"We're a couple of wise ones, going after that wolf with only three shots to our name. Of course by himself he's harmless--but he's likely enough to lead us straight toward the pack. And Snowbird--I didn't like his looks. He's too gaunt, and he's too hungry--and I haven't a bit of doubt he waited in that brush for us to come, intending to attack us--and lost his nerve the last thing. That shows he's desperate. I don't like him, and I wouldn't like his pack. And a whole pack might not lose _its_ nerve." "Then you think we'd better turn back?" "Yes, I do, and not come out any more without a whole pocket of shells. I'm going to carry my rifle, too, just as Lennox has always advised. He's only got a flesh-wound. You saw what you did with two cartridges--got in one flesh-wound. Three of 'em against a pack wouldn't be a great deal of aid. I don't mean to say you can't shoot, but a jumping, lively wolf is worse than a bird in the air. We've gone over three miles; and he'd lead us ten miles farther--even if he didn't go to the pack. Let's go back." "If you say so. But I don't think there's the least bit of danger. We can always climb a tree." "And have 'em make a beautiful circle under it! They've got more patience than we have--and we'd have to come down sometime. Your father can't come to our help, you know. It's the sign of the tenderfoot not to think there's any danger--and I'm not going to think that way any more." They turned back and mushed in silence a long time. "I suppose you'll think I'm a coward," Dan asked her humbly. "Only prudent, Dan," she answered, smiling. Whether she meant it, he did not know. "I'm just beginning to understand that you--living here only a few months--really know and understand all this better than I do." She stretched her arms wide to the wilderness. "I guess it's your instincts." "And I do understand," he told her earnestly. "I sensed danger back there just as sure as I can see your face. That pack--and it's a big one--is close; and it's terribly hungry. And you know--you can't help but know--that the wolves are not to be trusted in famine times." "I know it only too well," she said. Then she paused and asked him about a strange grayness, like snow blown by the wind, on the sky over the ridge. III Bert Cranston waited in a clump of exposed thicket on the hillside until he saw two black dots, that he knew were Dan and Snowbird, leave the Lennox home. He lay very still as they circled up the ridge, noticing that except for the pistol that he knew Snowbird always carried, they were unarmed. There was no particular reason why he should be interested in that point. It was just the mountain way always to look for weapons, and it is rather difficult to trace the mental processes behind this impulse. Perhaps it can be laid to the fact that many mountain families are often at feud with one another, and anything in the way of violence may happen before the morning.