d upon the
startled, wide-eyed children, and in a twinkling had them shepherded
into the cave-mouth, out of sight. The old men, springing from their
sleep, and blinking, hurried forth into the sunlight, with such spears
or clubs as they could lay instant hand upon.

A breathless moment, while all stood waiting for they knew not what.
Then around the corner appeared a tall, wide-antlered elk, its eyes
showing the whites with terror, its dilated nostrils spattering bloody
froth. A long, raking wound ran scarlet down one flank. Staggering
from weariness or loss of blood, it came on straight toward the
cave-mouth, so blinded by its terror that it seemed not to see the
human creatures awaiting it, or even the fires before them.

A-ya fetched a deep breath of relief when she saw that this was no
ravening monster. Her immediate thought was the hunter's thought. She
drew her bow to the full length of her shaft, and as the panting beast
went by she let drive. The arrow pierced to half its span, just behind
the straining fore-shoulder. Blood burst from the animal's nostrils.
It fell on its knees, struggled up again, blundered on for half a
dozen strides, and dropped half-way across the second fire.

There was a chorus of triumphant shouts from the old men and women;
and A-ya started forward with the intention of dragging her prize from
the fire. But a look of apprehension and warning in the keen little
eyes of Ook-ootsk, who had by this time hobbled to her side, checked
her. In a flash the meaning of it came to her.

"What do you suppose was chasing it, Ook-ootsk?" she queried; and
whipped about, without waiting for his answer, to stare anxiously at
the green shoulder of the hillside.

"Black lion, maybe," said Ook-ootsk, in his harsh, clucking voice,
dropping his spear and club beside him and setting a long arrow to the
string of his massive bow.

But the words were hardly out of his throat, when his guess was proved
wrong. Around the turn came lumbering, with huge heads hung low and
slavering, half-open jaws a pair of those colossal red bears of the
caves which had always been A-ya's peculiar terror.

"Hide the children!" she yelled, and then let fly an arrow, almost
without aim, at the foremost of the monsters. She was the best shot in
the tribe, and the shaft sped even too true. It struck the bear full
in the snout, and pierced through the palate and into the throat--a
wound which, though likely to prove mortal after