Page:The Cross Pull.pdf/84

 ask what his neighbor would do after listening to the chorus of the pack. At daylight the fastest horses stood saddled in front of every house and a relay string to which any rider was welcome was held in each corral. On every commanding knoll a rider lolled in the saddle, ready to dash down upon any hard pressed wolf which another should bring his way. From the dirt roof of every log cabin a man swept the country with powerful glasses for signs of an approaching race, his horse standing below with a rifle butt showing from the saddle scabbard.

These northern wolves were accustomed to the deep snow under the heavy trees where men traveled slowly on webs. They had not yet learned the lesson of the hard running horses and hard riding men of the open range—and most of them died as they learned.

That night when Flash and Silver made another kill there were but five of the pack who answered the call to feast.

Flash and Silver left them early and started on. The coyote brain warned the lobo of the danger of killing too often in one place. For almost two months they wandered on across several states, seldom killing in the same place twice.