ullet; a bulky body hurtled through the
air, knocking Mildmay and the professor right and left backward among
the reeds, and there lay the great beast, stone dead, between them.

"Just in the nick of time!" murmured the professor. "Another second,
and he would have had one of us."

"Yes," agreed Mildmay, with zest. "We are not having such bad sport,
are we, Professor, considering that we have only just come on the
ground?"

"Quite as good as could be expected," assented von Schalckenberg. "But
the sport has not been all on our side. Our friend, here, has at least
had the excitement of _stalking us_."

"Why, you surely do not mean to say that this beggar has been stalking
us?" ejaculated the sailor.

"As surely as that we are standing here," answered the professor. "He
was standing exactly in our tracks, and has undoubtedly been following
our scent, which he probably crossed on his way down here to the water.
It is lucky for us both that he did not come up while we were engaged
with the python. Had he done so, there would probably have arisen a
very awkward complication. Well, let us get on. We shall have to leave
the skinning of him and the snake until to-morrow morning; and I only
hope that the jackals will not spoil the pelts meanwhile."

Feeling their way carefully, they skirted the margin of the lake for
some distance until they came to what they were seeking, namely, a break
in the belt of encircling reeds. It was a good wide break, too, nearly
a hundred yards across, as nearly as they could guess in the uncertain
light; and from the down-trodden appearance of the grass leading to it,
it appeared to be a favourite drinking-place. This conjecture was
confirmed when the two hunters had forced their way into cover, by the
sight of several vaguely defined forms showing at the edge of the water,
about fifty yards away.

Settling themselves comfortably in their bed of dry reeds and grass, the
two hunters now concentrated their attention upon these indistinct and
stealthily moving objects, with the result that, as their eyes gradually
adapted themselves to the new conditions of light--or darkness, rather--
it became possible for them to form some sort of opinion as to the
species of the different animals there congregated together. They
appeared to be chiefly bucks of various kinds, with a zebra or two, none
of which the sportsmen thought worth a cartridge; they were therefore
permitted to pass to and f