“Ah! uncle,” exclaimed Pereira, “did you see those birds cross each other as I pulled? That was a lucky one for me, but I won’t count the second if the Heer Allan objects.”
“No, I did not, nephew,” answered Retief, “but doubtless they must have done so, or the same bullet could not have pierced both.”
Both Hans and I only looked at each other and laughed. Still we said nothing.
From the spectators under the cliff there came a murmur of congratulation not unmixed with astonishment. Again Pereira loaded, aimed, and loosed at a rather high goose—it may have been about seventy yards in the air. He struck it right enough, for the feathers flew from its breast; but to my astonishment the bird, after swooping down as though it were going to fall, recovered itself and flew away straight out of sight.
“Tough birds, these geese!” exclaimed Pereira. “They can carry as much lead as a sea-cow.”
“Very tough indeed,” answered Retief doubtfully. “Never before did I see a bird fly away with an ounce ball through its middle.”
“Oh! he will drop dead somewhere,” replied Pereira as he rammed his powder down.
Within four minutes more Pereira had fired his two remaining shots, selecting, as he was entitled to do, low and easy young geese that came over him slowly. He killed them both, although the last of them, after falling, waddled along the ground into a tuft of high grass.
Now murmurs of stifled applause broke from the audience, to which Pereira bowed in acknowledgment.
“You will have to shoot very well, Mynheer Allan,” said Retief to me, “if you want to beat that. Even if I rule out one of the two birds that fell to a single shot, as I think I shall, Hernan has killed five out of six, which can scarcely be bettered.”