“What is it?” asked Ned, as he followed Jerry’s extended hand.
“Those yellow eyes! Do you see them? Four of ’em! Yellow eyes—in the bushes!”
For an instant Ned saw nothing, but as he continued to look he caught a glimpse of what Jerry had seen. And as the last, flickering gleam of daylight glittered on the four yellow eyes, there came from the bushes menacing growls.
[CHAPTER XVI]
A STRANGE DISAPPEARANCE
Ned and Jerry halted, brought to a sudden stop by seeing the yellow eyes and hearing the low-voiced but ugly growls. It did not take long for Bob and the professor to reach the same spot. Uriah Snodgrass had been telling Bob how much better he felt since coming to Thunder Mountain, and the little scientist was discoursing on the zoölogical merits of some bug or other he had captured that day. But when the two who had been lingering in the rear caught up to Jerry and Ned, the stout lad exclaimed:
“What’s the matter?”
His voice, louder than the warning tones of Ned and Jerry, brought forth a fiercer growl from the owners of the four gleaming, yellow eyes, and even before Jerry could have replied had he desired to, there leaped into the trail, not far from the four, a pair of large mountain lions—a male and a female.
To the credit of Professor Snodgrass be it said that he was the coolest of the party of four. He stared at the two beasts, the light of the evening glow reflecting on the tawny coats of the lions, and then, in a soft voice he remarked: