"You know you speak such excellent English," she said irrelevantly.
He bowed low. As he straightened his figure, to his amazement, he beheld an agonizing look of horror on her face; her eyes riveted on the mouth of the cavern. Then, there came an angrier sound, unlike any that had gone before in that night of turmoil.
"Look there! Quick!"
The cry of terror from the girl's palsied lips, as she pointed to something behind him, awoke the mountain man to instant action. Instinctively, he snatched his long dagger from its sheath and turned quickly. Not twenty feet from them a huge cat-like beast stood half crouched on the edge of the darkness, his long tail switching angrily. The feeble light from the depth of the cave threw the long, water-soaked visitor into bold relief against the black wall beyond. Apparently, he was as much surprised as the two who glared at him, as though frozen to the spot. A snarling whine, a fierce growl, indicated his fury at finding his shelter—his lair occupied.
"My God! A mountain lion! Ravone! Franz! To me!" he cried hoarsely, and sprang before her shouting loudly to the sleepers.
A score of men, half awake, grasped their weapons and struggled to their feet in answer to his call. The lion's gaunt body shot through the air. In two bounds, he was upon the goat-hunter. Baldos stood squarely and firmly to meet the rush of the maddened beast, his long dagger poised for the death-dealing blow.
"Run!" he shouted to her.
Beverly Calhoun had fighting blood in her veins. Utterly unconscious of her action, at the time, she quickly drew the little silver-handled revolver from the pocket of her gown. As man, beast and knife came together, in her excitement she fired recklessly at the combatants without any thought of the imminent danger of killing her protector. There was a wild scream of pain from the wounded beast, more pistol shots, fierce yells from the excited hunters, the rush of feet and then the terrified and almost frantic girl staggered and fell against the rocky wall. Her wide gray eyes were fastened upon the writhing lion and the smoking pistol was tightly clutched in her hand.
It had all occurred in such an incredible short space of time that she could not yet realize what had happened.
Her heart and brain seemed paralyzed, her limbs stiff and immovable. Like the dizzy whirl of a kaleidoscope, the picture before her resolved itself into shape.