In fact, the curved
scabbards slipped over the hard snow as if it had been ice.
[Illustration: _Ahead of them, a shadow showed, a shambling shadow!
Tumbu ... with a bound was off full tilt after it._]
So they went on till a glimmer of dawn showed them that the summit had
been reached, the downward slope begun. But still, far and near, nothing
but snow was to be seen. Then suddenly, ahead of them, a shadow showed,
a shambling shadow! Tumbu stopped dead, sniffed, then with a bound was
off full tilt after it, the sledge, with the two children in it, flying
behind him!
For an instant the others were too much astonished to speak. Then Roy,
with frantic cries to Tumbu to come back, was off after them. In vain!
As he crested a little rise he saw by the growing light a big brown
Isabelline bear shambling along contentedly, seeming to go no pace at
all, yet gaining steadily on the sledge that was giving chase.
"I will follow as fast as I can!" panted the Rajput lad breathlessly, as
Foster-father, Meroo, and Old Faithful, hampered by their greater
weight, ran up. "It is a bear; but they cannot catch it--and Tumbu will
tire--then he always comes back. Follow you on my tracks with the
women."
With that he was off like an arrow from a bow behind the bear, Tumbu,
the sledge, the Heir-to-Empire and the Princess Bakshee Bani Begum, who
by this time had all disappeared behind the hilly horizon.
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