Page:Clarence Mulford - Man from Bar-20.djvu/122

 The Man from Bar-20 said, rising to his feet. "We wants to spread out. Mebby he's still hangin' around."

"Yes; an' shoot each other," growled Harrison. "I'm goin' to spread out, all right; an' when I quits spreadin' I'll be in my little bunk. He's a mile away by now; but if he ain't, don't you let him have that gun; he's got enough now."

He stopped suddenly, and their hair arose on their heads as a long-drawn, piercing scream rang out. It sounded like a woman in mortal agony and it came from the ridge above them. From the upper end of the rock-walled pasture below came a howl, deep, long-drawn, evil, threatening. They turned searching eyes toward the nearer sound and saw a crescent bulk silhouetted against the moon. It lay in the top of a blasted pine, and as they looked, it raised its chunky head and neck and screamed an answering challenge to the lobo wolf in the canyon.

Ben moved swiftly, and a spurt or flame split the night, crashing echoes returning in waves. The crescent silhouette in the tree-top leaped convulsively and crashed to the ground, breaking off the dead limbs in its fall, and then there ensued a spitting, snarling, thrashing turmoil as the great panther scored the earth in its agony.

Ben's friends forsook him as though he were a leper and melted into the shadows, cursing him from A to Z. 110