"What says he? What says he? What says he?" the wolves repeated
every few minutes; and Mowgli translated until he came to the
witch part of the story, which was a little beyond him, and
then he said that the man and woman who had been so kind to him
were trapped.

"Does Man trap Man?" said Bagheera.

"So he says. I cannot understand the talk. They are all mad
together. What have Messua and her man to do with me that they
should be put in a trap; and what is all this talk about the
Red Flower? I must look to this. Whatever they would do to
Messua they will not do till Buldeo returns. And so----" Mowgli
thought hard, with his fingers playing round the haft of the
skinning-knife, while Buldeo and the charcoal-burners went off
very valiantly in single file.

"I go hot-foot back to the Man-Pack," Mowgli said at last.

"And those?" said Gray Brother, looking hungrily after the brown
backs of the charcoal-burners.

"Sing them home," said Mowgli, with a grin; I do not wish them
to be at the village gates till it is dark. Can ye hold them?"

Gray Brother bared his white teeth in contempt. We can head them
round and round in circles like tethered goats--if I know Man."

"That I do not need. Sing to them a little, lest they be lonely