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130 a grip. Sometimes they brushed his dangling foot with their jaws, and at that Jerry involuntarily drew up a little.

When he had inserted the shells, he tried to get a chance to cover the big dog. That animal, though, apparently suspected his purpose, and kept jumping about so wildly that it seemed impossible to aim at him. The second brute had been wounded so seriously that it had crawled away, so there were now but two left.

Finally, seeing a good chance to knock over the smaller one of the pair, Jerry could not resist the temptation.

The animal may once have been a family pet, but a wild existence of some months, perhaps years, had taken him back to the wild state from which his ancestors had come ages ago. He was a mangy-looking, dirty white brute, with eyes that seemed red to the boy in the tree.

At the report of the gun the animal fell over in a kicking heap, for the distance was so very short that the charge of shot had gone with all the destructive power of a "forty-four" bullet.

But something not down on the programme immediately followed. The rotten limb upon which Jerry was hanging, unable to stand the strain of his weight and movements, gave way with a crash.