, forgetting everything for the sake of the
one egg; and Rikki-tikki saw Teddy's father shoot out a big hand,
catch Teddy by the shoulder, and drag him across the little table
with the tea-cups, safe and out of reach of Nagaina.

'Tricked! Tricked! Tricked! _Rikk-tck-tck!_' chuckled Rikki-tikki.
'The boy is safe, and it was I--I--I that caught Nag by the hood last
night in the bath-room.' Then he began to jump up and down, all four
feet together, his head close to the floor. 'He threw me to and fro,
but he could not shake me off. He was dead before the big man blew
him in two. I did it. _Rikki-tikki-tck-tck!_ Come then, Nagaina. Come
and fight with me. You shall not be a widow long.'

Nagaina saw that she had lost her chance of killing Teddy, and the
egg lay between Rikki-tikki's paws. 'Give me the egg, Rikki-tikki.
Give me the last of my eggs, and I will go away and never come back,'
she said, lowering her hood.

'Yes, you will go away, and you will never come back; for you will
go to the rubbish-heap with Nag. Fight, widow! The big man has gone
for his gun! Fight!'

Rikki-tikki was bounding all round Nagaina, keeping just out of
reach of her stroke, his little eyes like hot coals. Nagaina
gathered herself together, and flung out at him. Rikki-tikki jumped
up and backward. Again and again and again she struck, and each time
her head came with a whack on the matting of the verandah, and she
gathered herself together like a watch-spring. Then Rikki-tikki
danced in a circle to get behind her, and Nagaina spun round to keep
her head to his head, so that the rustle of her tail on the matting
sounded like dry leaves blown along by the wind.

He had forgotten the egg. It still lay on the verandah, and Nagaina
came nearer and nearer to it, till at last, while Rikki-tikki was
drawing breath, she caught it in her mouth, turned to the verandah
steps and flew like an arrow down the path, with Rikki-tikki behind
her. When the cobra runs for her life, she goes like a whip-lash
flicked across a horse's neck.

Rikki-tikki knew that he must catch her, or all the trouble would
begin again. She headed straight for the long grass by the
thorn-bush, and as he was running Rikki-tikki heard Darzee still
singing his foolish little song of triumph. But Darzee's wife was
wiser. She flew off her nest as Nagaina came along and flapped her
wings about Nagaina's head. If Darzee had helped they might have
turned her; but Nagaina only lowered