The chief evidence that one leopard did all the "kills" credited to
this one was the uninterrupted series while it lived, and the
cessation, for a while, when it died. But, though practically
uninterrupted in time, its killings varied in place, to the perplexity
of its pursuers. More than once, when most of those who were seeking
it were in one locality, ambuscading half-eaten remains, it went
elsewhere, and started afresh, where it had the advantage of being
unexpected. It took little pains to remain incognito. It might have
travelled far without eating, as other tigers and leopards often do;
but this leopard was as self-indulgent as railway passengers now can
be, in comfortable expresses, and beguiled the time by eating, as they
do. It seldom went a hundred miles without killing somebody for a
meal.
Colonel Bingham could not say whether it was helped by the people
being deprived of fire-arms; but thought that probably nothing had
happened in the Central Provinces to make any difference to the
leopard in that respect. A great many guns were given out to likely
persons to hunt it, and many young officers, and some no longer young,
not military men only, but civilians of all kinds, taking short leave
on purpose, when they could not otherwise come near it, gave their
leisure to the hunting of this multitudinous murderer. "I never saw
such cordial co-operation," said Bingham. "Rival hunting parties
forgot their rivalries, and helped each other to the uttermost." The
beast was beginning to obsess the minds of men; and, here and there,
fields were lying waste, uncultivated, through fear of it.
More than once a man with a gun was killed by it, which does not,
however, mean that a leopard can openly "fight" a man with a gun. It
means that when a leopard can take a man by surprise, a gun upon his
shoulder is no protection. They said so and explained it, to a postman
who had succeeded to a vacancy which the leopard had made.
Nevertheless the man continued to flagitate his official superiors for
a gun, until, wearied by his importunity, they gave him one. Then, as
he went his rounds, that postman's inquiries after the leopard had a
new significance.
The sight of his gun was pleasant to the villagers, and they praised
his public spirit. He deserved their praise. Bethink you of the mails
he carried in the broiling sun, as he plodded many weary miles along
the dusty roads, and how long you would have volunteered to add a gun
and ammunition to such a burden. What made his conduct the more
praiseworthy was that he knew the gun would not save him if the
leopard were on the war-path and saw him first. In fighting of that
kind, as in guerilla war, it is often only the first glimpse that
counts. When the rule is to kill at sight, then to see is to conquer.
He had been carrying the gun in this way some weeks, at least, perhaps
for months. It had ceased to be needful for him to ask questions as he
went from village to village. At sight of him, anyone who had news
came to tell it. Many a time he laid his burdens down, to let someone
far away but beckoning to him come to where he was, and then they
would sit and talk together as if time had barely even a relative
existence and did not count for much. Nobody ever grumbled. The rural
mails were never in a hurry.
One ever-memorable day he was met outside a village by many of the men
who lived there, coming out to meet him, and hastening to relieve him
of his business burdens with unusual solicitude, leaving nothing to
occupy him but the gun. Then with eager whispers they led him through
the village to a big tree on the farther side of it, half bare of
leaves. "See the leaves at that corner, high up. He's there, he's
there. We saw him go there. Watch till the leaves shake. He cannot
move without shaking them."
The postman got ready his gun, probably putting the end of the barrel
on a rest, though I am not sure I was told that. It was unfortunate
for the leopard that there was no wind. The air must have been rising,
as I have seen it under similar conditions, hot from the ground, as
from a furnace floor; but even through the shimmering atmosphere the
postman could see the leaves were still, fixed, as if made of metal.
The leopard waited long, but so did he. And all was hushed. Then he
saw a slight, slight movement, just visible among the leaves; and then
he fired.
It was some time before the leopard came down, and still longer before
anyone ventured close enough to the body to be sure it was dead. But
whatever reward had been offered was now payable to the postman. The
details of the post-mortem have been sufficiently indicated already;
and indeed they were no part of the life of the leopard, which, almost
immediately after the postman touched the trigger, ended suddenly. And
so does this--its history.