The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1898-04-04
MRS. AMES AND THE LIONS
ALSO THREE PIGS And A BABY And
THE OWNER OF THE PIGS.

ApUhS WIN cA w NV " as
Temporarily Absent-successive Sur
prises.
There had been for days great fire
in the forest up toward Onion Peak,
and a strong wind was driving it so
far toward the settlement on the Up
per Nehalem that some of the people
watched it with fear. But to Jered
Ames it was bringing small harvest
of silver, for he was a guide as well as
a freighter on the river, and fire on the
Oregon heights meant game on the
lower, accessible levels. Jered had
taken two parties of hunters up the
with the third and on his return he
must deliver three pigs sent to him for
a settler named Keegan.
Usually Jereds young wife did not
fret at being left alone with the year
old baby, but now the heat and smoke
oppressed her imagination, and made
her think of the end of the world, and
set her wishing for some neighbor to
talk with. The baby, too, was i'll at
ease in the sultry, smoke-scented air,
and cried fretfully as she tried to rock
it to sleep after her early supper.
From her seat, which was under
pine behind the cabin, the little woman
could see long stretch of the path on
which her husband must return from
his boat, but she could not see his boat
house nor the river. 1t was possible
that he might come home that evening,
and her heart was sore with longing to
see his tall form striding toward her
Ut was possible, too, that somebody,
some messenger or hunter, might come
up the path to engage him as guide or
freighter and she watched the path
lest some stranger should take her by
surprise.
While she rocked the little one and
sang to it letting it lie unhugged on her
lap that it might be the cooler, it's cry
ing ceased, and it seemed about to
sleep with it's face turned from her
But suddenly it shrieked as if from
some instructive alarm, and turned to
her, clutching with it's feeble little
hands and burying it's face in her lap.
The mother, wondering what had af-
frighted the child, stared down the
path, and there saw moving thing
which instantly disappeared.
"a dog she thought. Somebody's
hog-its owner is coming for Jered
Whoever it Is will have to stay all
night, for it's too late now to go back
to the settlement. I must hurry in
the man will want supper"
She clutched the baby and at her
grasp it screamed as if in the widest
terror-a note which made her again
wonder what allied it. Into the kitchen
she ran, put the kettle again on the
stove and thrust in some kindling.
Then she went into her bedroom, just
off the kitchen, and tried to brush her
hair and "tidy" herself with one hand
while she held the crying baby with the
other
1T struck her, after little while, that
she ought to have heard the footstep or
voice or knock of the stranger, and
she turned from her tiny looking glass
toward the door of the bedroom, be-
yond which was the open door of the
kitchen There stood full-grown cou-
gar, or mountain lion!
She recognized the beast at the first
glance, although she had never seen
one before, and in that one dazed
2ldICG sic WOIlQGIeu IL dill VIII DSGtsolS
were so gaunt and rusty looking.
In the next instant the wild Shrek of
her baby reused her to action and she
threw her shoulder against the door
just as the rusty, tawny, long body
crouched. The latch snapped down;
then the door shook as if from one
blow or a heavy. Walden mallet, and
the thin partition of upright boards
ratified and creaked. The little woman
stood in mortal terror and the baby
which had instinotively ceased to cry,
pressed it's head to her bosom and
clutched with trembling hands.
For an instant the partition seemed
aikely to be pushed down; then the
mother heard the fierce sweep of wild
claws across the boards, and then there
was great crash in the kitchen.
Nothing but fall of crockery could ac-
count for such noise, and Mrs. Ames
knew that her plates and cups and sau-
GERS, her preserve dishes, her admired
glass pitcher, and probably her treas
ured syrup jug, with the German silver
top, had all tumbled at once from the
shelves fastened to the partition. In
an instant she was as angry as if Tered
had upset her cherished things; her
courage came back in full force, and
she pulled open the door recklessly to
scold at the cougar.
He had been frightened badly al
ready; he had 1eaped like a frightened
cat out of the kitchen at a bound, but
he had not leaped out of the house He
had gone the other way. His head had
been toward an open interior door
when the precious crockery fell, and
his leap had sent him into the front
room" where he stood surprised
alarmed, awaiting something dreadful
AS angry Mrs. Ames, her baby
frightened into silence by the noise
opened the bedroom door, she saw in
the kitchen looking glass the reflection
of the cougar in the front room cycling
her, and she screamed at it with such
shrillness that the SCARED beast
shrank into the dark space between the
s'chest of drawers" and the north cor
ner. The small woman understood in
stantly that the cougar was frightened
and in the same instant, slipping for
ward boldly, she shut the door of the
front room with a slam.
The other door and the windows of
that room were all closed, and now
Mrs. Ames felt that she was mistress
of the situation. The cougar seemed
to feel so, too; while she listened and
peeped at the keyhole the wild crea-
ture shuffled around uneasily inside.
eyes you can snoop round In there
INV thipoS over, - cold Mrc