The Crimson Flash Part 17

"But I got to thinking that perhaps humans counted more than the great cats in the jungle. I didn't want to think that, not at first, but I couldn't shake it off. When I went into the jungle to watch the cats I saw in my mind those sick people coming, coming, coming. I didn't like it; didn't want to see them. There was yet the great black cat. I must find him somewhere in the jungle. I must see him.

"One day I talked to the doctor about my thoughts, and he told me that people counted for much more than big cats. He said he needed medicine, supplies, new houses, everything, and since I could go to the jungle and come back alive, perhaps I could help him.

"'How?' I asked.

"It was a terrible thing he said: 'Go into the jungle and get me tiger cubs. Traders will pay big money for them.'

"It was terrible. I could do it. There were three cubs. I could get them, but--

"'But,' I said to the doctor, 'the big cats, the father and mother, must first be killed.'

"'Yes,' he smiled. And that was all he said.

"I went into the jungle again that night and, as I watched the splendor of the great cats, I said, 'No, I will never do it! Never! Never!' And yet I was going to do that very thing. I was going to take a rifle with me, and lie there in that wonderful moonlight to wait for them to come back; sooner than I thought, too.

"It was that night, for the first time, that the old tiger left his mate and the three cubs while I watched them and went away to hunt by himself.

Then I was glad, for I always had wished to watch him as he hunted down the blue deer, the buffalo, wild goat or wild pig. So I followed.

Creeping after him through the moonlight I lost him many times, for his yellow stripes were like the moonbeams, and the dark ones like wavering shadows. But I always found him again, as he rose to leap along some path or across an open spot in the forest.

"At last I knew that we were nearing the village. 'Ah!' I said to myself, 'so that is your game. You will pick a calf or a fat young pig for your dinner. Perhaps you may not fare as well as that,' for I decided that I must use my charm to drive him from the village if he went to rob there.

"But, before I had expected it, he began to circle. By that I knew he had scented some prey. Narrower and narrower his circle grew. Greater and greater became my curiosity, for I wondered what kind of prey he could find so near the village and yet not safe in its pen.

"Finally I climbed upon the trunk of a dead tree, and then I saw. My blood ran cold. Out of the village had wandered a child, a little girl of four or five years. She had crept from her bed while others were asleep, and there she was, the pale moonlight glistening from her body, and the tiger not four springs away. Then it was that I saw, saw clear as midday how it was; that all big cats were men's enemies, and were but to be killed.

"Yet, I could not kill. I had not as much as a knife. I could do but one thing. I had my charm. I must stand between the beast and the child.

"Three leaps brought me in his path. Then I turned and faced him. It was a great and terrible moment. My charm; would it work? He was terribly angry. Las.h.i.+ng his tail, he leaped to one side. But that was no good. I had him. I was now beside the child, who was not one bit afraid.

"That time the tiger almost dared. He leaped once. Two more leaps remained. He leaped again. I could see the round, black pupils of his eyes; count his teeth; hear him breathe. Three times they relaxed. He did not dare. My charm; it worked. I had him. He did not dare.

"At last he slunk away through the tall gra.s.s. Then, because the child was not afraid, because I knew it would be the last time I should ever watch the cats and their cubs, I took the child and followed the tiger back to the lair, where all night long, beneath the moon, the tiger and his mate with their cubs beat a hard, round path about me and the little girl.

"Just before sunrise I heard the distant beat of the tom tom, the bellowing of bull buffaloes. Then it was that I knew that the natives were driving the herd of buffaloes to the jungle that they might frighten the tigers from their lair, and secure the remains of the child. And all the time I had the child safe in my arms."

Pant paused and looked away over the glimmering water. The tom, tom, tom of the circus drum was sounding. The indistinct noises wafted on the breeze might be the lowing buffaloes. Johnny, for the second, fancied himself in the heart of the jungle with Pant, the child, and the tigers.

"The next night," Pant's voice had grown suddenly husky, "I went to the jungle again, and that morning I brought in the pelts of the tiger and his mate. The kittens were chained to a tree. The natives brought them in later. The hospital was bigger and better after that. And I, I was a hero, a hero to them all, but not to myself."

"But the black cat, the panther?" suggested Johnny after a moment of silence.

"Oh, yes, that was later. We have not time for it now. We move to-night.

We must hurry. Already the people are leaving."

"One thing more before we go," said Johnny eagerly. "Light, Pant, does light travel in straight lines?" He was thinking of the crimson flash that had leaped apparently from mid-air in the tent the previous evening.

"I am surprised that you ask it," Pant smiled. "You have been in Alaska?"

"Yes."

"Then, at Cape Prince of Wales you must have seen the midnight sun?"

"Yes, in June."

"If the sun's rays shone straight, you must have had then as many hours of continuous darkness in December as you had of continuous daylight in June. Did you?"

"No," said Johnny. "We had three or four hours of sun every day, even in December."

"Then," said Pant, smiling, "the sun's rays must have been bent that they might reach you. In fact, the rays of light never travel straight. So long! I'll leave you now to think that over. See you at our next stand.

Hope I can tell you then who has your diamond ring."

He vanished into the night, leaving Johnny to stare after him in wonder and admiration.

"Some day," Johnny said to himself, "I'll hear the story of the black leopard."

CHAPTER XII JOHNNY WINS DOUBLE PAY

Johnny had scarcely reached the cl.u.s.ter of tents that loomed large in the darkness, when he was startled by a sudden wild burst of activity. Men and boys rushed silently here and there; lanterns and searchlights flashed from place to place. For a second he stood there paralyzed. What was it, a fire or an approaching cyclone?

Then he laughed.

"We move to-night. Down go the tents."

They did go down. Before his astonished eyes they disappeared as if by magic. In all his life he had never seen anything that came near equaling the team work displayed in the dropping of the big top and the loading of the circus.

In a marvelously short time they were on their way. Johnny, because of his prospects of becoming a regular performer, had been a.s.signed a berth in a sleeping car. Pant, being merely a hanger-on, slept as he had on many another night, beneath the stars, with only a bale of canvas for covering.

Johnny spent a half hour in thought before the even click, click of the wheels lulled him to sleep. They were on their way, and he was glad.

To-morrow he would have his try-out. To-morrow, too, he would give Gwen her second lesson in boxing. Should he ask her about the ring? To-morrow they would be in one of those small cities in which Pant had said the counterfeiters would reap their richest harvest. When would Pant find his man? Would he, Johnny, have a part in it? He must not fail to fulfill his promise to Pant; to get acquainted with the steam kettle cook and the midget clown.

The next morning Johnny kept his boxing appointment with Gwen. It was after a half hour of strenuous work, while they were resting on a mat, that she turned to him suddenly and said, in a low voice:

"A strange thing happened last night."

"What was that?"

"I was awakened from my sleep. I had been dreaming of a fire, and I would have sworn that it was a flash of red light that awakened me."

"That's strange." Johnny's tone told nothing.

"What is stranger still, two other girls were awakened in the same manner."

"You had upper berths?"