“Even ssso! Down hoods all!” said half a dozen low voices (every ruin in India becomes sooner or later a dwelling place of snakes, and the old summerhouse was alive with cobras). “Stand still, Little Brother, for thy feet may do us harm.”
Mowgli stood as quietly as he could, peering through the open work and listening to the furious din of the fight round the Black Panther--the yells and chatterings and scufflings, and Bagheera’s deep, hoarse cough as he backed and bucked and twisted and plunged under the heaps of his enemies. For the first time since he was born, Bagheera was fighting for his life.
“Baloo must be at hand; Bagheera would not have come alone,” Mowgli thought. And then he called aloud: “To the tank, Bagheera. Roll to the water tanks. Roll and plunge! Get to the water!”