228 NEIGHBOURS UNKNOWN 



knew very well that in all their range, for a 

 radius of forty or fifty miles about the humped 

 and massive hog-back of Red Rock, there 

 was no beast so bold as to trespass on the 

 panther's lair. 



It was, perhaps, a half hour later that a 

 man came in sight, a half-breed squatter, 

 moving stealthily up the further bank of the 

 stream. His dark figure appeared and dis- 

 appeared, slipping from rock to tree, from 

 tree to wild-vine thicket, as he picked his 

 way furtively along the steep and obstructed 

 slope. Not a twig cracked under his moc- 

 casined steps, so carefully did he go, though 

 the soft roar of the stream would have 

 covered any such light sound from all ears 

 but the initiated and discriminating ones of 

 the forest kindreds. His small watchful eyes 

 took note of the grassy level on the other 

 side of the stream, and, with a sure leap 

 to a rock in mid channel, he came across* 

 He arrived just a few feet below the spot 

 where the female panther had taken her de- 

 parture, digging in her broad pads heavily 

 in the take-off of her leap. The grasses, 

 trodden down in the heavy footprints, were 

 still slowly lifting their heads. At sight of 

 this trail, so startlingly fresh, the man 

 crouched instantly back into the fringing 



