But his attention was immediately diverted by the sight of a dark body starting up from the long grass in the slough. At the same instant he heard the sharp crack of Arnold's gun. Alf darted the butt of his rifle to his shoulder, to be in readiness for an emergency shot; but, before the position was attained, something launched down upon him from the trees—bearing him forwards into the willow bush, while the forest echoed with the snarls of an infuriated wild beast.
CHAPTER III
THE LONELY CAMP
A lynx may be only a cat, but a cat that is the size of a young tiger, with all a tiger's ferocity, is no pleasant opponent at any time. Add to naturally aggressive tendencies the fact that her baby has cried out in pain, and you have an angry mother-fiend that takes a deal of seeking to find her equal in fierceness.
In this case the lynx had been watching the young hunters with one eye for some time from her shelter among the leaves of the overhanging maple. She had been keeping the other eye upon her offspring, having an idea that the humans might endanger its safety; and, when she heard the cry of pain, she simply dropped from her branch right upon Holden's back, fixing her claws in his coat and snapping furiously at his neck.
Luckily the boy's hunting-coat was of tough buckskin, and when the lynx set her teeth in the collar she imagined that she was wreaking vengeance upon flesh and blood. And the sound she made was enough to chill the marrow.
Arnold had heard the scream and his chum's cry of surprise at the sudden assault. But he did not understand it at first. He surmised vaguely that it was nothing more than sympathetic rejoicing at his successful shot that had toppled a fine buck antelope in the grass.
However, second thoughts quickly dispelled the first surmise, for he heard Holden calling upon him in evident trouble.