"You can't kill it, Tatita."
"With ordinary bullets, no; but those which Sumichrast knows how to prepare will soon settle him."
My curiosity was raised; for this ghost was an animal called a tapir, which the Indians believe possessed of supernatural powers; and, as I had never met with one, I was anxious that we should come across it.
"And didn't you aim at it?" cried my friend.
"No; I ran away," replied the fearless tiger-hunter.
Thus l'Encuerado, whom the evening before we had seen braving tigers, crocodiles, and wild cattle, now trembled at the mere idea of facing an inoffensive animal, which was only a relation of the peccaries, with a snout terminated by a non-prehensile proboscis, yet to which his imagination attributed certain demoniac qualities. He that night utterly refused to go to rest; at the least rustling of the leaves he expected to see the ghost appear. Instead of directly opposing his error—which I knew would be of no use—I endeavored to convince him that my power far surpassed that of the object of his dread.
"The reeds were pushed aside."
"If it wasn't for that," I urged on him, "do you think I would permit Lucien to sleep in so dangerous a neighborhood?"
Sumichrast gave the Indian two bullets, and solemnly told him that with these projectiles he would surely kill the object of his dread if he aimed straight. L'Encuerado gradually recovered his self-possession; the idea of slaying in one of its most formidable shapes the cause of his superstition excited his self-esteem, and he went to sleep, and no doubt dreamt of his next day's exploit.