“Pig! Come along; we’ll have him,” says Jim, spurring up; and the two dash off in the wake of the dogs, whose clamour may be heard far ahead. The bush is thick, and here and there they meet with a check; but thorns and brambles are nothing when such quarry is in view, and Hicks hardly notices a gash left in his ear by a specially wicked wacht-am-bietje spike as he is half dragged through the thicket by his horse.
“He’s at bay, by Jove!” says Jim, as the clamour becomes stationary just in front of them. “Come on; here he is!” And in an open glade, in an angle formed by two bushes of bristling thorns, stood the boar, the dogs springing and snapping around him, but none of them quite liking to tackle him.
“Wait! I can get a good shot at him now,” said Jim, dismounting. “Better let me do it; it’s a ticklish shot, and you might hit one of the dogs. Besides, it’s all the same; he’s yours anyhow. You drew first blood.”
The creature is hard pressed now, and the foam lies on him in flakes as he chums with his tusks and snaps at his crowding, yelling foes. Crack! He sinks lifeless, the blood pouring from a hole in his forehead where Jim’s bullet has found its mark; and then the dogs throw themselves on the carcase, snarling and tearing in their excitement.
“Off, you brutes, off!” sings out Jim, coming up.
“Off! You’re plucky enough when the pig’s dead. Maarman—Spry—you schelms! What’s come over you?” And dispersing them with a kick or two, he and Hicks proceed to inspect the quarry.
“I’ll make something out of those tusks,” says Hicks. “No, I won’t, though; I’ll keep the whole skull.”
“It’s devilish lucky you had that tree handy,” says Jim. “He’d have cut you to ribbons.”
“Hullo! Where’s the pig?” asks Armitage, who, with the others, appear on the scene; and the Kafirs, standing round the defunct animal, fire off a volley of astonished “whaows,” and Thorman is heard to mutter something about “not having got a shot the whole damned morning, and that the damned Britishers seem to get all the fun.”
“By Jove! Those brutes of dogs have wallowed in all the water!” exclaimed Jim, in consternation, as the party arrived at their midday halting-place. “Faugh! It’s quite spoilt,” he added, surveying the fluid in question, which at no time specially inviting to any but a very thirsty man, was now positively nauseous, as the tired animals had rolled and splashed in it before any one had come up. “What will we do? Wait—there may be a little in the hole higher up; let’s go and see. Ah! it’s all right?” he called out, his exploration having proved satisfactory. “Jolwane, keep the dogs away from this, whatever you do.”