"Yes," said Mrs. Woods. "Wasn't it mysterious? Lost your cattle, boy? I am sorry for your folks. Mabbie (may be) 'tis Injuns."
"No; father says that he can find no injury on them."
"'Tis awful mysterious like," said Mrs. Woods, "cattle dyin' without anything ailin' 'em! I've always thought this was a good country, but I don't know. Tell your folks I'm sorry for 'em. Can I do anything for you? I'll come over and see ye in the course of the day."
That night the same strange, wild, pleading cry was repeated in the timber.
"There's something very strange about that sound," said Mrs. Woods. "It makes me feel as though I must run toward it. It draws me. It makes me feel curi's. It has haunted me all day, and now it comes again."
"Do you suppose that the cry has had anything to do with the death of Mr. Bonney's cattle?" asked Gretchen.
"I don't know—we don't understand this country fully yet. There's something very mysterious about the death of those cattle. You ought to have seen 'em. They all lie there dead, as though they had just lost their breath, and that was all."
The next night was silent. But, on the following morning, a boy came to the school with a strange story. He had been driving home his father's cows on the evening before, when an animal had dropped from a great tree on the neck of one of the cows, which struggled and lowed for a few minutes, then fell, and was found dead. The boy and the other cattle had run away on the sudden appearance of the animal. The dead cow presented the same appearance as the cows of Mr. Bonney had done.
When the old chief appeared at the school-house with Benjamin that morning, the school gathered around him and asked him what these things could mean. He replied, in broken Chinook, that there was a puma among them, and that this animal sucked the blood of its victims.
The puma or cougar or panther, sometimes spelled painter, is the American lion. It is commonly called the mountain lion in the Northwest. It belongs to the cat family, and received the name of lion from its tawny color. When its appetite for blood has been satisfied, and its face is in repose, it is a very beautiful animal; but when seeking its prey it presents a mean, cowardly, stealthy appearance, and its face is a picture of cruelty and evil. It will destroy as many as fifty sheep in a night, sucking their blood and leaving them as though they had died without any external injury. This terrible animal is easily tamed if captured young, and, strange to say, becomes one of the most affectionate and devoted of pets. It will purr about the feet and lick the hands of its master, and develop all the attractive characteristics of the domestic cat.