OLAF'S GREAT LESSON.
"Another thing that urged me to take the cubs," continued Olaf, "was
the fact that I was certain that if I kept them captive in my hut the
mother would sooner or later put in an appearance seeking them, and
then I could kill her with ease. So, as the two cubs rolled about
kitten-like, I wriggled through the brush toward them, and then with a
sudden leap I pounced on them and seized them both by the scruff of
the neck. They spat and growled vindictively, but I had hold of them
in such a way that they could not hurt me. It didn't take me long to
tie them together with a bit of twine, and then shouldering my rifle
and carrying the mewing, spitting cubs, I set out for home.
"The trail was a rough one to follow and I had a lot of difficulty. I
had not gone more than a hundred yards before, quite close behind me,
I heard a horrible yell. In an instant I dropped the cubs and jerked
my rifle up to my shoulder. I knew what that yell meant. It was the
mother lion after the man who had robbed her of her cubs.
"I dropped to my knee to steady my aim, and as her tawny, lithe body
came into view, I fired. It was a shot that I wouldn't have missed
once in a hundred times under ordinary circumstances. But this was the
hundredth time.
"As my weapon was discharged, the lioness emitted a great roar, gave a
whisk of her tail and dashed off into the forest. I knew that I had
not harmed her. It was then that I began to think that the creature
bore a charmed life. It certainly appeared so.
"I was the crack shot of that part of the country and yet I had gone
wide of a target that a ten-year-old boy could not well have missed.
But as I picked up the cubs and resumed my journey, I thought to
myself, with grim satisfaction, that it would not be long before I had
another chance at the beast, and that next time I promised myself that
my bullet would find its mark.
"Well, it wasn't long before what I expected and hoped for came true.
I was out in the back of my shack splitting wood two days later, when
through the light green of the trees that grew close up, I thought I
saw the flash of a swiftly-moving, tawny body.
"I chuckled to myself. 'So you have come at last, eh? That is good.
Now you and I will try conclusions together.'
"Such was the thought that ran through my mind as I made all haste
into the hut for my rifle. As the light-colored mass moved again among
the trees, I leveled my weapon and fired. But again I missed!
"There was a swift dash, more like the passage of a streak of light
than the moving of a living thing, and then I knew that the puma had
fooled me once more. But I also knew that she would come back. The
mother-love that lives in all animals would bring her. I was to pay
dearly for playing upon this noble instinct. I have never tampered
with it since. A creature with young is sacred to me. But I had not
learned my lesson then, and I planned to use the puma's motherly
instinct to trap her to her destruction.
"That evening she was back. I heard her crying her soft, mother cry
among the trees. From inside the cabin, in a sort of rough cage I had
contrived for them, the cubs answered her with little sharp barking
cries.
"But strong as were the ties that bound her to the cubs, the mother
mountain lion came no closer. She was not visible to me. I crouched,
rifle in hand, waiting for one chance at her; but it didn't come. She
kept far up the mountain side, from time to time giving her cry. It
was like the cry of that wild-cat we heard to-night. It was a sound
that I have come to dread. Sometimes in dreams I hear it and then I
waken and cry out. Lafe can tell you.
"I brought the cub's cage outside the hut. I thought that maybe that
would bring her within range of my rifle. But the animal seemed to
know I was laying a pitfall for her, for she did not approach any
closer; but all that night her cries shook the forest.
"I shouted at her. My desire for revenge had got the upper hand
completely of me now. When the puma shrieked and howled, I shrieked
and howled, too.
"'I shall kill you yet,' I promised her, 'your hour is close at hand.
Olaf will have his revenge for his horse. You will see.'
"Toward morning the cries came closer.
"'Now is my time,' I thought.
"I took my rifle and sallied out of the hut. It was bright moonlight.
Once more the cries came from a clump of woods up to my left. I swung
round. My heart gave a bound of delight. Out of the deep shadow of the
woods I saw two burning points of light gleaming. I knew what they
were. The puma's eyes!
"All I had to do was to fire between them. For me, that ought to have
been an easy task. But quick as I was in raising my rifle, the puma
was quicker of movement than I. In a flash the points of light had
vanished, and when next I heard her cries they came from some distance
off.
"Utterly disgusted, baffled and angry, I went back to my bunk. I lay
long awake revolving all sorts of schemes to catch the puma napping,
and I was still planning when I fell asleep. That night my dreams were
all of the working out of my revenge. I guess I wasn't far from going
crazy. Dwelling all the time on one thought and living alone, had
worked powerfully on my mind. I felt that if I didn't kill that
mountain lion she'd kill me, and how near she came to doing it, I'm
going to tell you in a minute.
"For one mortal week I tried every way I could think of to get a shot
at that lion. But it was all of no use. If the animal could have read
my mind, she couldn't have kept out of the way more cleverly than she
did.
"But all the time she was near at hand. The cubs, whom I fed regularly
with venison and small game, used to answer her night and day. I lost
sleep and flesh, but still I was no closer to attaining my object.
"I tried dozens of ways of getting my chance to shoot the animal down.
Failing in all of them, I set poisoned bait around the house. But it
was never touched. With the same uncanny instinct that had taught her
how to keep out of my reach, the puma avoided the poisoned meat. Steel
traps were a joke to her, I guess, for conceal them cleverly as I
might, she never went near them.
"And all the time I grew madder and madder. I had hunted and trapped
for a good many years and this was the first animal that had ever
escaped me once I set out to get it. I began to get nervous. When I
was out hunting, for I had to go pretty frequently to get food for the
young pumas, the slightest unexpected sound would make me jump out of
my skin.
"'Olaf, you've got to end this thing,' I told myself.
"And then later on I said to myself again:
"'Olaf, you must end the puma or the puma will end you, my friend.'
And so the days went by. A dozen times a day and as many at night I
would think I was at last to put an end to the almost unbearable
situation, and every time that puma fooled me. But all the time she
was about the hut. Always within earshot of the cubs.
"One day, for security, I shut them in an inner room. I was afraid
that during one of my absences the mother mountain lion might break in
and effect a rescue. It was about two days after I had made this
arrangement, that the thing happened that has ever since made me pale
when I hear the shrill cry of a mountain lion or any sound resembling
it.
"It was in the early morning. I was sitting outside my shack cleaning
my rifle. I was happy and whistling quite gaily. Suddenly I looked
round for some rags to finish up my job. There were none there and
leaning my rifle against a stump, I went into the hut to get some.
"I had just about got inside when I heard a roar, and then a great
body came hurtling past me into the hut. The puma had been watching
me. By this time, so often had I fired at her, she knew that my
strength lay in my rifle. The instant that she saw me lay it down, she
knew her chance had come. Like a flash she was into the hut after her
cubs.
"And there was I, weaponless, powerless, and face to face with a
mother puma mad to regain possession of her little ones.
"I had one second in which to think and act simultaneously. My bunk
was built high up, luckily, and with one bound, so active did my
terror make me, I was in it and secure for an instant. The puma
crouched, lashed her tail and with bared claws glared at me with
terrible hatred in her green eyes.
"I could feel the cold sweat break out upon me. I could almost sense
the last struggle when she should have sprung upon me in the bunk. But
at that instant the cubs beyond the door set up their cries anew. That
saved me for the time being. With a mighty bound the puma flung
herself against the door. Again and again she flung herself at it like
a battering ram.
"But it was a stout door and it resisted all her attacks till at last,
panting and breathless, she lay down on the floor of the hut to rest.
I dared not move for fear of attracting her attention. I was in a
horrible trap. Noon came and passed and still she lay there. I was
almost mad with thirst, but stronger than my thirst was my fear of
that great cat crouching there with her eyes fixed on the door beyond
which lay her cubs.
"The door fastened with a steel catch. If only I could reach that
catch, release it and open the door there was a possibility that my
ordeal would be at an end. Having regained her cubs, there was a
chance, a mighty slim one, but still a chance, that the lioness would
take them and go.
"The time dragged along on leaden feet. The sun grew lower. A ray of
the declining day struck in through the one window the hut boasted and
struck the steel catch that confined the cubs.
"How long it was after this that my nerve went all to bits, I don't
know. But go it did. I gave a loud yell and then, careless of what
might happen, but determined to end the tension at all hazards, I
reached out with one foot and kicked up the steel catch.
"I was quick but not quick enough. As the door swung open, the lioness
leaped for my leg, but the next instant she saw in the room beyond
her two cubs. In her joy at beholding them again everything else was
forgotten by her. With her sharp, strong claws she tore the box that
confined them to bits, and then, after licking them all over, she
picked them up as a cat does her kittens and--strode out of the door.
"I never saw her again; but I shall always remember her by this."
The woodsman drew up one leg of his loose trousers and showed a long,
livid scar.
"That bane why I skoll never hear the cry of the puma or a cry that
bane lake him without feeling the big fear," he concluded.
Olaf's story had taken some time in its narration, but it had held
them spell bound. They all agreed that he had passed through an ordeal
well calculated to make him dread the creatures, one of which had held
him a prisoner for so many terrible hours.
They turned in late and when they awakened, Olaf and Lafe had taken
their leave without disturbing them. They had left a scribbled note of
thanks, however, with their best wishes for good luck.
"I shall never forget Olaf Gundersen," declared Tom, a sentiment which
the rest echoed.