He was silenced by the light pressure of Sir Reginald Elphinstone’s hand upon his arm, and turning, he saw the baronet raise his hand and point. He looked in the direction indicated, and in a moment his frame seemed to stiffen with eagerness as he gazed. For there, standing knee-deep in a pool, some two hundred yards away, and quite alone, was an animal not unlike a giraffe, but very much smaller, and with a neck that, although not so long in proportion to its body as that of a giraffe, was still very long. The creature was strongly silhouetted against a patch of moon-lighted vegetation, and therefore stood out black against its lighter background, with no indication of its markings. The outline of it, however, was clear-cut and distinct, and as the professor continued to gaze at it he became an interesting study of growing excitement and agitation. He felt feverishly for the binocular glasses that he had not brought with him, and held his breath until he could do so no longer, letting it out suddenly with a gasp that he as suddenly checked, glaring through his spectacles, meanwhile, as though he would fain hypnotise the creature. Then, as it bowed its head to drink, he turned to Sir Reginald and whispered huskily—
“Shoot, my friend, shoot! But, as you love me, don’t miss; for, as I am a sinful man, it is none other than the okapi!”
Chapter Fourteen.
Lost!
The okapi! That strange new animal of which so much had been heard of late in zoological and scientific circles, the existence of which had been so absolutely asserted, and the creature itself so definitely described, by certain travellers; but of which, thus far, not so much as a single bone, or even a fragment of skin, had been forthcoming!
Sir Reginald instantly recognised the supreme importance of securing so pricelessly valuable a specimen, and carefully levelled his rifle. Kneeling on one knee, and resting his elbow on the other, with nerves as firm and steady as steel, he brought the two sights of his weapon in one upon a spot immediately behind the shoulder of the creature, as nearly as he could guess at it in that awkward light, and pressed the trigger. And at that precise moment a small stone under his heel slipped, and the jar of the movement, slight as it was, communicated itself to the weapon, causing the sights to swerve slightly out of line! An expression of intense annoyance escaped his lips. Had he missed? No; as the question presented itself to him he saw the animal throw up its head, give a single bound forward, and roll over. But, as an irrepressible shout of triumph was raised by the excited von Schalckenberg, the watchers saw the quarry scramble to its feet and limp off into the darkness of the forest, evidently pretty badly hurt.
“We must follow it up!” cried the professor, eagerly; “we must secure it, at all costs. An okapi is worth a hundred other animals of any kind that one can name. And that one is wounded; we have but to follow it, and we are certain to find it, sooner or later. Come, my friends, let us lose not a moment in pursuing it.”
And utterly ignoring any further idea of concealment, forgetting also, in the excitement of the moment, the imprudence, to say the least of it, of attempting to pursue a wounded animal through the intricacies of a dense forest, at night, and communicating his excitement to his companions by his eager exclamations, the professor led the way out of their ambush, dashing recklessly over rocks, loose boulders, and other obstructions in his anxiety to arrive quickly at the spot where he hoped to pick up the trail.