For a few minutes, or a few moments, I cannot tell which, I lay there
half stunned.
Then I began to think that I should be torn to pieces and devoured, and
my next vivid thought took the form of a question--Will it hurt much?
This set me wondering whether I was already badly injured, and as I had
read that people who are seriously hurt do not feel pain at the time, I
took it for granted that I was in a very sad state. But all the same I
did not feel torn by the creature's claws, nor yet as if its teeth had
been driven into the back of my neck, though I supposed that they had
been. What I did feel was that the puma was heavy, soft, and very hot.
"Then I can't be hurt," I reasoned with myself at last, "or I should
feel the pain now," and with this I began to think it was time to do
something; but I hesitated about beginning, for I could make no use of
my discharged gun.
There was my knife, though, if I could get it out from its sheath in my
belt, and feeling that, if it were to come to a struggle, my empty hands
would be no match for the puma's teeth and claws, I began to steal my
fingers towards my belt.
I stopped directly, though, for at the first movement there was a deep
shuddering growl at the nape of my neck, and it seemed to run down my
spine and out at the tips of my fingers and toes. It was just as if the
puma were saying--
"You just lie still, or I'll bite."
That must have been the meaning, for I lay quite still with the great
heat drops tickling my face and running in the roots of my hair, while
the puma crouched upon my back so that I could feel its shape exactly.
"What can I do?" I said to myself, and then I remembered the old story
about the traveller and the bear--how he shammed death, and the bear
left him. That was what I felt that I must do, and I lay perfectly
still in the hope that the puma would leave me, though it seemed quite
to approve of its couch, and lay close, breathing steadily, so that I
felt the rise and fall of its breast against my back.
Just when I was beginning to feel faint with the heat and excitement, a
thrill ran through me, for from somewhere close at hand, but invisible
to me in the position I occupied, I heard Pete's voice--
"Oh, Master Nat, Master Nat! Are you killed?"
"No," I cried; but I said no more, for there was a savage growl, a snap,
and I felt myself seized at the back of the neck and shaken, but the
puma had only seized the collar of my loose jacket, so that I was unhurt
still.
"What shall I do, Master Nat?" cried Pete.
The puma loosed its hold of the collar of my jacket, and I felt it raise
its head as if looking in the direction of Pete, and it growled fiercely
again.
"Shoot, Pete, shoot!" I cried, feeling that at all risks I must speak.
The puma's teeth gripped my collar again, and I could fell its claws
glide out of their sheaths like a cat's and press upon my shoulders,
giving me a warning of what the beast could do.
But its attention was taken off directly by Pete's voice, and it raised
its head again and growled at him as if daring him to approach and rob
it of its prey.