It was snowing fast. He closed his left hand and grasped a whole fistful of flakes. The body of the bear was a mound of white--like a new-made grave over him, he dismally thought. The snow had drifted under and about his shoulders. Its chill struck the wound in his thigh, which throbbed as though hit with pointed hammers, keeping time to the pulsations of his heart; but, thank God! he no longer felt that horrible warm trickling down his leg. He had been preserved from bleeding to freeze to death. How long before that would happen; or, if it were not cold enough for that, how long before the snow would drift clear over him and cut off the little breath which that ponderous, inert, dead-cold beast on his chest prevented from entering his lungs? Where was the dog? He called feebly: “Shep! Shep! Hi-i-i, Sh-e-p!” But no moist nose or rough tongue responded. He tried to whistle, but his parched mouth refused. Heavens, how thirsty! He stretched out his hand and gathered the snow within his reach. Then he closed his eyes and dreamed that two giants were pulling him asunder, and that a third was pouring molten lead down his throat. But it was only Bill Cooper trying to make him drink whiskey. He understood it after a little and realized that he ought to swallow. Then life came back, and with the knowledge that he was no longer alone on the cold, remote, relentless mountain top, but that Cooper was lifting away the bear, and that Shep was wild with sympathy and gladness because he had been able to bring help, came courage and forbearance of his suffering. In the morning new strength came with the sunshine. The snow rapidly melted. Cooper got breakfast and Tom rebandaged his knee. “These gashes won't amount to much, unless the claws were poisoned. You'll have to make me a crutch, and give me a couple of days to get rid of the stiffness, but then I'll be all right.” “How did you and the bear get into this scrimmage, anyhow? You surely didn't go hunting him with that there six shooter?” “Not I. The wind was blowing hard toward me, so he didn't smell nor hear me, and I ran right on to him. Shep was not there to warn me, but if he hadn't come back just as he did, or if I hadn't been able to get at my revolver, Old Ephraim would ha' used me up in about a minute.” “I ain't a betting on one pistol shot against a grizzly, anyhow.” “Of course, the chances were about one in a thousand, but I wasn't going to die without a shot. I suppose the bullet struck the lower part of the brain.” “Yes,” said Bill, who had been probing its track. “Tore it all to pieces. But what was the bear after in that brush?”