Page:The Boy Land Boomer.djvu/41



Slowly but surely the great rattlesnake came closer to where Pawnee Brown stood motionless in the darkness of the cavern.

The reptile had been enraged by the shot the great scout fired, and now meant to strike, and that fatally.

Listening with ears strained to their utmost, the boomer heard the form of the snake slide from rock to rock of the uneven flooring.

The rattler was all of ten feet long and as thick around as a good-sized fence rail.

One square strike from those poisonous fangs and Pawnee Brown's hours would be numbered.

Yet the scout did not intend to give up his life just now. He still held his pistol, four chambers of which were loaded.

"If only I had a light," he thought.

Retreat was out of the question. A single sound and the rattlesnake would have been upon him like a flash. It was only the darkness and the utter silence that made the reptile cautious. (33)