eat.” It was easy enough to understand why he was hungry but it just didn’t make sense that he was cold on such a warm summer night. We only kept the fire burning to cook with and keep the wild animals away. We fixed him an extremely generous plate of our rations which he accepted hesitantly, as if he was uncertain of what to do with it. His reaction was very peculiar considering he was the one who asked for the food in the first place. I just assumed he wasn’t sure if we really wanted him to have it. Also strange was his facial expression, or rather lack of any; as if human emotions were completely alien to him. After eating he retreated to the very edge of the campfire where he fashioned a bed from his cloak. Even if the heat hadn’t been almost unbearable that night by the fire, it would still have been a dangerous idea as close as he was to it. I think all of us slept uneasy that night with the mysterious titan only a few feet from our circle of tents. Mine happened to be the closest to the fire so I probably slept the least of any of us. I heard him stir before sunrise and he was gone as if he had never even been at our camp. There was an unspoken sigh of relief among the men when they rose at sunrise to find our eerie visitor gone. At breakfast everyone was curious about who he was and where he had gone but we had more important things to concentrate on. We had our work cut out for us with two calves missing and troublesome wolf tracks nearby which were almost definitely related; in addition to our regular responsibilities. It’s of little wonder that we put the previous night’s encounter out of our minds. That night Ross and Mark played their flat tops while the rest of us sang along to the old favorites which we all knew by heart. Occasionally we would switch on who sang the chorus or harmony parts but it was basically the same seven or eight songs each time. Jim; our “gourmet chef” announced that it was “Bean time” and none of us had to be told twice. Then, as the plates were being handed out and filled with “pot luck stew” he reappeared; like he had been waiting in the darkness just beyond the flame’s light for us to serve the “grub”. Jim fixed him a plate without waiting to be asked. In our camp we usually lived by the simple creed that only those who worked hard and earned their keep would deserve the right to eat but no one would have dared to protest the stranger’s free meal under the circumstances! He accepted the food graciously and sat down by the fire to eat without any of the previous night’s hesitation. Curious glances were exchanged between us for a moment and then we went back to filling our own stomachs. I suppose we were all wondering if this giant’s appearance at the camp was going to become a regular thing. We didn’t really mind sharing our food since Jim always made enough to feed an army but we didn’t know anything about him and he hadn’t volunteered anything about himself either. Worse still, there was an unspoken air of: “don’t ask”. I tried to ease my mind by reasoning that if he was a cattle rustler or cutthroat thief he would have already had ample opportunity to kill us as we slept. Somehow it wasn’t very comforting. When supper was over it was our custom to gather around the firelight and take turns telling stories. Most, if not all of them had been told a half dozen times before but to make them more interesting the story teller would try to add something new each time to make it more interesting. “Spicing up” the old stories was our way of compensating for the limited imaginations of simple ranch hands. Eventually these yarns became quite elaborate and the fun part, if you could call it that, was trying to figure out where the new parts would lead the next time it was told. Besides playing and singing the songs, this somewhat dull sounding activity was the only real pastime we had on the range. There was no better spinner of new yarns or extender of the old ones than Sammy and it was his turn! I was so deeply lost in thought about the secretive stranger that Sammy was nearly finished with his tale before I realized that it was one I had told before myself. It had been greatly changed around and improved to where it only slightly resembled my “bare bones” story. As he talked I watched the firelight dance on the giant’s massive features and blank, pale expression. He seemed greatly interested with our storytelling. When Sammy finished recycling and improving my old story there was an unanimous round of applause for his ingeniousness. With mock disgust I told him that I was happy to have provided him with an idea. That brought a round of laughter by everyone except the stranger who didn’t seem to know the appropriate response for my rebuttal. I may have been the only one who noticed his lack of comprehension but it seems that even among people who you don’t know, when something is funny, it IS funny. He didn’t seem to even understand even basic human emotions or gestures. When the laughter died down Sammy said: “By the way Jimmy, I think the stew was a little bland tonight.” Sammy was the only one of us who ever called Jim: “Jimmy” because we knew he hated it. Sammy realized it too but he would do it just to aggravate him. “So you’re telling me how to do my job now, are you? Well perhaps the ‘Master story teller’ would like me to step aside and allow you to do the cooking from now on!”; declared Jim angrily. He always had a very hot temper and any form of criticism ignited him like dynamite. Fortunately his “bark” was worse than his “bite”. “It just might be nice to see how the other half lives.”; Sammy said. The implication that Jim had it easy because he “only had to prepare the meals” while the rest of us were out on the range “where the real work was” didn’t sit well with him, to say the least. “Well you’re welcome to it if you want the job but don’t expect me to eat anything you fix, you ol’...” Sammy stopped him before Jim had a chance to say something that he would later regret. “I was just pullin’ your leg. I didn’t really mean it. I think the stew was just fine; ...really.”; Sammy apologized. Jim’s face lost most of it’s anger but in an attempt to restore his pride he came back and retorted; “It was never my intention to fix stew that was ONLY ‘fine!’” His tone changed mid sentence from rage to embarrassment when he realized that Sammy’s complaints had only been a joke. Another round of chuckles filled the air when Jim’s facial expression changed. He was still slightly distracted and a little insecure of his abilities from the mock dissatisfaction so he turned to the stranger and blurted out; “What did you think of the stew? Was it to good to your tastin’?” I think all of us gasped out loud at Jim’s bold questions to the silent stranger in black. After what seemed like an eternity of silence he spoke. “Yes, I enjoyed your food very much.” There was only the slightest hint of emotion in his low, rumbling voice. In another example of his mouth working faster than his mind, Jim seized the brief moment of communication to further quench his curiosity; and admittedly ours as well. “By the way, what did you say your name was again?” Jim knew fully well; as did the rest of us, that the stranger had never introduced himself! I’m sure you could have heard a pin drop in the sand as we eagerly anticipated his response. A nervous shudder passed through us as an unexpected cool wind brushed the back of our necks. “I ...am the one ...called Anak.” A deafening silence followed his response. It was only the third time we had heard his voice and it was just as chilling as before but now we had his unusual name to associate it with. We breathed a silent sigh of relief after the preliminary tension had dissipated slightly; including Jim who finally realized the magnitude of the situation. We still didn’t really know anything about him but Jim’s curiosity had revealed ten times more than we had known before. Secretly we were grateful for his blind boldness. Anak made his bed beside the fire again and was gone shortly before sunrise. For over two weeks he continued to appear each night around supper time. We came to almost expect his silent presence beside the campfire and his pre-dawn departure the following morning. I think most of us were pretty exhausted from tracking and setting wolf traps but we always looked forward to story time after supper. Mark told us a spook story that his Granddad had told him when he was young; complete with rattlin’ chains and creakin’ doors. Then Sammy described a 2 headed snake that he had seen once which couldn’t decide what direction it wanted to crawl in. The entire time Anak seemed mesmerized by our tales as he alwaysdid. To our great surprise after Sammy’s story was over, Anak spoke up and announced that he had a story to tell us! You could have knocked us over with a feather. We were all so curious and eager to learn more about him that we practically blurted out in unison; “Sure, go head!” In all the time he had been coming to our camp, Anak had probably spoken less than fifty words to us and they were simple responses. Now he was going to open himself up to us. We were all ears! With a terrifying gleam in his eyes, he proceeded to relay to us a spellbinding tale about spirits that materialized into human form and took for themselves human wives. Their offspring grew up to be ruthless tyrants that dominated the world mercilessly until a natural disaster ended their reign of terror. His story was simple in it’s approach but yet extremely effective in conveying an eerie mood to us in the firelight. Considering the ominous presence of it’s narrator, it wouldn’t have required much more to captivate us. We were pretty much speechless for several moments as we absorbed his intricate yarn. He seemed to be surveying our expressions to determine if we liked his story. Of course we loved it since we were completely starved for new tales but we were dumbfounded by his sudden burst of insightfullness and a little disturbed by the subject matter. As strange as it might seen, I didn’t really feel like I knew Anak any better after his story than I did before. Still, it was good that he was finally opening up to us a little. It was only fitting that Sammy, “The master story teller”;was the first to praise Anak’s imaginative yarn. The rest of us were quick to follow suit with our appreciation too and it obviously gave him a greatsense of satisfaction judging from the sinister smile on his otherwise nondescript, dark face. Once again Jim, who exercised his tendency to speak before thinking since his previous quandaries had been answered; asked: “How come you decided to join us tonight in telling a story?” Without changing his blank expression he replied; “I wanted to see how the other half lives.” It took us a brief moment to recognize his attempt at humor with what he had overheard Jim and Sammy arguing about previously. His emotionless expression and monotone voice delivery had caught us off guard. I nervously joined the other men in laughter as I appraised their faces for reassurance of the appropriateness of the situation. Jim’s bluntness had again cut through the tension and we were thankful. Since we had an early morning rise ahead of us counting heads of cattle and checking the wolf traps, we bid Anak good night and retired to our tents. The first rays of the sun woke us up much sooner than we would have preferred. Anak had already up and gone before any of us rose. After a breakfast of bacon, eggs and coffee we checked the traps. Nearly all of them had been sprung and robbed of the bait without capturing any of the animals responsible but one did have dried blood on it. Incredibly, it’s anchoring mechanism had been pulled out of the ground and the trap’s jaws had been twisted open until the teeth no longer touched! Someone whistled a low note after seeing the mangled trap. We all knew that any animal which could twist and bent open a steel spring trap like that was of great strength and intelligence. It would take a lot more than simple baited traps to solve the problem so we had no other choice but to take turns on night watch to protect the cattle. Already we had lost nine head and it would come out of our pay. We were allowed a few losses due to reasonably unforeseen circumstances but nine lost would certainly be inexcusable. After supper we drew straws and Mack drew the shortest one so he grabbed his riffle and a pot of coffee and headed over to the corral for the night watch. About his usual time, Anak’s strange but increasingly familiar figure appeared from out of the darkness. After eating his food he noticed that Mack was absent. “Where is the one called Mack?”; he asked with deep baritone authority. When we explained that he was on watch for wolves, a very peculiar thing happened. At first he appeared nervous and concerned and then he smiled in a way that sent an eerie shiver down my spine! I won’t ever forget that smile. A few songs and stories later Anak motioned that he wanted to take a turn. Using our earlier example, he chose to revise and improve on his earlier tale instead of telling a new one. It seemed odd for someone to be without enough imagination or stories worth telling that he had to recycle the only one he had told before but we all realized he was new to the game and obviously had very little human contact or exposure in the past. In his revision he added that the ruthless men were of great size and could change their shape at will. He also told that soon they would come back and control the Earth again and enslave all humanity. Most of the inspirations for his additions were transparently obvious but we all pretended to be unaware that he was trying to scare us by implying he was one of the offspring from the story. I’m sure our faces betrayed what we were thinking because he broke out into spine chilling laughter. It was the first time any of us had ever heard him laugh and we were amazed at his rapidly developing sense of humor. Even though we knew it was all a big set up, we still didn’t really know anything about him, where he came from or where he called home. Curiosity had eaten at us long enough so Jim blurted out what the rest of us were thinking. “But seriously Anak, tell us about yourself!” “I just did.”; He replied while warming himself by the fire. This time the laughter didn’t die down for at least five minutes. He was becoming quite a kidder! After I retired to my tent I was puzzled by the feeling that I had heard his story somewhere else before. During lunch the next day as Jim passed out the plates his eyes lit up when he came to Mack. “What direction did Anak go off in when he left camp this morning?” The answer to that question was eagerly awaited by all of us but instead of quenching our curiosity he simply looked confused. “Huh? I was going to ask why he didn’t show up at supper like healways does.”; he replied with a mystified expression. “He did; as a matter of fact he asked where you were! He got the strangest look on his face when we told him you were guarding the cattle from wolves. He retold his story with some new parts and then we ‘hit the hay’. He was gone before I even got up to fix breakfast a dawn.”; Jim explained. “Surely you must have seen him!” “Well how can that be? I didn’t see him walk by me last night or leave this morning either and there isn’t any other way in or out of thecamp except by the corrals! There isn’t anything but mountains on the other three sides of the camp.”: Mack added defensively. “Well maybe you didn’t see him because your eyelids were closed!”; Ross inferred. The insinuation that Mack had fallen asleep at his post didn’t sit well with him and he let Ross know, fiercely. The whole thing would have become a knock down drag out if I hadn’t stepped in and intervened. “Did any of our livestock disappear last night while he was on watch?”: I pointed out to Ross. “That doesn’t prove a thing. You could have propped up a scarecrow by the gate and got the same result.”; He scoffed. “Let’s see if you do as well tonight then.”: I challenged. “Well I would but uh, I uh, didn’t get very much sleep last night so Iwouldn’t be able to keep awake like I usually would..” “Sure you didn’t! Otherwise you would love to back up your boasting, wouldn’t you, Ross?”; I said sarcastically. “I haven’t heard you volunteer for a shift yet either!”; He fired back at me. I knew it would be my turn eventually if the wolves weren’t killed so I figured I might as well get it over with since I had put my whole foot in my mouth.
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