the old woman turned her tongue upon the men because they had
feared to go on after Ugh-lomi. She dreaded no one now Uya was slain.
She scolded them as one scolds children. And they scowled at her, and
began to accuse one another. Until suddenly Siss the Tracker raised his
voice and bade her hold her peace.

And so when the sun was setting they took Eudena and went--though their
hearts sank within them--along the trail the old lion had made in the
reeds. All the men went together. At one place was a group of alders,
and here they hastily bound Eudena where the lion might find her when he
came abroad in the twilight, and having done so they hurried back until
they were near the squatting-place. Then they stopped. Siss stopped
first and looked back again at the alders. They could see her head even
from the squatting-place, a little black shock under the limb of the
larger tree. That was as well.

All the women and children stood watching upon the crest of the mound.
And the old woman stood and screamed for the lion to take her whom he
sought, and counselled him on the torments he might do her.

Eudena was very weary now, stunned by beatings and fatigue and sorrow,
and only the fear of the thing that was still to come upheld her. The
sun was broad and blood-red between the stems of the distant chestnuts,
and the west was all on fire; the evening breeze had died to a warm
tranquillity. The air was full of midge swarms, the fish in the river
hard by would leap at times, and now and again a cockchafer would drone
through the air. Out of the corner of her eye Eudena could see a part of
the squatting-knoll, and little figures standing and staring at her.
And--a very little sound but very clear--she could hear the beating of
the firestone. Dark and near to her and still was the reed-fringed
thicket of the lair.

Presently the firestone ceased. She looked for the sun and found he had
gone, and overhead and growing brighter was the waxing moon. She looked
towards the thicket of the lair, seeking shapes in the reeds, and then
suddenly she began to wriggle and wriggle, weeping and calling upon
Ugh-lomi.

But Ugh-lomi was far away. When they saw her head moving with her
struggles, they shouted together on the knoll, and she desisted and was
still. And then came the bats, and the star that was like Ugh-lomi crept
out of its blue hiding-place in the west. She called to it, but softly,
because she feared the lion. And all through