But I lay perfectly still, feeling that the wounded monster would on seeing me make a spring, and if it did I knew that my life was at an end.
The splashings and the dull beating sound continued, but I kept behind the sheltering tree, now wondering whether the creature would have strength to get back into the river, or whether it would be there waiting for its assailant. At last, fascinated as it were by the desire to peep round the tree-trunk which sheltered me from my victim, I gently peered out, and stared in astonishment, for there was Pomp busy at work with his axe cutting off the reptile’s head, while the tail kept writhing and lashing the stream, alongside which it had nearly crawled.
“Dat’s got um,” cried Pomp. “Hi! Ohey! Mass’ George.”
I was already on my legs, and, gun in hand, I parted the bushes, and joined the boy just as the monster gave a tremendous heave and a writhe, and rolled off the bank with a tremendous splash in the water.
“Ah, you no kedge fish and eat um no more, eh, Mass’ George?” he cried. “’Gator no good widout um head, eh?”
I looked down on the mud, and there, sure enough, lay the creature’s head.
“Why, Pomp!” I exclaimed; “what have you been doing?”
“Cut off um head, Mass’ George. He no like dat.”
Pomp broke out with one of his laughs, hooked hold of the grinning head, and dragged it out of the mud up to the side of a clear pool, a little way back in the swamp.
“Stop a bit,” I said; “I want to have a good look at it.”