nough to jump entirely clear; and although the
panther had not succeeded in landing on her neck as he had intended, he
caught her shoulder with a raking sweep of his paw. Two long gashes,
from which the blood sprang freely, showed the track of those murderous
claws. Yet the blow was not a disabling one, and only served to rouse
the moose to fury. Rearing on her hind legs, she brought her
hatchet-edged fore hoofs down with all her force. Where she aimed, she
struck--the panther's neck. The blow from these terrible weapons, of
which every wild animal stands rightly in awe, with all the force of her
great weight behind them, was tremendous. With a howl of pain the
panther went down; but as he sank, he buried his fangs deep in the cow's
neck. His weight pulled her to one side. She lost her footing, and
plunged into the lake.

Dusty Star saw a fountain of spray and a welter of bloody foam. Then,
out of the seething whirlpool, the panther's dark body emerged and
staggered to the bank. The cow meantime had struggled to her feet, and
gave a defiant bellow of rage. Dusty Star fully expected to see the
battle begin again. But the panther, evidently not relishing the sight
of the Mother Fury, thought better of it, and slunk off into the bushes.
Dusty Star followed his example, and while the moose was busy in nosing
her terrified calf to assure herself that it had come to no harm, he
made quickly off into the woods, so that when the cow once more turned
her blazing eyes to the shore in search of her enemies, Dusty Star, like
the panther, was lost among the trees.

After his adventure with the moose, nothing disturbed the still monotony
of the sultry day. The mist had lifted now, and a grey haze veiled the
distance. He travelled as rapidly as possible, avoiding the swampy
ground. Every time he reached a point where he could look back along the
lake, he gazed anxiously for the shape of a canoe. Yet nothing broke the
glimmering levels of its vast expanse. For all that, he grew more and
more uneasy as the day wore on. He could not rid himself of the sense of
a danger already on its way. The fact that it gave no outward sign of
its approach only served to increase his anxiety. He went on steadily,
hoping that every fresh point he reached would show the end of the lake.
At length, from a narrow spit of sand (the very same in which Kiopo had
recovered himself) he saw it. Beyond in a dusky background, the forest
lay for leagues; and after