Once within the security of his own brightly lit tent, and surrounded
by his hastily assembled staff, the Count's pulse rate returned to
normal, and one of his officers suggested that the native
Eritrean guides be sent for and questioned on the terrible night sounds
that had plunged the entire battalion into consternation.
'Lion?' said the Count, and then again, 'Lion!' Instantly the
formless terrors of the night evaporated, for by this time the first
light of dawn was gleaming in the east, and the Count's breast swelled
with the fierce instincts of the huntsman.
'It appears, my Colonel, that the beasts will be feeding on the
antelope carcasses that you left lying out on the desert,' the
interpreter explained. 'The smell of blood has attracted them.'
aGi no snapped the Count. 'Fetch the Mannlicher and have the driver
bring the Rolls-Royce to my tent immediately.' My Colonel,'
protested
Major Luigi Castelani. 'The battalion, by your own orders, is to march
at dawn.'
'I Countermanded!' snapped the Colonel. Already he imagined the
magnificent trophy skin spread before his Louis XIV desk in the library
of his castle. He would have it prepared with wide open jaws,
flashing white fangs and fierce yellow glass eyes. The picture of open
jaws and fangs suddenly reminded him with considerable force of his
nerve racking brush with the beisa oryx. 'Major,' he ordered, 'I
want twenty men to accompany me, a truck to transport them, full battle
order, and one hundred rounds of ammunition each.' The Count was not
about to take any more silly chances.
The lion was a fully mature male, six years of age, and, like most of
the desert strain of leo panthers, he was much larger than the forest
lions. He stood well over three feet high at the shoulder, and he
weighed in excess of four hundred pounds. The late sun enhanced the
sleek reddish ochre of his skin and transformed his mane into a glowing
halo of gold. The mane was dense and long, framing the broad flattened
head, reaching far back beyond the shoulder, and hanging so low under
his chest and belly as almost to sweep the earth.
He walked stiffly, head held very low and swinging heavily from side to
side with each laborious step. His breathing came with a low explosive
grunt at each exhalation, and occasionally he stopped and swung his
head to snap irritably at the buzzing blue cloud of flies that swarmed
about the wound in his flank. Then he would lick at the small dark
hole from which pale watery blood oozed steadily.
The long pink tongue curled out and, rough as shagreen, rasped against
the supple hide. The constant licking had away the hair around the
wound, giving it a pale worn shaven appearance.
The 9.3 Marmlicher bullet had caught him at the instant he had begun to
turn away to run. It had angled in from two inches behind the last
rib, striking with a force of nine tons that had bowled the lion down,
rolling him in a cloud of pale dust. The copper-jacketed bullet was
tipped with soft expanding lead, and it mushroomed as it raked the
belly cavity, lacerating the bowels and tearing four large abdominal
veins. The slug had passed close enough to the kidneys to bruise both
