“Mr Wargrave, get to the front of the howdah and be ready,” she said in a low tone.

The subaltern protested chivalrously against taking the best place.

“Oh, it’s all right.  We’ve brought you out to get the tiger; so you must do as you’re told.  If he breaks out this side take the first shot,” she said peremptorily.

He submitted and took up his position with cocked rifle.  As the nullah wound a good deal the tops of the trees in it prevented them from seeing if the beater-elephants had gone in; but in a few minutes they heard distant shouts and the crashing of the undergrowth as the big animals forced their way through the scrub.

“Be ready, Mr. Wargrave,” whispered the girl.  “Sometimes a tiger starts on the run at the first sound.”

His nerves a-quiver and his heart beating violently the subaltern held his rifle at the ready, as the noise of the beaters drew nearer.  Again and again he brought the butt to his shoulder, only to lower it when he realised that it was a false alarm.  The sounds of the beat grew louder and closer, and still there was no sign of the tiger.  Frank’s heart sank.  He saw the vultures stir uneasily and some rise into the air as the elephants passed under them.

At last through the trees he began to catch occasional glimpses of the mahouts, and he lost hope.  But suddenly from the scrub below them in the nullah a number of small birds flew up; and the next instant the edge of the bushes nearest them was parted stealthily and a tiger slunk cautiously out in the bottom of the ravine.

Wargrave’s rifle went up to his shoulder; and he fired.  A startled roar from the beast told that it was hit; but it bounded in a flash across the ravine and up the steep bank on their side not forty yards from them.  As it scrambled swiftly over the edge it caught sight of the elephant and with a deep “wough!” charged straight at it.

Frank fired again, and his bullet struck up the dust, missing the swift-rushing animal by a couple of feet.  The next moment with a roar the tiger sprang at the elephant.  With one leap it landed with its hind paws on the elephant’s head, its fore-feet on the front rail of the howdah, standing right over the mahout who crouched in terror on the neck.  The savage, snarling, yellow-and-black mask was thrust almost into Wargrave’s face, and from the open red mouth lined with fierce white fangs he could feel the hot breath on his cheek as he tugged frantically at the under-lever of his rifle to open the breech and re-load.  In another moment the tiger would have been on top of them in the howdah when a gun-barrel shot past the subaltern and pushed him aside.  The muzzle of Muriel’s rifle was pressed almost against the brute’s skull as she fired.

Frank hardly heard the report.  All he knew was that the snarling face disappeared as quickly as it had come.  The whole thing was an affair of seconds.  Shot through the brain the tiger dropped back to the ground with a heavy thud and fell dead beside the staunch elephant which had never moved all through the terrible ordeal.