THE LEOPARDS' DEN
While Blake made a successful trip for the abandoned cocoanuts, his
companions levelled the stones beneath the ledges chosen by Winthrope,
and gathered enough dried sea-weed along the talus to soften the hard
beds.
Soothed by the monotonous wash of the sea among the rocks, even Miss
Leslie slept well. Blake, who had insisted that she should retain his
coat, was wakened by the chilliness preceding the dawn. Five minutes
later they started on their journey.
The starlight glimmered on the waves and shed a faint radiance over the
rocks. This and their knowledge of the way enabled them to pick a path
along the foot of the cliff without difficulty. Once on the beach, they
swung along at a smart gait, invigorated by the cool air.
Dawn found them half way to their goal. Blake called a halt when the
first red streaks shot up the eastern sky. All stood waiting until
the quickly following sun sprang forth from the sea. Blake's first
act was to glance from one headland to the other, estimating their
relative distances. His grunt of satisfaction was lost in Winthrope's
exclamation, "By Jove, look at the cattle!"
Blake and Miss Leslie turned to stare at the droves of animals moving
about between them and the border of the tall grass. Miss Leslie was the
first to speak. "They can't be cattle, Mr. Winthrope. There are some
with stripes. I do believe they're zebras!"
"Get down!" commanded Blake. "They're all wild game. Those big
ox-like fellows to the left of the zebras are eland. Whee! wouldn't we
be in it if we owned that water hole? I'll bet I'd have one of those
fat beeves inside three days."
"How I should enjoy a juicy steak!" murmured Miss Leslie.
"Raw or jerked?" questioned Blake.
"What is 'jerked'?"
"Dried."
"Oh, no; I mean broiled--just red inside."
"I prefer mine quite rare," added Winthrope.
"That's the way you'll get it, damned rare--Beg your pardon, Miss
Jenny! Without fire, we'll have the choice of raw or jerked."
"Horrors!"
"Jerked meat is all right. You cut your game in strips--"
"With a penknife!" laughed Miss Leslie.
Blake stared at her glumly. "That's so. You've got it back on
me-- Butcher a beef with a penknife! We'll have to take it raw, and
dog-fashion at that."
"Haven't I heard of bamboo knives?" said Winthrope.
"Bamboo?"
"I'm sure I can't say, but as I remember, it seems to me that the
varnish-like glaze--"
"Silica? Say, that would cut meat. But where in--where in hades are the
bamboos?"
"I'm sure I can't say. Only I remember that I have seen them in other
tropical places, you know."
"Meantime I prefer cocoanuts, until we have a fire to broil our
steaks," remarked Miss Leslie.
"Ditto, Miss Jenny, long's we have the nuts and no meat. I'm a
vegetarian now--but maybe my mouth ain't watering for something else.
Look at all those chops and roasts and stews running around out there!"
"They are making for the grass," observed Winthrope. "Hadn't we
better start?"
"Nuts won't weigh so much without the shells. We'll eat right here."
There were only a few nuts left. They were drained and cracked and
scooped out, one after another. The last chanced to break evenly across
the middle.
"Hello," said Blake, "the lower part of this will do for a bowl, Miss
Jenny. When you've eaten the cream, put it in your pocket. Say, Win,
have you got the bottle and keys and--"
"All safe--everything."
"Are you sure, Mr. Winthrope?" asked Miss Leslie. "Men's pockets seem
so open. Twice I've had to pick up Mr. Blake's locket."
"Locket?" echoed Blake.
"The ivory locket. Women may be curious, Mr. Blake, but I assure you, I
did not look inside, though--"
"Let me--give it here--quick!" gasped Blake.
Startled by his tone and look, Miss Leslie caught an oval object from
the side pocket of the coat, and thrust it into Blake's outstretched
hand. For a moment he stared at it, unable to believe his eyes; then
he leaped up, with a yell that sent the droves of zebras and antelope
flying into the tall grass.
"Oh! oh!" screamed Miss Leslie. "Is it a snake? Are you bitten?"
"Bitten?--Yes, by John Barleycorn! Must have been fuzzy drunk to put it
in my coat. Always carry it in my fob pocket. What a blasted infernal
idiot I've been! Kick me, Win,--kick me hard!"
"I say, Blake, what is it? I don't quite take you. If you would only--"
"Fire!--_fire!_ Can't you see? We've got all hell beat! Look here."
He snapped open the slide of the supposed locket, and before either of
his companions could realize what he would be about, was focussing the
lens of a surveyor's magnifying-glass upon the back of Winthrope's
hand. The Englishman jerked the hand away--
"_Ow!_ That burns!"
Blake shook the glass in their bewildered faces.
"Look there!" he shouted, "there's fire; there's water; there's
birds' eggs and beefsteaks! Here's where we trek on the back trail.
We'll smoke out that leopard in short order!"
"You don't mean to say, Blake--"
"No; I mean to do! Don't worry. You can hide with Miss Jenny on the
point, while I engineer the deal. Fall in."
The day was still fresh when they found themselves back at the foot of
the cliff. Here arose a heated debate between the men. Winthrope, stung
by Blake's jeering words, insisted upon sharing the attack, though with
no great enthusiasm. Much to Blake's surprise, Miss Leslie came to the
support of the Englishman.
"But, Mr. Blake," she argued, "you say it will be perfectly safe for
us here. If so, it will be safe for myself alone."
"I can play this game without him."
"No doubt. Yet if, as you say, you expect to keep off the leopard with
a torch, would it not be well to have Mr. Winthrope at hand with other
torches, should yours burn out?"
"Yes; if I thought he'd be at hand after the first scare."
Winthrope started off, almost on a run. At that moment he might have
faced the leopard single-handed. Blake chuckled as he swung away after
his victim. Within ten paces, however, he paused to call back over his
shoulder: "Get around the point, Miss Jenny, and if you want something
to do, try braiding the cocoanut fibre."
Miss Leslie made no response; but she stood for some time gazing after
the two men. There was so much that was characteristic even in this rear
view. For all his anger and his haste, the Englishman bore himself
with an air of well-bred nicety. His trim, erect figure needed only a
fresh suit to be irreproachable. On the other hand, a careless observer,
at first glance, might have mistaken Blake, with his flannel shirt and
shouldered club, for a hulking navvy. But there was nothing of the
navvy in his swinging stride or in the resolute poise of his head as he
came up with Winthrope.
Though the girl was not given to reflection, the contrast between the two
could not but impress her. How well her countryman--coarse, uncultured,
but full of brute strength and courage--fitted in with these primitive
surroundings. Whereas Winthrope . . . . and herself . . . .
She fell into a kind of disquieted brown study. Her eyes had an odd
look, both startled and meditative,--such a look as might be expected
of one who for the first time is peering beneath the surface of things,
and sees the naked Realities of Life, the real values, bared of masking
conventions. It may have been that she was seeking to ponder the meaning
of her own existence--that she had caught a glimpse of the vanity and
wastefulness, the utter futility of her life. At the best, it could
only have been a glimpse. But was not that enough?
"Of what use are such people as I?" she cried. "That man may be rough
and coarse,--even a brute; but he at least does things--I'll show him
that I can do things, too!"
She hastened out around the corner of the cliff to the spot where they
had spent the night. Here she gathered together the cocoanut husks,
and seating herself in the shade of the overhanging ledges, began to
pick at the coarse fibre. It was cruel work for her soft fingers,
not yet fully healed from the thorn wounds. At times the pain and an
overpowering sense of injury brought tears to her eyes; still more
often she dropped the work in despair of her awkwardness. Yet always
she returned to the task with renewed energy.
After no little perseverance, she found how to twist the fibre and plait
it into cord. At best it was slow work, and she did not see how she
should ever make enough cord for a fish-line. Yet, as she caught the
knack of the work and her fingers became more nimble, she began to enjoy
the novel pleasure of producing something.
She had quite forgot to feel injured, and was learning to endure with
patience the rasping of the fibre between her fingers, when Winthrope
came clambering around the corner of the cliff.
"What is it?" she exclaimed, springing up and hurrying to meet him. He
was white and quivering, and the look in his eyes filled her with dread.
Her voice shrilled to a scream, "He's dead!"
Winthrope shook his head.
"Then he's hurt!--he's hurt by that savage creature, and you've run
off and left him--"
"No, no, Miss Genevieve, I must insist! The fellow is not even
scratched."
"Then why--?"
"It was the horror of it all. It actually made me ill."
"You frightened me almost to death. Did the beast chase you?"
"That would have been better, in a way. Really, it was horrible! I'm
still sick over it, Miss Genevieve."
"But tell me about it. Did you set fire to the bushes in the cleft, as
Mr. Blake--"
"Yes; after we had fetched what we could carry of that long grass--two
big trusses. It grows ten or twelve feet tall, and is now quite dry.
Part of it Blake made into torches, and we fired the bush all across
the foot of the cleft. Really, one would not have thought there was that
much dry wood in so green a dell. On either side of the rill the grass
and brush flared like tinder, and the flames swept up the cleft far
quicker than we had expected. We could hear them crackling and roaring
louder than ever after the smoke shut out our view."
"Surely, there is nothing so very horrible in that."
"No, oh, no; it was not that. But the beast--the leopard! At first we
heard one roar; then it was that dreadful snarling and yelling--most
awful squalling! . . . . The wretched thing came leaping and
tumbling down the path, all singed and blinded. Blake fired the big
truss of grass, and the brute rolled right into the flames. It was
shocking--dreadfully shocking! The wretched creature writhed and leaped
about till it plunged into the pool. . . . . When it sought to crawl
out, all black and hideous, Blake went up and killed it with his
club--crushed in its skull--Ugh!"
Miss Leslie gazed at the unnerved Englishman with calm scrutiny.
"But why should you feel so about it?" she asked. "Was it not the
beast's life against ours?"
"But so horrible a death!"
"I'm sure Mr. Blake would have preferred to shoot the creature, had he
a gun. Having nothing else than fire, I think it was all very brave of
him. Now we are sure of water and food. Had we not best be going?"
"It was to fetch you that Blake sent me."
Winthrope spoke with perceptible stiffness. He was chagrined, not only
by her commendation of Blake, but by the indifference with which she had
met his agitation.
They started at once, Miss Leslie in the lead. As they rounded the point,
she caught sight of the smoke still rising from the cleft. A little later
she noticed the vultures which were streaming down out of the sky from
all quarters other than seaward. Their focal point seemed to be the trees
at the foot of the cleft. A nearer view showed that they were alighting
in the thorn bushes on the south border of the wood.
Of Blake there was nothing to be seen until Miss Leslie, still in the
lead, pushed in among the trees. There they found him crouched beside
a small fire, near the edge of the pool. He did not look up. His eyes
were riveted in a hungry stare upon several pieces of flesh, suspended
over the flames on spits of green twigs.
"Hello!" he sang out, as he heard their footsteps. "Just in time, Miss
Jenny. Your broiled steak'll be ready in short order."
"Oh, build up the fire! I'm simply ravenous!" she exclaimed, between
impatience and delight.
Winthrope was hardly less keen; yet his hunger did not altogether blunt
his curiosity.
"I say, Blake," he inquired, "where did you get the meat?"
"Stow it, Win, my boy. This ain't a packing house. The stuff may be
tough, but it's not--er--the other thing. Here you are, Miss Jenny. Chew
it off the stick."
Though Winthrope had his suspicions, he took the piece of half-burned
flesh which Blake handed him in turn, and fell to eating without further
question. As Blake had surmised, the roast proved far other than
tender. Hunger, however, lent it a most appetizing flavor. The repast
ended when there was nothing left to devour. Blake threw away his empty
spit, and rose to stretch. He waited for Miss Leslie to swallow her
last mouthful, and then began to chuckle.
"What's the joke?" asked Winthrope.
Blake looked at him solemnly.
"Well now, that was downright mean of me," he drawled; "after robbing
them, to laugh at it!"
"Robbing who?"
"The buzzards."
"You've fed us on leopard meat! It's--it's disgusting!"
"I found it filling. How about you, Miss Jenny?"
Miss Leslie did not know whether to laugh or to give way to a feeling
of nausea. She did neither.
"Can we not find the spring of which you spoke?" she asked. "I am
thirsty."
"Well, I guess the fire is about burnt out," assented Blake. "Come on;
we'll see."
The cleft now had a far different aspect from what it had presented on
their first visit. The largest of the trees, though scorched about the
base, still stood with unwithered foliage, little harmed by the fire.
But many of their small companions had been killed and partly destroyed
by the heat and flames from the burning brush. In places the fire was yet
smouldering.
Blake picked a path along the edge of the rill, where the moist
vegetation, though scorched, had refused to burn. After the first
abrupt ledge, up which Blake had to drag his companions, the ascent
was easy. But as they climbed around an outjutting corner of the steep
right wall of the cleft, Blake muttered a curse of disappointment. He
could now see that the cleft did not run to the top of the cliff, but
through it, like a tiny box canyon. The sides rose sheer and smooth as
walls. Midway, at the highest point of the cleft, the baobab towered high
above the ridge crest, its gigantic trunk filling a third of the breadth
of the little gorge. Unfortunately it stood close to the left wall.
"Here's luck for you!" growled Blake. "Why couldn't the blamed old
tree have grown on the other side? We might have found a way to climb it.
Guess we'll have to smoke out another leopard. We're no nearer those
birds' nests than we were yesterday."
"By Jove, look here!" exclaimed Winthrope. "This is our chance for
antelope! Here by the spring are bamboos--real bamboos,--and only half
the thicket burned."
"What of them?" demanded Blake.
"Bows--arrows--and did you not agree that they would make knives?"
"Umph--we'll see. What is it, Miss Jenny?"
"Isn't that a hole in the big tree?"
"Looks like it. These baobabs are often hollow."
"Perhaps that is where the leopard had his den," added Winthrope.
"Shouldn't wonder. We'll go and see."
"But, Mr. Blake," protested the girl, "may there not be other
leopards?"
"Might have been; but I'll bet they lit out with the other. Look how
the tree is scorched. Must have been stacks of dry brush around the hole,
'nough to smoke out a fireman. We'll look and see if they left any soup
bones lying around. First, though, here's your drink, Miss Jenny."
As he spoke, Blake kicked aside some smouldering branches, and led the
way to the crevice whence the spring trickled from the rock into a
shallow stone basin. When all had drunk their fill of the clear cool
water, Blake took up his club and walked straight across to the baobab.
Less than thirty steps brought him to the narrow opening in the trunk
of the huge tree. At first he could make out nothing in the dimly lit
interior; but the fetid, catty odor was enough to convince him that he
had found the leopards' den.
He caught the vague outlines of a long body, crouched five or six
yards away, on the far side of the hollow. He sprang back, his club
brandished to strike. But the expected attack did not follow. Blake
glanced about as though considering the advisability of a retreat.
Winthrope and Miss Leslie were staring at him, white-faced. The sight of
their terror seemed to spur him to dare-devil bravado; though his
actions may rather have been due to the fact that he realized the
futility of flight, and so rose to the requirements of the situation--the
grim need to stand and face the danger.
"Get behind the bamboos!" he called, and as they hurriedly obeyed, he
caught up a stone and flung it in at the crouching beast.
He heard the missile strike with a soft thud that told him he had not
missed his mark, and he swung up his club in both hands. Given half a
chance, he would smash the skull of the female leopard as he had crushed
her blinded mate. . . . . One moment after another passed, and he stood
poised for the shock, tense and scowling. . . . . Not so much as a snarl
came from within. The truth flashed upon him.
"Smothered!" he yelled.
The others saw him dart in through the hole. A moment later two limp
grayish bodies were flung out into the open. Immediately after, Blake
reappeared, dragging the body of the mother leopard.
"It's all right; they're dead!" cried Winthrope, and he ran forward
to look at the bodies.
Miss Leslie followed, hardly less curious.
"Are they all dead, Mr. Blake?" she inquired.
"Wiped out--whole family. The old cat stayed by her kittens, and all
smothered together--lucky for us! Get busy with those bamboos, Win. I'm
going to have these skins, and the sooner we get the cub meat hung up
and curing, the better for us."
"Leopard meat again!" rejoined Winthrope.
"Spring leopard, young and tender! What more could you ask? Get a move
on you."
"Can I do anything, Mr. Blake?" asked Miss Leslie.
"Hunt a shady spot."
"But I really mean it."
"Well, if that's straight, you might go on along the gully, and see if
there's any place to get to the top. You could pick up sticks on the
way back, if any are left. We'll have to fumigate this tree hole before
we adopt it for a residence."
"Will it be long before you finish with your--with the bodies?"
"Well, now, look here, Miss Jenny; it's going to be a mess, and I
wouldn't mind hauling the carcasses clear down the gully, out of sight,
if it was to be the only time. But it's not, and you've got to get
used to it, sooner or later. So we'll start now."
"I suppose, if I must, Mr. Blake-- Really, I wish to help."
"Good. That's something like! Think you can learn to cook?"
"See what I did this morning."
Blake took the cord of cocoanut fibre which she held out to him, and
tested its strength.
"Well, I'll be--blessed!" he said. "This _is_ something like. If
you don't look out, you'll make quite a camp-mate, Miss Jenny. But
now, trot along. This is hardly arctic weather, and our abattoir don't
include a cold-storage plant. The sooner these lambs are dressed, the
better."