13 Tiger Adventure (6 page)

Now the gaur had lost not only some of its power but its sour too. It wasn’t chasing the truck with the same enthusiasm.

It was easy to see why. The teeth of the tiger had cut deeply into the neck of the gaur and blood was trickling out.

The beast turned its head to look after the tiger, and this was Roger’s opportunity. With its head turned, the three-foot horns and the head were all on one line, and with a flip of the noose the animal was captured.

He was suffering from a deep gash in the neck and had no more thought of charging either the truck or the boys.

He came along with his head hanging down and no more fight in him.

A cage that was too small for an elephant but just the right size for the great hump-backed terror of the Gir Forest was waiting for him.

The noose was still round his neck and the pole was fastened to the noose. ‘How can we get him in?’ Roger wondered.

‘Go into the cage and stick the pole through the back of the cage, take hold of the pole, and pull. I’ll be there to help you.’

Roger did as Hal had suggested. Then both boys went round behind the cage, took hold of the end of the pole, and hauled away on it with all their strength.

The animal did not feel well. At first he resisted, then he moved forward an inch at a time and finally found himself in the cage. Roger ran back to close the door.

‘How do we get the noose off his neck?’ Roger asked.

Hal said, ‘Just leave it there. If he starts to rampage around we can pull the noose tight so that he won’t succeed in breaking the cage.’

Just for the moment the great wild ox had no idea 6f breaking anything. The pain in his neck had quietened him down.

‘What do we do about that cut in his neck?’ said Roger.

‘Let it be,’ Hal advised. The blood has stopped already. I can squirt some antiseptic on the cut without going into the cage. The tiger’s teeth may have been a little dirty. He’ll be all right in a few days,’

A strange animal came prowling around the Hunt camp. It had a tan-coloured skin.

Roger saw it first. He called Hal. ‘What do you think of that? It’s striped just like a tiger. Do you think it’s a young tiger?’

‘No, it’s a hyena.’

‘You’re nuts. We saw lots of hyenas in Africa. They didn’t have stripes.’

‘I know,’ replied Hal. ‘But the Indian hyena is a little different. It wears stripes. Dad wanted one of these. Let’s grab it.’

‘It looks like a kind of cat,’ Roger said. ‘Here pussy, here pussy. No, it looks more like a dog.’ And Roger barked.

‘It’s a little of both,’ Hal said. ‘You might call it a cat-dog.’

The hyena began to laugh. ‘Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!’ Then he sang a very different tune: ‘Garrar! Gurr-rr-aal Guddar! Guddar! Guddar! Goo-doo! Goo-doo!’

Then the beast made a screaming noise, starting low and running up high, staying high until it almost split the ears of the listeners, then dropping to low.

Roger looked around. He wasn’t sure that all these sounds had come from this beast. The animal had a curious ability to throw its voice this way and that so that no other animal could tell where the sound was coming from.

‘What a curious beast!’ Roger said. ‘It’s not just a cat-dog. It has a dog’s face, a lion’s ears, and the body of a bear. It has the teeth of a tiger. Why doesn’t it run? Isn’t it afraid of us?’

‘It may be afraid, but it smells the animals in the cages and would like to get at them.’

‘But I thought hyenas didn’t attack live animals. Those In Africa just ate dead bodies.’

These are a little different,’ Hal said. They are bolder than the others. ‘Hie headman of that village we visited told me that a hyena sneaked into a house, snatched up a baby, and ran out. The baby was very much alive and yelled to high heaven. The squalling was so loud that it frightened the hyena. It dropped the child and the mother ran out and got her baby.’

Hal went into the cabin and came out with the lasso. He forgot to close the door. Behind his back, the cat-dog-lion-bear-tiger slipped into the cabin. There was a great crackling, grinding sound and the boys looked in to see the hyena eating a clock. That clock would never go again. The hyena is famous for its terrific jaws. After the clock was ground up and swallowed, the tiger-striped beast saw Hal’s best hat on a peg. He stood on his hind legs, pulled down the hat, chewed it up and swallowed it.

Roger laughed, but Hal was not so happy. He threw his lasso. Then he dragged the animal out screaming« and screeching like a maniac. The monkeys in the trees set up a wild chattering and the birds joined in. Vic came running over to see what it was all about. The hyena pulled off one of his boots and ate it. Hal and Roger together pulled the beast to a cage. After a struggle in which they both got nipped, the crazy cat was in the cage and the door was shut.

1 don’t know why Dad wanted that horrible beast,’ said Roger.

‘He didn’t want it, but a zoo ordered it so he told us to get it.’

The boys went into the cabin. Not only the clock and the hat were gone, but three books on wildlife were in the hyena’s stomach.

‘Well.’ Hal said, ‘He has very good taste. Those were excellent books, and it’s nice that he appreciated them. I hope they give him a stomachache.’

Hal told Roger and Vic of the old local saying that hyenas are usually men or women who have come back from the dead in this form. They had been witches in their previous life and were considered very dangerous. ‘But it’s just one of those superstitions,’ he said. The fact is, the hyena is not all bad. It can really get quite affectionate.’

Vic thought he would find out just how affectionate this animal was. He put his fingers in through the wires of the cage. The hyena cocked its head to one side and studied those fingers. Then it leaped forward and clutched the fingers between its jaws. Vic let out a shriek that was as loud as any shriek of the hyena.

Clocks, hats and boots. Better than Vic’s fingers. It let go, and Vic drew out a very bloody hand.

Roger came out of the house with a piece of meat. He tucked it in between the wires of the cage and the hyena promptly devoured it. Looking at Roger, it made a sound that seemed very much like a purr. That was the cat in it. Roger knew that he would get along very well with this new neighbour.

‘It’s all right,’ he said. ‘It’s really kind of handsome with those stripes and all. And it smells rather sweet - not like the African hyenas. I think it will make a good pet.’ Roger found he could go into the cage and never fear those terrible jaws. He tickled the animal in the neck where dogs and cats like to be caressed, and Hi, as he called the hyena, responded with a noise that was halfway between a growl and a purr. If this hyena had once been a human being, he or she was certainly a friendly character.

One morning Roger found the hyena lying on its side, very sick. He called Hal. The animal was acting very strangely. It was biting its own stomach, chewing its legs until the blood came, and nipping its tail. A living animal eating itself as if it were a dead one!

They do that when they are about to die,’ Hal said. ‘But we won’t let this one die. I think he just has a bad case of stomachache.’

He ran to the cabin and came back with some alkaline tablets. Roger opened the door just wide enough so he could squeeze in and he fed the medicine to his suffering friend. Ten minutes later the hyena stopped eating itself and plainly showed a desire to live. It brushed up against Roger just as a cat or a dog would do, and Roger petted it. keeping away, however, from those powerful jaws that seemed ready to eat anything that came to hand, including clocks, hats, books and fingers.

When Vic turned up one morning at the Hunt camp he was carrying his rifle.

Hal said, ‘I see you have your gun. I heard some shooting yesterday. Were you doing it?’

‘Oh no, no. I wouldn’t do that.’

‘Come on now,’ Hal said. ‘You were doing some killing.’

‘No. I was just taking pot shots at some monkeys. I only got a couple of them.’

‘What makes you think it’s all right to shoot monkeys? You spent a night in jail for shooting. You promised not to shoot any more. If you’re caught you won’t get off with one night in jail. You’ll go to prison for ten years.’

Ten years! I suppose you will go to the police and tell on me.’

‘Not this time. I’m your friend. The next time you shoot I’ll give you a little ride. To the police station.’

‘Is that all?’

‘Not quite,’ Hal said. ‘How about that two hundred dollars I lent you?’

‘You didn’t lend it to me. You gave it to me. I don’t have to pay it back.’

‘Your memory is not too good. I didn’t make you a present of two hundred dollars. You were supposed to pay it back when you got a cheque from your father.’

‘Well, the cheque hasn’t come yet.’

‘I think it has come,’ Hal said. ‘You’re wearing a new suit. You can’t buy a suit of clothes with no money.’

‘Well,’ said Vic, ‘you can whistle for your two hundred dollars.’

‘If that’s the way you feel,’ said Hal, ‘I’ll have to write to your father. Not just about the two hundred dollars. The principal thing he should know about is the way you are breaking the law by killing animals in the Gir Forest and risking ten years in prison.’

Vic laughed. Tat chance you have of writing to my father. You don’t know his address. Cleveland is a big city. If you just put ‘Mr. Stone’ on the envelope, the post office is not going to hunt up the address. And I’m not going to give it to you. There’s no way in the world that you can write to my dad.’

I’m not so sure about that,’ Hal said.

There was one way he could reach Vic’s father. Vic had spent one term at Western Reserve-Case University. Hal wrote to the dean of the university:

Dear Sir - I enclose a letter to Mr. Stone, father of Vic Stone who spent a semester in your college. His address will be in your records. Would you be so kind as to address the letter properly and mail it to Mr. Stone?

In his letter to Vic’s father, Hal wrote:

Dear Mr. Stone - Your son Vic is working for me. I am afraid he will go to prison for a ten-year term if the police learn that he is shooting wild animals without a licence. The police here are very strict. I like Vic and want to save him from a lot of trouble. He is not completely honest. I loaned him two hundred dollars, and now he says it was not a loan but a present. The money doesn’t matter so much as the fact that he is breaking the law and may have to suffer for it. We don’t want him to have such bad luck.

When the reply came Hal learned that Vic’s father’s name was Robert Stone and his address was Parkwood Drive, Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.A. Mr. Stone wrote as follows:

Dear Mr. Hunt - I am sorry to hear that my son, Vic, is giving trouble. At this distance, I can do nothing for him. He is almost twenty and should be able to take care of himself. He ran away from home and made his mother, already a sick woman, so unhappy that her condition deteriorated and a week ago she died. I want nothing more to do with the brat. I sent him a good cheque, but that will be the last. As to the two hundred dollars, I am enclosing a cheque made out to you for that amount. I thank you for your interest in my son but so far as I am concerned he is dead.

Hal showed the letter to Vic. It was a great surprise to the runaway.

‘How did you get his address?’

‘Don’t worry about that. The thing that should really be very heavy on your conscience is that you speeded your mother’s death. I think you should go home now and make peace with your father.’

‘Not on your life. If he doesn’t want me I don’t want him. You were a sneak to tell him about me.’

‘I thought he might be able to help you. But he has good reason to be sick of you because of the death of your mother. Now you still have a chance to make good. You are still my friend, and I am ready to pay you for every animal you bring in. Let’s forget about all this and shake hands.’

Vic put his hands in his pockets. ‘No thank you. I wouldn’t touch you with a ten-foot pole. I’ll get even with you for this.’

‘For what? For keeping you out of prison?’

‘I’d rather go to prison than work for you.’ And with this final taunt, Vic strode off to the cabin where he lived with Jim and Harry.

Vic growled and moped for two days. Then he said to his two companions. ‘I’ve got it. I’ve got it.’

‘Got what?’

‘I’ve got a way to get back at Hal Hunt.’

‘Why do you want to get back at him? He just wanted to keep you out of jail.’

‘He’s a louse. I’ll treat him like a louse - step on him and smash him and his business. And I’ve figured out a way that we can make a lot of money.’

That sounded good to his two companions.

‘How would you do that?’ Harry asked.

‘Simple. Get him in trouble. Fix it so that he has an accident.’

‘You mean to kill him?’

‘Perhaps. But anyhow get him into the hospital. And his kid brother too. Put them there for a good long stretch.’

‘What good would that do?’

‘Keep them out of the way so we could sell their animals and put the money in our own pockets. Hunt reckons that on average his animals are worth a thousand dollars apiece, some less, some more. His dad wants sixteen animals. Hunt says he will get about four animals more than that, making twenty animals altogether. What is twenty times a thousand dollars?’

‘Well, it’s twenty thousand dollars,’ said Jim.

‘Right. Wouldn’t it be nice to have that divided among the three of us? We could sell the animals to zoos and make twenty thousand dollars.’

‘But he hasn’t got them all yet.’

‘No. Give him time to get them and then put him in the hospital. Of course if he dies we can’t help that. Nobody can blame us for that.’

Harry said, ‘Why don’t you go to work and help him get all his beasts as quickly as possible? After that we can get him and his brother busted up.’

But Vic was too lazy and bitter to go on working for Hal.

‘He’d only pay me fifty dollars an animal. What’s that compared with twenty thousand? We can start out by making a thousand dollars right now. When they are off doing some hunting we can open the cage where they keep that elephant they call Big Fella and bring him to our place and sell him for a thousand dollars to some zoo. How about that?’