The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-03-23
l. OUR DAILY SHORT STORY :.


 I was wide awake now and still gazing up at the fiendish face in the pulpit It was no longer dream. A heavy cloud covered the moon, and two burning balls of green glared down at me- The cloud passed, and a great cats mead showed against tho wall. It rose ht- tle, then disappeared inside the pulpit.
 There could be no mistake about the creature Never in my life Tn the woods had l seen a panther. but this could be nothing else There was q 'reak on the narrow stair along the wall, and the partners head appeared tgain over the balustrade. On, down came; softly and slowly winding out T the platform, with as much 1.-the ess as a snake.
 For a moment l watched the brute .'ith something of fascination. We fere face to face. with hardly fifteen set between us. The platform was d title higher than the bench on which 1 was lying and as the panther erept noiselessly forward to the edge for q closer look at me, her long, powerful body was brought full into the moon light in all its terribe beauty.
 Perhaps 1t was more than fascina- tion: it may have been fear from the first so numbing me that hardly knew was afraid. But when the wicked hVoa OSSoh tO Sthh OVb"SVi A'6 "a shoulders. when the eyes commenced to change color, and the long tail quickened and twitched as 1t moved from side to side, l understood my danger. A quick. sure shot would save me-but where was my rife? I was afraid to move, too terrified, to think. Then from beneath the huge paws the moon glinted on the dark steel barrel
 But my fingers closed about the f.fx h tts4er nd q e Ghea twitched and swayed for the spring, felt that my chances were worth the trial. Every muscle in the sinewy body suddenly grew tense. Her head dropped till 1t just cleared the floor. There was culver through the long, lean frame, a scream-and then an answering scream; such yell as that cat never heard before I uttered it so unexpectedly, so frightfully that the beast was startled in her leap, and went off an instant sooner than she intended, with such a twist that she rose high in the air and swerved in her aim. landing across the back of the bench instead of upon me. She made q vicious grab at me in passing, but 1t tell short, and as she struck the back of the bench her weight and the ve- locity of her spring overturned it with a crash. and came down on the floor,
 
 and the seat, as though under an up- turned trough.
 Her lightning swiftness had saved me. As the bench turned she sprang away, else she might have caught me as it turned and dragged me with her to the floor. Before I knew exactly what had happened she bounded back upon the bench, growing and clawing on my wooden shell as she might have clawed huge turtle The solid ends of the bench prevented her getting at my feet or head; but at the same i'm stant, it seemed, we discovered a large crack between the edge of the seat and the floor. The panther pushed her bare yellow teeth under close to my face. I greeted her with another yell that set her back upon her launches. Again she threw herself upon the bench, and like a flash thrust paw beneath and buried the claws in my arm. In a moment I would have been dragged from my shell; but l was watching fo rthat paw, and met it with my knife I must have driven the blade nearly through 1t. for with yelp of pain and fright she leaped away
 Again and again she made at me, and struck at the cat. but could not bring herself to risk another paw be- heath. In trying to get my wounded arm from under me moved the bench. The panther snarled and retreated. I moved it toward her and cAlled At every move she backed further off. splitting and snarling. until heard her laep past the end, run along the wall and spring. There was a crash of glass. two or three long leaps on the turf outside. then all was still.
 She had gone; but did not follow and shoot her. was content to lie there till daylight lent me more strength. When at last crawled out I found the blood stains of the wound ed paw on the floor and glass outside; but the panther had vanished in the deep shadows of the swamp.
 On Investigating the pulpit and room I discovered signs which showed the panther had made a den of the old church for a long time, and the swal- low-nest pulpit up on the wall. where once the Huguenot minister had stood, now served her for a bed.
 The belated cotton-boat picked me up that morning. and as the captain bound up my clawed arm he told me that more than once he had heard the wall of some beast which he supposed must be a panther, as his boat round ed the woody bluff where the old meeting house stood.