"Oh, there are Tommy and Nellie. They are after flowers too, for they each have a handful. But I must call to them. They should not wander too far away."
Together she and Alice, admiring the orchid, advanced toward the two children, who had come to a halt under a big sycamore.
Then, as Alice was about to call, she uttered an exclamation of terror.
"See!" she whispered hoarsely to Ruth. "That creature in the tree—right over their heads, and it is crouching for a leap!"
Ruth looked and saw a tawny beast with laid-back ears and twitching tail, stretched on a big limb a short distance above the ground, and right over the two children, who were innocently prattling away, and looking at the flowers they had gathered.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE ANIMATED LOGS
For a moment Alice and Ruth were almost paralyzed with fear. They stood spellbound, and could only gaze horrifiedly at the tawny beast stretched out on the limb of the tree.
"What—what shall we do?" asked Alice.