If anything was needed to make the moose furious this action of Shasta's was sufficient, At the boy's unexpected movement and cry he bounded to one side. Then he stood snorting and stamping the ground viciously. But he did not turn tail. Instead, he began to thrash the underwood furiously with his antlers.
Shasta was no coward. Yet what could he do, naked and utterly defenceless against this enormous animal, armed with those dreadful antlers and those pitiless hatchets on his feet? He looked quickly round, measuring the distance between himself and the nearest tree. To dart to it and climb into safety would be done in less time than it would take to tell it. But quick though he was, he knew, by experience, that some of the wild things were even quicker. What the moose could do in the way of quickness he had just seen. The whole of that great body was a mass of sinews and muscles that could hurl it this way or that like a flash of lightning before you had time to blink. And the moose, like the wolves and the bears, could make up his mind in less than a thousandth part of a minute, and be somewhere else almost before he had started, and finish a thing completely almost before it was begun!
If only Nitka or Shoomoo, or one of the wolf-brothers, could know the danger he was in, and come to the rescue! Big though he might be, it would be a bold moose who would lightly tackle Shoomoo, or any of his terrible brood, when once their blood was roused. But though Shasta looked wildly on every side, hoping that the call he had given might have attracted attention, not a dead leaf rustled in response under swiftly padding feet!
He turned his gaze again upon his enemy—for enemy he had now undoubtedly become—to catch the first sign of what he might be about to do. The moose was still thrashing the thicket as if to lash himself into increasing fury, and glaring at Shasta passionately out of his shining eyes. Because he did not know what was best to be done, Shasta threw back his head, and once again sent out the long ringing wolf-cry that was a summons to the pack. But as luck would have it, not one of all the wolf kindred was within ear-shot, and the Bargloosh was as empty of wolves as the sky of clouds.
At the second cry, the moose stopped thrashing the bushes, and stood still. But along his neck and shoulders the coarse black hair rose threateningly. A red light burned dangerously in his eyes. Suddenly, without warning, he sprang. Quick as a wolf, Shasta leaped aside. If he had been the fraction of a second later he would have been trampled to death. The murderous hoof of the moose missed its mark by a quarter of an inch. Snorting with rage, he raised himself on his hind legs to strike again.
And then the wonderful thing happened. Even as the moose rose, a huge black form hurled itself through the air, descending upon him like a thunderbolt. Before he could deliver the blow intended for Shasta, even before he could change his position in order to protect himself, a huge paw, armed with claws like curved daggers, had ripped his shoulder half-way to the bone.
So great was the force of the blow, with the whole weight of Gomposh's body behind it, that the moose was hurled to the ground. He had hardly touched it, however, before he was on his feet, quivering with pain and fury. Seeing that his assailant was one of the hated bears, his fury redoubled. In spite of his wounds, now streaming with blood, he rushed savagely at the bear, striking again with his hoofs. But Gomposh, though now old, was no novice at boxing. He simply gathered his great hind quarters under him and sat well back upon them, with his forepaws lifted. Each time the moose struck, Gomposh parried the blow with a lightning sweep of his gigantic paw; and each time the paw swept, the moose bled afresh. Only once did he do Gomposh any injury, and that was when, with a sudden charge of his left-hand antler, he caught the bear in the ribs. But he paid dearly for the action. Gomposh, though nearly losing his balance, brought his right paw down with such sledge-hammer force on his opponent's shoulder, that the moose staggered, and almost fell. The blow was so tremendous that the great bull did not care to receive another. With a harsh bellow of rage and anguish he turned, plunged into the underwood, and disappeared.
WITH A HARSH BELLOW OF RAGE AND ANGUISH
HE PLUNGED INTO THE UNDERWOOD