possession of his consciousness. But now some primitive instinct
perhaps or some subconscious intimation of danger made him
meticulously noiseless.

He went on down a winding sound-deadening path of sand towards the
drinking-place. He came to a wide white place that was almost
level, and beyond it under clustering pale-stemmed trees shone the
mirror surface of some ancient tank, and, sharp and black, a dog-
like beast sat on its tail in the midst of this space, started
convulsively and went slinking into the undergrowth. Benham paused
for a moment and then walked out softly into the light, and, behold!
as if it were to meet him, came a monster, a vast dark shape drawing
itself lengthily out of the blackness, and stopped with a start as
if it had been instantly changed to stone.

It had stopped with one paw advanced. Its striped mask was light
and dark grey in the moonlight, grey but faintly tinged with
ruddiness; its mouth was a little open, its fangs and a pendant of
viscous saliva shone vivid. Its great round-pupilled eyes regarded
him stedfastly. At last the nightmare of Benham's childhood had
come true, and he was face to face with a tiger, uncaged,
uncontrolled.

For some moments neither moved, neither the beast nor the man. They
stood face to face, each perhaps with an equal astonishment,
motionless and soundless, in that mad Indian moonlight that makes
all things like a dream.

Benham stood quite motionless, and body and mind had halted
together. That confrontation had an interminableness that had