It was Wahboo, the baby rabbit.  Instantly Miki was at him, and had a firm hold at the back of Wahboo’s back.  Neewa, hearing the smashing of the brush and the squealing of the rabbit, stopped catching ants and hustled toward the scene of action.  The squealing ceased quickly and Miki backed himself out and faced Neewa with Wahboo held triumphantly in his jaws.  The young rabbit had already given his last kick, and with a fierce show of growling Miki began tearing the fur off.  Neewa edged in, grunting affably.  Miki snarled more fiercely.  Neewa, undaunted, continued to express his overwhelming regard for Miki in low and supplicating grunts—­and smelled the rabbit.  The snarl in Miki’s throat died away.  He may have remembered that Neewa had invited him more than once to partake of his ants and bugs.  Together they ate the rabbit.  Not until the last bit of flesh and the last tender bone were gone did the feast end, and then Neewa sat back on his round bottom and stuck out his little red tongue for the first time since he had lost his mother.  It was the cub sign of a full stomach and a blissful mind.  He could see nothing to be more desired at the present time than a nap, and stretching himself languidly he began looking about for a tree.

Miki, on the other hand, was inspired to new action by the pleasurable sensation of being comfortably filled.  Inasmuch as Neewa chewed his food very carefully, while Miki, paying small attention to mastication, swallowed it in chunks, the pup had succeeded in getting away with about four fifths of the rabbit.  So he was no longer hungry.  But he was more keenly alive to his changed environment than at any time since he and Neewa had fallen out of Challoner’s canoe into the rapids.  For the first time he had killed, and for the first time he had tasted warm blood, and the combination added to his existence an excitement that was greater than any desire he might have possessed to lie down in a sunny spot and sleep.  Now that he had learned the game, the hunting instinct trembled in every fibre of his small being.  He would have gone on hunting until his legs gave way under him if Neewa had not found a napping-place.

Astonished half out of his wits he watched Neewa as he leisurely climbed the trunk of a big poplar.  He had seen squirrels climb trees—­just as he had seen birds fly—­but Neewa’s performance held him breathless; and not until the cub had stretched himself out comfortably in a crotch did Miki express himself.  Then he gave an incredulous yelp, sniffed at the butt of the tree, and made a half-hearted experiment at the thing himself.  One flop on his back convinced him that Neewa was the tree-climber of the partnership.  Chagrined, he wandered back fifteen or twenty feet and sat down to study the situation.  He could not perceive that Neewa had any special business up the tree.  Certainly he was not hunting for bugs.  He yelped half a dozen times, but Neewa made no answer.  At last he gave it up and flopped himself down with a disconsolate whine.