"Oh—we—we can't thank you enough!" gasped Alice. "The—the children—" but her voice choked, and she could not speak.
"Wa'al, I reckon he might have clawed 'em a bit," admitted the man with the gun. "And perhaps it's jest as well I come along when I did. You folks live around here? Don't seem like I've met you befo'."
"We're a company of moving picture actresses and actors," explained Alice, while Ruth, making a detour to avoid the dead body of the animal, went to Tommy and Nellie, who were still holding on to each other.
"Picture-players; eh?" mused the hunter, for such he evidently was. "I seen a movin' picture once, and it looked as real as anything. Be you folks on that steamer?"
"The Magnolia—yes," answered Alice, as her sister led the children up to her.
"You're all right now, dearies," said Ruth. "The nice man killed the bad bear."
"Excuse me, Miss; but that ain't a bear," said the hunter, with a pull at his ragged cap that was meant for a bow. "It's a bobcat—mountain lion some folks calls 'em—and I don't know as I ever saw one around this neighborhood before. Mostly they're farther to the no'th. This must be a stray one."
"Oh, but it might have killed us all if you had not been here," Ruth went on.
"Oh, no, Miss, beggin' your pardon. It wouldn't have been as bad as that. Most-ways these bobcats would rather run than fight. I reckon if it had seen you young ladies it would have run."
"Are we as scary as all that?" asked Alice, with a nervous little laugh.