III.
The struggles of my companion only seemed to infuriate the tigress still more, and for a moment it was impossible for me to attempt to rescue him. I drew my hunting-knife, and when a favourable opportunity arrived lunged at her as I threw myself bodily upon the tigress, determined to save Denviers at all hazards. The fierce beast, recognising that her injury had been inflicted by me, left my companion and, raising one paw, dashed me headlong to the ground. In a moment she bounded heavily upon me as I lay there, her weight crushing and bruising me severely. Immediately afterwards I felt myself lifted bodily from the ground, and the brute began to carry me away to the cave into which we had been recently lured by the treacherous fakir! I made one supreme effort to release myself, and succeeded as I thought in doing so, for the tigress dropped me and bounded with a fierce cry towards her lair, just as I heard the sharp ping of a bullet re-echo through the silent city. My companion rushed up, and, stooping over me, asked:—
"Harold, are you much hurt? I have shot the brute, she will never reach the end of her cave alive!" I staggered to my feet, and, looking towards the animal's lair, saw the body of the tigress lying motionless within the entrance.
"Not badly," I answered, "except that I got some pretty severe bruises in the encounter."
We rested quietly for several minutes; then I questioned:—
"Frank, where is Hassan concealed? We must rescue him somehow!" Denviers rose as he answered:—
"It is certain that he is hidden in one of these caves, very likely where the fakir is now."
"Then we must make a careful search for him," I responded; "but this time we will improvise some torches, so as to get a good view of these gloomy caverns before venturing into another one of them." We twisted together some of the tangled grass, and made for the direction in which the fakir went, just when he saw that his cunningly contrived plot was apparently successful.
When we reached the caves Denviers turned to me and said:—
"I think it would be a good plan to call out our guide's name from time to time, he may hear us, and unless he is gagged will respond, and so lead us to him." To this remark I readily assented, and standing before several of the caves which lay close together, my companion shouted:—
"Hassan!"
"We found our faithful guide bound hand and foot."
To our great joy we heard the well-known voice of the Arab answer us from a little distance. We shouted again, and, guided by his responses, found ourselves traversing one of the caves, holding the blazing torches in our hands. Moving a heavy block of stone which barred the way, we found our faithful guide lying behind it, bound hand and foot.
"Allah bless the sahibs!" he said, in his grave, Oriental way; then his eyes fell upon our garments, which were terribly rent after our encounter with the tigress. "The sahibs have gone through peril to rescue me," he continued, as Denviers speedily unbound him; "their slave will be ever faithful to them."
We had some difficulty in getting Hassan from the cave, his limbs being swollen and painful, but at last we emerged and sought for some way of egress other than the one
