Then he saw, right before him, the unthinkable. Majesty in miniature.
A perfect East Indian musk buck--the most beautiful of living things.
The wee fellow came on, leaping to the utmost of his strength; his nostrils wide, his lips apart, his eyes immense. He swayed a little, wavered and fell.
Skag ran and leaned over him--the little heart was driving out the little life. It seemed a pity out of all proportion. . . . He held the tiny breathless thing tenderly, as if it were a dead child. . . .
So he laid it down reluctantly, at last; and straightened--to see a hunting cheetah coming toward him, not far away.
He glanced down, Nels was not there. He looked all about, Nels was not in sight. Then the reserves in Skag"s nature came up. All his training flashed across his brain. Every nerve, every muscle in his body, was instantly adjusted to emergency. There was no failure in co-ordination.
He stood quietly watching the cheetah. It appeared not to have seen him. If it kept on, it would pa.s.s about seventy feet away. But Skag knew it would not keep on. With his mind he might think it would, but something in him knew it would not.
He remembered Carlin; no, he must not think of her now. He remembered that Nels was gone; no, he must not think of that either. All the weapons he had were in his heart, in his head. He set himself in order, ready. Recalling, while he waited, with what joy he had been ready to face the tiger that coughed near the monkey glen, to stand between Carlin and it--he was aware that now he faced a hunting cheetah _as much for her_.
The cheetah stopped, and turning toward him direct, laid itself along the ground so tight he could see only a line of colour among the gra.s.ses. There it seemed to stay.
When a man deals with a cat, to allay fear or to establish any common ground of sympathy, he ought to see its eyes. While realising this fact, Skag heard a piercing cat-scream, some distance back of him. He had not heard sounds from any of the animals before. . . . He found himself calculating whether the monsoon or night or the cheetah, would reach him first.
Changing sun-rays had laid a sheen resembling silver upon the wall; not dazzling, but softly bright. After a while the cheetah showed, nearer than when it settled into the gra.s.s. The wall was moving forward surely--as surely as time--but the cheetah would reach him first.
At last he saw two yellow discs. Then he worked with his power--his supreme confidence. He had never been more quiet, never more fearless in his life.
The hunting cheetah moved toward him without pause, till he could see the whole body along the ground; the broad, short head; the wide, sun-lit eyes. And while he sent his steady force of human-kindly thought into those eyes, they _narrowed into slits_. In that instant Skag knew that the beast had no fear to allay; no quality of nature he could touch. It was a murderer, pure and simple.
Then he thought of Carlin. . . . Of her brother. . . . Of Nels. He opened his lips to speak, but the name did not pa.s.s his throat.
Carlin, Carlin! It was only a question of time; and Skag folded his arms.
And high against the wall of the waters rolled the clarion challenge-call of Nels, the Great Dane dog. The cheetah leaped and settled back. Skag turned to look the way it faced. A grey line flashed along the ground. Skag did not know it, but he was racing toward their meeting.
The cheetah lifted and met Nels, body against body, in mid-air--Skag heard the impact. Nels had risen full stretch, his head low between his shoulders; the cheetah"s wide-spread arms went round him, but his entire length closed upon the cheetah"s entire length--like a jack-knife--folding it backward. Skag heard a dull sound, the same instant with a keen cat-scream--cut short as the two bodies struck the earth. When he reached them, Nels was still doubled tight over the cheetah"s backward-bent body; his grey iron-jaws locked deep in the tawny throat.
"Sahib! Sanford _Han_--tee Sahib!"
"Hi, Bhanah; this way!"
Bhanah came with a rain-coat in his hand. Stooping to examine Nels a moment and rising to glance at the wall, he spoke rapidly:
"The Sahib has seen his Great Dane Nels kill a second cheetah in one day. There are two cuts on each leg. Also because Nels must not lose his strength on a fast journey to his master"s place--I, Bhanah, will uncover mine honour in the presence of a man."
And quickly casting his turban from his head, he proceeded to tear it down the middle. While he worked, he talked--as if to himself--in half chanting tones:
"Men in my country do _not_--this thing; but I do it. Of a certainty Nels has accomplished that I could not, though I would. This night two cheetahs remain not--the G.o.ds witness--to destroy little tender children of men. And when the so-insignificant cuts of Nels shall be presently wrapped with the covering of mine own honour, I shall be exalted not less! _The G.o.ds witness_. Then we return swiftly into a safe place."
This was no ordinary exultation. Skag"s ears were wide open; and he heard grief--and hate.
"How did you know where I was?" he asked quietly.
"I heard the first cheetah"s death cry; and I knew he was not far from you, Sahib."
"I thought he was pretty far, one little while."
Skag had spoken, thinking of Nels. Bhanah searched his face while the look of a frightened child grew in his own. Again he stooped quickly and touched the man"s feet. He had done it once before--to Skag"s acute discomfort.
"What"s the meaning of that?"
"That a man"s life is in thy breath, my Master."
"Bhanah, I"ll find out--how to answer you."
Then Bhanah laughed a low exultant chuckle, while he finished binding Nels" legs with a part of his own turban.
"It is well, Sahib; the _fortune which never fails_ is thine. And now, if we are wise, we will run."
Nels led, all the way; and they were barely under cover, when the earth indeed shook. The stone walls of the building rocked; the dull thunder of a solid, continuous impact of dense water upon its roof, filled their ears. The light of the sun was cut off.
"Bhanah, you and Nels will camp with me to-night. This has been the hunting cheetah-day of my life; and--Nels is responsible that he didn"t get me."
"My master is the heart of kindness."
While Bhanah was busy, later, Skag laughed:
"I"m remembering that you said Nels did it _soon_. How did he do it?"
"By the drive of his weight against the cheetah"s body; and the strength of his limbs, in the action my master saw."
They had eaten and Nels was properly cared for, when Bhanah spoke softly:
"Shall we have tales, Sahib?"
Skag roused from a moment"s abstraction to answer:
"Bhanah, I don"t remember anything I could talk about to-night, but the hunting cheetah--Nels got."
"The hunting cheetah is one, Sahib; _there are many_. Telling is in knowledge and in speech; finding is in the man. I will tell, if the Sahib pleases; but he shall find."
So they had tales that night.
CHAPTER VIII
_The Monster Kabuli_
Skag had learned, in finding Carlin, that it wasn"t like a man in America finding the one particular and inimitable girl, not even if she were the _laurus n.o.bilis_ and he the eagle of the same coin. In India, where people have pride of race, and time to keep it shining, there are formalities. . . . The two had arranged to meet in the jungle--not deep in the glen where the tiger had coughed, but at the edge toward Hurda, when Skag returned from Poona. He was to go straight into the jungle from the railway station. Carlin would be watching and follow there. . . .
Sanford Hantee of the Natural Research Department, after much opportunity to wrestle with the subtle and gritty and hard-testing demon of delay, came at last to Hurda again, and stepped out of the coach with a throb in his chest and a knot in his throat which only the best and bravest soldiers have brought in from the field. As the moments of waiting at the edge of the jungle pa.s.sed, it dawned upon him that something had happened, or Carlin already would be with him, at least crossing the big sun-shot area from the walled city. . . . What had happened is this story of the monster Kabuli, which is an animal story even without the entrance of the racing elephant, Gunpat Rao.