The boy no longer hesitated.
Swiftly, with great deer-like leaps, he covered the distance to the edge of the water hole.
So sudden was the action that the great cats, their eyes fastened on the least movement of Polulu, were taken completely by surprise.
Bomba flung himself on the ground and had drunk great draughts of the clear cold water before they fairly grasped the situation.
Here was a new enemy. An enemy easier to fight than Polulu. Their hair began to bristle and they commenced to creep forward, their bodies, still close to the ground, moving almost as sinuously as so many snakes.
Polulu roared fiercely and struck at the nearest puma, raking him with his sharp claws from shoulder to thigh.
With a horrible scream of rage and pain, the wounded puma sprang at Polulu. But the old puma was quicker than the young one. His powerful jaws clamped about the throat of his adversary and worked savagely. No amount of thrashing about or raking with claws could shake off that grip.
The other pumas, temporarily daunted by the terrible punishment that Polulu was inflicting, began to creep toward Bomba.
The lad raised his revolver and pressed the trigger. The bullet sped straight and true, pierced the eye of the nearest puma and penetrated to the brain.
The stricken beast leaped into the air and then fell sprawling upon the ground.