Battle Fleet (2007) by Paul Dowswell Page A

shiver ran from the back of my neck to the base of my spine. Not twenty yards away was a tiger stooping down on its front paws to drink from a shallow river. Bel had seen him too.
    Watching silently, I felt a growing sense of awe. I had never seen such a magnificent beast. He was about the same length as a cow, but much sleeker, stronger and lower on the ground. Having drunk his fill, he lifted hisgreat head and sniffed the air. Everything he did seemed to be carefully calculated. He turned that head towards us, furry chops and whiskers still dripping with water. I wondered with growing terror if it was our scent he had picked up.
    Further upriver, a flock of waterfowl made a noisy landing. The beast looked over at its leisure. Then it sauntered off at a lordly pace, muscles bulging on the shoulders and haunches of its sleek black and orange fur. It slipped slowly into the river with barely a ripple and began to swim towards its quarry.
    We started to breathe again. ‘It’s a great big cat,’ said Bel. ‘I like cats, but you wouldn’t want to stroke that.’
    I had heard tigers ate people if they could catch them, but now wasn’t the time to mention it. ‘Let’s get back to the shore,’ I said, ‘before it makes its way over here.’
    We quickly gathered up our fruit and picked our way through the forest. I heard another terrifying roar and much squawking and flapping of wings. A goose or a duck wouldn’t keep a hungry tiger happy for long.
    ‘They say it roars before it pounces, to terrify its victims into paralysis,’ I said.
    ‘Shut up, Sam,’ said Bel. ‘The less I know about those things, the more I’ll be able to keep putting one foot in front of the other.’
    Going alone and unarmed into the jungle, we hadbitten off more than we could chew – something I suspected the tiger rarely did.
    We heard a rustle in the bushes behind us and Thomas Bagley turned white as a sheet. ‘It’s coming back this way!’ We stumbled through the undergrowth expecting the thing to pounce on us at any moment. I had seen its paws, and claws, and the thought of those sharp spikes digging into my back kept me running. Bel kept up as best as she could in her skirts. She was a good runner. Bagley lagged behind. He was a large rounded man and the heat was killing him. ‘Wait for me!’ he begged between gasping lungfuls of air.
    Bel shook her head. ‘Let’s get up one of these trees. Something that big isn’t goin’ to climb trees, is it?’
    We began to haul ourselves up the trunk of a tree with low branches, stopping when we reached a stout one about fifteen feet above the ground. Bagley was struggling for breath. ‘This should be high enough,’ he panted between great gulps of air. We sat down on the branch, legs dangling beneath us.
    ‘Do we call for help?’ I said. ‘Will that bring the tiger to us? Or will it bring one of our shipmates who’ll get eaten instead?’
    ‘Let’s just stay here for now,’ said Bagley, ‘and keep quiet. Maybe the thing will go away.’
    I felt very thirsty. Bel passed me some of the berriesshe had gathered and gave a few to Bagley. They felt sweet and juicy in my mouth – and balm to my swollen tongue. We calmed down a little. ‘When we get back to the beach, I’m going to drink a gallon of water,’ said Bel. Beads of sweat were dripping down her face and strands of dark hair were plastered to her forehead. ‘And then I’m going for a nice long swim.’
    Bagley shouted ‘Here he iiiissssss …’ In an instant the tiger had stretched out his body against the tree trunk and reached up with a paw to swat us. We all tried desperately to stand on that branch – none of us had expected the beast to have such a reach. In our fumbling haste, Bagley lost his footing and slipped. He grabbed urgently for the branch and for a brief moment he hung underneath. The tiger saw its chance and plucked him from the tree.
    Bagley collapsed into a limp bundle. The creature grabbed the scruff