CHAPTER XIV.

A TROOP OF LIONS.

“There’s no danger that you will be overburdened with company if you intend to pass the night at that shooting-hole,” said Bob, with a laugh. “I know who _won’t_ go. Here’s one.”

“Here’s another,” said George.

“Here’s one who will go,” cried Archie.

“You don’t mean it,” exclaimed George.

“I mean just this: if Eugene is brave enough to stay beside that spring to-night, I am,” returned Archie.

“So am I,” said Fred.

“Oh, of course,” laughed George. “If one of you three go, you’ll all go. Well, I shall stay contentedly by the fire, and about the time you hear the roar of the first lion that is coming to the spring to drink, you’ll wish yourselves safe beside the fire, too.”

“Do you really mean to go, Eugene?” asked Archie, in a low tone.

“Yes, I do, if you two fellows will go with me. We don’t expect to kill a lion or even shoot at one, but we’ll have something to brag of. When we get home we can say we performed a feat that none of the others dared attempt.”

“How big is one of them critters, anyhow?” asked Dick Lewis. “Is he much bigger’n a painter?”

“Why a panther wouldn’t make an ear for a lion,” replied Eugene. “Well, yes, perhaps he would, too,” he added, seeing that the trapper’s eyes were fastened searchingly upon him; “but he wouldn’t make more than a half a dozen good mouthfuls. Will you go with us, Dick?”

“Nary time,” exclaimed the trapper, quickly. “A critter that can make such a bellerin’ as that one did that stormy night a few weeks back, is something I don’t want to see.”

Our three friends, Archie, Fred, and Eugene, had something to talk about now—something in which they alone were interested; so they fell back behind the others, and during the rest of the forenoon were left almost entirely to themselves. Whether or not they expected to derive any pleasure from their projected enterprise, other than to be found in talking about it after it was all over, it is hard to tell. They tried their best to make themselves and one another believe that they did, and repeatedly expressed the hope that Uncle Dick would not interpose his authority, and spoil all their sport by ordering them to stay in the camp. They expected that he would have something to say about it during the noon halt, and so he did, but he did not put his veto on the project. He had done such a thing more than once during his young and foolish days, he said, and although he could not be easily induced to do it again, he would not like to sell his experience at any price. It was going to be a beautiful night for sport. It would be as dark as pitch, and that was just what they wanted. He hoped that they would bag lions enough so that each one of the party could have a skin to remind him of his sojourn in Africa, and of that night in particular. Frank talked much in the same strain, and added that he thought he had enough arsenical soap left to preserve a few of the heads of the lions, if the hunters would cut them off and bring them to the camp. The three friends were not prepared for this, and they did not know what to make of it. They had looked for opposition, and instead of that received encouragement and offers of assistance. They said nothing until the journey was resumed, and then they fell behind to compare notes.

“Now what do you suppose is in the wind?” asked Eugene, as soon as they were out of earshot of the rest of the party.

“Let Archie guess; he’s a Yankee,” replied Fred. “There’s something up, I know, or Uncle Dick and Frank would not have talked as they did. What is it, Archie?”

“There’s no danger that any lions will come near the spring,” replied Archie.

“Why, didn’t Mack tell me this morning that the veldt was full of them, and that he had seen three troops of lions at that very fountain?” demanded Fred. “That can’t be it. Guess again.”

“They think that when night comes and it begins to grow dark, our courage will give way, and we will say no more about going out to the shooting-hole,” said Archie. “Am I any nearer the mark this time?”

“I think you are,” replied Eugene. “That’s the best guess you have made yet. They may think so—it is probable they do—but they will find that they are mistaken. Do they imagine that I proposed this thing just to hear myself talk? They ought to know me better than that.”

The boys having now got it into their heads that their courage was questioned, were more than ever determined to carry their plans into execution, provided, of course, that Uncle Dick did not change his mind before night came. They tried to look very unconcerned when they announced this decision, and perhaps they felt so just then, for it is always easy to talk carelessly of danger when the danger itself is far distant; but as the afternoon began to wane, and the range of hills toward which they had been journeying all day seemed to approach nearer and nearer to them, our three hunters began to be a little nervous and uneasy. Perhaps the actions of their companions had something to do with this. The Griquas, who had all the day been loitering far in the rear, suddenly urged their beasts into something resembling a canter, and drew nearer to the boys, as if for protection; while the trappers, after exchanging a few words in a hurried undertone, rode up to the head of the line and joined Uncle Dick and his party. They seemed to feel safer in the captain’s presence and Frank’s than they did anywhere else. The Griquas were prompt to follow their example, and thus the rear-guard was reduced to a mere handful.

Archie and his friends cared nothing for the company of the natives, for they knew that in case of trouble no dependence was to be placed upon them; but the hurried flight of the two trappers, who had faced so many dangers without flinching, had anything but a soothing effect upon them. They would have been glad to ride up to the head of the line, too, but that would not look well in three hunters who had announced their determination to perform an exploit that not another person in the company was willing to undertake. They staid because their pride compelled them to do so, and George staid to keep them company.

An hour later the wagon entered the valley. It was a dreary, lonely-looking place they found when they got fairly into it, and they did not wonder that travellers hurried through it with all possible speed. It was about two miles wide, and on both sides arose steep hills, which were covered with thick forests from base to summit. The surface of the valley was not a level plain, as they had expected to find it. It was undulating, and even hilly in some places; and although almost bare of trees, it was thickly covered with boulders, some the size of a man’s head, and others as large as the wagon. Among these huge boulders the road twisted and turned in a way that was quite bewildering, a few of the bends being so abrupt that in passing around them the leaders of the team and the wheel oxen were seen moving in opposite directions. What an ambuscade it would have formed for hostile natives—wild Bushmen, for instance—and how easily a hungry lion could spring out from behind one of the boulders beside the road, seize a goat or a man, and jump back again before a shot could be fired at him! Once safe behind a boulder he was certain to escape with his booty, for he could spring from one rock to the cover of a second, and thence to a third, faster than even the breechloaders could be charged and fired at him. But if there was any hungry lion in the neighborhood he did not show himself, and the travellers passed safely through the wilderness of rocks, and finally drew up in the edge of a little grove, where Mack intended to camp for the night. Our three friends were on the ground at last.

Archie and his companions did not dismount as the others did, but set off at once in search of the fountain. The first ox that was freed from the yoke showed them where it was. Knowing that the animal’s instinct would direct him aright, they followed in his lead, and presently found themselves standing on the bank of the spring. It was, perhaps, a hundred yards away from the wagon.

Travellers on our Western plains, when they camp for the night, generally take pains to stop close beside a stream of water; but campers in Africa are obliged to follow a different custom. The springs, which are few and far apart, are generally found on the bare plain, and sometimes there is not a stick or bush within miles of them. Sticks and bushes are necessary, one to keep the fire going, and the other to build the barricade which is always erected to protect the travellers and their stock from sudden attacks of wild beasts; so the camp is made in the nearest piece of woods, the cattle are driven to the spring, and the traveller brings back enough of the water to make his tea and coffee.

Upon reaching the fountain the boys drew rein and looked about them with a great deal of interest. They saw before them a body of water about fifty yards long and half as wide, whose source of supply was in the limpid spring that bubbled out from the low bank that overhung one side of it. About twenty-five yards from the edge of the water, and in plain view of it, was the shooting-hole they were to occupy that night; and about twenty yards still further back was another bank, ten or twelve feet high, which completely shut them out from the view of the camp.

The shooting-hole was an excavation about four feet deep and six feet square. There was not much elbow-room in it for three such restless fellows as our young friends, but still it would afford them a very comfortable hiding-place if they could only content themselves with close quarters for a short time. They had one great objection to it when they came to look at it, and that was, it was too close to the water. “Two or three swift bounds would carry a wild beast from the fountain’s edge right into our very midst,” exclaimed Eugene; “that is, provided, of course, that one comes here to-night and makes up his mind to pitch into us.”

“Oh, he’ll come,” shouted Fred, from the other side of the fountain. “You needn’t borrow any trouble on that score. Come over here.”

The boys went, and, when they had examined the ground on that side of the spring, told one another that it would be surprising indeed if they did not have visitors before morning. Wild beasts of some sort came there to drink every night, and in goodly numbers, too. There could be no mistake about that, for the shore, which was low on that side of the spring, was tramped so hard that the hoofs of the thirty oxen made no impression on it. An experienced and enthusiastic hunter, like the English colonel of whom they purchased their outfit, would have been delighted at such a prospect for sport.

Their friends at the camp looked curiously at them when they came back, but saw no signs of backing out. The three hunters were not only in earnest, but they were impatient to begin operations, if one might judge by the way they hurried up the preparations for supper. They ate heartily of the viands that were set before them, and having satisfied their appetites and bidden their friends good-by, each boy shouldered his rifles and a bundle of blankets, and was ready to set out. We say “rifles,” for each boy carried two. Besides their double-barrels, Fred and Eugene took their sixteen shooters, and Archie his Maynard. They had the most faith in their breechloaders, for they were accustomed to them. Uncle Dick and Frank walked down to the spring with them, and having seen them snugly stowed away in the shooting-hole, bade them good-night and returned to the camp.

“I can’t quite understand what makes Uncle Dick act so,” said Eugene, thoughtfully. “Seems to me that he ought to have raised some objections, and I don’t see why he didn’t.”

“Perhaps he and Frank are hiding up there behind the bank to keep an eye on us, and be ready to lend us a hand in case we get into trouble,” said Fred.

“Well, we don’t want any such backing as that. If they want to take a hand in this business, let them come in here with us. There’s room enough for them with tight squeezing. I’ll just satisfy myself on that point.”

So saying, Eugene jumped out of the hole and ran up the bank. The campfire was burning brightly in the edge of the grove, and by the light it threw out the young hunter could see that Uncle Dick and his companion had just joined the rest of the party, who were busy making preparations for the night. The native servants, having built a small inclosure of thorn bushes, were driving the oxen into it and fastening them in; some of the boys were arranging the beds in the tent; and the others were tying the horses, which now began to come into the camp one after another. These intelligent animals never waited to be driven in at night as the oxen did. Their instinct taught them that the neighborhood of the campfire was the safest place for them, and thither they went as soon as it began to grow dark.

Having completed his observations, Eugene joined his companions in the shooting-hole, and reported that he had seen Uncle Dick go into the camp, and that he and his two friends were alone in their glory. The sudden silence that fell on the party when Eugene said this, was evidence that there was not near as much fun in being alone in their glory as they thought there was. How plainly they could hear the voices of the Kaffirs as they shouted at the oxen! And when the oxen were all driven in and the voices ceased, how still it became all at once, and how dark, too! They tried hard to shake off their feelings of awe and to find something to talk about, but both efforts were failures. They could not converse, for their lowest whispers were wonderfully distinct, and seemed to them loud enough to frighten away any animal that might be approaching the fountain. For an hour they remained almost motionless in their hiding-place, holding their weapons in readiness, and keeping their gaze directed over the edge of the bank toward the water, and then Fred gave a sudden start and placed his hand on Archie’s shoulder. “There’s something there!” he whispered, excitedly.

The others listened, and could distinctly hear a faint lapping sound, made by some animal in drinking; but he was invisible in the darkness. They could not obtain the slightest glimpse of him.

“It must be a lion,” whispered Fred. “You know Uncle Dick told us that he has heard lions drinking within ten yards of him, and couldn’t see them. They can’t be seen in the dark.”

“But they make a very loud noise in drinking,” said Archie, “and this animal we can scarcely hear. It must be something else.”

“I can see him now,” said Eugene, as he pushed his double-barrel slowly and cautiously over the bank. “Be ready to give him a broadside in case I don’t kill him at the first shot. I am not accustomed to shooting in the dark, you know.”

The other two could see the animal now, but not plainly enough to determine what it was. It was moving swiftly on the other side of the fountain, and the boys thought it was looking directly towards their hiding-place. It circled around to their right, Eugene following all its movements with his rifle, and only waiting for it to become stationary for a moment so that he could make a sure shot, and presently it reached the top of the bank at the rear of the shooting-hole, and stood out in bold relief against the sky. Then it got the “wind” of the young hunters, and, with a whisk of its tail and a toss of its head, it backed quickly down the hill out of sight, at the same time setting up a chorus of yelps that awoke the echoes far and near, and made the cold chill creep all over the boys.

“It’s a sneaking jackal,” exclaimed Fred, in great disgust.

“Yes, and I’d rather see almost anything else,” said Eugene. “Just hear what a yelping he keeps up! He’ll bring the lions down on us as sure as the world.”

The boys, being well versed in natural history, were acquainted with the habits of this animal before they ever saw one, and of late they had had a little experience with some of his tribe. They knew that the jackal is a sort of scout for the lion. Whenever he finds any game that he is afraid to attack himself, he sets up a terrific yelping, and any hungry lion who may be within hearing of the signal comes up and kills it, the jackal standing by and looking on until the lordly beast has satisfied his appetite and gone away, when he makes a meal of what is left. One day, just before they reached the house of the “surly Boer,” our three friends, in company with Frank Nelson, were hunting elands along the route, and in the excitement of the chase they followed them so far away that it was night before they rode into camp, to which they were directed by the firing of signal guns. Shortly after it began to grow dark, and while they were yet five miles from the wagon, they were discovered by a jackal, which followed them within sight of the campfire, yelping all the while and trying his best to call the lions to them. The cunning animal seemed to know what a gun was, for he took care to keep at a respectful distance from the boys, and whenever one of them halted and tried to shoot him, he would take to his heels and be out of sight in a moment.

“There he is,” continued Eugene, as the jackal cautiously raised his head above the top of the bank and looked down at them; but before the double-barrel could be brought to bear on him he had dodged back out of sight.

“Jump up there and shoot him, Archie,” cried Fred. “You are the nearest to him, and we don’t want that yelping in our ears much longer.”

“No, sir!” exclaimed Archie, drawing himself close into his own corner. “I wouldn’t go up there for—for—No, sir! Who knows but that he has called up a lion already?”

“I declare he has,” said Eugene, in a thrilling whisper. “I can see him. I see two—three. There is a troop of them!”

This startling announcement would have tested the nerves of older and more experienced hunters than Archie and Fred were; and if what they heard was enough to set their hearts to beating rapidly, what they saw a moment later was sufficient to take all the courage out of them. A single glance showed them that Eugene’s eyes had not deceived him. There they were in plain sight—a number of tawny animals moving swiftly about on the opposite bank of the fountain, passing and repassing one another in their rapid evolutions, crouching close to the ground, and gradually drawing nearer to the top of the bank where the jackal had disappeared, probably with the object of getting the “wind” of the boys. Archie tried to count them; but when he fixed his gaze upon one, two or three more would pass before it, these would quickly give place to as many more, and finally Archie became so bewildered and excited that he was ready to declare that troops of lions were springing up out of the ground before his very eyes. He thought they showed rather plainly in the dark for lions, but still there could be no doubt that they were lions. Their color and their stealthy, crouching movements were enough to settle that point.

“If they get in here among us, there’ll not be a mouthful apiece for them, will there?” said Fred.

“They’ll not all get in here,” replied Archie.

“Now that we are cornered, it is a good time to show what we are made of. I am going to begin shooting.”

Before the words had fairly left his lips Archie’s double-barrel spoke, and one of the lions sprang into the air, and fell at full length on the ground. A second received the contents of the other barrel without falling, and even succeeded in getting away out of sight, although Archie was certain that the ball from his Maynard, which he caught up as soon as his double-barrel was empty, must have found a lodgment in his body somewhere.

While Archie was thus engaged, his two companions were not idle. They promptly opened on the lions with their own weapons, and without waiting to see the effect of the bullets from their double-barrels, caught up their sixteen-shooters, and pumped the shots right and left. The magazines were emptied in a trice, and then the three hunters hastily ducked their heads and crouched close behind the walls of their hiding-place, holding their breath in dread suspense, and waiting for some of the wounded members of the troop to precipitate themselves into the shooting-hole. But nothing of the kind happened. All was still outside. They heard only the beating of their own hearts.

“We must have hit those we killed,” Fred ventured to whisper at last.

“Probably we did,” returned Archie. “We couldn’t have killed them unless we hit them.”

“I mean we must have killed all we hit and frightened the rest away,” said Fred. “If there were any wounded ones among them they would have been in here before this time.”

The others were very willing to accept this as the reason why they had not all been torn in pieces long ago. It put new life and courage into them, and having pushed a cartridge into their breechloaders, they raised their heads cautiously above the bank to take a survey of the scene of the slaughter. They could not see a single lion or hear anything of one; but they heard something else—a heavy tramping of feet and a confused murmur of voices. They looked hastily around, and saw a bright light shining above the bank behind them.

“Uncle Dick’s coming!” cried Fred; and the next moment the old sailor appeared at the top of the bank, closely followed by the rest of the party, two of whom carried firebrands in their hands.