Still the lad did not dare start his descent until all of them had vanished from sight. Then, slowly and cautiously, making as little noise as possible, he slipped downward through the heavy branches.
He had reached the lowest bough when something bade him pause.
Something was watching him from the jungle, something that he could not see but could feel!
CHAPTER XII
THE JAGUARS ATTACK
Bomba became suddenly motionless, flattened against the tree as though he were a part of it.
He did not dare move even to go upward again, for fear that the hidden enemy would be tempted to come forth from its hiding place.
Bomba had not lived all his life in close contact with the beasts of the jungle for nothing. His sense of smell was almost as well developed as theirs.
Now this useful sense told him that his enemy was none other than the big jungle cat, the jaguar, the most dreaded four-footed denizen of the jungle.
And there might be more than one of these ferocious beasts. He knew that they frequently traveled in pairs. His flesh crawled as the full helplessness of his position came over him.
There he was without bow or arrow or revolver—his only weapon the machete. His position in the tree rendered him all the more helpless against the attack of the big cats, for they could climb more swiftly than could he.