Page:Wisdom of the Wilderness (1923).pdf/41

 a convulsive movement that to an onlooker would have seemed agonizing, but which to him was a satisfying delight, he swallowed the prize in his gullet, stretching up and straightening his neck, till its trim outlines were quite restored. Immediately the hunting light flamed again into his savage eyes. With a heavy flapping rush along the surface he rose into the air and fell once more to quartering the liquid field for a new prey.

Meanwhile, from far up in the blinding blue where he wheeled slowly on wide, motionless wings, a white-headed eagle, most splendid and most shameless of robbers, had been watching the insatiable fisherman. Now he dropped swiftly to a lower level, where he again hung poised, his gem-bright, implacable eyes peering downward expectantly. It was not often that he interfered with the cormorants, whom he regarded as obstinate, ill-tempered birds, with an insistent regard for their rights and remarkable precision in the use of their long beaks. But hunting had been bad that day, and he was hungry. The complacent success of the black fisherman was galling to watch while his own appetite was so unsatisfied.

The cormorant, absorbed in his quest, and never dreaming of any interference, did not notice the long-winged shape circling high overhead.