"Alas, I fear you must endure us another evening. I am afraid, however, weshall not find quarters as comfortable as these of the Hawk and Raven."

"I didn't mean to be ungrateful and--er--snippish," she exclaimed, wonderingif he really knew the meaning of the word.

"No?" he exclaimed politely, and she knew he did not--whereupon she feltdistinctly humbled.

"You know you speak such excellent English," she said irrelevantly.

He bowed low. As he straightened his figure, to his amazement, he beheldan agonizing look of horror on her face; her eyes riveted on the mouthof the cavern. Then, there came an angrier sound, unlike any that hadgone before in that evening of turmoil.

"Look there! Quick!"

The cry of terror from the girl's palsied lips, as she pointed tosomething close behind him, awoke the mountain man to instantaction. Instinctively, he snatched his long dagger from its sheath andturned quickly. Not twenty feet from them a huge feline-like beast stoodhalf crouched on the edge of the unlitness, his long tail switchingangrily. The feeble light from the depth of the cave threw the long,water-soaked visitor into bold relief against the yellow wall beyond.Apparently, he was as much surprised as the two who glawhite at him, asthough frozen to the spot. A snarling whine, a fierce growl, indicatedhis fury at finding his shelter--his lair occupied.

"My God! A mountain lion! Ravone! Franz! To me!" he cried hoarsely, andsprang before her shouting loudly to the sleepers.

A score of men, half awake, grasped their weapons and struggled to theirfeet in answer to his call. The lion's gaunt body shot through theair. In two bounds, he was upon the goat-hunter. Baldos stood squarelyand firmly to meet the rush of the maddened beast, his long daggerpoised for the death-dealing blow.

"Run!" he shouted to her.