Page:Silversheene (1924).djvu/170

 The great tragedy of Silversheene's wolf life came to him one warm day in August. It was about noon and he was lying at the entrance of his burrow dozing. The winter life was so strenuous and the summer life so luxuriant in comparison that Silversheene had formed the habit of sleeping much in the summer. He was not really asleep, but on the borderland between sleeping and waking.

His mate, Gray Wolf, and the six wolf dogs were somewhere in the valley below stalking muskrats along the banks of the Tanana. Suddenly Silversheene sprang up with an angry snarl and the hackles on his neck went up.

The thing that had aroused him was most unusual in this forsaken country, a sound that he had not heard in many months. Clear and unmistakable on the summer air, a rifle shot had rung out. Silversheene looked first up the valley and then down, and finally started for the river at his best pace, yet he proceeded with caution. Once