For a space his
brain burned red, seething with a physical passion, a consuming anger
which, in all his life, had never been roused so terrifically within
him. He rushed forward and took his place in the thin circle of watching
men. He did not look at their faces. He did not know whether he stood
next to white men or Indians. He did not see the blaze in their eyes,
the joyous trembling of their bodies, their silent, savage exultation in
the spectacle.
He was looking at the cage.
It was 20 feet square--built of small trees almost a foot in diameter,
with 18-inch spaces between--and out of it came a sickening, grinding
smash of jaws. The two beasts were down, a ton of flesh and bone, in
what seemed to him to be a death embrace. For a moment he could not tell
which was Tara and which was Brokaw's grizzly. They separated in that
same breath, gained their feet, and stood facing each other. They must
have been fighting for some minutes. Tara's jaws were foaming with blood
and out of the throat of Brokaw's bear there rolled a rumbling, snarling
roar that was like the deep-chested bellow of an angry bull. With that
roar they came together again, Tara waiting stolidly and with panting
sides for the rush of his enemy.
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