“Ah! there is the water at last, thank goodness! And now, my friend, we must ‘go slow,’ as you say, and be careful where we put our feet, or we may stumble unawares over something that we have no desire to meet at quite such close quarters.”
The next moment the precise thing of which he had spoken happened. His foot encountered something bulky and firm that yielded and moved at the contact, and before the unfortunate man could utter a cry of warning there occurred a sudden and violent rustling and switching of the long grass in front of him, something struck him a violent blow on the shoulder, and in an instant he found himself enveloped in the coils of an enormous python, the great head of which towered threateningly above him, as it opened wide its gaping jaws within a foot of his face and emitted a loud, sibilant, angry hiss. Its hot, foetid breath struck him full in the face and, in conjunction with the overpowering musky smell of its body, affected him with a deadly nausea that, of itself, was quite sufficient to rob him of all power of resistance, apart from the fact that his arms were bound to his body so tightly by one of the immense convolutions of the serpent’s body—which it seemed to him was nearly as thick as his own—that it was impossible to move them by even so little as a single inch. And those deadly coils were tightening round him, too; he could feel the pressure increasing more rapidly than he could draw the breath into his already painfully labouring lungs; and he vainly strove to utter a cry to his companion for help. His elbows were being forced into his ribs with such irresistible pressure that he momentarily expected to feel and hear the bones crack beneath it, while the compression of his chest was rapidly producing a feeling of suffocation, when, above the loud singing in his ears, he caught the faint click of Mildmay’s weapon. Then the great threatening head suddenly drooped, the constricting coils relaxed their pressure and opened out, allowing the professor to struggle free of their encircling folds, the huge body writhed convulsively, the great tail threshing down the grass during the space of a full minute or more; then the writhings gradually subsided, and finally the great reptile lay stretched almost at full length before them, dead, with a bullet from Mildmay’s rifle through its brain.
“Thanks!” gasped the professor, as he wrung Mildmay’s hand, “that was a narrow escape for me, my friend, and I am indebted to you for my life. I could do nothing for myself, and even your companionship would have been of but little avail had you not acted so promptly. Another fifteen seconds in those great coils would have finished me off altogether. I thank you, Captain, and if ever the opportunity should occur I will do the same for you.”
“Of course you will, old chap, I know that,” answered Mildmay, heartily; “and likely enough the opportunity may occur ere long. One never knows. What a monster! Why, he must measure at least five and thirty feet, if an inch. He is the biggest I have ever seen. Now, how do you feel? Would you rather go back to the ship, or shall we go on?”
“Oh, we will go on, of course,” answered von Schalckenberg. “I am not a penny the worse for my little adventure, except that I feel bruised all over, and I expect I shall be too stiff to move to-morrow. The greater the reason why I should move to-night. Is not that so, my friend?”
“That, of course, is for you to say,” laughed Mildmay. “Such a narrow squeak as you have had is enough to try any man’s nerves. But, if you would rather go on, I am your man.”
“Come, then,” said the professor; “but let us pick our steps. One adventure of that kind, in a single night, is enough for any man.”
After walking a few yards further the two men found themselves at the edge of the dip in which lay the lake, with the tall reeds that fringed the margin of the water rising some half a dozen yards ahead of them. The surface of the lake was just visible in the soft sheen of the starlight, and here and there, at no great distance, could be descried certain bulky forms standing in the water, which, from their size, could only be those of elephants; while a small pattering sound, as of falling rain, told the watchers that the great brutes were treating themselves to the luxury of a shower-bath. The elephants were well out from the shore, standing apparently knee-deep in the water; hence their visibility; but the reeds were too tall to permit of animals being seen if they happened to be drinking at the extreme edge of the water. The hunters had made what Mildmay characteristically designated “a bad landfall.” What they desired was, to find a spot where there was a gap in the bed of reeds through which they could at least catch a glimpse of the various beasts drinking, and they were in the very act of turning to seek such a spot when von Schalckenberg laid his hand on Mildmay’s arm, whispering excitedly—
“My friend, look there.”
Mildmay glanced in the direction indicated and saw, standing on the very crest of the bank over which they had just passed, a lion, that in the deceptive starlight appeared to be of enormous proportions. He was within fifteen feet of them, but it is doubtful whether he saw them, for they were below him and within the shadow of the reeds; but if he did not see them it was quite certain that he winded them, for he was gazing straight toward them, his eyes shining in the darkness like twin moons, and he was slowly sweeping his tail from side to side, as though asking himself what strange beings were these whose scent now greeted his nostrils for probably the first time in his life. But there was no time to be lost, for even as von Schalckenberg whispered to Mildmay, “You take him!” the beast crouched in preparation for a spring.