OH, SHOOT! 



calculations. Not at all. Fred got into the 

 lower branches of the tree, but instead of re- 

 treating, as lions are supposed to do, instead of 

 recoiling in terror before the well-known power 

 of the human eye, this one opened her mouth 

 as if to get her throat sprayed and came down 

 to show it to Fred. She came with a rush, 

 too. 



"Look out!" Ambrose yelled, whereupon 

 Fred peeled the lower part of that cedar as 

 bare as a telegraph pole. For a few feet he 

 and the lioness were neighbors; they came 

 down together, face to face, cheek by growl, 

 as it were, leaving a trail of charred wood and 

 smoke above them. Then, as the increasing 

 force of gravitation made itself felt, Fred 

 gained on her. Finding that she could not 

 outrun a falling body, the cougar scrambled 

 out a projecting bough and launched herself 

 into space. Either I looked soft and springy 

 to her or my hair resembled a bunch of thick 

 grass in which she thought she could find con- 

 cealment anyhow, she selected me as a 

 leaping-pad. Fortunately she miscalculated, 

 and fell perhaps forty feet below the tree, but 

 much nearer me. She was off like a flash, with 

 canine pandemonium at her heels. As she 



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