My disappointment at having run out of Corbetts was assuaged when I discovered Harry Black by David Walker, a man-eater novel with a bit of WWII escape stuff thrown in. The character of Harry Black, the writing style and the detail of tiger hunting, the story of the loss and recovery of the nerve, and even the marvellous Indian gun bearer, were all ripped off from Jim Corbett who, unlike Harry Black’s author, actually did these things. Still, despite recognising the imitation, I was pleased by Walker’s detail and the tremendous heroics in the tiger scenes which Corbett’s gentlemanly modestly would never have admitted to.
    Two years later, they made a movie, and this time the tiger got into the title— Harry Black and the Tiger it was called. Stewart Granger, accompanied by a wonderful babbling Indian actor named I.S.Johar, stalks the man-eating tiger in the only decent film ever made on the subject. It even had a story defining the slender line between courage and cowardice—Harry’s best friend (Anthony Steele) lacks the nerve to escape from the German prison camp and hunt his own marauding tigers and needs Harry to do the tough stuff for him; Harry lacks the nerve to take the woman he loves and raise a family. Suddenly having a reason to live instils Harry with the one quality he cannot afford—fear! Harry gets the tiger but his friend gets to keep his wife and family. It was really quite touching, for mushy stuff.