The lunge seemed only a swift passing of gray light. No eye could believe that the vast form could move with such swiftness. There was little impression of an actual leap. Rather it was just a blow; the great form, huddled over the dead wolf, had simply reached the full distance to Hudson.
The man did not even have time to turn. There was no defense; his killer-gun was strapped on his back, and even if it had been in his hands, its little bullet would not have mattered the sting of a bee in honey-robbing. The only possible chance of breaking that deadly charge lay in the thirty-thirty deer rifle in Dave's arms; but the craven who held it did not even fire. He was standing just below the outstretched limb of a tree, and the weapon fell from his hands as he swung up into the limb. The fact that Hudson stood weaponless, ten feet away in the clearing, did not deter him in the least.
No human flesh could stand against that charge. The vast paw fell with resistless force; and no need arose for a second blow. The trapper's body was struck down as if felled by a meteor, and the power of the impact forced it deep into the carpet of pine needles. The savage creature turned, the white fangs caught the light in the open mouth. The head lunged toward the man's shoulder.
No man may say what agony Hudson would have endured in the last few seconds of his life if the Killer had been given time and opportunity. His usual way was to linger long, sharp fangs closing again and again, until all living likeness was destroyed. The blood-lust was upon him; there would have been no mercy to the dying creature in the pine needles. Yet it transpired that Hudson's flesh was not to know those rending fangs a second time. Although it is an unfamiliar thing in the wilderness, the end of Hudson's trail was peaceful, after all.
On the hillside above, a stranger to this land had dropped to his knee in the shrubbery, his rifle lifted to the level of his eyes. It was Bruce, who had come in time to see the charge through a rift in the trees.
XVII
There were deep significances in the fact that Bruce kept his head in this moment of crisis. It meant nothing less than an iron self-control such as only the strongest men possess, and it meant nerves steady as steel bars.
The bear was on Hudson, and the man had gone down, before Bruce even interpreted him. Then it was just a gray patch, a full three hundred yards away. His instinct was to throw the gun to his shoulder and fire without aiming; yet he conquered it with an iron will. But he did move quickly. He dropped to his knee the single second that the gun leaped to his shoulder. He seemed to know that from a lower position the target would be more clearly revealed. The finger pressed back against the trigger.
The distance was far; Bruce was not a practiced rifle shot, and it bordered on the miraculous that his lead went anywhere near the bear's body. And it was true that the bullet did not reach a vital place. It stung like a wasp at the Killer's flank, however, cutting a shallow flesh wound. But it was enough to take his dreadful attention from the mortally wounded trapper in the pine needles.