“So sorry,” answered Dick, contritely, at once falling back.
“Never mind,” said the girl, “go on ahead and tell them. Things in traps break loose sometimes if left too long. So the sooner we get there the better.”
“We? Are you going with us, then?” eagerly.
“Certainly. So tell them to saddle up a horse for me too. Now go on, and don’t lose any time, or the tiger may break loose before we get there and get clean away.”
Presumably everybody knows that there is no such thing as a tiger on the whole African continent—north, south, east, or west. What everybody, however, may not know is that in the southern section of the same, “tiger” is the colloquial word used to designate leopard, and that invariably; hence, of course, the trapped beast in this case represented not “Stripes” but “Spots.”
“Well, well,” said old Hesketh, when he was told, “that’s good news certainly. How was he caught, Kleinbooi?”
“By one fore leg, Baas. He seems fast, but it might be as well to go and shoot him, now at once.”
“Ja, that’s so. Tell Dirk to saddle up three horses—it don’t matter which—what’s that? Four?” turning to his niece, who had just joined them. “Four, did you say, girlie?”
“Certainly,” said Hazel. “I’m going too. I don’t why I should be left out of the fun.”
The old man chuckled.