I did not answer.
I did not want to answer just then, but I did exactly as I was told, dropping the rope and standing ready with my pole on one side, so as to thrust it into the brute’s mouth.
I did not have long to wait for my opportunity, and it was not the alligator’s fault that he did not get right hold, for through nervousness, I suppose, I thrust short, and the jaws came together with an ugly snap that was startling.
“Never mind; try again; quick, my lad, or he’ll get away back to the hole.”
To prevent this Morgan made a rush, and gave the brute a sounding thwack with his broken pole, sufficiently hard to make it turn in another direction, when, thoroughly excited now, I made a poke at it with the pole, and it snapped at it viciously.
I made another and another, and then the teeth closed upon the end, and the pole quivered in my grasp.
“Well done! Brave lad!” shouted Morgan, for he did not know I was all of a tremble. “That’s the way; hold on, and keep him thinking about you just a moment. Pull! Let go! Pull again!”
As he gave me these directions, he got the end of the pole from me for a moment so as to pass the noose of the rope he had picked up over it, and then once more shouting to me to pull, he boldly ran the wide noose down over the pole; and as the brute saw him so near, it loosed its hold to make a fierce snap; but Morgan was too quick for the creature, and leaped away with a shout of triumph, tightening the rope, which was right round the reptile’s neck, and running and passing the other end about a tree.
“Got him now,” panted Morgan, as the alligator thrashed at the rope with its tail, and tugged and strained with all its might, but of course only tightening the noose with every effort.
“Yes,” I said, breathlessly, as I stood now well out of danger; “we’ve got him now.”