09 Lion Adventure (2 page)

But the lioness, approaching the goat, suddenly stopped and stared at the boma. She stretched her head towards it and sniffed strongly. The boys wished at that moment that they were not so smellable.

She lowered herself to a crouching position and crept towards the wall of thorns. Roger’s light wobbled, and even Hal felt a sudden chill crawling up his backbone. He brought his gun to his shoulder.

The lioness came straight up to the boma, asking questions with her nose.

She raised her paw and gave the wall a light swat. The whole structure shivered. If she swatted again, a little harder, it would fall down. But she evidently didn’t like the feel of the thorns. She started on a circuit of the boma and Roger followed her with his light.

‘I’d shoot if I were you,’ he whispered to Hal.

‘Perhaps she’s just curious,’ replied Hal, knowing that lady lions were much like lady humans.

Having completed the circle, the lioness stood on her hind feet, put her front paws on the top of the wall, and looked inside. Roger put his hand on his spear.

‘Steady,’ whispered Hal. ‘Don’t move.’

For tea seconds that seemed like ten minutes the lioness looked. Then she gave a snort as if expelling a bad odour from her nose, dropped to the ground, and padded out to join her husband at dinner.

Hal lowered his gun. She had passed the test with flying colours - she was no man-eater.

One goat was not enough food for two big animals. And yet it was not in lion nature to be selfish. When the male and his mate had partially satisfied their own hunger, they stood back. The lion raised his head to the

skies and let out his thunderous after-dinner roar. That notified all lions within miles that dinner was being served.

In a matter of minutes they began emerging from the brush. Eight lions made short work of what was left of the goat.

But there was a ninth lion that did not take part. He looked different from the others - evidently not a member of the same ‘pride’ or related group. He was older, bigger, bore a heavy mane that was black instead of the usual light brown, and he sat alone, staring straight into the light from the boma.

Though he would have nothing to do with the goat he was apparently hungry, for moisture kept dripping from the corners of his mouth. Presently he rose and came slowly towards the boma.

‘Here we go again,’ said Hal, a little wearily.

The boys were getting used to it. They could not remain scared every time a lion came sniffing around. Probably this one would behave like the others. He would be disgusted with the man-smell and would go back to the goat.

It was at this moment that Roger began to itch.

‘Something’s biting me,’ he said.

‘Probably just nervousness,’ said Hal.

Then he felt it himself. A crawling over his skin and a nipping at the most tender parts.

‘Ants!’ he exclaimed.

Why couldn’t they have waited until this lion hunt was over?

The ground had been carefully examined for ant-nests before the boma was built. These were evidently army ants, coming from heaven knows where, marching in a column like a well-trained army, eating up everything on the way. They had chosen to parade straight through the boma.

‘Let’s get out of here,’ said Roger, standing up and trying to shake the pests out of his clothes.

‘You stay right here and keep quiet,’ Hal ordered.

‘Keep quiet! How can you keep quiet when you’re being eaten alive?’

‘Better the ants than the lions.’

‘Oh, I’m not afraid of him. He’ll be just like the others. Give us the once-over and then leave us flat.’

‘I don’t know,’ said Hal. ‘He acts as if he meant business.’

The lion’s tail was twitching back and forth. Then it stood up straight and stiff like the mast of a ship. The ears were laid back. The teeth were bared. There was no roaring - just a soft ughing.

At this angle Hal could not use a heart shot. He must hit the brain. The brain was not up there in the top of the head - he knew that. That was all hair and nothing else. To get the brain he must strike between the eyes. He aimed his gun accordingly.

The lion flattened himself on the ground. This was called the ‘spread’. After the spread comes the spring.

The ants were biting. Hal tried to ignore them. As the lion’s claws bit into the earth, Hal fixed. At the same instant Roger hurled the thunderflash. It struck the ground directly in front of the lion’s, nose and exploded. The lion gave it a contemptuous swat with his paw, then leaped into the boma. Things happened fast. The torch was knocked from Roger’s hand. It lay blinking in the grass. Roger tried to get his spear. It was buried under five hundred pounds of lion.

Hal, leaping about to keep clear of the lion’s claws, did not dare to shoot again for fear of hitting his brother. He finally got the muzzle close to the lion’s head. Then a great paw, more powerful than any baseball bat, the paw that could knock a zebra dead with one slap, struck the barrel and bent it into a V.

If Hal had fired at that instant, the gun would have exploded, killing all three, and that would have been the end of the story.

He took his finger off the trigger. As the lion lunged for him, jaws agape, he jammed the bent barrel down the beast’s throat.

The lion fell over and clawed at the gun with his hind paws. He rolled about on the ground. He rid himself of the gun barrel but he got something else.

Ants.

He stood up and shook himself. He bit at his flanks and pawed his ears and throat. He dashed about the boma. He had forgotten the boys.

The ants that had tortured them promptly left them to attack their new victim. They were large for ants, almost an inch long, and had jaws like pincers.

Attacking by the thousands, they could strip an animal to the bone. They entered the throat, the eyes, the ears. One of the smallest of creatures was conquering the king of beasts.

The lion leaped out of the boma and dived into the dark. They heard him plunge into a near-by water-hole.

Roger picked up the torch and they looked themselves over. Their faces, arms, clothes, were smeared with blood. But they couldn’t find where the blood came from. They had many scratches, but none deep enough to produce all this gore.

Hal breathed a sigh of relief. ‘It’s the lion’s blood, not ours. I thought I missed, but I must have creased his skull.’

‘Well, let’s get out of here,’ said Roger. ‘I’ve had enough for tonight.’

‘You know better than that.’

Roger did know better. He knew that when a hunter wounds a wild animal he must follow it and finish it off. He knew that a badly hurt animal cannot be allowed to go loose. It must be tracked down and put out of its pain. There is another reason. A savage beast after being wounded is far more savage than before. It would revenge itself upon the first human being it could find.

‘We’ll go after it in the morning,’ Roger said.

‘We’ll go after it now. It could be fifty miles away by morning.’

‘But your gun is busted.’

‘We still have the spear. Come along. But first, those scratches.’ He took a tube of penicillin out of his bush jacket pocket.

‘Why fool with them now? They are not bad.’

‘Just a little scratch from a lion’s claw could kill you. Blood poisoning. Lions don’t manicure their nails. They are really pretty clean animals - lick themselves all over just like a cat. But they can’t get under the nails. Scraps of meat get under them and rot and become poisonous. One fellow I knew who got a light scratch from a lion’s claw spent the next six months in the hospital. He was lucky. He lived.’

Hal rubbed a little of the ointment into Roger’s scratches, then into his own.

‘That ought to do it. Let’s go.’

‘How about the other lions?’ Roger said. He picked up the torch and played it on the goat, or the place where the goat had been. It was gone, and so were the lions.

‘Good,’ he said. ‘We don’t have to worry about them.’

‘We can’t be sure of that. They may be lying near by, digesting their meal. Perhaps they’re all around us. If we bump into one of them, we’re in trouble. They may be harmless old pussycats if they’re let alone, but they don’t like to be stepped on.’

He took the spear and pushed the thorns aside at the point where the man-eater had leaped over the wall. He stepped through and Roger followed, carrying the torch.

There were deep gouges in the ground where the Hon had landed. Then he had made straight for the water-hole, leaving a trail of blood. The boys followed warily, watching every rock to be sure it was a rock and not a lion. Sleepy growls came from the bushes. At the edge of the water-hole three lions that had been drinking looked into the light.

‘Steady,’ whispered Hal. ‘No sudden moves.’

It was important to show no sign of fear. Even a well-behaved lion can’t resist the temptation to chase a man who runs.

‘Walk backwards,’ Hal whispered.

Still facing the animals, they stepped slowly backwards along the edge of the pool. They took their time about it. If they tripped on a root or a hummock and fell the chances were good that they would not be allowed to get up again.

Hal felt he was getting cross-eyed, trying to watch the lions and at the same time watch the ground to see where the man-eater had come out of the pool. There was no use looking for footprints. The prints of lions’ feet were everywhere.

They had gone halfway around the water-hole before he saw what he was looking for - pebbles stained with red, and a blood trail leading off into the jungle.

This was going to be worse than he had expected. The lion had not stayed in the open, but had crawled off into the underbrush. It might be hiding behind any bush, with an aching head and a heart full of hate. If it heard and smelled hunters approaching, it would brace itself for a spring. Lions had been known to leap twelve feet high and span a distance of forty-five feet in one jump. This one wouldn’t need to do as well. Bushes pressed close on both sides-if the lion were lurking behind one he might reach his enemies with a spring of only ten feet or less.

Roger stepped on a log. It rolled, dropping him on his back, then came up on four legs and made off.

‘Watch your step!’ Hal said angrily as Roger picked himself up. ‘Lucky that wasn’t the one we’re looking for.’

‘Perhaps it was,’ admitted Roger.

‘Not a chance. He wouldn’t have let you off so easily. Besides, the blood trail shows he didn’t stop here.’

They followed the red-stained bushes a little farther.

Then Hal stopped.

‘Shine that torch down here - close.’

He examined every leaf, every twig. No sign of blood. Perhaps the wound had stopped bleeding. But that was not likely. It was more probable that the lion was right here, somewhere, behind these bushes.

He approached a bush cautiously, trying to peer through it or around it.

‘Look out,’ cried Roger. ‘Behind you.’

Hal wheeled around. He braced himself for the lion’s spring. But lions seldom do what is expected of them. There was no spring.

A pair of great yellow coals burned in the bush. Above them was a shaggy head matted with blood.

The beast was flat on the ground. He crept forward inch by inch. He did not roar, he did not cough. He purred.

It was not a friendly, catty purr. It was a dreadful thing to hear, full of anger and revenge, and it seemed to come not just from the throat but from the whole furious beast. It was like the rumbling before an earthquake.

‘Give me that spear,’ Roger said.

‘No, I’ll use it. You get back out of the way.’

‘Give it to me,’ insisted Roger. ‘They showed me how to use it.’

‘You’re not strong enough.’

‘It doesn’t take strength.’ He yanked it out of Hal’s hand. ‘You hold the light.’

There was no time to argue. Hal held the light. He realized with a jolt that this youngster was growing up. In ten seconds he would either be dead or he would be a man. It was Masai custom - no Masai youth was considered a man until he had killed a lion.

Roger was already regretting his burst of courage.

Those glaring yellow eyes, the tail erect and as stiff as a gun barrel, the deep deadly purr, brought the sweat out in beads on Roger’s forehead. He clenched his teeth. He tried to quiet Ms fluttering nerves.

He was big and strong for his age—yet he knew better than to trust his own strength. He called on Mother Earth to help him. Instead of hurling the spear, he planted the butt firmly in the ground. He pointed the blade directly towards the lion’s chest. He held it in that position as steadily as his dancing nerves would permit.

The final charge of a lion comes like a bolt of lightning.. By comparison, a charge of an elephant or rhino or hippo or even a buffalo is slow motion.

At one instant Roger was watching a creeping animal still a good ten feet away. At the next instant it was

coming out of the bush like a bullet, but a bullet with five hundred pounds behind it.

But behind the spear was the whole weight of Mother Earth. The point penetrated the chest. The great jaws jerked down, gripped the shaft, pulled it out, and snapped it as if it had been bamboo. With a roar of rage and pain, the man-eater fell on his side, struggled to get up, fell again, and lay still.

Roger felt suddenly very young. He sat down weakly and mopped his face. Hal put his hand on the boy’s trembling shoulder. He tried to speak - but the words wouldn’t come.

Words were not necessary. They both knew what that touch on the shoulder meant - not the comfort given by a man to a child, but the respect of a man for a man.

Hal and Roger were not happy about it. They had not wanted to kill the animal - it was just a job that had to be done.

Someone else was not happy. King Ku.

1 don’t believe it,’ he growled when Tanga, the station master, told him the news. Two boys - alone? Their crew must have helped them. I thought I gave orders…’

‘Your orders were obeyed,’ Tanga said. ‘The boys did it alone.’

‘Were they hurt?’