The Great Downpour

Prologue

PROLOGUE

RISING WATER

The man-eater of Pench had been moving restlessly for the past four days. He was a magnificent specimen of his species, and one of the few remaining tigers in the forest. He weighed in at almost 250 kilograms, and measured 11 feet from the front of his nose to the tip of his tail. A characteristic of his body was the foot-long scar that ran down the side of his left foreleg; he had acquired the long flesh wound in a fight he had had with a much more virile male tiger: the duo had fought over the attentions of a beautiful tigress about two rains ago; he had won the bout mostly on account of his youth and bravado, and he had fathered two broods of cubs in the following two mating seasons. Off and on, he bent towards the foreleg and licked the scar to diminish the itchy feeling which harassed him from time to time.

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Another mark that distinguished him from the other tigers in this part of the forest was a spot of alternating stripes and brown intervening skin in the middle of his forehead. It looked rather like a rising wave of water, and marked him distinctly from the other members of his species.

He had tasted the first human meat about four moons ago, and had been cheated out of his second chance by the sudden arrival of men in brown khakis carrying long smoking sticks which made a loud noise and spat fire now and then. He had seen these men several times, and one, a rather old looking dark-skinned man, irritated him in particular. He always seemed to carry the smoking-stick, and mostly led the others into the environs he knew as his only home. Once, in the recent past, his smoking-stick had been aimed at him, and a searing pain in his flank from the projectile that had penetrated his skin had caused him to run as fast as he could from the man and his followers. A piece of his flesh had protruded out from the wound in his side, and it had taken him a long time to lick and nurse the side back to health. From then onward, the tiger had nurtured respect tinged with fear for the man with his smoking stick. He avoided the men as much as possible.

For the past three moons, human prey had eluded him, and he had fed on smaller animals like sheep, goats, and on one happy occasion, a full-grown cow. The last five days had been singularly unlucky, as he had had nothing to eat at all. He was hungry, he was angry, and he was tired.