"Rather!" Lord Victor ejaculated. "To-night we'll drink a toast in fizz to the one-eared bull—a thoroughbred gentleman!"
"We'll need the elephant up to pad this tiger," Finnerty said. Mahadua, who was sent to bring on Raj Bahadar, had not been gone two minutes when from their back trail came, upwind, the shrill trumpeting of two elephants, and mingling with this was the harsh honk of a conch shell.
"That's Moti, or wild elephants tackling Raj Bahadar," Finnerty declared. "I must get back. The tiger will be all right here for a little—those dogs won't come back—and I'll send Mahadua and the elephant after him."
PART THREE
Chapter XIII
It was a stirring scene that greeted the three sahibs on their arrival at the conflict. Like a family of monkeys the natives decorated the tree, while below was Burra Moti giving lusty battle to the tusker. Either out of chivalry or cowardice, Raj Bahadar was backing up, refusing to obey the prod of his mahout's goad, and charge.
As Moti came at the bull like a battering-ram he received her on his forehead, the impact sounding like the crash of two meeting freight cars, and she, vindictively cunning, with a quick twist of her head, gashed him in the neck with a long tusk.
"Come down out of there, you women of the sweeper caste!" Finnerty commanded. The natives dropped to the ground. One of them, uncoiling his rawhide rope, darted in behind Moti, noosed a lifted foot, and ran back with the trailing end.