2. “I have played the fox, now I must play the cat of the fable.”

After creating a misleading path through the jungle to lose Zaroff on the first night of the hunt, Rainsford switches modes and hides in a tree to save some of his strength. Comparing Rainsford with foxes and cats allows Connell to highlight Rainsford’s descent into a more animalistic state in which he must mimic the instinctive behavior of animals to survive. This quotation also reminds readers of Rainsford’s earlier conversation with his friend Whitney on board the yacht when Rainsford dismisses the notion that prey feel fear. Such thoughts, he had initially believed, only personify animals and ascribe a complexity of thought and emotion that animals don’t really possess. Playing the fox, however, with hunting hounds close on his heels, Rainsford feels the powerlessness and terror that all prey feel. Even though he jumps to his seeming death out of fear of the pursuing dogs, he manages to keep his fear in check enough to ultimately outwit General Zaroff and end the hunt.