"He is telling of some kind of danger," said the older elephant. "Just what it is I don't know. But the herd will be moving away very soon, to hide in a dark part of the jungle, and we must go with them."
As Umboo and his mother came out into an open part of the forest, where they had left the other elephants, when Umboo had been led away to be given his root-digging lesson, there was great excitement. Tusker stood on top of a little hill, his trunk high in the air, making all sorts of queer, trumpeting noises.
"We were waiting for you," said Mr. Stumptail to Umboo's mother. "We are going to run away and hide. Tusker is calling you."
"Well, tell him we are here now," said Mrs. Stumptail. "I had to give
Umboo his lesson."
"And I dug up some sweet roots," said the little elephant, "but I didn't have time to bring you any," he told his father.
"Some other time will do," spoke Mr. Stumptail. "Hello, Tusker!" he called through his trunk to the old, big elephant. "Here they are now! Umboo and his mother have come back. We can all go hide in the jungle."
"Why must we hide?" asked Umboo.
"Because Tusker smelled danger," answered Keedah, who was with the other small elephants where they were gathered together, the older ones about them. "He smelled white and black hunters, with guns, and they are coming to shoot us, Tusker says. So he called a warning to all of us."
"I heard it away off where I was digging up roots," said Umboo. "But did Tusker see the hunters with their guns?"
"No, I didn't see them," said Tusker himself, coming down from the hill just then. "But I smelled them, and that is the same thing. The wind was blowing from them to me, and I could smell them very plainly. Come now, elephants! Into the deep, dark part of the jungle, where the hunters can not find us, we will go—far into the jungle."