“I’m not tellin’ you to, either. Your job is to stay away from there.” Fargo suddenly leaned forward, his eyes burning. “You know what I’d like to see?” he whispered. “I’d like to have that Crowson girl ride up there in a day or two and find every one of those damned woollies—every one, not three or four hundred of ’em—dead and rotting in the grass. Then people’d know this was a cattle country. Since we’ve gone as far as we have, the thing to do is to go all the way. And we might work it yet.” José’s face showed that he was interested. “Poison?” he asked. “You can’t never tell about poison. Sheep are queer critters. When they’re well fed they’ll shy of anything that tastes queer. Think again——” “The only other way’s rifles—and that would take a carload of shells. But I tell you—the coyotes will slash a lot of ’em and run the rest to death.” “Maybe—and maybe not. A coyote don’t run sheep. They kill all they can, and then start to eatin’. Of course there’s exceptions. It takes a dog to slash a hundred of ’em in one night—and run the rest——” And at that instant his words were drowned out. A strange, formidable cry reached them from behind the house: a long, far-carrying chorus of savage voices. It rang shockingly loud in the silent darkness. It was a symphony of prolonged, deep bays,—a sound as terrifying and menacing as any voice of the wilderness. And an evil glitter came into Fargo’s eyes. The explosion of sound, blaring out so suddenly in the stillness, had startled José; but he caught himself at once. The cry ceased, the stillness fell again. “Your pack of bear dogs!” he exclaimed. “Yes. It was as if they heard us talkin’ about sheep. It’s like they was tryin’ to tell us what to do.” It was true. It might have been the voice of an evil genius, prompting their vicious designs. Fargo was a superstitious man, and now he was tingling all over with hatred and malice, inspired to the depths of his wicked being by the cry in the darkness. “Yes,” he whispered. “My pack of bear dogs—ten of ’em, savage as wolves—and not to be afraid of no wounded shepherd dog, and tearin’ to pieces any one that tries to stop ’em. They’ve told us how to solve our problem. And I don’t see why I didn’t think of ’em before.” CHAPTER XIV It didn’t take Fargo long to perfect his plans. As the dawn emerged he talked them over with the Mexican, José, and the latter was ready with any little suggestions that did not occur to his chief. And the gray, soft, mysterious light of early morning came into that conference—through the stained and cobwebbed windowpane—and found a darkness it could not alleviate.