my head and
called me bad little tree-cat names, because I lay asleep in the open."

"Ay, and turned every driven deer to all the winds, and Mowgli was
hunting, and this same Flathead was too deaf to hear his whistle, and
leave the deer-roads free," Mowgli answered composedly, sitting down
among the painted coils.

"Now this same Manling comes with soft, tickling words to this same
Flathead, telling him that he is wise and strong and beautiful, and
this same old Flathead believes and makes a place, thus, for this same
stone-throwing Manling, and--Art thou at ease now? Could Bagheera give
thee so good a resting-place?"

Kaa had, as usual, made a sort of soft half-hammock of himself under
Mowgli's weight. The boy reached out in the darkness, and gathered in
the supple cable-like neck till Kaa's head rested on his shoulder, and
then he told him all that had happened in the Jungle that night.

"Wise I may be," said Kaa at the end; "but deaf I surely am. Else I
should have heard the pheeal. Small wonder the Eaters of Grass are
uneasy. How many be the dhole?"

"I have not yet seen. I came hot-foot to thee. Thou art older than
Hathi. But oh, Kaa,"--here Mowgli wriggled with sheerjoy,--"it will be
good hunting. Few of us will see another moon."

"Dost THOU strike in this? Remember thou art a Man; and remember what
Pack cast thee out. Let the Wolf look to the Dog. THOU art a Man."

"Last year's nuts are this year's black earth," said Mowgli. "It is true
that I am a Man, but it is in my stomach that this night I have said
that I am a Wolf. I called the River and the Trees to remember. I am of
the Free People, Kaa, till the dhole has gone by."

"Free People," Kaa grunted. "Free thieves! And thou hast tied thyself
into the death-knot for the sake of the memory of the dead wolves? This
is no good hunting."

"It is my Word which I have spoken. The Trees know, the River knows.
Till the dhole have gone by my Word comes not back to me."

"Ngssh! This changes all trails. I had thought to take thee away with me
to the northern marshes, but the Word--even the Word of a little, naked,
hairless Manling--is the Word. Now I, Kaa, say----"

"Think well, Flathead, lest thou tie thyself into the death-knot also. I
need no Word from thee, for well I know----"

"Be it so, then," said Kaa. "I will give no Word; but what is in thy
stomach to do when the dhole come?"

"They must swim the Waingunga. I thought to meet them with my knife