Page:The Cross Pull.pdf/132



here was one man who had given many interesting facts to the world. He had unravelled the half-century old mystery of the lost herd. All that men knew of the swift-fox was through his research. He had definitely linked the buffalo gray with the so-called lobo wolf.

Great beasts had come down out of the north and it was rumored that for the first time moose had been seen in the beaver swamps of the Thoroughfare. This man was now on his way to the Land of Many Rivers to determine whether this new western moose was a distinct type or merely a detached band strayed down from their northern range.

Far up Seclusion Creek Moran lay rolled in his blankets, his head propped up on one elbow as he listened to the night sounds which he loved so well and had not heard for so long a time. A cow elk barked from the timber; from far down the stream came the shrill staccato of a coyote, and another