soon the forest began to lighten and the tall yellow-wood trees to give way to high scrub with open patches here and there. here the fingo, kleinbooi, who had been striding on in front, his kerrie over his shoulder, now signed them to dismount. this they did, and the horses were made fast to convenient boughs.
guided by kleinbooi they walked cautiously forward, the three men in front, the girl just behind; dick selmes and greenoak with their pieces in readiness. then a vicious snarl, and the clank of iron told them that the object of their quest was reached, and that at any rate it had not yet succeeded in breaking loose.
a small runlet here trickled down the kloof in a chain of water-holes. beside one of these, in a stony open space, stood a magnificent leopard. the great iron gin trap had caught the poor beast just above one front pad, and the powerful grip held him firmly.
at sight of his intending destroyers the creature sank down into a crouching attitude, uttering a hideous yell that was half a snarl, evoked by the renewed agony of the movement. his unwounded forepaw was over the trap, his hindquarters gathered beneath him as though for a spring, and his long tail waved viciously to and fro. a deep, hoarse, snarling growl issued from his throat, and in his yellow eyes was a perfectly fiend-like glare of helpless ferocity. his jaws were dropping great flakes of foam reddened with blood, for he had been plentifully licking his wounded limb.
“oh, do shoot, and have done with it,” whispered hazel, shuddering violently.
“hold on, greenoak. don’t blaze yet,” said dick selmes, who had not heard. “i want to have a closer look.”
“better not,” warned harley greenoak, who had already got his quarry covered. “he might break loose, or the chain might give,”—the trap was chained to a tree.
but the other laughed recklessly, and continued to advance—we dare not swear that the consciousness of having a certain form of gallery to play to did not add to his rashness. he halted within very few yards of the maddened beast.
the latter was now frightful to behold. he seemed to flatten himself lower in his crouch. the great speckled head literally opened, until, viewed in section, it resembled a crescent. the lips were drawn back from the formidable fangs till the contracted folds of the skin well-nigh closed the glaring eyes, and the infuriated snarl had become something terrific.
suddenly every muscle in the beast’s body was seen to stiffen. with an appalling yell it flung itself forward. dick selmes was hurled to the ground, half stunned; his confused senses feebly conscious of the crash of a report, leading him to suppose he had been shot by accident.
“well of all the complete young idiots i ever saw, you are the champion one,” cried old hesketh, with excusable heat, having ascertained that his guest was uninjured. the latter laughed, rather feebly, for he felt sore all over.
“what’s the row, eh? greenoak, i thought you’d shot me.”
“the row? look there,” was the answer grimly given.
dick screwed himself round. there lay the iron trap—empty, and further on, the spotted corpse of the great leopard. he himself was between the two.
“lucky greenoak’s got the eye of a hawk, and the quickness of a flash of lightning,” said his host, grimly. “i know i could never have got in that shot in time. how would you be feeling now if the brute’s spring hadn’t been cut short? he was stone dead in the middle of it when he knocked you over.”
“did he knock me over then?” said dick, rising to his feet.
“rather,” answered greenoak. “even then the muscular contraction of his claws might have given you fits; but he made a bad shot—only hit you with his shoulder and knocked you flying.”
they gathered round the splendid beast, grim and terrible still in death. the heavy express bullet had gone clean through the heart.
“by george, but i’ve had a narrow squeak for it!” ejaculated dick. then his glance fell upon hazel brandon, who was standing a little in the background, white and shuddering, and his heart smote him with self-wrath and contempt. he had thought to show off, and had only succeeded in frightening her, and making a most egregious ass of himself.
“oh, miss brandon, i’m so sorry i’ve given you a scare!” he exclaimed penitently. “but it’s all right now. come and look at the tiger—such a splendid beast.”
“well, you did give me rather a fright,” she said, with a faint smile, while the colour returned to her cheeks. “but—what a splendid shot!”
“wasn’t it!” answered dick, whole-heartedly, at the same time not quite able to help wishing that the positions had been exactly reversed. he was conscious, too, that this was the third time harley greenoak had stepped between himself and sure and certain death. the latter was thinking the same thing, and was more than ever convinced that sir anson had spoken the bare truth in saying that he would find his charge no sinecure. the while he had drawn his sheath knife and was tucking up his shirt-sleeves.
“we’ll just strip off this uncommonly fine skin, kleinbooi and i,” he announced imperturbably. “but as it isn’t a pleasant process to watch, i’d suggest that miss brandon should wait for us where we left the horses.”
“that’s a good idea,” said dick, briskly. “come along, miss brandon. we’ll wait there.”
having thrown off her temporary scare, hazel turned to her uncle and rated him soundly for having the trap set at all it was abominably cruel, she declared, unsportsmanlike too. the old man chuckled.
“ho—ho! not bad that, for a girl who’s been raised on a farm,” he said. “don’t they ever set traps down at windhoek then, or has your father got too many sheep and calves? i can tell you this beast has been taking toll of mine finely.”
“well, why don’t you hunt him then, in fair and sportsmanlike fashion,” retorted the girl, “instead of setting an abominably cruel thing like that?”
“hunt him? ho—ho! look there.”
he pointed to the upper end of the hollow, which was shut in by a wall of terraced rock and cliff. but many a dark hole and crack on the face of this showed that the towering rampart was honeycombed by caves and labyrinthine galleries.
“how are you going to get him out of these?” went on old hesketh. “why, all the dogs in the world wouldn’t get him out. he’d only have to skip from one hole to another. eh, greenoak?” the latter nodded.
“well, it’s abominably cruel all the same,” repeated hazel as she turned away. “aren’t i right, mr selmes?”
“a trap that doesn’t kill outright always is cruel,” answered the diplomatic dick, whose last wish in the world was to disagree with her. “i know i’ve often thought it hard luck on the rabbits at home when they got into one—poor little beggars.”
“do you know,” she went on, jumping from one subject to another, “i can’t tell you how glad i am to have had the opportunity of meeting mr greenoak. what a splendid man he is! isn’t he?”
“rather. he’s a thundering good old chap.”
hazel lifted an eyebrow.
“old! but you surely don’t call him old. why, he’s just in his prime. oh, i see, you mean it as a term of comradeship,” she added.
“er—yes. that was it,” agreed dick, upon whose mind a very unwelcome qualm was beginning to force itself.
“so strong and cool and clearheaded,” she went on, “and such nerve. why, he’s everything a man should be. don’t you agree with me?”
“most decidedly.”
“ah, i like to hear a man speak well of another.”
“why? isn’t it usual?” said dick.
“no. at least not within my experience. almost invariably if i boom one man to another that other will either agree half-heartedly, or find something disparaging to say.”
“well, even if i felt that way inclined, i should be an absolutely unspeakable cur were i to say anything of the sort about greenoak, considering that this is the third time he has saved my life,” answered dick.
“is it? oh, do tell me about the others,” cried hazel, eagerly.
“i can’t tell you about the other because it comes into the mystery of this place, as to which, as you know, we are sworn to secrecy. but i told you the first. it was the night i shot the big buffalo.”
looking down into the bright, sparkling eager face, dick selmes was conscious of that unwelcome misgiving taking even more definite hold of his mind. the eagerness with which she hung upon his words was not because they were his words. greenoak of all people! why, he must be old enough to be her father, concluded dick, in his inexperience rather consoling himself with the thought.
“yes, you told me that,” rejoined hazel. “but you are only one of many. harley greenoak has the reputation of having saved countless lives and got no end of people out of difficulties of one kind or another, yet he never talks about it, they say. i can’t tell you how proud i am to have made his acquaintance.”
“shall i tell him so, for here he comes?” said dick, mischievously. “now, or when you’re not there?”
“if you do i’ll never speak to you again. and yet i don’t know that i’d greatly care if you did.”
they had been waiting as directed, where the horses had been left, and now the other two were coming up.
“you’ve made a quick job of that, greenoak,” said dick.
“yes. but i only took charge of the more difficult part, kleinbooi’ll do the rest. it’s a good skin, dick, and ought to look well in your hall, or wherever you stick up such things.”
dick stared.
“but it’s yours,” he cried. “why, it was your shot—and a jolly fine shot too. don’t know where i’d have been but for it.”
“oh, that’s all right. i’ve nowhere to keep trophies and you have. you’ll be able to hang it under the buffalo head.” and the speaker swung himself into the saddle, and resumed his conversation with old hesketh.
“there!” exclaimed hazel. “isn’t that like him? and you hardly said thank you.”
“greenoak doesn’t like much thanking. it seems to hurt him; sets him on the shrink, don’t you know.”
“i can quite believe that,” rejoined hazel. “now—you can help me to mount.”
the while, the subject under discussion was some way ahead, with hesketh. they were in fact passing the scene of that other tragedy.
“not much trace of that affair,” hesketh was saying as he glanced keenly around. “tell you what, though, i wonder yon tiger didn’t put an end to the ‘mystery’ long ago, and save us the trouble. ho-ho!”
“i don’t,” rejoined greenoak, quietly. “it’d have to be a very smart tiger indeed to get the blind side of a veteran bushman. the ‘mystery’ was a darn sight more likely to scoff the tiger than the tiger was to scoff the ‘mystery.’”
