In a moment a crowd of excited natives had swarmed on to
the scene, and their shouting speedily carried the glad news to
the village, where a thumping of tom-toms took up the chorus of
triumph. And their triumph and rejoicing found a ready echo in
the heart of Mrs. Packletide; already that luncheon-party in
Curzon Street seemed immeasurably nearer.
It was Louisa Mebbin who drew attention to the fact that the goat
was in death-throes from a mortal bullet-wound, while no trace of
the rifle's deadly work could be found on the tiger. Evidently
the wrong animal had been hit, and the beast of prey had succumbed
to heart-failure, caused by the sudden report of the rifle,
accelerated by senile decay. Mrs. Packletide was pardonably
annoyed at the discovery; but, at any rate, she was the possessor
of a dead tiger, and the villagers, anxious for their thousand
rupees, gladly connived at the fiction that she had shot the
beast. And Miss Mebbin was a paid companion. Therefore did Mrs.
Packletide face the cameras with a light heart, and her pictured
fame reached from the pages of the TEXAS WEEKLY SNAPSHOT to the
illustrated Monday supplement of the NOVOE VREMYA.
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