"I dare not risk the torture of suspense like this for her; but we might have Kathleen. If he remembers anything, it would be Kathleen," answered Mr. Desborough.
"Send for her at once without alarming Mrs. Desborough," said the deputy, taking out his pocket-book; and scribbling a note to his niece, he despatched his syce with it to Runnangore.
At a very early hour, Bona's dandy appeared once more at the gate of the compound at Noak-holly.
"I have come in the cool of the morning," she said, "to fetch your little girl to spend the day at Runnangore. You must not refuse her to me, dear Mrs. Desborough, for Mr. Desborough wishes her to accept my invitation."
But Kathleen did not much like Bona, and did not want to go, until Bona whispered, "Hush! not a word; but come you must. They are searching for Carl in the jungle."
Oh how tedious it seemed to wait until the little beebee was bathed and dressed!
In the meanwhile Oliver was nodding in his tree, waiting for the shikaree's signal. The old man was listening for the faintest sound. Not a quiver in the bush below escaped him; not the beat of a weary wing as the night-birds drew to their haunts; not a tremble in the grass at his feet, where the children of the day were awaking.
The wind changed with the daybreak, and the wary hunter changed his position with it. He swung himself from tree to tree, leaving no footprint on the ground that the keen scent of the wolf might detect. Avoiding the trees where the branches grew low to the ground, he stationed the boy at a far greater distance than before. Again they watched and waited. A few sharp, trotting steps went by, and a dhole sprang from the thicket.
"Bear," murmured Tara, as the creature turned aggressive, and dashing out with a rush upon the wild dog, charged him fiercely.
In the noise of their scuffle other sounds were lost. But the flap of the vulture's wing, the scream of the kite, and the hoarse gobble-gobble of the still more numerous turkey-buzzards grew more and more distinct as the red light of morning painted the eastern sky.