Crouching over the body of a deer and tearing at it with low, snarling growls, was a thing that looked something like Billy’s “big cat,” but was much too large to have ever been mistaken for that peaceful domestic animal. The creature was too engrossed with its meal to pay much attention to the badly-scared boy, and if he had retained his presence of mind he might even have tiptoed off unnoticed, but at that moment the luckless Billy was impelled to sneeze.
As his loud “Ah, c-h-o-o!” sounded the animal lifted its head angrily. In the moonlight Billy could see its white, gleaming teeth and cruel eyes. It looked about, as if puzzled, for a few seconds, but suddenly its green eyes lighted on the petrified Billy, who was too scared even to run.
Instantly it crouched down on its belly and began lashing the ground with its tail. Its upper lip was pulled back in a snarling grin that disclosed its saber-like teeth and dripping fangs.
“It’s all off,” groaned poor Billy. He raised his rifle to his shoulder in a desperate sort of hope that it might scare the thing away.
“If I only hadn’t been ashamed to ask how the thing worked,” thought Billy.
As the thought flashed across his mind the animal with a loud, screaming snarl sprang directly at the trembling reporter. More from instinct than anything else he pulled the trigger and a loud report followed. It was a heavy sporting rifle that Billy carried and the unexpected recoil, which, not knowing anything about firearms, he had not prepared for, threw him off his balance. This saved his life for the minute, for as he reeled the huge creature he had disturbed at its forest meal shot past him so close that he could feel its warm breath against his cheek.
Foiled of its prey for the moment the maddened animal switched round with the agility of its kind and crouched for a fresh spring.
“Gee, now I know how a mouse feels,” gasped poor Billy to himself, as the huge creature prepared for what Billy felt was to be its death-spring.
With an agility born of desperation the youth made a wild leap for a hanging tendril of one of the giant creepers that festooned a tree near by. He caught it and began climbing with a skill he never knew before he possessed. He was beginning to think that he could at least reach a branch of the tree where he would be out of his savage opponent’s reach, when something happened that threw him into a cold sweat.
He felt the creeper begin to sag. It was breaking under his weight. In vain he tried to brace himself against the tree trunk. His knees slipped and slid and he could get no foothold.