And time has worn us into slovenry,
But, by the mass, our hearts are in the trim
King Henry V
At night came that weird lowing sound a leopard often makes when hunting. Our friend of the afternoon, of course. He wakened us up, and we turned out to see that the watch happened to be on the alert. It would be a parlous thing if we lost any of the precious trophies now when the expedition was almost over—not that taxidermine-covered skins and heads would be the sort of feast that would appeal to a saucy leopard. Then silence again.
Next day one of our hunters heard of a neighbouring karia losing a sheep the previous night. It was struck down but not removed. I had heard of such a thing before, and believe it to be an undoubted fact that a leopard kills on occasion for mere lust.
Cecily and I went to the karia, which was perched on a plateau surrounded with slopes covered with aloes. Quite a natural fortress, and one that might be most easily guarded from the incursions of wild beasts. But the Somalis seem to me to introduce the kismet idea into every phase of their everyday life. Any easily avoided disaster is accepted in this fashion.
The head-man gave us all the particulars. A leopard had indeed entered the karia, killed a sheep, and then left the carcase. We begged for the remains, and for a consideration got them. Clarence bestowed them at the foot of the rise in open ground, by a brake of aloes and thick cover. The men set about constructing a “machan” in the jungly place, and kept guard till sunset, when Cecily and I took the job on. We climbed into our refuge; it was intensely rickety, and rocked every time we made the least movement. I was no more enamoured of this sort of sport than before, and suppose we were doing it because we felt the trip being so nearly over it was foolish now to miss any chance whatever. For once in a way we were both rather uninterested, a fatal frame of mind in this sort of an affair. We were bitterly cold, and I could hardly hold my rifle at all. Hours seemed to drag along, minutes really. I had to strike a light, whatever the consequence, to ascertain the time. It was 12 a.m. Oh, for bed and this sort of sport at an end! Another weary silence. I slept, I believe, with one eye open. Then an ominous rustle, and a lightning whirr and rush, succeeded by a blank silence again. Whatever had happened now? We listened and gazed attentively, but no more sounds reached our straining ears. Over all the jungle brooded a stillness that could almost be felt. Then Cecily, whose sight is better than mine, said it was plain to be seen even in the blackness that surrounded us that the carcase of the sheep was no longer there. After that, what a weary night. We did not care to risk getting out, and there was no good to be done in staying in. The dawn broke at last, falsely at first, and dark gray shadows fell again to flee away before the all conquering sun, who rose in splendour, gilding the lofty ranges with tips of gold and red.
We pushed our way out, not waiting for the men to come and let us free, and the whole show, unable to hold up any longer, fell over with us. It was very badly put together, and would have been a pantomime protection in case of stress. We were dishevelled looking before, and worn out for want of sleep, but we were objects by the time we had fought our way from out the collapsed “machan.” We followed the pugs of the leopard till they disappeared in impenetrable bush. He had taken his victim to a safe stronghold. But we weren’t to be worsted so easily. When Clarence appeared we asked him the best plan for dislodging the cat, who must be gorged now, and a little overdone. Our shikari said he would order some of the men out and try to beat the place. I asked him to take the .35 Winchester himself, and use it if he could. Then began a lively morning. The men beat the place with their spears in sort of flying rushes, dashing forward, then dashing back, and at last, as we really made the radius of the place smaller, we heard a continuous snarling, like that a domestic cat makes when it has a mouse in its paws, only this was much more vicious and sounding louder.
I stood close to the jungle, and Clarence begged me to stand a little farther off. This I did not care to do. The men were not armed, bar their spears, and it seemed unfair to expose them so without giving them the protection of one’s rifle. Cecily was doing the same thing on her side of the brake, where the men were spearing bravely and shouting lustily. We fired into the undergrowth, but it was of no avail; still the ominous snarling kept up, still the animal would not break cover. I made up my mind I would try and see if I could not get a shot into him somehow, so I took on the silly job of crawling very slowly down the rough trail made through the dense bush by the dragging of the sheep. I came on its remains almost at once. The leopard, where was he? Then I saw it in one brief second. What a face of rage and fury! I dare not fire. I backed hurriedly, getting clear of the place, and then fired twice into the very place where I judged the leopard lay up. A rush. Out he came, rather from the side, looking like a fiend let loose. I was glad we were not bang in his path. I could not get a shot in at all, for one of the hunters, in the warmth of his earnest efforts, put himself in my light. There was Cecily, she blazed away; there was Clarence, whose rifle spoke, but I heard his bullet strike a rock behind. The leopard, with lithe swinging bounds, was up the clefts of the ravine in a moment. I threw up my rifle and had a try for him. No result. He was lost to sight. Four of the men went to the top of the ravine and descended carefully, reporting the leopard to be in a sort of cave between two boulders. We must get there too, of course, which would be a prodigious bit of climbing. Cicely said she was confident her bullet told; I know mine didn’t. We reached the spot where the animal was ensconced, and there, sure enough, we could see, if we stooped, his crouched shoulders, head dropped on paws, eyes gleaming defiance. He was a foe to be afraid of, and I was afraid for consequences. The men were in such dangerous positions, and all of us had such insecure foothold. In case of a charge from the leopard one or more would certainly go over the rocks to the bottom of the gorge, a very nasty fall indeed. I made up my mind I would finish it. I walked as carefully as I could towards my enemy, rifle ready, expecting the very worst every minute. I drew a bead on its head. Fired! A moment of such intense anxiety. No movement. We advanced cautiously. The great cat was dead. A passive ending indeed.
By all the laws of first blood he belonged to Cecily. She had got him very much indeed, in the base of the spine. He was done for when I shot him, and it is questionable if he had the power to move at all. Indeed, his ascent of the place, wounded where he was, seemed to us a wonderful feat. The men extricated the beautiful thing; he was somewhat aged, with old teeth, and skin much scarred and seamed with fighting. The head-man from the karia was very much delighted, for he insisted the leopard was one for whom they had long looked to make an end of. He had struck down a Somali, who was only saved by the spears of his friends. The yellow danger lurked in rocks, and would, from all accounts, probably have developed into a man-eater. We were glad to have finished his career.