im
where he was, immovable.

"Look, I tell yo'!" cried that great voice again.

A hand pushed past him and pointed; and sullenly he turned, ignoring the
figure at his side, and looked.

The wind had dropped suddenly as it had risen; the little man on the
mound had ceased to chuckle; Andrew's sobs were hushed; and in the
background the huddled flock edged closer. The world hung balanced on
the pinpoint of the moment. Every eye was in the one direction.

With dull, uncomprehending gaze James Moore stared as bidden. There was
the gray dog naked in the moonlight, heedless still of any witnesses;
there the murdered sheep, lying within and without that distorted shade;
and there the humpbacked boulder.

He stared into the shadow, and still stared.

Then he started as though struck. The shadow of the boulder had moved!

Motionless, with head shot forward and bulging eyes, he gazed.

Ay, ay, ay; he was sure of it--a huge dim outline as of a lion
_couchant_, in the very thickest of the blackness.

At that he was seized with such a palsy of trembling that he must have
fallen but for the strong arm about his waist.

Clearer every moment grew that crouching figure; till at length they
plainly could discern the line of arching loins, the crest, thick as a
stallion's, the massive, wagging head. No mistake this time. There he
lay in the deepest black, gigantic, revelling in his horrid debauch--the
Black Killer!

And they watched him at his feast. Now he burrowed into the spongy
flesh; now turned to lap the dark pool which glittered in the moonlight
at his side like claret in a silver cup. Now lifting his head, he
snapped irritably at the rain-drops, and the moon caught his wicked,
rolling eye and the red shreds of flesh dripping from his jaw. And
again, raising his great muzzle as if about to howl, he let the
delicious nectar trickle down his throat and ravish his palate.

So he went on, all unsuspicious, wisely nodding in slow-mouthed
gluttony. And in the stillness, between the claps of wind, they could
hear the smacking of his lips.

While all the time the gray dog stood before him, motionless, as though
carved in stone.

At last, as the murderer rolled his great head from side to side, he saw
that still figure. At the sight he leaped back, dismayed. Then with a
deep-mouthed roar that shook the waters of the Tarn he was up and across
his victim with fangs bared, his coat standing erect in wet, rigid
furrows from to