“Santa Maria! Tigre! He’s there!” he whispered. “He’s there, beside the body of something he’s killed. He’s been there all night. He was there when we first heard him. We thought he was trailing. Muella, I must see closer. Stay back—you must not follow!”
But as he crept under the low palms she followed him. They came to the open clearing. Tigre lay across the trail, his beautiful yellow and black body stretched in lax grace, his terrible sightless eyes riveted on a dead man beside him.
“Muella—stay back—I fear—I fear!” said Augustine.
He crept yet a little farther, and returned with pale face and quivering jaw.
“Muella, it’s Bernardo! He’s dead—has been dead for days. When you started off that day to warn me, Bernardo must have run round by the old wagon road to head off Tigre. The blind brute killed him!”
“Bernardo repented!” moaned Muella. “He repented!”
THE RUBBER HUNTER