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that sounded like “You just scared the piss out of me! Do something, Doc!”
    I planned to do something, even though I had no plan. I considered risking a shot at the animal’s flank, but there were too many people around, and the slug would skip if it hit the water. No ... I had to get closer.
    It took longer than expected. Despite the gator carrying a man in its jaws and a second man clinging to its tail, I still had trouble catching the animal because I was palming the pistol in my right hand. A pound of polymer and steel is not an efficient fin.
    Finally, though, I was close enough to throw my left arm over the animal’s back, which wasn’t easy because the creature was twice my size. The gator bucked its head at me in warning, its hard belly spasmed, but it kept going. I felt around until I had what I thought was a good grip on the far ridge of scutes, hoping the thing would continue swimming long enough for me to get my right hand up. Next, I would position the pistol flat against the bony ridge behind the gator’s right eye.
    Alligators have tiny brains, little more than a bulbous junction of nerve cells. However, their heads and jaws are also covered with thousands of bead-sized nodules that serve as remarkably sensitive pressure detectors. That’s why a gator can sense a lapping dog, or the splash of a child, from a hundred yards away. Even if the bullet missed the brain, the shock might cause the animal to release its prey and dive or swim for safety.
    As I pushed the pistol barrel hard against the gator’s head, though, the thing rolled again. I was on the animal’s right side. It slapped its tail and rolled to the left. The movement was as abrupt as the slamming of a steel trap, and I was vaulted over the animal, into the air, and lost my grip as I hit the water.
    When I surfaced, I had no idea where Tomlinson was. But I knew the gator still had its prey because I could hear the man coughing water and I could see his dangling legs only a yard away in the flashlight’s beam.
    I had come up just behind and to the left of the gator’s snout. Close enough to see the animal’s bulging right eye, its pupil dilated within gelatinous tissue that cast an orange glow.
    The gator saw me. No doubt about it, and I wasn’t surprised when the thing slowed and swung toward me, opening its jaws, then slinging its head to release its prey, now fixated on me. It had been harassed enough. In the animal’s mind, I was attempting to steal its meal. It had decided to fight.
    I grabbed the man’s leg with my left hand and pulled, trying to help him roll free but also using the resistance to lever myself close enough to throw my right arm over the animal’s back. The gator shook its head again, maybe having difficulty tearing its teeth from the man’s clothing, which provided me with the extra second I needed to get a grip on the reptilian neck with my left hand.
    As its tail hammered the water, spinning toward me, I wrestled myself atop the gator long enough to steady the pistol barrel flush behind its right eye. My hold was tenuous, the positioning wasn’t perfect, but I was adrenaline-buzzed and scared. I didn’t hesitate. I fired two quick shots, the report of the pistol heavy and flat, muffled by the animal’s keratin skin.
    There was a convulsive, watery explosion that threw me backward. When I surfaced, the gator’s tail was vertical, slashing the air like a wrecking crane, and I had to scull backward to keep from being hit. A moment later, the animal rolled to the surface, still thrashing, and then submerged abruptly in a boil of bubbles and muddy detritus from the bottom.
    I wasn’t sure if I’d killed the thing or not. Alligators sink when dead, but they also submerge if they’re wounded or feel threatened. If the bullets had done only minor damage, then the gator could be drifting to the bottom right now, tracking my vibrations as it regrouped. I didn’t relish the possibility. To me, a known quantity,