The Leopard Woman

ind people and to find water, if possible. The cook camp, too, was afoot, dark figures passing

to wash. At the sound of his voice men stirred sleepily, sat up, poked the remains of their tiny fires. As though through

who speedily cut out the centre, leaving a little round green room in the heart of the shadow. Thither Kingozi caused to be conveyed his chop-box table, his canvas chair, and his tin box; and there he spent the entire morning writing in a blank boo

shot up to great heights; animals stood on stilts; the tops of the hills were flattened, and from their summits often reached out into space long streamers. Sometimes these latter joined across wide intervals, creating an illus

ised his voice. Mali-ya-bwana, next in co

he was told, "and

, and Kingozi believed him staunch. Therefore, often, in absenc

gainst the cheek as though a furnace door had been opened. Nevertheless Kingozi knew that this was also the hour when the sun's power begins to decline; when

herds. Motionless they stood; and often, were it not for the switch of a tail, they would have remained unobserved. Even the sentinel hartebeestes, posted atop high ant hills on the outskirts of

th rocky outcrops. Toward this they plodded methodically: Kingozi slouching ahead, Mali-ya-bwana close at his heels, very proud of his tempo

nce it looked no different from any of the hundreds of others of like size and colour everywhere to be seen. Kingozi's attention, however,

none of the slow and clumsy upheaval one would naturally expect from an animal of so massive a body and such short, thick legs. One moment it slumbered, the next it was afoot, warned by some s

cles. Though it faced directly toward them, the men knew that they were as yet unseen. The rhinoceros' eyesight is very short, or very circumscribed, or both; and only objects in motion and comparatively close enter its range of vision. Kingozi and his man hel

ck his tail perpendicular and plunged forward a

ush in the direction toward which the animal happened to be headed. The rhinoceros, alarmed by the first intimation of danger, unable to get further news from

n were exactly

ceros catch sight of them he would fight; and within twenty-five yards or so his eyesight would be quite good enough. A

that Mali-ya- bwana held ready near his elbow. The bullet inflicted a slight flesh wound in the outer surface of the beast's left sh

e direction from which it seemed to his stupid brain the h

t, finally stopped, whirled, and faced to a new direction. The s

uds. Then the huge brute trotted slowly away, still snorting angrily, pausing to butt violently the larger t

ge, "but you're none the worse. Only I'm afraid your n

change guns wit

t one word. Mali-ya-bwana was secretly a little proud of himself for having

to the rifle, and the two resu