Josephson said, “Sure thing,” and got to his feet. He moved with the other two for the door.
Shaw’s hand moved suddenly, went over Flame’s mouth. He whispered urgently to her to keep quiet and still. There had been a click from the window and now there was a current of air blowing across the divan, across his face. The french window was wide open. Shaw felt a tingling in the back of his neck, as if the short hairs were rising under their own power. The wind blew the drapes out and the moonlight glinted on two star-like points of brilliance, brilliance that was moving in through the open space. Tiger, tiger, burning bright.…
“Flame,” Shaw whispered, so low she could scarcely hear him, “you’ve left it a shade too late already. Don’t look now, but there’s a panther outside and he’s on his way in. The best we can do is to keep absolutely dead still.” He felt the sudden start, then a rigor in her body. She gave a small cry which he muffled with his hand. The band of moonlight showed the tawny body padding towards the divan.
Chapter Nine
The slightest movement might attract the animal, make him investigate more closely. A soft mouth nuzzled into Shaw’s shoulder-blades, hot breath swept down his back and around his neck. He kept dead still. The mouth moved away. Looking across Flame’s hair, he saw the tawny back prowl around the foot of the divan, padding softly, noiseless on the carpet’s thick pile.
He heard it breathing… sniffing.
Suddenly, a table went over on to the carpet and there was a softly cushioned thud. The big animal stiffened in the moonlight, head twisted round, ears flat, haunches pressed to the carpet; then slowly it relaxed. Again Shaw caught the brilliant shine of the eyes as the panther looked briefly into the moon. Again it padded across to the divan. He felt a paw come down on his shoulder, heavy but soft. Flame was trembling in his arms but remaining quiet. So far that paw was merely a pad, with the claws retracted. If he could keep quite still, it might remain that way.
There was a sound from the direction of the door and the claws came out as the panther moved. They raked down Shaw’s back — lightly, but he felt the skin part and the blood run. He bit down hard on his lips but he couldn’t prevent a jerk of his body.
“What is it?” Flame whispered. Her voice was panicky; she was crying now. He tightened his grip on her but didn’t answer. Blood soaked into the sheet. The panther’s tail was lashing the floor now and it was beginning to snarl. The smell of blood… the snarling moved away across the room, then came back towards the divan. Shaw reached out and snapped the light on.
The panther stopped in its tracks as it met Shaw’s eye, its lips drawn back from big, ugly teeth. Shaw had remembered the way the animal had refused earlier to sustain his gaze through the glass; recalled, too, that he had once read somewhere that some of the big cats could in fact be stared out, that if a man looked for long enough into their eyes they would turn and run.
The panther’s bright eyes, narrowed now, looked into his and he stared back fixedly. The tail swished, the head moved a little to one side. Already the great animal was slightly out of countenance. Without moving his head or his eyes Shaw said steadily, “Flame, be ready to move when I say. I want you to slide out of bed behind me, move slowly, and get through the french window. Shut it after you but be ready to open it for me when I’m ready myself — when I tap on the glass. Got all that?”
“Yes,” she said in a dead scared voice, “but it looks like Josephson’s on to something — he must have let that panther in. He’ll be covering the window.”
“He can’t be on to anything yet. This could be just his idea of a night’s entertainment.” Shaw’s voice was savage. “I’d sooner face him than the cat, anyway. We’ll chance Josephson.”
She whispered, “I haven’t any clothes on.…”
Anger put an edge on his voice. “For God’s sake, there’s no time to worry about that and the panther’s probably broadminded.” He went on staring. The animal licked its lips and narrowed its eyes further. It was looking more and more uncertain of itself. It began tossing its head, looking back at Shaw briefly, waiting for him to turn his eyes away. Praying that it wouldn’t spring when Flame moved Shaw said, “Now… away you go — and remember, take it slow!”
He slid forward, giving her room to pass behind his back. The panther didn’t move. He heard Flame’s quick intake of breath as she got a full view of his lacerated skin and then she was off the bed and going for the window. Slow… it must have cost her an effort of will to go slow like that, but she was a cool girl and she had guts. The panther took no notice of her as she went out through and shut the window. The animal’s head was drooping now, the eyes not meeting Shaw’s at all apart from those brief glances. Soon after that it began to inch backwards and went on doing so until its rump was hard up against the far wall.
Very slowly Shaw stuck a leg out.
The panther cringed.
Shaw got the other leg out and stood up. Keeping his face towards the animal, he went sideways for the open air. Standing with his back to the glass, he reached behind and tapped.
He heard the opening noises and felt Flame’s hands guiding him. He stepped backwards into safety and pushed the glass to. As he tried the handle and found it firm the panther got to its feet and padded across, its courage returning now. Shaw grimaced at it. “Hard bloody luck!” he said. “Why not try sinking those fangs into a nice, succulent black rump!”
He swung round on Flame and she asked, “What do we do now?”
“Hope for a miracle,” Shaw answered grimly. “While we’re waiting for it, we’ll see if there’s any adjacent roof we can nip on to, or any way down to the street through this block without us having to go back through panther country.” He added, “Or Josephson country either. It won’t be long before he goes in to see if we’ve been eaten by his pet, and if not why not.”
He had been looking around while he had been speaking. Josephson’s penthouse was at the end of the block and between it and its one-side-only neighbour there was a high, smooth wall. If he chanced what he found the other side, that might be a way out — if he could reach the top. A naked girl and a man in pyjamas were going to cause a certain amount of comment if ever they reached the street, but they would have to worry about that when it happened.
He could just reach the top of the wall with his finger-tips and he was about to jump for it when he heard Flame cry out and before the soft phut of the silenced gun came he had flung himself aside. The bullet smacked into the wall where he had been a moment before.
He whirled round.
Josephson was coming for him and he didn’t waste time. He dived. But he never reached his target, which was the Negro’s legs, because someone else was just a fraction quicker. A foot with a heavy boot on it took him smack in the guts with all a man’s weight and muscle behind it and at the same time something that felt like a length of lead piping came down on the back of his neck and that was all he knew for quite a while.
Ice-cold water was being sluiced over him and the assembled company was waiting for him to come round.
He was in a bathroom, on a tiled floor, and they were all there: Josephson, his tame guard, the sullen Negro girl, and Flame, who was still in the nude. So was Shaw, as he realized when his head began to clear itself of a nasty swimming sensation and he felt the pain of the panther’s claw-marks in his back. There were two other men present as well — both with dangerous faces, both strangers to him and both, by the look of them, white Puerto Ricans. The one absentee appeared to be the panther and Shaw wasn’t intending to insist on holding up the proceedings until it was fetched.