the canes, he saw the black cow in the path ahead of him, up the wind from him and with her head turned the other way. With good luck he could come within arm's length of her and he knew a thrust which would kill her before she could travel twenty bow shots. But seeing the calf, Keenta knew that the wild cow would not run when the thrust had been delivered. She would wheel and charge like lightning; and Keenta the Beaver was a bold hunter, but no fool.
A moment the young Indian stood motionless, considering; then, with dramatic suddenness, fate solved his problem for him. Already his eyes had been searching the path beyond the cow, for he had noted the tossing of her head, the nervous lashing of her tail, and he knew that along that dim winding tunnel through the canes some great beast must be coming. Wolves, bears and pumas walked the canebrake paths, and from the cow's actions Keenta judged that she had scented one of these three; but, alert and expectant though he was, the swiftness of the tragedy surprised him.
For a fraction of a second he glimpsed a vague shape at the bend of the trail beyond the cow—a shadowy, indeterminate form which seemed to fill the path and in the midst of which two large eyes gleamed cold and bright like jewels. Then, instantaneously, the puma was blotted from his view by
