CHAPTER XIII—“THE DOG SOLDIERS”

The maverick was not a happy addition to the camping party—not at first, at least. Dig tied him to a tree, giving him the length of the lariat to tangle himself up in; and he did just that.

Three times during supper Dig had to get up and unwind the rope to save the creature from choking himself to death. His plaintive “bla-att” might bring night-prowling beasts from the distant hills.

In fact, Chet could not easily figure out how the yearling had escaped becoming the prey of some flesh-eating brute ere this, save that the season was in his favour.

The bears had plenty of berries and other forest fruit. In the winter or in the early spring after his hibernation, Bruin would have stalked this maverick as cleverly as any wolf.

The latter creatures were not plentiful in the hills now, and the coyotes were so cowardly they would not pull a bull calf down unless it was a cripple—especially when there was plenty of smaller game.

The mountain lion is always hungry; but he does not often come out of the hills save when a herd of cattle is being wintered in some well-watered valley like this in which the chums from Silver Run were encamped. Then the cougar will slink down and lurk on the outskirts of the herd to catch a cow and calf away from the protection of their mates.

“Your maverick struck a fat time in this valley, Dig,” Chet said. “It’s escaped all beasts of prey save man. What are you going to do with it? It’s rather old for veal; but I expect he’d be fair eating—would give us all the steaks we’d need between here and Grub Stake.”

“I reckon not!” exclaimed Digby Fordham. “We’re not going to butcher him.”

“What then?”

“I tell you I’m going to lead him to Grub Stake.”

“Cracky! you’ll surely bite off an awful mouthful to chew,” laughed Chet. “It is a hundred and sixty or seventy miles to Grub Stake, and that maverick will pull back every foot of the way.”

“I don’t care,” said Dig obstinately. “I can sell him if I get him to Grub Stake.”

“Waugh!” said Chet, laughing. “Who do you suppose would want this little, scrawny red-and-white dogy?”

“Don’t call him names, Chet. Poor little fellow,” said Dig. “Wonder if he’d like a leg of this grouse to pick?”

“Or a cup of coffee?” suggested his chum.

But Dig was very much interested in his new possession. He was up two or three times in the night to see if he were tangled in the rope.

“The maverick ought to be ‘gentled’ very quickly,” Chet said; “he is receiving enough attention.”

The boys did not try to keep watch. They looked for no danger, and the horses feeding near the camp would give notice of the approach of any wild animal.

There was no disturbance and the chums finally slept soundly beneath their blankets till morning. Indeed, the bawling of the yearling for water after sunrise was what awoke them.

“Say!” yawned Chet, rising and stretching. “We’re a fine pair of travellers—I don’t think! We won’t get started as early this morning as we did yesterday. Let’s hurry breakfast.”

“No, no!” objected Digby. “Hurry anything but the meals.”

Nevertheless, Chet allowed only bacon, flapjacks and coffee to be prepared, although Digby had brought fishing tackle and begged for enough time to try for the catfish in the river.

“I just know there are catfish as long as your arm down under that bank,” he declared. “They’d go fine, Chet. Why eat bacon when you might have a nice catfish flapping in the pan?”

Chet, however, had made up his mind that they ought to make fairly good time on the trail until they should pass the second line of foothills. Then they would reach the broader plains, on which it was reported the herd of buffaloes had been seen. If the expedition to Grub Stake was to be delayed at all, he hoped it would be delayed only by the huge buffalo and its mates, of which the men about the Silent Sue shaft had spoken.

“We don’t want to be fooling around here with a mess of catfish,” he said to Dig, “when we may be able, later, to get a shot at something worth while.”

“Oh, Chet!” exclaimed Digby, “you’ve got that buffalo on the brain and nothing else is going to suit you. Bet you we lug these heavy rifles clear to Grub Stake and don’t get a shot.”

“Never mind; you’ve captured a deer, Dig,” said his chum soothingly. “And you say you are going to lead it with you.”

“So I am!” snapped Dig. “I can be pigheaded just as well as you can.”

But something almost immediately happened to cheer Dig up and avert any quarrel between the chums. It was something that held them at the camp by the river for a while, too.

As it fell out, breakfast was finished and the pots and pans washed. Their blanket-rolls were repacked and all was ready for saddling, when a torrent of pounding hoofs reached their ears.

“Stampede!” yelled Chet, starting for the edge of the grove.

“What of—buffaloes?” demanded his friend, following in a more leisurely fashion.

Chet first came to the edge of the grove, where he could see back along the trail by which they had come from Silver Run. There was a cloud of dust which shrouded a number of horsemen; but how many were coming, and who they were, the boy could not at first imagine.

Then, out of the cloud, as it slowed up, appeared a band of frowsy ponies, most of them piebald. They were ridden by Indians—and rather savage looking ones at that.

Chet Havens had never seen so many redmen before, save at a show. They were stripped to the waist and wore only fringed leggings and moccasins. There were feathers in their topknots; yet Chet, seeing them closer, knew that those feathers were not worn because they were “braves” and had killed their enemies in battle.

These were only Indian youths out on a frolic or a hunt, none of them being much older than Dig and himself. But how they did ride! They had only a cloth over their ponies’ backs and each rode with a single rein to guide his half wild brute.

Each young redskin carried a rifle and they all tossed them up as high as they could reach when they saw the two white boys appear from the riverside. Then, at a signal from their leader, they flung themselves to the far side of their mounts, and circled out from the trail, passing the amazed Chet and Dig, only one hand and a foot of each Indian showing, their ponies still tearing along at a great pace. In wartime the Indians performed this trick, shooting at their enemies under the ponies’ necks.

Dig had brought his gun, and when he heard the “E-i! e-i! e-i!” of the Indian yell he was a little scared.

“What kind of a game is this?” he wanted to know of Chet. “By the last hoptoad that was chased out of Ireland! those yelling galoots look as though they meant business.”

“Shucks, boy!” said Chet, “you know there are no more wild Indians.”

“Huh! if those fellows are not wild, what are they? And whew! how they can ride!”

“That’s John Peep in the lead,” Chet said. “Though what he’s doing away over here I can’t imagine.”

“Huh! I’ll get even some way!” threatened Digby. “Scaring a fellow out of half a year’s growth!”

The cavalcade came back, the sweat-streaked faces of the riders grinning. Dig said to his chum:

“A great mess of ‘dog soldiers.’ Whew! you can’t cure an Indian of his old tricks. I bet right now they’d like to scalp us.”

“Don’t see how they’d ever perform the operation on you,” laughed Chet, “with that prizefighter’s cut you have.”

Chet noticed that all of the young fellows that Dig called “dog soldiers” were fine looking boys. In the old days the young braves that could not be controlled by the chiefs, but who desired to go to war and make names for themselves, were called “dog soldiers.”

“Hello, John!” shouted Chet. “What are you doing over here? Last time we saw you, you were playing baseball. You must have hustled some to catch us.”

The Cheyenne dropped off his pony’s back and the animal went to cropping the grass at once, and hungrily. Chet decided that the party had been travelling for some hours and that the ponies had had no chance for grazing, but had been watered when the band crossed the river.

John glanced at Chet in rather an odd manner; but true to his national trait he did not answer the question directly.

“We go on hunt,” John Peep said. “Mebbe stay week; mebbe longer. These boys all my friends,” and he waved his hand at the young riders who waited to be asked to dismount. “Not all Cheyenne. Sioux—Pawnee—Ogallala. All go to Government school at Benway. Vacation now, like us. We make breakfast with you.”

The customs of the trail must prevail. The white boys had finished their meal, but nobody ever denied the hospitable rite on the plains. The first party at a camping place was bound to ask the new-comers to join them. But here were ten or twelve hearty appetites suddenly to be appeased.

“All right,” grunted Dig. “I could do something to another breakfast. We only had an apology for one, as I told you, Chet.”

Chet sighed; but he felt, too, that John Peep had not come down this trail without cause. He wondered if, perhaps, the young Indians had heard of the buffaloes and were on their way to hunt for them.

“Don’t say anything about the big buffalo, Dig,” he whispered to his chum, as they hurried back through the grove. “I hope they don’t know anything about it. And what they don’t know won’t hurt them.”

“All right, boy! I won’t tell them any fairy tales,” said Dig.

Chet stirred up the fire, and mixed some prepared pancake flour, and put on the coffee pot. Some of the Indians joined Digby in catching fish. They had much more primitive tackle than the white boy; but the catfish bit so hungrily that it scarcely mattered whether the bait was let down to them on “store tackle” or on a thorn from a whitethorn bush.

“Say!” exclaimed Dig, “somebody besides us was hungry for breakfast. These cats are ravenous. Whew! look at that one!”

CHAPTER XIV—THE WARNING

As fast as the catfish were caught they were skinned and dressed. Chet had sliced all the bacon they had brought with them; he told Dig that the way they were feasting now pointed to a fast for the rest of their trip to Grub Stake.

“Don’t worry,” advised his chum. “Let’s give these Indians a good meal for once. They’re good fellows.”

Chet, as chief cook, was hampered by the size of his skillet; Poke had kicked a hole in the largest one the day before. But John Peep cooked the fish for the most part, while Chet fried flapjacks.

And no old cook with a trail outfit could toss a flapjack better than Chet Havens. One of the Indian lads brought clean pieces of bark—one for each person—and Chet slid the cakes on to these make-shift dishes. The fish were handed about on the same platters. There was plenty of seasoning besides the general good appetite.

“Don’t talk!” grumbled Dig. “By this time I don’t know whether I had any breakfast early or not. Don’t be stingy with the cakes, Chet.”

But his chum got tired of tossing flapjacks after a while; to tell the truth, his arm got lame. Then John Peep tried it. The chums discovered that these Indian lads did not call each other by the outlandish names that white people had bestowed upon them. They all spoke of John Peep as “Amoshee,” and Chet quickly began to address him by his Indian name, too.

There was a lot of fun at that breakfast. Indian boys are not like whites in all things, it is true; but they are not lacking in a sense of humour, and as these sat about the campfire in the glade, jokes and quips passed to and fro as they might have at a gathering of white boys.

Chet “counted noses” and said to Amoshee:

“Say, they froze you out of our ball club, but why don’t you have one of your own? Here’s enough of you boys to make up a good nine.”

The Indian lad’s eyes brightened, and he looked proudly around the circle of faces. Their racial features were pronounced; there wasn’t a redskin boy there that could not trace his line back to some big chief of the olden time when the Indian was master of these plains and hills.

“Heap good boys,” Amoshee grunted, but smiled, too, for he only used English in that barbarous way in fun, or when he was excited. Out in the open like this, having thrown off all the shackles of civilisation, his natural thoughts and instincts rose to the surface. “Heap good boys,” he said again, and with pride.

“I should say they were!” exclaimed Chet, with enthusiasm. “Look at that tall fellow yonder. Couldn’t he reach the high ones out in centrefield? My! And that little, squatty fellow—what a shortstop he’d make! Say! don’t they know anything about baseball?”

Amoshee smiled rather pityingly upon his white friend.

“They all play baseball at school—and football, and ev’rything else. I want to go away to Government school if my grandfather will let me.”

“Say! then you’ve got a nine ready-made to your hand. Practise a little,” said Chet. “Get to working together well, and then challenge our high school nine. It would serve them right if you licked them. You’ve a delivery that would puzzle most of them, I tell you.”

Amoshee, otherwise John Peep, thought well of the scheme, it was plain. But meanwhile Digby Fordham and the other Indians had been hatching out something entirely different.

It was already nine o’clock, but Dig was not ready for the trail yet. He had been bragging with the Indians about ponies and riding. Now they had to prove out each other’s prowess.

“Oh, Dig!” complained Chet. “We’ll never get away.”

“Be still!” grinned his chum, knowing what was really troubling Chet. “That old bull buffalo will wait for you, don’t fear.”

“Hush!” warned Chet again.

He had learned from Amoshee that the party of Indian lads was going north on this hunting trip. He did not believe they had heard anything about the herd of buffaloes, and he did not propose to tell them.

Few hunters crossed these valleys and hills at this time of year, and only two men whom he knew of had chanced upon the buffaloes. Neither had been prepared to stalk the beasts, and Chet hoped that nobody else had been along the Grub Stake trail beside which the buffaloes seemed to be feeding.

Meanwhile the Indians were catching their ponies. They did not hobble them as the white boys did, but picketed them out at the end of their lariats. The scrubby little beasts did not look either fast or trustworthy; but Chet and Dig knew what they could do.

They had seen Indians perform on horseback before. With but one line twisted about the pony’s lower jaw, and without even a cloth on its back, an Indian can ride and perform evolutions that are really remarkable.

On the great lawn outside the grove in which they had camped, the Indian youths performed all manner of tricks. Amoshee was one of the best, for on the back of a pony he was the equal of any of his mates. His shortened leg did not count against him there.

They hung by their heels while the ponies scoured the plains, running in a circle. Two rode swiftly, side by side, and picked up a third who lay as though dead on the prairie, and bore him off at full gallop. Two rode from opposite sides and actually changed ponies as they passed!

“Now, white boy,” said the big fellow whom Chet wanted to see in centrefield. “Show what him do.”

Dig was nothing loath. He stripped Poke and brought him out with neither saddle nor bridle. Meanly as the black horse sometimes acted, this was not an occasion when he was likely to play the runaway.

He seemed to understand that there was a contest, and he liked to show off just as well as did his master. The presence of the ponies made him snort and toss his mane; and in the corral he would doubtless have tried to bite them. But he obeyed his master’s voice and hand—even his whistle—now, with most exemplary promptness.

Dig did not try to equal the Indian boys’ tricks; but he had others of his own. He mounted and dismounted while Poke was on the run. He made the mustang lie down under him and roll over, Dig standing on the horse all the time and never once touching the ground.

He rode both kneeling and standing on the mustang’s bare back. Then he cinched on the saddle, dropped his kerchief on the sod and picked it up with his teeth, Poke running like a wolf meanwhile. Amoshee and his friends hailed this last feat as the greatest and they all shook Dig by the hand.

“Guess they think I’m some pumpkins,” Dig said to his chum. “I reckon there isn’t anything a redskin can do that a white man can’t beat him at.”

Of course, he said this when none of the visitors could hear him. Now the Indian lads wanted to see Chet shoot. Probably Amoshee had told them that young Havens excelled in that.

The Indian boys themselves had only the cheapest kind of rifles, and no pistols at all. The chums had their revolvers, and the heavy rifle that Chet had brought with him was almost the equal of a cannon for distance. And the accuracy of its shooting was far superior to that of the Indians’ guns.

So Chet pitted himself with his pistol against the rifles of Amoshee and his friends. At distance marks the Indian boys thought they had Chet beat; but after they had all plugged away at the target, none of them hitting very near the centre, Chet paced ten paces back of the line from which they had shot and came within half an inch of the bull’s-eye at his first shot. With his remaining five bullets he riddled the target.

Then he leaped aboard Hero and showed them some fancy shots with his horse on the run. He and Dig had practised so much in the corral at home that Chet had really become wonderfully expert. Pistol shooting is a matter of eye and practice. Ordinarily one must have a big target to hit with a six-shooter.

The morning was growing old. Even the Indians began to wish to get on. Amoshee drew Chet Havens aside and said:

“I took your advice and went to see Mr. Havens.”

“Bully for you!” exclaimed Chet. “I know my father will be glad to do something for you, if you’ll let him.”

“But I didn’t see him, Chet,” the Indian lad said calmly.

“You didn’t see him?”

“No. He had a visitor. I stayed hidden. I knew that man.”

“Who—the man with father?”

“Yes.”

“Who was he? What did he want?” queried Chet, in wonder.

“I not know what he wanted of Mr. Havens; but I know he is a bad man,” declared the Indian lad with conviction.

“Hel-lo!” exclaimed Chet. “Not that man who—who burned your shack?”

“He’s the man,” grunted Amoshee. “I shall get square with him.”

“But what did he want of father?”

“I not know. He has been around that old mine I showed you. He dug hole into old tunnel. He want something,” said Amoshee shortly.

“Say! can he be the fellow who is after the old Crayton diggings?”

“He after you,” said the Indian.

“What do you mean, John?” cried Chet. “He’s not following us?”

“He’s on this trail before now. Going to Grub Stake. I heard him talk to big man that work in mine—get kicked out—quick! You know?” Amoshee said excitedly.

Chet seemed preternaturally sharp at the moment.

“You don’t mean Tony Traddles? The man who was discharged for the trouble in our mine?”

“That’s he—Tony,” Amoshee assured him. “I heard him spoken to. I followed that man from Mr. Havens’ house. I heard them say they take this trail. You better look out for them. That man mad as he can be.”

“My goodness! what can they want of Dig and me?” queried Chet wonderingly.

“Don’t know. They not friendly. That’s all I can tell you. Me—I go hunting with these boys. I get ’em start last night instead of this morning, so we can catch you and say this. Good-bye!”

He wrung Chet’s hand and leaped astride his impatient pony. The other Indians were already mounted. They all turned at a little distance and gave the Indian yell and threw up their rifles. Then they struck heels to their ponies’ sides and darted away into the north.

“There goes a good bunch of fellows,” Digby Fordham said, with a sigh. “I hadn’t any idea Indians were such good sports.”

CHAPTER XV—“WHAT WON’T BE LED MUST BE DRIVEN”

“Come along,” said Chet, after the Indians were gone. “Let’s pick up the pieces and get away. We won’t get anywhere on the trail to-day. But there’s one thing sure—we won’t stop at noon to eat.”

“Whew! I lose that meal, do I?” grumbled Dig.

“And you’ll lose supper, too, if we don’t shoot some game. Our guests pretty nearly ate us out of house and home. I calculated on your appetite when I made up our list of provisions; but I didn’t calculate on a plague of locusts. Amoshee, or John Peep, and his red friends had their appetites with them, and no mistake.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” said his chum, with sarcasm. “We can’t starve when buffaloes roam the plains as plentifully as they do. We’ll soon be able to rope a buffalo calf, eh?”

“No, there’s no need of that,” said Chet calmly. “We’ve got your maverick to feed on. When are you going to butcher him, Dig?”

“I guess not!” cried Dig indignantly. “He’s a pet. See! he knows me now.”

He was just then approaching the yearling to unfasten the lariat. The little brute waited, with lowered head, watching Dig with what Chet was sure was a malevolent eye.

Dig stooped to untangle the rope, turning rearward to the captured calf. As though he had been waiting for the chance, the calf blatted and charged. The impact of his forehead against the seat of Dig’s pants was tremendous.

“Waugh! Take him off! Help!” roared Dig, after performing a complete somersault. Chet absolutely could not help him. The maverick leaped about his prostrate captor, stiff-legged. The rope became wound around Dig’s ankle and then, when he tried to get to his feet, he could not do so.

“Stop your laughing!” he called to his chum, “and come to help a fellow. He’s going to bat me again!”

“What do you want—a gun?” sputtered Chet. “That calf is just as dangerous as a tiger.” But he helped his chum out of his predicament, though continuing to make remarks regarding the maverick and its troubled owner.

“So you call this a pet, do you? I’d just as soon pet a Kansas cyclone. Whoa, boy! Easy! My goodness, Dig! he pulls like a bull elk. There’s something wrong with this maverick. He’s crossed with a traction engine, I know.”

“Oh, you behave!” complained Digby. “Why pick upon the innocent little thing? I believe you’ve been tantalizing him when my back was turned. That’s why he acts in such an ornery fashion.”

They got on their horses at length, and Dig attempted to lead his prize. Instantly the maverick set all four hoofs in the soft prairie and braced himself against the line. But Dig had his line fastened to the fork of the saddle and the yearling could not pull Poke over.

The mustang snorted and dragged the maverick over the torn sod. The latter animal could not blat, for its wind was shut off.

“Hi!” cried Chet. “You’ll stretch its neck until it will look like a giraffe. Then you’ll never sell it at Grub Stake for a pet or for anything else.”

“Get better money for it,” declared Dig grimly. “It would sell for a freak in a circus. And, by Jo! it’s got to come.”

Chet watched the tug of war for some minutes further before asking, seriously:

“You haven’t called it anything yet, have you, Dig?”

“Called it anything?” protested his chum. “I’ve called it everything I dared aloud, and a whole lot of names that don’t sound well to myself!”

“Oh, no—I mean a real name,” said Chet, chuckling. “You haven’t named it yet?”

“Haven’t had time,” returned Dig innocently enough. “I been too busy trying to make the darned thing behave.”

“Well, I’d like to suggest a name for it,” said Chet.

“Yes?” responded Dig, yanking again on the calf’s line.

“Call it Stone Fence. You can move it just as easily.”

“Waugh!” shouted Dig, as the calf hung back again and the rope became taut, burning the boy’s hand between rope and saddle. “Now you’ve said something, boy! Stone Fence let him be.”

Poke was dancing. He was no cow-pony and he objected to the dragging of the waif.

“We’ll never get anywhere,” said Chet impatiently. “Do something to that calf, Dig, please!”

It did seem as though after the little brute had been half choked to death he ought to be willing to trot along behind Poke; but not so. Stone Fence fell down on his knees, flopped over on his side, and allowed himself to be dragged in that position.

“Say!” gasped the sweating Dig, “he’ll be worn as thin as paper if he keeps that up. By the last hoptoad that was chased out of Ireland! I’ll beat that little nuisance!”

He dismounted and cut two long willow sprouts. The maverick began to graze. Nothing seemed to disturb its appetite. In that possession it and Digby Fordham were brothers, and Chet, with gravity, pointed this fact out.

“Brothers?” sniffed Dig. “You can bet we are brothers in another way. That dogy is obstinate; but so am I. You watch me!”

He mounted into the saddle again. He stuck one willow wand into his bootleg for emergency, and then used the other to prod the maverick. The latter didn’t like this. He kept ahead of the point of the willow wand which, whenever he lagged, poked between his hind legs.

Chet almost fell out of his saddle from laughing at the performance; and Poke looked as disgusted as a mustang can look. That calf plunging along the trail just ahead of Poke’s nose disgruntled the spirited horse.

Chet led the march, the maverick came next, and Dig brought up an active rear. “What won’t be led must be driven,” quoth Dig, now quite himself again. “All aboard for Grub Stake again, Chet, my boy.”

“My goodness!” exclaimed his chum, rather exasperated. “When do you think we’ll ever get there at this rate?”

They made fair time, however, considering the obstacles during a part of the afternoon. Chet galloped away off the trail at sight of a small herd of deer, and managed to get near enough to shoot a young doe. He cut its throat, and let it bleed well, and then flung it over the saddle and cantered back to the trail.

Dig was rather disappointed because he had not had any of the fun of stalking the deer. Chet pointed out the fact that Dig had the maverick, saying:

“There is compensation in everything, my boy. You have that pet to play with; I don’t own any maverick. You don’t hear me kicking—”

“Oh, go on!” growled Dig.

There was one good thing about Digby Fordham: he never really held rancour; and he could take a joke as well as give one. Of course he knew that he had caught a Tartar in the yearling; but he would not give him up.

Before the afternoon was gone Stone Fence had learned that it was better to walk more or less sedately along the trail than to be poked with a sharp pole. Their pace was not rapid; but they got through the pass between the hills after a time.

It was just before they left the pass and as the wider plain beyond broke upon their view that Dig spied a grey animal sitting on a rock ahead of them, and some distance off the trail.

“What do you call that, Chet?” he cried. “Looks like an old woman with a nightcap on—only she’s got two tassels on the cap and they stick up straight.”

“Wolf!” responded his chum, the instant he saw the grey figure on the rock. “And the ‘old woman’ is all right. Bet she’s a big she-wolf with a litter somewhere near. Yes, by cracky! there they are, Dig.”

“I see ’em,” Dig returned.

There were several moving figures beside the big old wolf sitting on her haunches. Dig was anxious to try and get a shot.

“No more chance of hitting her than of hitting the moon,” returned Chet, restraining him. “But I’ll tell you something right now.”

“What’s that?”

“You keep this blamed calf tagging us around for long, and we’ll have a whole pack of wolves ringing our camp. Make up your mind to that, boy.”

“‘Tagging us around’? That sounds good,” snorted Dig. “Get up there, you pest! I’ve driven this pesky creature almost far enough now.”

“Turn him loose then.”

“Oh, no! I couldn’t be so cruel. Not with those wolves in sight,” said Dig, shaking his head.

“Make up your mind that he is going to attract night prowlers.”

“Good! I want to get a shot at something besides grouse.”

“Never mind. Deer liver for supper to-night,” said Chet.

“And the tongue. That’s a fat doe; there’ll be plenty of kidney suet to fry the meat in. Whew! I’m hungry now,” cried Digby.

“Never saw such a disgracefully hungry person in my life,” declared his chum. “Always thinking of your stomach.”

They did not see the wolves again as they came out upon the edge of the great prairie. Indeed, they saw no animal. The prairie rolled away before them as far as they could see. To the north and to the south were lines of hills; but a haze almost hid the higher Rockies toward which they were bound.

Chet stopped at a stream and they filled their canteens.

“Try to be careful with it,” he advised Digby. “We’re not sure that we shall reach another stream to camp beside. I’m not so sure of the trail from here on, anyway.”

“I’ll get a good drink right here, then,” said his chum, climbing carefully down.

With the maverick to take care of he had to be cautious as to his movements. It was not safe to leave the lead-rope tied to the fork of his saddle, for if the calf pulled when the saddle was empty, Poke immediately backed around preparatory to throwing his heels at the blatting young calf.

Now Dig kneeled down at the edge of the stream above where the horses were drinking. Stone Fence had dropped down on the grass, chewing a cud, but evidently tired. The run had been a hard one for him.

Poke lifted his head, “blew” softly, and felt the tug of the leash at his saddle. The black’s wicked ears shot backward and he turned his head to mark the place where Stone Fence contentedly chewed his cud.

“Look out, Dig!” cried Chet, who was just raising himself into his own saddle.

But his chum’s head was down for another drink. He did not hear.

The maverick scrambled up with a snort of fright as the black horse whirled upon him. Dig tried to get up just as quickly; but when he put his weight upon a turf at the brink of the stream, the sod broke away and down he plunged, with his right arm into the water to his arm-pit.

“Oh—ouch!” gurgled Dig. “What’s the matter now?”

“Trouble!” called Chet.

But, as Dig claimed afterward, that was no fit warning. He didn’t know whether he was being attacked from behind, before, on either flank, from the sky above, or whether trouble was rising out of the ground.

And it seemed as though it had come from all points when it reached him. Dig was trying to rise when the calf, escaping Poke’s vicious hoofs, collided with his young master. Ker-splash! they were both in the stream!

The calf was scared fully as much as Dig, if not more. Both bawled and splashed about, unable to obtain their footing at first, and had Chet not dismounted and run to the assistance of the pair, one or the other might have remained under water longer than would have been good for him.

The rope had become wound about Dig’s legs in some mysterious way, and the calf was tangled up in a regular “cat’s cradle.”

“I declare!” said Chet Havens, with disgust as well as laughter. “I never saw anybody do so much and to so little purpose with a rope in all my life. For goodness’ sake, Dig! come out of that water. You’re a sight!”

“I—I don’t f-feel much b-b-better than I—I look,” chattered his chum. “That water’s cold, lemme t-tell you.”

“I know it’s wet—from just looking at you,” proclaimed young Havens. “You’re in fine shape for riding. What are you going to do with that blamed calf now?”

“Take him to Grub Stake,” said Dig obstinately. “You can ride on without me, if you want to, Chet. But Stone Fence is going to be my companion if I spend the rest of the summer on the trail.”

He would not remount then, however, but made Poke trail on behind him while he urged the complaining Stone Fence with a willow wand. Besides, the sun would dry his garments better when he walked, and the exercise kept him from becoming chilled.

“Gee! Haw!” he was soon calling to the yearling, teaching him to turn from side to side as the case might be. “Never too young to learn,” Dig confided to his chum. “Mebbe somebody will want to work him with a bull-team.”

Chet rode ahead and scanned the prairie carefully. The trail they were supposed to follow was only a faint trace now. He knew the general direction to go, and he carried a compass. He did not think he could get lost; but he was watching the plain for signs of a water-hole. The sun was descending, and they must camp before dark.

Besides, Chet was looking for signs of disturbing animals now. Having seen the old she-wolf and her young, he expected to find other—and perhaps more dangerous—creatures on the plain.

An hour later he spied some low shrubs which seemed to follow a watercourse between two coulies. The shrubs were green and thrifty, although they did not mark a very extensive stream. It might be merely a water-hole which had not yet dried up. However, Chet was quite sure it would afford the party all the water they needed for one night.

So he led the way off the trail. Even Stone Fence seemed to know that the day’s journey was nearly over. He trotted on more placidly, and the horses quickened their pace.

They had made but small progress that day. However, with all the set-backs and delays it was fortunate that they had come this far.

The water was a narrow stream trickling between willows and other moisture-loving shrubs. They made camp and started a fire very quickly. They cut up the doe Chet had shot and all the dainty parts that Dig clamoured for were prepared for the skillet, while the flayed haunches and shoulders were hung high in the saplings, out of the way (as the boys thought) of any marauding beast.

“Tell you what,” Chet said, “if your calf doesn’t draw the wolves down here, the smell of that fresh venison will do the trick. Watch and watch tonight, boy.”

“Oh, Chet! what’s the use? I’m tired,” yawned his chum.

“I should think you would be paddling on after that fool calf! But expect no sympathy from me,” and Chet insisted upon tethering the horses near the camp instead of letting them roam, hobbled.

“By the last hoptoad that was chased out of Ireland!” Dig exclaimed, “why don’t you build a stockade and build a big bonfire? One would think you were expecting a whole drove of savage beasts down here.”

Just then a mournful wail came down the wind—a shuddering cry that made Dig start and hold suspended the piece of meat he had upon his fork.

“Wha—what’s that? A coyote?” demanded Dig.

“That’s one of your friends,” said Chet grimly. “It’s the call of a hungry wolf. You can expect him and his gang early.”

Stone Fence bawled where he was tethered nearby, instinctively knowing that there was danger near.

CHAPTER XVI—THE WOLF RING

The howling of the lone wolf, however, did not take the boys’ appetites away. Fresh venison is rather tough until it has hung awhile; but the parts of the kill Chet and Dig ate that night were tender and succulent. The steaks they would not try until the next day.

“There’s a whole lot more than we can eat ourselves,” said Chet. “But some other party may come along and be glad of a haunch.”

“Ugh!” grunted Dig. “There’s that party talking up in the hills. He’ll be around for his share,” as the long-drawn wail of the wolf shuddered again across the gathering night.

The cry of the wolf made the horses nervous, too; they kept stepping around instead of grazing at the end of their tethers. As for the yearling, he tried to answer bawl for bawl—and so led the wolf on.

“I never did realise before how big a fool a calf can be,” said Dig, reviewing his strenuous day. “But say! let’s smoke one of the hams.”

“How?” demanded Chet.

“Hang it over the fire, of course,” returned the sanguine Digby.

“And who’s going to find the proper kind of wood to smoke it without merely blackening the meat with soot? And who’s going to sit up all night and watch the fire? Besides, it would take three or four nights to smoke a ham properly. I hope we’ll shoot other game before we get to Grub Stake.”

“Oh, well, I only threw it out as a hint,” sighed Dig. “Nothing I say goes.”

“Not even your maverick, eh?” chuckled Chet.

They cleared up after supper and then Chet advised Dig to get into his blanket and get two hours’ sleep.

“Don’t believe that wolf will be down here,” Dig mumbled. “No need to keep wa-wa-watch—Waugh!” and he stretched his jaws in a mighty gape.

“All right,” returned Chet. “You’re welcome to your belief. But I’ll keep first watch, and if I hear nothing alarming, I won’t wake you up.”

He was satisfied at first to go to the horses and see that they were picketed all right. He did not want either of them to get entangled in the rope and so get a burn. For that might lame them, and a lame horse on the trail is no happy chance.

The howling of the wolf up in the hill made the horses restless; but the maverick finally got tired and lay down again, Chet returned to the fire. His chum was already breathing heavily. The activities of the day had tired him out. Dig wasn’t exactly “soft,” but he was not innured to an out-of-door life as Chet was. Besides, he had several pounds of superfluous flesh to carry around.

His sleep was healthful, however; in the flickering firelight his bronzed face was calm.

“Good old scout!” thought Chet, watching him. “And heaps of fun! But he’s as obstinate as a toad—one of those whom he says were chased out of Ireland! I don’t know what I’d do without Dig.”

The evening had shut down now, damp and still. Frogs complained somewhere along the edge of the narrow stream. Sleepy birds croaked now and then. Night insects sang.

Then came the long, haunting howl of the wolf from the heights. Every other sound seemed to hush while the howl endured.

A reply came from far out on the prairie; then a third wolf took up the cry from another direction. The pack was gathering.

Chet drew his heavy rifle closer and examined the hammer. It was well greased and the mechanism was working perfectly. But he put the rifle aside. He was not going to waste expensive ammunition on such useless creatures as wolves—if he could help it.

It was on his pistol that he depended to drive off marauders. He spun the cylinder and then tucked in the sixth cartridge. It was fully loaded now and he laid the gun down upon his dry blanket. It was as dangerous as a loaded bomb, for the plainsman never carried a gun fully loaded unless in time of stress or peril.

The horses stamped, and Poke nickered. But Dig slept on. His chum got up, pistol in hand, and slowly patrolled the camp again. Of course the wolves were not near as yet; nor were they giving tongue.

Chet had had some experience on the trail; and he had listened to many stories related by old plainsmen, but he did not know much about wolves, after all. He expected the pack to try to rush the camp, and to come up yelling like a band of wild Indians.

When the animals, which seemed to be gathering from all sides of the camp, ceased howling, he was puzzled. He wondered what had become of the wolves. Perhaps they had gone off on some other scent. Perhaps they had crossed the track of a deer and it had drawn them away from the camp.

The horses were still uneasy, and now Stone Fence scrambled up and leaped at the end of his rope, bawling pitifully. Something near at hand disturbed the animals, whose instinct and sense of smell were far superior to the boy’s sight and hearing.

Chet could see nothing; nor could he hear anything. Yet the restlessness of the horses and the calf kept him alert. He went around the camp again, and afterwards replenished the fire. He wished he had prepared more fuel. It was warm and they did not really need the fire; but at night a blaze in the open is company.

He went to Hero and quieted him, petting him and talking to him. Poke still stamped. Out on the open prairie, beyond the fringe of willows, Chet thought he saw something moving. He was tempted to send a shot in that direction.

“But that will wake Dig. And it’s only nervousness,” thought the boy. “Huh! I must be afraid of the dark.”

He went back to the fire and sat down. There was the bole of a small tree at his back. The position was tempting.

But the restlessness of the yearling precluded sleep. The little beast strained at the end of its tether, headed toward the fire, and blatted plaintively.

“My goodness! but you are a scared calf,” Chet muttered, rising again.

And then, just over the line of the calf’s straining back, he saw the gleam of two eyes in the edge of the thicket.

Chet Havens sprang up on the instant, and as he sprang he fired. He didn’t have to aim, for those eyes looked as big as saucers to him!

There was a shrill howl from the stricken beast. Chet’s ball had punctured its breast as it threw up its head. Answering howls came from all about the camp. It was ringed with the savage brutes that had gathered silently in expectation of the killing.

The pistol shot, the wolf’s howl, and the maverick’s bawling awoke Dig. He scrambled up, confused and dreaming.

“Don’t kill him! don’t kill him, Chet!” he begged. “The poor thing hasn’t bucked you into the brook.”

“You bet I killed him,” returned his chum, and the next instant fired again.

“But, Chet,” squealed his chum. “You don’t need to shoot him after he’s dead. Save your powder and lead—

“Whew! what’s happened? Stone Fence seems to be all right.”

“And if I hadn’t shot Mr. Wolf just in the nick of time, Stone Fence would have been slaughtered to make a lupine holiday,” chuckled Chet. “They’ve run, the cowardly scoundrels.”

“Thought you said they weren’t cowards?” yawned Dig.

“They’re not hungry enough to be brave yet. In the dead of winter, however, they’d have come right in to the fire and fought for the calf. Shorten the tether on him, Dig. And I’ll bring the horses nearer. I don’t like these beasts. They sneak in too close for comfort.”

“Say! you’ve waked me up now,” grumbled Dig. “Might as well stay awake. I’ll keep watch. What time is it?”

“Wake me at midnight,” Chet said, not at all loath to give his partner a bit of work.

He rolled up in his blanket; but he did not sleep at first, although he closed his eyes. Dig did not make any particular noise, but he kept stirring around the camp. The horses and the yearling remained quiet for a long time.

Dig was getting tired of his vigil. He slumped down with his back to the same tree against which Chet had rested. Then—one, two, three, and he was off! A long snore, and he was in the Land of Nod.

Save for the boys’ breathing the camp was still. Stone Fence probably dozed as he lay at the end of his tether. The horses were grazing again.

But if nothing else, the smell of their brother’s blood would have brought the wolves back. They skulked along the watercourse and at the edge of the thicket. The flickering firelight did not frighten them.

They gave the horses a wide berth, for they feared their heels. The yearling was lying within the radiance of the firelight. The wolves surrounded the camp once more; but they drew near only at one point.

The beasts are not averse to licking the bones of their own kind. The dead wolf, that Chet had shot, drew them. And nearby hung the venison in the tops of the saplings.

Silently at first; then with muffled growls and the snapping of slavering jaws, the wolves fought over their comrade. There were a dozen and more of them. The horses moved uneasily, and the yearling struggled up again; but the boys slept.

One lank and hungry brute smelled the hanging deer flesh and slunk away to the spot. He leaped for it—again and yet again.

Chet had no idea how high a wolf could jump. He thought he had hung the meat out of reach of every marauder; but Mr. Wolf did not think so.

The horses and Stone Fence became quiet again. The chums sunk together into a deeper sleep. The fire burned down to mere embers.

Perhaps something occurred to make the wolves beat a silent retreat; at least, they left the vicinity of the encampment without raising another alarm. If the horses were now and then uneasy, their stamping did not awake Chet and Dig.

The day’s activities had exhausted the chums. Once asleep, Chet slept as heavily as Digby. Nothing occurred to arouse them until daybreak; then Chet awoke suddenly, sat up, threw off his blanket, and looked about in surprise.

“Say, you sleepy-headed coot!” he roared, flinging an empty milk-can at the still sleeping Dig. “What d’ye mean—sleeping like this? You never woke me up.”

“Ugh! Huh?” demanded Dig. “You ought to thank me for that, then.”

“You’d make a nice soldier!”

“Never claimed to be a soldier, and didn’t expect to go soldiering when I came out on the trail with you,” declared Dig belligerently. “I guess you’ll find everything all right. And you slept just as hard as I did.”

“Sha’n’t trust you to keep watch again,” said Chet.

“Well, that’s a good thing! By the last hoptoad that was chased out of Ireland! I don’t want to keep watch.”

But Chet was serious. He saw that the horses and the calf were safe. But when he went into the thicket, he saw that the dead wolf had been dragged away to a distance and there torn to bits. Only red bones and bits of fur remained.

Then he remembered the haunches of venison left hanging to cool. He ran to the spot. Only a single ham hung in the top of a sapling. The others had been torn down. The tops of the saplings were broken, supposedly by the wolves as they leaped for the meat.

At Chet’s first cry Dig came running.

“Now you can see what was done while you slept,” said young Havens, with disgust.

“Whew! The miserable, thieving beasts!” burst out Dig. “Wish I’d caught ’em at it—”

“You were snoozing your head off,” was his chum’s accusation. “That’s when this happened.”

He suddenly became silent, however. He bent over and examined the disturbed ground underneath the spot where the lost meat had hung. Then he glanced keenly all about.

“Hold on, Dig,” he said softly, waving his chum back. “Don’t step in any nearer.”

“What’s the matter?” queried his surprised friend. “See a wolf print that you know? An old friend, for instance?”

“Wait,” begged Chet again. “I see something besides wolf-paw prints.”

“What, for goodness’ sake?” demanded the other, startled.

“The print of boots—men’s boots.”

“Get out!”

“I tell you at least one man has been here.”

“Pshaw! our own footprints! You gave me a scare, Chet.”

“No,” Chet said earnestly. “I see our marks. But a person with a much bigger foot has been here. See that? and that? Some stranger. I—I’m not sure that we have been robbed by wolves, after all, Dig.”

“By the last hoptoad that was chased out of Ireland” gasped the other boy. “What do you mean? Who could have robbed us? I don’t understand, Chet.”

“Neither do I,” returned young Havens. “Don’t come this way and foul the marks any more. Let’s see where this fellow came from, and where he went to.”