“You keep buckshot in that gun, Brother Schoonover; do you hear? Oh, my li’l’ lamb! What if that wicked lion had eat you up?” Her son did not appear at all disturbed by the speculation, but thumped on her breast with his fists. There was a tremendous to-do up and down the country for eighty leagues. The manager of the Anvil offered a hundred dollars reward for the murderer’s hide and the cowboys of the region blazed away at every bobcat that showed a hair within their line of vision. Even Richter’s sheep herders bestirred themselves to set traps, but all to no avail. And the victim being a native child, the killing soon ceased to be a live topic. The winter arrived in the wake of a norther. It blustered for a fortnight, then set in to be bitterly cold. Bowallopus fared well, and grew ever more malignant and furtive. One rib was cracked owing to misjudgment of distance, but accidents are likely to occur to the best of hunters. In diving from a tree for the back of a colt, he missed and came down close to the mare. In a flash he gathered himself and leaped again, but the mother’s heels crashed full on his side and she went away at full speed, her son running a good second. On another occasion a young bull caught him with a headlong rush, unprepared on his kill, and would have made short work with so excellent a start, had not Bowallopus sought safety in the fleetness of his legs. He was a sapient animal and knew when he had enough. Spring came at last, and Bowallopus had a fight. It was a family affair--his wife was not wholly blameless--and it is better for all concerned to say only that he came off the victor. A young puma had wandered into his ridges from the south and west, and he never went back. When a mountain lion does fight, it is worth going many miles to see. Some years it will rain so hard in this part of the cow country that the nesters can but sit and watch their puny efforts at raising corn seep away; but the cattle rejoice exceedingly. It must be admitted, however, that this happens extremely seldom. Generally the land bakes under cloudless skies from February to June and the earth opens in cracks, as though gasping for breath. Brother Schoonover broke his ground and planned to raise a bumper crop of corn, the signs being propitious. He made two trips to town, three days each way by wagon, in order to make all ready. Bowallopus used often to see him toiling long after sunset; the puma spent many hours of the dark in sinister vigil beyond the fence, where he could see the light burning steadily in the dugout. Again he would prowl completely around the claim, keeping always off the wire, for that solitary strand was associated with man. Once he topped the hill back of the home in late afternoon, though it was seldom he went abroad in daylight, and hid behind a boulder. The Schoonover baby was crawling near the door, on hands and knees. Bowallopus never once removed his gaze from him in a full hour.