Finally F. stopped.
"I'm all in for water," he gasped in a whisper.
Somehow that confession made me feel a lot better. I had thought
that I was the only one. Cautiously we settled back on our heels.
Memba Sasa and Simba wiped the sweat from their faces. It seemed
that they too had found the work severe. That cheered me up still
more.
Simba grinned at us, and, worming his way backward with the
sinuousity of a snake, he disappeared in the direction from which
we had come. F. cursed after him in a whisper both for departing
and for taking the risk. But in a moment he had returned carrying
two canteens of blessed water. We took a drink most gratefully.
I glanced at my watch. It was just under two hours since I had
fired my shot. I looked back. My supposed quarter mile had shrunk
to not over fifty feet!
After resting a few moments longer, we again took up our
systematic advance. We made perhaps another fifty feet. We were
ascending a very gentle slope. F. was for the moment ahead. Right
before us the lion growled; a deep rumbling like the end of a
great thunder roll, fathoms and fathoms deep, with the inner
subterranean vibrations of a heavy train of cars passing a man
inside a sealed building. At the same moment over F.'s shoulder I
saw a huge yellow head rise up, the round eyes flashing anger,
the small black-tipped ears laid back, the great fangs snarling.
The beast was not over twelve feet distant.
