"Some day, old chap," he said very solemnly, "I shall hope to do something for you, for I do most undoubtedly owe you my life. But it seems quite natural that I should do so. I don't know when it was that I first began to watch you--I expect from the first hour we came aboard--but I remember thinking that you looked like a fellow well able to take care of himself, and of others. There was such a quiet way about you. You were so jolly with the others, and yet something seemed to show that you had gone through a little more, and had had experiences which few of the subalterns or clerks could boast of. Then came your swatting at Hindustani, the remarks made about it, and the fight. Yes, it all seems quite natural. You have a knack of finding a way out of difficulties, and you've brought us through this one well." "That's all right, then," said Owen with a smile, blushing furiously red at the compliments paid him. "Now to decide how to get clear of this place. It is early in the day yet, but we shall have to get down to the shore before very long." "And while these gentlemen are down below, why, it is a little difficult," answered Jack with a laugh, for Owen's light-heartedness was infectious. "They won't move on, I suppose, for the mere asking?" "Hardly. But we might speak to them in a manner which would be understood. Supposing we try a shot or two." Owen unslung his gun and calmly loaded the weapon, perching himself securely in the tree meanwhile, for to have tumbled out would have been to have courted a speedy death. For the two-horned rhinoceros of Sumatra is not a beast to trifle with, and when his anger is aroused, as on this occasion, he is, indeed, a terrible foe to have anything to do with. More than that, a fact which surprised all three, and caused them to alter their opinions, was the unexpected agility of these ponderous animals. They had only to recollect the rapidity of the charge which the dead beast had made to know that a rhinoceros, however unwieldy he might appear, was in fact capable of extremely rapid action. And in addition, as many a hunter has learned ere now, the rhinoceros is an animal possessed of an irascible temper, which makes him an extremely difficult and dangerous enemy to attack. However, the tree in which they had found refuge, though it had been blasted by lightning, was still sufficiently strong to protect them from the beasts below, and Owen made the most of the position. "Take him at the point of the shoulder, sahib," said Mulha, as Owen put the weapon to his shoulder and aimed at one of them. "They are so close that you should have every chance of killing them." "And they stand conveniently quiet. I will do my best with them."