Author: Henryk Sienkiewicz
Category: Nonfiction
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sat on a single acacia in thisparticular manner: the male was perched on the top of the tree and theothers lower, and after the first notes, which seemed like the tuningof their little throats, the male began a song and the others listenedin silence. Only when he had finished did they repeat together in achorus the last refrain of his song. After a brief pause, he resumedand finished, and they again repeated; after this the whole flock flewin a light wavy flight to the nearest acacia and the concert, composedof the soloist and chorus, again resounded in the southern stillness.The children could not listen enough to this. Nell, catching theleading tune of the concert, joined with the chorus and warbled in herthin little voice the notes resembling the quickly repeated sound of"tui, tui, tui, twiling-ting! ting!"
Once the children, following the winged musicians from tree to tree,went away over half a mile from the camp, leaving in it the threenegroes, the King, and Saba. Stas was about to start on a hunting tripand did not want to take Saba with him, for fear that his barking mightscare away the game. When the little flock finally flew to the lastacacia on the other side of a wide ravine, the boy stopped Nell andsaid:
"Now I will escort you to the King and after that I shall see whetherthere are any antelopes or zebras in the high jungle, for Kali saysthat the smoked meats will not last longer than two days."
"Why, I am big now," answered Nell, who was always anxious to make itappear that she was not a little child, "so I will return alone. We cansee the camp perfectly from here, and the smoke also."
"I am afraid that you may stray."
"I won't stray. In a high jungle we might stray, but here, see how lowthe grass is!"
"Still, something may happen to you."
"You yourself said that lions and panthers do not hunt in the daytime.Besides, you hear how the King is trumpeting from longing after us.What lion would dare to hunt there where the sound of the King reaches?"
And she began to importune:
"Stas, dear, I will go alone, like a grown-up."
Stas hesitated for a while but finally assented. The camp and smokereally could be seen. The King, who longed for Nell, trumpeted everylittle while. In the low grass there was no danger of going astray, andas to lions, panthers, and hyenas, there plainly could be no talk ofthem as these animals seek prey during the night. The boy after allknew that nothing would afford the little maid greater pleasure than ifhe acted as though he did not regard her as a little child.
"Very well," he said, "go alone, but go directly, and do not tarry onthe way."
"And may I pluck just those flowers?" she asked, pointing at a cussobush, covered with an immense number of rosy flowers.
"You may."
Saying this, he turned her about, pointed out to her once more forgreater certainty the clump of trees from which the smoke of the campissued and from which resounded the King's trumpeting, after which heplunged into the high jungle growing on the brink of the ravine.
But he had not gone a hundred paces when he was seized by uneasiness."Why, it was stupid on my part," he thought, "to permit Nell to walkalone in Africa. Stupid, stupid. She is such a child! I ought not toleave her for a step unless the King is with her. Who knows what mayhappen! Who knows whether under that rosy bush some kind of snake isnot lying! Big apes can leap out of the ravine and carry her away fromme or bite her. God forbid! I committed a terrible folly."
And his uneasiness changed into anger at himself, and at the same timeinto a terrible fear. Not reflecting any longer, he turned around as ifstung by a sudden evil presentiment. Walking hurriedly, he held therifle ready to fire, with that great dexterity which he had acquiredthrough daily hunting, and advanced amid the thorny mimosas without anyrustle, exactly like a panther when stealing to a herd of antelopes atnight. After a while he shoved his head out of the high underwood,glanced about and was stupefied.
Nell stood under a cusso bush with her little hand outstretched; therosy flowers, which she had dropped in terror, lay at her feet, andfrom the distance of about twenty paces a big tawny-gray beast wascreeping towards her amid the low grass.
Stas distinctly saw his green eyes fastened upon the little maid'sface, which was as white as chalk, his narrow head with flattened ears,his shoulder-blades raised upward on account of his lurking andcreeping posture, his long body and yet longer tail, the end of whichhe moved with a light, cat-like motion. One moment more one spring andit would be all over with Nell.
At this sight the boy, hardened and inured to danger, in the twinklingof an eye understood that if he did not regain self-command, if he didnot muster courage, if he shot badly and only wounded the assailant,even though heavily, the little maid must perish. But he could masterhimself to that degree that under the influence of these thoughts hishands and limbs suddenly became calm like steel springs. With oneglance of the eye he detected a dark spot in the neighborhood of thebeast's ear,--with one light motion he directed the barrel of the rifleat it and fired.
The report of the shot, Nell's scream, and a short, shrill bleatresounded at the same moment. Stas jumped towards Nell, and coveringher with his own body, he aimed again at the assailant.
But the second shot was entirely unnecessary, for the dreadful cat laylike a rag, flattened out, with nose close to the ground and clawswedged in the grass--almost without a quiver. The bursting bullet hadtorn out the back of its head and the nape of its neck. Above its eyes,gory, torn, white convolutions of its brain oozed out.
And the little hunter and Nell stood for some time, gazing now at theslain beast, then at each other, not being able to utter a word. Butafter that something strange happened. Now this same Stas, who a momentbefore would have astonished the most experienced hunter in the wholeworld by his calmness and coolness, suddenly became pale; his limbsbegan to tremble, tears flowed from his eyes, and afterwards he seizedhis head with the palms of his hands and began to repeat:
"Oh, Nell! Nell! If I had not returned!"
And he was swayed by such consternation, such belated despair, thatevery fiber within him quivered as if he had a fever. After anunheard-of exertion of his will and all the powers of his soul and bodya moment of weakness and relaxation had come. Before his eyes was thepicture of the dreadful beast, resting with blood-stained muzzle insome dark cave and tearing Nell's body to pieces. And of course, thiscould have happened and would have happened if he had not returned. Oneminute, one second more and it would have been too late. This thoughthe plainly could not banish.
Finally it ended in this, that Nell, recovering from her fear andalarm, had to comfort him. The little upright soul threw both herlittle arms around his neck and, weeping also, began to call to himloudly, as if she wanted to arouse him from slumber.
"Stas! Stas! Nothing is the matter with me. See, nothing is the matterwith me. Stas! Stas!"
But he came to himself and grew calm only after a long time.Immediately after that Kali, who heard the shot not far from the campand knew that the "Bwana kubwa" never fired in vain, came leading ahorse to carry away the game. The young negro, glancing at the slainbeast, suddenly retreated, and his face at once became ashen.
"Wobo!" he shouted.
The children now approached the carcass, already growing rigid. Up tothat time Stas did not have an accurate idea as to what kind of beastof prey had fallen from his shot. At the first glance of the eye itseemed to the boy that it was an exceptionally large serval;nevertheless, after closer examination he saw that it was not, for theslain beast exceeded the dimensions of even a leopard. His tawny skinwas strewn with chestnut-hued spots, but his head was narrower thanthat of a leopard, which made him resemble somewhat a wolf; his legswere higher, paws wider, and his eyes were enormous. One of them wasdriven to the surface by a bullet, the other still stared at thechildren, fathomless, motionless, and awful. Stas came to theconclusion that this was a species of panther unknown to zoology, justas Lake Bassa-Narok was unknown to geography.
Kali gazed continually with great terror at the beast stretched uponthe ground, repeating in a low v
oice, as if he feared to awaken it:
"Wobo! The great master killed a wobo!"
But Stas turned to the little maid, placed his hand on her head, asthough he desired definitely to assure himself that the wobo had notcarried her away, and then said:
"You see, Nell. You see that even if you are full-grown, you cannotwalk alone through the jungle."
"True, Stas," answered Nell with a penitent mien, "but I can go withyou or the King."
"Tell me how it was? Did you hear him draw near?"
"No-- Only a golden fly flew out of those flowers. So I turned aroundafter it and saw how he crept out of the ravine."
"And what then?"
"He stood still and began to look at me."
"Did he look long?"
"Long, Stas. Only when I dropped the flowers and guarded