In the narrow confines of the cave, the howling of the bear and the snarling of the seven dogs, gone mad at sight of their enemy and with balked lust for fighting, made the din of an inferno. The gray snow runners twisted and tore at their leashes, and leaped and leaped again, only to fall back on the rock floor, as their ropes held. Pallas alone used method. Finding her struggles for freedom in vain, she turned on the stout rope and rent it with her teeth. Tearing at it furiously, she weakened it. At last it gave way, and she bounded past the princess and leaped straight in the monster's face. Slashed and bleeding, with the sight of one eye nearly gone, the bear was fully aroused. As the dog leaped, one powerful white paw swung, armed with its spread of crescent claws. It caught Pallas in midair, hurled her against the side of the passage, and she fell, her lifeblood spurting from a jagged wound in her neck. Another stroke dashed the spear from the hand of Memene. Gathering his hind legs under him against the rock, the bear thrust himself forward into the cave! CHAPTER VI BACK TO LIFE AND LIGHT Screaming in a desperate frenzy that cast aside all fear, the Princess Memene sprang back along the passage and caught up another spear to replace that which the stroke of the bear had spun from her grasp. In her veins surged up the blood that had faced death on many a hard-fought battlefield in the years when the world was young, and counted no odds. Pale to the lips, her eyes ablaze, she fronted her towering antagonist. For the bear was over the rock now, reared on his hinder legs, and advancing to make an end. At her feet writhed the dying dog, above her swung the crescent talons; the roaring, slavering jaws were opening wide to rend and tear her tender flesh. Came a flash of fire from the passage, a crashing report that echoed and vibrated through the rocky corridor. The bear stiffened in every limb and line. A shudder ran through his immense bulk. He turned half around and, with one unearthly howl, collapsed across the floor of the passage, his life gushing from him in a crimson torrent that jetted from under his shoulder. As though in the grip of a dream, the girl saw the beast go down. She heard the fiendish clamor of the ravening pack behind her, sounding faint and from a distance. Then with a shout a great man clothed in white furs strode into the passage. His cap had fallen from his head, and long golden hair fell about his shoulders. In his hand he carried a smoking rifle. For a moment he stood out to the girl's sight, clear cut as a living cameo. The darkness fell upon her. Vainly she strove to command her dizzying senses. Her knees gave way. With a little sigh, she pitched forward, falling across the carcass of the bear, which still was moving feebly in its death agony.