I heard them click on the
wall. Again and again he spat, showing great, white fangs. He was a
Tom, heavy and large.
It had been my purpose, of course, to photograph this lion, and now
that we had cornered him I proposed to do it. What would follow had
only hazily formed in my mind, but the nucleus of it was that he
should go free. I got my camera, opened it, and focused from between
twenty and twenty-five feet.
Then a growl from Don and roar from the lion bade me come to my
senses. I did so and my first movement after seeing the lion had risen
threateningly was to whip out my revolver.
The lion's cruel yellow eyes darkened and darkened. In an instant I
saw my error. Jones had always said in case any one of us had to
face a lion, never for a single instant to shift his glance. I had
forgotten that, and in that short interval when I focused my camera
the lion had seen I meant him no harm, or feared him, and he had
risen. Even then in desperate lessening ambition for a great picture I
attempted to take one, still keeping my glance on him.
It was then that the appalling nature of my predicament made itself
plain to me. The lion leaped ten feet and stood snarling horribly
right in my face.
Brave, noble Don, with infinitely more sense and courage than I
possessed, faced the lion and bayed him in his teeth. I raised the
revolver and aimed twice, each time lowering it because I feared to
shoot in such a precarious position.
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