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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2f196f0 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #65777 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/65777) diff --git a/old/65777-0.txt b/old/65777-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 50ad8dd..0000000 --- a/old/65777-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,7784 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Treve, by Albert Payson Terhune - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Treve - -Author: Albert Payson Terhune - -Release Date: July 6, 2021 [eBook #65777] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: Tim Lindell, University of Vermont, Martin Pettit and the - Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net - (This book was produced from images made available by the - HathiTrust Digital Library.) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TREVE *** - -+-------------------------------------------------+ -|Transcriber’s note: | -| | -|Obvious typographic errors have been corrected. | -| | -+-------------------------------------------------+ - - -Treve - - - - -BOOKS BY - -ALBERT PAYSON TERHUNE - -Lad: A Dog -Further Adventures of Lad -Lad of Sunnybank -Bruce -Buff: A Collie -The Critter -A Dog Named Chips -The Faith of a Collie -Gray Dawn -His Dog -Lochinvar Luck -My Friend the Dog -Treve -The Way of a Dog -Wolf -A Highland Collie -Collie to the Rescue -Best Loved Dog Stories - - -[Illustration] - - - - -ALBERT PAYSON TERHUNE - -Treve - -Grosset & Dunlap - -PUBLISHERS - -NEW YORK - - - - -COPYRIGHT, 1924, -BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY - - -PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA - - - - -My book - -is dedicated to - -ELLEN COMLY - -_Treve’s friend and mine_ - - - - -CONTENTS - -CHAPTER PAGE - I. The Coming of Treve 11 - - II. Thirst! 39 - - III. Marooned 70 - - IV. The Killer 104 - - V. A Secret Adventure 133 - - VI. Deserted 155 - - VII. Theft and Untheft 179 - -VIII. In the Hands of the Enemy 205 - - IX. His Mate 225 - - X. The Rustlers 247 - - XI. The Parting of the Ways 267 - - XII. Afterword 290 - - - - -Treve - - - - -CHAPTER I: THE COMING OF TREVE - - -The rickety and rackety train was droning along over the desert -miles--miles split and sprinkled by cheerless semi-arid foothills. -At dusk it had shrieked and groaned its way over a divide and slid -clatteringly down the far side amid a screech of brakes. - -Out into the desert-like plain with the scatter of less dead foothills -it had emerged in early evening. Now, as midnight drew on, the desert -ground--with its strewing of exquisite wild flowers here and there -among the sick sage brush and crippled Joshua trees--took a less -desolate aspect; though it was too dark a night for the few waking -passengers to note this. - -The Dos Hermanos River lay a few miles ahead--many more miles on the -hither side of the Dos Hermanos mountain range. The half-fertile land -of the river valley was merging with the encroach of the desert. - -Fraser Colt got to his feet in the rank-atmosphered smoking section of -the way-train’s one Pullman; hooked a fat finger at the porter to find -if his berth had been made up; then loafed through to the baggage car -for a last inspection of his collie pup, before turning in. - -Now it is a creditable thing for a man to assure himself of his dog’s -comfort for the night. Often it bespeaks more or less heart. But, -in the case of Fraser Colt it did nothing of the sort; nor was it -creditable to anything but his interest in his dog’s money value. - -As to heart, Fraser Colt had one;--a serviceable and well-appointed -heart. It pumped blood through his plump body. Apart from that -function, it did no work at all. Or if it beat tenderly toward any -living thing, that living thing was Fraser Colt alone. - -Into the ill-lit baggage car he made his way. There were not less than -ten occupants of the car. Two of them were normal humans. The third was -Fraser Colt. The remaining seven were dogs. - -This was by no means the only westbound train, of long or short run, to -carry dogs, that night. For at eleven o’clock on the morrow the annual -show of the Dos Hermanos Kennel Club was to open. Exhibitors, for two -hundred miles, were bringing the best in their kennels to it. - -Seven crates were lined up, along the walls of the baggage car, when -Colt slouched in. The baggageman was drowsing in his tiptilted greasy -chair. In a far corner sat an oldish kennelman who had just taken from -a crate a police dog, which he was grooming. Because the night was -stiflingly hot, the car’s side door was rolled halfway open to let in a -sluice of dust-filled cooler air. - -Fraser Colt went over to a crate, unlocked and opened its slatted door -and snapped his fingers. At the summons--indeed, as soon as the door -was opened wide enough for him to wriggle through--a dog danced out -onto the dirty floor. - -Then, for an instant, the newly released prisoner halted and glanced -up at the man who had let him out. The wavery light revealed him as a -well-grown collie pup, about eight months old. Golden-tawny was his -heavy coat and snowy were his ruff and frill and paws. He had about him -the indefinable air that distinguishes a great dog from a merely good -dog--even as a beautiful woman is distinguished from a merely pretty -woman. - -His deepset dark eyes had the true “look of eagles,” young as he was. -His head and fore-face were chiseled in strong classic lines. His small -ears had the perfect tulip dip to them, without which no show-collie -can hope to excel. But, though three show-collies out of five need to -have their ears weighted or otherwise treated, to attain this correct -bend of the tips, here was a pup whose ear-carriage was as natural as -it was perfect. - -You will visit many a fairly good dogshow, before you find an -eight-month pup--or grown collie, for that matter--with the points -and classic beauty and indefinable air of greatness possessed by the -youngster that was now returning Fraser Colt’s appraising gaze. - -There was no love in the pup’s upturned glance, as he viewed his -owner;--although, normally, a pup of that age regards the whole world -as his friend, and lavishes enthusiastic affection on the man who owns -him. - -This pup was eyeing Colt with no fear, but with no favor. His look -was doubting, uncertain, almost hostile. But Colt did not heed this. -His expert eye was interested in scanning only the young collie’s -perfection, from a show-point. And he was well satisfied. - -He had paid a low price for this collie; buying him at his breeder’s -ill-attended forced sale, three weeks earlier. Colt was a dog-man; -but that does not mean he was a dog fancier. To him, a dog was a mere -source of revenue. He had foreseen grand possibilities in the pup. - -He had entered him in three classes, for the Dos Hermanos show; whither -now he was taking him. This he had not done through any shred of -sportsmanship; but because he knew the type of folk who visit such -western shows. - -He was certain of carrying the pup triumphantly through his various -classes and of annexing several goodly cash specials. For there were, -and are, few high class show-collies in the Dos Hermanos region; though -there are scores of wide-headed and splay-footed sheep-tending collies -scattered among the ranches there. - -Fraser Colt knew that rich ranchmen and others of their sort would be -glad to pay a fancy price for such a pup; especially after he should -have won a few blue ribbons under their very eyes. There were certain -to be fat offers for the puppy, at the show; and the fattest of these -Colt was planning to take. - -Thus it was that he had come for a last look at the youngster before -going to bed. He wanted to make sure the pup was comfortable enough, -to-night, not to look jaded or dull in the ring, to-morrow. - -He stooped and ran a rough hand over the golden-tawny coat; not in -affection, but in appraisal. The puppy drew back from his touch; in -distaste rather than in fear. Then the deepset dark eyes caught sight -of the police dog in the far corner. - -Perhaps in play, perhaps in lonely craving for friendliness, the collie -scampered gayly across to the larger dog. - -The latter was submitting in dumb surliness to his handler’s grooming. -The big police dog had not relished being yanked from his crate, late -at night, for brushing and rubbing. Indeed, he had not relished any -part of the joltingly noisy ride. He was not in the sunniest of tempers. - -Over to him scampered the friendly collie pup. As he came within a foot -or so of his destination, the car gave a drunken lurch, in rounding a -bend of the track. The capering puppy was thrown off his unaccustomed -car-balance. He collided sharply with the police dog. - -The impact set the larger dog’s ruffled temper ablaze. With a roar, he -hurled himself bodily upon the unsuspecting collie stripling. - -Now a collie comes of a breed that is never taken wholly by surprise. -Even as the big dog lunged, the pup recoiled from the onslaught, at the -same time bracing himself on the swaying floor of the car. He recoiled; -but not far enough. - -The larger dog’s ravening teeth missed their mark at the base of the -spine; but they seized the puppy’s left ear; biting it through. At the -same time the police dog shook the dumbfounded pup savagely from side -to side. - -Before the puppy could make any effort to defend himself, the handler -and Fraser Colt had rushed into the fray. The police dog was hauled -back, snapping and snarling. Colt’s rough hand restrained the collie -from doing anything in the way of reprisal. The very brief fight was -ended. - -Colt glanced over his pup, once more; this time with more worry than -mere appraisal. Battle-scarred canine visages do not impress dogshow -judges favorably. - -Then, from Fraser Colt’s thick throat avalanched a torrent of lurid -blasphemy. For he saw something which affected him as might the loss of -his garish diamond scarfpin. - -One of the puppy’s tulip ears still tipped gracefully forward from the -point. But the other ear hung down from the side of his head as limply -as a sodden handkerchief. In brief, if one ear was tulip, the other was -wilted cabbage leaf. - -From the down-hanging lacerated ear, blood was trickling; in token of -the police dog’s bite. The shaking of the mighty jaws had wrenched -and broken the cartilage and muscular system of the stricken ear into -raglike loppiness. - -Ear-carriage is an all-important detail in the judging of show-collies. -Lack of perfect ear-carriage may perhaps be condoned to some extent, -if the dog’s other points be good enough to counteract it. But no -collie-judge on earth would give a ribbon to a dog with one semi-erect -ear and one ear that hangs flappily down the side of his head. - -No, the pup’s show possibilities were gone,--absolutely gone. Two -minutes earlier he had been worth perhaps $400 of any fancier’s cash. -As he stood, he was worth as much, for all show-purposes, as a one-eyed -woman in a beauty contest. - -That savage wrench of the police dog’s jaws had harmed no vital spot. -But it had ripped hundreds of dollars out of Fraser Colt’s bank -account. Why, nobody, now, would be willing to pay as much as $50 for -the collie, as a pet! Who would want a lopsided, clownish-looking dog, -when a handsome mutt could be bought for half the price? - -To Colt, a dog was as much an insensate chattel as was a bank note. -This particular dog had just deprived him of a rare chance to annex -many bank notes. In illogical fury, he brought his open hand down over -the puppy’s bleeding head, with a resounding and stingingly painful -slap. In Colt’s present frame of mind, he must needs take out his -furious disappointment on something. - -The blow knocked the puppy half way across the car. Striding after him, -Fraser Colt swung his hand--fist clenched, this time--for a second and -heavier blow. - -In righteous indignation at the injustice, and in unbearable pain, the -collie met the second attack, halfway. As Colt’s big fist smote at him, -the pup shifted deftly aside from the descending arm. Slashing as he -jumped, he scored a deep red furrow in his owner’s wrist. - -With a howl of rage, Colt flung himself, mouthing and foaming, upon -the luckless puppy. He snatched up the young collie by the nape of the -neck, and hurled the vainly protesting furry body out through the open -side doorway of the car. - -Now, by all laws of averages, a puppy thrown off a train going thirty -miles or more an hour, should have landed on the hard track ballast or -the right of way, with enough force to break several bones or even his -skull. - -But the law of averages was kind to this particular puppy. Perhaps out -of pity for his wrecked show-career; perhaps because the pup was born -for great deeds. - -For several seconds the rumble of the train over the ballast had given -place to a hollower sound. Also, the thirty-mile speed had slowed down -perceptibly. All this by reason of the fact that the engine and front -cars had begun to cross the cantilever railroad bridge which spans the -Dos Hermanos River in the very heart of the Dos Hermanos Valley. - -The pup catapulted out into windy space, in the arc of a wide circle. -But he did not smash sickeningly against the hard ground beside the -track. There was no ground alongside the track. There was nothing -alongside the track but night air. - -Through this air, head over heels, spun the flying tawny-gold body. -Down and down he fell, past the level of the bridge span; missing an -outthrust concrete-and-stone buttress by a fraction of an inch. - -With a loud splash that knocked the breath out of him, he struck the -sluggish water of the Dos Hermanos River. The rush of his fall was -broken, in part, by this breath-expelling impact. But enough momentum -remained to carry him several feet below the surface. - -The train chugged drearily on. The stillness of midnight crept -down again over the lonely valley. The ripples had not died on the -disturbed water when a classically wedge-shaped head reappeared above -the surface; and four sturdy feet began to strike out in confused but -energetic fashion toward the nearer bank. Still in sharp pain and -fighting for his lost breath, the puppy swam on; letting the easy -current carry him downstream in a slant, rather than to waste extra -strength in fighting it. - -Lionel Arthur Montagu Brean was far too accustomed to the roar of -passing trains to let such sounds awaken him from slumber. As the -engine and cars rolled hollowly over the bridge, a hundred yards -upstream, they did not so much as penetrate his sleep-mists in the form -of a dream. But presently a far less noticeable sound stirred him to -wakefulness. This because the lesser sound was also less familiar to -the wanderer’s subconscious self. - -Through his sleep he heard a despairful panting and an accompanying -churn of the quiet stream on whose bank he had pitched camp for the -night. Brean sat up, stupidly, rubbing his eyes. In front of him, not -twenty feet from shore, something was plowing a difficult way through -the yellow water, toward the spot where he sat. - -Brean got to his feet, wondering. The advancing shape took on size -and form. The swimmer was emerging from the water. Through the dim -starlight, the man was able to make out that the oncomer was a very wet -and bedraggled collie. - -At sight of the man, the pup hesitated, half in and half out of the -water. Brean bent toward him and called: - -“Come on, son! Nobody’s going to hurt you.” - -The voice and the gesture that went with it were reassuringly friendly. -The dog read them aright. He was still little more than a baby. He had -been cruelly and unjustly manhandled. His heart ached for the human -kindness he had known before he fell into Fraser Colt’s possession. -Hesitant no longer, he came straight up to the man. - -Brean petted him, speaking friendlily. Then, as the light was elusive, -he went over to his smoldering camp fire and stirred it into life. The -flare showed him every detail of the pup; even to the bleeding and -lopped ear. At sight of the injury a long-dormant professional instinct -flared up in the wanderer, as suddenly and as brightly as the fire had -just flared from its embers. - -Lionel Arthur Montagu Brean had once possessed the right to tack the -courtesy title of “Honorable” in front of his name. For he was the -fifth son of Lord Airstoken, an impecunious Irish peer. There had been -four older brothers; and Lionel had been allowed to follow his own -yearnings to become a physician. He was a natural-born surgeon; and, -from the start, he won for himself an enviable name at Guy’s Hospital. - -But he was a natural-born crook, as well. Thus, within three months -after his graduation with honors, he was a fugitive from justice; -through the clumsy forging of a check, wherewith to meet certain -pressing gambling debts. - -He smuggled himself to America by steerage. - -Penniless, hopeless, afflicted with a love for wandering, he had sunk -presently to the philosophical leisure of tramphood. Life was easy for -him. He followed the climate, north and south, through a belt of the -Far West; picking up food and rudimentary clothes as best he could. -Half forgotten was his British home. Wholly forgotten had been his -almost uncanny skill at surgery;--until the sight of the collie pup’s -broken ear revived it. - -Partly in self-derision, partly in amusement, he set to work, before -the crackling campfire, treating the ear. In his final year at Guy’s, -he had won a wager from a collie-breeding friend. The latter had -claimed that a collie’s broken ear is incurable. Brean had made such -an ear as good as new. True, then he had had all manner of appliances -for the task; while now he was forced to rely on ingenuity and on such -meager makeshifts as his battered kit contained. Yet the old skill was -throbbing in his fingertips. - -The pup did not wince under the deftly light handling. He seemed to -know the tramp was trying to help him. If the operation hurt, the -accompanying words soothed. - -“Puppy,” apostrophized Brean, “you’re a most honored dog. Do you -realize that the hand operating on you might now be operating on the -King of England, if the luck had broken differently for me? They all -said nothing could stop me from going straight to the top. And then -a little oblong of scribbled paper sent me straight to the bottom, -puppy. But it’s lucky for you that it did. For if I were back in -Harley Street, with a ‘Sir’ stuck in front of my name for my surgical -preëminence,--why, don’t you see I couldn’t be working over you, now? - -“That’d mean you’d have to go through life with one-half of your grand -head looking like a lop-eared rabbit’s. Yes, you’re an honored dog; -and a lucky dog, too.... Now don’t shake your head or rub it against -anything, before that dressing gets set! - -“This is known as the ‘Treve Operation.’ Because I tried it, first, on -Noel Treve’s dog, you see. I think I’ll name you ‘Treve’ in honor of -your own operation. Like the name? - -“How about something to eat? I ask the question merely as a bit of -rhetoric. For there isn’t a crumb of food in the larder. We’re on our -way to the Dos Hermanos ranch, Treve. Last year, when I dropped in -there, they gave me a sumptuous breakfast and told me if I was caught -on their land again, they’d shoot me. Let’s hope their memory for -faces is short, puppy. I’m taking you along as my welcome. It’s only a -matter of twelve miles to the ranch house. Now, let’s go back to sleep, -shan’t we?” - - -Neither Royce Mack nor his sour old partner, Joel Fenno, had or ever -would have the right to prefix their names with “Honorable”;--either by -dint of being the sons of British lords or by election to legislature -or Congress. But, unlike the Honorable Lionel Arthur Montagu Brean, -they never had had to worry as to where the next meal was coming from. - -Their big sheep ranch covered eighteen hundred acres of grazing land. -And, in the dry season, their flocks went northward, at an absurdly -small price per head, into the richer government grazing lands, on the -upper slopes of the twin Dos Hermanos peaks. - -They were working hard and they were making fair money. Their chief -cause for woe in life was that their neighbors, the cattle ranchers, -looked upon them and on all sheepmen as something lower than skunks. - -This contemptuous hostility on the part of the cattlemen did not annoy -Joel Fenno in the very least; so long as it was confined to mere -words and looks. Fenno was ancient and hardbitten and surly and with -the mental epidermis of a rhinoceros. Mack, being younger and more -sensitive, girded at the thought that any man or collection of men on -earth could look on him as an inferior. - -The partners had ridden out from the ranch house before daylight this -morning to their Number Three camp, where the spring “marking” was -going on. Having seen that the marking gang was satisfactorily at work, -they walked over to the Number Three foreman’s shack, for breakfast. - -The shack was like a thousand of its sort, from Arizona to Oregon; -the single room’s walls decked with fading and yellowed and frayed -pictures cut from long-ago Sunday Supplements; its untidy furniture -sparse and in dire need of repair. Its one distinguishing feature was a -fast-graying lump of sugar which adorned a broken corner bracket, in a -place of honor among a litter of fossil bits and snake rattles and the -like. - -This lump of sugar was the sole and treasured memento of the foreman’s -sole and treasured spree at Sacramento, three years agone. There he -had eaten at a restaurant. In a bowl at the restaurant were many such -cubes of white sugar. Never having seen sugar in such shape before, -the reveler had stolen one of the lumps and brought it home to show to -admiring friends. - -The foreman had finished his breakfast and had hurried back to his -gang; as is the way of foremen when the boss or the bosses chance to -be on hand. But Mack and Fenno were lingering over their flapjacks and -black coffee. - -Both looked up as a shadow--or rather two shadows--blocked the open -doorway. On the threshold stood a man whose clothes and bearing -proclaimed him a tramp. Close at his knee, and surveying the partners -with gravely inquiring interest, was a tawny-golden young collie dog; -one ear bound up in a queer arrangement of splints. - -On the way to the ranch house, Brean had skirted the edge of Number -Three camp; modestly keeping out of sight of its busy workers. The -sight of smoke curling from the foreman’s chimney and the faint-borne -aroma of coffee had made him change his plans. Perhaps he could get a -satisfactory meal here, without risking ejection by facing the partners -at the ranch house. Wherefore, he had made furtively for the shack; and -now stood confronting the two he had sought to avoid. - -For a moment the men at the table stared dully at the man in the sunlit -doorway. The man in the doorway stared embarrassedly at the men at the -littered table; and inhaled the smell of coffee and fried meat. The -collie also sniffed appreciation of the goodly smells; and continued -to eye the eaters with friendly gravity. It was Brean who spoke first. - -“I say, you fellows,” he said, dropping for once into the voice and -manner that had been his birthright. “I have a really valuable collie, -here. I am forced to part with him, because I have decided to abandon -my hike through your state, and return East. He is sheep-broken. I know -how worthwhile he will be on your sheep-ranges. Do you care to make me -an offer for him? I was referred to you by my good friend and former -schoolfellow, Carston, of the Beaulieu ranch.” - -The last portion of his smoothly spoken harangue was pure inspiration. -True, an Englishman named Carston owned an adjoining sheep ranch. And -Brean had chanced to hear his name. But never had he set eyes on the -rancher; an odd reluctance causing him to avoid fellow-countrymen, in -his present straits. - -“Why didn’t Carston buy the pup himself?” demanded Royce Mack, breaking -the brief silence, as Joel glowered perplexedly at the visitor as -though trying to place him in an elusive memory. - -“He’s full up, with sheep dogs,” said Brean, glibly. - -“So are we,” grunted Fenno. “Say, where have I run across you before?” - -“Perhaps at Carston’s?” suggested Brean, trying not to quail. “But I -was not in these hiking clothes then. I wonder you recognize me.” - -“Maybe,” grumbled Joel. “But I doubt it. I’ll remember, presently. I -always do.” - -“In the meantime,” urged Brean, with much jauntiness, “do you care to -buy this dog?” - -“No,” replied Joel. “We don’t.” - -“It’s your own loss,” smiled Brean. “I offered you the chance, because -Carston told me to. I must be going. By the way,” lingering at the -threshold, “will you sell me a mouthful of breakfast? I shall be glad, -of course, to pay a fair price for it. I hoped to get over to Carston’s -ranch house in time to eat. But I overslept. If it is any trouble--” - -He hesitated politely. - -“If you had kept your eyes and ears open, on your hike,” supplied Mack, -wondering at the British pedestrian’s ignorance of the ranch-country’s -ways, “you’d know folks around here don’t let a stranger pay for a -meal. If an American had offered to, it’d have been an insult. Being -foreign, I s’pose you don’t know any better. Draw up a chair and eat. -Stop at the stove and bring the coffee-pot along with you.” - -He spoke with no hospitality. Yet he was almost fawningly friendly, -compared with his partner, who continued to favor the guest with a -deepening scowl of perplexity. Brean was glad he had shaved the beard -which had been one of his salient marks when last he had met these men. -Also that, this time, he had abandoned his wonted tramplike speech. - -Eagerly, yet with no show of his stark eagerness, he drew up a rickety -chair to the board; and began to eat. Nor did he abandon the table -manners which, like correct speech, were his birthright. Royce, -covertly watching, was impressed. - -The collie lay down at Brean’s feet. The pup was hungry. But he did not -beg. This, too, impressed Royce Mack. Picking up a greasy lump of pork -from the central dish, Royce tossed it to the pup. The latter caught it -in mid-air--an easy trick his breeder had long since taught him. Then -he proceeded to eat it,--not wolfishly, but with a certain highbred -daintiness. - -“What’s his name?” asked Mack. - -“Treve,” said Brean, trying not to sound as if his mouth were -chuck-full. - -“Funny name for a dog,” commented Royce. - -“Not in my country,” civilly contradicted Brean, pouring himself -another cup of coffee. - -“What’s the matter with his ear?” pursued Mack. - -“Torn in a fight,” replied Brean, wishing devoutly there might be more -eating and less talking at this meal. “I set it, as best I could. It’s -only makeshift. But the splint and the bandage must stay on, for a few -days. After that the ear will be as good as new.” - -“H’m!” marveled Royce, noting the skill wherewith the bandage was -applied. “You dressed it as neat as a doctor.” - -“Quite naturally,” assented Brean, transferring two more flabbily -cooling flapjacks to his plate. “You see I chance to be a surgeon.” - -At this statement and at the confirmation offered by the deft dressing -on the ear, Joel Fenno’s face took on new clouds of puzzlement. He felt -he had almost cudgeled his memory into placing the visitor. Now, this -new development sidetracked his processes. He was quite certain he had -not met Brean in any medical capacity. He had been increasingly sure he -had met the man under circumstances somehow unfavorable to Brean. But -again he was all at sea. - -“You say the pup is broke to handlin’ sheep?” demanded Fenno, in hope -of finding some clue to bring his thoughts back again to the right -trail. “How old is he?” - -“A year old, last Monday,” returned Brean, rising as he spoke. “In my -country, we begin to break them to sheep at four months. I am sorry -you don’t care to buy him. He is a bargain.” - -He paused for an instant, then resumed, as he started doorward: - -“I must thank you for a good breakfast. I shall not forget your -hospitality to a foreigner in disreputable hiking clothes. But, -really,” feeling for his pocket, “I should feel more comfortable and -less like an intruder, if you would let me pay for what I have eaten.” - -Fenno’s curt headshake and his partner’s more vociferous refusal were -interrupted by Treve. - -Past the shack a herdsman drove a handful of lambs toward the marking -yard. As the way was short, and as the Number Three outfit’s only dog -was a half mile away herding another and larger bunch of sheep, the man -had undertaken to steer the lambs, singlehanded. He was making a ragged -job of it. - -At sound and scent of the approaching huddle of sheep, Treve leaped to -his feet; queer ancestral instincts tugging at the back of his alert -young brain. In all his eight months of life he had never seen nor -smelt a sheep. But his Scottish ancestors, for a hundred generations, -had earned their right to live by tending such creatures as these which -came trooping past the shack. Something far stronger than himself urged -the pup to action. - -At a single bound he cleared the table and bolted madly out through the -doorway, straight among the lambs. They scattered in every direction at -his onset. - -The shepherd yelled aloud in consternation. The lambs’ wild bleating -merged with Treve’s wilder barking. The two partners, at these dire -omens, jumped up; and dashed out of the shack, to witness the damage -menacing their four-footed means of livelihood. - -Lionel Arthur Montagu Brean stood, for one brief instant, frozen with -horror. Then he bolted through the back window of the shack; and ran -at top speed to the nearest patch of cover. Nor did he slacken greatly -his rapid retreat until he had put something like five miles between -himself and Number Three camp. Even then he did not come to a halt, but -kept on at such pace as he could muster. - -His haste and his continued flight were due only in part to the -unmasking of his pretense that Treve was a trained sheep-worker. As he -fled from the shack he snatched Joel Fenno’s vest from the back of the -rancher’s chair. - -During breakfast he had noted the presence of a broken old wallet in -the inside pocket of this momentarily discarded garment. From the -ill-fastened top of the wallet he had seen protruding the fringed edges -of a little roll of bills. And, as he fled, he took with him the price -of his dog. - -Meantime, the partners reached the shack’s doorway just in time to see -Treve come to a momentary halt as he eyed the far-scattering bunch of -lambs. - -Something else was clawing at the collie’s heartstrings. Something he -could not account for was striking into his young brain. Ancestry was -gripping him; even as it has gripped scores of other untrained collies -at their first sight of galloping sheep. This atavism takes a murderous -turn, in some such dogs; but in a few instances it plays true to form. - -Treve halted for only an instant. Then, like a furry whirlwind, he was -off after the lambs. Working wholly by instinct, he flashed past three -of them that were racing neck and neck. Then, almost without breaking -his stride, he wheeled, sweeping the bleating trio ahead of him toward -two more strays. - -He bunched the five in some semblance of scared order, then darted away -to the remaining strays, driving them, singly or in pairs, toward the -nucleus he had formed. Again and again he tore around this nucleus, as -it tried to scatter; welding it firm again. - -When the last stray had been added to it, he set the compact bunch in -motion. Brean was somewhere back there by the shack. To Brean, if to -any one now, he owed allegiance. And to Brean he resolved to drive his -baa-ing and milling lambs. - -Thus it was that the partners, in the doorway, saw the young dog round -up the bunch and bring it toward them. - -“A little ragged in spots, his work is,” commented Royce Mack. “But -for a young dog it isn’t so bad. Maybe they train ’em ragged, over in -England. We might do worse than take him, if we can buy him cheap. -We’re a dog short, since that rattler got Zippy. Besides, the pup’s -got a way with him that makes a hit with me. We can easy train that -roughness out of him.” - -He lowered his voice, and spoke with his lips close to Fenno’s ear; -lest Brean catch his words Joel looked about; as, at a wide-arm shooing -from the shepherd, the lambs bolted into the marking yard with the -joyous collie at their heels. - -Treve, his job done, trotted into the shack with them to rejoin his -tramp-master. Royce patted him in comradely fashion. To his own -surprise, he had begun to take a strong fancy to the beautiful pup. - -They did not find Brean in the hut. While the partners were still -wondering what had become of him, Joel Fenno discovered the loss of -his vest. And Treve’s ears were assailed with language which would have -done credit to Fraser Colt. - -“Well,” philosophized Mack, when the older man had sworn himself -hoarse, “we’ve got the pup, anyhow. It’s up to us to make him worth -the fifty bucks that panhandler got with your wallet. The dog’s yours. -You’ve sure paid for him.” - -“Your money as much as mine,” grunted Fenno. “It was from the ranch -cashbox. I brang it over here to give Billings for that lumber he -freighted to Number Three last week. He was due, past here, to-day, -and--” - -“Then it’s _our_ dog,” amended Mack; feeling somehow happier for the -knowledge. “Anyhow, we’ll see whose he is. Suppose we match for him?” - -Fenno glowered. He had bad luck when he and his partner matched coins -for anything. Yet his sporting nature was roused by the suggestion. His -glance fell speculatively upon the foreman’s treasured lump of sugar on -the bracket. - -“Gimme your pencil,” he ordered. “Mine is in my vest.” - -With the proffered pencil stub, he fell to work making regular dots on -the cube of sugar. Mack, after one questioning glance, saw his intent -and grinned. - -“Roll dice for him, hey?” he chuckled. “Good boy! Only we’ll have to -rub those spots off the sugar afterward. Moyle sets a heap of store by -that trophy. He’ll be as sore as a--” - -“Roll, first?” asked Joel, finishing the transformation of a smudged -lump of sugar into a spotty-looking and irregular die. - -“No, you,” said Mack. “Best two out of three. Let ’er roll!” - -Treve had come back from a fruitless quartering of the room, for Brean. -He stood inquisitively beside the table, as Joel prepared to cast the -die. Treve knew well what the spotted object was. In early puppyhood -his breeder’s little daughter used to give him lumps of sugar to eat; -until her father had caught her at it and had forbidden her to do it -any more; telling her that sugar is bad for a dog’s teeth and stomach. -The pup had regretted deeply the loss of these delicious treats. - -“Say!” snarled Joel, as he paused in the act of rolling the die. “I -remember, now. I always remember, sometime or other.” - -“Remember what?” asked Royce, impatiently. “Remember you promised your -dying great-aunt you’d never shake dice with any man named Mack? Oh, -roll it out, man! I want that dog. He sure is--” - -“I remember that slick English crook,” went on Joel, unheeding. “He’s -the tramp that panhandled us for grub, back at the house, last year; -and tried to steal the tobacco jar. I told him, then, I’d put a bullet -in him if he ever dast show his face here aga’n.” - -Pettishly, cross at memory of the swindle, he rolled the cube of sugar -across the table. In his ill-temper, he rolled it an inch too far. It -bounced off the table-edge. - -But it was not destined to land on the floor. In mid-air Treve caught -it. In another second he was crunching it, rapturously. - -“And now we won’t ever know what number was on top,” grumbled Joel, -disgustedly. “Not without we cut him open and see. We’ll have to match -for the measly cuss, after all. And you always win when we match.” - -“Nope,” said Royce Mack, taking pity on his disgruntled partner. “We -won’t match. Treve’s decided it for us; by swallering our only fair way -of deciding. He’s OUR dog.” - - - - -CHAPTER II: THIRST! - - -Treve lay drowsing, in the early morning sunshine, in front of the Dos -Hermanos ranch house. The big young collie sprawled lazily on his left -side; his classic head outlined sharply against the warming sand of the -dooryard; his tiny white forepaws thrust forward as if in a gallop; the -sun’s rays catching and burnishing his massive tawny-gold coat. - -Treve was well content to sprawl idly like this. It had been a large -night. Mack and Joel Fenno, and three of their men, had spent hours of -it in rounding up a bunch of stray sheep that had butted their silly -way out of the rotting home fold, after sundown, and had rambled off -aimlessly down the coulée. - -The sheep had been gone for hours and had traveled with annoying -steadiness and speed before their loss was noted. Then, it had taken -some time, through the dark, to overhaul them; and far longer to convoy -them home. - -The sheep might never have started upon their illicit ramble--assuredly -they would never have proceeded along ten minutes of it--if Treve had -been on the job. But the big young dog had gone with Royce Mack, in -the buckboard, over to Santa Carlotta, for the week’s mail; and had not -gotten home until dark. It was only during his before-bedtime patrol of -the outbuildings that he found the forced wattle; and realized what had -befallen the fold’s occupants. - -He had dashed up to the ranch house. There, by his clamor of wild -barking, he had brought the two partners out of doors on the jump. He -led them to the empty fold and obligingly took up the scent there; -tracing the strays far faster than his human companions could follow -through the dense dark and over the rough ground. - -Ahead of him, this morning, was another long day’s work as soon as the -partners should finish breakfast. In the meantime, it was pleasant to -sprawl sleepily on the dooryard’s soft sand. - -Through the open door, rumbled the sound of voices. Being only a -real-life collie and not a phenomenon, Treve could not understand one -word in ten that reached his keen ears, as he lay there. But he did not -need a knowledge of words to tell him the two men were quarreling. - -Vaguely, Treve regretted this; not only as a highly developed collie -always dislikes the sound of human strife, but because one of those -men was his god. He did not like the thought that any one should be -speaking unkindly to this deity of his. - -However, he had heard quarrels, before, since he came to Dos Hermanos -Ranch; and none of them had ended in any harm to his deity. So, he -listened drowsily, rather than apprehensively. - -To both the partners Treve was docilely obedient. Under their tutelage -he had become one of the best herding dogs in that valley of herding -dogs. But to only one partner did Treve grant the allegiance of his -heart. Old Joel Fenno regarded all livestock as mere counters in his -game for a livelihood. He neither liked nor disliked Treve. He worked -him hard; and he saw that the collie obeyed orders. There the man’s -interest in him ended. - -Young Royce Mack was different. By nature he was a dog-lover. Moreover, -he “had a way” with dogs. Between him and Treve, from the outset, a -deep friendship had sprung up. At every off-duty moment, Treve was -at Mack’s heels. He slept beside his bunk, at night; and usually lay -beside his chair at meals. He joined Mack, right joyously, on all walks -or rides. In brief, he adopted Royce as his overlord; and gave him glad -worship. - -With disgusted grunts, old Fenno had noted the jolly chumship between -dog and man. To him it was as absurd as though Royce Mack had made a -pet of a horned toad. Yet never until now had he voiced any active -objection. Fenno was a man of few and grudging words. To-day, however, -he considered it high time to speak. He chose the breakfast table as -the place for his rebuke. - -“If that cur had been to home, where he belongs, yesterday afternoon,” -he grumbled, as he began his second cup of coffee, “them sheep wouldn’t -ever have got a chance to stray.” - -“If he hadn’t been here, last night,” said Royce, “we’d never have -found them in a week. Besides, it wasn’t his fault he was off the job, -in the afternoon. I took him to Santa Carlotta with me. You know that.” - -“Sure, I know it,” growled Joel. “Why wouldn’t I know it? Cost me a -night’s sleep, didn’t it? Oh, I _know_ it, all right! But what I’m -gettin’ at is: Every critter in this outfit has got to earn his way; -got to pay for his keep. If he don’t, then he’s got to stop eatin’ our -grub. Treve pays for himself when he works. And when he don’t work, -he’s dead wood. Dos Hermanos Ranch can’t afford dead wood. We don’t -hire Treve to go drivin’ to Santa Carlotta in lux’ry and to traipse -around on loafin’ walks with you. Nor yet we don’t hire him to snore in -the bunk room, nights, when he’d ought to be on guard. If that’s what -he’s goin’ to do, the sooner we feed him a lump of lead, the better.” - -The old fellow returned to the task of demolishing his breakfast. He -ate surlily and without gusto. He did all things surlily and without -gusto. - -Royce Mack did not speak for a moment or two. He had been waiting for -this outbreak ever since the mischance at the fold. It was like old -Fenno not to have blurted it in the first flush of the excitement; but -to wait until he had marshaled his facts and had cooled down to normal. - -Royce, too, had had time for preparation. Presently he made reply; -schooling himself to calmness and even to an assumption of good humor. - -“Treve isn’t dead wood,” he said. “If he’d never done another lick -of work, since we had him, he’d have paid for a lifetime’s keep by -rounding up that bunch of strays, last night. You remember where he -found them. And they were still traveling--still heading north. By -daylight, they’d have been over the edge of the Triple Bar range. And -you can figure what that outfit of cow-men would have done to ’em. We’d -never have seen wool nor hoof of one of ’em again. The Triple Bar or -any other of the cattle crowd wouldn’t ask better than to shoot up a -flock of sheep that strayed onto their range.” - -Joel Fenno kept on munching his food, interspersing this with noisy -swigs of coffee. He said nothing. Mack resumed: - -“Besides, we’ve got Zit and Rastus, for the regular herding and for -night guard. That isn’t supposed to be Treve’s job. They’re both -born to it. They’re little and black and squat and splayfooted and -they can’t be made homelier by galloping all day and every day, over -hardpan, for hundreds of miles in the broiling sun. Neither of them -has got Treve’s brain or his looks. I don’t want him turned into a -splayfoot drudge. He earns his keep, good and plenty, here on the home -tract. We agreed to that, long ago.” - -“_You_ agreed to it,” mumbled Fenno, his mouth full, his eyes glum. -“_I_ didn’t. I haven’t been jawin’. But I’ve been watchin’. An’ here’s -where we come to a showdown. Till we got that cur, there wasn’t any -loafin’ here. Since then, you go on silly walks with him, when you -might be workin’. That comes out of _my_ pocket. You let him sleep in -the bunk room, like he was a Christian. The Dos Hermanos is a workin’ -outfit. No time for measly pets and the like. It’s got to stop.” - -“I don’t neglect my job, by taking Treve up into the hills or along the -coulée for a tramp, Sundays,” denied Mack. “Better do that, on my rest -day, than play poker in the mess shack or ride over to Santa Carlotta -and get drunk on bootleg. He’s my chum. If you don’t like him--” - -“I don’t. I don’t like a hair of him. He--” - -“Then figure out what his keep costs us; and deduct it from my share of -the profits, every month. That’s fair, isn’t it?” - -“No,” denied Joel, sullenly. “It ain’t. You’re makin’ us both lose -money by the time you waste, learnin’ him tricks and suchlike, and -loafin’ around with him. Besides, it sets a bad example to the hands. -Yesterday, I saw Toni tryin’ to learn Rastus to shake hands. Tryin’ -to make him do like Treve does. Nice stunt for a sheep-wrastler, huh? -Shakin’ hands! It’s got to stop.” - -“If it stops, then I stop, too,” said Mack. - -He spoke without heat, but with much finality. Fenno grunted as usual -and pushed back his chair from the table. Royce continued, getting to -his feet: - -“I’m the only man who ever was able to get on with you, Joel. I’ve -stood your grouches and your crankiness; because I figured those -grouches hurt you a lot more than they could hurt me. And I’ve always -tried to dodge any squabbles with you. I’m still going to try to. So I -guess you’d better think over what you’ve just said about our getting -rid of Treve. If Treve gets out, I get out. Not that I’m fool enough -to value a dog more than I value a man; but because when one partner -begins handing out ultimatums, it’s time for the other to quit. The -ultimatum habit is a rotten one. If I gave in to the first ultimatum, -there’d be more and more of ’em; till some day there’d come one that -I’d have to fight over. So, the first ultimatum is going to be the last -one. That’s why I’m asking you to think it over and take it back. See -you at supper time. So long.” - -Still holding in his temper, he left the shack; Joel Fenno staring -after him in baleful speechlessness. - -As Mack came out into the dooryard, Treve was off the ground in one -leap; and cantering up to him; eagerly expectant of accompanying his -god whithersoever Royce might be going. But Mack checked him. - -“No, old boy,” he whispered, stooping to pat the classic head. “Not -this morning. He’s riled. No sense in riling him worse, by us starting -off to work, together. He’d figure we were going to waste half the day -in chasing jackrabbits and learning tricks. Stay here. He’s going down -to the South Quarter this morning. He said so yesterday. He said, then, -he’d need you to help Rastus drive that South Quarter bunch over to the -Bottoms. I’ve got to pack the big truck across to Santa Carlotta for -the freight we found there yesterday. It’d be good fun for both of us, -to have you ride on the front seat with me, Treve, son. But--well, just -now, he’d likely throw a fit if you took the morning off.... Lie down -there and wait for him.” - -The dog obeyed. But he did so with none of his wonted gay alacrity. -Naturally, he understood not a tithe of Royce’s harangue. But he caught -some of its drift, from the tone and from a scattered word or so that -was within his experience. - -Like so many lonely men, Mack had fallen into the habit of talking to -this collie chum of his, during their long rides or hikes, as if to a -human. The dog, in true collie fashion, had learned to read both voice -and face; and to pick up the meaning of certain familiar words. - -For example, he understood perfectly, now, that he must not accompany -his god as usual, but must lie down and wait for his other owner’s -commands. This was ill news to the dog. His deepset dark eyes were full -of wistful appeal, as he stretched himself reluctantly in the sand -again and stared after the departing Royce. - -Treve had not long to wait there, alone. In another minute Joel Fenno -slouched out of the ranch house and stood on the threshold looking -moodily down at him. The collie did not greet Fenno’s advent with any -of the exuberant joy wherewith he had hailed Mack’s. Indeed, he did -not greet Joel at all. - -He lay, returning the man’s look. Treve was ready to obey any command -given him by this oldster or to do any work Fenno might assign him to. -He recognized that as his duty. But duty did not entail an enthusiastic -greeting to a man who had never yet lavished so much as a careless pat -on his head or spoken a pleasant word to him. - -Joel Fenno was wont to bolt breakfast and then to hustle busily off to -the morning’s tasks. But to-day he stood quite still, his brooding old -puckered eyes scanning the dog; his ears strained for some expected -sound. - -Presently he heard the sound he had been awaiting. It was the starting -of the truck’s engine; down at the barn. Joel shifted his puckered gaze -to the group of ramshackle adobe buildings. - -Royce Mack was backing the big truck out of its cubby-hole. He swung -it about and headed bumpily for the main road. Treve’s own eyes and -ears were at attention, as he saw Mack departing on a jaunt without his -chum. He whimpered, low down in his throat; and peered longingly after -the truck. Then with a sigh of resignation he turned again to face Joel. - -As the truck vanished in a fluff of choky yellow dust, Fenno came -to life. Stepping back into the shack, he scribbled a few lines on a -crumpled paper bag; and pinned the paper to the deal surface of the -table, where it must catch Royce’s notice as soon as the younger man -should come into the house again. - -Writing was a tedious and grunt-evoking labor to Joel Fenno. He took -a pardonable pride in his few literary productions. Now, he gratified -such pride by bending over to reread what he had written. Half aloud he -muttered the scrawled words: - - - “Mack, maybe I was too hot under the collar about Treve. Maybe he - is a good chum, like you say. I aim to find out. I am going to let - Toni take the bunch over to the South Quarter with Zit or Rastus - to-day. And I am going to take a two-day camping trip down to the - Ova and back. Last year this time the waterholes down there had - kept the grazing pretty good. If it is as good this year we can - maybe save a couple of weeks rent money on the gov’t grazing lands - up on the peaks by going to the Ova first. It is worth a try. I - ought to be back by to-morrow night. I am going to take Treve - along for company. JOEL.” - - -Fenno, for the first time in his sixty-odd years, was attempting wily -diplomacy. And he was doing it very badly indeed. It did not occur -to him that his partner might not accept, at its face value, this -unprecedented taste of his for Treve’s society. - -True, both ranchers had had a hazy idea of investigating grazing -conditions in the Ova, before shifting their flocks, as usual, to the -government grazing lands on the slopes of the Dos Hermanos peaks, for -the summer and autumn. But it was a trip any of their men could have -made for them. It was unlike Joel to waste two busy days that way, in -person. Royce could not well avoid wondering at it. This possibility, -too, escaped Fenno’s imagination. To him, his scheme appeared truly -inspired. - -He valued Mack’s partnership. In a grouchy way, he was fond of the -jolly young fellow. Royce was a hard worker and a good sheep man. -Moreover, he had up-to-date ideas which more than once had been coined -into money for the ranch. Fenno had no intention of breaking with so -useful a partner. - -At the same time, he had still less intent of letting Royce go on -loafing and frittering valuable time away, as Joel deemed it, by making -a pet of a dog. He regarded the romps and comradeship and long walks -of the two, as a hustling financier might view a card game among his -employees in the middle of a busy office day. - -Time was money. Also, if Mack had any energy and inventiveness to -spare, he might better place those at the service of the ranch than in -teaching a cur to find his tobacco pouch or to catch food-morsels from -the top of his own nose. - -Joel had protested. His protest had been met by Mack’s firm refusal -to give up the collie. There was no sense wasting time in useless -bickering. The one wise move was to get rid of the dog; and to do it -in such a manner that Mack should not suspect his partner of doing it -purposely. - -Fenno’s plan had been worked out, in swift detail, as soon as Royce had -departed for the day’s work. He would start on horseback toward the -Ova. At some spot too far from the ranch for Mack to trace the deed, -and lonely enough to preclude the chance of witnesses, he would stop; -put a bullet through the collie; scoop out a shallow grave in the sand -and bury him. - -Then, the same evening Fenno would return to the ranch house, saying -Treve had run away during their journey and that he had come back -for him. Mack could prove nothing. According to Joel’s elaborate -calculations, he could suspect nothing. Treve would merely seem to have -strayed from his human companion of the trip, and either to have lost -his way home or to have been stolen by some Mexican or else shot by a -passing cattleman. It was very simple. - -Fenno made certain of his scheme’s verisimilitude by ordering Chang, -the cook, to put up two days’ rations for him. Then, giving commands to -Toni, he saddled his mustang for the lethal ride toward the Ova. At his -imperative whistle, Treve ranged alongside the pony, and the two set -forth. - -The dog did not relish the prospect of a ride with Joel. True, -almost every dog enjoys a walk or a ride with even a human whom he -does not love. But Treve was aware of a queer distaste for to-day’s -jaunt. Perhaps he was warned by the sixth sense which puzzles so many -collie-students. Perhaps the heat of the day and the glum company of -Fenno made the outing seem less attractive than usual. Yet, obediently, -even if not ecstatically, he loped along at the pony’s side. - -The mustang enjoyed the trip still less than did the collie. Fenno -had no understanding of horses. He rode, as he did everything else; -busily and unsparingly. He had no sympathy or sense of fellowship with -his mount. To him, a horse was a machine which must be made to earn -its cost and upkeep. He would have sworn derisively at any one who -might have suggested to him the need of warming a horse’s bit on an -icy morning or of dismounting during a ten-minute halt or of easing -his mount over the heavy going of the sands or tethering him out of -draughts and in the shade rather than in wind and sun. - -Horses understand such failings on the part of the men who use them. -Thus, not a pony on the Dos Hermanos ranch bothered to lift head and -to whinny when old Fenno clumped into the barn in the morning. Not -one that did not toss back the head in fear of a fist-blow when Joel -undertook to bridle him. - -His mount, to-day, was a temperamental little buckskin, Pancho by name, -whose devil temper and inborn mischief had never been trained fully out -of him. Royce Mack understood Pancho and got good service from him, in -spite of the buckskin’s occasional phases of meanness. But Joel Fenno -and Pancho had a steady hatred for each other. - -Joel had chosen the buckskin for to-day’s ride, because his own temper -was still frayed from the night’s work and the morning’s squabble. -Subconsciously, he yearned for something on which to vent his -crankiness. He found himself watching for any trick or meanness on the -part of Pancho which should warrant the liberal use of quirt and spur. - -When a man is looking for a fight, Destiny is prone to send one to -him. Fenno had not ridden for more than two hours, when Pancho saw, or -affected to see, something terrifying about a jack rabbit that bounded -out of a sage-clump in front of the pony’s nose. - -Pancho went straight up into the air, wheeling half-way about, as -he did so, and coming to earth again, stiff-legged, in a series of -spine-jarring buck-jumps. The first of these banging impacts nearly -unseated Fenno and wholly snapped the ill-tied cord which strapped the -bundle of rations to the back of the saddle. - -So occupied was Joel with the punitive values of curb and quirt and -heel that he did not observe the loss of his provisions and water bag. - -Treve had viewed the advent of the jack rabbit with pleased interest; -foreseeing some excitement in chasing the long-eared and longer-legged -bunny. But, instantly, the scrimmage between man and horse offered -far more excitement for him, and with less need for active exercise. -Wherefore, the collie stood, tulip ears cocked and classic head -interestedly on one side, watching the battle. - -Two or three times, it is true, he had to dodge back in lightning -haste, to avoid Pancho’s flying heels or crazy plunges. But, on the -whole, it was a most entertaining and lively spectacle, wherewith to -vary the tedium of the hot trip. Nor was the collie’s fun in it marred -by any anxiety as to the outcome. Once or twice when Pancho had cut up -like this with Royce Mack, the dog had been terrified for his god’s -safety; and had even sprung for the plunging pony’s nose, until Royce -had shouted gayly to him to stand clear. - -But to-day, Treve could witness the fight with unmarred interest. He -did not care, in the very least, whether Pancho should demolish Joel or -Joel demolish Pancho. He had no liking for either of them. It was an -enthralling spectacle to watch. And no personal feeling was involved. - -The horse fought frantically. The man fought back with scientific fury. -For ferocity and murderous brutality, he outbattled the beast. - -In little more than a minute, Pancho gave up the conflict. Not that -he was subdued, but because he found he could not hope to win this -particular bout. He stood trembling and non-resisting; while the rider -whaled him unmercifully. Then, at a harsh-voiced order, the mustang -continued his journey; his mouth dripping blood-flecked foam; his coat -a white lather of sweat and weals; his sides scored bloodily by the -rowels. - -Joel settled himself down into his saddle. Grimly, he was pleased with -himself. He had worked off his sour temper, and he had won a victory. -The dog, resignedly trotting along beside him, could have told him how -far he had come from breaking his foe’s spirit. For Treve could see -the pony’s eyes. And a devil was smoldering behind them. Their whites -showed unduly. There was a hint of murder in their rolling irises. - -Joel Fenno, smugly confident in his own horsemanship and in the victory -of man over brute, would have sworn there could not be an atom of fight -left in the sweating and trembling victim of his beating. Thus, for -the billionth time in history, a man might have profited vastly had he -known as much as did his dog. - -Two hours went by. And another hour. Then, Fenno began to scan the -distance for some shady spot where he might make his noonday halt, for -a bite of lunch and ten minutes’ rest. - -There was no shade in sight. In fact it was the most shadeless season -of a shadeless region in that semi-arid belt of shadeless country. - -In Dos Hermanos County, except on the slopes and summits of the Dos -Hermanos Peaks, the average yearly rainfall is but twenty-four inches. -And more than twenty-one of those twenty-four inches fall between -November and April. - -Late May had arrived. The level ground--most of it little better than -hardpan--was beginning to dry to the consistency of friable clay. The -lower foothills were losing the last of their verdure and beginning -to assume their summer coat of khaki tan. True, in such lowlands as -the Ova, the occasional waterholes, and like receptacles for rainfall, -sometimes on wet years kept enough green grass alive to serve as -temporary grazing ground for sheep; before the utter drouth of summer -sent the sheep men to the government land high in the mountains, with -their flocks, in search of grass to carry the livestock through until -late autumn. But this was not a wet year. - -Joel Fenno saw the arid sweep of ground; broken, perhaps a mile ahead -of him, by an irregular ring of yellowish green. Here, by all signs, -should be a waterhole. True, no shade was near it. But it might offer a -chance to bathe his hot face and wrists in moderately cool water. The -increasing heat of the day made this seem more and more desirable. - -Fenno headed for the waterhole. His tired pony plodded along over the -uneven ground with head adroop. Treve had moved from Pancho’s right -side, to his left; seeking such tiny patch of shade as the mustang’s -moving body might afford. The air hung dead and stifling. The sun -blazed down in a copper glare from the pitilessly hot sky. Nature -seemed dead and blistering. - -Joel’s tough skin sweated drippingly. It was the hottest day, thus far, -of the year; and the weatherwise man knew it was the first of at least -three scorchingly hot days. He was not minded to continue the ride any -farther than he must. It would be well to do what he had come to do, -and then turn back toward the ranch. - -This was as good a spot as any for his purpose. Here, at intervals, -patches of soft and easily-diggable sand cropped out through the -hardpan and rock. It would be easy enough to gouge a space deep enough -to bury the body of a dog. Yes, and it would be best to do so, before -getting any nearer to the waterhole. The presence of water might well -attract other wayfarers,--men who might investigate a newly heaped -mound of sand, in the dead level. The burial would better be here, a -mile on the hither side of the waterhole and on a trackless bit of -ground. - -Joel Fenno halted his mustang, and glanced around to make certain he -had the wide sweep of swooningly arid country to himself. In that -pitilessly clear atmosphere, his keen old eyes could have descried any -moving object, many miles away. Treve, still keeping in the shadow of -the pony, stopped and looked inquiringly up at the man. It had been a -long and fast and steady ride, under the sickeningly hot sun glare and -over the ever-hotter hardpan. The dog was glad for a rest. - -Then, suddenly, his attention was caught by Fenno’s upraised voice. -Joel, in the course of his sweeping survey of the country behind -him, had chanced to drop his gaze to the hips of his sweating and -welt-skinned mount. He saw the water bag and the bundle of rations were -gone from behind his saddle. - -He was an old enough plainsman to realize what this implied. It meant -he must go hungry until night--he who had ridden himself into such a -hearty appetite. It meant, too, that he must do all his drinking from -the muddy and perhaps alkaline puddle of the mile-distant waterhole; -and that thereafter he must travel through the heat with unassuaged -thirst until he should get back to the ranch at nightfall. - -Small wonder that he burst into a roar of red profanity! - -He knew well enough how the mischance had occurred. His spine still -ached from the bucking of Pancho, four hours ago. It must have been -during that series of jarring bucks that the water bag and the bundle -had been loosened and had tumbled unheeded to earth. It was Pancho’s -fault--all Pancho’s fault! - -In a gust of wrath, he slashed the mustang across the neck with his -quirt. - -Now a horse is almost as quick as a dog to note a change in his -master’s mood. Even before the blow--even before the burst of -swearing--Pancho had become aware of a slackening in his rider’s wonted -grim self-command. He had prepared, in his meanly uncertain mind, to -take advantage of it. - -Before the quirt had fairly landed athwart his neck, Pancho had -left ground. This time he did not buck. Straight up in air shot his -forequarters. - -There was no warning of the outbreak. Moreover, Fenno had been sitting -carelessly in the saddle; for the horse had been standing still. There -was no scope for guarding against the trick. Scarce did the man’s knees -seek to grip the pony, in anticipation of any plunge the quirt blow -might entail, when Pancho reared. - -With the speed of light, the mustang flung his head and shoulders -upward. In practically the same motion he hurled his tense body back; -dashing himself to the ground, with his rider beneath him. - -More than once, in former battles, Pancho had attempted this, with -Joel. But, usually a fist-thump between the ears had brought him down -on all fours again before the ruse was complete. Failing to land such -a punch, Fenno had at other times twisted out of the saddle and safely -out of the falling body’s path, before the pony could strike ground. - -But, to-day, the outshot fist started its drive an instant too late. It -grazed Pancho’s ear. Joel slipped from the saddle; but again a fraction -of a second too late. - -Down crashed the nine-hundred-pound mustang, full on the helplessly -struggling body of his fallen rider; pinning Fenno to earth on an -outcrop of shale rock. - -With a snort and a wriggle, Pancho was up on his feet again. - -On the trampled ground behind him floundered a writhing and bruised -man, who twisted like a stamped-on snake. - -With all his might, Joel Fenno strove to get up. He knew something -of untamable horses’ temper; and he knew what must be in store for -himself, should he fail to regain his feet. - -But he could not arise. He did not know why. His legs refused to obey -him. The fall, and the crushing weight that ground his back into the -rock, had wrenched the spine. While his injury was not mortal or even -beyond easy surgical cure, yet it had left his legs temporarily numb -and useless. He was paralyzed. - -The mustang celebrated his own release by a thunderous circular -gallop; the circle bringing him again toward the prostrate man. With -lips drawn back from his evil teeth, and with ears flat, the infuriated -pony charged. Here was the longed-for chance to revenge himself on the -enemy who had scourged and roweled him and jerked his lips to ribbons -with the curb chain! The devil that lurked behind the rolling eyes -flamed forth in murder. - -With an effort that wellnigh made him faint with agony, Fenno reached -back to his hip for the service revolver he had strapped to his belt -that morning for the killing of Treve. - -Then, the agony of his mind made him forget the anguish of his body. In -his tumble, the pistol had bounced from its holster. It was lying some -ten feet away; impotently reflecting from its blue barrel and cylinder -the glint of the noonday sun. For all use the weapon could now be to -its owner, it might as well lie in the next county. - -Down at the helpless cripple thundered Pancho. - -The mustang’s flashing forefeet were in air above the man; poised for -the tearing beats which should stamp their victim to a jelly. Joel shut -his eyes. - -But the murderous hoofs did not reach their goal. - -This because a tawny-golden body whizzed through the air, from nowhere -in particular, but with the deadly accuracy of a rifle shot. A pair of -snapping jaws sunk their teeth deep in the mustang’s sensitive nose; -while a sixty-pound furry body whirled itself so sharply to one side -that Pancho’s aim and velocity were deflected. - -Down came the hoofs; but waveringly and scramblingly and not within ten -inches of the fallen man. Before they could rear again, the grip on the -nose was changed to a slash along the left side of the mustang’s head. -Under the pain of this, Pancho veered. A second slash veered him still -farther from the crippled Joel. - -Probably Treve had no clear idea why he dashed to the rescue of the -man for whom he had no feeling except a vague dislike. While Pancho -and Joel had fought upon more even terms, the dog had looked on -impersonally, entertained by the spectacle, and with no impulse to -interfere. But now that the man was down and helpless, somehow it was -different. - -To a dog, all men are gods. That does not mean they are his own -particular gods or that he has any interest in most of them. But they -are of the race which he and his ancestors have served and guarded and -worshiped since the days when the new earth was covered with vapor and -the Neanderthal man tamed the first wolf-cub. - -So now, when Joel Fenno lay stricken and defenseless and the mustang -turned on him in murder, the collie played true to ancestral instinct. - -Pancho spun about at the dog that had balked his yearning to murder the -man. Apparently the collie must be gotten rid of, before the mustang -could finish the task of killing Fenno, with any peace and absence of -interruption. Wherefore, the pony turned his attention to killing Treve. - -But, in less than a handful of seconds, he found he had taken upon -himself a job far too big and too dangerous for his powers. The dog -entered rapturously into the sport. He was everywhere at once and -nowhere at any particular moment. - -He was rending the bloody nostrils of the mustang. He was nipping the -mustang’s hocks. He was slashing at the throat; he was tearing at face -and chest and hips, in almost the same instant. With perfect ease, he -eluded the flailing hoofs and the pony’s wide-snapping jaws. - -Joel Fenno forgot his own intolerable pain in the fascination of the -combat. But, as suddenly as it began, the fight ended. The mustang had -wit enough to know when he was bested. Bleeding, smarting, confused, -all the lust of battle bitten out of him, he turned tail and fled. -After the first few yards of clamorous barking and heel-teasing, Treve -let him go and trotted back to the groaning Fenno. - -Gravely, inquisitively, the collie stood over the man who had brought -him here to shoot him. Down into the tortured face he looked. Joel -returned the sorrowful gaze, with something of terror in his own -leathern visage. He was jolted out of a lifetime’s beliefs and -theories. His thoughts would not assemble themselves. - -He tried once more to get to his feet. But his legs were numb. He -sought to wriggle along on his stomach toward the mile-off waterhole. -There he could quench the awful thirst that had begun to grip him. -There, too, he might be found by some passerby, seeking water on the -way across the arid waste. - -But the pain of even the slightest motion was more than his iron nerve -could endure. With a groan he gave up the attempt. Supine and panting, -Fenno lay where he had fallen; the great dog standing protectingly -above him. - -From time to time Treve would bend down to lick the tortured face or to -whine softly in sympathy. He knew the man was helpless and in pain. But -there was nothing he could do except to interpose his own hot shaggy -body between Fenno’s head and the terrific sun-rays. And even this may -have been done by accident. - -Thirst gripped Joel; tenfold more agonizingly than did the pain of his -wrenched back. His mouth was parched and burning. His tongue had begun -to swell. Burying his face--now sweatless and dryly torrid--in his -hands, he lay and prayed for death. - -When he looked up again, Treve was gone. An awful sense of loneliness -seized the tormented sufferer. Blithely would he have given his share -of the ranch, in return for the dog’s comforting presence at his side. -More blithely would he have given ten years of life for one drop of -water, to ease the fever and maniac thirst that possessed him. - -To few is it given to receive the granting of the only two wishes they -make. But, presently, it was granted to Joel Fenno. He heard a patter -of running feet. Toward him, from the direction of the waterhole, Treve -came bounding. The collie’s massively shaggy coat was adrip with water. - -Up to the parched victim he trotted, and lay down beside Fenno’s head. -Greedily Joel dug both fevered hands in the dog’s mattress of soaked -fur, squeezing into his own mouth the drops of grimy water wherewith -the coat was saturated. - -Now, Treve had done no miraculous thing; although to Fenno it seemed a -major miracle of brain and devotion. Indeed, the dog had done something -absolutely normal and characteristic. Seeing Joel lie still, with his -face buried in his hands, he had concluded the man was asleep; and thus -was in no immediate need of the collie’s services. Thus, the young dog -had scope to think of his own needs. - -For more than five hours, through the scorching heat, Treve had been -running; without so much as a single drink of water to cool his throat. -Collies, more than almost any other dogs, require plenty of drinking -water. Now that he was at leisure to consider his own wants, Treve -realized he was acutely thirsty. - -His uncanny sense of smell told him there was water, somewhere ahead. -Off he went to investigate. Finding the waterhole, he drank his fill; -then, collie-like, he wallowed deep in the muddy liquid. Cooled and -with his thirst assuaged, he recalled his duty; and galloped back to -the injured man; lying down in front of him to await orders. That his -soaked coat chanced to contain enough water to soothe the torment of -Joel’s fever-thirst, was mere coincidence. - -Twice more, during that terrible afternoon of heat, the dog stole away -to the waterhole to drink and to wallow. Both times he came back -to the sufferer who waited so frantically to wring out into his own -burning mouth the life-saving drops. - - -Even before the riderless Pancho came cantering home in late afternoon, -Royce Mack had begun to worry. Returning early from Santa Carlotta, he -had found Joel’s note; and had read perplexedly between the lines. At -sight of Pancho, he flung a saddle on another pony and yelled to two of -his men to follow. Then he set off at top speed along the trail toward -the Ova. - -Dark had fallen, hours agone, when the bark of a collie came to Mack, -on his plodding ride. Then there was a scurry of padded feet; and Treve -was leaping and barking about Royce’s pony. From a mile to one side -of Mack’s line of march, the night breeze had brought the collie his -master’s scent. He had galloped to intercept him and to guide him to -where a half-delirious old man lay sprawled out on a hot rock. - -At sight of the rescuer, Joel Fenno tensed his muscles and forced -his face into its wonted sour grimness. But he could not keep his -delirium-tickled tongue from babbling. - -“Say!” he grunted, before Mack could speak. “We’ll keep Treve, if -you’re so set on keepin’ him. Not that he’s reely wuth keepin’--except -maybe sometimes. Let him stay on at Dos Hermanos, if you like. -He’s--he’s only part collie, though. He’s got some of the breedin’ -of--of the ravens that fed Elijah. Let him stay with us. I don’t mind, -so long as he don’t eat too much.... Now quit gawpin’ like a fool; and -help get me to a doctor! Why, that collie’s got more sense than what -you’ve got. Besides, he’s--he’s sure one grand water-dog!” - - - - -CHAPTER III: MAROONED! - - -All through the parchingly dry summer the sheep of the Dos Hermanos -ranch had pastured on the upper slopes of the Peaks; far above the -rainless and baking valley where the verdure was dead and where the -short grass would not come to life again until late autumn should usher -in the brief rainy season. - -Here on the government grazing land of the lofty mountainsides there -was good pasturage. Here, too, as far up as the end of the timber line, -there was shade and there were tempered heat of day and coolness of -nights; and there were brooks and springs and pools of cold water. - -For a mere handful of dollars, paid to the government, the Dos Hermanos -ranch partners and many another denizen of the valley could graze their -sheep at will among the upland meadows and gorges. - -Young Royce Mack and old Joel Fenno still kept their headquarters at -the lowland ranch house during the hot spell, one or both of them -riding up, weekly, into the cooler hill country to inspect the flocks -and to see that their three shepherds were taking best advantage of -the successive grass stretches. - -When it was Royce Mack’s turn to make this periodic tour of the -mountain pastures, he always took with him the tawny-gold young collie, -Treve. This companionship meant much to both dog and man. For the two -were still inseparable chums. - -Three little black collies, Zit and Rastus and Zilla, were permanently -attached to the flocks; and worked, day and night, with the -shepherds, in all weathers. But Treve’s actual sheepdog work was more -intermittent. True, in emergencies or in times of extra toil, he was -impressed into service with the sheep. But, as a rule, nowadays, he -was the ranch house’s guard and the guard of the home-tract folds. -He helped, also, in rounding up and driving bunches of sheep to the -railroad, and the like. The routine duties fell to Zit and Rastus and -Zilla. - -Occasionally, for Mack’s benefit, Fenno still complained of this -favoritism shown to the big dog. But, since the day when Treve saved -him from death under the broiling sun, on the Ova trail, he had privily -accepted the collie as a privileged member of the ranch household. - -This he did in grudging fashion, as he did all things. It was an -ingrained trait of old Fenno’s crusty nature to be grudging of anything -and everything; from toothaches to legacies. But, to his own amaze -and shame, he had become aware of an odd affection for the big young -collie. This fondness he hid from Royce and from Treve himself under a -guise of grumpy distaste. - -So successfully did Joel mask his new liking for the dog that Mack had -no suspicion his partner did not still regard Treve with the impersonal -aversion which he felt toward all the world. As for Treve, the dog was -as well aware of Fenno’s new attitude of mind toward him as though Joel -had spent a lifetime in cultivating his society. - -A collie has a queer sixth sense not granted to all dogs. But even a -street puppy has the instinct to know what humans like him and what -humans do not. Treve, of yore, had known that Fenno had no use for dogs -in general, nor for him in particular. Since their ordeal on the Ova -trail and during Joel’s brief convalescence from his hurts, the collie -recognized that the old man had grown reluctantly to like him. - -Formerly, Treve had obeyed Fenno, as part of his daily routine of duty. -But never had he accorded to the oldster the slightest mark of personal -friendliness. Nowadays, at times, he would stroll up to Joel, with -wagging tail, and would thrust his classic nose affectionately into the -old fellow’s cupped hand or would lay a white forepaw on his knee or -come gamboling across to greet him on a return to the ranch. - -Such exhibitions of good-fellowship embarrassed the crochety Joel -as much as secretly they delighted him. For the first time in his -sixty-odd years, a living creature was proffering active friendship to -him. It did funny things to Fenno’s withered sensibilities. - -When other humans were present at these manifestations, Joel would -thrust the dog aside with a glower or a mutter of disgust. When no -fellow-human was in sight, Fenno would look guiltily around him and -then give Treve’s head a furtive pat and would whisper: “_Nice_ -doggie!” He would do this with as keen a sense of self-contempt as -though he were picking a pocket. - -Treve, with a collie’s inherent love of mischief, not only understood -the foolish situation, but seemed to take positive delight in shaming -Fenno by playful efforts to make friends with him in the presence of -Mack and the shepherds. - -“You owe a lot to that dog, Joel,” said Royce, at dinner one day, as -Fenno angrily shoved aside the paw which Treve had placed on his knee. -“It’s a wonder you keep on hating him. He doesn’t make friends with -every one. And I don’t see why he keeps on trying to make friends with -you. He never used to. Why can’t you pat him or say ‘hello’ to him -sometimes when he comes up to you like that?” - -“I got no use for dogs,” grumbled Joel, “nor yet for any other critter; -except for the work we can get out of ’em. I got no time to go makin’ -a pet of any cur. One of these days, when he comes sticking that ugly -nose of his into my hand or wiping his dirty forepaw onto my knee, I’m -goin’ to give him a good swift kick.” - -He glared forbiddingly at the collie. Treve wagged his plumed tail, -unafraid; and thrust his muzzle into the cup of the forbidding old -man’s gnarled hand. Joel drew back in ostentatious aversion. But, -somehow, he did not carry out his threat of a kick. Presently, when -Mack chanced to leave the room, Fenno slipped a large hunk of meat from -his own plate to the collie’s dinner platter on the kitchen floor. He -did it with the air of one poisoning a loathed enemy. But it was the -biggest and tenderest morsel of meat in his noonday meal. And he had -been waiting an opportunity to give it, unobserved, to Treve. - -All of which was silly, past words. Nobody realized that more clearly -than did Joel Fenno. - -The endless hot summer wore itself out; but not until long after its -drouth had worn out every trace of vegetation in the valley and the -lower foothills; and had turned the once-verdant lowland world into -a khaki brown lifelessness. Day after day, evening after evening, the -mercury in the rusty thermometer on the Dos Hermanos ranch house porch -registered anywhere from 110 to 120. It was weather to fray nerves -and temper. Treve, under his heavy coat, sweltered and looked forward -longingly to the occasional trips to the mountain pastures. - -Then came late autumn; and on one of these mountain trips both partners -went, instead of going singly. They took along Treve; and they took -every man on the ranch except Chang, the old Chinese cook. - -The time had come to drive all the sheep down from the mountain grazing -grounds, into the valley ranges, for the winter. It was a job calling -for the services of all available men and dogs. - -Up through the foothills toward the towering heights of the mountains -rode Mack and Fenno; the collie gamboling happily along in front of -their ponies and halting at every few yards to investigate the burrow -of some rabbit or ground-squirrel. - -In front of the riders loomed the twin peaks of Dos Hermanos, rising -into the very clouds. For more than three-fourths of the way up, there -were lush forest and meadow. Then, the timberline halted abruptly; like -the ring of hair that encircles a baldheaded man’s skull. Above timber -line, on each peak, was a smooth expanse of rock; crowned by snow. - -The foothills were passed by; and now the indiscriminate green -of the left hand peak, whither the riders were moving, took on a -hundred irregularities. The brown and twisting trail upward, through -rock-shoulders, could be seen in spots. So could the dense forests and -the softer green of the cleared grazing lands. Adown the left peak -roared the torrential little Chiquita River, broken in fifty places by -cataract and cascade;--the river that is born among the mountain-top -springs and is fed by melting snows from the summit. - -By reason of the innumerable inequalities of ground and the erratic -course of the rock-ledges, this mountain stream forms roughly a -half-moon in its descent; and is joined and reënforced, three-fourths -of the way down, by the Pico, a tributary rivulet from adjacent -summit-springs; forming a “Y,” that encloses perhaps five square miles -of the wildest and most inaccessible section of the left slope. - -By reason of the trickiness of the Chiquita River and of the narrower -Pico, the sheepmen seldom lead their flocks into the “Y.” Not only -is much of the pasturage bad, but the streams are subject to sudden -freshets from unduly swift melting of the summit snows. Thus, flocks -venturing into the enclosure are liable to be cut off unexpectedly from -the outer world or even to be swept to death in attempting to cross. - -Wherefore the place is shunned by man and sheep. And as a result it -long since became the winter haunt of such wild animals as spend the -rest of the year on the inaccessible upper reaches of the left peak. - -In another hour of steady riding, the partners had reached the lower -plateau of pasturage on which they had told their men to have the Dos -Hermanos sheep rounded up, this day, for the drive to the ranch. - -There, on the rolling plateau, they found their flocks and shepherds -awaiting them; the little black collies busily keeping the mass of -milling and silly sheep in some semblance of formation. - -The partners had left the ranch house while the big autumn moon was -still yellow in the sky. The sun had barely risen when they reached the -plateau. Within another half hour the long procession of woolly sheep -and their attendant men and dogs were starting down the twisty trail -toward the far-off valley;--the partners arranging to camp for the -night among the foothills and to reach the ranch some time the next day. - -For sheep in great numbers cannot be hurried unduly. Nor can -their drivers insure against a score of senseless stampedes -or side-excursions which delay the march to the point of utter -exasperation. A sheep is probably--no, _certainly_--the most foolish -and non-dependable item of livestock sent by Satan to harry an -agricultural life. - -“The patriarch, Job,” spoke up Fenno, dourly, as he and Mack chanced to -be riding side by side, after an uncalled-for scattering of a thousand -of the sheep had delayed the line of travel for nearly an hour while -Treve and Zit and Rastus and Zilla and the partners and the shepherds -(named in the order of their importance in handling that particular -crisis) had succeeded in getting them into line again and in preventing -any wholesale scattering of the rest of the huge flock, “The patriarch, -Job, in Holy Writ, got the name for bein’ the most patient cuss in all -the Bible. D’ you know how he got that same reputation, Royce?” - -“No,” laughed the younger man, amused that his taciturn partner should -choose such a time for theological debate. “If it’s a riddle I give it -up. How?” - -“The Good Book tells us,” glumly expounded Fenno, mopping the sweat -from his leathern face, “the Good Book tells us Job owned ‘seven -thousand sheep.’ But it tells us he had seven sons to handle the measly -brutes, and a multitude of men servants. So he could stay home an’ -work at his trade of being patient and let his boys and that same -multitude of hired men rustle the sheep. I’ll bet $9 if he’d had only -one lazy young rattle-pated kid of a partner and three numbskull Basque -herdsmen and three or four wuthless collies to help him work the sheep, -he’d never ’a’ won the Patience Medal in his district. He’d likely ’a’ -been jailed for swearin’. I--” - -“Speaking of ‘worthless collies,’” interrupted Mack, who had been -standing in his stirrups and staring over the gray-white sea of sheep, -“what’s become of Treve? Generally, when his work’s done for a few -minutes, he trots alongside me. You took him with you, didn’t you, when -you rode back after that last bunch of strays? You ran the bunch into -the lot that Zit is handling. Where’s Treve?” - -“Oh, likely he’s barkin’ down some gopher-hole or tryin’ to make Toni -play tag with him, or suthin’!” growled the old man, annoyed at Royce’s -dearth of interest in the comparison between Job and his partner. -“He’ll show up. He always does. You waste more time worritin’ over that -four-legged flea-pasture than any sensible feller would spend on his -bankbook. Treve’s all right. He always is. It’s a way he’s got. Fergit -it.” - -But, oddly enough, Joel himself did not forget it. Indeed, presently -he made excuse to ride back to speak to Toni; who was in charge of -the rearguard of the flock. Out of hearing of his partner, he bawled -lustily to Treve. But there was no answering scurry of white paws. - -Nor, when the party made camp, at dusk, among the foothills, had the -big young collie rejoined them. Joel Fenno scoffed at Mack’s show of -anxiety about the absent Treve. Yet, Joel discovered now that he had -dropped his pipe, somewhere along the route; and fussily he insisted on -riding back through the dark to look for it. - -He was gone for three hours. On his return he grumbled at his failure -to find the missing pipe--which, by the way, he had been smoking -throughout his three-hour absence. - -“Didn’t see or hear anything of Treve, back yonder, did you?” queried -Mack, from among the blankets. - -“Treve?” repeated Joel, grouchily. “Nope. Never thought to look for -him. Likely he’s gone on ahead; and we’ll find him at the ranch house. -He’s a lazy cuss. Likely he’s scamped his work and trotted on home. -Nope, I never bothered to look for him. It was my pipe I was huntin’. -Not a measly dog.” - -He cleared his throat contemptuously. His throat was rough and raw from -repeated shoutings of Treve’s name, during his three hours of futile -hunt for the missing collie. - -Treve was not at the ranch house, when the herders got there, next -afternoon. Fenno was loud in derision, when Royce Mack insisted on -riding back over the mountain trail in quest of the lost dog. But Mack -went. And he found nothing. - - -Meanwhile, Treve was in serious trouble. - -Toni and the other shepherds had grown unspeakably weary of the lonely -mountainside life; and yearned for the ranch with its nearness to a -town. The bunk house was a bare eleven miles from the 1,500-population -metropolis of Santa Carlotta. - -Thus, their work of driving the sheep down the trail, toward the -valley, was marked with more haste than care. But for the presence of -their two employers, they would have done the driving in a far more -precipitate and slipshod way. At it was, at every possible chance, when -Royce and Fenno were engaged elsewhere along the line of march, they -sacrificed care to haste. - -At one point, thanks to this over-hurrying, a large bunch of wethers, -at the rear of the procession, bolted. They streamed backward, up the -trail, and they scattered to every side of it in fan-formation. It was -heartbreaking work to get them back. Fenno and Treve had gone to help -Toni and the little black Zit in the thanklessly hard task. - -“All here?” Joel had demanded, when the round-up of the strays seemed -complete. - -“All here!” glibly announced Toni; and Fenno rode forward. - -Toni had been certain all were there;--chiefly because he wanted to -believe so. Hence, he did not trouble to count the bunch of galloping -wethers. He knew that both Treve and Zit had worked the underbrush and -the upper trail, in search of the wanderers; and he knew both were -absolutely reliable sheep dogs. Zit was back with him again. And Treve, -presumably, had trotted ahead with Fenno. Toni knew Treve would not -have given up the search while any strays were left unfound. The delay -had been long. The Basque herder was cross and hungry. - -Toni had been justified in his faith that Treve would not abandon the -quest, while any strays still remained outside the flock. Treve was on -the job. And that was why Treve was in trouble. - -When, for some idiotic reason of their own, the several hundred wethers -of the rear guard started to bolt, the foremost contingent of them went -up the steep trail in a mad rush, well in advance of the rest. Up they -galloped, along the twisting path, crowding and milling and jostling. -Midway of their rush, a jack rabbit flashed across the trail; just in -front of their leader. - -At this truly terrifying spectacle, the leader shied with as much dread -as might a skittish colt at sight of a newspaper blowing across the -road. Into the underbrush he wheeled, continuing his flight at an acute -angle to the trail, but bearing gradually farther away from it, as -bowlder and thicket forced him out of his direct line. - -After the manner of their breed, the remaining sheep of this advance -band wheeled into the underbrush behind him. After the first few -hundred feet, some of them balked at a narrow brooklet which the leader -had crossed at a single jump. They turned again toward the trail, -leaving the rest--forty-eight in all--to run on and to become hidden in -the undergrowth. - -Zit, following close behind, came to the brook. There, the scent veered -to the left; and he pursued it; presently coming up with the contingent -which had not crossed; and herding them skillfully back to the main -body. - -The forty-eight strays continued their onward and upward course, at -last slackening their gallop to a trot and stopping now and then to -snatch at a mouthful of herbage, but always resuming their journey, -farther from the trail. There was no sense at all in their doing so. -This, probably, was why they did it;--being sheep. - -Treve had gone after a half-score sheep that broke trail lower down the -mountain. He rounded them up and sent them into the main flock. Then, -scenting or hearing or guessing the presence of other sheep, higher -on the mountain, he cantered up the steep slope to investigate. His -straight line of progress brought him out on the track of the strays, a -few rods to the right of the brooklet. He followed; only to catch the -scent of Zit’s flying feet, where they had passed by, a few minutes -earlier. The scent proved that Zit had rounded up this particular bunch -of strays, and that Treve’s climb had gone for nothing. - -Thirsty from his fast ascent, he stopped at the brook to drink. Here -the sheep had arrived. Here, some had turned and had been overtaken by -Zit. But here, too, Treve’s scent told him, other sheep had crossed the -trickle of water; and Zit had not followed this lot. - -As he stooped to drink, Treve’s nose was not eighteen inches from -the opposite bank. There, the leader and his remaining followers had -planted their feet as they bounded across. The scent was fresh. To the -trained collie it told its own story. Zit had missed the clue because -of following the remnant that they had not crossed. In following the -stronger and nearer scent he had taken no note of the other. Treve -himself might well have overlooked it, but for the chance of his -stopping to drink. - -Hot on the track of the escaped forty-eight wethers, the collie sprang -across the narrow brook and up the hill after them. Bad as was the -going and uncertain as was the runaways’ course, it was a matter of -only a few minutes for him to overhaul them. - -They had just come to a huddled pause in their flight. Detouring, to -avoid climbing a high ridge of rock which arose in front of them, -they had followed this barrier of stone to rightward, with some idea -of going around its end. But this they could not do. The ridge ended -abruptly in a cliff that jutted out above the Chiquita River. - -The Chiquita was in flood. This, because a spell of warm weather, had -replaced a spell of snow and chill on the summit; sending millions of -gallons of melted snow cascading down the peak. The Chiquita and the -Pico alike were changed from modest creeks to turbulent torrents. Even -the usually dry stream beds along the slope were now full of water, as -in the case of the brooklet which some of the sheep had crossed and -which others of them had avoided. - -Thus, the venturesome leader of the wethers found his detour had been -in vain. There was no space between the cliff and the roaring river; -no path whereby he and his forty-seven followers might continue their -aimless climb. - -Bridging the stream, just in front of them, was an uprooted tree; -undermined, years earlier, by some freshet which had cut the dirt from -its roots. Athwart the river, at this narrow point, lay the huge tree. -Its branches had rotted away or had been broken off by successive -hammering of freshets. - -But the trunk still bridged the current, its top resting on the edge of -a high bank of clay upon the far side. The bark had long since decayed. -Worms and woodpeckers and weather and rot had been busily at work on -the exposed trunk, for decades, until it was but a sodden shell of its -former self. - -The leading runaway apparently had no great desire to tempt a ducking, -through continuing his escape by means of so fragile a path as the -rotted log. Hence, he paused as he reached it. And the others piled up -behind him, milling and bleating and as uncertain as he. - -It was at this moment that Treve came charging up the mountainside; -sweeping toward them, with a thunder of barking. - -The dog knew every phase of sheep herding. He knew how to herd and -drive a flock of lambs as tenderly as a mother would guide her child’s -first steps. He knew the art of coaxing and soothing the march of a -bunch of heavy ewes. But he also knew that a band of scraggy wethers, -on the autumn roundup, can be dealt with in more tumultuous fashion, -and that finesse is not needed in driving such strays back to the flock. - -Wherefore, his furious charge, now; a charge planned to get the sheep -on the run, in a compact bunch, and to gallop them back to the main -body. But, unfamiliar with that part of the mountain, he knew nothing -of the impasse which had halted them; nor of the log across the river. - -At sound of the bark and of the oncoming rush of the pursuer, the -wether-leader lost what scant discretion a sheep may have been born -with. In fear of recapture and of fast driving down the mountain, -he ran bleating out on the rotten log. Urged by the same fear, the -forty-seven wethers followed him. - -A sheep is not as sure-footed as a goat. But sure-footedness was not -needed. Under the pattering hoofs the decayed surface of the log -crumbled; leaving a soft and ever-deeper rut for the ensuing hoofs to -tread. - -Over the impromptu bridge scampered the wether; to the safety of the -far bank. And over the same bridge, in scurrying haste, stormed the -other sheep. - -Under their sustained weight and the incessant reverberating impact of -their pounding hoofs, the rotted log was assailed more heavily than its -feeble shell of resistance could withstand. Not with the usual cracking -and rending, but with a soggily soughing sound, it gave way. Not a -fiber of it was strong enough to crackle. But the whole bridge went to -pieces as might a wad of soaked blotting paper that is wrenched apart. - -By the rare luck that so often attends idiots and sheep, the leader and -forty-six of his flock had reached the high clay bank on the far side, -before the thick log collapsed. - -Treve came whizzing up the slope to the spot where the crossing had -been made. He arrived, just as the log went to pieces. Its punk-like -sections splashed noisily into the torrent below. And with them -splashed almost as noisily the last sheep that had attempted the -crossing. This wether had hesitated and started to turn back as he felt -the bridge sinking under him. The moment of delay had sent him headlong -into the water among the log débris. - -Down plunged the unlucky wether. Before his body struck water, his -silly head smote against a pointed outcrop of rock that protruded -above the churned surface of the river. The contact broke the sheep’s -skull, as neatly as could a hatchet-corner. Stone dead, the poor -creature went bobbing and tossing and revolving, down the swirling -current. - -Scarce had the wether plunged into the Chiquita when Treve was off the -bank, in one wild bound; and into the water after him. - -It was not the first nor the tenth time that the collie had “gone -overboard” to rescue a sheep. For there is no limit to the quantity and -quality of mischances into which sheep can entangle themselves. Falling -off bridges is one of their recognized accomplishments. - -But never in his two years of life had the young dog found himself in a -torrent like this. At his first immersion into it, he was bowled over, -then sucked under water; then he was spun dizzily about;--all before he -could get his bearings. Rising to the surface and taking instinctive -advantage of the current, he shook the water from his eyes and struck -downstream after the bobbing gray-white body of the sheep. - -At the end of fifty yards--during which a whirling log had well nigh -stove the collie’s ribs in, and two successive eddies had pulled his -head under water--he saw a twist of the erratic current pick up the -sheep’s body and sling it high on a patch of stony beach at a bend in -the stream. - -There it sprawled. And thither the collie fought his breath-tortured -way. But when he dragged himself up out of the water and sniffed at the -wet huddle of wool and flesh, a single instant’s inspection told him he -had had his hazardous swim for nothing. The sheep was dead. - -Panting from his stupendous efforts, Treve started at a canter along -the far bank of the stream, toward the forty-seven wethers that had -crossed in safety. His sole duty, now, was toward them; and he realized -it. He must get them back to the other side of the river and thence -down to the main flock, a mile below. - -The sheep had been grievously affrighted by the splash of the log and -by the mishap to their fellow-imbecile. They were scattering, with loud -bleats, through the rock-strewn underbrush. But they did not scatter -far. After them, in front of them, on every side of them, swept a -golden-tawny and loud-mouthed whirlwind; that gave them no peace until -they consented to turn back from their four-direction flight and bunch -themselves as he decreed. - -Then, his strays rounded up and submissive, Treve undertook to get -them out of their predicament. But this was a task beyond his collie -brain. He did not seek to drive them across the tossing little river. -The death of the one sheep that had fallen into the flood told him -the futility of such a move;--even could he have forced them to the -terrifying passage. He must find some better way to get back to the -flock. - -The river, in its descent, waxed ever wider. Moreover, its course -continued steadily to travel farther and farther from the trail. -Perhaps for this reason, perhaps by mere instinct, Treve began to drive -his scared sheep up the mountain; keeping ever as near as possible to -the stream; and watching for a safe way to cross. Again and again he -tested its bottom in hope of a ford. But he found none. Nor was the -river bridged, farther up, by any tree. - -Still, he continued his climb, marshaling the forty-seven wethers ahead -of him. The going was rough and the sheep were tired and rebellious. -But he kept on. At the end of a few minutes he stopped. Or rather, he -_was_ stopped. He was stopped by the same form of barrier as had halted -the sheep, in the first place, on the other side of the stream, far -below. - -A rock ridge, some twelve feet high, and with a front as precipitous as -the wall of a room, loomed in front of him and his flock. It continued -to the very edge of the stream and indeed for a yard or two out into -the water; the current foaming around its base. There was no way of -climbing it. Treve must needs follow, to the right along its base, for -an opportunity to skirt it or else to surmount it at some place where -the cliff should be lower and less precipitate. - -So, to the right, he guided his weary captives and moved along the -ridge’s base. Presently, the roar of the Chiquita River died away -behind them as they pushed forward through the rubble and thickets that -fringed the bottom of the cliff. Nowhere did the cliff itself appear -to be lower. Instead, it seemed to be sloping upward, gradually, to -greater height. - -The sheep became harder to drive. For hereabouts were wide clearings in -the forest and underbrush. These clearings were lush with grass. Here, -no flock had grazed; the herdsmen wisely sticking to the other side of -the Chiquita. But Treve would not let the wethers loiter. The day was -growing late, and the journey to the flock below was momentarily waxing -greater. - -Only once did the collie check his steady drive. That was when the -front of the cliff opened wide in a split that had had its origin in -some ancient earthquake. Here was an aperture, some six feet wide; the -cliff-top meeting above it in a sort of Gothic arch, formed by the -toppling of two crest bowlders against each other, long ago. - -Leaving his fagged-out sheep to browse on the grass, Treve explored -this opening. Warily, he advanced into it. For his nostrils registered -the scent of wild beasts here. But, as the scent was old and stale, he -did not hesitate to continue. - -Inside the arch was a cave, partly natural, partly caused by the -juncture of fallen bowlders at the top. The cavern was about ninety -feet wide, by some seventy feet deep; before the gradually shelving -roof rock made it too low for the dog’s body to wriggle onward. Its -floor was strewn with rock-fragments and with the scattered bones of -animals long since slain. - -Here the wild beast scent was somewhat more rank than from the -entrance. Yet here too it was stale. To all appearances this was -the lair of some brute or brutes that used it only as a winter-time -shelter. The fact did not interest Treve. He had come in here, hoping -the opening might go all the way through the ledge and let him and -the sheep out at the other side. As it did not, he went back to his -wethers; rounded them up from their grass-munching and set them in -motion, still skirting the ledge in the same direction. - -A few rods farther, the cliff was broken again; this time by a spring -that trickled out from a rent in the precipice and filled a little -natural rock pool in the ground in front of it. - -Another half-mile brought them within sound of rushing water, again; -and they emerged on the bank of the little Pico River,--as swollen and -as turbulent as the Chiquita itself and as impassable. Both tiny rivers -had their birth on the summit. Both flowed down, on opposite sides -of the cliff which extended from one to the other. The two streams -converged a mile below. - -The sight of this new obstacle roused Treve to worried activity. -Once more deserting his flock, he set off at a loping run, downhill, -skirting the Pico. And at the end of a mile he came on the seething -confluence of the two rivers. Thence he traced the Chiquita back to the -ledge; after which, perplexedly, he ran on and rejoined the sheep. - -To his collie mind, one thing was clear. Until the waters should -subside, there was no possibility of leading his wethers out of this -enclosure. - -Here they must stay; and here he must look after them. It would have -been the simplest sort of exploit for him to swim the river himself -and get back to his master. But this would involve deserting the -sheep;--which is the first and the most sacred “Thou Shalt Not” in all -a trained sheep dog’s list of commandments. - -Having been wholly out of earshot from the trail, Treve did not hear -the shouts of Fenno and later, of Royce. Mack, following the path of -the strays, on his return, two days later, saw where it had approached -the brook and then where part of it had branched off again, back toward -the trail. Hence, he missed the one chance of finding his chum. He knew -no sheep would swim the flooded river. The bridging log was gone. Thus, -he did not explore beyond the Chiquita. - -The tally at the ranch proved the flock to be forty-eight sheep short. -Both partners came to the somewhat natural conclusion that these must -have encountered a group of cattlemen, rounding up their herds on the -no-sheep section of the peak; and that the cowboys had destroyed them -and their guardian collie. Such reprisals were not unprecedented in the -eternal sheepman-cattleman war. - -Mack would have made further search and would have quartered the whole -mountain. But, before he could arrange to do so, the rains set in. -The upper half of Dos Hermanos peaks was lost in deep snow. The lower -half was a combination of quagmire and torrent. No, the search must be -postponed till spring. Heavy-hearted, the partners set themselves to -forget the collie they loved and the sheep whose loss they could not -afford. It was not likely to be a happy winter at the ranch. - -At first the marooned dog and his forty-seven sheep fared comfortably -enough. The grass was lush. The water was plentiful. In that -man-avoided loop of the two rivers, there were an abundance of rabbits -and squirrels and raccoons and similar small game which any clever and -energetic collie could catch with no vast difficulty. - -Treve was miserably unhappy over his absence from Royce and from home. -But he was far from starvation. And his herding job was reasonably -easy. The first snows did not creep down as far as the ledge. Nor was -the cold too intense to make outdoor sleeping comfortable. The larger -forest creatures were taking greedy advantage of the fat autumn season -of easy kills, farther up the peak. Not until driven down by cold and -by dearth of game would most of them invade the ledge-and-water-girt -loop between the rivers. - -But, in another fortnight, rain changed to alternate sleet and snow. In -one night the wool of nearly half the flock froze hard to the ground. -But for a merciful sluice of warmer rain in the early morning, the -victims must have stuck there until they starved. But the accident -gave Treve his warning. Thus had a bunch of sheep frozen to the corral -ground, one sleety night, the year before, at the ranch. Next night -Treve had helped Mack herd them through the narrow gate into a covered -fold. The memory had stayed by him, as well as the sane reason for the -act. - -And, this day, when night drew near, he shoved and coerced his -wondering charges in through the six-foot opening of the cliff-cave -he had explored. It was an ideal fold. He himself slept at the cave’s -narrow mouth;--perhaps less, at first, with an idea of guarding his -flock than to escape their rank odor and jostling bodies. But, on the -third night, he had good cause to be glad of his choice of a bed. - -He was roused from a snooze, by the return of the lair’s winter -occupant. Starting up, urged by some warning that pierced his slumber, -he confronted an indistinct form that approached in the darkness, not -twenty feet in front of him. - -The elderly mountain lion which, for years, had made his winter abode -in the cave, had dropped down over the ledge, from his summer and -autumn wanderings in the rich hunting grounds among the higher reaches -of the peak. A warm reek of delicious live mutton assailed his hungry -senses as he neared his home. Then, of a sudden, out of the doorway of -the lair flashed something hostile and furious; charging straight at -him before the lion could so much as crouch for a spring. - -Treve carried the battle to the enemy, ere the latter knew there was -such a thing as a foe between him and the sheep whose stronger odor -had stifled the scent of the collie. - -With hurricane speed he dashed at the approaching beast. The lion -reared on his hind legs, spitting, snarling, swatting with both -murderous forepaws. But, by reason of the attack’s complete surprise -and a season of heavy feeding and his advancing years, he was slow. The -dog was able to dive beneath the flailing claws, slash the unprotected -underbody, and spring to one side. - -The lion swerved, to follow. But Treve was of a breed whose ancestors -were wolves;--a breed whose brain never quite loses, at emergency, -the wolf-cunning. A million times, in the world’s earlier centuries, -had panther and wolf done death-battle in prehistoric forests. Their -warfare was a phase of the eternal cat-and-dog feud. Some native -ancestral skill guided Treve, to-night. - -For, as he swerved, he twisted back, with the speed of thought. The -mountain lion lunged after him. The collie was no longer there. -Instead, his white fangs had found the mark that instinct taught them -to seek. They closed on the nape of the lion’s neck, as the old cat -shifted his head in pursuit of his dodging foe. - -The lion thrashed madly about to dislodge the jaws that were grinding -unrelentingly toward his spinal cord. He tossed the dog to and fro. -He banged him against the ground and against the cliffside. Once his -curved claws raked Treve obliquely, shearing to the bone. - -But the dog hung on; ever deepening his bite into the neck-nape. He was -knocked breathless. He was in torment. But he hung on. He redoubled the -muscular pressure of his grinding jaws. It was his only chance. And he -knew it. - -Then, with a last frantic plunge, the lion flung him off. The dog’s -whirling body crashed athwart the cliffside. - -Treve fell breathless and stunned to the ground; and lay there. The -lion did not follow up his victory, but lay where he had fought. -He twisted and writhed like a broken snake. That last irresistible -fling had been his death-struggle. The collie’s teeth had found their -unerring way to the spinal cord. - -When, at last--battered and bruised and bleeding--the collie staggered -to his feet, the enemy sprawled inert and lifeless, ten feet away from -him; and the cave was reverberant with the bleating of panic sheep. - -On another night, two coyotes approached the cave. Treve stood his -ground in the narrow passageway, resisting their lures to venture -forth; that they might take him from opposite sides. - -One of them, feinting a dash, in hope of drawing him out, ventured -too close. The next moment he went howling back to his mate; a broken -forepaw dragging limp. - -The two marauders contented themselves with lurking out of reach for -the rest of the night. In the dawning they set off in search of easier -prey. Nor did they return. - -Luckily for Treve, the wolves and the bulk of the other large beasts of -prey had not yet crossed the rivers or come down over the ledge, for -the winter. As it was, his labors were wearing enough; in leading his -hungry flock to stretches of snow not too deep or too hard for them to -dig through in search of grass. - -Then dawned a morning when the temperature was many degrees below -zero. It was the third morning of the first real ice-grip weather of -the young winter. Another night or so of such awful cold would bring -the hungry wolf-packs down from their higher hunting grounds;--down to -where the scent of sheep would muster them to the slaughter. - -On that morning the hollow, below the spring-trickle, was frozen solid. -Perforce, Treve led his sheep afield in search of water. He led them to -the Chiquita River, a quarter mile below the ledge. As they neared it, -he left them and bounded forward. - -To his amazed near-sighted eyes, there was a wide and solid bridge -spanning the stream at this narrow point;--a bridge which, assuredly, -had not been there when last he visited the river. It shone like white -flame in the bitter cold sunrise. - -The freshet had long since subsided. The freezing of the pools near the -summit, for two nights, had made the stream sink still lower. Here, the -queer trend of the water into a cataract, and the sudden visitation of -the supreme cold had caused a phenomenon familiar to every one who has -seen northern waterfalls in winter. An ice-bridge had formed over the -shallow cataract. - -Now, Treve had no method of knowing whether this seemingly firm bridge -was strong enough to hold an army or too fragile to support a mouse. -Nor did he stop to test it. Enough for him to realize that he and his -sheep were no longer cut off from the world. - -Wheeling, he bunched his flock, with clamorous barks and with flying -feet; and fairly hurled them at the bridge. Laggards and cowards were -nipped or hustled. Fearing their guard more than they feared the -uncertain ice, the forty-seven wethers rushed the bridge; slipping and -slithering across it, helter-skelter, singly and in twos and threes. - -Over they surged, in safety; the big young dog driving them fast and -mercilessly. - - -Early winter dusk had fallen. Royce and Fenno were entering the ranch -house at the close of their day’s chilly work, when a shout from Toni, -at the barns, made them stop and turn around. - -Up the meadow, from the direction of the foothills, a scarred and thin -collie was driving a bunch of thinner and leg-weary sheep. All day and -at a racking pace Treve had driven them; giving them no semblance of -rest; keeping them at a gallop whenever he could urge their tired legs -into such violent action. - -Now, at sight of Mack, the collie left his detested charges to the -oncoming Toni; and galloped ecstatically up to Royce; leaping on the -dumbfounded man and licking his hands and making the icy air reëcho -with his rapture-barks. - -While master and dog were greeting each other, Toni counted the sheep -and made report to Fenno. - -“Where--where the blue blazes have you been, old friend?” Mack was -demanding of the excited dog. “And where’d you lose all that flesh and -get all those scars? You poor boy! Where you been?” - -“Huh!” scoffed Joel, blowing his nose and forcing his shaky voice -to its wonted growl of complaint. “Best ask him what he done with -that other sheep. There was forty-eight of ’em, when him and them -disappeared. There’s only forty-seven now. I’m wonderin’--” - -“I’m wondering, too!” flared the indignant Royce, pausing in the -petting of Treve, to whirl angrily on his partner. “I’m wondering -what’d happen if some one should return a thousand-dollar roll of -banknotes to you, that you’d lost. I’m wondering what you’d say to him. -No, I’m not wondering, either. I _know_. You’d say: ‘What became of -the nice rubber band that used to be fastened around this roll?’ Gee, -but you’re a grateful soul, partner! Lost forty-eight sheep; and Treve -pretty near gets himself scarred and starved to death getting ’em back -for you! And all you do is to kick because one of ’em’s lost!” - -He strode contemptuously into the house, whistling the collie to -follow. But Joel Fenno surreptitiously laid a detaining hand on Treve’s -neck. - -“Trevy,” he cooed, hoarsely, bending low over the happy dog and petting -him with clumsy fervor, “I--I reckon _you_ understand, don’t you? Lord, -but I’ve missed you!” - - - - -CHAPTER IV: THE KILLER - - -The rainy season was coming to an end--the season as nastily -disagreeable as it was needful. Spring was at hand. And the folk on -the Dos Hermanos ranch rejoiced almost as much as did their thousands -of chronically damp sheep and their soggy acres of mud-tormented range -land. - -To Treve the winter had passed pleasantly enough. He had had more time -for cross-country rambles and for jack rabbit chasing than was at his -command during the year’s three other and busier seasons. - -The soaking rains bothered him not at all. True, his mighty outer coat -was often drenched and flattened by the wet. But the queerly woven and -downy mist-hued undercoat served him as well as could any mackintosh. -It was waterproof and all but coldproof. - -The occasional snowfalls exhilarated him. The glare and tingle of them -went to his head and made him frisk and roll in puppylike glee and -snatch up mouthfuls of the stinging white flakes as they lay for a -brief space on the sodden or half-frozen earth. - -True, hard snow-lumps had an annoying way of forming between his pads; -so that he had to halt in his romps or his runs, every few minutes, to -gnaw them out. But these were petty drawbacks. The snow, for the most -part, was Treve’s loved playfellow. - -Royce Mack was as enthusiastic over the snowfalls as was Treve himself. -They reminded him of the jolly winter sports in the Vermont hills -he had left so far behind him. He and Treve used to tramp for miles -through the glistening whiteness; just for the fun of it. - -Joel Fenno had never in his long and grouchy life done anything “just -for the fun of it.” Fun had no place in his meager workaday vocabulary. -Sourly he used to watch Royce and young Treve set forth together on -their snow-tramps, in the rare hours of worklessness, that winter. - -He grudged the idea of any energy not directed to the piling up of -dollars and cents. Moreover, he had grown to care queerly much for the -big collie that once had saved him from death. He was vaguely annoyed -by the dog’s evident preference for Mack; and the gay romps and rambles -they enjoyed. - -To Royce, the old chap grumbled loudly about the folly of wasting time -in such fashion. He used to scowl in disgust at Treve and make as -though to repel the collie’s playful offers of friendship. Not to Royce -or to any one else would Fenno have admitted that he had so far broken -the crust of his own grouchiness as to entertain a genuine yearning for -the comradeship of a mere dog. - -Mack was deceived by Joel’s attitude of lofty contempt; even though -Treve was not. The fact that Joel ignored him or glowered at him, in -public, did not offset to Treve the pleasanter fact that he fed him -choice bits from his own dinner plate or patted his head with awkward -furtiveness when Royce’s back was turned. - -One morning, as spring was dawning, the two partners sat at their -sunrise breakfast, preparatory to starting out for a day of “marking,” -at their Number Three camp. Treve’s usual place, at meals, was on the -puncheon floor; to the left of Royce Mack’s seat at the table. This -morning, the big dog was absent. - -“Where’s Treve?” asked Fenno, with elaborate carelessness; adding, -surlily: “It’s good to have one meal in peace, without a measly cur to -take away my appetite by scratchin’ fleas and watchin’ every mouthful I -eat.” - -“I don’t know where he is,” Mack answered. “Around, outside, somewhere, -most likely. These warm spring nights when we leave the doors open, -he’s apt to trot out, as soon as he’s awake. If it takes your appetite -away to have him here when we eat, I can tell him not to come in at -meals. He never needs to be told anything but once.” - -Royce spoke, aggrievedly. Treve was his chum, his loyal and loved -comrade. It irked him to hear Fenno’s incessant grumblings at the great -dog’s presence as a housemate. - -“Oh, let him keep on comin’ to table if you’re a mind to!” muttered -Joel, ungraciously. “If it makes a hit with you to have him spraddled -out on the floor beside you when you eat an’ at the foot of your bunk -at nights and traipsin’ along after you all day--why, go ahead. We -settled that, long ago. I’d rather put up with it than have you sore -about it or bickerin’ an’ jawin’ at me all the time, because your purp -can’t be treated like he was folks. I c’n go on standin’ it, I reckon. -I used to figger that this outfit was a workin’ proposition; an’ that -every man and every critter on the Dos Hermanos ranch was s’posed to -hustle all day and every day fer his board and keep. But if it amooses -you to keep a dog that’s just a silly pet an’ to waste a lot of good -work-time playin’ around with him--” - -“Treve does his share of the ranch work, and more than his share!” -declared Royce. “You know that as well as I do. And you wouldn’t have -been here, grouching and whining, if he hadn’t saved you from dying, -out on the Ova trail. Yes, and we’d have been shy forty-seven sheep, -last fall, if he hadn’t herded ’em safe home here, when they got lost -up on the Peak. Oh, what’s the use? We’ve been over all this a trillion -times. Either say outright you don’t want him in the house at meals and -at night; or else quit nagging about it.” - -Joel Fenno rebuked this unwonted tirade from his pleasant-tempered -partner by sinking into grieved silence. Surreptitiously, he hid under -a slice of bread two tempting morsels of pork that he had been saving -to give to Treve. - -Seldom was the collie absent from meals, and Fenno missed him. He -enjoyed feeding the big young dog on the sly, when Mack was not -looking. The loveless, sour old man had never before made a pet or a -chum of any dumb animal. He was unreasonably vexed that Treve should -not be there to eat the bits of meat he had set aside for him. - -As Mack wiped his mouth and got up from the deal table, Joel took -occasion to slip the two fragments of pork into his own shirt pocket, -on the chance of being able to give them to Treve, unnoticed, during -the morning. Then he swore at himself for a slobbery old fool, for -doing such a thing. - -He and Royce left the house. As usual, they made their way toward the -ramble of adobe outbuildings which served as barn, garage, storerooms, -stable and “home-fold.” As they neared this straggling group of shacks, -two men came in sight, over the low swell of ground from the southward. - -The men were mounted, and they rode fast. As they sighted Mark and -Fenno, they left the trail-like road and cantered across the three-acre -dooryard toward them. - -At a glance, both partners had recognized the riders. They were Bob -Garry, of the Golden Fleece sheep-ranch, five miles to southward, and -Garry’s foreman. - -“I tried to get you boys on the phone,” hailed Garry, as he drew near. -“But you didn’t answer. So we rode over. I--” - -“Phone’s been out of kilter, for three days,” said Mack. “They’re -sending a man out from Santa Carlotta, to-day, to fix it. What’s wrong?” - -He noted both horses had been ridden hard and their riders’ faces were -grim. - -“What’s wrong?” echoed Garry. “’Nough’s wrong. We came over to see if -he’d visited Dos Hermanos, yet. Has he?” - -“Who?” snapped Joel; continuing crankily: “We don’t hone for vis’tors. -Not in a rush season like this. Who’s due to come a-visitin’?” - -“If you don’t know,” retorted Garry, nettled at the inhospitable tone, -so rare in that region of roughly eager hospitality, “if you don’t -know, then it’s a cinch he didn’t come here. Your herders would have -reported him, before now. He--” - -“Who?” insisted Fenno, trying to stem the flood of angry garrulity and -to glean the facts. “Who’s--?” - -“The Killer,” replied Garry. “First one that’s hit the Dos Hermanos -valley, since--” - -“Killer?” babbled Royce Mack, aghast. “Good _Lord_, man!” - -He and Joel stared at the riders and then at each other, in slack-jawed -dismay. Well did they understand, now, the grim look on the faces of -Garry and his foreman. Well did they realize what was implied to all -sheepmen by that sinister word, “Killer.” - -From time to time, throughout the annals of Western shepherding, flocks -have been devastated by some predatory dog or wolf; whose murders have -been wrought on a wholesale basis and have piled up a cash loss of -many thousands of dollars, before he could be destroyed. Not a mere -mischievous mongrel, which perhaps managed to kill a sheep or two and -then was tracked down and shot; but a genuine Killer. - -Such a Killer was the famed “Custer wolf” of the Black Hills country, -whose depredations cost more than $25,000 in slaughtered livestock, -and whose killing, by Harry Williams, in November, 1920, was greeted -by a local celebration which eclipsed that of Armistice Day. Such a -Killer was the dread “black greyhound” of Northern California, with his -hideous toll of slain and mangled young cattle and sheep. - -Killers seem to be inspired by a devilish ingenuity which for a time -gives them charmed lives and renders useless the cleverest efforts of -ranchers and professional hunters to track and slay them. Tidings that -such dog or wolf has begun operations in any particular region is cause -for tenfold more alarm than would be the news of a smallpox epidemic. -For it means grave loss to the community and to all the community’s -stockmen. - -Small wonder that Royce and Joel gaped blankly at each other, on -hearing Garry’s announcement! Mack was the first to recover his tongue. - -“Every time a lamb is missing or a wether gets gouged on a barbed -wire,” he said, with an effort at banter, “the yell of ‘Killer’ goes -up. Most likely this is--” - -“Most likely you’re talking like a wall-eyed ijit!” cut in Garry. -“Eleven of my sheep found, an hour ago, with their throats torn out.” - -“Huh?” grunted Fenno, with much the sound that might have been expected -had he been kicked in the stomach. - -“Eleven of ’em!” reiterated Garry. “Down in my Number Two range. I -had a bunch of five hundred wethers and old ewes down there. My poor -collie, Tiptop, was in charge of ’em. We found him with both forelegs -broke and his jugular slit. He’d done his best. I c’d see that, by the -way the soft ground was mussed up, all around him. But he’s a little -feller; and pretty old, besides. So the Killer got him. And then he got -eleven of my sheep. Simmons found what’d happened, when he made his -rounds, at sunrise. He came, lickety-split, to me. I phoned up and down -the line; but the Golden Fleece seems to be the only ranch he came to.” - -“He didn’t come here,” said Royce. “We’d have got word, before now, if -he’d done any killing at one of the outlying ranges. He--” - -“That’s the Killer of it!” commented Fenno, savagely. “I know. I’ve -been in sections where one of ’em worked. Never visit the same place -twice in the same month. Never go back to their kill. Clean up at one -ranch to-night; then at another, twelve miles away, to-morrow night; -then maybe a week later at one that’s fifty miles away; then back -next door to where they killed fust. No way to dope out where they’ll -land next. They’re wise to pizen an’ traps an’ guns an’ sich. Send -out parties to track ’em, an’ they give ’em the slip an’ double back -an’ kill, right behind ’em. Put night guards on the ranges, an’ next -mornin’ you’ll find dead sheep not fifty feet from where the guards was -posted. Killers are smarter than folks are. We’re sure in for a passel -of trouble--the lot of us. That’s the way with luck!” sighed the old -pessimist with the sorrily triumphant air of one whose worst fears are -realized. “Yep, that’s what I always say about luck. It’s pretty bad, -for a while. Then all at once it begins to get a heap worse. Now--” - -“Well, I’m out to round up a posse of hunters,” interrupted Garry. -“That’s the only hope. Post good shots everywhere, on every range; and -then let a posse comb the country for the Killer’s lair. Most likely -he has a hide-out, somewheres along the foothills of the Dos Hermanos -peaks, or maybe down in the coulée. And maybe, with the right men, we -can root him out. Anyhow, with men hunting him all day and with the -ranges close-guarded all night, he’s li’ble to figger that this ain’t a -healthy region for his work; and he’ll shift to somewheres else.” - -“You said just now that my partner is a wall-eyed ijit,” drawled Fenno. -“I’m not denyin’ it. Lord knows he is. I found it out, a long while -back. But he’s plumb sensible, compared to you, Mister Garry; with -your talk of trackin’ down a Killer or makin’ the region too hot to -hold him. Why, that sort of a thing is meat an’ drink to a Killer! -That’s what a Killer likes better’n to be ’lected Pres’dent. It gives -him a chance to amoose himself by gettin’ the best of folks. He’ll run -circles around your posse an’ he’ll toll it into a swamp. He’ll sneak -behind your range-guards; just like I said; an’ they’ll find a bunch of -killed sheep, next mornin’, not fifty feet from where they was standin’ -guard. You’re wastin’ your time, a whole lot and you’re losin’ sleep. -No, sir, it’s you that’s the wall-eyed ijit; not Royce Mack;--when you -hand out that line of chatter. Why, son, you couldn’t even strike the -Killer’s trail; let alone foller it! He’ll--” - -“Maybe there’s _three_ wall-eyed ijits, then,” spoke up the Golden -Fleece foreman, “with you for the middle one, Mister Fenno. ’Cause -we’ve found his trail, as plain as if it was wrote in big print. -Likewise we follered it. Follered it clean to the main road; and lost -it, there, on a ridge of hardpan and rock that didn’t leave any marks -like the wet ground did. Headed for the coulée, I’ll bet he was. It’s a -trail that ain’t to be mistook for any other, neither.” - -“Huh?” grunted Joel, with reluctant interest. “If it’s a queer trail, -maybe that’ll help. Did--?” - -“It’s a queer trail, all right,” said Garry. “It’s a three-legged -trail.” - -“A _which_?” - -“A three-legged trail,” repeated Garry. “Left front foot don’t touch -ground at all.” - -“A lame Killer!” ejaculated Mack. “That’s something new.” - -“Maybe so. Maybe not,” said Garry. “It struck me queer, first-off. But -I got figgering on it. If it’s a wolf or a coyote that’s hurt its left -front foot, that means it can’t run as fast as it used to; and it can’t -run down its food in the hills. The only way it can get square meals is -to slink down to the ranges and stalk a bunch of sleeping sheep. That’s -simple enough, ain’t it? My foreman’s right. We studied those tracks of -the Killer, in the mud of the range and in the muck at the edge of the -road. Three legs. I c’n swear to that. Left forefoot off the ground.” - -“Some sheep dog, gone bad, most likely!” ruminated Mack, half to -himself. “I’ve read about such. And--” - -“Nope,” denied Garry. “Nothing like it. I thought of that, too. But it -ain’t.” - -“How d’_you_ know?” challenged Fenno, ever eager for argument. “Can’t a -sheep dog hurt his left front foot as easy as a wolf can? Huh? Tell me -that! Is there anything in the Constitootion that forbids a--” - -“Sure he can,” assented Garry. “Only, this time he didn’t. A dog -that’s spent his life running, thirty miles a day, over this country’s -hardpan, after straying or bolting sheep--that dog’s feet gets as -splayed as a cimmaron bear’s. A wolf’s don’t. A wolf don’t have to run, -except when he wants to. And his pads don’t splay, to any extent. No -more’n a house dog’s feet splay. These tracks was of feet that weren’t -hardly splayed at all. So that’s the answer to that.... Well, we’re -wasting time. I wanted to pass the word to you boys, and I wanted to -see if one of you or both of you would maybe join up with the posse -we’re going to form. How about it?” - -Before either of the partners could answer, the Golden Fleece foreman -cried out and pointed a stubby forefinger, dramatically. Around the -corner of the farthest outbuilding, from the direction of the coulée, -appeared a bedraggled figure. - -The newcomer was Treve. His golden-tawny coat and his immaculate white -ruff and frill were stained with mire and blood. Bloodstreaks marred -his classic muzzle and his jaws. - -He was hobbling on three legs; his left forepaw dangling helpless in -air. - -The dog made straight for Mack and Fenno; his plumed tail essaying to -wag greeting to his masters. He was a sorry sight. In his dark deepset -eyes lurked the glint of half-shame, half-fun, which is the eternal -expression of a collie that has been in delightful mischief and fears a -scolding for his pranks. - -After that first loud exclamation from the foreman, none of the -onlookers spoke or moved; for the space of perhaps ten seconds. Frozen, -wide-eyed, jaws adroop, they stared at the oncoming Treve. - -In every brain raced the same line of glaringly simple logic. And in -every brain was registered the dire word: “Guilty!” - -Treve, ignoring the battery of horrified eyes, came limping up to Royce -Mack, and stood in front of the younger man, gazing in friendly fashion -into the whitened face and holding out for sympathy his sprained -foreleg. - -But, for once in his life, Treve received from his adored god neither -sympathy nor a pat, nor any other sign of welcome. Royce simply blinked -down at him in unbelieving horror. - -As Mack gave no response to his overtures, Treve limped over to Joel -Fenno, thrusting his bloodstained muzzle affectionately into the -oldster’s cupped palm. At the touch, a violent shudder wrenched Joel’s -whole meager body. He did not withdraw his hand from the caress. But -he turned his sick eyes miserably toward Bob Garry. In response to the -look, Garry said curtly: - -“The Killer’s found; sooner’n I thought. I’m sorry, boys. I know what -store you set by the brute. But there’s only one thing to do. You know -that, as well as I do.” - -There was no answer. Royce Mack took an impulsive half-step between the -speaker and the wondering collie. Fenno did not speak nor stir. His -sick old eyes were still fixed on Garry with a world of appeal in them. -Garry spoke again; this time with a tinge of angry impatience in his -tone. - -“Well,” he rasped, “I’m waiting to see it done. I reckon I’ve paid -for my seat to the show. I paid for it with eleven killed sheep. And -I don’t aim to go from here till I make sure the Killer is put out -of the way for good. We can settle, later, for the sheep of mine he -slaughtered and for my good little old collie, too. But that can wait. -Just now, the main thing is to see he don’t do any more killing.” - -Neither partner answered. Garry laid a hand on the rifle he had -strapped across his saddlebow when he had started forth on the -Killer-hunt. The gesture made old Fenno shake from head to foot as with -a congestive chill. - -Royce Mack, hollow-eyed and desperate, pushed the amazed collie behind -him; and stood shielding him with his own athletic body. - -“That won’t get you nowheres!” sternly reproved Garry, noting the -instinctive motion, and unstrapping his rifle as he spoke. “You know -the law as well as I do. You ought to be thankful we’ve nailed him -before he could do any more killing. It isn’t once in a blue moon that -a Killer is nabbed at the very start; before he c’n get away to the -hills. We’re plumb lucky. Now, then, will you shoot him; or do you want -me to do it? Which’ll it be? Speak up, quick!” - -“Wait!” sputtered Royce, stammering in his heartsick eagerness. “Wait! -This dog’s my chum. He’s never done anything like this, before. He’d -never have done it, now; if he hadn’t gone crazy, some way. I’ve read -about sheep dogs ‘going bad,’ like this. It isn’t their fault. Any -more’n it’s a human’s fault, if he goes crazy. Folks don’t shoot a -human that’s lost his wits. They shut him up somewheres and treat him -kind; and then, like as not, he gets his mind back again. It’s likely -the same with a dog. I--” - -“It’s _you_ that’s lost your mind!” scoffed Garry, angrily, as he -fingered his rifle. “If you haven’t the whiteness or the nerve to shoot -him, stand clear; and I’ll do it, myself. He--” - -“Wait!” implored poor Mack, the sweat running down his tortured face. -“Hold on! Let me finish. Here’s my proposition:--I’ll pay you double -market price on your eleven killed sheep and on your dog he killed. -And I’ll put up a thousand-dollar bond to keep Treve tied or else in -the house, all the time. I’ll do this, if you and your man will call -it square and keep your mouths shut about his going bad. I’m offering -this, on my own hook. My partner hates Treve, anyhow. So I’m not asking -him to share the cost or the responsibility. How about it, Garry? Is it -a go?” - -“It is--_not_!” refused Garry, his voice like the scraping of a file -upon rust. “I’m not in the bribe-taking game. Besides, I’d feel grand, -wouldn’t I, first time the cur sneaked loose and began killing sheep -again, all up and down the Valley? Nice responsibility I’d have, hey? -And that’s what he’d do. Once a Killer, always a Killer. I’m clean -s’prised at you for making such a crack as that! Clean _s’prised_! -Stand clear, there! I’m going to put a stop to this Killer danger, here -and now. The law will uphold me. Stand clear of him, unless you want me -to take a chance at shooting him between your knees.” - -He swung the rifle to his shoulder, as he spoke. Then it was that Joel -Fenno came out of his brief trance of dumbness. - -“You’re right,” agreed Fenno, grumpily. “The law’ll uphold you. But the -law gives a owner the right to shoot his own dog, if he’s willin’ to. -Royce, here, ain’t willin’ to. But I am. And I’m the cur’s joint owner.” - -“Go ahead and do it then,” ordered Garry forestalling a fierce -interruption from Royce Mack. “Only, cut out the blab; and _do_ it. I -got a morning’s work to catch up with. And I don’t stir from here till -the dog’s dead.” - -“All right!” agreed Joel; a tinge of gruff anticipation in his surly -voice. “That suits me. An’ when you tell this yarn around, jes’ bear -witness that _one_ of the Dos Hermanos partners was willin’ and ready -to obey the law; even if t’other one was too white-livered. Gimme the -rifle. My own gun’s up to the house.” - -He reached out for the weapon; and snatched, rather than accepted it, -from Garry’s hands. Hefting it, and turning toward Treve, he grumbled: - -“I never did get the right hang of a rifle. A pistol’s a heap handier. -Got a pistol along, either of you?” - -“No,” said Garry. - -The foreman shook his head. - -“_That’s_ all right, then,” cheerily remarked Fenno. “I--” - -“You’ll shoot Treve, through _me_!” panted Royce, shoving the collie -behind him again; and advancing in hot menace on his detested partner. -“It’s bad enough to have--” - -He got no further. Eyes abulge, he stared at Fenno. - -Joel had caught the rifle deftly in both hands and was hard at work -pumping the cartridges from its magazine. In clinking sequence they -fell to earth. Three seconds later, he picked up and pocketed the -shells and laid the empty and useless gun on the ground. Then he faced -the loudly blaspheming Garry. - -“I’ll send the rifle back to you by one of the men,” said he. “I’m not -givin’ it to you, now; for fear you may have a spare ca’tridge or two -in your jeans. I was afraid maybe one of you had packed a revolver, -too. That’s why I made sure. Your teeth is drawed, friends. S’pose you -traipse off home?” - -“Joel!” cried Mack, overjoyed, incredulous. “_Joel!_” - -The old man spun about on him; scowling, shrill with peevish wrath. - -“What’ve I always told you about that dog?” he accused. “Didn’t I -always say he wa’n’t wuth his salt? You’ve cosseted him an’ you’ve -made much of him an’ you’ve sp’iled him. Not that he ever ’mounted to -anything, to begin with. An’ now you see what you’ve brang him to. Made -a Killer of him! He--” - -“I’m going to have the sheriff here, inside of one hour!” the enraged -Garry was declaiming, unheeded, at the same time. “And after the Killer -is shot by an off’cer of the court, I am going to bring soot agin you -for impeding the course of the law and likewise for stealing my gun. -Then I’m going to sue you both, in the Dos Hermanos County Court, for -the loss of my sheep and--” - -“Likewise,” snarled on old Joel Fenno, still haranguing his partner, -“this comes of tryin’ to make a dog a c’mpanion instead of a beast -of burden, like the Almighty intended him to be. I hope you’re plumb -sat’sfied with the passel of trouble you’ve yanked down onto us, an’--” - -“My foreman, here, is witness to it all,” raged on Garry, in the same -breath. “He’ll test’fy how you d’prived me of my rifle, by trick’ry; -and then--” - -“Don’t go pirootin’ off with the idee I put Friend Garry’s gun out of -c’mission, jes’ to save Treve from the death he’s deservin’,” orated -Joel, to his dizzy partner. “I didn’t crave to have outsiders come here -an’ give me orders. And if I help you hide Treve away somewheres or -ship him East to my nephew, before the sheriff gets here, it’ll only be -because--” - -The advent of two new figures, around the corner of the barns, cut -short the dual flood of oratory. - -Toni, the Basque chief herder of the Dos Hermanos ranch, came into -view. He was bent far forward under the weight of something that was -balanced across his spine and which dangled lifelessly to either side -of his ox-like shoulders. - -Close behind him walked a smaller man, in soiled khaki and puttees; a -repeating rifle slung by a bandolier athwart his back. - -At sight and scent of the thing, carried by the big herdsman, Treve -abandoned his puzzled efforts to make out what all the din and -elocution were about. Wheeling, he bared his teeth and lowered his -blood-stained head. - -Then and only then did his human companions make out the nature of -Toni’s burden. It was the scarred and lifeless body of a giant gray -wolf. - -The partners, at the same time, recognized the slender khaki-clad -rifleman who moved lightly along in the herdsman’s wake. Twice, on his -journeys, this man had stopped at the ranch for a meal. For hundreds of -miles in all directions, he was known and admired. - -For this was Eleazar Wilton, of the “Hunters’ and Trappers’ Service,” -operated by the governmental Biological Survey;--one of the best shots -in the West; and a huntsman who had done glorious work from Texas to -northern Wyoming, in ridding the range country of predatory wolves. His -fame was sung at a score of campfires and bunkhouses. He was a royally -welcome guest wherever he might choose to set foot. - -At sight of him, now, Bob Garry shouted aloud: - -“Here’s the man who’ll do the job you tricked me out of doing! Cap’n -Wilton, this dog has kilt eleven of my sheep! I call on you, in the -name of the law, to put a bullet through his head. I’d ’a’ done it -myself; if these fellers hadn’t fooled me out of it. He--” - -“This dog, here?” asked Wilton in his quietly uninterested voice; as he -strolled past Toni and up to Treve. - -“Yep! That’s the one!” trumpeted Garry. “See? He’s still got their -blood all over him. And his forefoot’s bit and chawed where my collie -died fighting him. There’s other bitemarks on him, too. He--” - -Royce and Fenno, by common consent, moved in front of their imperilled -chum. But, before either of them could speak, Wilton interrupted -Garry’s harangue by stepping past the two partners and laying his -bronzed hands on Treve’s blood-streaked head. - -There was greeting--almost benediction--in the gesture. At the touch, -Treve left off growling at the huge dead wolf which Toni was laying -on the ground, nearby; and glanced quickly up at the stranger who had -offered him this unwonted familiarity. - -At what he read behind Wilton’s steady eyes, the collie’s glint of -suspicion softened to friendliness. His tail wagged, hospitably; and he -laid his cut head against the huntsman’s khaki knee. - -Meantime, Wilton was turning to the gesticulating Garry. - -“They ‘fooled you’ out of shooting this collie, did they?” he asked. -“Then it was the luckiest bit of fooling done in Dos Hermanos County -for a long time. I was afraid of something like that. So I came on -here, as soon as I could. I got that double-sized herder to give me a -lift with the wolf; so we could get here quicker.” - -He nodded over his shoulder, as he spoke. The others, for the first -time, took full cognizance of the wolf that Toni was stretching out on -the muddy ground. - -The giant animal measured well over six feet from muzzle to tail-tip. -His hide was plentifully scored with olden wounds and with very new -gashes. But it was Bob Garry who, with a gasp of amaze, pointed out -the beast’s most striking peculiarity. - -His left forefoot was gone. - -It had been cut off, clean, at the ankle-joint. The injury had occurred -long ago, for the skin and the hair had grown over the wound. - -“Ever hear of him?” asked Wilton. - -Nobody answered. Wilton continued: - -“No, you wouldn’t have been likely to hear. But, up in the Mateo -country, there isn’t a sheepman or a cattleman that hasn’t heard of -him. I was sent up there, to get him. He had visited every range from -San Mateo to Hecker’s. Always they could trace him by his three-footed -track. Must have been caught in a steel trap, years ago, and got loose -by gnawing his foot off. He seems to have navigated faster on three -legs than most animals can, on four. He was a ‘lone wolf,’ too. And he -had all the sense of a dozen stage-detectives. Never tackled the same -place twice in succession. Poison-wise and trap-wise. He could throw -off pursuit as easily as any dime-novel Sioux. They sent me up to the -Mateo district to get him. He fooled me, every time. Then he started -south. The rains helped me track him. I suppose he didn’t bother to -confuse his trail or to double, on a long hike like that. More than a -hundred miles, it was. And I could never catch up with him. Sometimes I -lost his trail, altogether; and I’d pick it up, more by chance than by -any skill.” - -A second time his hand dropped caressingly on Treve’s head. The collie -paused in the task of licking his own various flesh wounds and licked -the caressing hand. Wilton smiled, rubbed clean his licked hand with -his other sleeve, and resumed: - -“Last night, at dusk, I lost the trail again. He was beginning to get -cautious, once more. I figured that meant he was planning to stop and -do some raiding. There was no use looking for tracks in the twilight. -He couldn’t be very far ahead of me. So I rode on. I rode till I got -to the coulée, beyond here. It’s a great place for any animal to hide -out in;--with all those rocks and bushes. It struck me that would be -just the lair for him to crawl into, daytimes; while he was ravaging -this part of the world. Besides, it was right in his line of march. So -I spent the night there; waiting for him. I was pretty sure I’d gotten -in front of him; and that he’d stop there, to hide or else to sleep; -before he went farther. Well, he did.” - -Again he paused, as if for dramatic effect. - -“I watched, from before daybreak,” he continued, presently. “No sign -of him. I had crawled into a little niche between two bowlders, at the -top of the coulée, just at its mouth. I couldn’t miss him there. Then, -about an hour ago, I got sight of him. He was pelting away, at top -speed, on those three pins of his. And he wasn’t using any craftiness, -either. He was running, full tilt. And, not a hundred yards behind him, -a collie was tearing along. This collie dog, here.” - -“They hunted together, hey?” exclaimed Garry. “I knew this cur was--” - -“No,” denied Wilton. “Dogs don’t hunt with wolves. Coyotes do, but not -dogs. The collie was hunting the wolf. He was after him, with every -ounce he had. I take it the collie had been out on an early morning -stroll, not far from his own home; when he got sight or scent of the -wolf as he was coming this way from a kill And the dog gave chase. -The wolf was all blood; so I knew he’d been at a bunch of livestock, -somewhere. The dog hadn’t a mark on him. There was light enough for me -to see that.” - -“Good old Treve!” applauded Mack. “But, Captain, if--” - -“Wasn’t the dog even running on three legs?” despairingly asked Garry. - -“He was,” admitted Wilton; adding: “And on the fourth leg, too. -No lameness, then. I wondered, at first, why a Killer, like the -three-legged wolf, should run away from a dog smaller and lighter than -himself. But I made a guess; and the guess was right. Dawn had come. -People were likely to be astir. It was no time to be caught in the -open, in a fight. The wolf was looking for cover. After he found it, -there’d be time enough to dispose of the collie. That’s wolf-nature.” - -“He--” - -“The wolf got to the mouth of the coulée; where another ten steps -would hide him in the undergrowth and the rock holes so safely that no -hundred hunters could root him out. He was right below me. I drew a -bead on him. But I didn’t shoot. Because just then, the collie overtook -him. And I saw the prettiest battle ever. It would have been a crime to -spoil it by a shot.” - -“Lord!” breathed Royce Mack. “Why wasn’t I there?” - -“The wolf spun around on him,” went on Wilton, “and made a dive, -wolf-fashion, for the collie’s foreleg; to break it. The collie was -going too fast to dodge, altogether. But he did his best. And he got -off with nothing worse than a pinched left forefoot. Then the fun -began. The old wolf was as quick as lightning. But the collie--well, -the collie was as quick as--as a collie. I don’t know anything quicker. -He got a slash or two; and once he was bowled over in the mud and the -wolf got a throat grip.” - -“But--” - -“But the collie tore free, by leaving a handful of mattress-hair and -skin in the wolf’s jaws. And before the wolf could spit it out and -get his jaws into action again, the collie had flashed in and gotten -to the jugular. He hung on, like grim death; grinding those slender -jaws of his deeper and deeper; while the wolf kept thrashing about -and hammering him against rocks and against the ground; to make him -let go. But the collie hung on. That’s the collie of it. That’s the -thoroughbred of it, too. He knew he had the one hold he could hope to -win by. And he held it. At last his teeth ground their way down to the -jugular and through it. That’s all there was to that fight.” - -“Treve!” babbled Joel. “_Trevy!_” - -His unconscious exclamation went unheard in the hum of excitement. - -“The collie lay down for a minute, panting,” finished Wilton. “Then -he got up and sniffed at the dead wolf. Then, before I had the sense -to try to stop him, he limped off, in this direction. It seemed to -me I remembered him, when I was at Dos Hermanos, last time. I got to -wondering if he’d be shot, by mistake, when news came of killed sheep -and when he was all bloody. So I hustled on here, after him. A dog, -like that, is too plucky to let die.” - -“Mister Bob Garry, Esquire,” drawled Fenno sourly, as Royce bent in -keen solicitude over his battered collie chum. “You was sayin’ suthin’, -awhile back, ’bout having a mort of work to do, at your own ranch, this -mornin’. Well, friend, the mornin’s joggin’ on. Here’s your pop-gun. -Here’s your pretty ca’tridges. _Scat!_” - -“You’ll come to the house for some breakfast, won’t you, Captain?” -asked Royce, as the disgruntled Garry and his foreman rode off. “Chang -can rustle you some grub, in no time. Come on, Treve. I want to wash -out those bites of yours; and fix up your paw.” - -He set off toward the house, at Wilton’s side. But Joel Fenno, behind -their backs, buried his fingers lovingly in the collie’s bloody and -muddy ruff. - -“Trevy,” he whispered, the other hand groping in his shirt pocket, -“here’s some grand lumps of pork I saved out for you, from my -breakfast. An’--an’, Trevy, that Garry blowhard would ’a’ had to shoot -me as full of holes as these last year’s pants of mine; before I’d -’a’ let him git you. Yep--an’ Wilton, too. Of all the dogs that ever -happened, Trevy--you’re that dog.... Hey!” he called grumpily after the -departing Royce. “Here’s your cur. Take him along to the house with -you. He’s jes’ in my way, down here!” - - - - -CHAPTER V: A SECRET ADVENTURE - - -“The only place where two can live as cheap as one,” ruminated old Joel -Fenno, pointing with his chewed pipestem, “is right yonder.” - -He indicated Treve, lounging on the puncheon floor in front of the -group. Treve had awakened with some abruptness from a snooze and was -scratching busily; driving his right hindfoot with great vigor and -speed into his furry body in the general direction of the short ribs. -On the collie’s wontedly wise face was the grin of idiotic vacuity -which goes with flea-scratching. - -He was not looking his best or gracefulest or most sagacious, at the -moment. Joel Fenno was sharply aware of his chum’s absurd aspect. For -the benefit of the ranch guest, he sought to forestall any unfavorable -comment on the dog. - -“Yep,” he resumed, as Davids, the guest, eyed him in mild curiosity, -“the only two, that can live as cheap as one, is not a spouse an’ a -spousess; but a flea an’ a dog.” - -Davids smiled politely. Royce Mack had read this joke aloud to his -partner, from a year-old copy of _The Country Gentleman_, a month -before. He forbore to encourage the old fellow’s rare trip into the -realms of humor, now, by so much as a grin. But Davids followed up his -own civil smile by saying: - -“I’ve been looking at that collie of yours, off and on, ever since I -got here. He’s a beauty. How’s he bred?” - -“They say there’s beautiful things an’ useful things,” answered Fenno, -surlily. “An’ I’ve allus found the beautiful things is no use and the -useful things ain’t wuth lookin’ at. Yep, Treve must be ‘a beauty,’ all -right, all right. For he’s no use to anybody. Jes’ eats and snores and -loafs; an’ hunts fleas instead of sheep; an’ tries to make busy folks -romp with him. Likewise he succeeds in making ’em do it; so far as -Royce, here, is concerned. The work hours my partner wastes in playin’ -and trampin’ an’ skylarkin’ with that measly cur--” - -“How’s he bred?” repeated Davids, to stem the tide of Joel’s chronic -complaints against Mack and the collie. - -“Bred?” echoed Fenno. “Who? Royce? All fired _ill_ bred, when he has a -mind to be. An’ that’s about all the time. He--” - -“I mean the collie. What is it you call him? Treve?” - -“Treve? Bred? I don’t--” - -“He means,” spoke up Royce Mack, from boyhood memories of pedigreed -animals, in the East, “he means, who were Treve’s ancestors? We don’t -know, Davids. A queer sort of English tourist hobo came here and sold -him to us. The man absconded with all the cash in Joel’s vest and left -the pup behind. As far as we know, Treve’s pedigree began on the ranch, -here. Why?” - -“Because,” said Davids, “he’s a high-bred dog. What’s more, he’s the -true show-type of collie. He’s good enough to win a blue ribbon at any -bench show in America. The hobo, most likely, stole him. Such dogs -aren’t left to roam at will.” - -Treve had ceased to pursue the wicked flea; or else his frantic -clawing had dislodged the pest. For, with a lazy sigh, he resumed -his nap on the cool puncheon. Stretched out there on his left side, -silhouetted against the floor, he presented a picture to stir the heart -of any collie-judge. The classic head might have been chiseled by a -master-hand. The frame was mighty, yet as graceful as any greyhound’s. -The coat was unbelievably heavy and it shone like burnished copper. - -Joel eyed the couchant dog with outward sourness of visage; but with -inward pride that Treve should have won such praise from this Eastern -engineer who had halted at the Dos Hermanos ranch for the night. It -was part of Fenno’s life-creed to maintain a continuous and universal -grouchy disapproval of everything and everybody. - -“Just what I’ve always said!” exulted Mack, at Davids’ endorsement of -his pet. “I’ve always told Joel the dog was good enough to go to any A. -K. C. show. He’s--” - -“Yep!” snarled Fenno, “he’d make a show of us, all right. Why, most -prob’ly they’d laugh him out of the place. Unless it was a flea-chasin’ -match. Then he might--” - -“If I were you,” put in Davids, addressing Mack and ignoring the -peevish oldster, “I’d enter him for the big Dos Hermanos Show, up at -La Cerra, next month. I was reading about it, on the way here. Quite -a ‘spread’ on it in the Sunday _Clarion_. I’ll leave my copy of it -with you, if you’d like to glance over it. They’re trying for a record -entry. A big English judge is going to handle collies and one or two -sporting breeds. On another page of the paper is a sort of primer for -novice exhibitors; telling them how to enter their dogs for the show, -whom to write to for premium lists and blanks, and all that, and how -to make out the blanks. A lot of people don’t understand how to do it. -Take my tip and enter Treve at La Cerra.” - -“Huh!” snorted Joel, loudly. - -“It’s only about a hundred miles from here,” pursued Davids. “You can -make most of the trip by train; and get there in less than a day. Think -it over. It’d be a fine thing to bring Treve home with a bunch of blue -ribbons and maybe a big silver cup; and have all the papers printing -his name. It’s as much of a triumph for a dog to win first prizes at -such a show as for a man to be elected to Congress.” - -Another derisive snort from Joel Fenno interrupted his homily and made -Royce frown apologetically at the annoyed guest. - -Now there was harrowing ridicule in Fenno’s snort. But in the heart -of Fenno an astonishing impulse had swirled into life. The snort was -designed to frighten this yearning impulse to death. It could not. - -Whenever any one looked or spoke approvingly of Treve, old Fenno -had something of the thrill that might come to a man at praise of -a cherished brother. While he girded at this feeling, as babyishly -absurd, he could not check it. He loved the big collie; and he was -inordinately proud of him. That others should admire Treve seemed in a -way a sort of backhanded compliment to himself--to Joel who had never -in his life been admired or complimented. - -And now, at Davids’ careless words, a glowing picture leaped into -Fenno’s dazed mental vision--a picture of cheering throngs at the La -Cerra show, all admiring and praising his victorious Treve. This and a -crazy desire to take the collie there. - -As if in contempt for his companions’ chatter about a mere dog, Joel -got up, presently, and sauntered into the house. He strolled through -the room he and Royce Mack had assigned to Davids for the night. There -on the floor, alongside the engineer’s kitbag, lay the crumpled copy -of the _Clarion_. Furtively, Joel pouched it and bore it to his own -cubbyhole room. There, that night, long after the others were asleep, -he crouched on his bunk and read and reread and sought to master the -many bewildering bits of information as to the show and as to the mode -of conducting dogshows in general. - -Much was as Greek to him; until he figured it out with painful -patience. Twice he flung the paper on the floor with a grunt of -disgust. But ever that glowing vision of his chum’s triumphs goaded him -on. Through the silent hours he continued to wrestle with the details; -as simplified for the benefit of novices. - -Once, during his reading, he looked up guiltily. In the doorway of -his little room stood Treve, gravely inspecting him. The soft sound -of rustled paper had roused the collie from his nightly slumber -alongside Royce’s bunk. He had set forth to investigate. As Joel -peered blinkingly toward him, Treve wagged his plumed tail and came -mincing forward; thrusting his classic muzzle into the hand which Fenno -instinctively stretched forth. - -“Trevy,” whispered the old man, “how’d you like to hear all them folks -clappin’ you an’ sayin’ what a grand dog you are? Hey? Think it over, -Trevy. There needn’t anybody know, but you and me, Trevy. Royce has -got to go to Omaha, with them sheep, next month. He’ll be gone for two -days before this show-date an’ for a couple of days after it. Nobody’ll -ever know, Trevy. I’ll tell the hands I’m goin’ to run up to Santa -Clara to see about a bunch of merinos an’ that I’m totin’ you along -to herd ’em. I--Oh, Trevy, we’re a pair of old fools, you an’ me! I -never thought I’d be such a dodo-bird as to waste time an’ cash on a -dog. I’m gettin’ in my dotage. Granther Hardin used to think he was a -postage stamp, when he got old, Trevy. An’ he used to putter around, -lookin’ for a env’lope big enough to stick himself to. They put him in -a foolish house. I reckon I’m qualifyin’ for one, all right, all right. -But--you’re sure a grand dog, Trevy!” - - -The modernized old Spanish city of La Cerra, at the westerly end of -Dos Hermanos County, had come to life in a rackety way, as it did -once a year when the annual three-day show of the Dos Hermanos Kennel -Association brought to town thoroughbred dogs and humans of all shades -of breeding. - -It was to this show, two years earlier, that Fraser Colt had been -taking his collie pup when the latter’s clash with a police dog in the -baggage car had led to the temporary wrecking of one of his tulip ears; -and when his resentment of Colt’s kick had led his owner to hurl him -bodily out through the car’s open side door. - -The memory of his own treatment at the hands--and boot toe--of the -gross brute who had bought him on speculation and who had been taking -him showward, rankled ever in the far-back recesses of Treve’s brain. -Which is the way of a collie. The harsh memory had been glozed over -by two years of friendly treatment. Treve himself was not aware it -existed. But it was there, none the less. - -Joel Fenno, daily, had been more and more ashamed of his queer -impulse to take Treve to the show. But, daily, also, the show-virus -had infected him, more and more. Any one who has shown dogs will -understand. Ever he visualized a more and more gorgeous triumph for his -secret chum. - -The first twelve miles of the trip were made in the Dos Hermanos -ranch’s wheezy little car--the same in which Joel had piloted his -partner to Santa Carlotta, the day before; when Royce set forth on his -Omaha journey. Treve sat proudly beside the ever-more nervous Fenno, on -the car’s one shabby seat. - -The dog was delighted at the jaunt, as is nearly every collie who is -taken by his master on an outing. Instinctively, too, he felt Joel’s -grouchily suppressed thrill of excitement, and responded to it with a -quick gayety. Apparently this was some dazzlingly jolly adventure he -and his friend were embarking on. - -At Santa Carlotta they took the spur line train for an eighty-mile run. -Sixty of these eighty miles were across dreary greenish gray desert, -flower-splashed, yet as dismal as the Mojave itself;--rolling miles of -sick alkaline sand, skunk-infected, habitat of rattlesnakes--a waste -strewn with sagebrush and Joshua trees. A dead and fearsome stretch; -steel-hard of outline, shrilly vivid of coloring. - -Then came the steep upgrade, over an elephant-backed mountain’s -swordcut pass; and a pitch down into the fertile valley whose nearest -city was La Cerra. - -Joel did not crate his dog; but sat on a trunk in the baggage car, with -the collie curled up comfortably at his feet. The train-ride woke dim -and not wholly pleasing memories in Treve. Something unpleasant had -befallen him on such a ride. Once or twice he glanced up worriedly at -the old man; only to be reassured by an awkward pat on the head or a -grumbled word of friendliness. - -It was so, too, after they had debarked and had found their way to the -armory where the dogshow was in progress. As they entered the vast -barnlike building, Treve’s ears and nostrils were assailed in a way -that made him halt abruptly in his stately advance at Fenno’s side. - -To him gushed the multiple plangent racket of hundreds of dogs barking -in hundreds of keys. To a dog, even more than to a dogman, each bark -carries its own translation. Treve read excitement in many of these -barks that now yammered about his sensitive ears. In more, he read -terror and loneliness and worried apprehension. - -Also, the myriad blended odors of fellow-dogs rushed in upon him, -dazing his senses with their incredible volume. It is through ears and -nostrils that a dog receives his strongest impressions. And Treve was -receiving more than he could assimilate. - -His troubled, deepset eyes scanned Joel Fenno’s gnarled face for -reassurance. The oldster was wellnigh as confused and scared as -his dog. He was a dweller in the lonely places. Crowds confused and -frightened him. Yet he rallied enough to pass his hand comfortingly -over the silken head of the collie and to mutter something by way of -encouragement. Then man and dog marched valiantly down the intersecting -aisles of barking or yelling or silently unhappy exhibits, to the -section labeled “Collies.” - -There, Joel motioned Treve to jump up on the straw-littered bench that -bore his number. He tied him; and tipped a lounging boy to get a panful -of fresh water. The collie drank feverishly; but would touch none of -the tempting meat scraps which Fenno produced from a greasy newspaper -parcel for his benefit. - -The great young dog did not cringe or shiver, amid this bedlam which -tortured his sensitive soul and which was so hideous a contrast to his -wonted life amid the sweet-scented silences. His head was erect. His -dark eyes were steady. He was a good soldier. But--well, it was out of -the question for him to swallow food, at such a place. - -Joel looked about him. On either side of Treve’s bench, and across -the aisle, other collies were tied in their stall-like benches. Fenno -counted eighteen of them, in all. Some were snipe-nosed and fragile. -Some were deep of chest and massive of coat and had strongly classic -heads, much like Treve’s. - -A few were snub-nosed and round-eyed and broad of skull. Old-fashioned -types, these, and without chance of victory in any contested class. - -Their like is seen at nearly every show. They are pets, loved by their -masters or mistresses (oftenest mistresses), who think them wonderful. -They are brought to shows in the futile hope that a blue ribbon or a -cup may lend zest to their owners’ pride in them. To a judge who is -luckless enough to have a soft heart, these poor dogs and their cruelly -disappointed owners are the saddest features of an exhibition which, at -best, is never lacking in sad features. - -Fenno stood, eyeing the dogs around him. He had a refreshing ignorance -of everything which constitutes a collie’s good or bad show points. All -he knew was that Treve was the grandest dog on earth. He had come here -to prove it to mankind at large. And the belief did not waver. Yet as -he watched the handlers prepare their collies for the ring, he scowled. -He had slicked Treve’s glorious coat down smooth, with much water. He -knew that humans are supposed to have their hair slicked down when they -want to look their best. And he supposed it was the same with dogs. - -But now he saw men currying their dogs with expert touch; brushing -the hair up and out; so that it should not cleave to the body and -so that its texture and abundance might be fully seen by the judge. -After watching this process for several minutes and catching sight -of a collie poster on one of the benchbacks, Joel unearthed a mangy -dandy-brush from his kitbag; and proceeded to fall to work right -vigorously on Treve. The water had, for the most part, evaporated from -the slicked coat. What was left of it made the coat and frill stand out -with redoubled luxuriance as Joel brushed it upward. - -Then Fenno scanned his neighbors, once more, for further tips in -collie-dressing. He was vaguely aware that several spectators had -paused at Treve’s bench, as they drifted past. They were eyeing the dog -in open admiration. This pleased Joel, but it did not surprise him. To -him it seemed only natural that people should stop to admire such a -dog. Then he heard one of the spectators read aloud to another from a -gray-backed catalog he held: - -“_‘217. J. Fenno. TREVE. Particulars Not Given. Entered in Class 68.’_ - -“That’s funny!” went on the reader, looking up from the catalog’s -meager information and studying afresh the collie in front of him. -“That’s mighty funny, Chris! Here’s one of the best collies I’ve set -eyes on. Class in every inch of him. He’ll give Champion Howgill Rival -the tussle of his life, for Winners, to-day. And yet he isn’t even -registered. ‘Particulars not given.’ It doesn’t seem possible the owner -of a championship-timber collie, like that, shouldn’t know his pedigree -and his breeder’s name. ‘Particulars not given.’ Gee! That’s the stock -phrase they use for mutts. This dog’s a second Seedley Stirling. It -doesn’t make sense. Who’s ‘J. Fenno,’ anyway? Ever hear of him?” - -“Some yap, out here, who bought the dog as a month-old pup, I s’pose,” -answered the man addressed, “and who doesn’t know what he’s got. I’m -going to hunt him out, before the judging; and see what I can buy this -collie for. Maybe I can pick him up for a song. It’s a cinch his value -will boom, after he’s been judged. Everybody’ll be wanting him, then. -I’m going on a still hunt, right away, for J. Fenno.” - -“Meanin’ me?” asked Joel, turning on him with a sour suddenness that -made the Easterner recoil an involuntary step. “I’m Fenno. An’ I’m the -man you’ve got to go on a still hunt for, to buy this dog for a song.” - -“No offense,” disclaimed the other, mistaking Joel’s normal manner for -snarling displeasure. “I like this dog of yours. That is,” he hedged, -craftily, “I like him in spots. He’s more good than bad. I don’t mind -making you an offer for him, if you’ve got the sense to sell him -cheap. How about it?” - -“I don’t know how much cash you’re packin’ in that greasy old -ill-fitting handmedown suit you’re wearin’,” replied Joel, with his -wonted exquisite courtesy. “Nor yet I don’t know what value you place -on the mortgaged hencoop you live in, back home. But the whole price -won’t buy this collie of mine. Not if you throw in the million dollars -diff’rence between your valuation of yourself and my valuation of you. -Have I made it plain, friend? If I haven’t, I’ll try to speak less -flatterin’ and talk turkey to you.” - -Without awaiting reply he turned his lean back to the flustered -Easterner. The move brought Fenno face to face with a stout man in -vivid raiment. - -“Selling that dog of yours?” queried the stout man, catalog in hand. - -“Oh, _you’re_ looking for a bargain, too, from the ‘yap,’ are you?” -snorted Joel. “Before the judge c’n tell him he’s got a good dog? Well, -the yap don’t need to be told. He knows it. That’s why he brang Treve -here to-day. If your fat was wuth a hundred dollars a pound, you’d be a -billionaire. But you wouldn’t be able to buy my dog. Get that?” - -He was about to turn away from the stout personage, as from his -former interlocutor, when he noted the man was no longer looking -at him Instead, oblivious of the grouchy old hurler of insults, the -stranger was once more studying Treve. In his plump face was a glint of -perplexity, of struggling recollection. - -Fraser Colt had an excellent memory. And the more he examined Treve, -the closer he came to verifying a most improbable idea that had come -to him, to-day, when first he caught sight of the collie reclining -unhappily on the bench. - -Back into his trained mind came the picture of a highbred collie pup, -lying thus sorrowfully in Colt’s stuffy kennel yard, some two years -earlier, after Fraser had picked him up at his first master’s forced -sale. The dog’s markings and facial expression were unusual. It seemed -impossible. Yet-- - -Half-unconscious of his own gesture, Fraser Colt stretched out his hand -toward Treve’s shapely left ear. If there were sign of break or of -ancient teeth-marks therein, the mystery was solved. If not-- - -Treve had lain resignedly in this place of turmoil, consoling himself -by following with his sorrowful eyes the master who, for some -unexplainable reason, had brought him here. Then, amid the million -disturbing odors of the show, one special scent came to his nostrils in -a way to annihilate his heed of all the rest. - -Suspiciously, his eyes clouding with half-formulated and long-sleeping -recollections, he sniffed the heavy air. At the same instant, came the -sound of a voice that was more than vaguely distasteful to him. Into -his friendly heart sprang a righteous anger--but against what or whom -he scarcely knew. - -Then he saw Colt. And sound and scent and sight brought his dormant -memories wide awake. He knew the man. Even as he would have recognized -Royce and Joel, whom he loved--even as he would have recognized and -loved them after two years of absence--so now he knew and hated the man -who had maltreated him so abominably as a defenseless puppy. Into the -soft eyes flamed red rage. - -All ignorant of the emotion he had aroused, Fraser Colt had stretched -forth his plump hand, confidently, to inspect the collie’s left ear. -The expert big fingers turned over the ear-tip. A glance showed Colt -what he sought. There, faintly white, on the ear’s pinkish underside, -were the harrow-marks of the police dog’s teeth. There, too, was a far -fainter groove-mark where the plaster and splints had once remained for -weeks on the healing ear. There could be no doubt. - -This in less than a second. Before the big hand could be withdrawn, -Treve had completed his recognition. More, he realized what liberty -this loathed ex-owner of his was taking with him. The outstretched -hand, too, was reminiscent of the brute blow that once had crashed -against that mangled ear. And the dog’s hatred flamed into life. - -His white eyeteeth slashed murderously. Colt’s thick sleeve and silken -cuff were shorn, as by a razor-sweep. So little did cloth and silk -deflect the slash that the eyetooth scored deep in the wide wrist; -missing artery and major veins by a hairbreadth. - -With a yell, Fraser Colt yanked back his hurt wrist. Yet swift as was -his motion, it could not keep pace with the motion of the furious -collie’s head. And, before the hand was out of reach, Treve’s front -teeth had almost met in the fleshy heel of the thumb. - -“You leave my dog be!” shrilled Joel, taking in only the fact that Colt -had reached out and done some presumably painful thing to Treve, which -the collie was trying angrily to punish. - -He spoke too late. At the dog’s assault, Colt’s readily mislaid temper -scattered beyond control. Still yelling with pain he kicked with all -his might at the collie who ravened at him far over the pine footboard -of the bench. - -The kick was less well calculated than fervent. The fury-driven toe -hit the top of the footboard; shattering the wood to splinters. But -it missed Treve. As the leg was withdrawn, Treve exacted tribute from -the ankle of the loud-patterned trousers; and his jaws raked the man’s -shin, agonizingly. - -But not until later did Fraser Colt have chance to note this latest -hurt. For scarcely was the kick delivered when a lanky and wrinkled -bulk had hurled itself cursingly at his fat throat. - -Joel Fenno prided himself on his surly self-control. Yet when this big -stranger kicked his beloved chum, self-control burst into a maniacal -wrath that could find vent only in homicide. - -He flung himself at the big man’s throat; gouging, tearing, hammering; -and all the while keeping up a gruesome whimpering noise from between -his hard-clenched teeth; unpleasantly like the sound made by a rabid -beast worrying its prey. - -Back, under that crazy onslaught, staggered the unprepared Colt. His -heel caught in a bench support, before he could rally his balance. -And he pitched backward onto the aisle floor. Not once had Fenno -relinquished his attack on the face and throat of his foe. Now, landing -atop the squirming bulk, he drove his fists madly into the upturned -visage. As Colt sought to fend off the flailing fists, Joel lunged at -his neck with yellowed teeth. - -Above them, lurching far over the edge of the bench, Treve tugged and -struggled roaringly to free himself and to join in the carnage. Foam -spattered from his back-writhen lips. Added to his own hate of Colt was -the fact that this man was fighting with Fenno, whom the dog loved. -With all his weight and all his might be strove to break free from his -chain. A hundred dogs added their din to his. - -All at once, the bystanders stirred from their momentary trance of -amaze. As crowds came running to the scene of strife, fifty hands -dragged Joel away from his enemy and lifted him, yelling and twisting, -to his feet. Others helped Fraser Colt to rise. Still others hung -officiously to the arms of both combatants, to prevent a resumption of -warfare. Scores of voices vociferated and questioned and babbled. Every -dog in the show took up the racket, with full-throated barks and howls. -Every human jabbered. No human could be heard. - -Presently, into the ruck, two policemen shouldered their way; followed -by the show’s superintendent. Out of the myriad simultaneous efforts -at explanation and accusation, the police could gather only that a -lantern-jawed old rancher had committed flagrant assault and battery -upon Mr. Fraser Colt, a man well known to dozens present and vouched -for by the superintendent. The rancher, presumably, was either drunk -or insane. - -His first madness dissipated, Joel stood trembling and sick; scared to -the point of horror at what he had let himself in for; yet furious as -ever at the assailant of his collie. - -A policeman ended the uproar by taking hold of Joel’s collar and -propelling him through the milling crowd to the door of the armory -and thence out into the street, where a commandeered automobile bore -captive and captor to the police station a mile away. - -Twice, on his forced progress through the armory and once during the -horrible station-ward drive, Fenno tried to plead with the officer to -let him make some arrangement for the comfort of his dog, before going -to jail. But the policeman, every time, shut him up and would not let -him speak. - -Joel sank down in a miserable and all but sobbing heap on the slat -bed of his cell. Not for himself was his woe. He foresaw a long jail -sentence. In the meantime, what was to become of Treve? Who would feed -him? Who would see he got back to the ranch? At the close of the show, -would the beautiful collie be thrust out into the streets of this -strange city, a hundred miles from home; to fend for himself--he who -had always been so well cared for? - -Worse yet, would he fall into the hands of the man who had kicked -him--the man who seemed all-powerful there at the show--the man who had -secured Fenno’s arrest and who had, himself, gone scot free? He had -kicked the collie; in the presence of Fenno. What might he not do to -luckless Treve, now there was no one to protect the dog? - -At the searing thought of his chum’s defenselessness, Joel groaned -aloud, rocking back and forth on his hard seat. - -“An’ it was all my own fault!” he mumbled, brokenly. “All my own -foolishness! What’n blue blazes can I do? What--what _IS_ there to do? -Oh, Trevy, you trusted me! You was glad to come along with me. An’ see -what I’ve made happen to you!” - - - - -CHAPTER VI: DESERTED - - -A day earlier, Joel Fenno had been happily, if always grouchily, the -master of his own actions. - -To-day, Joel Fenno sat huddled miserably in a police station cell, at -La Cerra, a hundred miles from home. - -The man did not know how long he crouched there in growing mental -torment, on the hard cell bench. It seemed to him a handful of -centuries in duration. Actually, it was something under an hour. - -Then a policeman came to lead him to the captain’s room at the front of -the station. Besides the captain, two other men were in the room. One -of them was jolly and elderly. The captain treated him with grudging -respect and addressed him as “Judge.” The other was a lazy-looking -chap, much younger, with a shock of red hair and a snub nose. The -awesome police captain, apparently, was on comradely terms with him. - -As Joel shuffled miserably into the private room, it was this -red-headed youth who greeted him. - -“Well, old-timer,” he said, breezily, “it sure was one grand and -wakeful little scrap while it lasted. I was in the gallery, looking at -the chows benched up there. And I got a fine view of it. But I couldn’t -work my way through the crowd, till after you’d been gathered in. I -thought they’d just turned you out of the place; till one of the bulls -told me, a few minutes ago, that he’d cooped you. Then I hustled for -Judge Brough and came here on the run.” - -He talked fast and with easy good-fellowship, undeterred by Fenno’s -sour glare. Scarcely had he paused for breath when Joel, ignoring him, -turned to the uniformed captain in tremblingly eager appeal. - -“Mister,” he pleaded, “my dog got left alone there at that show. He’s -li’ble to starve or get lost or stole or hurt, without me to watch out -for him. I--I’m kind of--kind of fond of him,” he mumbled shamefacedly; -adding in a more normal tone: “I got forty-one dollars in my pocket, -here. It’s yourn, if you’ll see he’s looked out for an’ shipped back to -the ranch, while I’m servin’ my term. If that ain’t enough, I’ll write -a check for--” - -“You’ll come around to court with me,” interposed Judge Brough, “and -write out a check for five dollars, for your fine. Then you can go and -look after your own dog. I’m holding special court for your benefit, -my man. Because this nosey reporter friend of mine is pestering me to. -Come along. My car’s outside.” - -“I--I don’t--I don’t just rightly understand!” sputtered Fenno, -incredulous, as ever, that any such golden good luck could sift into -his morbid life-lot. “I--” - -“Gladden, here, was in the gallery,” explained the judge. “Just as he -told you. He saw it all. He gives me his word that you didn’t tackle -Mr. Colt, till Colt kicked your collie. Of course, that doesn’t excuse -you for breaking the law. But--well, I’m glad it was your collie, and -not mine, that was kicked. I’m getting too old to punch my fellow-man. -Come along.” - -In a trance, Joel Fenno trailed to the car, in the wake of Brough and -Gladden. In a trance, he answered the Judge’s few official questions, -in Brough’s chambers, back of the deserted courtroom. He paid his fine, -and then asked, uncertainly: - -“C’n I go, now?” - -At Brough’s assenting nod, the old man set forth at a shambling run. -Too long Treve had been left there, lonely and unhappy, among that mob -of strange dogs and stranger men, and possibly at the mercy of Fraser -Colt. He must get back to the collie as fast as a lanky pair of legs -could carry him. - -“Hold on!” called the reporter, hurrying after him. “Judge Brough says -I can take you back to the show in his car. It’s a couple of miles from -here. Jump in.” - -Gladden had been sent to the dogshow, by his paper, _The Clarion_, in -quest of human interest items that might brighten up the technical -account of the exhibition. He was not minded to let slip this chance of -getting more material for the most worthwhile human interest item the -day thus far had produced. Wherefore, he stuck to the excited oldster. - -During the drive to the armory, he fired adroit questions at the -taciturn and worried Fenno; most of which the old man did not trouble -to answer. But, from a word or two forced from Joel’s overburdened -soul, the lad gathered something of Fenno’s dread lest harm had -befallen Treve through Colt’s ill-will. - -“You can go to sleep over that, brother!” Gladden reassured him. “You -and Treve, between you, managed to make Friend Colt one hundred per -cent eligible for first aid treatment. Before I left, he had been -helped across to the hotel and a doctor had been sent for. By the time -Doc gets through stitching and bandaging him, Colt will be glad enough -to stay in bed for the rest of the day and probably to-morrow, too. -He’s in no shape to carry on a canine vendetta, just now. Sleep easy!” - -Joel sighed in deep relief and turned upon his companion a look that, -in a less forbidding old face, would have been classified as one of -gratitude. - -“You been mighty decent to me, young feller,” he muttered, grudgingly, -as though the effort at graciousness were physically painful. “An’--I’m -thankin’ you. Let it go at that.--Say! Can’t this chuffer make his car -move a wee peckle faster?” - -“Not unless we want to go back to court again for wearing holes in the -speed limit,” said Gladden. - -Joel sighed, rustily. Speaking to himself rather than to the reporter, -he grumbled: - -“I’d counted a hull heap on Treve’s winnin’ all them ribbon-gewgaws -an’ sich. Most likely the judgin’s been goin’ on while I was to the -hoosgow. Luck couldn’t ever hand me out a hundred p’cent parcel but -there’d be sure to be a hole punched into it somewheres. I s’pose me -an’ Treve has got to lay away them grand hopes of our’n, like they was -the pants of some dear dead friend; as the feller said. But if he could -’a’ won just a single ribbon or a--” - -“Buck up!” exhorted Gladden, who had caught not a distinct word of the -mumbled soliloquy but who saw the old man’s first glow of relief was -beginning to merge with his chronic gloom. “Buck up, brother. Jail’s -better than a lot of dogshows I’ve covered. It’s a funny thing! I’ve -covered every line of sport from cockfighting to horse-racing. And I’ve -found more bad feeling and less true sportsmanship in the dog game than -in all the rest put together. More slams and knocks and poor losers and -petty meanness than in every other form of sport, combined.” - -Fenno continued to fidget, unheeding. Less to distract the oldster from -his worries than to air his own views, the reporter went on: - -“I’ve figured it out. I mean the reason for the dog-game’s -unsportsmanliness. And I think I’ve hit on the answer. It’s because -there are so many women in it.” - -He paused, waiting for the exclamation which usually followed this pet -speech of his. Fenno was deaf to the harangue. Undeterred, Gladden -resumed: - -“My wife says I’m a crank for thinking that. But it’s true. In the old -days we men were out fighting or fishing or hunting or doing other -stunts that call for sportsmanship. The women were at home taking -care of the house and the kids. During the centuries, men learned to -be sportsmen. They learned to lose gracefully and to win modestly. -They had to. They had thousands of years start on women in mastering -sportsmanship. It wasn’t till a very few years ago that women at large -took any part at all in sport. They had to learn it from the beginning. -Or rather, they still have to. Most of them haven’t made much of a -start at it yet.” - -“Uh-huh,” grunted the unhearing Fenno. - -“Women don’t take a general part in any forms of sport, even yet,” -pursued the reporter, “except dogshowing and tennis. At least those -are almost the only sports they’ve achieved any prominence in. And -look at the result! The dog game is full of squabbles and backbiting -and poor sportsmanship. But for the A. K. C.’s wise guidance it would -have gone to pot, long ago. As for women in tennis--well, maybe you’ve -read of the Mallory-Lenglen mixups and others of the same sort. There -couldn’t be anything like that, on the same scale, in baseball or -pugilism or boating. Only in tennis. Because women are prominent in it. -And in dog-breeding-and-showing. Not that I’m knocking women. It isn’t -their fault. Sportsmanship is a thing that takes hundreds of years to -acquire. They’ve been at it for less than a quarter-century. At that, -they do fifty times better at it than any man could hope to, in some -purely feminine art he was just learning. And many of them are clean -sportsmen--these women. Better than most men. But some few of them--” - -“Say!” exploded Joel. “You tol’ me that armory wa’n’t but two miles -away. We been ridin’ in this open hearse for a--” - -“We’ll be there in a minute now,” said Gladden, swallowing the rest of -his oration. “It’s just around that corner. Don’t worry about your dog. -He’s all right. You won’t even miss the collie judging. It won’t begin -for another half-hour. Plenty of time to-- Here we are!” he finished, -as the car swung a corner and stopped in front of the armory. - -Joel scarce waited for the machine to halt; before scrambling out and -making his way, at a run, up the steps and into the rackety building. -Gladden followed as fast as he could; amusedly interested in the -prospect of watching the grouchy old man when he should rejoin his -belovèd dog. - -This meeting was scheduled to be the most pathetic or the most humorous -point in the story the reporter was planning. Would Fenno be as glum in -that big moment as in the moment of his release from the cell? Gladden -hoped so. He hated to think that the keynote of the story was to be -spoiled by Fenno slopping babyishly over his restored collie chum. - -Down the crowded aisles sped Joel; Gladden close in his wake. They -reached the collie section. There Fenno came to a standstill with an -abruptness that all but threw him off his balance and sent Gladden -colliding against him. - -Treve’s straw-cluttered bench was empty. - -It was the same bench, with the same printed number tacked to it; the -same splintered pine footboard that Fraser Colt had kicked. But Treve -was no longer there. - -Gladden’s trained reportorial eye fixed itself upon another detail of -the deserted bench, a fraction of a second earlier than did Fenno’s. -The stout chain, affixed to the bench staple, was pulled to its full -length and hung over the splintered top of the footboard. From the -chain’s snap hung a dog collar--broken. The collie’s frantic plunges -had at last made the decaying leather give way. - -A man, working over a dog on the adjoining bench, glanced up at -sound of Gladden’s ejaculation. He noticed the reporter and the -horror-petrified old ranchman. He addressed them, impersonally; though -keeping a wary eye on Joel, as though fearing a fresh outbreak of -assault and battery on the part of the newly released prisoner. - -“He’s gone,” announced the man. “Kept lunging and tugging at his chain -all the time the cop was taking you out. Kept it up afterward, too. All -at once, the collar bust; and he was off after you, quicker’n scat. I -made a grab for him as he went past me. But I missed him. I thought -it’d be kind of neighborly to catch him for you. When I got to the -front door, though, he wasn’t anywheres in sight. The doorman told me -the dog had gone whizzing out into the street, like greased lightning. -No sign of him anywheres. That must ’a’ been--le’s see--that must ’a’ -been about three or four minutes after you was took away by the cop. -Er--I’m glad to see you back,” he ended politely, as Fenno did not -cease from staring in blank despair at the empty bench and the riven -collar. - -Gladden made as though to speak. But he had no time to form the -well-meaning words he was groping for. With a galvanic start, Joel -wheeled and headed for the armory doorway. Gladden made after him, once -more taxing his own young speed to keep close to the oldster. - -At the front steps, he overhauled the ranchman. - -“I’ll phone the pound and then send word to the police to keep their -eyes open for him,” said the reporter, genuinely touched by the ghastly -face of his companion. “And we’ll advertise, too. Oh, we’ll find him, -all right! You mustn’t worry.” - -Joel did not answer. Joel did not hear. All his days, he had lived in -the open spaces and far from the peopled haunts of life. To him there -was terror in the sight of such crowds as now moved past the armory. -There was double terror in the spectacle of the thick-built city which -harbored the crowds. He had a born and reared countryman’s distrust -and dislike for populous streets. To him they held mystery--sinister -mystery. - -Somewhere in these unfriendly and confusing and perilous streets his -beautiful collie chum was wandering in search of the master who was -responsible for his misfortune;--was seeking Fenno, wistfully and in -vain, amid a million dangers. - -A score of whizzing automobiles, flashing in and out, in front -of Joel--the clang of trolley cars and the onrush of a passing -fire-engine--all these were possible instruments of death to the -ranch-raised collie who was straying out yonder, perplexed and aimless, -hunting for the man who was his god. - - -Treve had crowded into two brief minutes more agonizing excitement and -drama than had been his in the past two years. - -He had met and attacked his olden tyrant. He had seen his master in -life-and-death battle with that tyrant. Fifty-fold worse than all else, -he had seen that cherished master overpowered and dragged away; and had -had no power to fly to his assistance. - -Small wonder the frenzied dog had hurled himself with all his might -against the collar that held him back from battling for his master’s -release! Then, at last, the collar had broken; leaving Treve free to -follow and to rescue the captured man. Down the aisle he tore; and out -through the gateway and down the steps. It was in this direction they -had taken Fenno. Treve had seen him go. And he ran by eye and not by -scent. - -But, when he reached the sidewalk and saw no trace of Joel, he reverted -to first principles; and dropped his muzzle earthward. - -Hundreds of people had traversed that stone pavement during the past -minutes. But through the welter of scents Treve’s keen nostrils had -scant difficulty in picking up Joel Fenno’s long-familiar trail. -Rapidly he followed it;--but only for a yard or so. It led to the curb. -There the policeman had bundled Joel into the car that was to bear him -to the mile-off station. There, of course, the trail ceased. And there -the dog paused, wholly checkmated. - -After the fashion of his kind, he wasted no time in standing -nonplussed. Instantly, he set off at a hand-gallop, nose to ground, -running in a wide circle; in the hope that some arc of that circle -might intersect Fenno’s lost trail. It was a ruse he had employed a -hundred times in seeking for strayed sheep. But always his questing -nostrils, at such times, had inhaled the good clean smell of earth and -herb. Now they were filled with the stench of spilled gasoline and of -grease. They were baffled by the passing of countless feet and by the -numberless and nameless reeks of the city streets. - -Undeterred by the sickening strange odors, he continued his hunt; -galloping in the broad circle he had begun. Head down, all his senses -concentrated on the finding of the trail he sought, he was completing -the circle when his nerves were jarred by a yelling voice just above -him. There were menace and vexation in the voice. It was accompanied by -a deafening blare. Instinctively, Treve shrank aside as he looked up to -discern the dual noise’s origin. - -The sidewise move saved him from a hideous and too-common form of -death. For, as he shifted his direction, a fast-going limousine’s -fender grazed his flank with such force as to send him rolling over -and over in the filth of the asphalt roadway. The chauffeur, who -had shouted and honked at him, yelled back a mouthful of oaths. But -Treve did not hear them. Scrambling to his feet, jarred and muddied -and breathless, he was barely in time to dart out of the way of a -motor-truck that was bearing heavily down upon him. - -The wide street was alive with these engines of destruction, all -seemingly bent upon his death. Bewilderment swept the luckless dog’s -brain. For an instant he stood, glancing pitiably to left and right; -trying to find a pathway of escape from among the tangle of vehicles. - -Then the ever-ready wit of a trained collie came to his aid. This -mid-street, assuredly, was no place for him. The sidewalk offered -shelter, with no worse perils than the stream of passing pedestrians. -Toward the sidewalk he made his way. - -It is in such safety-seeking efforts that the average dog, in like -conditions, becomes confused and is run over. Treve was not confused. -With the skill and dexterity of a timber wolf he sped in and out of -the traffic, timing his every step to a nicety; enacting prodigies of -time-and-distance gauging. - -In another few seconds he was on the sidewalk; nearly a block distant -from the armory. - -The collie was panting; but not from fatigue. He was panting through -excitement and nervousness. Light froth gathered on his lips and -tongue. His rich coat was one smear of muck and mud. He was collarless. -His aspect was ferocious and disreputable. People made plenty of room -for him as he swung on down the sidewalk, nose to ground, still seeking -Fenno’s lost trail. - -His dangerous circling of mid-street had failed to locate that trail. -Collie-like, he knew there was no use in casting back over the same -ground again. Henceforth, he must hunt on mere chance and with nothing -to guide him. It was not a hopeful prospect. Fenno had left the armory. -That much Treve’s eyes and nose had told him. Fenno had walked as far -as the curbstone. There his trail had ended. - -Gallantly, the collie kept on, along his aimless route, still sniffing -the ground; pedestrians giving him the widest possible berth and -turning to look back apprehensively at him. - -A man came briskly out of a store. So suddenly did he debouch onto the -pavement that the dog had no room to avoid him. The man felt something -collide glancingly with his knee; and peered down. He beheld a huge -collie; mud-coated and bleeding from a graze on the flank. - -Panic possessed the newcomer as he recalled the impact at his knee. -By every law of fiction, this was a mad dog. The dog, of course, had -bitten or at least tried to bite him, in passing--which was also the -way of fictional mad dogs. - -The man, like most of the world, was actuated by what he had read, -rather than by what he had learned, or should have learned, from real -life experience. Hence, he did the one regulation thing that was to be -done, under the circumstances. He screeched at the top of his lungs: - -“_Mad dog! MAD DOG!_” - -A hundred persons stopped and stared apprehensively around them. They -saw a chalk-faced man clutching at his left knee with one hand while -with the other he pointed dramatically at the harmlessly-trotting -Treve. Again and again he waked the echoes with that imbecile bellow of -“Mad Dog!” - -Only a few times did he have a chance to warble the fool-cry as a -solo. In a moment or so, voices from everywhere had caught up the -shriek. The street reëchoed to the multiple howl. People ahead turned -in fright as they heard it. Then they saw the mud-streaked and bloody -collie trotting in their direction; and they scattered squawkingly to -the refuge of shop doors or parked cars. (Two local newspapers, next -day, printed strong editorials on the menace of allowing dogs to roam, -unmuzzled, in the city.) - -Treve was unaware of the furor he was creating. For all he knew, -this sort of bedlam might be an ordinary phase of street life. In any -event, it was no concern of his. And he padded unconcernedly on; still -sniffing in vain for his lost master’s footsteps. - -His progress received a rude check, as a sharper note mingled with -the looser volume of his pursuer’s yells. Some born idiot had drawn a -pistol and had opened fire on him. A bullet spatted the stone pavement -just in front of him; a pin-tip of the scattered lead stinging his -sensitive nose. Treve stopped, and looked back, in mild wonder. - -Then, for the first time, he realized that everybody in the world was -racing along at his heels; waving umbrellas or canes or any other -weapon. One youth had even snatched up a half-full tin ash-can and -was brandishing it above his head; while a halo of blown ashes sifted -lovingly down upon him and blew into the eyes of those nearest him. - -The pistol-wielder, luckily for Treve, chanced just then to be nearest -the can-brandisher. He halted and took aim at the momentarily moveless -dog. Providence sent an eddying breeze from heaven which gathered up a -spoonful of ashes from the tilted can and whirled them blindingly into -the marksman’s eye. The bullet sped skyward. - -A policeman, then another, appeared from nowhere and joined the chase. - -It dawned on Treve, belatedly, that it _was_ a chase; and that he was -its quarry. With no fear, but with a strong determination not to let -these people catch him and thus prevent him from continuing his search -for Fenno, the dog quickened his swinging wolf-trot into a hand-gallop. - -One of the policemen was stopping at every third jump to rap for -reënforcements. In response to these raps and to the clamor of the -pursuit, a bluecoat rounded a corner, on the run, just in front of -Treve. He made a noteworthy effort to brain the collie with his club. -Treve saw the blow coming and he dodged it with perfect ease. Then, -diving between the policeman’s threateningly outstretched legs, and -upsetting him, the dog continued on his way; though at a faster pace. -Passersby, in front, gave him a world of room. - -Pausing only at street crossings, to avoid passing motors, he fled at a -mile-eating run; leaving the chase far behind. He was hot and worried -and cruelly thirsty. Yet the sound of pursuit warned him not to slacken -pace. - -At last, this sound grew fainter. For no running men can hope to keep -within hailing distance of a running collie. - -Treve slackened speed. He glanced around him. The houses had grown few -and straggling. He was on the compact little city’s outskirts. Ahead -of him arose green foothills. Toward them he bent his pavement-bruised -feet. - -Assuredly there was no sense in trying to find Joel Fenno in that hell -of unfriendly humans behind him. There was no trace of the old man. And -Treve did what the wisest of lost collies usually do. He headed for -home. - -On he went, until he had breasted the nearest green slope of the ridge -which divided the fertile valley from the desert beyond. Almost at the -summit, he found a little trickle of water, from a hilltop-spring not -yet dried by the approaching summer. There he paused; and drank long -and greedily. His thirst assuaged, he stretched himself and clambered -to the crest of the ridge. - -Pausing again, he lifted aloft his dainty muzzle; and sniffed. For -perhaps two minutes he stood thus, testing the breeze with quick, -comprehensive intakes of breath. From side to side he moved his head -and forequarters; until presently he stood still; verifying the hint -the air had brought him. - -Then, without a shadow of indecision in mind or in gait, he set off -down the desertward side of the ridge. He knew the course he must take. - -(If perhaps this action of Treve’s be scoffed at, as nature-faking, -there are a dozen authentic cases of the sort. How a collie can get his -direction in the way just described, is past human knowledge. But that -such direction _is_ gotten in that way cannot be denied.) - -Thus it was that the great dog began his hundred-mile homeward journey, -across unknown land and guided solely by his mysterious sixth sense. -Down the hill he went, never breaking that deceptively rapid choppy -wolf-trot of his. In another half hour his feet had left the springy -turf and ridges of the hill and were pattering across the prickling -gray sands of the desert. - -On he went; while the sun dipped past the meridian; on into sweltering -afternoon. Here was no chance for thirst-quenching; no chance for -adequate shade; no chance for anything but grim endurance. The collie’s -pink tongue lolled far out. His eyes were bloodshot from sand and from -heat. The mud on his coat had caked and dried; as had the blood from -the graze on his flank. He was suffering from thirst, from fatigue, -from reaction. But he kept on. - -At sunset, he had his first alleviation of discomfort. Trotting -exhaustedly over the top of a gray sand dune he saw at its base, in -front of him, a black and white animal, about the size of a cat. The -animal saw and heard him. Yet it made no hurry to get out of his way. -Skunks know from experience that few larger animals willingly take a -chance of attacking them. - -But Treve was as hungry as he was thirsty. All day he had been on the -move; and he had eaten nothing. With express train speed he dashed -downward, at this possible dinner. The skunk wheeled, bracing its four -feet firmly in the sand; tail aloft. - -But this was not the collie’s first encounter with such opponents. Ten -feet from the tensely waiting skunk, Treve leaped high in the air and -far to the left. Then, before the skunk could get opportunity to brace -itself a second time, he veered as rapidly to the right; and slashed -as he sprang. The skunk lay lifeless at his feet, its back broken. And -Treve feasted in luxurious comfort. - -An hour later he came to the railroad track. Here, it seemed, was -surcease for his aching pads, from the teasing desert sands. Gladly he -trotted along the ties, in the exact middle of the track. But after the -first mile, the bite of cinders on his sore feet grew more unbearable -than were the sand-grains. And he shifted from track to right-of-way. - -Not five minutes later, the Limited came thundering past, shaking -the earth and almost knocking him down by the suction of its nearby -passage. Truly, those foot-cutting cinders had done Treve a good turn, -by driving him from between the steel rails and out of the path of -annihilation. - -It was wolf instinct that guarded him from his next mortal danger. - -In early dusk he was padding wearily along the sage sprinkled gray -plain when something buzzed like fifty windblown telegraph wires, from -beneath a sagebush directly in front of him. There was no time to -dodge. Without stopping to plan his own action, he gathered his tired -muscles and leaped; clearing the two-foot bush with several inches -to spare. So instant-quick had been the move that the rattlesnake -beneath the bush missed him by a clean six inches as it struck at his -approaching bulk. - -The great white desert stars came out in a black velvet sky. The torrid -heat of day merged into a dampish chill which helped to assuage the -collie’s burning thirst. On he stumbled. Then his wornout frame took a -new brace. From far off, the night wind brought him the craved scent of -running water--the Dos Hermanos River. - - -It was two nights later when Joel Fenno came home to the ranch, after -raking the city of La Cerra, hysterically, with a fine-tooth comb, for -his lost dog;--after posting deliriously exorbitant rewards whose -payment would have bankrupted him. - -He halted the wheezy car at the gate and stumped up the walk. The dazed -old man’s spirit was dead within him. He hoped Royce Mack might not yet -have gotten back from Omaha. He himself wanted to gather up some money -and some clean clothes, before returning to La Cerra to continue the -hopeless hunt. - -As he started up the walk, something furry and cyclonic burst out of -the house;--dashed limpingly down the walk to meet him and flung itself -at his breast, barking ecstatic welcome to the wanderer. - -“Treve!” gasped the unbelieving Fenno, chokingly. “Oh--oh, _Trevy_!” - -That was all. But he gathered the gayly dancing collie into his arms in -a bear hug that well-nigh crushed the victim’s ribs. - -The man’s heart seemed likely to burst, from sheer joy and relief. He -wanted to dance; or else to pray. He was not sure which. Then, of a -sudden, he straightened himself and drew a long breath. Out onto the -porch, from the living room, his partner, Royce Mack, was sauntering. - -“Hello!” hailed Royce. “You’ve been to Santa Clara, Toni says. Treve -must have gone on a rampage while we were both away. When I got back, -this morning, he was lying at the door, all in. Cut and muddy and lame -and--” - -“Don’t waste breath, gassin’ about the measly cur!” rasped Fenno, with -all his wonted grouchiness, as he fended off Treve’s welcoming advances -in much show of disgust. “Get busy an’ tell me what prices you got -for them sheep, down to Omaha. A business man’s got no time to jabber -dogtalk, when there’s prices to be quoted.” - -“Say!” retorted Royce, nettled. “If I hated anything as much as you -hate that grand collie of ours, I’d just bite myself and die of -hydrophobia. Isn’t there any heart in you for a dog like that?” - -“No!” grunted Joel. “There ain’t. Dogs is pests. An’ this dog is the -peskiest of the lot.” - -But in the darkness, he was furtively drawing a hoarded lump of sugar -from his pocket and slipping it to the playfully eager Treve. - - - - -CHAPTER VII: THEFT AND UNTHEFT - - -“That cat of yours,” commented Royce Mack,--as he paused beside the -adobe shelf on his way into the kitchen of the Dos Hermanos ranch -house, and addressed the slant-eyed Chang, who served him and Fenno as -cook and handy man,--“that cat of yours must have more suction power -than a three-horse-power gas pump. She draws up milk the way the sun -draws up water. And what the skinny brute does with it all, is more -than I can figure out.” - -As the young rancher spoke, he nodded critically toward a -pinkish-grayish-white cat that crouched in morbid indolence on the edge -of the high adobe shelf, alongside an empty tin dish. She was a forlorn -and gloomy thing, of scrawny ludicrousness and nasty temper. Chang -loved her, beyond words. - -The Chinaman wiggled apologetically, as always he did when either of -the partners said more than he could understand. His slitted eyes -strayed protectingly toward his beloved cat. She looked like the kind -of a cat a Chinaman like Chang might be expected to own and cherish. -Royce went on, in banter that his servitor took as solemn earnest: - -“Twice to-day I’ve happened to see you fill that dish with milk. There -must have been a quart of it, each time. It’s barely noon and the dish -has been emptied again. That makes half a gallon of new milk your -rainbow-colored cat has absorbed, since breakfast. Why, man, that bag -of bones couldn’t _hold_ half a gallon of milk! She must cart it off -somewhere and sell it. Lucky for you that both our milch cows happen to -be ‘fresh,’ just now. Or lucky for Mr. Fenno and me. Otherwise, we’d be -drinking our coffee straight; and all the milk’d go to that miserable -cat.” - -“She good cat,” expostulated Chang, in his high voice. “Vel good catty. -Catch mice. Catch lats. Keep house flee of ’em. Gland cat. Can’t get um -fat; no matt’ how much eat. Not built fat. Just like Mist’ Fenno.” - -A grunt of disgust from behind him made Chang spin about in -apprehensive haste. - -Old Joel Fenno had come padding up to the house for dinner, from one of -the sheep pastures. He arrived at the kitchen stoop in time to hear his -spare figure compared by the Chinaman to that of the scarecrow cat. - -Though without normal vanity, Joel was not pleased. And the grunt would -have been followed by more vehement expressions of distaste had not -Chang scuttled nervously into the kitchen, tucking the multicolored -cat under his yellow arm as he ran. Presently, out through the doorway -issued the sound of many pans clattering. Dinner was in active -preparation. - -Joel poured water from a pail into a tin basin on the stoop-floor; and -began to scrub his dirty hands with a lump of smelly yellow soap. Royce -had washed; and was starting into the house when a scamper of galloping -feet announced the arrival of Treve. - -The dog had been helping Toni, the chief shepherd, and the latter’s -squat black collie, Zit, in No. 3 pasture, that morning with the -management of a new and fractious bunch of merinos. But--as ever, -unless he had orders to the contrary--the big dog had trotted home, -promptly at lunch-time. Always he lay on the floor, at Royce Mack’s -left side, during meals; and occasionally a scrap of food from his -master’s plate rewarded his presence. - -Royce stooped to pat the dog, as Treve pattered to the porch. The -collie looked past his master, up at the narrow adobe shelf which -stood fully four feet above the level of the floor. He seemed keenly -interested in that shelf. There was a glint of mischief in his dark -eyes. Joel Fenno, gouging the soapy water out of his own eyes, caught -the dog’s expression. Following the collie’s quizzical gaze, Joel noted -that the edge of the tin dish projected an inch or so over the edge of -the shelf. In picking up the cat, Chang unconsciously had joggled it -forward. - -While Fenno still watched, Treve arose upon his hindlegs, his white -forepaws resting lightly against the wall. Taking the edge of the -tin dish daintily between his jaws he dropped to earth again; -depositing the dish on the floor in front of him. Then, after a single -disappointed glance at the empty receptacle, Treve walked away. - -Royce Mack looked after him, with speculative amusement. Then an idea -dawned on him. He picked up the dish and turned to the open doorway. - -“Chang!” he called. “Fill this.” - -The Chinaman, delighted that his adored cat was apparently arousing -so much interest in Royce, hastened to fill the dish to the brim and -replace it on the high shelf. After which he returned to the kitchen to -find the cat and bring her out to feast. Meantime, Joel Fenno snorted -contempt at his partner’s prodigal waste of milk and at his interest in -a mere cat. - -“Lord!” he exclaimed. “Ain’t it enough for you to pamper that measly -collie all the time, without dry-nursin’ Chang’s cat, too? Don’t you -know, the more good milk she drinks the fewer rats she’ll bother to -catch? She ain’t wuth her salt, now. You’ll make her wuth even less’n -that if--” - -He stopped abruptly his flow of chronic complaint. Treve had seen the -Chinaman place the refilled dish on the shelf. Instantly, and with no -hint of concealment or of snooping, the collie trotted over to the -wall, upreared himself again and once more caught the edge of the dish -in his teeth. A second time he lowered it carefully to the floor, -not spilling a drop. Then he proceeded to lap appreciatively at its -contents, his pink tongue busily emptying the dish as fast as possible. - -The dog had an inordinate fondness for milk. Indeed, it was because of -this fondness and to insure his cat from loss of her meals that Chang -had formed the habit of placing the milk dish on the shelf, presumably -well out of the dog’s reach. Finding it, empty, but upright, on the -porch floor, several times, the Chinaman supposed the cat had knocked -it thither in jumping on or off the shelf. - -Chang appeared now, in the kitchen doorway, a fatuous smile on his -yellow face and with the cat in his arms. He arrived just in time to -see Treve lift down the dish to the floor and begin to drink. - -The Chinaman’s little eyes bulged. His nerveless arms let the cat slump -to the ground. To him, the simple spectacle he was witnessing had all -the earmarks of black magic. - -This was not the first time he had suspected Treve to be a devil in -guise of a furry dog. - -He had thought it when the collie learned to manipulate the kitchen -door latch with his forepaw and let himself into the house. He had -thought it when Treve had sniffed disdainfully at a bit of tempting -looking meat the Chinaman had drenched in carbolic acid solution with -the idea of getting rid of him. The dog had sniffed, then stared coldly -from the meat to its giver, and had walked off in icy contempt. (Not -knowing it was the rank smell of the acid which revolted the dog, Chang -had supposed Treve realized the meat was poisoned and that he knew -who had poisoned it. Wherefore he forbore to try to poison him again; -deeming such efforts useless.) - -Chang had been even more assured the dog was a demon when once he -chanced to see Joel Fenno--who blatantly and eternally professed -dislike for the collie--surreptitiously slip Treve the choicest meat -morsels from his own plate; and pat his head. - -Now the Chinaman’s last doubts were removed. It was not in nature that -a dog could reach up, forty-eight inches, and lift down from a shelf a -full dish of milk; setting it unspattered on the floor. It didn’t make -sense. The dog was a devil. It was not well to abide in the house with -a devil. Yet the ranch job was one that Chang did not like to lose. -Something must be thought up. Something must be done! Meantime, Chang -retired into his kitchen. - -Royce Mack was laughing loudly at his canine chum’s exploit. Joel -glowered at the placidly drinking dog. - -“Gee, but that was clever!” Mack declared. “It took a lot of thinking -out, too. Treve, you’ve sure got brains! So that’s where all the -cat-milk has been going! I wondered--” - -“Clever, nuthin’!” grumbled Joel. “Any fool would have sense enough to -steal food when he’s hungry. He’s stoopid. An’ he’s lazy, too. If I had -my way--” - -To shut off his partner’s eternal invective against the dog, Mack -passed on into the house, leaving Joel in mid-swing of his diatribe. -Chang happened to glance apprehensively out of the window, a second -later. He saw Joel bend over the lapping dog, a silly grin of -admiration on his wizened face, and pat the collie’s head in approving -friendliness. - -“Trevy,” the old man was whispering, “it _was_ clever of you. One of -the plumb cleverest things I ever seen you do. An’ I’ve seen you do a -passel of slick things. You know more’n ten humans an’ a Chink, Trevy.” - -Treve wagged his tail vigorously at the praise and caress. He even -paused in his stolen meal long enough to lick milkily the petting hand. -Joel, grinned, resentless of the milk spattered on his sleeve. Then, -catching sight of Chang’s bobbing head, through the window, the old man -favored Treve with a glare of utter detestation; and stumped into the -house and slammed the door. - -When the partners had bolted dinner and, with Treve at their heels, had -gone back to work, Chang repaired to his own cubbyhole room under the -roof. There, in front of his bash-nosed Joss, he proceeded to burn a -flight of faintly perfumed prayer-papers, accompanying the process with -certain pious “setting-up exercises” before the idol. - -To his Joss and to the spirits of his innumerable ancestors, Chang -offered orisons for the instant vanishing of that devil collie. - -The dog’s size and buoyantly noisy ways had jarred him, from the first. -Then the collie had taken sinful pleasure in treeing Chang’s dear cat; -and in making playful little rushes at her, even when she sought refuge -on her master’s thin shoulder. The uncanny wisdom of the dog had long -ago completed the wreck of Chang’s nerves. The big beast, assuredly, -was a devil; and might in time be expected to wreak awesome torments -upon the Chinaman himself. - -Not a week earlier, on ironing day, Chang had burned a hole in the arm -of Royce Mack’s only silk shirt. To hide his fault, he had taken the -ruined shirt out back of the stables and had buried it. Then he had -gone smugly to his kitchen, prepared to deny with innocent smiles that -he had ever set eyes on the garment. - -Indeed, an hour later, he was in the midst of that convincing denial, -when Treve frisked up to the credulous Royce, shaking merrily between -his jaws the muddy and burnt shirt he had exhumed. Nothing short of a -demon could have done that! - -Yes, Treve must go. And Chang prayed fervently and burned many scented -papers. Then, hoping, yet doubting, the efficacy of his devotions, he -went down again to his kitchen. - -Seldom is such immediate and complete answer vouchsafed to -prayer-papers and Joss-genuflections as was granted to Chang. - -Scarcely had he been puttering around the kitchen for three minutes, -when a car stopped at the gate and a fat man in fine raiment came -striding up the walk. Chang was alone in the house. Neither of the -partners could be expected to return until supper-time. The Chinaman -desisted from his task of dishwashing; wiped his wet yellow arms on -a drying flannel shirt of Joel’s, and shuffled forward to meet the -stranger. - -Fraser Colt had come three hundred miles, to claim his collie. - -Recovering from his rough treatment at the hands of Fenno and at the -teeth of Treve, at the Dos Hermanos dogshow, he had returned to the -show, next day, only to learn that collie and rancher had departed. - -To trace them had been a simple enough matter. In the back of every -show catalog are the names and addresses of the exhibitors. Thus, to -locate the owner of Treve was the work of a minute. “_J. Fenno, c/o Dos -Hermanos Ranch, Dos Hermanos County._” That was the line at the back of -the book. And a score of people at La Cerra knew the exact location of -the partners’ ranch. - -A telegram had called home the bitten and bruised Colt, on the second -day of the show. And the business involved therein had kept him -occupied for the next few months. But in the first lull of work, he -prepared to get back the collie whose cash value would make worth while -any trouble involved in the quest. - -By law, Treve belonged to Fraser Colt. Colt held the bill of sale -whereby he had bought the dog, as an eight-month pup. He had lost him; -and now had found him again. Any law-court on earth would uphold his -claim to the collie’s ownership. - -So, with no fear of successful opposition he had come to the wilderness -to recover his property. If Fenno should refuse, he could take the -case to court and make the rancher not only give up the dog but pay -trial costs. Several folk could swear to Treve’s identity as the collie -bought by Colt. - -Then, when at last he should have the costly animal safe in his own -kennel--well, it would be time to pay a little personal bill of his. At -the thought, Colt was wont to glance at his bite-mangled hand and then -swing his arm viciously; as though it already wielded a blood-flecked -rawhide. Yes, there would be a sweet little hour of revenge for the way -the dog had attacked him. - -“I want to see Fenno,” announced Colt, as the smiling Chang confronted -him at the ranch house door. - -“Not in,” cooed the Chinaman. “And Mist’ Loyce Mack not in. Not in till -sup’ time he come.” - -Colt did not reply at once. But neither did he depart. Instead, he -stood surveying the Chinaman’s face, from between thoughtfully squinted -lids. - -Fraser Colt was a good deal of a scoundrel. He was a good deal of a -brute. But his worst foe never doubted his queer power of reading -human nature. Especially, could he read crookedness in the face of his -fellow-man. He had an unerring eye for that quality--long possession of -it having made him expert. - -So now he was reading Chang as though the Celestial’s usually -inscrutable visage had been a printed page. Colt’s alert brain was -working fast. - -He had come hither prepared for a scene of possible violence; perhaps -for a long legal delay to follow it. And now appeared the chance for a -short cut out of all that. If he could secure the dog without giving -Treve’s owners a chance to protest, then so much the better. Back at -home he could register the collie under another name. If, in future, -Joel should chance to recognize Treve at some show, there would be no -redress for the rancher. The dog was Colt’s. Chang was to be the means -to this easy end. - -As the Chinaman still wiggled nervously from one felt-slippered foot to -the other, under the silent appraisal of Colt’s eyes, the fat man drew -forth a lump of bills; and began to riffle them. Chang’s eyes beamed -admiration on the handful of money. - -“Listen, Chink!” said Colt, at last. “There’s a collie dog lives here. -He’s mine. And I want him. Get that?” - -“Tleve?” quavered Chang, wonderingly. - -“Yep. Treve. That’s his name in the catalog. It wasn’t his name when I -had him. And it won’t be when I get him back. He--” - -“You want--you want take Tleve away--to take him away, so he not be -heah no longeh, at all?” demanded Chang, dizzy with the speed wherewith -his prayer-papers were paying double dividends. - -“That’s it,” assented Colt. “And you’re the man to help me. It’s worth -just--just fifty dollars to me to get that cur, without any fuss being -made. To get him, quiet, and get him _away_, quiet. Want to earn that -fifty, Chink? Nobody’ll ever know.” - -Now, Chang was a man of much finesse. But this delirious prospect of -having his prayer answered and of getting fifty whole dollars, to boot, -drove him for once to simple directness. - -“Yes-s-s,” he simmered, ecstatically; his claw-hand outstretched for -the money. - -Into his moist palm, Fraser Colt laid a ten-dollar bill. The rest of -the roll he pocketed. - -“You get the other forty when I get my dog,” said he. “Where is he, -now? In the shack?” - -“Nope. He out with Mist’ Loyce Mack, Tleve is,” replied Chang. “Not -back till sup’ time. At lanch house allee night, though,” he added, -consolingly. - -“Good!” resumed Colt. “Now, let’s you and me go into executive session. -This thing ought to be easy to fix up. Do you get a chance at the dog, -alone, any time;--when the others aren’t likely to horn in?” - - -At supper, that evening, Treve lay as usual on the floor beside Royce’s -chair. He was more or less tired from a hard workday on the range, and -he looked forward with joy to his own approaching supper. - -Apart from such stray tidbits as Mack might happen to toss to him at -the table, Treve had but one daily meal;--one big meal a day being -ample for any grown dog and far better for his health and condition -than is more frequent feeding. This one meal was always served to Treve -on the kitchen hearth, by Chang, when the partners’ supper was ended. - -To-night, when Joel and Royce pushed back their chairs and lighted -their pipes and Chang began to clear the table, Treve as usual arose -and made his way to the kitchen. As a rule, his supper was awaiting -him on the hearth. But to-night Chang had not placed it there. - -As the dog turned toward the adjoining room in surprise at the -omission, Chang came scuttling into the kitchen, laden with dishes. -These dishes he set down, then tiptoed back to the door and shut it. -From a cupboard he took Treve’s heaped supper plate and set it on the -hearth bricks. - -The dog wagged his tail in appreciation and followed the Chinaman to -the hearth; his white paws beating out an anticipatory little dance on -the puncheon floor. He neither liked nor disliked this shuffling and -queer-smelling Celestial. But always he was keenly interested in the -plate of table-scraps Chang gave him at night. - -Hungrily, now, he set to work on his supper. Eating with odd -daintiness, yet with egregious speed, the dog became oblivious to -everything around him. - -Chang stepped back to the cupboard and drew therefrom a huge canvas -bag and a length of thin rope. Then, with an apprehensive glance at -the door of the adjoining room, he set ajar the outer kitchen door and -stole over to where the collie was eating. Holding the bag and rope -ready, he came up behind Treve. - -There were several prayer-papers and three anti-devil charms in -the bag. In one lightning move, Chang slipped the sack over the -unsuspecting dog’s head and forequarters; jamming a double handful of -the loose canvas, gag-wise, into the protestingly parted jaws of the -victim. - -Swiftly and dextrously the man trussed up his prisoner; pinioning his -indignant struggles with wily twists of the rope. Then, in the same -scared haste, and murmuring Chinese spells, he heaved the squirming -burden over his shoulder; and ran staggeringly from the house. - -Across the dooryard he ran and out into the road. There, though the -load was heavy and restless, he continued at as rapid speed as he -could, through the darkness, until he came to the bend of the road, a -furlong beyond; where the coulée began. - -Just beyond the bend waited a car with dimmed lights; a bulky man -crouching beside it. With an exclamation of joy, Fraser Colt hurried -forward to meet the burden-bearer. - -Eagerly, he snatched from Chang the indignantly tossing bag, and -heaved it into the tonneau. Jumping to the driver-seat, he pressed the -self-starter. - -“Hey!” squealed Chang, as the machine woke into motion. “Hey, Mist’! -Fo’ty doll’ I get, now. Gimme!” - -He caught hold of the door, as he spoke, lifting himself to the running -board. - -“Sure!” pleasantly assented Colt. “You get what’s coming to you, -Chinkie.” - -As he spoke, he slugged his plump right fist to the point of the -unsuspecting Chinaman’s jaw; and at the same time stepped on the -accelerator. The car lurched forward. The Chinaman lurched back. - -On into the night sped the automobile, at as fast a pace as Colt dared -to drive it along that bumpy twisting road, at the coulée-edge. Chang -slumped, half-senseless, into a wayside clump of manzanita. - -Colt had taken no foolish chances when he gave the Chinaman a -fist-punch instead of the promised forty dollars. He was thrifty, was -Fraser Colt. He was averse to unnecessary expense. He knew Chang would -not dare betray him to Fenno or to Royce; and thus confess his own -share in the kidnaping. With a smile of pure happiness, he drove on, -not troubling to look back at his dupe. - -Now, Treve was anything but a fool. When frantic struggles availed only -to enmesh him the tighter and to exhaust what little air could still -seep into the close-woven canvas sack--when his growls of wrath were -smothered in the almost sound-proof bag--he sought the next expedient -for escape. - -By the time he had reached the gate, on Chang’s shoulders, the dog -had rid his mouth of the stuffed folds of cloth which had been thrust -therein as a gag. The first use he made of this freedom of teeth was to -seize the nearest fold of canvas between his scissors-sharp incisors; -and begin to gnaw. - -Any one who has watched a mischievous puppy gnaw holes in a mat can -imagine the power exerted by the skilled and mighty jaws of a grown -collie; if put to such infantile use. By the time he was flung into the -tonneau, Treve had worked a hole in the canvas, wide enough to permit -his protruding nose to escape. - -Wasting no time in vain howls, he wrought furiously and deftly on such -portions of bag and rope as seemed to bind him most tightly. When it -came to severing the twined rope, he resorted again to gnawing tactics. -But with the rest of the bag, his curved tusks as well were brought -into play. - -Twice he heaved himself upright, only to find some part of him was -still fast to the bag. Both times, he whirled about and bit fiercely -into the trammeling folds or rope. He worked now with added zest of -fury. For his nostrils had caught the hated scent of Fraser Colt, the -man he detested above all the world. The man who had maltreated him -and had fought with Joel Fenno,--the only unfriendly human the dog had -known! And he saw and smelt that his mortal enemy was in the seat just -in front of him. - -Too wise to risk attack until he should be free, he continued to rend -loose his bonds. The car was jolting and bumping and rattling at first -speed over the bad bit of climb in the trail-like road; rendering its -driver deaf to the muffled sounds behind him. - -Then, as Colt bent forward over the wheel, to negotiate a particularly -tricky twist of the climbing road, something silent and terrible -launched itself upon him from behind. - -Sixty-odd pounds of furry muscular weight crashed against his fat -shoulders. A double set of razor-teeth sheared like red-hot iron into -the back of his fat neck. - -With a yell, Colt threw back both clawing hands, instinctively, to fend -off this unseen and agonizing Horror. - -It is not well to abandon the wheel of a light touring car, just as one -is driving around a right-angle pitch in an uneven road, by night;--the -less so if the gully-sides of a steep coulée are within six inches of -one’s left wheel. - -The left tire struck glancingly against a wayside bowlder. The impact -twisted both front wheels sharply to the left. There was no hand at the -wheel to correct the wrenching shift of direction. - -Obliquely, the machine shot over the edge of the coulée and down its -abrupt side. Ten feet farther on, the fender smote a scrub-tree. The -tree was smashed. The speeding car turned turtle. - -Before Fraser Colt was well aware of what had happened, the -down-plunging car came to a jarring stop, then rose in air and fell on -him, pinioning him beneath it. Treve was flung clear of the car and -landed in a scratchy mass of greasewood. Beyond a bruise or so, both he -and Colt were unhurt. - -The man had been caught in the front seat-well of the topless little -car; alongside and under the steering wheel. One side-door was jammed -irremediably shut. The other had been knocked clean off. Through the -aperture thus left, Colt began to squeeze his rotund bulk, to reach -firm ground and to get free of the imprisoning car. But, as his head -protruded, turtle-like, from its shell, something whizzed at it through -the darkness; and two sets of teeth raked the fat face in a laudable -effort to tear it off. - -Back shrank Fraser Colt, screeching. Blocking the outlet as best he -could with the torn seat cushion, he cowered in his tiny prison; while -outside ravened and snarled the great dog who hated him. - -Colt fumbled for his pistol. Somehow, in the course of the wholesale -spill, it had fallen out of his pocket. Once he reached out a -tentatively feeling hand from behind the leathern barrier of cushion. -Swiftly as he yanked it back, Treve’s raking teeth were a fraction of a -second swifter. - -Around and around his barricaded foe whirled the roaring collie. Then, -failing to get at or dislodge the man, Treve accepted the situation. He -lay down at full length, alongside the car, as close as possible to the -blocked aperture behind which the cramped and bleeding Colt was huddled. - - -Joel Fenno was awake at grayest dawn. He woke with a vague memory of -unpleasantness. Then he located the cause. - -Treve had strayed away after supper, the night before; and had not -showed up as usual at bedtime. This was not the dog’s habit. Always he -was in the house and on his mat beside Royce Mack’s bunk, before the -partners went to sleep. - -Royce had asked Chang if he knew what had become of their collie. Chang -said he had given Treve his supper and that the dog had then strolled -out of the kitchen, into the yard; and had not returned. Fenno had -sneered ostentatiously at his partner’s solicitude over the beast. But, -secretly, he had worried. - -Now, waking, he peeped into Mack’s room. No, Treve was not lying on -his mat at the snoring Royce’s feet. Joel dressed and went out into the -dim morning. - -A very few miles up the coulée was the southern boundary of the Triple -Bar cattle range. Chris Hibben’s Triple Bar outfit, like most cow-men, -had no use for sheep ranchers or for sheep-ranchers’ dogs. If, by any -chance, Treve had strolled over their line and should be seen by any -gun-packing puncher-- - -Joel set off at a worried walk, towards the coulée. The farther he went -the faster he walked; the while cursing himself for a silly old fool, -for wasting good sleep and good exercise on such a wild-goose chase. - -At last, giving up the idea of squandering his energy by a trudge to -the boundary of the Triple Bar, he stopped and made as though to turn -back. As a salve to his feelings, he peeped over the wooded edge of -the coulée, on the chance that Treve might be coursing jack rabbits -somewhere along its dry bed. At the same time he bawled, perfunctorily: - -“_Treve!_” - -To his amaze, there was an answering bark, from somewhere along the -coulée’s upper sides, not a hundred yards ahead of him. Joel broke into -a shambling run. - -Around the sharp turn in the road, just in front of him, appeared -Treve. After a glance of appeal at his master, and a pleading bark, -the collie turned and vanished into the chaparral along the lip of -the gorge. Joel knew enough of the dog to read this plea aright. He -followed, and, at the road-turn, he peered once more over the edge, -along the general direction in which the dog had disappeared. - -There, before him, he saw an upside-down and badly smashed automobile. -Treve was mounting guard alongside. From an opening in the inverted -front section of the car, as Joel crashed through the chaparral toward -the wreck, appeared a blood-splotched and distorted face. - -At sight of the face, Treve charged. The head was withdrawn, and a -doubled seat-cushion was thrust hurriedly into its place. But not -before Fenno had recognized the ample features of Fraser Colt. - -The old man stood, blinking down at the upset car. Then his gaze fell -upon a badly torn canvas bag, lying nearby; a bag whose few remaining -bindings of rope showed sure signs of having been gnawed asunder by -teeth. Joel whistled, long and low. - -“I c’n understand how he cotched you, all right, Mister Colt,” said -he, addressing the invisible occupant of the car. “Trevy c’n do ’most -anything, when he reely puts his mind to it. But how _you_ ever -managed to ketch _him_ is beyond me. He--” - -“Grab your dog and help me out of here!” bleated Colt, feebly, his -nerve gone. “I’ll--I’ll make it worth your while.” - -“Why should I butt in to help a dirty dog-stealer?” snarled Joel. “Tell -me that, Mister. Why--?” - -“I didn’t steal him!” wailed Colt. “He’s mine. He-- Say, here’s his -bill of sale to prove it, friend!” - -Cautiously, he shoved forth through a cranny in the cushions a crumpled -paper. Joel picked it up and read it, at the same time mechanically -ordering Treve back from an abortive charge at the disappearing fingers. - -“H’m!” grunted Joel, after a long pause for thought. “The dog seems to -b’long to you, all right. Selling him?” - -“No!” whined Colt, in a last flare of spirit. - -“All right,” acquiesced Fenno, with something akin to geniality in his -grouchy voice. “I’ll drop around, in a day or two, and see if you’ve -changed your mind. Nobody’s li’ble to find you, down here in the -chaparral, till then. Watch him, Trevy! Watch him, till I get back.” - -He started off, up the coulée side. A pitiful howl from the prisoner -recalled him. - -“Hold on!” wheedled Colt. “Don’t leave me here, with this rabid brute. -I-- What’ll you gimme for him? I paid--” - -“I’m not honin’ to hear what you paid; or even what you _say_ you -paid,” retorted Joel, scribbling a line or two on the bottom of the -bill of sale. “I’ll buy him from you for one dollar in cash an’ for the -priv’lege of taking him away; so you c’n crawl out an’ get to a place -where they’ll fix up your car an’ lift it to the road again. Take my -bid or leave it.” - -Colt “left” it. He did so, right blasphemously. Joel said nothing, -except: “Watch him, Trevy!” and strolled away. He had reached the road -before Colt recalled him. - -“Good!” approved Joel. “Lucky I got my fount’n pen, in this vest. -Here’s the bill of sale. Here’s the pen. Here’s the dollar. Sign under -where I’ve writ that you’ve sold him to me. It’ll keep you from comin’ -back to claim him ag’in. In this neck of the woods, my word’s better’n -any stranger’s, like yours. An’ I’m p’pared to depose in court that you -sold him to me of your own free will. If you try to steal him a second -time, it’ll sure mean jail for you. Not that you wouldn’t be more to -home there, than where decent folks is. C’mon, Trevy. Le’s you and me -go to breakfast. So long, stranger. There’s a garage jes’ up the road. -Not more’n about nine miles. By-by.” - -As Joel and the collie neared the ranch house, Treve beheld the scrawny -cat dozing on the kitchen stoop. In playful mischief, he rushed at -her. The cat ran back into the kitchen, spitting blasphemously. Chang -appeared on the threshold to learn the cause of his pet’s fright. - -One look at the approaching dog, and the Celestial grabbed up his cat -and ran gibbering from the house. Nor did he stop in his headlong -flight from the supposed devil, until he had left the Dos Hermanos -ranch far behind him. - -“We’re out one good Chink,” mused Joel Fenno to himself, as he and Mack -prepared their own breakfast, at sunrise. “But we’re _in_ one grand -dog. An’ I’m figgerin’ that’s nineteen times better.” - -“Here, Trevy!” he called, slyly, taking advantage of Mack’s momentary -departure from the kitchen. “Here’s a big hunk of fried pork for -you--the kind you’re always beggin’ for. Ketch it!” - - - - -CHAPTER VIII: IN THE HANDS OF THE ENEMY - - -Joel Fenno was wading almost thigh-deep in a billowing and tossing -grayish sea. Here and there, near him, arose the upper two-thirds of -other men--his young partner, Royce Mack; their chief herder, Toni, the -big Basque; and the other Dos Hermanos shepherds. - -The tossing gray-white sea was made up of sheep;--hundreds upon -hundreds of milling and worried sheep. Through its billows, like -miniature speed-boats of black and of red-gold, dashed Zit, the squat -little black “working collie” and his little black mate, Zilla, and the -glowingly tawny bulk of Treve. - -The three sheepdogs had their work cut out for them. Drouth had come -with an unheard-of earliness to the Dos Hermanos Valley, that spring. -And, now, in the past week, fire from some herder’s carelessly thrown -cigarette had kindled a blaze in the tinder-dry buffalo grass, which -a steady north gale had whipped into a very creditable little prairie -fire. - -The men of the Dos Hermanos ranch had fought back the crawling Red -Terror, foot by foot; beating it to a sullen halt with brush, saving -the ranch buildings by a cunningly managed backfire; and frantically -digging and dampening shallow ditches in the path of the creeping -scarlet line. - -The ranch houses had been saved. The course of the fire had been -deflected up the coulée. The dogs had been able, by working twenty-four -hours a day, to hold in bounds the smoke-scared sheep. - -But the range in many places was burned as bare of grass as the palm of -one’s hand. True, this area would bear all the richer verdure, later -on. In the meantime, however, the innumerable sheep must be fed. And -there was not grazing enough left standing to keep one-third of the -ranch’s stock. - -Wherefore, the one possible recourse was adopted. Fully a month ahead -of the usual time, the flocks were to be driven to their summer -pasturage along the grassy upper slopes of the Dos Hermanos peaks. - -This entailed much bustle and some confusion. For the ordinary -preparations, to smooth the yearly exodus, had not been made. - -Range pasture after range pasture had been denuded of its woolly -population. All the mass of sheep had been rounded up into the Number -Three field; and now men and dogs were steering them toward the -gateway, which opened direct on the trail they were to take for the -hills. - -An outsider, watching the scene, would have beheld merely a handful -of excited men, waving staves and yelling and making uncouth and -apparently unheeded gestures; and three panting and galloping dogs -making crazy dashes through the tight-crowding multitude of sheep. - -As a matter of fact, not one gesture of the men and not one step of -the running dogs was without direct purpose. By degrees the sheep were -bunched and headed for the wide-flung gateway, beyond which waited a -shepherd. - -At one moment, everything seemed hopeless confusion. The next, a -disorderly but steadily progressing throng of sheep were headed for -the open gate; and their leaders had begun to trot bleatingly out into -the trail; started in the right direction by the shepherd who stood -outside. The rest surged on in their wake. - -By the time a half hundred of the pioneers essayed a scrambling rush -from the trail, up a bank toward a burned and still smoking field -beyond, Treve had cleared the pasture’s high wire and had flung himself -ahead of them; noisily yet deftly driving them back to the trail; -rounding up strays; keeping the huddle in the right direction and -giving wide berth to the gateway that continued to vomit forth more and -more woolly imbeciles. - -Treve had been far inside the pasture when the sheep at last consented -to head for the gate. In order to obey Royce Mack’s shouted command to -guide aright those already outside, he had been forced to leap on the -backs of the tight-jammed sheep nearest him; and to run lightly along -on a succession of bumpy hips, until he could spy an opening on the -ground of sufficient size for him to pursue his race on solid earth -instead of sheepback. - -While Zit and Zilla continued to herd and drive forward the remaining -foolish occupants of the field, Treve was here and there and everywhere -in general and nowhere in particular; among the debouching and ever -more numerous sheep that had hit the trail. - -It was a time for lightning action--for incessant motion;--for the use -of the queer hereditary sheepdog instinct. There was no question of -merely obeying shouted orders, now, nor of following the direction of -a waved hat. Treve was working “on his own.” He was using his native -genius as a herder; keeping that wild bunch headed aright and in the -trail; and cutting short abortive efforts of the whole mass to cascade -out on to the burnt fields on either side or to bolt for the smoking -coulée. - -His flying feet spurned the ground, scarcely seeming to touch it. His -tawny-gold body flashed in and out; seemingly in ten parts of the -trailside at once. - -Then all at once the nerve-racking job was done. The whole flock was -out of the gateway and safe on the trail; with Zit and Zilla weaving in -and out, steering them straight; and the herdsmen in their places along -the pattering ranks. Treve could change his flying zigzag gallop to a -wolf-trot. He could even brush his panting muzzle against Royce Mack’s -hand as he trotted past the busy rancher. - -Up the coulée-side trail moved the sheep; the myriad patter of their -hoofs sounding on the rutted roadbed like cloudburst rain on a shingle -roof. - -Deep in the bottom of the coulée, to left of the twisting trail, the -fire still snapped and flickered. Its smell and sight and smoke sent -recurrent panic waves over the army of sheep. The three dogs seemed to -know in advance when these efforts at bolting would begin. - -Treve’s white paws were grimed and sore from frequent dashes along -the coulée-side; where he needs must run on the steep scorched bank -paralleling the trail; turning back any loose edges of the gray-white -flock that sought to scamper down the incline. - -“Keep it up, Trevy,” whisperingly encouraged old Joel Fenno, as the -collie whisked past him on such an errand. “Another mile, an’ the -road’s due to shift to the right, away from this smoke-hole. Then it’ll -be plain goin’.” - -Treve caught the low sound of his own name; and wagged his plumed tail -in reply, as he ran on. - -“Be past the coulée in a little while, now!” sang out Royce Mack, to -his partner. “The dogs are holding them, great!” - -“Yep,” growled Fenno. “The two black ones are. Treve’s loafin’ on the -job, as usual. I’m hopin’ he won’t do some fool stunt, when we get to -the crossroad, up yonder, an’ hustle a bunch of the sheep onto the -Triple Bar range. I wouldn’t put it past the chucklehead.” - -Royce Mack did not answer, but hurried on to his own new place in the -tedious procession. Fenno had touched on a theme that worried him. Not -that either Royce or Joel really thought Treve would “do some fool -stunt,” at the spot where the trail crossed the road that led to the -Dos Hermanos peaks, nor at any other place or time. But both of them -dreaded that bit of crossroad territory, which bordered the Triple Bar -range. - -The Triple Bar was a cattle outfit. Like most other aggregations of -cattlemen, its men held sheep and sheep ranchers in sharper abhorrence -than they held rattlesnakes and skunks. - -More than once had a serious clash been narrowly averted, between the -Dos Hermanos partners and Chris Hibben of the Triple Bar, their nearest -neighbor to the north. It was understood, without need of words, that -any Dos Hermanos sheep or sheepdog, setting foot on the Triple Bar -range, would be courting swift and certain death. - -To-day the continued reek of smoke and the crackle and smolder of fire, -in the coulée below them, served to fray the sheep’s bad nerves and to -deprive them of what little sense they had. The work of the dogs and -the shepherds grew increasingly difficult, as the trail mounted high -and higher alongside the burning gorge. - -At length, in front, appeared the open space at the coulée-head; the -space where ran the road toward the peaks; and beyond which stretched -the Triple Bar range. - -The foremost dozen sheep caught sight of the cleared space. Perhaps -with an idea that it signified an end of their smoky and terrifying -climb, they bolted frenziedly toward it. Those behind them followed -suit. A veritable tidal wave of sheep surged galloping toward the -clearing; deaf and blind to all coercion. - -Springing on the backs of the close-packed runaways nearest him, Treve -tore forward to head off the stampede. He reached ground in front of -the onrushing wall of sheep, at a spot where the bank rose high on the -right side and where the pit-like top of the coulée fell in almost -sheer precipice for fifty feet on the left. - -Wheeling to face his panic-charges, Treve barked thundrously. But -before he completed the bark or the wheel, the sheep were upon him. -Unable to stop their own gallop and pushed on resistlessly by those -behind, the front line smote against the whirling collie with the force -of a catapult. - -Knocked clean off his feet, Treve rolled writhingly to one side, to -avoid being trampled to death. Over the coulée-lip he rolled; and -crashed down the steep side of the gorge. - -He landed on his back in the midst of a brush-fire, at the bottom; -breathless and half-stunned. Joel Fenno cried aloud, as he saw the dog -reel over the cliff-edge. He ran forward, kicking aside the encumbering -sheep that tangled his progress. He reached the lip of the gorge just -in time to see the dog come charging up the precipitous slope, his -beautiful coat smeared by soot and with sparks still crackling here and -there in it. - -Gaining the summit, Treve wasted not a second; but forged ahead toward -the front of the stampede. He was too late. - -The few seconds of leeway had permitted the galloping sheep to reach -the clearing, unchecked. The two black collies were far behind, with -the main flock. Nor were any of the men far enough forward to stem the -rush. As a result, the first hundred sheep struck the cleared space at -a speed which they could not check. Across the narrow highroad they -hurled themselves blindly, shoved on by those behind them. - -They crashed into a tall barbed wire fence on the far side of the -road;--the boundary fence of the Triple Bar. They hit it with the -impact of a battering ram. The front rank were ripped and torn on the -jagged wires. But their weight and their blind momentum sagged the wire -and snapped the nearest worm-gnawed post. A whole panel of fence gave -way; falling obliquely backward, almost onto the grass. Through the gap -and over the bodies of their wire-entangled comrades, swept scores of -sheep. On they rushed; scattering into a ragged fan-shaped formation as -they found themselves in the open range. - -Joel Fenno went green-white with horror. Mack groped feebly for a -gun at his belt. But, as usual, his gun hung forgotten from a peg -in his bedroom. Indeed the whole party could not muster any weapon -more lethal than a staff. The shepherds involuntarily came to a dazed -standstill. - -But Treve did not hesitate, for the space of an instant. Hurdling -the sheep which struggled in the strands of wire, he cleared the -low-slanted broken panel and sprang into the forbidden range of the -enemy. His singed coat almost sweeping the ground as he sped, he bore -down upon the hundred strays. - -The boundary range of the Triple Bar was perhaps two miles wide by -three miles in length. Dotted along its expanse numbers of cattle were -grazing. Also, entering through a gateway, three-quarters of a mile up -the field, rode Chris Hibben. - -Fate had brought Hibben to this especial field at this especial minute, -during his leisurely tour of inspection of the Triple Bar herds. - -Hibben pulled his pinto pony to a standstill. Open-eyed and -open-mouthed he sat staring; unable to believe what his goggled eyes -told him. - -There, inside the road-end of his sacred range, cavorted something like -a hundred detestable sheep! There, too, among them, galloped an equally -detestable dog! The thing was impossible! - -To add insult to injury, a panel of his barbed wire was down; and men -of the loathed Dos Hermanos ranch were disentangling from it still -more sheep; while two herdsmen were seeking to steer something like a -billion other vile sheep aside from following their brethren into the -field! - -All this, in almost no space of time, did Chris Hibben see. Then back -to him came his senses and with them his flaming temper. He whipped out -a heavy-caliber pistol and struck spurs deep into his pinto. - -Down the field, like a cyclone, came the infuriated cattle king; -whooping, Comanche-fashion, and brandishing his drawn gun. - -Meantime, in other parts of the field, other things had been happening. -It was mere child’s play for Treve to round up and turn his runaways. -It was the work of almost no time. Driving them headlong, he put them -at the gap in the fence. Sharply checking their repeated tendency to -loosen the close bunch into which he had welded the scattered hundred, -he sent them at top speed toward the gap. - -Through it he hustled them, just as the wire-tangled sheep had been -cleared therefrom. Back into the mass of their fellows, Treve galloped -the loudly baa-ing runaways. Then, collie-fashion, he whizzed about and -stood midway in the gap, to prevent their doubling back. - -He had worked fast and he had worked well. Mildly, he was pleased with -himself. He glanced from one to the other of his two masters for a word -of approval. But no such word was spoken. Aghast, dumbfounded, Joel and -Mack were gaping at the oncharging Chris Hibben. - -Toni, the chief herdsman, had presence of mind to grab Treve by the -ruff and to yank the indignant collie back from the fence gap, out -onto the neutral ground of the road. As he did so, one of the restored -runaways exercised his inborn traits of idiocy by breaking from his -subdued mates and scampering again through the gap, into the field. -To avert capture, he continued to run, even after he had achieved his -escape. Others made as though to follow. But the shepherds beat them -back. - -Treve noted the single sheep’s flight. It outraged all his native -prowess as a herder that he should be held ignominiously by the scruff -of the neck while such a thing went on. Twisting suddenly, he wrenched -free from Toni’s careless grip; and rushed back into the field after -the stray. Toni snatched belatedly at the golden swirl of fur that -flashed past him. So did Joel Fenno. - -The sheep, hearing his pursuer behind him, veered to the left; making -for a right-angle niche that indented one edge of the side fence, -perhaps a hundred yards from the gap;--a sort of alcove; where cattle -had formerly been herded in bunches of two or three, to pass on through -a gate whose place had since been taken by the high barrier of wire. - -With Treve not three feet behind him, the sheep reached this -cul-de-sac; discovered that it led nowhere; and turned to get out -of it. At his first shambling step he rolled heels over head in a -somersault; a .45 bullet drilling him clean. - -Chris Hibben had gone into action. As soon as the hard-ridden pony had -brought him within range, he had opened fire. His first bullet found -its mark; but--as he himself knew--more by luck than by skill. For, -only in motion pictures and in Buffalo Bill shows can a man hope to -take any sort of accurate aim from the back of a jerkily running pony. - -Moreover, this pinto of Hibben’s was but half-broke. At sound of the -shot, the pony swerved, spun about on the pivot of his own bunched -hindlegs; and then sought to get the bit between his teeth and run -away. Failing, he resented curb and spur by a really brilliant -exhibition of bucking. - -Enraged, and by no means intending that his prey should escape or -that the wizened old Fenno should complete his rheumatic run across -the corner of the field in time to save the collie, Hibben sprang to -earth, flinging the reins over his pinto’s head. - -A trained cow-pony will stand for hours if the rein is thus flung. But -the pinto was not yet well trained. Also, he had been bewildered by the -shot and by the spurring, into a forgetfulness of all he had learned. -He set off at a panicky canter, the loose rein catching in his forefoot -and snapping. - -Unheeding, Chris Hibben ran forward to the niche where Treve was -standing in grieved amaze above the body of the slain sheep. Halting -just within the outer opening of the alcove, Hibben leveled his gun, -using his left forearm as a rest; and pulled the trigger. - -He was not twenty feet from the motionless dog; and he was a good shot. -Yet he missed Treve by at least six feet. This by reason of a fragile -old body that hurled itself against him from behind. - -Joel Fenno had made the last few rods of the distance between the gap -and the indented niche in something like record time; his stiff muscles -stirred to incredible power by the imminent danger of his chum. The -others from the Dos Hermanos ranch, Royce Mack among them, were still -standing stupefied and inert. Joel struck up the pistol arm and in the -same move banged his own full weight against the broad back of the -cattleman. The result was a lamentable miss; and the saving of the -collie’s life. - -The impact and the heavy-caliber pistol’s own recoil, knocked the gun -from Hibben’s hand. Chris turned, cursing. His left elbow caught Fenno -in the chest and knocked the little old rancher flat. Then Hibben -stooped to regain the pistol. - -But he was met and driven backward by a flamingly wrathful mass of -fur and whalebone strength that smote him amidships, in an effort to -seize his throat. Treve, seeing his loved master knocked down, had left -his post beside the dead sheep and launched himself like a vengeful -avalanche upon Joel’s assailant. Here lay his first duty; and he wasted -no time in fulfilling it. - -Hibben staggered backward, clawing at the furious brute which sought to -rend his throat. In the same instant, a scream of mortal terror from -Joel Fenno was taken up by the far-off group at the gap. At the sound, -Treve forsook his prey and spun about to face the slowly rising Joel. -Hibben, too, forgot his own danger, in the stress of that shriek; and -turned to look. - -The drouth and the eternal smell of smoke had gotten on the nerves of -the three hundred cattle pastured in the field. To-day, the inrush -of the strange and repellent-smelling grayish creatures upon their -territory had agonized those raw nerves to frenzy. On top of all this, -the scent of fresh-spilled blood had the effect that so often it has on -overwrought range cattle. - -Something like fifty white-fronted Hereford steers suddenly lowered -their horns and, by common consent, charged that blood-reek. In other -words, Joel Fenno, in trying to get up, had seen coming toward the -alcove-space a tumble of lowered heads and express-train red bodies. -Though he was a sheepman, he knew what a cattle charge meant. And he -screamed horrified warning to his fellow-human in that death-trap. - -Old cattleman though he was, Chris Hibben stood frozen to stone at the -sight. Then he glanced toward the alcove fence behind them. Seven feet -of close-meshed barbed wire--coyote-proof, bull-tight, horse-high. No -man might hope to scale so bristling a stockade. Hibben himself had -ordained that fence in the days when this end of the range had been -given up to calves, and when wolves and rustlers abounded. - -Subconsciously, the two men stood close beside each other, as they -faced the thundrous charge. Their hands met in a moment’s tight grip. -Treve did nothing so professionally melodramatic. He saw the peril -quite as clearly as did Joel or Hibben. But his duty was to avert -it; not to stand supine or to make stagey gestures. In the wink of -an eye, he was off on his gay dash toward the on-thundering bunch of -blood-crazed steers. - -Treve had had no experience in driving cattle. But his wolf ancestors -had known crafty ways of their own, in dealing with wild cows. Into -their descendant’s wise brain their spirits whispered the secret, now; -even as Treve’s collie ancestors had told him, from the first, how -sheep must be herded. - -Tearing along toward the galloping phalanx of horned and lowered heads, -the collie burst into a harrowing fanfare of barks. Straight at the mad -steers he ran; barking in a way to rouse the ire of the most placid -bovine. Nor did he check his flying run, until he was almost under -the hoofs of the foremost steer--a mighty Hereford which ran well in -advance of his crowding companions. - -To the lowered nose of this leader, Treve lunged; slashing the -sensitive nostril; and then, by miraculous dexterity, dodging aside -from the hammering hoofs. Not once did he abate that nerve-jarring bark. - -The hurt steer swerved slightly, in an effort to pin the elusive collie -to earth. The dog swerved, too--barely out of reach of the horns. As he -dodged, he slashed the bleeding nostril afresh. - -It was pretty work, this close-quarters flirting with destruction. The -fearless dog was enjoying the gay thrill and novelty of it as seldom -had he enjoyed anything. - -Under the repeated onslaught, the steer definitely abandoned his former -course; and set about to demolish the dog. But Treve, always a bare -inch or two out of reach, refused to be demolished. Indeed, he ducked -under the lumberingly chasing body and flew at the two nearest steers -that pressed on behind their leader. The nose of one of these he -slashed deeply. The second steer of the two was too close upon him for -such treatment. Treve leaped high in air, landing on the back of the -plunging animal, and nipping him acutely in the flank before jumping -off to continue his nagging tactics. - -That was quite enough. The steers had some definite object, now, in -their charge. Following their three affronted leaders, the whole -battalion of them bore down upon the flying collie. Forgotten was their -vague intent to charge the alcove space and trample the blood-soaked -earth around the dead sheep. There was a more worthy object now for -their rage. - -Treve noted his own success in deflecting the rush. Blithely he fled -from before his bellowing foes. But he fled at an increasing angle from -the direction in which first they had been going. The steers hammered -on in his wake. He kept scarcely five feet of space between himself and -their front rank. Head high, plumed tail flying, he galloped merrily -along, barking impudent insult over his shoulder; and leading the chase -noisily down the field. - -Treve was having a beautiful time. - -Nearly a mile farther on, he tired of the sport. His ruse had -succeeded. Putting on all speed, he drew away easily from the wearying -cattle; made a wide detour and trotted back to his master. The winded -steers had had quite enough. Finding at length that the dog had -swiftness they could not hope to equal, they shambled to a halt. One -by one they stopped staring sulkily after their tormentor; and fell to -cropping grass. Steers are philosophers, in their way. - -Treve found Joel and Hibben standing with the herdsmen at the fence -gap. They were waiting only for his return to lift the broken-posted -panel to place again, as best they could. - -“If you’re still honin’ to shoot him, Mister Hibben--” began Fenno, -sourly, as Treve came up. - -“I--I left my gun back yonder,” muttered Hibben, in reply, his tall -body still shaking as with a chill. “And, anyhow-- Say, put a price -on that collie of yours! Don’t haggle! Put a price on him. If I c’n -help it, no such grand dog is going to have to live with a passel of -sheepmen, no longer. He--” - -“This here’s only a dog,” gravely interrupted Fenno, “a no-’count dog, -for the most part. But we-all don’t aim to humiliate him by makin’ him -’sociate with cowboys an’ steers and suchlike trash. He ain’t wuthless -enough for that. So long, neighbor! We’ll be on our way, now. Any time -you want to reform an’ buy a nice bunch of sheep, jes’ give us a call. -C’m’on Trevy!” - - - - -CHAPTER IX: HIS MATE - - -When Treve saved Chris Hibben from a peculiarly hideous death under the -hoofs of Chris’s own Triple Bar steers, he did more to patch up a truce -between the Dos Hermanos and the Triple Bar outfits than could a score -of peace conferences. - -From the beginning, throughout the West, sheepmen and cattlemen have -been mortal enemies. Seldom has this eternal feud blazed hotter than -between Chris Hibben’s cattle ranch and the nearby Dos Hermanos sheep -ranch of Joel Fenno and Royce Mack. - -Ever there had been a grim understanding that a sheep or sheepdog -straying over the line into the Triple Bar range was a sheep or -sheepdog killed. More than once this understanding had been justified. - -Then, too, a year before, a bunch of six yearling beef cattle had -strayed through a fence gap and down the coulée into Number Six camp of -the Dos Hermanos. There all trace of them was wiped out;--except that -Toni and the other Dos Hermanos herdsmen varied their dreary fare of -tinned goods and tough mutton by a prolonged fresh-beef debauch. - -Then had come the day when Treve unwittingly played the rôle of Dove -of Peace by turning a cattle stampede and saving the dismounted Hibben -from being trampled into the next world. After which Chris gave terse -command to his cowboys that the pesky Dos Hermanos sheep could come -along and chew the barbs off the wire of the Triple Bar home corral if -they chose to; and if need be they were to be escorted back in safety -and in cotton wool. - -Nor did Hibben stop there. From that one briefly terrific moment of -the turned stampede, he had seen what a collie could accomplish with -cattle. He saw more. He saw that two or three well-trained collies -could do the work of a dozen cowboys. Yes, and they could and would do -it on board wages and without threats of going on strike or complaints -about the grub. Nor would they vanish on pay-day and show up a week -later with delirium tremens. It would be a tremendous saving. Anyhow, -the experiment was worth trying. - -It was not Hibben’s custom to do anything rashly. Thus he planned to -begin in a small way; by the purchase of a single collie. If that first -dog should do the work satisfactorily it would be time to buy more. -With this in view he surprised the Dos Hermanos partners, one evening, -by riding across to their ranch-house. Mack and Fenno were sitting on -the handkerchief-sized porch, smoking a before-bedtime pipe. At Royce’s -feet lay Treve. - -On sound of Hibben’s approach, the big collie was awake and alert. Down -the path he dashed, to meet, and if need be stop, the intruder. Then, -recognizing the man he had rescued, the collie drew aside and let Chris -proceed up the path to the porch. - -“Evening,” said Hibben, stiffly uncertain of his welcome. - -“Evening,” replied Mack, with cold civility, while old Joel Fenno sat -still and scowled mute query. - -“Have you eaten?” went on Royce, in the time-honored local phrase of -hospitality. - -“Yep,” said Chris; adding: “Not cawed mutton, neither.” - -He caught himself up, belatedly recalling that he was at peace with -these sheepmen; and he hurried on to ask: - -“Will you boys set a price on that collie of yours? Nope, I’m not -joshing. I don’t know how such critters run in price. But I’ve got a -couple of hundred dollars in my jeans, here, that I’ll swap for him.” - -“Treve’s not for sale,” was Royce Mack’s curt retort. “We told you -that, the day he kept your steers out of your hair. He--” - -“Hold on!” purred Joel, smitten with one of his rare and beautiful -ideas. “Hold on, Friend Hibben. Trevy ain’t for sale. Just like -my partner says. Not that he’s wuth any man’s money--not even a -cattleman’s. But we’ve got kind of used to his wuthless ways and we aim -to keep him. But if you’re honin’ for a collie, I c’n tell you where to -get one. Always s’posin’ you’re willin’ to pay fair for a high-grade -article. I c’n give you the _ad_dress of the feller who used to own -Treve.” - -“That’s good enough for me,” returned Chris. “The feller that bred this -dog of yours sure knew how to breed the best. I’ll hand him that much. -And it’s the best I want. Who is he and where does he hang out?” - -“Wait,” said Fenno, with amazing politeness, as he heaved his rheumatic -frame up from his chair and pottered away into the house. “I’ve got his -_ad_dress in here. I’ll write it down for you.” - -With as near an approach to a grin as his surly leathern mask could -achieve he made his way to his own cubbyhole room. There he dug out the -battered gray catalog of the Dos Hermanos dogshow to which he had taken -Treve. Riffling its pages, he came to the list of exhibitors’ names at -the back. One of these he jotted down with a pencil stump on a dirty -envelope and returned with it to the porch. - -The name he had found and scribbled was “Fraser Colt.” After it he had -copied the man’s address, from the catalog. - -It seemed to Joel the acme of refined humor to steer this once-hostile -cowpuncher up against the man of all others who seemed most likely -to cheat him. Judging from his own experience with Colt, he felt -reasonably certain the dog-breeder could be relied on to whipsaw any -trusting customer; especially when that customer was so far distant as -to make it necessary to buy, sight unseen. - -Royce Mack gave a low whistle of amaze as Fenno showed the name and -address to him, on the way across the porch to hand it to Hibben. Then -Mack choked back a half-born expostulation. He remembered the loss of -sheep after sheep at the hands of the Triple Bar outfit. He saw no -reason to spoil his partner’s joke. - -A week later, in response to a letter of inquiry, Chris received -word from Fraser Colt that the latter had no full-grown and trained -cattle-herding collies in stock, just then; but that he had an -unusually promising thoroughbred female collie puppy which could -readily be taught to work cattle, since both her parents had been -natural cattle workers. - -As Mr. Fraser Colt was closing out his kennels and moving East, Mr. -C. Hibben was at liberty to avail himself of this really remarkable -chance for a bargain, by purchasing the puppy in question (“Cirenhaven -Nellie”) at the ridiculously low price of seventy-five dollars; payable -in advance. If this generous proposition interested Mr. C. Hibben, -would Mr. C. Hibben kindly forward his check (certified) for the above -sum; along with shipping directions? If, on the contrary, Mr. C. Hibben -was a mere “shopper” or was inclined to haggle, this letter required no -answer. - -Now Chris Hibben could no more have been cheated or overcharged on -a consignment of beef cattle than could a bank cashier be hoaxed by -a leaden half-dollar. But, on the subject of dogs he was woefully -ignorant. Moreover, there was a curtly self-assured and businesslike -tang to the letter, which impressed him. Besides, hadn’t the Dos -Hermanos outfit a wonder-dog, acquired from the same man? Surely it was -worth the gamble. - -Chris sent the certified check, as soon as he could get it from the -Santa Carlotta bank. - -A week later arrived a matchwood crate, containing the collie pup. -Hibben himself motored across to Santa Carlotta to bring home his -purchase. His homeward road led past the Dos Hermanos ranch. He saw the -two partners washing up, on the steps, preparatory to supper. Beside -them stood Treve; mildly tired and more than mildly hungry after a long -day on the range. - -Chris turned in at the gate and hailed Fenno and Mack, pointing with -pride to the crate. - -“Oh, you got her, hey?” said Joel, with much interest. “I’ll come out -and have a look at the pup. Fraser Colt sure knows a collie. Pretty -near as intimate as a vivisector is due to know the smell of brimstone. -This dog will be a treat to see.” - -“I’ll save you the trouble of comin’ out here,” called back Hibben, -lifting the crate and its light burden out of the truck. “I’ll fetch -her up there, onto your stoop. I haven’t even had a chance to look at -her yet. We’ll have an inspection bee. I want your opinion of her.” - -As he talked, he was carrying the crate along the path. Joel astounded -Royce Mack by going out to meet him and by carrying one end of the box -up the steps. Joel was not wont to lend an unasked hand. - -On the porch floor the crate was set. Hibben undid its crazy catch and -opened its door. - -Slowly, uncertainly, a half-grown collie pup stepped out and stood -before them. - -Hibben nodded appreciatively. He was no dog judge. But he could see -that this was a really handsome puppy. Her coat was dense and long. -It was a rich mahogany in hue; save for the snowy chest and paws -and tailtip. An expert might have found the pretty head too broad -and the ears too large and low for show-purposes or even for a show -brood-matron’s career. But the newcomer was decidedly good-looking. She -seemed not only intelligent but strong. - -Joel puckered his forehead. The unaccustomed smirk fled from his -leathern face. The joke was turning out to be no joke at all. This -strikingly handsome youngster appeared to be well worth seventy-five -dollars. - -Mack was loud in his praise. But, like Fenno, he could not reconcile -the pup’s excellent value with his own theories of Colt. - -“Yep,” pursued Hibben, “that’s Cirenhaven Nellie. A beauty, ain’t she? -I’m sure your debtor for sickin’ me onto that Colt chap. I wish now I’d -ordered a couple more of ’em.” - -Treve had watched with keen interest the opening of the crate. Now he -came forward eagerly and touched noses with the bewildered pup. His -plumed tail was wagging in friendly welcome. - -“He won’t bite Nellie, will he?” asked Hibben, a trifle anxiously. - -“No,” answered Royce Mack. “Man is about the only animal that mistreats -the female of his race. Treve’s making friends with her. See, Joel? -He’s making more friends with her than ever he’s made with any of the -range collies. He acts like he knew she was helpless and that he had to -protect her. He--” - -Mack broke off in his lecture. The new puppy had begun to move about, -on the porch, with a queer wariness. Now, coming to its edge, she did -not observe that there was a two-foot drop to the yard below; and she -was stepping out into space when a quick intervention of Treve’s shaggy -shoulder turned her back to confused safety. - -“Hold on!” exclaimed Joel, suddenly. “I knew there was a catch in it, -somewheres. An’ her eyes have a funny look, too! Watch me.” - -He struck a match and held it scarcely an inch from the puppy’s wide -eyes; twitching the flame back and forth in the windless air, so close -to her unflinching pupils that the lashes were all but singed. Nellie -did not so much as blink. - -“Blind!” diagnosed Joel, with grim satisfaction. “Stone blind. I knew -there was suthin’ queer. There was bound to be. Been blind always, most -likely, if she’s only six months old. Hibben, you’re stung all the way -acrost the board. Your Cirenhaven Nellie couldn’t ever be learned to -herd anything--without it was the three blind mice the feller writ the -song about. You’re seventy-five dollars in the hole!” - -The poor blind pup seemed to sense the ridicule in his tone. She shrank -back a little in her groping approach toward the speaker. Instantly, -Treve licked her face reassuringly, as though he were comforting a -scared child. The big dog had known instinctively that this newcomer -was afflicted and unable to look after herself. And his great heart had -gone out to her in loving protectiveness. - -Now, before Joel had fairly stopped speaking, the sensitive Nellie -shrank even more appealingly against Treve’s shaggy side. For Chris -Hibben was waking the echoes with a salvo of profanity that shook the -house. Fenno listened with real interest to the outburst. He had the -air of one who is acquiring many new and valuable words. As Chris -paused for breath, Joel said sanctimoniously to Treve: - -“Best run indoors, Trevy. You’re learnin’ language that won’t do you no -reel good. You’ve been brought up by a couple of God-fearin’ sheep men. -This blasphemious cattle talk is new to you. Best run away till he--” - -A sharp gesture from Hibben interrupted him. The cattleman whipped out -his heavy pistol and leveled it at the hapless little female collie as -she crouched shivering and frightened before him. - -Nellie had had bruisingly terrible experience with Fraser Colt’s brutal -rages. To her, the sound of an angry voice meant a fast-ensuing kick--a -kick her blind eyes could not tell her how to avoid. - -Treve, too, understood Chris Hibben’s volley of fury; and he understood -the deadly gesture which was its climax. In an instant he was ready for -what might follow. - -“Stand clear!” bawled Hibben, dropping his pistol muzzle to cover the -quivering Nellie’s head. “You boys tolled me into gettin’ this cur. Now -you boys c’n have the job of buryin’ her an’ of mopping up your stoop. -Stand clear, I said! And haul Treve out of the way; unless you want me -to drill him, too.” - -For the tawny gold collie had stepped quietly between Chris and the -puppy. Steadfastly, his mighty body guarding the cowed little Nellie, -he was gazing at the furious cattleman. - -Hibben took a stride nearer his victim. With his free hand and one -booted foot, he thrust Treve sharply from between him and Nellie; -leveling the pistol afresh as he did so. - -Now, it was not on the free list to lay menacing hands upon Treve; to -say nothing of booting him. The thing had never before been done. Added -to his natural resentment was his keen urge to save Nellie from the -fate he fore-read in Hibben’s glance and in the leveled pistol. Once -before had he seen the man fire that pistol; and he had seen a Dos -Hermanos sheep fall dead from its bullet. - -Before Chris could shoot, a furry thunderbolt launched itself on him; -lethal as a flung spear; silent with concentrated wrath. - -Under that fierce impact the unprepared Hibben reeled back; his finger -spasmodically pressing the trigger as he threw both arms up to shield -his menaced throat. - -The bullet rent a splintering hole in the porch roof. The marksman, in -his staggering retreat, slipped off the edge of the top step and bumped -backward to earth; with a thud that knocked the breath out of him. - -Scarce had his lean shoulders touched ground when Treve was on him; -ravening for his throat. - -Mack watched, dumbfounded. Joel, quicker-witted, yelled to the dog. -Reluctantly, Treve quitted his prey; and in a bound was back at -Joel’s side; while Royce Mack with profuse apologies was helping the -sputteringly infuriated Hibben to his feet. - -Joel surreptitiously picked up the fallen pistol from the floor and -pocketed it. Then he turned to look at Treve, who had left his side and -had moved across to Nellie. - -The puppy, frightened out of all self-control, had bolted. Her -blundering rush had brought her up against the house door with a force -that knocked her down. Now, shaking all over and moaning softly, she -crouched with her head hidden in the angle of porch and door. - -Above her stood Treve; his eyes fixed on Hibben in cold menace. The big -dog knew well that it was not permissible to attack a human; least of -all a human who was the guest of his two masters. Perhaps swift death -might be the punishment for his deed. But he did not falter. - -His body shielding the wretched puppy, he stood there, tensely ready -for Hibben’s next assault. Joel Fenno read the dog’s purpose and his -thoughts; as he might have read those of a fellowman. The collie was -playing with possible death, to guard something that could not defend -itself. Fenno’s gnarled old heart gave a queer twist. - -“Trevy!” he breathed, under cover of Hibben’s loudly truculent return -to the porch. - -At sound of Joel’s voice, Treve shifted his stern gaze from Chris to -the old man. And in the collie’s sorrowful dark eyes, now, was an agony -of appeal. So might the eyes of a mother be raised to the doctor who -alone could save her sick child. - -Joel Fenno’s thin lips set tightly. His old eyes were slits. He was -about to do the foolishest thing of his career. The saner half of him -told him so and reviled him scathingly for it. But sanity went by the -board, in face of that awful pleading in his belovèd dog’s eyes. - -“Hold on, friend!” he interposed, as the cursing Hibben peered -murderously about the floor for his lost pistol. “You’ll stop temptin’ -Providence to swat this shack with lightin’, as a punishment for that -string of hellfire words you’re bellerin’; and you’ll listen to me. -You paid seventy-five dollars for this poor sick puppy you’re tryin’ -to kill. Well, I’m buyin’ her off’n you, for seventy-five dollars. -Get that? _I’m buyin’ her!_ Now shut up an’ stand quiet-like, while I -traipse indoors and git the cash for you.... I’m doin’ this out’n my -own pocket!” he snarled at the thunderstruck Royce. “Not out of the -partnership funds. Josh me all you like. I don’t care a hoot for your -blattin’. I’ve--I’ve took a sort of fancy to the pup.” - -Five minutes later Hibben was driving away; grumbling but appeased. -Joel, awkward and shamefaced, was guiding Nellie’s questing nose to -a saucer of bread and milk. Royce Mack was looking on, bereft of -speech and incredulous. Treve, too, was looking on; a glint of utter -contentment in his deepset eyes. Joel addressed his blank-faced -partner, glumly: - -“Now I s’pose you’ll be makin’ my life rotten by hect’rin’ me ’bout -this! Well, I done it to show you there c’n be another dog on this -ranch as wuthless as your mis’ble Treve. At that, I doubt if she’s as -wuthless as what he is. She ain’t lived so long on the same ranch with -_you_.” - - -Followed the first peaceful, not to say beautifully happy, time that -Nellie had ever known. From the moment Fraser Colt had discovered her -blindness--and thus her absolute uselessness--she had been kicked and -maltreated and made to feel that her only use in life was to serve as a -vent for her breeder’s ill-temper. - -Colt had continued to feed and lodge her, only in the well-founded -hope of cheating some one into buying her. He and his kennels had -been permanently disqualified by the American Kennel Club for crooked -dealings. So, as he was forced to go out of the dog business, anyway, -he had no fear of reprisal, in selling the blind puppy to some novice. - -Under decent treatment now, Nellie’s brain and spirits bloomed forth. -Swift to learn and coming from a breed that has more than normal -intelligence, her progress was amazing. Ever beside her, to fend off -trouble and to show her the way, was Treve. With unfailing patience -Treve watched over her and trained her. Joel looked on with secret -admiration and patiently contributed his own quota to the wise training. - -Nellie could never hope to see. But, with almost miraculous intuition -she learned to find her way about. A collie’s ears and nose are more to -him than are his eyes. Nellie’s absence of sight intensified tenfold -her power of scent and of hearing. - -She could track either of the partners for miles, nose to earth; nearly -always forewarned in some occult manner to avoid obstacles in her path. -She was even, in a small way, of help to Treve in rounding up sheep. -And ever that strange instinct--a sort of sixth sense--developed more -and more, as her brain and experience developed. - -Around the house she was the sweetest and most loving of pets; though -her real adoration and slavish worship were lavished on Treve alone. -She was his shadow. And to her he accorded a tender friendliness which -he had refrained haughtily from bestowing on the splay-footed little -black range collies. - -It was nearly six months after the coming of Nellie that the blizzard -struck the Dos Hermanos region. - -In that southerly and semi-arid stretch, snow was a rarity. Heavy snows -were practically unknown in the lowlands. Storms, which whitened the -Dos Hermanos peaks and slopes, fell usually as rain in the valley. But -now, in mid-February, came a genuine blizzard. - -It caught the ranch totally by surprise. The various bunches of sheep -were grazing wide; as usual at that rain-flecked time of year. Out -of a softly blue sky came a softer grayish haze. Two hours later the -blizzard was roaring in full spectacular fury. - -Every man and every dog was pressed into service. Floundering knee-deep -through drifts, the partners and their herdsmen and Sing Lee, the new -Chinese cook, sought puffingly to drive the scattered and snow-whipped -sheep to places of shelter. - -The dogs, half-submerged in the floury snow, staggered and fought their -way in the teeth of the blast and the stabbing cold. Their pads were -tight-packed with painful snow-lumps. There was no time to stop and -gnaw these torments out. The dogs drove on, limping, unresting. - -It was a madly busy three or four hours. Men and dogs alike were -blinded by the whirling tons of snow. There was no such thing as -following a scent, with any accuracy, through that smother. Nor could a -voice be heard, fifty feet away, in the screech of the gale. - -Spent, dizzy, numb, the partners came back at last to their snow-piled -home. The storm had ceased as suddenly as it had begun. Already a -watery sunshine was beginning to glisten on the ocean of snow that -spread everywhere. - -“All safe except the bunch on Six Range,” reported Royce breathlessly -as he and Fenno met, near the gate. “It was touch-and-go, with the -whole lot. But those got tangled up somehow in the blizzard and bolted. -Treve and I worked for two hours to find them. But it was no good. -They’ve stampeded over the rock wall of the coulée or else over the -cliff into the river. Either way, they’re goners. In a storm like that -they--” - -He stopped short. The dazzling white snow around the house was darkened -by a shifting and huddling mass of dirty gray. The partners squinted -their snow-blurred eyes to see what the phenomenon might mean. - -There, encircling the house and pressing against it for warmth in a -world of pitiless cold, swarmed something like three hundred sheep. - -On the porch--worn out and panting, her pink tongue lolling--slumped -Cirenhaven Nellie. - -Nellie had followed Treve, as ever, into the welter of blizzard, in -pursuit of the stampeded Number Six flock. Presently she had caught the -scent on her own account; and had held it. When Treve had been lured -aside in quest of a handful of strays that had turned back from the -main stampede, Nellie had plodded heavily on. - -The scent of the main body of sheep had by this time become too badly -obliterated by snow-swirl and cross-winds, for even Treve to pick it -up. He could not scent Nellie’s own tracks through that hurricane of -whizzing snow which blotted out each footstep as fast as it was made. - -But to Nellie the elusive scent was still strong enough for her -preternaturally keen nose to follow it more or less correctly. When -this was at times impossible, her uncanny instinct--the instinct of the -trained blind--carried her on. Slowly, wearily, yet unfaltering, she -kept up the quest. - -She came staggeringly upon the sheep, at last, as they wavered on -the precipice edge of the coulée--as they waited for some leader to -be insane enough to fling himself over the brink; so that they might -follow. Nellie ran nimbly along the slippery cliff-edge; forcing them -back with bark and nip; just as one panicky wether was gathering -himself for the downward leap. - -Back she drove them, huddled and bleating and milling; rounding up the -exhausted beasts and heading them away from the coulée. She had no -faintest idea where they belonged; or whither to guide them. All she -knew was that she was sick and suffering and that she stood in dire -need of getting home. Her Hour was close upon her. So homeward she -drove the flock; unaware that she had achieved a bit of tracking that -no normal-eyed sheepdog could have hoped to copy. - -Next morning, Chris Hibben started for Santa Carlotta, to direct the -unloading of freight for the Triple Bar. The snow was too deep for a -car to get through it. So Hibben rode his strongest cow-pony;--a pony -that made heavy enough going of it through the drifts. As Chris neared -the Dos Hermanos ranch house, a man came running out of the kitchen and -hailed him excitedly. - -The man was Joel Fenno. Never before had Hibben seen the old chap -excited. Fearing something might be amiss in the house, the rider -dismounted, tossed the bridle over his pony’s head and waded up the -walk. - -“What’s wrong?” he demanded, as he came face to face with Joel. - -“Nuthin’s wrong,” Fenno assured him, his mouth twisted in an effort to -grin. “Ev’rything’s grand--and ‘ev’rything’ incloods a bunch of three -hundred sheep that Nellie yanked out’n the blizzard yest’d’y, for us. -That dog sure paid her board yest’d’y. She--” - -“Say!” interposed Chris, none too graciously. “Did you stop me, when I -was in a hurry, just to tell me Nellie had been wastin’ her time by -roundin’ up a lot of mangy sheep? I’m gladder’n ever that I sold her -to you, if that’s all she’s fit for. Now if it’d been a bunch of good -cattle--” - -“She’s fit for suthin’ else,” returned Fenno. “That wa’n’t why I -high-signed you. I wanted to show you the suthin’ else she’s fit for. -C’m’on in.” - -He led the way into the kitchen. There, behind the stove, was a -big box, half full of soft rags. In the box lay Cirenhaven Nellie, -reclining comfortably on her side. At sound of Joel’s step her tail -gave a lazy wag or two, by way of welcome. But at sound and scent of -the stranger behind him, her tail ceased to wave, and her lip curled in -menace. For Nellie was on guard again. - -This time she was not guarding silly sheep. She was guarding eight -squirming gray-brown atoms, that nuzzled close against her furry body. - -The baby collies were no larger than plump rats. But the way they -wriggled and drank proved them none the worse for their mother’s -gallant exploits of the preceding day. - -At a gentle word from Royce Mack, the collie mother dropped her tired -head back on the bed of rags and suffered the outsider to draw near and -gaze. Hibben stood looking curiously at the snuggling family in the -box. Treve crossed the kitchen and stood beside Mack, his head on one -side, gazing down at his babies. It was Joel who broke the silence. - -“Eight of ’em!” he proclaimed. “An’ they take after their ma. For -ev’ry one of ’em is as blind as a cowman’s int’llects. But in another -nine days the hull eight of ’em is due to git their eyes wide open. -That’s when they’ll commence to take after their pa an’ be a credit to -a sheep ranch. How many of ’em d’you want us to save out for you--at -seventy-five dollars per?” - - - - -CHAPTER X: THE RUSTLERS - - -Three miles to eastward of the Dos Hermanos ranch runs the Black Angel -Trail. Far to northward it has its beginning. It cuts the state from -top to bottom, like a jaggèd swordstroke. Up above the Peixoto Range it -starts; and it runs almost due south across the Mexican border. - -Nearly a century ago this trail was blazed. Of old it was the chief -artery between the north counties and Mexico. The state roads and the -railways have long since taken its place; and have diverted from it the -bulk of traffic. Bumps and dips and narrow cuts between canyonsides -render it impassable to motor car or to other modern vehicle. - -But in spite of all this, the grass does not grow over-thick in -the Black Angel Trail. No longer a main highway, it is a mighty -convenient byway. Burro trains still traverse it. So do cattle drovers -and shepherds. So do less reputable forms of traffic. It has great -advantages over the thronged and town-fringed state roads, for the -driving of livestock as well as for the transporting of goods which -are best moved with no undue publicity. Sojourners of the Black Angel -Trail have a way of minding their own business. The law seldom patrols -the backwater route or takes cognizance of it. - -Along this trail, from southward, one day in earliest spring, fared a -bee caravan, five wagons strong. Each wagon carried full complement of -hives. - -The only noteworthy detail of the procession was that it numbered -several more grown men than can usually find time to accompany such a -caravan. The chief work of the bee route can be done by women and boys; -leaving most of the men of the family or community to attend to the -crops at home. - -Every year, these bee caravans are loaded with hives, as soon as the -fruit blossoms in the southernmost corner of the state have been -despoiled of their honey-making possibilities. Northward move the -caravans; following the various blossom seasons; and camping in likely -spots along the way, to let their bees ravage whatever blooms happen to -be most plentiful at that place and at that time. - -There is a regularly marked-out rotation of blossom-ripening, in one -section of the state after the other. And this rotation the beekeepers -follow; thus gathering the choicest honey everywhere and all season -long. - -The five-wagon caravan halted and pitched camp in a sheltered arroyo, a -few miles from the borders of the Dos Hermanos ranch. It was the first -year a bee outfit had done such a thing. But then it was the first year -the new almond orchard of the Goldring ranch, a mile to east of the -arroyo, had put forth any profusion of blossoms. Thus there was nothing -remarkable about the occurrence. - -Indeed when Royce Mack rode back from collecting the mail at Santa -Carlotta, and told his partner about their temporary neighbors, old -Joel Fenno did not deem the news worth so much as a grunt of comment. - -Instead, he glared dourly at Treve, who had trotted homeward alongside -Royce’s mustang. - -“That cur,” he railed, “is gettin’ wuthlesser an’ wuthlesser ev’ry -day of his life. Here I go an’ train poor little blind Nellie to work -sheep with him; an’ this morning I took her along to help me shift that -Number Four bunch to Number Five. It was a two-dog job; ’count of the -twist by the coulée an’ ’count of some of the bunch bein’ new. I took -her and Zit. What d’ye s’pose? She wouldn’t work with him! Acted like -she didn’t know how. An’ no more she did, I reckon; her havin’ worked -only with Treve and only knowin’ his ways, an’ all that. I couldn’t -do a thing with her. Only that she’s blind an’ that she was most -likely doin’ her best, I’d ’a’ whaled the daylights out’n her. An’ -where was Treve, all that time? Where _was_ he, I’m askin’ you? He was -pirooting over to Santa Carlotta, along of _you_; pleasurin’ himself -an’ holiday-makin’, while there was work to do;--the measly slacker!” - -“It wasn’t Treve’s fault,” rejoined Mack, wearily. “I took him along -for comp’ny. I didn’t know you were aiming to shift that bunch till -to-morrow. You said--” - -“Took him ’long for comp’ny?” gibed Fenno. “_Comp’ny_, hey? You got -plenty of comp’ny here, without no useless dog traipsin’ after you. -Ain’t _I_ ‘comp’ny,’ if comp’ny’s what you’re honin’ after. Ain’t I?” - -“Yes,” said Mack, briefly. “That’s why I took Treve.” - -Leaving his glum partner to digest this cryptic speech, Royce stamped -off to the back steps to wash up for dinner. Left alone with Treve, the -elder partner lost his disgusted glower. Glancing furtively after Mack, -he drew something from his pocket. - -“Trevy!” he called under his breath. - -The big collie had been following Royce out of the room. At the whisper -of his name he halted and turned quickly back. Tail wagging and eyes -full of eager friendliness to the old man who had just been denouncing -him so harshly, he came up to Joel and sniffed interestedly at the hand -extended to him. In the palm was a crumby and none-too-clean fragment -of cake. - -It was the final morsel left from a surreptitious visit to the bakery, -the last time Joel had gone to Santa Carlotta. Guiltily, the old man -had bought a whole pound of stale jumbles. He had bought them for -Treve’s sole benefit; and he had been doling them out, secretly, to -the delighted collie ever since. It was the first present of any sort -he had purchased for anybody or anything, in all his sixty-odd crabbèd -years. - -“Here you are, Trevy!” said Joel hospitably, as the collie made a -single dainty mouthful of the offering. “An’ when we go to town, -next time, I’ll see can I git you some pound cake. Pound cake is -dretful good. You’ll sure relish it a whole lot, Trevy. Mighty few -millionaires’ dogs gits to eat pound cake, I reckon. Then--Say, -Royce,” he broke off, snarlingly, as he caught the sound of his -partner’s return, “call this durn cuss out onto the stoop with you. -He’s tromplin’ dust all over the clean floor. Dogs don’t b’long in the -house, anyhow. You’ve got him pampered till he’s no good to no one. He -thinks he’s folks. Take him outside!” - -“I forgot to tell you,” said Royce, coming into the room, red and -shining from his wash, “I met up with Chris Hibben, over at Santa -Carlotta. He was coming out of the sheriff’s office; and he was mad as -hops. He says thirty of his beef cattle were run off the Triple Bar -last night. Three of his cow-ponies were lifted right out of the home -corral, too, he says.” - -“Strayed, most likely,” suggested Joel, with no sign of interest in his -neighbor’s mishap. - -“Chris says not,” denied Royce. “He says they were lifted. Says it’s -rustlers.” - -At the ominous word, Joel Fenno’s crooked brows twitched. Nobody in the -sheep-and-cattle country, in those days, could hear the name “rustlers” -without a twinge. In spite of watchfulness and in defiance of all law, -livestock thieves had not yet been stamped out. They worked, as a rule, -in gangs and with consummate cleverness. Their system of theft might -vary, as occasion demanded. But whatever the system chanced to be, it -had a way of circumventing the best efforts of ranchers. - -It was easy for crafty and organized bands to lift large or small -bunches of livestock from a vast range; to drive it to the nearest safe -hiding place; and thence run it across the border or sell it to some -dishonest wholesale butcher’s agent. There was much money in such an -enterprise;--much money and occasional death. For the captured rustler -expected and received short shrift. The Black Angel Trail was the local -livestock thief’s route to wealth. - -Long and disputatiously the Dos Hermanos partners talked over the news; -Fenno as usual discrediting its truth and Royce increasingly impressed -by it. The conference ended with an arrangement to send word to every -herder on the Dos Hermanos ranch to keep strict guard for a night or -two, and to carry a shotgun. - -“Treve,” said Royce, at bedtime, as the collie prepared to stretch -himself as usual on the rag mat at the foot of his master’s bunk, -“you’ve got to do guard duty to-night. It’s outdoors for yours. There -are too many sheep in the home fold, just now, for us to take any -chances. The other dogs are out on the range; and they’ve got to stay -there while this scare lasts. All but Nellie. She’s no good, Joel says, -except when you can work with her. It’s up to you to keep an eye on the -fold. Outside, son! _Watch!_” - -Treve did not catch the meaning of one-tenth of his master’s harangue. -But he understood enough of it to know, past doubt, that he was -expected to stay away from his cherished rag mat that night, and -stand guard over the house and the stable-buildings and the adjoining -fold. He sighed discontent at his banishment. Then obediently he -went outdoors and lay down with a little thump on the corner of the -porch;--a post whence he could see or hear or scent anything going on -in the clutter of outbuildings and yards in the hollow directly below. - -His little blind mate, Nellie, came forward from the door-mat which -was her usual bed and walked across the porch to him. Mincingly she -came; her mahogany coat fluffing in the faint breeze. She touched noses -affectionately with the big golden dog. Then, crouching, she danced her -white forepaws on the boards, excitedly, tempting Treve to a romp. - -But Treve was on duty, and he knew it. He resisted the temptation for -a scamper and a mock battle in the soft dust. He lay still, merely -wagging his plumed tail in recognition of the inviting dance. Failing -to lure her mate into a frolic, Nellie lay soberly down beside him, her -graceful body curled against his mighty shoulder. - -She loved to romp with Treve. Always he was as gentle in his play with -her as with a weak child. With her, alone of the ranch dogs, would he -unbend from his benign dignity. But since he would not play to-night, -it was next best to cuddle close to him and to join in his vigil. - -The long nights were a stupid and lonely time to Nellie, out there -by herself on the porch. It made her happy, now, to have Treve’s -companionship in the hours of dark. - -The two collies dozed. Yet they dozed as only a trained watch-dog knows -how to; with every sense subconsciously alert. A little after midnight -both their heads were lifted in unison, and both sets of ears were -pricked to listen. - -Along the road beyond the ranch-house gate came the pad-pad-pad of a -slow-ridden horse that wore no shoes. - -This, by itself, was not a matter for excitement. Both collies knew the -ill-kept road was public, and that passersby were not to be molested. -Thus, they did not give tongue, nor do more than look up and listen as -the horse padded by. - -The night was close-clouded; though there was a moon behind the -banks of gray vapor. There was light enough for even a human to -detect dimly any objects moving at a reasonable distance. To Treve’s -night-accustomed eyes there was no difficulty in making out the figures -of horse and rider as they passed the gate. - -The man was sitting carelessly in the saddle. His face was turned -toward the house, on whose porch-edge the two silent collies were -wholly visible to him. He watched them a moment or so, and they -returned his gaze. - -Then gradually his horse carried him past and on a line paralleling -the outbuildings. Treve’s eyes followed him, but only in the mildest -interest, as an incident of a quiet night. Nellie’s uncannily keen -nostrils sniffed the rider’s unfamiliar scent, as the breeze bore it to -her. - -Then, of a sudden, Treve got to his feet; his hackles bristling. -Dutifully, Nellie followed his example. - -The rider had jogged on for more than a hundred yards. But at the far -end of the outbuildings he had halted his horse. Dismounting, he took -a hesitant step toward the palings which separated the ranch from -the road. Instantly, both dogs were in motion. Running shoulder to -shoulder, they bore down upon the man to resent the threat of intrusion. - -Now “Greaser” Todd was anything but a fool. Hence the deservedly high -place he occupied in his chosen trade. He knew dogs. A man in his line -of business must know them and know them well. Of these two dogs he had -gained casual knowledge, not only on an earlier ride past the ranch, -but from chat with one of the herders whom he had managed to engage in -idle talk that day. Thus, he was not silly enough to suppose he could -hope to climb the paling undeterred. - -But he had no desire to climb it just then. His plan was to get the -dogs down here, well away from the house and from any possibly wakeful -occupant thereof. Moreover, their dash would unquestionably bring -forth any other of the ranch dogs which might be quartered around the -fold. - -As Treve and Nellie ran silently toward him, Todd sprang to the saddle -again and set his mount in motion. The two collies came alongside, -just inside the paling, as Greaser touched heel to his horse. He was -grateful that they had advanced in silence, instead of barking in a way -to disturb weary sleepers’ rest. He was a most considerate man, was -Greaser Todd. - -As he cantered off, he drew from his saddlebags two objects, each about -half the size of a man’s fist, and tossed them over the paling at the -angrily dancing collies. - -The two flung objects were hunks of cooked meat; savory and alluring. -One of them, on its downward flight, would have hit Treve in the head -had not he flashed aside from the strange missile. It struck against -a sloping stone and bounced back again through the gap between two -palings into the dust of the road. There it lay, out of his reach; -unless he should care to go all the way around to the gate and retrieve -the tempting food. There Fenno found it next day. - -The second bit of well-aimed meat fell to earth directly in front of -Nellie’s quivering nostrils. Lightly fed and perpetually hungry, she -pounced upon the titbit; guided by her powers of scent. One gulp and -she had swallowed it. - -Treve was of two minds as to the advisability of waking the echoes -with a salvo of barking by way of farewell insult to the intruder, -or to go around and get the delicious-smelling meat that had rolled -so provokingly out of his reach. The man was gone. His horse’s light -hoofbeats were dying away, up the coulée. The logical thing to do now -was to get that generously-given meat and devour it. - -Already, Nellie was beside the palings, thrusting her slender nose -through the gap, in quest of the food she could smell but could not -get. Being blind, she could not know, as did Treve, the futility of -pushing her nose through one paling-gap after another in the hope of -finding a space wide enough to let her jaws close on the meat. - -But as Treve set off, along the inner side of the fence, on his errand -of retrieving the fragment of cooked food, she seemed to understand his -purpose. For she trotted eagerly alongside him; her shoulder as ever -touching his, in order to guide her steps. - -Treve had not gone twenty feet when he felt her swing away from him, in -a lurch that almost upset her. Halting to let her catch up with him -after her supposed stumble, he saw Nellie stagger sideways a step or -two, then curl back her lips from her teeth and come to a shivering -stop. She moaned once in stifled agony; then collapsed in a furry heap -on the ground. - -Full of keen solicitude, Treve ran over to where she lay. As he gazed -worriedly down upon the pitifully still little body, a trembling shook -him from crown to toes. Not for the first time was the great collie -looking upon Death. - -His adored little mate was dead;--stone dead. How or why she had been -stricken down so suddenly--she who just now had been so full of life -and of pretty, loving ways--was beyond his knowledge. But grief smote -him to the depths of his soul. - -Long he stood there above her; now and then touching her still little -body or face with his nose, as if entreating her to come back to him. -Then, whimpering as no physical pain could have made him whimper, he -turned and fled to the house. - -Even as man in dire distress turns to his God for aid, so did the -heartbroken collie turn now to his two human gods. - -Bounding up on the porch, he scratched imperiously at the locked door; -whining and sobbing in stark anguish of heart. Perhaps these humans -could bring back to life the dear mate who had meant so much to him. - -Fiercely impatient in his grief, he scratched the harder at the door -panel; crying under his breath and quivering as in a death-chill. - -After an eternity came a slumbrous and cross voice from Royce Mack’s -room. - -“Shut up there, Treve!” commanded Royce, angry at being wakened. “Shut -up, you fool! No, you can’t come in! You’re spoiled--pampered--just as -Joel said. You’ll stay outside, as I told you to. Shut up!” - -Mack rolled over, as he finished shouting his peevish order, and sank -again into slumber, worn out by his long day in the open. - -Treve shrank back from the door as though his master’s angry reproof -had been a blow. Hesitant, he crouched there. He had turned to his god -in his moment of heartbreak. And his god had refused to come to his aid. - -Then, an instant later, the collie’s ears were raised in new eagerness. -A soft, if stumpy, footfall was crossing the kitchen floor. Joel Fenno -opened the door and slipped out onto the porch, in sketchy attire, -closing the door behind him. - -“What’s the matter, Trevy?” he whispered. “What’s wrong, old sonny? -Hey?” - -Treve caught him by the hem of his abbreviated nightshirt and tugged -at the garment, frantically; backing off the steps and seeking to drag -Fenno after him. Joel gave one sharp look at the quivering dog; then -nodded. - -“I’ll take your tip, Trevy,” he whispered, disengaging his shirt from -the hauling jaws. “Wait!” - -He tiptoed indoors. But Treve was content. He knew the man would rejoin -him. - -In less than a minute Joel came back. He had yanked on his trousers and -had stuck his feet into a ragged pair of carpet slippers. Under his -arm he carried a loaded shotgun. In a trouser pocket were stuck four -buckshot cartridges and a flashlight. - -“Now, then,” he bade the dog, “come on!” - -Treve waited for no second bidding. He wheeled and made for the -outbuildings. At every few rods, he would pause and look back to make -sure Fenno was following. - -“All right!” grumbled Joel, as if to a human companion. “All right! -I’m a-comin’, Trevy. I heard Royce call you a fool, jes’ now. Maybe -it’s me that’s the fool for trailin’ along with you. And then ag’in, -maybe not. You ain’t given to actin’ like this. Besides, with all this -rustler-talk--” - -He stopped short. Treve was no longer leading him on. The dog had -halted at the fence edge, and was standing there, looking downward in -drooping misery at something small and dark that lay at his feet. Joel -pressed his flashlight button. - -Almost instantly he released the pressure. But not before he had seen -Nellie’s lifeless body and had taken cognizance of her writhen lips. -Her attitude and her convulsed mouth told their own story. - -“Pizen!” muttered Joel, aghast. - -His first sharp thought was for Treve. He went over to the disconsolate -collie and felt his head and jaws. - -“Nope,” he said. “She was the only one that got it. If it was strong -enough to git her as quick as that, it’d ’a’ got you, too, before now. -An’--an’, Trevy, I’m thankin’ Gawd it didn’t! I’m a-thankin’ Him, reel -rev’rent!” - -The old brain was working and working fast. Now that the Dos Hermanos -ranch was at peace with the Triple Bar outfit, there was no neighbor -who would poison any of the collies. The only person to do such a -damnable thing must be some one who desired to get the ranch guards out -of the way in order to rob the place. - -Rustlers! - -Joel listened. Except for an occasional bleat or stir in the nearby -fold, no sound broke the awesome stillness of the early spring night. -The collie stood statuelike above his dead mate, his sorrowful dark -eyes fixed on Joel in dumb appeal. - -“We can’t bring her back, Trevy,” said Fenno, gently, caressing the -bowed silken head with rough tenderness. “Only the good Gawd c’d do -that. An’ in His wisdom, He don’t ever do it no more--nowadays.... -_He_ knows why. _I_ don’t. We ain’t so lucky as them folks in Bible -times.... But maybe we c’n git the swine that killed her, Trevy!” - -There was a fiery thread of menace in the old voice, a note that made -the collie lift his drooping head and turn toward the rancher. Just -then, blurred and from far off, came a scent and a sound. They were -indistinguishable to gross human senses. But Treve read them aright. - -The sound was of three cautiously-ridden horses. The scent was of -men;--one of them the man who had loitered beside the fence and flung -the meat that had killed Treve’s mate. - -The dog stiffened. His teeth bared. Deep down in his throat a growl was -born. He remembered; and now he understood. - -This was the man who had somehow done Nellie to death. It was directly -after he stopped there, on the far side of the fence, that she had -died. Red rage flamed in the dog’s heart and eyes. - -“Quiet, Trevy!” breathed Joel, at the sound of the low growl. “Hear -suthin’, do you? Quiet, then, an’ wait!... Huh! Royce Mack called you a -fool, did he? Called _you_ a fool! In the mornin’--” - -He fell silent. To his own straining ears now came the faint beat of -muffle-hoofed horses. Nearer they came and nearer. Joel gripped his -shotgun and peered through the high fence palings. - -Presently, in the dim light, he was aware of three mounted men and two -more men on foot, coming toward him from the direction of the coulée. - -At the same moment one of the three riders spurred forward from the -rest. Drawing his horse alongside the high fence, he vaulted lightly -from the saddle, coming to earth on the inner side of the palings. - -As his feet touched ground, something hairy and terrible whizzed at him -through the darkness; awful in its murderous silence. Before Greaser -Todd could get his hand to his knife or shove back his mysterious -assailant, Treve’s mighty jaws had found their goal in his unshaven -throat. - -The rustler crashed to earth, the mutely homicidal collie atop him; the -curved white eyeteeth grinding toward the jugular. - -“What’s the matter, Greaser?” queried the rider behind him, hearing -his leader stumble and fall. “Bootsoles too slippery?” - -As he spoke, he, too, vaulted the palings and dropped to his feet in -the yard. One of the unmounted men was climbing the fence in more -leisurely fashion, his head appearing now over the top. - -As calmly as though he were shooting quail, Fenno went into action. - -One barrel of his shotgun was fired point-blank at the rustler who had -just landed in the yard. Wheeling, he emptied the left barrel into the -head of the climber. - -There was a panic yell from the road; then pell-mell a scurry of hoofs -and of running feet. Slipping two new cartridges into the breech, Joel -Fenno climbed halfway up the fence and fired both barrels down the road -into the muddled dust-cloud that was dashing toward the coulée. - - -Royce Mack, still drunk with sleep, came staggering and shouting down -from the ranch house, his flashlight playing in every direction. At the -edge of the outbuildings he slithered to a dumbfounded halt. - -The arc of white radiance from his flashlight illumed a truly hideous -and incredible scene. Athwart the fence top, like a shot squirrel, -sprawled an all-but headless man. On the ground, just inside the -palings, lay another slumped figure. - -Somewhat nearer to Mack knelt Joel Fenno, his gun on the earth beside -him. He was stanching the blood of a third man--a man whose throat was -that of a jungle beast’s victim. - -Beside him, tense and raging, and held in check only by Joel’s crooning -voice, towered the huge gold-white Treve. - -“I reckon we c’n save this one of ’em, Royce, long ’nough for the -sheriff to git his c’nfession,” airily observed Joel, continuing his -first-aid work. “I pried Trevy loose before he got to the jug’l’r. With -Trevy standin’ by, to prompt him like, the feller’s due to talk all the -sheriff wants him to. Me an’ Trevy will see to that. As f’r them other -two--” - -“What--what the--?” sputtered Mack, stupid with horror. - -“Trevy’s a ‘fool,’ all right!” scoffed Joel. “Jes’ like I heard you -call him, awhile back. He tries to be more like you all the time. -Likewise he s’cceeds. Now run an’ phone for the sheriff. Me an’ Trevy -has had a busy night. It’s up to _you_ to do the rest of the chores.” - - - - -CHAPTER XI: THE PARTING OF THE WAYS - - -Treve lay on the porch at the Dos Hermanos ranch house; his classic -head between his little white forepaws; his mighty gold-and-white body -like a couchant lion’s. A casual passerby would have said the dog was -asleep. A dog-student would have known better. Seldom do collies sleep -in that picturesque pose. Usually they slumber asprawl on one side. - -Neither were the collie’s deepset sorrowful eyes shut. They were -looking wearily across the heat-pulsating miles of ranch land. Nor were -they alert, as when the big dog was on guard. There was perplexed worry -in their soft gaze. - -Things were happening at the ranch; things Treve did not understand. -Yet his collie sixth sense told him there were change and confusion in -the air as well as in the words and voices of his two masters. These -two masters were often at odds. The dog long since had ceased to let -himself be stirred by their incessant and harmless quarrels. - -But they were not at odds, nowadays. Indeed, there was a new -civility--almost a sad friendliness--in their manner toward each other. - -We humans often grope for the solution to some baffling mystery which -eludes our sharpest intelligence, and whose key, could we but master -it, lies within easy reach of us. So with Treve. The key to this -disturbing new ranch development lay within six inches of his nose, in -the form of a newspaper which had fallen from the porch rocker to the -dusty floor. - -Had Treve been able to read type--as he could read human nature -and weather signs and danger to the Dos Hermanos flocks--a front -page news item in that paper might have told him much. The paper -was the Santa Carlotta _Bugle_. The item had been written by the -_Bugle’s_ proprietor, himself, in his best florid style. The -proprietor, by the way, chanced to be the managing editor, the city -editor, the reportorial staff and the printer of the paper. Also the -business-and-advertising manager and office boy. The _Bugle_ was a -one-man sheet. - -His front-page article ran: - - - “Dan Cupid has been making a spring roundup of the ranch country, - this season. We have had glad occasion to announce no less than - four engagements and two marriages, in the Dos Hermanos Valley, - during the past three months. We now take personal pleasure in - retailing the latest romance from that garden spot of our fair - state. - - “Mr. Royce Mack, younger partner of the popular sheep-ranchers, - Fenno and Mack, of the Dos Hermanos Ranch outfit, is about to - marry Miss Reine Houston, the lovely and popular and talented - Fourth Grade teacher at the Ova school. - - “Miss Houston’s gain is the loss of the Dos Hermanos Valley; as - the young couple plan to leave this section (which so aptly has - been termed ‘God’s Country’), and to settle in the far and effete - East, upon a well-stocked Vermont dairy farm which was recently - bequeathed, along with a considerable cash legacy, to Mr. Mack, by - his deceased maternal uncle. - - “The nuptials, we understand, will occur at the bride’s parental - home in Dodge City, Kas., early next month. Miss Houston - expects to leave Ova, Friday, to go home for her final wedding - arrangements. Mr. Mack, we learn, will follow the first of the - week.” - - -There was more of the article, including a stanza of machine-made -poetry, with a highly original reference to two hearts that beat as -one. But no more is needed to explain the atmosphere of impending -change which had begun to grate upon the collie’s nerves. - -For a long time this change had been coming. Treve had trotted across -to Ova, evening after evening, for weeks alongside of Royce’s pinto. -He had lain boredly on a rug in a stuffy little boarding house parlor, -while his master forgot him and everything else in chatting with a -plump girl who smelt annoyingly of lily-of-the-valley perfume. A girl -who said at the outset that she didn’t care much for dogs and who asked -if collies weren’t supposed to be treacherous. - -Treve had known from the first that she did not like him. This -bothered him not at all. For he didn’t like her, either. Her pungent -lily-of-the-valley perfume was as distressing to his sensitive nostrils -as would be the reek of carrion to a human nose. Moreover, she was not -the type of human that dogs like. Also, she took up too much of his -master’s attention. - -Intuitively, Treve realized Mack was not as fond of him as once he had -been and that the man was not the jolly chum of yore. It grieved the -sensitive collie. He sought wistfully to draw Royce’s attention more to -himself and less to this painfully-scented outsider. But it was all in -vain. - -Royce Mack was blindly and deliriously in love. The world, for the -time, contained for him only one person. That person was far more -like an angel than a mere woman. And she exhaled in some occult way a -faintly angelic perfume from her garments. - -Sheepishly, Mack told his partner of the engagement. Joel’s reply -was a grunt which implied nothing or anything. Fenno made precisely -the same reply, a week afterward, when news came to Royce of his -comfortable legacy of cash and of pleasant farmland in southern Vermont. - -Risking monotony, Joel had achieved a third grunt when Mack went on to -inform him of the projected eastward move. This move meant a breaking -up of the partnership. Mack could not run a dairy farm in Vermont and -also a ranch in the West. - -Joel came out of the silences and out of a maze of calculations long -enough to make an offer for Royce’s share of the Dos Hermanos. The -offer was as meager as was Fenno himself; but it was as reliable. Too -foolishly happy to barter, Mack closed with it. Thus, in another three -days, Joel Fenno was to become sole owner of the ranch. - -Both men had evaded the question of Treve’s ownership. The collie -belonged jointly to them. Yet he was not included in the list of land, -buildings and livestock set forth in the bill of sale. - -From the first, Mack had regarded the dog as his own, and had made -Treve his particular chum. Joel had scoffed at such folly, and had -pretended to hold the collie in utter contempt. But Treve had grown -to be everything to the gnarl-souled oldster. For the first time in -his sixty-odd warped years, he had learned to care about some living -creature. It was with a twinge that he saw how much fonder the dog -seemed to be of Mack than of Fenno’s unlovable self. - -Now, at the possibility of parting with his loved dog-comrade, his -heart was as sore as a boil. Wherefore, as usual, he held his peace on -the theme so close to him; and he was outwardly the more savage in his -comments on Treve’s worthlessness. - -Treve lifted his head from between his paws, and stared down the road -toward the coulée. His trained ears not only caught the rattle and chug -of an approaching car, but they recognized it as a car belonging to the -ranch. - -Presently, the dusty runabout rounded the bend, a furlong beyond. -Royce Mack was driving it. At his side sat a plump and slackly pretty -figure in billowy white. Treve was too far away to catch the reek of -lily-of-the-valley. But he knew it would assail and torture his keen -nostrils soon enough. - -The dog got to his feet, with a bark of welcome. He was about to lope -forward to meet the car and escort Mack to the house, when Joel Fenno, -hearing the bark, stumped out of the kitchen doorway behind him. - -The old man had come from work, with Treve at his heels, a half-hour -early that day. Now he reappeared from his bedroom, crossly -uncomfortable in his store clothes; his neck teased by a frayed -collar-edge and further girt with a ready-made tie of awesome coloring. -If his bulls-eye emerald scarfpin had been genuine, it would have been -worth more than the entire ranch. His new boots squeaked groaningly on -the porch floor. - -The collie, wondering at such change in his friend’s costume and -bearing, halted in his scarce-begun journey toward the approaching car -and stared, with head on one side. - -“Sure!” growled Fenno. “Sure! Keep a-lookin’ at me, Trevy. I’m sure -wuth it. If ’twasn’t that he’s leavin’ here for good, in a day or two, -I’d ’a’ saw him in blue blazes before I’d ’a’ rigged me up like this, -on a hot week-day; jes’ ’cause he took a idee to ask her over to eat -supper with us, to-night. I feel like I was to a fun’ral, Trevy.” - -As he spoke, Joel was strolling down the dusty walk, toward the -gateway, to give such sour welcome as he might to his partner’s -sweetheart. The collie abandoned his own intent to gambol ahead; and -paced sedately along at Joel’s side. - -The average high-class collie has reduced snobbishness to an art. -Witness the courtesy wherewith many of them hasten to greet a -well-dressed stranger, as contrasted with their fierce rebuff of a -tramp. - -Perhaps it was Fenno’s unwonted splendor of raiment which made Treve -elect to continue the gateward walk in his company, rather than dash on -ahead. Yet of late, he had more than once chosen Joel’s companionship -rather than Mack’s. As they walked, Joel continued to mutter under his -breath. - -“She said she ‘wanted to meet her darling Royce’s dear old partner,’” -he sniffed. “Well, Trevy, the pleasure’s all her’n. (Not that I’m -a-grudgin’ her the treat of seein’ me.) Nothing’d do but she must come -over to supper with us, Trevy. And if Sing Lee don’t cook no better’n -he’s been cookin’ lately, she’s sure due to remember this supper for -quite a spell. She--Whatcher smellin’ at, Trevy?” he broke off. - -The dog had slowed in his walk, and was moving stiff-legged. His -nostrils were sniffing the still air with queer intensity. The car was -drawing to a stop, in front of the gate, twenty feet away;--quite near -enough for the hated lily-of-the-valley perfume to reach the collie’s -acute senses. - -But it was not perfume he was smelling. It was something far more -familiar and far more detested; something still too faint to reach -Fenno’s grosser powers of scent. - -The noisy little car stopped. Mack, on its far side, got out and -hurried around the runabout, to help Reine Houston to the ground. He -did not even pause in his loverly haste long enough to turn off the -noisy engine; an engine whose coughing reverberations drowned all -lesser sounds. - -Reine did not wait for her lover to reach her side and assist her in -the wholly simple task of opening the car door and stepping to earth. -Coming toward the gateway, from the direction of the house, were Joel -and the dog. Anxious to make a good impression on Fenno, the girl -jumped down before Mack could come around from the far side of the car. -Her plump hands outstretched in friendly greeting to Joel, she ran -forward to meet him. - -There was a patch of roadside tumbleweed between the car and the gate. -The girl prepared to clear this in her stride. But she did not do so. - -This because Treve suddenly abandoned his stiff-legged suspicious -advance and made one lightning bound at her. - -The dog did not growl, nor did he show his teeth. But he sprang -with the incredible speed of a charging wolf. Clearing the patch of -tumbleweed by fully twenty inches, he sent his body crashing with all -its force against the white-clad girl. - -He did not bite. His lowered head and much of his furry body smote her -amidships. Back she shot, under that swift impact, banging hard against -the side of the car and using up what little breath she still had in a -loud screech. - -Royce Mack rounded the side of the car just in time to see the dog hurl -himself at the all-precious Reine. - -With a yell of fury at such vile sacrilege to his angel, he sprang at -Treve and kicked him. - -The kick struck the dog in the short ribs with an agonizing force -that doubled Treve and sent him rolling over and over in the dust. -Furiously, Mack followed him up, his boot drawn back for a second and -heavier kick. The girl did not cease from screaming as she gathered -herself up, bruised and hysterical with fright. - -As his foot swung back for the kick, Royce chanced to see Joel Fenno -from the corner of his eye. The old man was also in violent action. At -sight of his partner’s activities, Mack checked himself with one foot -still in air. - -Fenno, regardless of his own rheumatic limbs, was doing a vehement -dance in the center of the low tumbleweed patch. Beneath his stamping -feet writhed and twisted a fat four-foot rattlesnake. - -The nasty odor of crushed cucumbers--certain sign of the pit viper--was -strong enough in the air now, for even these blundering humans to get -the scent which Treve had caught twenty feet away. - -“I ain’t got my gun on me!” wheezed Joel, to his partner, as a final -drive of his heel smashed the rattlesnake’s evil, arrow-shaped head. -“But if you kick that dog ag’in, I swear t’ Gawd I’ll go in an’ git it, -an’ blow your mangy face off! I seen the hull thing. This gal of your’n -was jes’ a-goin’ to plant her foot in the tumbleweed, when I seen this -rattler h’ist up his dirty head an’ bend it back to strike her ankle. -Trevy seen it, too. An’ he pushed her out’n death’s way, when there -wa’n’t neither one of us humans near enough nor quick enough to. An’ -you kicked him fer savin’ her! Lord! Kicked--kicked--_Trevy_!” - -He had left the slain snake and was hustling across to the dog. - -Treve had gotten gaspingly to his feet. No whimper had been wrung from -him by the anguishing pain of the kick in his tender short-ribs. No -snarl nor other sign of wrath had shown resentment at this brutality--a -brutality for which any human stranger would have been attacked by him -right murderously. - -Instead, the great dog stood stock-still in the road, his glorious -coat dust-smeared, his mighty body a-tremble. His soft eyes were fixed -on the man who had kicked him--the man who had been his god--the man -whose sweetheart the collie had risked his own life to save. - -This was the man to whom he had given loyal and worshipful service -since long before he could remember. And now his god had turned on -him;--had not punished him, for punishment implies earlier fault; but -had half-killed him for no fault at all. - -The deepset dark eyes were terrible in their heartbreak. Royce Mack, -blinking stupidly, felt their look sear into him. Slowly he stared -from the stricken dog to the dead snake. Then his eyes fell upon Reine -Houston. - -At sight of the snake, and at comprehension of what Treve had averted -from her by that wild leap, Reine collapsed, blubbering and quaking, on -the running-board of the car. - -Drawn by supreme impulse, Royce turned his back on the collie and -hurried over to her. Treve was forgotten. - -With babbled love words Mack sought to reassure and comfort the girl -and to learn if she were badly hurt. In this tender employment he -was interrupted by Joel Fenno’s rasping voice. The old man had been -examining Treve, with the tender touch of a nurse, and crooning softly -to the hurt collie. Now he turned grimly on his partner. - -“Best boost your young lady into the car,” he snarled, “an’ trundle her -back to Ova. She ain’t li’ble to have much ap’tite left, after what’s -happened. Besides, Sing Lee’s salaraytus biscuits ain’t no good example -for a new-mown bride to take to heart for future use. More’n that, -she’s met me. That’s what she come here for, wa’n’t it? She’s met me. -Likewise, she’s saw me dance. She’s met Treve ag’n, too. Met him reel -sudden an’ personal. That’s why she’s still alive. S’pose you traipse -back to Ova with her; an’ leave me an’ Trevy to ourselves. We kind of -need to be left thataway. If you don’t mind. So long!” - -His wizened hand on the dog’s ruff, he strode back to the house, -shutting the door loudly behind Treve and himself. - -It was late when Royce Mack got back from Ova, that evening. Joel was -sitting up for him. Royce said nothing to his partner, but went at once -to Treve, who had come slowly forward to meet him. - -His hands roamed remorsefully over the dog, and he seemed trying to -say something. Treve was looking up into Royce’s face with that same -strickenly reproachful expression that the man had not been able to get -out of his memory all evening. - -“If you’re huntin’ for broken ribs or for rupture,” commented Joel -as he watched his partner’s exploring hands, “there ain’t any. Small -thanks to you; an’ by a mir’cle of heaven. Treve’s all right. Except -you’ve smashed suthin’ in the heart an’ the soul of him that you can’t -unsmash. That’s all you done.” - -The old man’s toneless voice irked Mack. - -“Can you blame me?” he challenged. “What else could I do? I saw him -spring at her and knock her down. I thought he was killing her. It -seemed the only way to--” - -“To prove you’re a born fool?” supplemented Joel. “You didn’t need to -prove it to me. Nor, when she’s knowed you a while longer, you won’t -need to prove it to her, neither. Why would he be killin’ her? Hey? -We’ve had him all these years; an’ he never yet did a thing that wa’n’t -wiser’n the wisest thing _you_ ever did. Nor yet he never did anything -that was rotten. You might ’a’ knowed he had some reason for actin’ -so. Anyhow, there’s lots better ways for a man to show he’s a dog’s -inferior, than by kickin’ him.” - -“Let it go at that!” muttered Royce, sullenly; harder hit than he -cared to show, by the look in his collie chum’s dark eyes. “I’ll make -it up to him, somehow. I--” - -“Make it up to him?” mocked Fenno. “How? By tellin’ him you’ve forgave -him, maybe? Or by gettin’ him a nice gold watch an’ wearin’ it for him -till he’s old enough to take care of it? ‘Make it up to him!’ _Lord!_” - -Royce turned wrathfully on his expressionless partner. - -“I don’t see what business it is of yours!” he snapped. “You’ve always -hated the dog. You’ve always called him worthless and said you wished -we could be rid of him. Well, you’ll be rid of him, all right. In less -than a week he and I will be out of here for good.” - -“Where do you get that stuff about ‘him and you?’ _You’ll_ be gone. But -Treve’s as much mine as he’s yours.” - -Royce glanced at his scowling partner in genuine surprise. - -“You don’t mean to say you’re going to be cantankerous about _that_, -too?” he exclaimed. “Why, Joel, you hate the very sight of the dog! -You’ve hated him from the beginning. You’ve never had a decent word for -him. I don’t believe you ever spoke to him in his life, except to give -him some order or else to swear at him. And now you talk about his -being as much yours as mine. Well, let’s come to a showdown. What do -you want for your share in him?” - -Joel made no immediate answer. He was peering through the dim -candle-light at Treve. The old man’s thin lips moved rhythmically, -as though he were chewing the mysterious cud of senility. His chin -quivered. Otherwise his leathery face was blank. It gave no sign of the -turmoil behind it. - -But Treve understood. With all a collie’s strange trick of reading -human emotion behind a wordless and expressionless mask, he knew his -friend was acutely unhappy. The dog got to his feet and came over to -Fenno, pressing his furry bulk against the rancher’s lean legs and -thrusting a sympathetic muzzle into the tough palm. He whined softly, -his gaze fixed on Joel’s. - -From long habit, in the presence of others, Fenno made as though to -repulse the dog’s friendliness. Then, with a little intake of breath, -he bent over the collie and caught the classic head almost roughly -between his hands. - -“Treve!” he mumbled, thickly. “Trevy, you and me know all about that, -don’t we? We’re--we’re good pals, me and you, Trevy. The best pals -there ever was.” - -Royce Mack looked on, dumbfounded. There was caress in Fenno’s thin -voice and in his rough grasp of the dog. Treve, too, was behaving as -though he were well accustomed to such signs of affection from the man. - -“I--I thought--” began Mack, “I thought--” - -“No, ye didn’t!” crossly denied Fenno, the barriers down. “You never -‘thought,’ in all your born days. If you’d knowed what it meant to -think, you’d ’a’ knowed a white man couldn’t go hatin’ Trevy, like I -made out I hated him. Nobody could. And likewise you’d ’a’ remembered -how he kept me alive that day down by Ova, when I was throwed and -crippled up and couldn’t stir to help myself; an’ how he brang water to -me; an’ how he flagged you and brang _you_ to me, besides. An’ now you -go jawin’ about takin’ him away; an’ askin’ what do I want for my share -of him. Well, I want just a even billion dollars for my share of Trevy. -I ain’t sellin’. I’m buyin’. Now whatcher want for _your_ share of him? -Speak up! If I got it, I’ll pay.” - -Royce pondered a moment. He could not fathom this phase of the old man. -Then a solution came to him. - -“Remember the day we got him?” asked Mack. “Remember how we made dice -marks on a lump of sugar, out to the foreman shack, to see which owned -him? He ate the sugar, and we compromised by owning him between us. -Suppose we throw dice again to see who owns him? Loser to give up all -claim to him. How about it?” - -“Nope,” refused Joel, stubbornly. “Lemme buy him off’n you, Mack. I’ll -pay--” - -“I’m not selling him,” as stubbornly insisted Royce, enamored of his -own sporting idea. “I’m giving you your chance. Take it or leave it. -You ought to be glad I don’t suggest we let him go to whichever of us -he chooses.” - -Joel winced. Then, despondently, he clumped across the room to the -shelf where lay the parcheesi game. Choosing a cylinder cup and a -pair of dice, he came back to the table. On the way he paused to pat -furtively the collie’s silken ears. - -“Best two out of three?” suggested Royce. - -“Nope,” said Fenno. “One throw. When a tooth’s got to come out, a -single yank is best. You throw first.” - -Royce took the dice-cup and shook it with relish. Nothing could beat -him. He knew that. In his present streak of luck, when a glorious -bride and a legacy were falling to his lot, a bout of chance with his -Jonah-like old partner could not fail to bring him success--and Treve. - -Expertly he chucked the dice out on the table, in the flickering -candle-flare. Over and over the white cubes tumbled and hopped and -rolled; coming to a halt, at last, barely an inch from the table edge -and almost side by side. Both men leaned forward to read the pips on -the exposed top surfaces of the dice. - -A six and a five! Eleven! Unbeatable except by a next-to-impossible -Twelve. - -Joel’s face set itself like wrinkled granite. He made no other outward -sign of distress. Treve, at sound of the noisily rattling dice, had -gotten interestedly to his feet, and stood with his head on a level -with the deal table, watching. - -Royce swept up the dice and tossed them into the cup; passing it across -to Fenno. With hand as steady as a boy’s, the old man accepted the cup -and sulkily he threw the two dice upon the board. - -The jar of a heavy tread on the porch made both men turn their heads. -Visitors at such an hour were unheard-of. Toni, the chief herdsman, -stamped in to report the straying of a bunch of sheep that had nosed -a hole in the rotting wattles of the home fold. Instinctively the -partners glanced back to the dice. - -There lay the little cubes, just under the candle’s nearest rays. - -Two sixes! Twelve! - -There had been fewer than nine chances in a hundred that Joel could -have made such a throw. Yet, his proverbial hoodoo was broken. Luck, -for once, seemed to have gravitated his way. - -Fenno made no comment, but bent over to pat Treve with an odd new air -of personal possession, while Mack listened scowlingly to Toni’s tale -of the lost sheep. - -“Suppose you and _your_ dog chase out with Toni and round ’em up?” said -Royce, at last, turning maliciously to his partner. “They’re not mine -any longer, you know. Any more than Treve is. For once I’ll have the -fun of going to bed and letting the rest of the outfit do the hustling. -Good-night.” - - -At dusk, three days later, the one livery car from Santa Carlotta -stopped at the ranch gate to carry Royce Mack and his belongings to the -distant railroad, whence the night train was to bear him eastward to -his bride. - -Herders piled the car with luggage; then stood at the gate to say -good-by to their former boss. Joel loitered in the doorway; Treve -beside him, Fenno was frowning and fidgeting. - -Royce came up to him with outstretched hand. For a moment the old man -ignored the hand. Once more his jaws were at work with senility’s cud. -Suddenly he burst forth: - -“Trevy’s your’n! Take him along East with you!” - -There was a world of stifled heartache and stark misery in the grouchy -old voice. - -“What the blue blazes!” sputtered Royce in amaze. “D’you mean to say -you don’t want him, after all the fuss you made? He--” - -“Yep!” snarled old Fenno. “I want him more’n I want my right leg. An’ I -reckon I’ll be twice as lonesome without him as I’d be without the two -of my legs. But I--I don’t want him the way I won him. I thought I did. -But I don’t. It--it sticks in my throat. He’s a square dog, Trevy is. -He ain’t goin’ to be won by no crooked trick. So I-- Oh, take him along -an’ shut up!” - -Royce continued to stare in bewilderment. His owlish aspect angered -Joel. - -“We shook dice for him,” expounded Fenno, sourly. “You throwed a six -an’ a five. I throwed a six an’ a one. You looked back to see who was -buttin’ into the room that time of night. I flicked the one-spot over, -an’ made it a six. Take him along. I--I-- Trevy, son,” he ended, a frog -in his throat as he laid a shaky hand on the collie’s head, “you see -for yourself, I couldn’t keep you, that way; you bein’ so clean an’ -decent; an’ me cheatin’ to get you. I--” - -To his astonishment, Royce Mack broke into a shout of laughter. - -“When I put Reine on the Pullman to go East,” said Royce, “I told her -about our throwing dice for Treve. I was still sore over losing him. -D’you know what she said? Said she was tickled to death that I’d lost. -Said she can’t bear dogs, and that she’d never be able to endure having -Treve around after the savage way he upset her. She said she’d always -be afraid of him, and that she’d have insisted, anyway, on my leaving -him behind. That settles it.... Good-by, Treve, old friend. Good-by, -Joel. Luck to the pair of you!” - -Late into the warm evening, Joel Fenno sat silent on the porch. At his -feet, in drowsy contentment, lay Treve. The old man’s face was aglow -with wordless happiness. Every now and then he would stoop to stroke -the sleeping dog. Then he would listen delightedly to the responsive -lazy thump of Treve’s tail on the boards. - -Life was worth while, after all. It was great to have a chum that was -all one’s own, and to sit thus with him at the close of day. No more -bickerings, no more jawing, no more need to pretend he didn’t like this -wonderful collie of his. It was _fine_ to be alive! - -“Trevy,” he exhorted, solemnly, as he knocked out his final pipe and -prepared to go indoors, “don’t you ever let me ketch you throwin’ dice -crooked. But if ever you do, don’t go blabbin’ about it. Not one time -in a trillion-an’-seven, c’d you expec’ to find a girl who’d square it -all for you, like that pudgy Reine person done for me. An’, Trevy, -lemme say ag’in, for the sev’ralth time, right here,--of all the dogs -that ever happened--you’re--you’re that dog. Now le’s quit jabberin’ -an’ go to sleep!” - - - - -CHAPTER XII: AFTERWORD - - -I have drawn upon one of our Sunnybank collies for the name and the -aspect and certain traits of this book’s hero. The real Treve was my -chum, and one of the strangest and most beautiful collies I have known. - -Dog aristocrats have two names; one whereby they are registered in -the American Kennel Club’s immortal studbook and one by which they -are known at home. The first of these is called the “pedigree name.” -The second is the “kennel name.” Few dogs know or answer to their own -high-sounding pedigree names. In speaking to them their kennel names -alone are used. - -For example, my grand old Bruce’s pedigree name was Sunnybank -Goldsmith;--a term that meant nothing to him. My Champion Sunnybank -Sigurdson (greatest of Treve’s sons), responds only to the name of -“Squire.” Sunnybank Lochinvar is “Roy.” - -Treve’s pedigree name was “Sunnybank Sigurd.” And in time he won his -right to the hard-sought and harder-earned prefix of “CHAMPION”;--the -supreme crown of dogdom. - -We named him Sigurd--the Mistress and I--in honor of the collie of -Katharine Lee Bates; a dog made famous the world over by his owner’s -exquisite book, “_Sigurd, Our Golden Collie_.” - -But here difficulties set in. - -It is all very well to shout “Sigurd!” to a collie when he is the -only dog in sight. But when there is a rackety and swirling and -excited throng of them, the call of “Sigurd!” has an unlucky sibilant -resemblance to the exhortation, “Sic ’im!” And misunderstandings--not -to say strife--are prone to follow. So we sought a one-syllable kennel -name for our golden collie pup. My English superintendent, Robert -Friend, suggested “Treve.” - -The pup took to it at once. - -He was red-gold-and-snow of coat; a big slender youngster, with the -true “look of eagles” in his deepset dark eyes. In those eyes, too, -burned an eternal imp of mischief. - -I have bred or otherwise acquired hundreds of collies in my time. No -two of them were alike. That is the joy of collies. But most of them -had certain well-defined collie characteristics in common with their -blood-brethren. Treve had practically none. He was not like other -collies or like a dog of any breed. - -Gloriously beautiful, madly alive in every inch of him, he combined the -widest and most irreconcilable range of traits. - -For him there were but three people on earth;--the Mistress, myself and -Robert Friend. To us he gave complete allegiance, if in queer form. -The rest of mankind, with one exception--a girl--did not exist, so far -as he was concerned; unless the rest of mankind undertook to speak to -him or to pat him. Then, instantly, such familiarity was rewarded by a -murderous growl and a most terrifying bite. - -The bite was delivered with a frightful show of ferocity. And it had -not the force to crush the wing of a fly. - -Strangers, assailed thus, were startled. Some were frankly scared. They -would stare down in amaze at the bitten surface, marveling that there -was neither blood nor teeth-mark nor pain. For the attack always had an -appearance of man-eating fury. - -Treve would allow the Mistress to pat him--in moderation. But if I -touched him, in friendliness, he would toss his beautiful head and dart -out of reach, barking angrily back at me. It was the same when Robert -tried to pet him. - -Once or twice a day he would come up to me, laying his head across -my arm or knee; growling with the utmost vehemence and gnawing at -my sleeve for a minute at a time. I gather that this was a form of -affection. He did it to nobody else. - -Also, when I went to town for the day, he would mope around for awhile; -then would take my cap from the hall table and carry it into my study. -All day long he would lie there, one paw on the cap, and growl fierce -menace to all who ventured near. On my return home at night, he gave me -scarcely a glance and drew disgustedly away as usual when I held out my -hand to pat him. - -In the evenings, on the porch or in front of the living room fire, he -would stroll unconcernedly about until he made sure I was not noticing. -Then he would curl himself on the floor in front of me, pressing his -furry body close to my ankles; and would lie there for hours. - -The Mistress alone he forbore to bite. He loved her. But she was a -grievous disappointment to him. From the first, she saw through his -vehement show of ferocity and took it at its true value. Try as he -would, he could not frighten her. Try as he would, he could not mask -his adoration for her. - -Again and again he would lie down for a nap at her feet; only to waken -presently with a thundrous growl and a snarl, and with a lunge of bared -teeth at her caressing hand. The hand would continue to caress; and his -show of fury was met with a laugh and with the comment: - -“You’ve had a good sleep, and now you’ve waked up in a nice homicidal -rage.” - -Failing to alarm her, the dog would look sheepishly at the laughing -face and then cuddle down again at her feet to be petted. - -There was another side to his play of indifference and of wrath. True, -he would toss his head and back away, barking, when Robert or myself -tried to pat him. But at the quietly spoken word, “Treve!”, he would -come straight up to us and, if need be, stand statue-like for an hour -at a time, while he was groomed or otherwise handled. - -In brief, he was the naughtiest and at the same time the most -unfailingly obedient dog I have owned. No matter how far away he might -be, the single voicing of his name would bring him to me in a swirling -rush. - -In the show-ring he was a problem. At times he showed as proudly and as -spectacularly as any attitude-striking tragedian. Again, if he did not -chance to like his surroundings or if the ring-side crowd displeased -him, he prepared to loaf in slovenly fashion through his paces on the -block and in the parade. At such times the showing of Treve became as -much an art as is the guiding of a temperamental race-horse to victory. -It called for tact; even for trickery. - -In the first place, during these fits of ill-humor, he would start -around the ring, in the preliminary parade, with his tail arched high -over his back; although he knew, as well as did I, that a collie’s tail -should be carried low, in the ring. - -I commanded: “Tail down!” Down would come the tail. But at the same -time would come a savage growl and a sensational snap at my wrist. The -spectators pointed out to one another the incurably fierce collie. -Fellow-exhibitors in the ring would edge away. The judge--if he were an -outsider--would eye Treve with strong apprehension. - -It was the same when I whispered, “Foot out!” as he deliberately turned -one white front toe inward in coming to a halt on the judging block. A -similar snarl and feather-light snap followed the command. - -The worst part of the ordeal came when the judge began to “go over” -him with expert hands, to test the levelness of his mouth, the spring -of his ribs, his general soundness and the texture of his coat. An -exhibitor is not supposed to speak to a judge in the ring except to -answer a question. But if the judge were inspecting Treve for the first -time, I used to mumble conciliatingly, the while: - -“He’s only in play, Judge. The dog’s perfectly gentle.” - -This, as Treve resented the stranger’s handling, by growl-fringed -bites at the nearest part of the judicial anatomy. - -A savage dog does not make a hit with the average judge. There is scant -joyance in being chewed, in the pursuit of one’s judging-duties. Yet, -as a rule, judges took my word as to Treve’s gentleness; especially -after one sample of his biteless biting. Said Vinton Breese, the famed -“all-rounder” dog-judge, after an Interstate show: - -“I feel slighted. Sigurd forgot to bite me to-day. It’s the first time.” - -The Mistress made up a little song, in which Treve’s name occurred -oftener than almost all its other words. Treve was inordinately proud -of this song. He would stand, growling softly, with his head on one -side, for an indefinite time, listening to her sing it. He used to lure -her into chanting this super-personal ditty by trotting to the piano -and then running back to her. - -Nature intended him for a staunch, clever, implicitly obedient, gentle -collie, without a single bad trait, and possessed of rare sweetness. -He tried his best to make himself thoroughly mean and savage and -treacherous. He met with pitifully poor success in his chosen rôle. The -sweetness and the obedient gentleness stuck forth, past all his best -efforts to mask them in ferocity. - -Once, when he bit with overmuch unction at a guest who tried to pat -him, I spoke sharply to him and emphasized my rebuke by a light slap on -the shoulder. The dog was heart-broken. Crouching at my feet, his head -on my boot, he sobbed exactly like a frightened child. He spent hours -trying pitifully to make friends with me again. - -It was so when his snarl and his nip at the legs of one of the other -dogs led to warlike retaliation. At once Treve would rush to me for -protection and for comfort. From the safe haven of my knees he would -hurl threats at his assailant and defy him to carry the quarrel -further. There was no fight in him. At the same time there was no taint -of cowardice. He bore pain or discomfort or real danger unflinchingly. - -One of his chief joys was to ransack the garage and stables for sponges -and rags which were stored there for cleaning the cars. These he would -carry, one by one, to the long grass or to the lake, and deposit them -there. When the men hid these choice playthings out of his way he would -stand on his hindlegs and explore the shelves and low beam-corners in -search of them; never resting till he found one or more to bear off. - -He would lug away porch cushions and carelessly-deserted hats and -wraps, and deposit them in all sorts of impossible places; never by any -chance bringing them back. - -From puppyhood, he did not once eat a whole meal of his own accord. -Always he must be fed by hand. Even then he would not touch any food -but cooked meat. - -Normally, the solution to this would have been to let him go hungry -until he was ready to eat. But a valuable show-and-stud collie cannot -be allowed to become a skeleton and lifeless for lack of food, any more -than a winning race-horse can be permitted to starve away his strength -and speed. - -Treve’s daily pound-and-a-half of broiled chuck steak was cut in -small pieces and set before him on a plate. Then began the eternal -task of making him eat it. Did we turn our backs on him for a single -minute--the food had vanished when next we looked. - -But it had not vanished down Treve’s dainty throat. Casual search -revealed every missing morsel of meat shoved neatly out of sight under -the edges of the plate or else hidden in the grass or under nearby -boards or handfuls of straw. - -This daily meal was a game. Treve enjoyed it immensely. Not being -blessed with patience, I abhorred it. So Robert Friend took the duty -of feeding him. At sound of Robert’s distant knife, whetted to cut up -the meat, Treve would come flying to the hammock where I sat writing. -At a bound he was in my lap, all fours and all fur--the entire sixty -pounds of him--and with his head thrust under one of the hammock -cushions. - -Thence, at Robert’s call, and at my own exhortation, he would come -forth with mincing reluctance and approach the tempting dish of broiled -steak. Looking coldly upon the food, he would lie down. To all of -Robert’s allurements to eat, the dog turned a deaf ear. Once in a blue -moon, he consented to swallow the steak, piece by piece, if Robert -would feed it to him by hand. Oftener it was necessary to call on Wolf -to act as stimulant to appetite. - -“Then I’ll give it to Wolf,” Robert would threaten. “_Wolf!_” - -Treve got to his feet with head lowered and teeth bared. Robert called -Wolf, who came lazily to play his part in the daily game for a guerdon -of one piece of the meat. - -Six feet away from the dish, Wolf paused. But his work was done. -Growling, barking, roaring, Treve attacked the dish; snatching up -and bolting one morsel of meat at a time. Between every two bites he -bellowed threats and insults at the placidly watching Wolf,--Wolf who -could thrash his weight in tigers and who, after Lad and Bruce died, -was the acknowledged king of all the Place’s dogs. - -In this way, mouthful by mouthful and with an accompaniment of raging -noise that could be heard across the lake, Treve disposed of his dinner. - -Yes, it was a silly thing to humor him in the game. But there was no -other method of making him eat the food on which depended his continued -show-form and his dynamite vitality. When it came to giving him his -two raw eggs a day, there was nothing to that but forcible feeding. In -solid cash prizes and in fees, Treve paid back, by many hundred per -cent., the high cost of his food. - -When he was little more than a puppy, he fell dangerously ill with some -kind of heart trouble. Dr. Hopper said he must have medicine every half -hour, day and night, until he should be better. I sat up with him for -two nights. - -I got little enough work done, between times, on those two nights. The -suffering dog lay on a rug beside my study desk. But he was uneasy and -wanted to be talked to. He was in too much pain to go to sleep. In a -corner of my study was a tin biscuit box, which I kept filled with -animal crackers, as occasional titbits for the collies. Every now and -then, during our two-night vigil, I took an animal cracker from the -box and fed it to Treve. - -By the second night he was having a beautiful time. I was not. - -The study seemed to him a most delightful place. Forthwith he adopted -it as his lair. By the third morning he was out of danger and indeed -was practically well again. But he had acquired the study-habit; a -habit which lasted throughout his short life. - -From that time on, it was Treve’s study; not mine. The tin cracker box -became his treasure chest; a thing to be guarded as jealously as ever -was the Nibelungen Hoard or the Koh-i-noor. - -If he chanced to be lying in any other room, and a dog unconsciously -walked between him and the study, Treve bounded up from the soundest -sleep and rushed growlingly to the study door, whence he snarled -defiance at the possible intruder. If he were in the study and another -dog ventured near, Treve’s teeth were bared and Treve’s forefeet were -planted firmly atop the tin box; as he ordered away the potential -despoiler of his hoard. - -No human, save only the Mistress and myself, might enter the study -unchallenged. Grudgingly, Treve conceded her right and mine to be -there. But a rush at the ankles of any one else discouraged ingress. -I remember my daughter stopped in there one day to speak to me; -on her way for a swim. As the bathing-dressed figure appeared on -the threshold, Treve made a snarling rush for it. Alternately and -vehemently he bit both bare ankles. - -“I wish he wouldn’t do that,” complained my daughter, annoyed. “He -_tickles_ so, when he bites!” - -No expert trainer has worked more skillfully and tirelessly over -a Derby winner than did Robert Friend over that dog’s shimmering -red-gold coat. For an hour or more every day, he groomed Treve, until -the burnished fur stood out like a Circassian beauty’s coiffure and -glowed like molten gold. The dog stood moveless throughout the long and -tedious process; except when he obeyed the order to turn to one side or -the other or to lift his head or to put up his paws for a brushing of -the silken sleeve-ruffles. - -It was Robert, too, who hit on the scheme which gave Treve his last -show-victory; when the collie already had won fourteen of the needful -fifteen points which should make him a Champion of Record. - -Perhaps you think it is easy to pilot even the best of dogs through the -gruelling ordeals that go to make up those fifteen points. Well, it is -not. - -Many breeders take their dogs on the various show-circuits, keeping -them on the bench for three days at a time; and then, week after week, -shipping them in stuffy crates from town to town, from show to show. -In this way, the championship points sometimes pile up with reasonable -speed;--and sometimes never at all. (Sometimes, too, the luckless dog -is found dead in his crate, on arriving at the show-hall. Oftener he -catches distemper and dies in more painful and leisurely fashion.) - -I am too foolishly mush-hearted to inflict such torture on any of -our Sunnybank collies. I never take my dogs to a show that cannot be -reached by comfortable motor ride within two or three hours at most; -nor to any show whence they cannot return home at the end of a single -day. Thus, championship points mount up more slowly at Sunnybank than -at some other kennels. But thus, too, our dogs, for the most part, -stay alive and in splendid health. I sleep the sounder at night, for -knowing my collie chums are not in misery in some distemper-tainted -dogshow-building. - -In like manner, it is a fixed rule with us never to ship a Sunnybank -puppy anywhere by express to a purchaser. People must come here in -person and take home the pups they buy from me. Buyers have motored to -Sunnybank for pups from Maine and Ohio and even from California. - -These scruples of mine have earned me the good-natured guying of more -sensible collie breeders. - -Well, Treve had picked up fourteen of the fifteen points needed to -complete his championship. The last worthwhile show of the spring -season--within motor distance--was at Noble, Pa., on June 10, 1922. -Incidentally, June 10, 1922, was Treve’s third birthday. His wonderful -coat was at the climax of its shining fullness. By autumn he would be -“out of coat”; and an out-of-coat collie stands small chance of winning. - -So Robert and I drove over to Noble with him. - -The day was stewingly hot; the drive was long. Show-goers crowded -around the splendid dog before the judging began. Bit by bit, Treve’s -nerves began to fray. We kept him off his bench and in the shade, and -we did what we could to steer admirers away from him. But it was no -use. By the time the collie division was called into the tented ring, -Treve was profoundly unhappy and cranky. - -He slouched in, with no more “form” to him than a plow horse. With -the rest of his class (“Open, sable-and-white”), he went through the -parade. Judge Cooper called the contestants one by one up to the block; -Treve last of all. My best efforts could not rouse the dog from his -sullen apathy. - -It was then that Robert Friend played his trump card. Standing just -outside the ring, among the jam of spectators, he called excitedly: - -“_Wolf!_ I’ll give it to Wolf!” - -I don’t know what the other spectators thought of this outburst. But I -know the effect it had on Treve. - -In a flash the great dog was alert and tense; his tulip ears up, his -whole body at attention, the look of eagles in his eyes as he scanned -the ringside for a glimpse of his friend, Wolf. - -Judge Cooper took one long look at him. Then, without so much as laying -a hand on the magnificently-showing Treve, he awarded him the blue -ribbon in his class. - -I had sense enough to take the dog into one corner and to keep him -there, quieting and steadying him until the Winners’ Class was called. -As I led him into the ring, then, to compete with the other classes’ -blue ribboners, Robert called once more to the absent Wolf. Again -the trick served. The collie moved and stood as if galvanized into -sparkling life. - -Cooper handed me the Winners’ rosette; the rosette whose acquisition -made Treve a Champion of Record! - -It was only about a year ago. In that little handful of time, the -judge who made him a champion--the new-made champion himself--the dog -whose name roused him from his apathy in the ring--all three are dead. -I don’t think a white sportsman like Cooper would mind my linking -his name with two such supreme collies, in this word of necrology. -Cooper--Treve--_Wolf_! - -(There’s lots of room in this old earth of ours for the digging of -graves, isn’t there?) - -Home we came with our champion--Champion Sunnybank Sigurd--who -displayed so little championship dignity that, an hour after our return -to the Place, he lifted my brand new Panama hat daintily from the -hall-table, carried it forth from the house with a loving tenderness; -laid it to rest in a patch of lakeside mud; and then rolled on it. - -I was too elated over our triumph to scold him for the costly -sacrilege. I am glad now that I didn’t. For a scolding or a single -harsh word ever reduced him to utter heartbreak. - -And so for a while, at the Place, our golden champion continued to -revel in the gay zest of life. - -He was the livest dog I have known. Wolf alone was his chum among all -the Sunnybank collies. Wolf alone, with his mighty heart and vast -wisdom and his elfin sense of fun and his love for frolic. Wolf and -Treve used to play a complicated game whose chief move consisted of a -sweeping breakneck gallop for perhaps a half-mile, to the accompaniment -of a fanfare of barking. Across the green lawns they would flash, like -red-gold meteors; and at a pace none of their fleet-footed brethren -could maintain. - -One morning they started as usual on this whirlwind dash. But at the -end of the first few yards, Treve swayed in his flying stride, faltered -to a stop and came slowly back to me. He thrust his muzzle into my -cupped hand--for the first time in his undemonstrative life--then stood -wearily beside me. - -A strange transformation had come over him. The best way I can describe -it is to say that the glowing inward fire which always had seemed -to shine through him--even to the flaming bright mass of coat--was -gone. He was all at once old and sedate and massive; a dog of elderly -dignity--a dignity oddly majestic. The mischief imp had fled from his -eyes; the sheen and sunlight had vanished from his coat. He had ceased -to be Treve. - -I sent in a rush for the nearest good vet. The doctor examined the -invalid with all the skilled attention due a dog whose cash value runs -into four figures. Then he gave verdict. - -It was the heart;--the heart that had been flighty in puppyhood days, -but which two competent vets had since pronounced as sound as the -traditional bell. - -For a day longer the collie lived;--at least a gravely gentle and -majestic collie lived in the marvelous body that had been Treve’s. He -did not suffer--or so the doctor told us--and he was content to stay -very close to me; his paw or his head on my foot. - -At last, stretching himself drowsily to sleep, he died. - -It seemed impossible that such a swirl of glad life and mischief and -beauty could have been wiped out in twenty-four little hours. - -Not for our virtues nor for our general worthiness are we remembered -wistfully by those who stay on. Not for our sterling qualities are we -cruelly missed when missing is futile. Worthiness, in its death, does -not leave behind it the grinding heartache that comes at memory of some -lovably naughty or mischievous or delightfully perverse trait. - -Treve’s entertaining badnesses had woven themselves into the very life -of the Place. Their passing left a keen hurt. The more so because, -under them, lay bedrock of staunch loyalty and gentleness. - -I have not the skill to paint our eccentrically lovable chum’s word -picture, except in this clumsily written sketch. If I were to attempt -to make a whole book of him, the result would be a daub. - -But I have tried at least to make his _name_ remembered by a few -readers; by giving it to the hero of this collection of stories. -Perhaps some one, reading, may like the name, even if not the stories; -and may call his or her next collie, “Treve”; in memory of a gallant -dog that was dear to Sunnybank. - -We buried him in the woods, near the house, here. A granite bowlder -serves as his headstone. - -Alongside that bowlder, a few days ago, we buried the Mistress’s hero -collie, Wolf; close to his old-time playmate, Treve. - -Perhaps you may care to hear a word or two of Wolf’s plucky death. Some -of you have read his adventures in my other dog stories. More of you -read of his passing. For nearly every newspaper in America printed a -long account of it. - -It is an account worth reading and rereading; as is every tale of clean -courage. I am going to quote part of the finely-written story that -appeared in the _New York Times_ of June 28, 1923; a story far beyond -power of mine to improve on or to equal: - - - “Wolf, son of Lad, is dead. The shaggy collie, with the eyes that - understood and the friendly tail, made famous in the stories of - Albert Payson Terhune, died like a thoroughbred. So when Wolf - joined his father, in the canine Beyond, last Sunday night, there - was no hanging of heads. - - “Wolf died a hero. But yesterday the level lawns of Sunnybank, the - Terhune place at Pompton Lakes, N. J., seemed empty and the big - house was curiously quiet. True, other collies were there; but so, - too, was the big bowlder out in the woods with just ‘Wolf’ graven - across it. - - “Ten years ago, when thousands of readers were following Lad’s - career as told by his owner, Mr. Terhune, an interesting event - took place at Sunnybank. Of all the puppies that had or have come - to Sunnybank, that group of newcomers was the most mischievous. - Admittedly, Lad was properly proud, but readers will remember his - occasional misgivings about one of the pups. The cause of parental - concern was Wolf. He was a good puppy, you know, but a trifle - boisterous; maybe--yes, he was, the littlest bit inclined to - wildness. - - “In 1918 Lad passed on; and the whole country mourned his - departure. Wolf succeeded his famous father in the stories of Mr. - Terhune. The son had long since abandoned his harum-scarum ways - and had developed into a model member of the Terhune dog circle. - Wolf was the property and the pet of Mrs. Terhune. - - “He became the cleverest of all the collies. One could talk to - Wolf and get understanding and no back talk. One could depend on - Wolf and get full loyalty. One could like Wolf and say so; and the - soft cool nose would come poking around and the tail would begin - to wag till it seemed as if Wolf would wag himself off his feet. - - “Wolf constituted himself warden of the Sunnybank lawns and - custodian of the driveways. When motoring parties came in and - endangered the lives of the puppies playing about the driveways, - Wolf, at the first sound of the motor, would dash importantly down - into the drive and would herd or chase every puppy out of harm’s - way. - - “Each evening it was the habit of Wolf to saunter off on a long - ‘walk.’ Three evenings ago he rambled away and-- - - “Down in the darkness at the railroad station some folk were - waiting to see the Stroudsburg express flash by. It was a few - minutes late. A nondescript dog, with a hunted, homeless droop to - his tail, trotted onto the tracks. - - “Far down the line there came the warning screech of the express. - The canine tramp didn’t pay any attention to it, but sat down to - scratch at a flea. - - “The headlight of the express shot a beam glistening along the - rails. Wolf saw the dog and the danger. With a bark and a snap, - the son of Lad thrust the stranger off the track and drove him to - safety. - - “The express was whistling, for a crossing, far past the station, - when they picked up what was Wolf and started for the Terhune - home.” - - -All dogs die too soon. Many humans don’t die soon enough. A dog is only -a dog. And a dog is too gorgeously normal and wholesome to be made -ridiculous in death by his owner’s sloppy sentimentality. - -The stories of one’s dogs, like the recital of one’s dreams, are of no -special interest to others. Perhaps I have talked overlong about these -two collie chums of ours. Belatedly, I ask your forgiveness if I have -bored you. - -ALBERT PAYSON TERHUNE. -_“Sunnybank,” -Pompton Lakes, -New Jersey._ - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TREVE *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, -and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following -the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use -of the Project Gutenberg trademark. 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If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Treve</p> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Albert Payson Terhune</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: July 6, 2021 [eBook #65777]</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Tim Lindell, University of Vermont, Martin Pettit and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.)</div> - -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TREVE ***</div> - -<div class="mynote"><p class="center">Transcriber’s Note:<br /><br /> -Obvious typographic errors have been corrected.<br /></p></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/front.jpg" alt="front" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i">[Pg i]</a></span></p> - -<h1>Treve</h1> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[Pg ii]</a></span></p> - -<h2>BOOKS BY</h2> - -<p class="bold2">ALBERT PAYSON TERHUNE</p> - -<p class="center">Lad: A Dog<br />Further Adventures of Lad<br />Lad of Sunnybank<br />Bruce<br />Buff: A Collie<br />The Critter<br />A Dog Named Chips<br /> -The Faith of a Collie<br />Gray Dawn<br />His Dog<br />Lochinvar Luck<br /> -My Friend the Dog<br />Treve<br />The Way of a Dog<br />Wolf<br /> -A Highland Collie<br />Collie to the Rescue<br />Best Loved Dog Stories</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/frontispiece.jpg" alt="frontispiece" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="center"><img src="images/title.jpg" alt="title page" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[Pg iii]</a></span></p> - -<p class="bold">ALBERT PAYSON TERHUNE</p> - -<p class="bold2">Treve</p> - -<hr class="smler" /> - -<p class="bold">Grosset & Dunlap<br /><br />PUBLISHERS<br /><br />NEW YORK</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[Pg iv]</a></span></p> - -<p class="center">COPYRIGHT, 1924,<br />BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY<br /><br /><br />PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span></p> - -<p class="center">My book<br /><br />is dedicated to<br /><br /> -<span class="smcap">Ellen Comly</span><br /><br /><i>Treve’s friend and mine</i></p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CONTENTS</h2> - -<hr class="smler" /> - -<table summary="CONTENTS"> - <tr> - <td colspan="2" class="left"><span class="smaller">CHAPTER</span></td> - <td><span class="smaller">PAGE</span></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>I. </td> - <td class="left">The Coming of Treve</td> - <td><a href="#Page_11">11</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>II. </td> - <td class="left">Thirst!</td> - <td><a href="#Page_39">39</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>III. </td> - <td class="left">Marooned</td> - <td><a href="#Page_70">70</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>IV. </td> - <td class="left">The Killer</td> - <td><a href="#Page_104">104</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>V. </td> - <td class="left">A Secret Adventure</td> - <td><a href="#Page_133">133</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>VI. </td> - <td class="left">Deserted</td> - <td><a href="#Page_155">155</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>VII. </td> - <td class="left">Theft and Untheft</td> - <td><a href="#Page_179">179</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>VIII. </td> - <td class="left">In the Hands of the Enemy</td> - <td><a href="#Page_205">205</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>IX. </td> - <td class="left">His Mate</td> - <td><a href="#Page_225">225</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>X. </td> - <td class="left">The Rustlers</td> - <td><a href="#Page_247">247</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XI. </td> - <td class="left">The Parting of the Ways</td> - <td><a href="#Page_267">267</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>XII. </td> - <td class="left">Afterword</td> - <td><a href="#Page_290">290</a></td> - </tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span></p> - -<p class="bold2">Treve </p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER I: THE COMING OF TREVE</h2> - -<p>The rickety and rackety train was droning along over the desert -miles—miles split and sprinkled by cheerless semi-arid foothills. -At dusk it had shrieked and groaned its way over a divide and slid -clatteringly down the far side amid a screech of brakes.</p> - -<p>Out into the desert-like plain with the scatter of less dead foothills -it had emerged in early evening. Now, as midnight drew on, the desert -ground—with its strewing of exquisite wild flowers here and there -among the sick sage brush and crippled Joshua trees—took a less -desolate aspect; though it was too dark a night for the few waking -passengers to note this.</p> - -<p>The Dos Hermanos River lay a few miles ahead—many more miles on the -hither side of the Dos Hermanos mountain range. The half-fertile land -of the river valley was merging with the encroach of the desert.</p> - -<p>Fraser Colt got to his feet in the rank-atmosphered smoking section of -the way-train’s one Pullman; hooked a fat finger at the porter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> to find -if his berth had been made up; then loafed through to the baggage car -for a last inspection of his collie pup, before turning in.</p> - -<p>Now it is a creditable thing for a man to assure himself of his dog’s -comfort for the night. Often it bespeaks more or less heart. But, -in the case of Fraser Colt it did nothing of the sort; nor was it -creditable to anything but his interest in his dog’s money value.</p> - -<p>As to heart, Fraser Colt had one;—a serviceable and well-appointed -heart. It pumped blood through his plump body. Apart from that -function, it did no work at all. Or if it beat tenderly toward any -living thing, that living thing was Fraser Colt alone.</p> - -<p>Into the ill-lit baggage car he made his way. There were not less than -ten occupants of the car. Two of them were normal humans. The third was -Fraser Colt. The remaining seven were dogs.</p> - -<p>This was by no means the only westbound train, of long or short run, to -carry dogs, that night. For at eleven o’clock on the morrow the annual -show of the Dos Hermanos Kennel Club was to open. Exhibitors, for two -hundred miles, were bringing the best in their kennels to it.</p> - -<p>Seven crates were lined up, along the walls of the baggage car, when -Colt slouched in. The baggageman was drowsing in his tiptilted greasy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> -chair. In a far corner sat an oldish kennelman who had just taken from -a crate a police dog, which he was grooming. Because the night was -stiflingly hot, the car’s side door was rolled halfway open to let in a -sluice of dust-filled cooler air.</p> - -<p>Fraser Colt went over to a crate, unlocked and opened its slatted door -and snapped his fingers. At the summons—indeed, as soon as the door -was opened wide enough for him to wriggle through—a dog danced out -onto the dirty floor.</p> - -<p>Then, for an instant, the newly released prisoner halted and glanced -up at the man who had let him out. The wavery light revealed him as a -well-grown collie pup, about eight months old. Golden-tawny was his -heavy coat and snowy were his ruff and frill and paws. He had about him -the indefinable air that distinguishes a great dog from a merely good -dog—even as a beautiful woman is distinguished from a merely pretty -woman.</p> - -<p>His deepset dark eyes had the true “look of eagles,” young as he was. -His head and fore-face were chiseled in strong classic lines. His small -ears had the perfect tulip dip to them, without which no show-collie -can hope to excel. But, though three show-collies out of five need to -have their ears weighted or otherwise treated, to attain this correct -bend of the tips, here was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> a pup whose ear-carriage was as natural as -it was perfect.</p> - -<p>You will visit many a fairly good dogshow, before you find an -eight-month pup—or grown collie, for that matter—with the points -and classic beauty and indefinable air of greatness possessed by the -youngster that was now returning Fraser Colt’s appraising gaze.</p> - -<p>There was no love in the pup’s upturned glance, as he viewed his -owner;—although, normally, a pup of that age regards the whole world -as his friend, and lavishes enthusiastic affection on the man who owns -him.</p> - -<p>This pup was eyeing Colt with no fear, but with no favor. His look -was doubting, uncertain, almost hostile. But Colt did not heed this. -His expert eye was interested in scanning only the young collie’s -perfection, from a show-point. And he was well satisfied.</p> - -<p>He had paid a low price for this collie; buying him at his breeder’s -ill-attended forced sale, three weeks earlier. Colt was a dog-man; -but that does not mean he was a dog fancier. To him, a dog was a mere -source of revenue. He had foreseen grand possibilities in the pup.</p> - -<p>He had entered him in three classes, for the Dos Hermanos show; whither -now he was taking him. This he had not done through any shred of -sportsmanship; but because he knew<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> the type of folk who visit such -western shows.</p> - -<p>He was certain of carrying the pup triumphantly through his various -classes and of annexing several goodly cash specials. For there were, -and are, few high class show-collies in the Dos Hermanos region; though -there are scores of wide-headed and splay-footed sheep-tending collies -scattered among the ranches there.</p> - -<p>Fraser Colt knew that rich ranchmen and others of their sort would be -glad to pay a fancy price for such a pup; especially after he should -have won a few blue ribbons under their very eyes. There were certain -to be fat offers for the puppy, at the show; and the fattest of these -Colt was planning to take.</p> - -<p>Thus it was that he had come for a last look at the youngster before -going to bed. He wanted to make sure the pup was comfortable enough, -to-night, not to look jaded or dull in the ring, to-morrow.</p> - -<p>He stooped and ran a rough hand over the golden-tawny coat; not in -affection, but in appraisal. The puppy drew back from his touch; in -distaste rather than in fear. Then the deepset dark eyes caught sight -of the police dog in the far corner.</p> - -<p>Perhaps in play, perhaps in lonely craving for friendliness, the collie -scampered gayly across to the larger dog. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p> - -<p>The latter was submitting in dumb surliness to his handler’s grooming. -The big police dog had not relished being yanked from his crate, late -at night, for brushing and rubbing. Indeed, he had not relished any -part of the joltingly noisy ride. He was not in the sunniest of tempers.</p> - -<p>Over to him scampered the friendly collie pup. As he came within a foot -or so of his destination, the car gave a drunken lurch, in rounding a -bend of the track. The capering puppy was thrown off his unaccustomed -car-balance. He collided sharply with the police dog.</p> - -<p>The impact set the larger dog’s ruffled temper ablaze. With a roar, he -hurled himself bodily upon the unsuspecting collie stripling.</p> - -<p>Now a collie comes of a breed that is never taken wholly by surprise. -Even as the big dog lunged, the pup recoiled from the onslaught, at the -same time bracing himself on the swaying floor of the car. He recoiled; -but not far enough.</p> - -<p>The larger dog’s ravening teeth missed their mark at the base of the -spine; but they seized the puppy’s left ear; biting it through. At the -same time the police dog shook the dumbfounded pup savagely from side -to side.</p> - -<p>Before the puppy could make any effort to defend himself, the handler -and Fraser Colt had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> rushed into the fray. The police dog was hauled -back, snapping and snarling. Colt’s rough hand restrained the collie -from doing anything in the way of reprisal. The very brief fight was -ended.</p> - -<p>Colt glanced over his pup, once more; this time with more worry than -mere appraisal. Battle-scarred canine visages do not impress dogshow -judges favorably.</p> - -<p>Then, from Fraser Colt’s thick throat avalanched a torrent of lurid -blasphemy. For he saw something which affected him as might the loss of -his garish diamond scarfpin.</p> - -<p>One of the puppy’s tulip ears still tipped gracefully forward from the -point. But the other ear hung down from the side of his head as limply -as a sodden handkerchief. In brief, if one ear was tulip, the other was -wilted cabbage leaf.</p> - -<p>From the down-hanging lacerated ear, blood was trickling; in token of -the police dog’s bite. The shaking of the mighty jaws had wrenched -and broken the cartilage and muscular system of the stricken ear into -raglike loppiness.</p> - -<p>Ear-carriage is an all-important detail in the judging of show-collies. -Lack of perfect ear-carriage may perhaps be condoned to some extent, -if the dog’s other points be good enough to counteract it. But no -collie-judge on earth would give a ribbon to a dog with one semi-erect<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> -ear and one ear that hangs flappily down the side of his head.</p> - -<p>No, the pup’s show possibilities were gone,—absolutely gone. Two -minutes earlier he had been worth perhaps $400 of any fancier’s cash. -As he stood, he was worth as much, for all show-purposes, as a one-eyed -woman in a beauty contest.</p> - -<p>That savage wrench of the police dog’s jaws had harmed no vital spot. -But it had ripped hundreds of dollars out of Fraser Colt’s bank -account. Why, nobody, now, would be willing to pay as much as $50 for -the collie, as a pet! Who would want a lopsided, clownish-looking dog, -when a handsome mutt could be bought for half the price?</p> - -<p>To Colt, a dog was as much an insensate chattel as was a bank note. -This particular dog had just deprived him of a rare chance to annex -many bank notes. In illogical fury, he brought his open hand down over -the puppy’s bleeding head, with a resounding and stingingly painful -slap. In Colt’s present frame of mind, he must needs take out his -furious disappointment on something.</p> - -<p>The blow knocked the puppy half way across the car. Striding after him, -Fraser Colt swung his hand—fist clenched, this time—for a second and -heavier blow. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p> - -<p>In righteous indignation at the injustice, and in unbearable pain, the -collie met the second attack, halfway. As Colt’s big fist smote at him, -the pup shifted deftly aside from the descending arm. Slashing as he -jumped, he scored a deep red furrow in his owner’s wrist.</p> - -<p>With a howl of rage, Colt flung himself, mouthing and foaming, upon -the luckless puppy. He snatched up the young collie by the nape of the -neck, and hurled the vainly protesting furry body out through the open -side doorway of the car.</p> - -<p>Now, by all laws of averages, a puppy thrown off a train going thirty -miles or more an hour, should have landed on the hard track ballast or -the right of way, with enough force to break several bones or even his -skull.</p> - -<p>But the law of averages was kind to this particular puppy. Perhaps out -of pity for his wrecked show-career; perhaps because the pup was born -for great deeds.</p> - -<p>For several seconds the rumble of the train over the ballast had given -place to a hollower sound. Also, the thirty-mile speed had slowed down -perceptibly. All this by reason of the fact that the engine and front -cars had begun to cross the cantilever railroad bridge which spans the -Dos Hermanos River in the very heart of the Dos Hermanos Valley. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p> - -<p>The pup catapulted out into windy space, in the arc of a wide circle. -But he did not smash sickeningly against the hard ground beside the -track. There was no ground alongside the track. There was nothing -alongside the track but night air.</p> - -<p>Through this air, head over heels, spun the flying tawny-gold body. -Down and down he fell, past the level of the bridge span; missing an -outthrust concrete-and-stone buttress by a fraction of an inch.</p> - -<p>With a loud splash that knocked the breath out of him, he struck the -sluggish water of the Dos Hermanos River. The rush of his fall was -broken, in part, by this breath-expelling impact. But enough momentum -remained to carry him several feet below the surface.</p> - -<p>The train chugged drearily on. The stillness of midnight crept -down again over the lonely valley. The ripples had not died on the -disturbed water when a classically wedge-shaped head reappeared above -the surface; and four sturdy feet began to strike out in confused but -energetic fashion toward the nearer bank. Still in sharp pain and -fighting for his lost breath, the puppy swam on; letting the easy -current carry him downstream in a slant, rather than to waste extra -strength in fighting it.</p> - -<p>Lionel Arthur Montagu Brean was far too<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> accustomed to the roar of -passing trains to let such sounds awaken him from slumber. As the -engine and cars rolled hollowly over the bridge, a hundred yards -upstream, they did not so much as penetrate his sleep-mists in the form -of a dream. But presently a far less noticeable sound stirred him to -wakefulness. This because the lesser sound was also less familiar to -the wanderer’s subconscious self.</p> - -<p>Through his sleep he heard a despairful panting and an accompanying -churn of the quiet stream on whose bank he had pitched camp for the -night. Brean sat up, stupidly, rubbing his eyes. In front of him, not -twenty feet from shore, something was plowing a difficult way through -the yellow water, toward the spot where he sat.</p> - -<p>Brean got to his feet, wondering. The advancing shape took on size -and form. The swimmer was emerging from the water. Through the dim -starlight, the man was able to make out that the oncomer was a very wet -and bedraggled collie.</p> - -<p>At sight of the man, the pup hesitated, half in and half out of the -water. Brean bent toward him and called:</p> - -<p>“Come on, son! Nobody’s going to hurt you.”</p> - -<p>The voice and the gesture that went with it were reassuringly friendly. -The dog read them<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> aright. He was still little more than a baby. He had -been cruelly and unjustly manhandled. His heart ached for the human -kindness he had known before he fell into Fraser Colt’s possession. -Hesitant no longer, he came straight up to the man.</p> - -<p>Brean petted him, speaking friendlily. Then, as the light was elusive, -he went over to his smoldering camp fire and stirred it into life. The -flare showed him every detail of the pup; even to the bleeding and -lopped ear. At sight of the injury a long-dormant professional instinct -flared up in the wanderer, as suddenly and as brightly as the fire had -just flared from its embers.</p> - -<p>Lionel Arthur Montagu Brean had once possessed the right to tack the -courtesy title of “Honorable” in front of his name. For he was the -fifth son of Lord Airstoken, an impecunious Irish peer. There had been -four older brothers; and Lionel had been allowed to follow his own -yearnings to become a physician. He was a natural-born surgeon; and, -from the start, he won for himself an enviable name at Guy’s Hospital.</p> - -<p>But he was a natural-born crook, as well. Thus, within three months -after his graduation with honors, he was a fugitive from justice;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> -through the clumsy forging of a check, wherewith to meet certain -pressing gambling debts.</p> - -<p>He smuggled himself to America by steerage.</p> - -<p>Penniless, hopeless, afflicted with a love for wandering, he had sunk -presently to the philosophical leisure of tramphood. Life was easy for -him. He followed the climate, north and south, through a belt of the -Far West; picking up food and rudimentary clothes as best he could. -Half forgotten was his British home. Wholly forgotten had been his -almost uncanny skill at surgery;—until the sight of the collie pup’s -broken ear revived it.</p> - -<p>Partly in self-derision, partly in amusement, he set to work, before -the crackling campfire, treating the ear. In his final year at Guy’s, -he had won a wager from a collie-breeding friend. The latter had -claimed that a collie’s broken ear is incurable. Brean had made such -an ear as good as new. True, then he had had all manner of appliances -for the task; while now he was forced to rely on ingenuity and on such -meager makeshifts as his battered kit contained. Yet the old skill was -throbbing in his fingertips.</p> - -<p>The pup did not wince under the deftly light handling. He seemed to -know the tramp was trying to help him. If the operation hurt, the -accompanying words soothed. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Puppy,” apostrophized Brean, “you’re a most honored dog. Do you -realize that the hand operating on you might now be operating on the -King of England, if the luck had broken differently for me? They all -said nothing could stop me from going straight to the top. And then -a little oblong of scribbled paper sent me straight to the bottom, -puppy. But it’s lucky for you that it did. For if I were back in -Harley Street, with a ‘Sir’ stuck in front of my name for my surgical -preëminence,—why, don’t you see I couldn’t be working over you, now?</p> - -<p>“That’d mean you’d have to go through life with one-half of your grand -head looking like a lop-eared rabbit’s. Yes, you’re an honored dog; -and a lucky dog, too.... Now don’t shake your head or rub it against -anything, before that dressing gets set!</p> - -<p>“This is known as the ‘Treve Operation.’ Because I tried it, first, on -Noel Treve’s dog, you see. I think I’ll name you ‘Treve’ in honor of -your own operation. Like the name?</p> - -<p>“How about something to eat? I ask the question merely as a bit of -rhetoric. For there isn’t a crumb of food in the larder. We’re on our -way to the Dos Hermanos ranch, Treve. Last year, when I dropped in -there, they gave me a sumptuous breakfast and told me if I was caught -on their land again, they’d shoot me.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> Let’s hope their memory for -faces is short, puppy. I’m taking you along as my welcome. It’s only a -matter of twelve miles to the ranch house. Now, let’s go back to sleep, -shan’t we?”</p> - -<p class="space-above">Neither Royce Mack nor his sour old partner, Joel Fenno, had or ever -would have the right to prefix their names with “Honorable”;—either by -dint of being the sons of British lords or by election to legislature -or Congress. But, unlike the Honorable Lionel Arthur Montagu Brean, -they never had had to worry as to where the next meal was coming from.</p> - -<p>Their big sheep ranch covered eighteen hundred acres of grazing land. -And, in the dry season, their flocks went northward, at an absurdly -small price per head, into the richer government grazing lands, on the -upper slopes of the twin Dos Hermanos peaks.</p> - -<p>They were working hard and they were making fair money. Their chief -cause for woe in life was that their neighbors, the cattle ranchers, -looked upon them and on all sheepmen as something lower than skunks.</p> - -<p>This contemptuous hostility on the part of the cattlemen did not annoy -Joel Fenno in the very least; so long as it was confined to mere -words and looks. Fenno was ancient and hardbitten and surly and with -the mental epidermis of a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> rhinoceros. Mack, being younger and more -sensitive, girded at the thought that any man or collection of men on -earth could look on him as an inferior.</p> - -<p>The partners had ridden out from the ranch house before daylight this -morning to their Number Three camp, where the spring “marking” was -going on. Having seen that the marking gang was satisfactorily at work, -they walked over to the Number Three foreman’s shack, for breakfast.</p> - -<p>The shack was like a thousand of its sort, from Arizona to Oregon; -the single room’s walls decked with fading and yellowed and frayed -pictures cut from long-ago Sunday Supplements; its untidy furniture -sparse and in dire need of repair. Its one distinguishing feature was a -fast-graying lump of sugar which adorned a broken corner bracket, in a -place of honor among a litter of fossil bits and snake rattles and the -like.</p> - -<p>This lump of sugar was the sole and treasured memento of the foreman’s -sole and treasured spree at Sacramento, three years agone. There he -had eaten at a restaurant. In a bowl at the restaurant were many such -cubes of white sugar. Never having seen sugar in such shape before, -the reveler had stolen one of the lumps and brought it home to show to -admiring friends.</p> - -<p>The foreman had finished his breakfast and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> had hurried back to his -gang; as is the way of foremen when the boss or the bosses chance to -be on hand. But Mack and Fenno were lingering over their flapjacks and -black coffee.</p> - -<p>Both looked up as a shadow—or rather two shadows—blocked the open -doorway. On the threshold stood a man whose clothes and bearing -proclaimed him a tramp. Close at his knee, and surveying the partners -with gravely inquiring interest, was a tawny-golden young collie dog; -one ear bound up in a queer arrangement of splints.</p> - -<p>On the way to the ranch house, Brean had skirted the edge of Number -Three camp; modestly keeping out of sight of its busy workers. The -sight of smoke curling from the foreman’s chimney and the faint-borne -aroma of coffee had made him change his plans. Perhaps he could get a -satisfactory meal here, without risking ejection by facing the partners -at the ranch house. Wherefore, he had made furtively for the shack; and -now stood confronting the two he had sought to avoid.</p> - -<p>For a moment the men at the table stared dully at the man in the sunlit -doorway. The man in the doorway stared embarrassedly at the men at the -littered table; and inhaled the smell of coffee and fried meat. The -collie also sniffed appreciation of the goodly smells; and continued<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> -to eye the eaters with friendly gravity. It was Brean who spoke first.</p> - -<p>“I say, you fellows,” he said, dropping for once into the voice and -manner that had been his birthright. “I have a really valuable collie, -here. I am forced to part with him, because I have decided to abandon -my hike through your state, and return East. He is sheep-broken. I know -how worthwhile he will be on your sheep-ranges. Do you care to make me -an offer for him? I was referred to you by my good friend and former -schoolfellow, Carston, of the Beaulieu ranch.”</p> - -<p>The last portion of his smoothly spoken harangue was pure inspiration. -True, an Englishman named Carston owned an adjoining sheep ranch. And -Brean had chanced to hear his name. But never had he set eyes on the -rancher; an odd reluctance causing him to avoid fellow-countrymen, in -his present straits.</p> - -<p>“Why didn’t Carston buy the pup himself?” demanded Royce Mack, breaking -the brief silence, as Joel glowered perplexedly at the visitor as -though trying to place him in an elusive memory.</p> - -<p>“He’s full up, with sheep dogs,” said Brean, glibly.</p> - -<p>“So are we,” grunted Fenno. “Say, where have I run across you before?” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Perhaps at Carston’s?” suggested Brean, trying not to quail. “But I -was not in these hiking clothes then. I wonder you recognize me.”</p> - -<p>“Maybe,” grumbled Joel. “But I doubt it. I’ll remember, presently. I -always do.”</p> - -<p>“In the meantime,” urged Brean, with much jauntiness, “do you care to -buy this dog?”</p> - -<p>“No,” replied Joel. “We don’t.”</p> - -<p>“It’s your own loss,” smiled Brean. “I offered you the chance, because -Carston told me to. I must be going. By the way,” lingering at the -threshold, “will you sell me a mouthful of breakfast? I shall be glad, -of course, to pay a fair price for it. I hoped to get over to Carston’s -ranch house in time to eat. But I overslept. If it is any trouble—”</p> - -<p>He hesitated politely.</p> - -<p>“If you had kept your eyes and ears open, on your hike,” supplied Mack, -wondering at the British pedestrian’s ignorance of the ranch-country’s -ways, “you’d know folks around here don’t let a stranger pay for a -meal. If an American had offered to, it’d have been an insult. Being -foreign, I s’pose you don’t know any better. Draw up a chair and eat. -Stop at the stove and bring the coffee-pot along with you.”</p> - -<p>He spoke with no hospitality. Yet he was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> almost fawningly friendly, -compared with his partner, who continued to favor the guest with a -deepening scowl of perplexity. Brean was glad he had shaved the beard -which had been one of his salient marks when last he had met these men. -Also that, this time, he had abandoned his wonted tramplike speech.</p> - -<p>Eagerly, yet with no show of his stark eagerness, he drew up a rickety -chair to the board; and began to eat. Nor did he abandon the table -manners which, like correct speech, were his birthright. Royce, -covertly watching, was impressed.</p> - -<p>The collie lay down at Brean’s feet. The pup was hungry. But he did not -beg. This, too, impressed Royce Mack. Picking up a greasy lump of pork -from the central dish, Royce tossed it to the pup. The latter caught it -in mid-air—an easy trick his breeder had long since taught him. Then -he proceeded to eat it,—not wolfishly, but with a certain highbred -daintiness.</p> - -<p>“What’s his name?” asked Mack.</p> - -<p>“Treve,” said Brean, trying not to sound as if his mouth were -chuck-full.</p> - -<p>“Funny name for a dog,” commented Royce.</p> - -<p>“Not in my country,” civilly contradicted Brean, pouring himself -another cup of coffee.</p> - -<p>“What’s the matter with his ear?” pursued Mack. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Torn in a fight,” replied Brean, wishing devoutly there might be more -eating and less talking at this meal. “I set it, as best I could. It’s -only makeshift. But the splint and the bandage must stay on, for a few -days. After that the ear will be as good as new.”</p> - -<p>“H’m!” marveled Royce, noting the skill wherewith the bandage was -applied. “You dressed it as neat as a doctor.”</p> - -<p>“Quite naturally,” assented Brean, transferring two more flabbily -cooling flapjacks to his plate. “You see I chance to be a surgeon.”</p> - -<p>At this statement and at the confirmation offered by the deft dressing -on the ear, Joel Fenno’s face took on new clouds of puzzlement. He felt -he had almost cudgeled his memory into placing the visitor. Now, this -new development sidetracked his processes. He was quite certain he had -not met Brean in any medical capacity. He had been increasingly sure he -had met the man under circumstances somehow unfavorable to Brean. But -again he was all at sea.</p> - -<p>“You say the pup is broke to handlin’ sheep?” demanded Fenno, in hope -of finding some clue to bring his thoughts back again to the right -trail. “How old is he?”</p> - -<p>“A year old, last Monday,” returned Brean, rising as he spoke. “In my -country, we begin to break them to sheep at four months. I am<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> sorry -you don’t care to buy him. He is a bargain.”</p> - -<p>He paused for an instant, then resumed, as he started doorward:</p> - -<p>“I must thank you for a good breakfast. I shall not forget your -hospitality to a foreigner in disreputable hiking clothes. But, -really,” feeling for his pocket, “I should feel more comfortable and -less like an intruder, if you would let me pay for what I have eaten.”</p> - -<p>Fenno’s curt headshake and his partner’s more vociferous refusal were -interrupted by Treve.</p> - -<p>Past the shack a herdsman drove a handful of lambs toward the marking -yard. As the way was short, and as the Number Three outfit’s only dog -was a half mile away herding another and larger bunch of sheep, the man -had undertaken to steer the lambs, singlehanded. He was making a ragged -job of it.</p> - -<p>At sound and scent of the approaching huddle of sheep, Treve leaped to -his feet; queer ancestral instincts tugging at the back of his alert -young brain. In all his eight months of life he had never seen nor -smelt a sheep. But his Scottish ancestors, for a hundred generations, -had earned their right to live by tending such creatures as these which -came trooping past the shack. Something far stronger than himself urged -the pup to action. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p> - -<p>At a single bound he cleared the table and bolted madly out through the -doorway, straight among the lambs. They scattered in every direction at -his onset.</p> - -<p>The shepherd yelled aloud in consternation. The lambs’ wild bleating -merged with Treve’s wilder barking. The two partners, at these dire -omens, jumped up; and dashed out of the shack, to witness the damage -menacing their four-footed means of livelihood.</p> - -<p>Lionel Arthur Montagu Brean stood, for one brief instant, frozen with -horror. Then he bolted through the back window of the shack; and ran -at top speed to the nearest patch of cover. Nor did he slacken greatly -his rapid retreat until he had put something like five miles between -himself and Number Three camp. Even then he did not come to a halt, but -kept on at such pace as he could muster.</p> - -<p>His haste and his continued flight were due only in part to the -unmasking of his pretense that Treve was a trained sheep-worker. As he -fled from the shack he snatched Joel Fenno’s vest from the back of the -rancher’s chair.</p> - -<p>During breakfast he had noted the presence of a broken old wallet in -the inside pocket of this momentarily discarded garment. From the -ill-fastened top of the wallet he had seen protruding the fringed edges -of a little roll of bills.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> And, as he fled, he took with him the price -of his dog.</p> - -<p>Meantime, the partners reached the shack’s doorway just in time to see -Treve come to a momentary halt as he eyed the far-scattering bunch of -lambs.</p> - -<p>Something else was clawing at the collie’s heartstrings. Something he -could not account for was striking into his young brain. Ancestry was -gripping him; even as it has gripped scores of other untrained collies -at their first sight of galloping sheep. This atavism takes a murderous -turn, in some such dogs; but in a few instances it plays true to form.</p> - -<p>Treve halted for only an instant. Then, like a furry whirlwind, he was -off after the lambs. Working wholly by instinct, he flashed past three -of them that were racing neck and neck. Then, almost without breaking -his stride, he wheeled, sweeping the bleating trio ahead of him toward -two more strays.</p> - -<p>He bunched the five in some semblance of scared order, then darted away -to the remaining strays, driving them, singly or in pairs, toward the -nucleus he had formed. Again and again he tore around this nucleus, as -it tried to scatter; welding it firm again.</p> - -<p>When the last stray had been added to it, he set the compact bunch in -motion. Brean was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> somewhere back there by the shack. To Brean, if to -any one now, he owed allegiance. And to Brean he resolved to drive his -baa-ing and milling lambs.</p> - -<p>Thus it was that the partners, in the doorway, saw the young dog round -up the bunch and bring it toward them.</p> - -<p>“A little ragged in spots, his work is,” commented Royce Mack. “But -for a young dog it isn’t so bad. Maybe they train ’em ragged, over in -England. We might do worse than take him, if we can buy him cheap. -We’re a dog short, since that rattler got Zippy. Besides, the pup’s -got a way with him that makes a hit with me. We can easy train that -roughness out of him.”</p> - -<p>He lowered his voice, and spoke with his lips close to Fenno’s ear; -lest Brean catch his words Joel looked about; as, at a wide-arm shooing -from the shepherd, the lambs bolted into the marking yard with the -joyous collie at their heels.</p> - -<p>Treve, his job done, trotted into the shack with them to rejoin his -tramp-master. Royce patted him in comradely fashion. To his own -surprise, he had begun to take a strong fancy to the beautiful pup.</p> - -<p>They did not find Brean in the hut. While the partners were still -wondering what had become of him, Joel Fenno discovered the loss of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> -his vest. And Treve’s ears were assailed with language which would have -done credit to Fraser Colt.</p> - -<p>“Well,” philosophized Mack, when the older man had sworn himself -hoarse, “we’ve got the pup, anyhow. It’s up to us to make him worth -the fifty bucks that panhandler got with your wallet. The dog’s yours. -You’ve sure paid for him.”</p> - -<p>“Your money as much as mine,” grunted Fenno. “It was from the ranch -cashbox. I brang it over here to give Billings for that lumber he -freighted to Number Three last week. He was due, past here, to-day, -and—”</p> - -<p>“Then it’s <i>our</i> dog,” amended Mack; feeling somehow happier for the -knowledge. “Anyhow, we’ll see whose he is. Suppose we match for him?”</p> - -<p>Fenno glowered. He had bad luck when he and his partner matched coins -for anything. Yet his sporting nature was roused by the suggestion. His -glance fell speculatively upon the foreman’s treasured lump of sugar on -the bracket.</p> - -<p>“Gimme your pencil,” he ordered. “Mine is in my vest.”</p> - -<p>With the proffered pencil stub, he fell to work making regular dots on -the cube of sugar.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> Mack, after one questioning glance, saw his intent -and grinned.</p> - -<p>“Roll dice for him, hey?” he chuckled. “Good boy! Only we’ll have to -rub those spots off the sugar afterward. Moyle sets a heap of store by -that trophy. He’ll be as sore as a—”</p> - -<p>“Roll, first?” asked Joel, finishing the transformation of a smudged -lump of sugar into a spotty-looking and irregular die.</p> - -<p>“No, you,” said Mack. “Best two out of three. Let ’er roll!”</p> - -<p>Treve had come back from a fruitless quartering of the room, for Brean. -He stood inquisitively beside the table, as Joel prepared to cast the -die. Treve knew well what the spotted object was. In early puppyhood -his breeder’s little daughter used to give him lumps of sugar to eat; -until her father had caught her at it and had forbidden her to do it -any more; telling her that sugar is bad for a dog’s teeth and stomach. -The pup had regretted deeply the loss of these delicious treats.</p> - -<p>“Say!” snarled Joel, as he paused in the act of rolling the die. “I -remember, now. I always remember, sometime or other.”</p> - -<p>“Remember what?” asked Royce, impatiently. “Remember you promised your -dying great-aunt you’d never shake dice with any man named<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> Mack? Oh, -roll it out, man! I want that dog. He sure is—”</p> - -<p>“I remember that slick English crook,” went on Joel, unheeding. “He’s -the tramp that panhandled us for grub, back at the house, last year; -and tried to steal the tobacco jar. I told him, then, I’d put a bullet -in him if he ever dast show his face here aga’n.”</p> - -<p>Pettishly, cross at memory of the swindle, he rolled the cube of sugar -across the table. In his ill-temper, he rolled it an inch too far. It -bounced off the table-edge.</p> - -<p>But it was not destined to land on the floor. In mid-air Treve caught -it. In another second he was crunching it, rapturously.</p> - -<p>“And now we won’t ever know what number was on top,” grumbled Joel, -disgustedly. “Not without we cut him open and see. We’ll have to match -for the measly cuss, after all. And you always win when we match.”</p> - -<p>“Nope,” said Royce Mack, taking pity on his disgruntled partner. “We -won’t match. Treve’s decided it for us; by swallering our only fair way -of deciding. He’s OUR dog.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER II: THIRST!</h2> - -<p>Treve lay drowsing, in the early morning sunshine, in front of the Dos -Hermanos ranch house. The big young collie sprawled lazily on his left -side; his classic head outlined sharply against the warming sand of the -dooryard; his tiny white forepaws thrust forward as if in a gallop; the -sun’s rays catching and burnishing his massive tawny-gold coat.</p> - -<p>Treve was well content to sprawl idly like this. It had been a large -night. Mack and Joel Fenno, and three of their men, had spent hours of -it in rounding up a bunch of stray sheep that had butted their silly -way out of the rotting home fold, after sundown, and had rambled off -aimlessly down the coulée.</p> - -<p>The sheep had been gone for hours and had traveled with annoying -steadiness and speed before their loss was noted. Then, it had taken -some time, through the dark, to overhaul them; and far longer to convoy -them home.</p> - -<p>The sheep might never have started upon their illicit ramble—assuredly -they would never have proceeded along ten minutes of it—if Treve had -been on the job. But the big young dog had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> gone with Royce Mack, in -the buckboard, over to Santa Carlotta, for the week’s mail; and had not -gotten home until dark. It was only during his before-bedtime patrol of -the outbuildings that he found the forced wattle; and realized what had -befallen the fold’s occupants.</p> - -<p>He had dashed up to the ranch house. There, by his clamor of wild -barking, he had brought the two partners out of doors on the jump. He -led them to the empty fold and obligingly took up the scent there; -tracing the strays far faster than his human companions could follow -through the dense dark and over the rough ground.</p> - -<p>Ahead of him, this morning, was another long day’s work as soon as the -partners should finish breakfast. In the meantime, it was pleasant to -sprawl sleepily on the dooryard’s soft sand.</p> - -<p>Through the open door, rumbled the sound of voices. Being only a -real-life collie and not a phenomenon, Treve could not understand one -word in ten that reached his keen ears, as he lay there. But he did not -need a knowledge of words to tell him the two men were quarreling.</p> - -<p>Vaguely, Treve regretted this; not only as a highly developed collie -always dislikes the sound of human strife, but because one of those -men was his god. He did not like the thought that any one should be -speaking unkindly to this deity of his. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span></p> - -<p>However, he had heard quarrels, before, since he came to Dos Hermanos -Ranch; and none of them had ended in any harm to his deity. So, he -listened drowsily, rather than apprehensively.</p> - -<p>To both the partners Treve was docilely obedient. Under their tutelage -he had become one of the best herding dogs in that valley of herding -dogs. But to only one partner did Treve grant the allegiance of his -heart. Old Joel Fenno regarded all livestock as mere counters in his -game for a livelihood. He neither liked nor disliked Treve. He worked -him hard; and he saw that the collie obeyed orders. There the man’s -interest in him ended.</p> - -<p>Young Royce Mack was different. By nature he was a dog-lover. Moreover, -he “had a way” with dogs. Between him and Treve, from the outset, a -deep friendship had sprung up. At every off-duty moment, Treve was -at Mack’s heels. He slept beside his bunk, at night; and usually lay -beside his chair at meals. He joined Mack, right joyously, on all walks -or rides. In brief, he adopted Royce as his overlord; and gave him glad -worship.</p> - -<p>With disgusted grunts, old Fenno had noted the jolly chumship between -dog and man. To him it was as absurd as though Royce Mack had made a -pet of a horned toad. Yet never until now had he voiced any active -objection. Fenno<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span> was a man of few and grudging words. To-day, however, -he considered it high time to speak. He chose the breakfast table as -the place for his rebuke.</p> - -<p>“If that cur had been to home, where he belongs, yesterday afternoon,” -he grumbled, as he began his second cup of coffee, “them sheep wouldn’t -ever have got a chance to stray.”</p> - -<p>“If he hadn’t been here, last night,” said Royce, “we’d never have -found them in a week. Besides, it wasn’t his fault he was off the job, -in the afternoon. I took him to Santa Carlotta with me. You know that.”</p> - -<p>“Sure, I know it,” growled Joel. “Why wouldn’t I know it? Cost me a -night’s sleep, didn’t it? Oh, I <i>know</i> it, all right! But what I’m -gettin’ at is: Every critter in this outfit has got to earn his way; -got to pay for his keep. If he don’t, then he’s got to stop eatin’ our -grub. Treve pays for himself when he works. And when he don’t work, -he’s dead wood. Dos Hermanos Ranch can’t afford dead wood. We don’t -hire Treve to go drivin’ to Santa Carlotta in lux’ry and to traipse -around on loafin’ walks with you. Nor yet we don’t hire him to snore in -the bunk room, nights, when he’d ought to be on guard. If that’s what -he’s goin’ to do, the sooner we feed him a lump of lead, the better.”</p> - -<p>The old fellow returned to the task of <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>demolishing his breakfast. He -ate surlily and without gusto. He did all things surlily and without -gusto.</p> - -<p>Royce Mack did not speak for a moment or two. He had been waiting for -this outbreak ever since the mischance at the fold. It was like old -Fenno not to have blurted it in the first flush of the excitement; but -to wait until he had marshaled his facts and had cooled down to normal.</p> - -<p>Royce, too, had had time for preparation. Presently he made reply; -schooling himself to calmness and even to an assumption of good humor.</p> - -<p>“Treve isn’t dead wood,” he said. “If he’d never done another lick -of work, since we had him, he’d have paid for a lifetime’s keep by -rounding up that bunch of strays, last night. You remember where he -found them. And they were still traveling—still heading north. By -daylight, they’d have been over the edge of the Triple Bar range. And -you can figure what that outfit of cow-men would have done to ’em. We’d -never have seen wool nor hoof of one of ’em again. The Triple Bar or -any other of the cattle crowd wouldn’t ask better than to shoot up a -flock of sheep that strayed onto their range.”</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno kept on munching his food, interspersing this with noisy -swigs of coffee. He said nothing. Mack resumed: </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Besides, we’ve got Zit and Rastus, for the regular herding and for -night guard. That isn’t supposed to be Treve’s job. They’re both -born to it. They’re little and black and squat and splayfooted and -they can’t be made homelier by galloping all day and every day, over -hardpan, for hundreds of miles in the broiling sun. Neither of them -has got Treve’s brain or his looks. I don’t want him turned into a -splayfoot drudge. He earns his keep, good and plenty, here on the home -tract. We agreed to that, long ago.”</p> - -<p>“<i>You</i> agreed to it,” mumbled Fenno, his mouth full, his eyes glum. -“<i>I</i> didn’t. I haven’t been jawin’. But I’ve been watchin’. An’ here’s -where we come to a showdown. Till we got that cur, there wasn’t any -loafin’ here. Since then, you go on silly walks with him, when you -might be workin’. That comes out of <i>my</i> pocket. You let him sleep in -the bunk room, like he was a Christian. The Dos Hermanos is a workin’ -outfit. No time for measly pets and the like. It’s got to stop.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t neglect my job, by taking Treve up into the hills or along the -coulée for a tramp, Sundays,” denied Mack. “Better do that, on my rest -day, than play poker in the mess shack or ride over to Santa Carlotta -and get drunk<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> on bootleg. He’s my chum. If you don’t like him—”</p> - -<p>“I don’t. I don’t like a hair of him. He—”</p> - -<p>“Then figure out what his keep costs us; and deduct it from my share of -the profits, every month. That’s fair, isn’t it?”</p> - -<p>“No,” denied Joel, sullenly. “It ain’t. You’re makin’ us both lose -money by the time you waste, learnin’ him tricks and suchlike, and -loafin’ around with him. Besides, it sets a bad example to the hands. -Yesterday, I saw Toni tryin’ to learn Rastus to shake hands. Tryin’ -to make him do like Treve does. Nice stunt for a sheep-wrastler, huh? -Shakin’ hands! It’s got to stop.”</p> - -<p>“If it stops, then I stop, too,” said Mack.</p> - -<p>He spoke without heat, but with much finality. Fenno grunted as usual -and pushed back his chair from the table. Royce continued, getting to -his feet:</p> - -<p>“I’m the only man who ever was able to get on with you, Joel. I’ve -stood your grouches and your crankiness; because I figured those -grouches hurt you a lot more than they could hurt me. And I’ve always -tried to dodge any squabbles with you. I’m still going to try to. So I -guess you’d better think over what you’ve just said about our getting -rid of Treve. If Treve gets out, I get out. Not that I’m fool<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> enough -to value a dog more than I value a man; but because when one partner -begins handing out ultimatums, it’s time for the other to quit. The -ultimatum habit is a rotten one. If I gave in to the first ultimatum, -there’d be more and more of ’em; till some day there’d come one that -I’d have to fight over. So, the first ultimatum is going to be the last -one. That’s why I’m asking you to think it over and take it back. See -you at supper time. So long.”</p> - -<p>Still holding in his temper, he left the shack; Joel Fenno staring -after him in baleful speechlessness.</p> - -<p>As Mack came out into the dooryard, Treve was off the ground in one -leap; and cantering up to him; eagerly expectant of accompanying his -god whithersoever Royce might be going. But Mack checked him.</p> - -<p>“No, old boy,” he whispered, stooping to pat the classic head. “Not -this morning. He’s riled. No sense in riling him worse, by us starting -off to work, together. He’d figure we were going to waste half the day -in chasing jackrabbits and learning tricks. Stay here. He’s going down -to the South Quarter this morning. He said so yesterday. He said, then, -he’d need you to help Rastus drive that South Quarter bunch over to the -Bottoms. I’ve got to pack the big truck across to Santa Carlotta for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> -the freight we found there yesterday. It’d be good fun for both of us, -to have you ride on the front seat with me, Treve, son. But—well, just -now, he’d likely throw a fit if you took the morning off.... Lie down -there and wait for him.”</p> - -<p>The dog obeyed. But he did so with none of his wonted gay alacrity. -Naturally, he understood not a tithe of Royce’s harangue. But he caught -some of its drift, from the tone and from a scattered word or so that -was within his experience.</p> - -<p>Like so many lonely men, Mack had fallen into the habit of talking to -this collie chum of his, during their long rides or hikes, as if to a -human. The dog, in true collie fashion, had learned to read both voice -and face; and to pick up the meaning of certain familiar words.</p> - -<p>For example, he understood perfectly, now, that he must not accompany -his god as usual, but must lie down and wait for his other owner’s -commands. This was ill news to the dog. His deepset dark eyes were full -of wistful appeal, as he stretched himself reluctantly in the sand -again and stared after the departing Royce.</p> - -<p>Treve had not long to wait there, alone. In another minute Joel Fenno -slouched out of the ranch house and stood on the threshold looking -moodily down at him. The collie did not greet Fenno’s advent with any -of the exuberant joy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> wherewith he had hailed Mack’s. Indeed, he did -not greet Joel at all.</p> - -<p>He lay, returning the man’s look. Treve was ready to obey any command -given him by this oldster or to do any work Fenno might assign him to. -He recognized that as his duty. But duty did not entail an enthusiastic -greeting to a man who had never yet lavished so much as a careless pat -on his head or spoken a pleasant word to him.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno was wont to bolt breakfast and then to hustle busily off to -the morning’s tasks. But to-day he stood quite still, his brooding old -puckered eyes scanning the dog; his ears strained for some expected -sound.</p> - -<p>Presently he heard the sound he had been awaiting. It was the starting -of the truck’s engine; down at the barn. Joel shifted his puckered gaze -to the group of ramshackle adobe buildings.</p> - -<p>Royce Mack was backing the big truck out of its cubby-hole. He swung -it about and headed bumpily for the main road. Treve’s own eyes and -ears were at attention, as he saw Mack departing on a jaunt without his -chum. He whimpered, low down in his throat; and peered longingly after -the truck. Then with a sigh of resignation he turned again to face Joel.</p> - -<p>As the truck vanished in a fluff of choky <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span>yellow dust, Fenno came -to life. Stepping back into the shack, he scribbled a few lines on a -crumpled paper bag; and pinned the paper to the deal surface of the -table, where it must catch Royce’s notice as soon as the younger man -should come into the house again.</p> - -<p>Writing was a tedious and grunt-evoking labor to Joel Fenno. He took -a pardonable pride in his few literary productions. Now, he gratified -such pride by bending over to reread what he had written. Half aloud he -muttered the scrawled words:</p> - -<blockquote> - -<p>“Mack, maybe I was too hot under the collar about Treve. Maybe he -is a good chum, like you say. I aim to find out. I am going to let -Toni take the bunch over to the South Quarter with Zit or Rastus -to-day. And I am going to take a two-day camping trip down to the -Ova and back. Last year this time the waterholes down there had -kept the grazing pretty good. If it is as good this year we can -maybe save a couple of weeks rent money on the gov’t grazing lands -up on the peaks by going to the Ova first. It is worth a try. I -ought to be back by to-morrow night. I am going to take Treve -along for company. <span class="smcap">Joel.</span>”</p></blockquote> - -<p>Fenno, for the first time in his sixty-odd years, was attempting wily -diplomacy. And he was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> doing it very badly indeed. It did not occur -to him that his partner might not accept, at its face value, this -unprecedented taste of his for Treve’s society.</p> - -<p>True, both ranchers had had a hazy idea of investigating grazing -conditions in the Ova, before shifting their flocks, as usual, to the -government grazing lands on the slopes of the Dos Hermanos peaks, for -the summer and autumn. But it was a trip any of their men could have -made for them. It was unlike Joel to waste two busy days that way, in -person. Royce could not well avoid wondering at it. This possibility, -too, escaped Fenno’s imagination. To him, his scheme appeared truly -inspired.</p> - -<p>He valued Mack’s partnership. In a grouchy way, he was fond of the -jolly young fellow. Royce was a hard worker and a good sheep man. -Moreover, he had up-to-date ideas which more than once had been coined -into money for the ranch. Fenno had no intention of breaking with so -useful a partner.</p> - -<p>At the same time, he had still less intent of letting Royce go on -loafing and frittering valuable time away, as Joel deemed it, by making -a pet of a dog. He regarded the romps and comradeship and long walks -of the two, as a hustling financier might view a card game among his -employees in the middle of a busy office day. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span></p> - -<p>Time was money. Also, if Mack had any energy and inventiveness to -spare, he might better place those at the service of the ranch than in -teaching a cur to find his tobacco pouch or to catch food-morsels from -the top of his own nose.</p> - -<p>Joel had protested. His protest had been met by Mack’s firm refusal -to give up the collie. There was no sense wasting time in useless -bickering. The one wise move was to get rid of the dog; and to do it -in such a manner that Mack should not suspect his partner of doing it -purposely.</p> - -<p>Fenno’s plan had been worked out, in swift detail, as soon as Royce had -departed for the day’s work. He would start on horseback toward the -Ova. At some spot too far from the ranch for Mack to trace the deed, -and lonely enough to preclude the chance of witnesses, he would stop; -put a bullet through the collie; scoop out a shallow grave in the sand -and bury him.</p> - -<p>Then, the same evening Fenno would return to the ranch house, saying -Treve had run away during their journey and that he had come back -for him. Mack could prove nothing. According to Joel’s elaborate -calculations, he could suspect nothing. Treve would merely seem to have -strayed from his human companion of the trip, and either to have lost -his way home or to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> have been stolen by some Mexican or else shot by a -passing cattleman. It was very simple.</p> - -<p>Fenno made certain of his scheme’s verisimilitude by ordering Chang, -the cook, to put up two days’ rations for him. Then, giving commands to -Toni, he saddled his mustang for the lethal ride toward the Ova. At his -imperative whistle, Treve ranged alongside the pony, and the two set -forth.</p> - -<p>The dog did not relish the prospect of a ride with Joel. True, -almost every dog enjoys a walk or a ride with even a human whom he -does not love. But Treve was aware of a queer distaste for to-day’s -jaunt. Perhaps he was warned by the sixth sense which puzzles so many -collie-students. Perhaps the heat of the day and the glum company of -Fenno made the outing seem less attractive than usual. Yet, obediently, -even if not ecstatically, he loped along at the pony’s side.</p> - -<p>The mustang enjoyed the trip still less than did the collie. Fenno -had no understanding of horses. He rode, as he did everything else; -busily and unsparingly. He had no sympathy or sense of fellowship with -his mount. To him, a horse was a machine which must be made to earn -its cost and upkeep. He would have sworn derisively at any one who -might have suggested to him the need of warming a horse’s bit on an<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> -icy morning or of dismounting during a ten-minute halt or of easing -his mount over the heavy going of the sands or tethering him out of -draughts and in the shade rather than in wind and sun.</p> - -<p>Horses understand such failings on the part of the men who use them. -Thus, not a pony on the Dos Hermanos ranch bothered to lift head and -to whinny when old Fenno clumped into the barn in the morning. Not -one that did not toss back the head in fear of a fist-blow when Joel -undertook to bridle him.</p> - -<p>His mount, to-day, was a temperamental little buckskin, Pancho by name, -whose devil temper and inborn mischief had never been trained fully out -of him. Royce Mack understood Pancho and got good service from him, in -spite of the buckskin’s occasional phases of meanness. But Joel Fenno -and Pancho had a steady hatred for each other.</p> - -<p>Joel had chosen the buckskin for to-day’s ride, because his own temper -was still frayed from the night’s work and the morning’s squabble. -Subconsciously, he yearned for something on which to vent his -crankiness. He found himself watching for any trick or meanness on the -part of Pancho which should warrant the liberal use of quirt and spur.</p> - -<p>When a man is looking for a fight, Destiny is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> prone to send one to -him. Fenno had not ridden for more than two hours, when Pancho saw, or -affected to see, something terrifying about a jack rabbit that bounded -out of a sage-clump in front of the pony’s nose.</p> - -<p>Pancho went straight up into the air, wheeling half-way about, as -he did so, and coming to earth again, stiff-legged, in a series of -spine-jarring buck-jumps. The first of these banging impacts nearly -unseated Fenno and wholly snapped the ill-tied cord which strapped the -bundle of rations to the back of the saddle.</p> - -<p>So occupied was Joel with the punitive values of curb and quirt and -heel that he did not observe the loss of his provisions and water bag.</p> - -<p>Treve had viewed the advent of the jack rabbit with pleased interest; -foreseeing some excitement in chasing the long-eared and longer-legged -bunny. But, instantly, the scrimmage between man and horse offered -far more excitement for him, and with less need for active exercise. -Wherefore, the collie stood, tulip ears cocked and classic head -interestedly on one side, watching the battle.</p> - -<p>Two or three times, it is true, he had to dodge back in lightning -haste, to avoid Pancho’s flying heels or crazy plunges. But, on the -whole, it was a most entertaining and lively spectacle, wherewith to -vary the tedium of the hot trip.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> Nor was the collie’s fun in it marred -by any anxiety as to the outcome. Once or twice when Pancho had cut up -like this with Royce Mack, the dog had been terrified for his god’s -safety; and had even sprung for the plunging pony’s nose, until Royce -had shouted gayly to him to stand clear.</p> - -<p>But to-day, Treve could witness the fight with unmarred interest. He -did not care, in the very least, whether Pancho should demolish Joel or -Joel demolish Pancho. He had no liking for either of them. It was an -enthralling spectacle to watch. And no personal feeling was involved.</p> - -<p>The horse fought frantically. The man fought back with scientific fury. -For ferocity and murderous brutality, he outbattled the beast.</p> - -<p>In little more than a minute, Pancho gave up the conflict. Not that -he was subdued, but because he found he could not hope to win this -particular bout. He stood trembling and non-resisting; while the rider -whaled him unmercifully. Then, at a harsh-voiced order, the mustang -continued his journey; his mouth dripping blood-flecked foam; his coat -a white lather of sweat and weals; his sides scored bloodily by the -rowels.</p> - -<p>Joel settled himself down into his saddle. Grimly, he was pleased with -himself. He had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> worked off his sour temper, and he had won a victory. -The dog, resignedly trotting along beside him, could have told him how -far he had come from breaking his foe’s spirit. For Treve could see -the pony’s eyes. And a devil was smoldering behind them. Their whites -showed unduly. There was a hint of murder in their rolling irises.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno, smugly confident in his own horsemanship and in the victory -of man over brute, would have sworn there could not be an atom of fight -left in the sweating and trembling victim of his beating. Thus, for -the billionth time in history, a man might have profited vastly had he -known as much as did his dog.</p> - -<p>Two hours went by. And another hour. Then, Fenno began to scan the -distance for some shady spot where he might make his noonday halt, for -a bite of lunch and ten minutes’ rest.</p> - -<p>There was no shade in sight. In fact it was the most shadeless season -of a shadeless region in that semi-arid belt of shadeless country.</p> - -<p>In Dos Hermanos County, except on the slopes and summits of the Dos -Hermanos Peaks, the average yearly rainfall is but twenty-four inches. -And more than twenty-one of those twenty-four inches fall between -November and April.</p> - -<p>Late May had arrived. The level ground—most <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>of it little better than -hardpan—was beginning to dry to the consistency of friable clay. The -lower foothills were losing the last of their verdure and beginning -to assume their summer coat of khaki tan. True, in such lowlands as -the Ova, the occasional waterholes, and like receptacles for rainfall, -sometimes on wet years kept enough green grass alive to serve as -temporary grazing ground for sheep; before the utter drouth of summer -sent the sheep men to the government land high in the mountains, with -their flocks, in search of grass to carry the livestock through until -late autumn. But this was not a wet year.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno saw the arid sweep of ground; broken, perhaps a mile ahead -of him, by an irregular ring of yellowish green. Here, by all signs, -should be a waterhole. True, no shade was near it. But it might offer a -chance to bathe his hot face and wrists in moderately cool water. The -increasing heat of the day made this seem more and more desirable.</p> - -<p>Fenno headed for the waterhole. His tired pony plodded along over the -uneven ground with head adroop. Treve had moved from Pancho’s right -side, to his left; seeking such tiny patch of shade as the mustang’s -moving body might afford. The air hung dead and stifling.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> The sun -blazed down in a copper glare from the pitilessly hot sky. Nature -seemed dead and blistering.</p> - -<p>Joel’s tough skin sweated drippingly. It was the hottest day, thus far, -of the year; and the weatherwise man knew it was the first of at least -three scorchingly hot days. He was not minded to continue the ride any -farther than he must. It would be well to do what he had come to do, -and then turn back toward the ranch.</p> - -<p>This was as good a spot as any for his purpose. Here, at intervals, -patches of soft and easily-diggable sand cropped out through the -hardpan and rock. It would be easy enough to gouge a space deep enough -to bury the body of a dog. Yes, and it would be best to do so, before -getting any nearer to the waterhole. The presence of water might well -attract other wayfarers,—men who might investigate a newly heaped -mound of sand, in the dead level. The burial would better be here, a -mile on the hither side of the waterhole and on a trackless bit of -ground.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno halted his mustang, and glanced around to make certain he -had the wide sweep of swooningly arid country to himself. In that -pitilessly clear atmosphere, his keen old eyes could have descried any -moving object, many miles away. Treve, still keeping in the shadow of -the pony, stopped and looked inquiringly up<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> at the man. It had been a -long and fast and steady ride, under the sickeningly hot sun glare and -over the ever-hotter hardpan. The dog was glad for a rest.</p> - -<p>Then, suddenly, his attention was caught by Fenno’s upraised voice. -Joel, in the course of his sweeping survey of the country behind -him, had chanced to drop his gaze to the hips of his sweating and -welt-skinned mount. He saw the water bag and the bundle of rations were -gone from behind his saddle.</p> - -<p>He was an old enough plainsman to realize what this implied. It meant -he must go hungry until night—he who had ridden himself into such a -hearty appetite. It meant, too, that he must do all his drinking from -the muddy and perhaps alkaline puddle of the mile-distant waterhole; -and that thereafter he must travel through the heat with unassuaged -thirst until he should get back to the ranch at nightfall.</p> - -<p>Small wonder that he burst into a roar of red profanity!</p> - -<p>He knew well enough how the mischance had occurred. His spine still -ached from the bucking of Pancho, four hours ago. It must have been -during that series of jarring bucks that the water bag and the bundle -had been loosened and had tumbled unheeded to earth. It was Pancho’s -fault—all Pancho’s fault! </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p> - -<p>In a gust of wrath, he slashed the mustang across the neck with his -quirt.</p> - -<p>Now a horse is almost as quick as a dog to note a change in his -master’s mood. Even before the blow—even before the burst of -swearing—Pancho had become aware of a slackening in his rider’s wonted -grim self-command. He had prepared, in his meanly uncertain mind, to -take advantage of it.</p> - -<p>Before the quirt had fairly landed athwart his neck, Pancho had -left ground. This time he did not buck. Straight up in air shot his -forequarters.</p> - -<p>There was no warning of the outbreak. Moreover, Fenno had been sitting -carelessly in the saddle; for the horse had been standing still. There -was no scope for guarding against the trick. Scarce did the man’s knees -seek to grip the pony, in anticipation of any plunge the quirt blow -might entail, when Pancho reared.</p> - -<p>With the speed of light, the mustang flung his head and shoulders -upward. In practically the same motion he hurled his tense body back; -dashing himself to the ground, with his rider beneath him.</p> - -<p>More than once, in former battles, Pancho had attempted this, with -Joel. But, usually a fist-thump between the ears had brought him down -on all fours again before the ruse was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> complete. Failing to land such -a punch, Fenno had at other times twisted out of the saddle and safely -out of the falling body’s path, before the pony could strike ground.</p> - -<p>But, to-day, the outshot fist started its drive an instant too late. It -grazed Pancho’s ear. Joel slipped from the saddle; but again a fraction -of a second too late.</p> - -<p>Down crashed the nine-hundred-pound mustang, full on the helplessly -struggling body of his fallen rider; pinning Fenno to earth on an -outcrop of shale rock.</p> - -<p>With a snort and a wriggle, Pancho was up on his feet again.</p> - -<p>On the trampled ground behind him floundered a writhing and bruised -man, who twisted like a stamped-on snake.</p> - -<p>With all his might, Joel Fenno strove to get up. He knew something -of untamable horses’ temper; and he knew what must be in store for -himself, should he fail to regain his feet.</p> - -<p>But he could not arise. He did not know why. His legs refused to obey -him. The fall, and the crushing weight that ground his back into the -rock, had wrenched the spine. While his injury was not mortal or even -beyond easy surgical cure, yet it had left his legs temporarily numb -and useless. He was paralyzed.</p> - -<p>The mustang celebrated his own release by a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> thunderous circular -gallop; the circle bringing him again toward the prostrate man. With -lips drawn back from his evil teeth, and with ears flat, the infuriated -pony charged. Here was the longed-for chance to revenge himself on the -enemy who had scourged and roweled him and jerked his lips to ribbons -with the curb chain! The devil that lurked behind the rolling eyes -flamed forth in murder.</p> - -<p>With an effort that wellnigh made him faint with agony, Fenno reached -back to his hip for the service revolver he had strapped to his belt -that morning for the killing of Treve.</p> - -<p>Then, the agony of his mind made him forget the anguish of his body. In -his tumble, the pistol had bounced from its holster. It was lying some -ten feet away; impotently reflecting from its blue barrel and cylinder -the glint of the noonday sun. For all use the weapon could now be to -its owner, it might as well lie in the next county.</p> - -<p>Down at the helpless cripple thundered Pancho.</p> - -<p>The mustang’s flashing forefeet were in air above the man; poised for -the tearing beats which should stamp their victim to a jelly. Joel shut -his eyes.</p> - -<p>But the murderous hoofs did not reach their goal. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p> - -<p>This because a tawny-golden body whizzed through the air, from nowhere -in particular, but with the deadly accuracy of a rifle shot. A pair of -snapping jaws sunk their teeth deep in the mustang’s sensitive nose; -while a sixty-pound furry body whirled itself so sharply to one side -that Pancho’s aim and velocity were deflected.</p> - -<p>Down came the hoofs; but waveringly and scramblingly and not within ten -inches of the fallen man. Before they could rear again, the grip on the -nose was changed to a slash along the left side of the mustang’s head. -Under the pain of this, Pancho veered. A second slash veered him still -farther from the crippled Joel.</p> - -<p>Probably Treve had no clear idea why he dashed to the rescue of the -man for whom he had no feeling except a vague dislike. While Pancho -and Joel had fought upon more even terms, the dog had looked on -impersonally, entertained by the spectacle, and with no impulse to -interfere. But now that the man was down and helpless, somehow it was -different.</p> - -<p>To a dog, all men are gods. That does not mean they are his own -particular gods or that he has any interest in most of them. But they -are of the race which he and his ancestors have served and guarded and -worshiped since the days when the new earth was covered with vapor<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> and -the Neanderthal man tamed the first wolf-cub.</p> - -<p>So now, when Joel Fenno lay stricken and defenseless and the mustang -turned on him in murder, the collie played true to ancestral instinct.</p> - -<p>Pancho spun about at the dog that had balked his yearning to murder the -man. Apparently the collie must be gotten rid of, before the mustang -could finish the task of killing Fenno, with any peace and absence of -interruption. Wherefore, the pony turned his attention to killing Treve.</p> - -<p>But, in less than a handful of seconds, he found he had taken upon -himself a job far too big and too dangerous for his powers. The dog -entered rapturously into the sport. He was everywhere at once and -nowhere at any particular moment.</p> - -<p>He was rending the bloody nostrils of the mustang. He was nipping the -mustang’s hocks. He was slashing at the throat; he was tearing at face -and chest and hips, in almost the same instant. With perfect ease, he -eluded the flailing hoofs and the pony’s wide-snapping jaws.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno forgot his own intolerable pain in the fascination of the -combat. But, as suddenly as it began, the fight ended. The mustang had -wit enough to know when he was bested. <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span>Bleeding, smarting, confused, -all the lust of battle bitten out of him, he turned tail and fled. -After the first few yards of clamorous barking and heel-teasing, Treve -let him go and trotted back to the groaning Fenno.</p> - -<p>Gravely, inquisitively, the collie stood over the man who had brought -him here to shoot him. Down into the tortured face he looked. Joel -returned the sorrowful gaze, with something of terror in his own -leathern visage. He was jolted out of a lifetime’s beliefs and -theories. His thoughts would not assemble themselves.</p> - -<p>He tried once more to get to his feet. But his legs were numb. He -sought to wriggle along on his stomach toward the mile-off waterhole. -There he could quench the awful thirst that had begun to grip him. -There, too, he might be found by some passerby, seeking water on the -way across the arid waste.</p> - -<p>But the pain of even the slightest motion was more than his iron nerve -could endure. With a groan he gave up the attempt. Supine and panting, -Fenno lay where he had fallen; the great dog standing protectingly -above him.</p> - -<p>From time to time Treve would bend down to lick the tortured face or to -whine softly in sympathy. He knew the man was helpless and in pain. But -there was nothing he could do except to interpose his own hot shaggy -body between<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> Fenno’s head and the terrific sun-rays. And even this may -have been done by accident.</p> - -<p>Thirst gripped Joel; tenfold more agonizingly than did the pain of his -wrenched back. His mouth was parched and burning. His tongue had begun -to swell. Burying his face—now sweatless and dryly torrid—in his -hands, he lay and prayed for death.</p> - -<p>When he looked up again, Treve was gone. An awful sense of loneliness -seized the tormented sufferer. Blithely would he have given his share -of the ranch, in return for the dog’s comforting presence at his side. -More blithely would he have given ten years of life for one drop of -water, to ease the fever and maniac thirst that possessed him.</p> - -<p>To few is it given to receive the granting of the only two wishes they -make. But, presently, it was granted to Joel Fenno. He heard a patter -of running feet. Toward him, from the direction of the waterhole, Treve -came bounding. The collie’s massively shaggy coat was adrip with water.</p> - -<p>Up to the parched victim he trotted, and lay down beside Fenno’s head. -Greedily Joel dug both fevered hands in the dog’s mattress of soaked -fur, squeezing into his own mouth the drops of grimy water wherewith -the coat was saturated. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p> - -<p>Now, Treve had done no miraculous thing; although to Fenno it seemed a -major miracle of brain and devotion. Indeed, the dog had done something -absolutely normal and characteristic. Seeing Joel lie still, with his -face buried in his hands, he had concluded the man was asleep; and thus -was in no immediate need of the collie’s services. Thus, the young dog -had scope to think of his own needs.</p> - -<p>For more than five hours, through the scorching heat, Treve had been -running; without so much as a single drink of water to cool his throat. -Collies, more than almost any other dogs, require plenty of drinking -water. Now that he was at leisure to consider his own wants, Treve -realized he was acutely thirsty.</p> - -<p>His uncanny sense of smell told him there was water, somewhere ahead. -Off he went to investigate. Finding the waterhole, he drank his fill; -then, collie-like, he wallowed deep in the muddy liquid. Cooled and -with his thirst assuaged, he recalled his duty; and galloped back to -the injured man; lying down in front of him to await orders. That his -soaked coat chanced to contain enough water to soothe the torment of -Joel’s fever-thirst, was mere coincidence.</p> - -<p>Twice more, during that terrible afternoon of heat, the dog stole away -to the waterhole to drink and to wallow. Both times he came back<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> -to the sufferer who waited so frantically to wring out into his own -burning mouth the life-saving drops.</p> - -<p class="space-above">Even before the riderless Pancho came cantering home in late afternoon, -Royce Mack had begun to worry. Returning early from Santa Carlotta, he -had found Joel’s note; and had read perplexedly between the lines. At -sight of Pancho, he flung a saddle on another pony and yelled to two of -his men to follow. Then he set off at top speed along the trail toward -the Ova.</p> - -<p>Dark had fallen, hours agone, when the bark of a collie came to Mack, -on his plodding ride. Then there was a scurry of padded feet; and Treve -was leaping and barking about Royce’s pony. From a mile to one side -of Mack’s line of march, the night breeze had brought the collie his -master’s scent. He had galloped to intercept him and to guide him to -where a half-delirious old man lay sprawled out on a hot rock.</p> - -<p>At sight of the rescuer, Joel Fenno tensed his muscles and forced -his face into its wonted sour grimness. But he could not keep his -delirium-tickled tongue from babbling.</p> - -<p>“Say!” he grunted, before Mack could speak. “We’ll keep Treve, if -you’re so set on keepin’ him. Not that he’s reely wuth keepin’—except -maybe sometimes. Let him stay on at Dos<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> Hermanos, if you like. -He’s—he’s only part collie, though. He’s got some of the breedin’ -of—of the ravens that fed Elijah. Let him stay with us. I don’t mind, -so long as he don’t eat too much.... Now quit gawpin’ like a fool; and -help get me to a doctor! Why, that collie’s got more sense than what -you’ve got. Besides, he’s—he’s sure one grand water-dog!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER III: MAROONED!</h2> - -<p>All through the parchingly dry summer the sheep of the Dos Hermanos -ranch had pastured on the upper slopes of the Peaks; far above the -rainless and baking valley where the verdure was dead and where the -short grass would not come to life again until late autumn should usher -in the brief rainy season.</p> - -<p>Here on the government grazing land of the lofty mountainsides there -was good pasturage. Here, too, as far up as the end of the timber line, -there was shade and there were tempered heat of day and coolness of -nights; and there were brooks and springs and pools of cold water.</p> - -<p>For a mere handful of dollars, paid to the government, the Dos Hermanos -ranch partners and many another denizen of the valley could graze their -sheep at will among the upland meadows and gorges.</p> - -<p>Young Royce Mack and old Joel Fenno still kept their headquarters at -the lowland ranch house during the hot spell, one or both of them -riding up, weekly, into the cooler hill country to inspect the flocks -and to see that their three <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>shepherds were taking best advantage of -the successive grass stretches.</p> - -<p>When it was Royce Mack’s turn to make this periodic tour of the -mountain pastures, he always took with him the tawny-gold young collie, -Treve. This companionship meant much to both dog and man. For the two -were still inseparable chums.</p> - -<p>Three little black collies, Zit and Rastus and Zilla, were permanently -attached to the flocks; and worked, day and night, with the -shepherds, in all weathers. But Treve’s actual sheepdog work was more -intermittent. True, in emergencies or in times of extra toil, he was -impressed into service with the sheep. But, as a rule, nowadays, he -was the ranch house’s guard and the guard of the home-tract folds. -He helped, also, in rounding up and driving bunches of sheep to the -railroad, and the like. The routine duties fell to Zit and Rastus and -Zilla.</p> - -<p>Occasionally, for Mack’s benefit, Fenno still complained of this -favoritism shown to the big dog. But, since the day when Treve saved -him from death under the broiling sun, on the Ova trail, he had privily -accepted the collie as a privileged member of the ranch household.</p> - -<p>This he did in grudging fashion, as he did all things. It was an -ingrained trait of old Fenno’s crusty nature to be grudging of anything -and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> everything; from toothaches to legacies. But, to his own amaze -and shame, he had become aware of an odd affection for the big young -collie. This fondness he hid from Royce and from Treve himself under a -guise of grumpy distaste.</p> - -<p>So successfully did Joel mask his new liking for the dog that Mack had -no suspicion his partner did not still regard Treve with the impersonal -aversion which he felt toward all the world. As for Treve, the dog was -as well aware of Fenno’s new attitude of mind toward him as though Joel -had spent a lifetime in cultivating his society.</p> - -<p>A collie has a queer sixth sense not granted to all dogs. But even a -street puppy has the instinct to know what humans like him and what -humans do not. Treve, of yore, had known that Fenno had no use for dogs -in general, nor for him in particular. Since their ordeal on the Ova -trail and during Joel’s brief convalescence from his hurts, the collie -recognized that the old man had grown reluctantly to like him.</p> - -<p>Formerly, Treve had obeyed Fenno, as part of his daily routine of duty. -But never had he accorded to the oldster the slightest mark of personal -friendliness. Nowadays, at times, he would stroll up to Joel, with -wagging tail, and would thrust his classic nose affectionately into the -old<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> fellow’s cupped hand or would lay a white forepaw on his knee or -come gamboling across to greet him on a return to the ranch.</p> - -<p>Such exhibitions of good-fellowship embarrassed the crochety Joel -as much as secretly they delighted him. For the first time in his -sixty-odd years, a living creature was proffering active friendship to -him. It did funny things to Fenno’s withered sensibilities.</p> - -<p>When other humans were present at these manifestations, Joel would -thrust the dog aside with a glower or a mutter of disgust. When no -fellow-human was in sight, Fenno would look guiltily around him and -then give Treve’s head a furtive pat and would whisper: “<i>Nice</i> -doggie!” He would do this with as keen a sense of self-contempt as -though he were picking a pocket.</p> - -<p>Treve, with a collie’s inherent love of mischief, not only understood -the foolish situation, but seemed to take positive delight in shaming -Fenno by playful efforts to make friends with him in the presence of -Mack and the shepherds.</p> - -<p>“You owe a lot to that dog, Joel,” said Royce, at dinner one day, as -Fenno angrily shoved aside the paw which Treve had placed on his knee. -“It’s a wonder you keep on hating him. He doesn’t make friends with -every one. And I don’t see why he keeps on trying to make friends with -you. He never used to. Why can’t you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> pat him or say ‘hello’ to him -sometimes when he comes up to you like that?”</p> - -<p>“I got no use for dogs,” grumbled Joel, “nor yet for any other critter; -except for the work we can get out of ’em. I got no time to go makin’ -a pet of any cur. One of these days, when he comes sticking that ugly -nose of his into my hand or wiping his dirty forepaw onto my knee, I’m -goin’ to give him a good swift kick.”</p> - -<p>He glared forbiddingly at the collie. Treve wagged his plumed tail, -unafraid; and thrust his muzzle into the cup of the forbidding old -man’s gnarled hand. Joel drew back in ostentatious aversion. But, -somehow, he did not carry out his threat of a kick. Presently, when -Mack chanced to leave the room, Fenno slipped a large hunk of meat from -his own plate to the collie’s dinner platter on the kitchen floor. He -did it with the air of one poisoning a loathed enemy. But it was the -biggest and tenderest morsel of meat in his noonday meal. And he had -been waiting an opportunity to give it, unobserved, to Treve.</p> - -<p>All of which was silly, past words. Nobody realized that more clearly -than did Joel Fenno.</p> - -<p>The endless hot summer wore itself out; but not until long after its -drouth had worn out every trace of vegetation in the valley and the -lower foothills; and had turned the once-verdant<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> lowland world into -a khaki brown lifelessness. Day after day, evening after evening, the -mercury in the rusty thermometer on the Dos Hermanos ranch house porch -registered anywhere from 110 to 120. It was weather to fray nerves -and temper. Treve, under his heavy coat, sweltered and looked forward -longingly to the occasional trips to the mountain pastures.</p> - -<p>Then came late autumn; and on one of these mountain trips both partners -went, instead of going singly. They took along Treve; and they took -every man on the ranch except Chang, the old Chinese cook.</p> - -<p>The time had come to drive all the sheep down from the mountain grazing -grounds, into the valley ranges, for the winter. It was a job calling -for the services of all available men and dogs.</p> - -<p>Up through the foothills toward the towering heights of the mountains -rode Mack and Fenno; the collie gamboling happily along in front of -their ponies and halting at every few yards to investigate the burrow -of some rabbit or ground-squirrel.</p> - -<p>In front of the riders loomed the twin peaks of Dos Hermanos, rising -into the very clouds. For more than three-fourths of the way up, there -were lush forest and meadow. Then, the timberline halted abruptly; like -the ring of hair that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> encircles a baldheaded man’s skull. Above timber -line, on each peak, was a smooth expanse of rock; crowned by snow.</p> - -<p>The foothills were passed by; and now the indiscriminate green -of the left hand peak, whither the riders were moving, took on a -hundred irregularities. The brown and twisting trail upward, through -rock-shoulders, could be seen in spots. So could the dense forests and -the softer green of the cleared grazing lands. Adown the left peak -roared the torrential little Chiquita River, broken in fifty places by -cataract and cascade;—the river that is born among the mountain-top -springs and is fed by melting snows from the summit.</p> - -<p>By reason of the innumerable inequalities of ground and the erratic -course of the rock-ledges, this mountain stream forms roughly a -half-moon in its descent; and is joined and reënforced, three-fourths -of the way down, by the Pico, a tributary rivulet from adjacent -summit-springs; forming a “Y,” that encloses perhaps five square miles -of the wildest and most inaccessible section of the left slope.</p> - -<p>By reason of the trickiness of the Chiquita River and of the narrower -Pico, the sheepmen seldom lead their flocks into the “Y.” Not only -is much of the pasturage bad, but the streams are subject to sudden -freshets from unduly swift<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> melting of the summit snows. Thus, flocks -venturing into the enclosure are liable to be cut off unexpectedly from -the outer world or even to be swept to death in attempting to cross.</p> - -<p>Wherefore the place is shunned by man and sheep. And as a result it -long since became the winter haunt of such wild animals as spend the -rest of the year on the inaccessible upper reaches of the left peak.</p> - -<p>In another hour of steady riding, the partners had reached the lower -plateau of pasturage on which they had told their men to have the Dos -Hermanos sheep rounded up, this day, for the drive to the ranch.</p> - -<p>There, on the rolling plateau, they found their flocks and shepherds -awaiting them; the little black collies busily keeping the mass of -milling and silly sheep in some semblance of formation.</p> - -<p>The partners had left the ranch house while the big autumn moon was -still yellow in the sky. The sun had barely risen when they reached the -plateau. Within another half hour the long procession of woolly sheep -and their attendant men and dogs were starting down the twisty trail -toward the far-off valley;—the partners arranging to camp for the -night among the foothills and to reach the ranch some time the next day.</p> - -<p>For sheep in great numbers cannot be hurried unduly. Nor can -their drivers insure against a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> score of senseless stampedes -or side-excursions which delay the march to the point of utter -exasperation. A sheep is probably—no, <i>certainly</i>—the most foolish -and non-dependable item of livestock sent by Satan to harry an -agricultural life.</p> - -<p>“The patriarch, Job,” spoke up Fenno, dourly, as he and Mack chanced to -be riding side by side, after an uncalled-for scattering of a thousand -of the sheep had delayed the line of travel for nearly an hour while -Treve and Zit and Rastus and Zilla and the partners and the shepherds -(named in the order of their importance in handling that particular -crisis) had succeeded in getting them into line again and in preventing -any wholesale scattering of the rest of the huge flock, “The patriarch, -Job, in Holy Writ, got the name for bein’ the most patient cuss in all -the Bible. D’ you know how he got that same reputation, Royce?”</p> - -<p>“No,” laughed the younger man, amused that his taciturn partner should -choose such a time for theological debate. “If it’s a riddle I give it -up. How?”</p> - -<p>“The Good Book tells us,” glumly expounded Fenno, mopping the sweat -from his leathern face, “the Good Book tells us Job owned ‘seven -thousand sheep.’ But it tells us he had seven sons to handle the measly -brutes, and a multitude<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> of men servants. So he could stay home an’ -work at his trade of being patient and let his boys and that same -multitude of hired men rustle the sheep. I’ll bet $9 if he’d had only -one lazy young rattle-pated kid of a partner and three numbskull Basque -herdsmen and three or four wuthless collies to help him work the sheep, -he’d never ’a’ won the Patience Medal in his district. He’d likely ’a’ -been jailed for swearin’. I—”</p> - -<p>“Speaking of ‘worthless collies,’” interrupted Mack, who had been -standing in his stirrups and staring over the gray-white sea of sheep, -“what’s become of Treve? Generally, when his work’s done for a few -minutes, he trots alongside me. You took him with you, didn’t you, when -you rode back after that last bunch of strays? You ran the bunch into -the lot that Zit is handling. Where’s Treve?”</p> - -<p>“Oh, likely he’s barkin’ down some gopher-hole or tryin’ to make Toni -play tag with him, or suthin’!” growled the old man, annoyed at Royce’s -dearth of interest in the comparison between Job and his partner. -“He’ll show up. He always does. You waste more time worritin’ over that -four-legged flea-pasture than any sensible feller would spend on his -bankbook. Treve’s all right. He always is. It’s a way he’s got. Fergit -it.”</p> - -<p>But, oddly enough, Joel himself did not <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>forget it. Indeed, presently -he made excuse to ride back to speak to Toni; who was in charge of -the rearguard of the flock. Out of hearing of his partner, he bawled -lustily to Treve. But there was no answering scurry of white paws.</p> - -<p>Nor, when the party made camp, at dusk, among the foothills, had the -big young collie rejoined them. Joel Fenno scoffed at Mack’s show of -anxiety about the absent Treve. Yet, Joel discovered now that he had -dropped his pipe, somewhere along the route; and fussily he insisted on -riding back through the dark to look for it.</p> - -<p>He was gone for three hours. On his return he grumbled at his failure -to find the missing pipe—which, by the way, he had been smoking -throughout his three-hour absence.</p> - -<p>“Didn’t see or hear anything of Treve, back yonder, did you?” queried -Mack, from among the blankets.</p> - -<p>“Treve?” repeated Joel, grouchily. “Nope. Never thought to look for -him. Likely he’s gone on ahead; and we’ll find him at the ranch house. -He’s a lazy cuss. Likely he’s scamped his work and trotted on home. -Nope, I never bothered to look for him. It was my pipe I was huntin’. -Not a measly dog.”</p> - -<p>He cleared his throat contemptuously. His throat was rough and raw from -repeated <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span>shoutings of Treve’s name, during his three hours of futile -hunt for the missing collie.</p> - -<p>Treve was not at the ranch house, when the herders got there, next -afternoon. Fenno was loud in derision, when Royce Mack insisted on -riding back over the mountain trail in quest of the lost dog. But Mack -went. And he found nothing.</p> - -<p class="space-above">Meanwhile, Treve was in serious trouble.</p> - -<p>Toni and the other shepherds had grown unspeakably weary of the lonely -mountainside life; and yearned for the ranch with its nearness to a -town. The bunk house was a bare eleven miles from the 1,500-population -metropolis of Santa Carlotta.</p> - -<p>Thus, their work of driving the sheep down the trail, toward the -valley, was marked with more haste than care. But for the presence of -their two employers, they would have done the driving in a far more -precipitate and slipshod way. At it was, at every possible chance, when -Royce and Fenno were engaged elsewhere along the line of march, they -sacrificed care to haste.</p> - -<p>At one point, thanks to this over-hurrying, a large bunch of wethers, -at the rear of the procession, bolted. They streamed backward, up the -trail, and they scattered to every side of it in fan-formation. It was -heartbreaking work to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> get them back. Fenno and Treve had gone to help -Toni and the little black Zit in the thanklessly hard task.</p> - -<p>“All here?” Joel had demanded, when the round-up of the strays seemed -complete.</p> - -<p>“All here!” glibly announced Toni; and Fenno rode forward.</p> - -<p>Toni had been certain all were there;—chiefly because he wanted to -believe so. Hence, he did not trouble to count the bunch of galloping -wethers. He knew that both Treve and Zit had worked the underbrush and -the upper trail, in search of the wanderers; and he knew both were -absolutely reliable sheep dogs. Zit was back with him again. And Treve, -presumably, had trotted ahead with Fenno. Toni knew Treve would not -have given up the search while any strays were left unfound. The delay -had been long. The Basque herder was cross and hungry.</p> - -<p>Toni had been justified in his faith that Treve would not abandon the -quest, while any strays still remained outside the flock. Treve was on -the job. And that was why Treve was in trouble.</p> - -<p>When, for some idiotic reason of their own, the several hundred wethers -of the rear guard started to bolt, the foremost contingent of them went -up the steep trail in a mad rush, well in advance of the rest. Up they -galloped, along the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> twisting path, crowding and milling and jostling. -Midway of their rush, a jack rabbit flashed across the trail; just in -front of their leader.</p> - -<p>At this truly terrifying spectacle, the leader shied with as much dread -as might a skittish colt at sight of a newspaper blowing across the -road. Into the underbrush he wheeled, continuing his flight at an acute -angle to the trail, but bearing gradually farther away from it, as -bowlder and thicket forced him out of his direct line.</p> - -<p>After the manner of their breed, the remaining sheep of this advance -band wheeled into the underbrush behind him. After the first few -hundred feet, some of them balked at a narrow brooklet which the leader -had crossed at a single jump. They turned again toward the trail, -leaving the rest—forty-eight in all—to run on and to become hidden in -the undergrowth.</p> - -<p>Zit, following close behind, came to the brook. There, the scent veered -to the left; and he pursued it; presently coming up with the contingent -which had not crossed; and herding them skillfully back to the main -body.</p> - -<p>The forty-eight strays continued their onward and upward course, at -last slackening their gallop to a trot and stopping now and then to -snatch at a mouthful of herbage, but always resuming their journey, -farther from the trail.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> There was no sense at all in their doing so. -This, probably, was why they did it;—being sheep.</p> - -<p>Treve had gone after a half-score sheep that broke trail lower down the -mountain. He rounded them up and sent them into the main flock. Then, -scenting or hearing or guessing the presence of other sheep, higher -on the mountain, he cantered up the steep slope to investigate. His -straight line of progress brought him out on the track of the strays, a -few rods to the right of the brooklet. He followed; only to catch the -scent of Zit’s flying feet, where they had passed by, a few minutes -earlier. The scent proved that Zit had rounded up this particular bunch -of strays, and that Treve’s climb had gone for nothing.</p> - -<p>Thirsty from his fast ascent, he stopped at the brook to drink. Here -the sheep had arrived. Here, some had turned and had been overtaken by -Zit. But here, too, Treve’s scent told him, other sheep had crossed the -trickle of water; and Zit had not followed this lot.</p> - -<p>As he stooped to drink, Treve’s nose was not eighteen inches from -the opposite bank. There, the leader and his remaining followers had -planted their feet as they bounded across. The scent was fresh. To the -trained collie it told its own story. Zit had missed the clue because -of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> following the remnant that they had not crossed. In following the -stronger and nearer scent he had taken no note of the other. Treve -himself might well have overlooked it, but for the chance of his -stopping to drink.</p> - -<p>Hot on the track of the escaped forty-eight wethers, the collie sprang -across the narrow brook and up the hill after them. Bad as was the -going and uncertain as was the runaways’ course, it was a matter of -only a few minutes for him to overhaul them.</p> - -<p>They had just come to a huddled pause in their flight. Detouring, to -avoid climbing a high ridge of rock which arose in front of them, -they had followed this barrier of stone to rightward, with some idea -of going around its end. But this they could not do. The ridge ended -abruptly in a cliff that jutted out above the Chiquita River.</p> - -<p>The Chiquita was in flood. This, because a spell of warm weather, had -replaced a spell of snow and chill on the summit; sending millions of -gallons of melted snow cascading down the peak. The Chiquita and the -Pico alike were changed from modest creeks to turbulent torrents. Even -the usually dry stream beds along the slope were now full of water, as -in the case of the brooklet which some of the sheep had crossed and -which others of them had avoided. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span></p> - -<p>Thus, the venturesome leader of the wethers found his detour had been -in vain. There was no space between the cliff and the roaring river; -no path whereby he and his forty-seven followers might continue their -aimless climb.</p> - -<p>Bridging the stream, just in front of them, was an uprooted tree; -undermined, years earlier, by some freshet which had cut the dirt from -its roots. Athwart the river, at this narrow point, lay the huge tree. -Its branches had rotted away or had been broken off by successive -hammering of freshets.</p> - -<p>But the trunk still bridged the current, its top resting on the edge of -a high bank of clay upon the far side. The bark had long since decayed. -Worms and woodpeckers and weather and rot had been busily at work on -the exposed trunk, for decades, until it was but a sodden shell of its -former self.</p> - -<p>The leading runaway apparently had no great desire to tempt a ducking, -through continuing his escape by means of so fragile a path as the -rotted log. Hence, he paused as he reached it. And the others piled up -behind him, milling and bleating and as uncertain as he.</p> - -<p>It was at this moment that Treve came charging up the mountainside; -sweeping toward them, with a thunder of barking. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span></p> - -<p>The dog knew every phase of sheep herding. He knew how to herd and -drive a flock of lambs as tenderly as a mother would guide her child’s -first steps. He knew the art of coaxing and soothing the march of a -bunch of heavy ewes. But he also knew that a band of scraggy wethers, -on the autumn roundup, can be dealt with in more tumultuous fashion, -and that finesse is not needed in driving such strays back to the flock.</p> - -<p>Wherefore, his furious charge, now; a charge planned to get the sheep -on the run, in a compact bunch, and to gallop them back to the main -body. But, unfamiliar with that part of the mountain, he knew nothing -of the impasse which had halted them; nor of the log across the river.</p> - -<p>At sound of the bark and of the oncoming rush of the pursuer, the -wether-leader lost what scant discretion a sheep may have been born -with. In fear of recapture and of fast driving down the mountain, -he ran bleating out on the rotten log. Urged by the same fear, the -forty-seven wethers followed him.</p> - -<p>A sheep is not as sure-footed as a goat. But sure-footedness was not -needed. Under the pattering hoofs the decayed surface of the log -crumbled; leaving a soft and ever-deeper rut for the ensuing hoofs to -tread.</p> - -<p>Over the impromptu bridge scampered the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> wether; to the safety of the -far bank. And over the same bridge, in scurrying haste, stormed the -other sheep.</p> - -<p>Under their sustained weight and the incessant reverberating impact of -their pounding hoofs, the rotted log was assailed more heavily than its -feeble shell of resistance could withstand. Not with the usual cracking -and rending, but with a soggily soughing sound, it gave way. Not a -fiber of it was strong enough to crackle. But the whole bridge went to -pieces as might a wad of soaked blotting paper that is wrenched apart.</p> - -<p>By the rare luck that so often attends idiots and sheep, the leader and -forty-six of his flock had reached the high clay bank on the far side, -before the thick log collapsed.</p> - -<p>Treve came whizzing up the slope to the spot where the crossing had -been made. He arrived, just as the log went to pieces. Its punk-like -sections splashed noisily into the torrent below. And with them -splashed almost as noisily the last sheep that had attempted the -crossing. This wether had hesitated and started to turn back as he felt -the bridge sinking under him. The moment of delay had sent him headlong -into the water among the log débris.</p> - -<p>Down plunged the unlucky wether. Before his body struck water, his -silly head smote against<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> a pointed outcrop of rock that protruded -above the churned surface of the river. The contact broke the sheep’s -skull, as neatly as could a hatchet-corner. Stone dead, the poor -creature went bobbing and tossing and revolving, down the swirling -current.</p> - -<p>Scarce had the wether plunged into the Chiquita when Treve was off the -bank, in one wild bound; and into the water after him.</p> - -<p>It was not the first nor the tenth time that the collie had “gone -overboard” to rescue a sheep. For there is no limit to the quantity and -quality of mischances into which sheep can entangle themselves. Falling -off bridges is one of their recognized accomplishments.</p> - -<p>But never in his two years of life had the young dog found himself in a -torrent like this. At his first immersion into it, he was bowled over, -then sucked under water; then he was spun dizzily about;—all before he -could get his bearings. Rising to the surface and taking instinctive -advantage of the current, he shook the water from his eyes and struck -downstream after the bobbing gray-white body of the sheep.</p> - -<p>At the end of fifty yards—during which a whirling log had well nigh -stove the collie’s ribs in, and two successive eddies had pulled his -head under water—he saw a twist of the erratic current pick up the -sheep’s body and sling it high<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> on a patch of stony beach at a bend in -the stream.</p> - -<p>There it sprawled. And thither the collie fought his breath-tortured -way. But when he dragged himself up out of the water and sniffed at the -wet huddle of wool and flesh, a single instant’s inspection told him he -had had his hazardous swim for nothing. The sheep was dead.</p> - -<p>Panting from his stupendous efforts, Treve started at a canter along -the far bank of the stream, toward the forty-seven wethers that had -crossed in safety. His sole duty, now, was toward them; and he realized -it. He must get them back to the other side of the river and thence -down to the main flock, a mile below.</p> - -<p>The sheep had been grievously affrighted by the splash of the log and -by the mishap to their fellow-imbecile. They were scattering, with loud -bleats, through the rock-strewn underbrush. But they did not scatter -far. After them, in front of them, on every side of them, swept a -golden-tawny and loud-mouthed whirlwind; that gave them no peace until -they consented to turn back from their four-direction flight and bunch -themselves as he decreed.</p> - -<p>Then, his strays rounded up and submissive, Treve undertook to get -them out of their predicament. But this was a task beyond his collie<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> -brain. He did not seek to drive them across the tossing little river. -The death of the one sheep that had fallen into the flood told him -the futility of such a move;—even could he have forced them to the -terrifying passage. He must find some better way to get back to the -flock.</p> - -<p>The river, in its descent, waxed ever wider. Moreover, its course -continued steadily to travel farther and farther from the trail. -Perhaps for this reason, perhaps by mere instinct, Treve began to drive -his scared sheep up the mountain; keeping ever as near as possible to -the stream; and watching for a safe way to cross. Again and again he -tested its bottom in hope of a ford. But he found none. Nor was the -river bridged, farther up, by any tree.</p> - -<p>Still, he continued his climb, marshaling the forty-seven wethers ahead -of him. The going was rough and the sheep were tired and rebellious. -But he kept on. At the end of a few minutes he stopped. Or rather, he -<i>was</i> stopped. He was stopped by the same form of barrier as had halted -the sheep, in the first place, on the other side of the stream, far -below.</p> - -<p>A rock ridge, some twelve feet high, and with a front as precipitous as -the wall of a room, loomed in front of him and his flock. It continued -to the very edge of the stream and indeed for a yard or two out into -the water; the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span>current foaming around its base. There was no way of -climbing it. Treve must needs follow, to the right along its base, for -an opportunity to skirt it or else to surmount it at some place where -the cliff should be lower and less precipitate.</p> - -<p>So, to the right, he guided his weary captives and moved along the -ridge’s base. Presently, the roar of the Chiquita River died away -behind them as they pushed forward through the rubble and thickets that -fringed the bottom of the cliff. Nowhere did the cliff itself appear -to be lower. Instead, it seemed to be sloping upward, gradually, to -greater height.</p> - -<p>The sheep became harder to drive. For hereabouts were wide clearings in -the forest and underbrush. These clearings were lush with grass. Here, -no flock had grazed; the herdsmen wisely sticking to the other side of -the Chiquita. But Treve would not let the wethers loiter. The day was -growing late, and the journey to the flock below was momentarily waxing -greater.</p> - -<p>Only once did the collie check his steady drive. That was when the -front of the cliff opened wide in a split that had had its origin in -some ancient earthquake. Here was an aperture, some six feet wide; the -cliff-top meeting above it in a sort of Gothic arch, formed by the -toppling of two crest bowlders against each other, long ago.</p> - -<p>Leaving his fagged-out sheep to browse on the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> grass, Treve explored -this opening. Warily, he advanced into it. For his nostrils registered -the scent of wild beasts here. But, as the scent was old and stale, he -did not hesitate to continue.</p> - -<p>Inside the arch was a cave, partly natural, partly caused by the -juncture of fallen bowlders at the top. The cavern was about ninety -feet wide, by some seventy feet deep; before the gradually shelving -roof rock made it too low for the dog’s body to wriggle onward. Its -floor was strewn with rock-fragments and with the scattered bones of -animals long since slain.</p> - -<p>Here the wild beast scent was somewhat more rank than from the -entrance. Yet here too it was stale. To all appearances this was -the lair of some brute or brutes that used it only as a winter-time -shelter. The fact did not interest Treve. He had come in here, hoping -the opening might go all the way through the ledge and let him and -the sheep out at the other side. As it did not, he went back to his -wethers; rounded them up from their grass-munching and set them in -motion, still skirting the ledge in the same direction.</p> - -<p>A few rods farther, the cliff was broken again; this time by a spring -that trickled out from a rent in the precipice and filled a little -natural rock pool in the ground in front of it.</p> - -<p>Another half-mile brought them within sound<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> of rushing water, again; -and they emerged on the bank of the little Pico River,—as swollen and -as turbulent as the Chiquita itself and as impassable. Both tiny rivers -had their birth on the summit. Both flowed down, on opposite sides -of the cliff which extended from one to the other. The two streams -converged a mile below.</p> - -<p>The sight of this new obstacle roused Treve to worried activity. -Once more deserting his flock, he set off at a loping run, downhill, -skirting the Pico. And at the end of a mile he came on the seething -confluence of the two rivers. Thence he traced the Chiquita back to the -ledge; after which, perplexedly, he ran on and rejoined the sheep.</p> - -<p>To his collie mind, one thing was clear. Until the waters should -subside, there was no possibility of leading his wethers out of this -enclosure.</p> - -<p>Here they must stay; and here he must look after them. It would have -been the simplest sort of exploit for him to swim the river himself -and get back to his master. But this would involve deserting the -sheep;—which is the first and the most sacred “Thou Shalt Not” in all -a trained sheep dog’s list of commandments.</p> - -<p>Having been wholly out of earshot from the trail, Treve did not hear -the shouts of Fenno and later, of Royce. Mack, following the path<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> of -the strays, on his return, two days later, saw where it had approached -the brook and then where part of it had branched off again, back toward -the trail. Hence, he missed the one chance of finding his chum. He knew -no sheep would swim the flooded river. The bridging log was gone. Thus, -he did not explore beyond the Chiquita.</p> - -<p>The tally at the ranch proved the flock to be forty-eight sheep short. -Both partners came to the somewhat natural conclusion that these must -have encountered a group of cattlemen, rounding up their herds on the -no-sheep section of the peak; and that the cowboys had destroyed them -and their guardian collie. Such reprisals were not unprecedented in the -eternal sheepman-cattleman war.</p> - -<p>Mack would have made further search and would have quartered the whole -mountain. But, before he could arrange to do so, the rains set in. -The upper half of Dos Hermanos peaks was lost in deep snow. The lower -half was a combination of quagmire and torrent. No, the search must be -postponed till spring. Heavy-hearted, the partners set themselves to -forget the collie they loved and the sheep whose loss they could not -afford. It was not likely to be a happy winter at the ranch.</p> - -<p>At first the marooned dog and his forty-seven <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span>sheep fared comfortably -enough. The grass was lush. The water was plentiful. In that -man-avoided loop of the two rivers, there were an abundance of rabbits -and squirrels and raccoons and similar small game which any clever and -energetic collie could catch with no vast difficulty.</p> - -<p>Treve was miserably unhappy over his absence from Royce and from home. -But he was far from starvation. And his herding job was reasonably -easy. The first snows did not creep down as far as the ledge. Nor was -the cold too intense to make outdoor sleeping comfortable. The larger -forest creatures were taking greedy advantage of the fat autumn season -of easy kills, farther up the peak. Not until driven down by cold and -by dearth of game would most of them invade the ledge-and-water-girt -loop between the rivers.</p> - -<p>But, in another fortnight, rain changed to alternate sleet and snow. In -one night the wool of nearly half the flock froze hard to the ground. -But for a merciful sluice of warmer rain in the early morning, the -victims must have stuck there until they starved. But the accident -gave Treve his warning. Thus had a bunch of sheep frozen to the corral -ground, one sleety night, the year before, at the ranch. Next night -Treve had helped Mack herd them through the narrow gate<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> into a covered -fold. The memory had stayed by him, as well as the sane reason for the -act.</p> - -<p>And, this day, when night drew near, he shoved and coerced his -wondering charges in through the six-foot opening of the cliff-cave -he had explored. It was an ideal fold. He himself slept at the cave’s -narrow mouth;—perhaps less, at first, with an idea of guarding his -flock than to escape their rank odor and jostling bodies. But, on the -third night, he had good cause to be glad of his choice of a bed.</p> - -<p>He was roused from a snooze, by the return of the lair’s winter -occupant. Starting up, urged by some warning that pierced his slumber, -he confronted an indistinct form that approached in the darkness, not -twenty feet in front of him.</p> - -<p>The elderly mountain lion which, for years, had made his winter abode -in the cave, had dropped down over the ledge, from his summer and -autumn wanderings in the rich hunting grounds among the higher reaches -of the peak. A warm reek of delicious live mutton assailed his hungry -senses as he neared his home. Then, of a sudden, out of the doorway of -the lair flashed something hostile and furious; charging straight at -him before the lion could so much as crouch for a spring.</p> - -<p>Treve carried the battle to the enemy, ere the latter knew there was -such a thing as a foe <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span>between him and the sheep whose stronger odor -had stifled the scent of the collie.</p> - -<p>With hurricane speed he dashed at the approaching beast. The lion -reared on his hind legs, spitting, snarling, swatting with both -murderous forepaws. But, by reason of the attack’s complete surprise -and a season of heavy feeding and his advancing years, he was slow. The -dog was able to dive beneath the flailing claws, slash the unprotected -underbody, and spring to one side.</p> - -<p>The lion swerved, to follow. But Treve was of a breed whose ancestors -were wolves;—a breed whose brain never quite loses, at emergency, -the wolf-cunning. A million times, in the world’s earlier centuries, -had panther and wolf done death-battle in prehistoric forests. Their -warfare was a phase of the eternal cat-and-dog feud. Some native -ancestral skill guided Treve, to-night.</p> - -<p>For, as he swerved, he twisted back, with the speed of thought. The -mountain lion lunged after him. The collie was no longer there. -Instead, his white fangs had found the mark that instinct taught them -to seek. They closed on the nape of the lion’s neck, as the old cat -shifted his head in pursuit of his dodging foe.</p> - -<p>The lion thrashed madly about to dislodge the jaws that were grinding -unrelentingly toward his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> spinal cord. He tossed the dog to and fro. -He banged him against the ground and against the cliffside. Once his -curved claws raked Treve obliquely, shearing to the bone.</p> - -<p>But the dog hung on; ever deepening his bite into the neck-nape. He was -knocked breathless. He was in torment. But he hung on. He redoubled the -muscular pressure of his grinding jaws. It was his only chance. And he -knew it.</p> - -<p>Then, with a last frantic plunge, the lion flung him off. The dog’s -whirling body crashed athwart the cliffside.</p> - -<p>Treve fell breathless and stunned to the ground; and lay there. The -lion did not follow up his victory, but lay where he had fought. -He twisted and writhed like a broken snake. That last irresistible -fling had been his death-struggle. The collie’s teeth had found their -unerring way to the spinal cord.</p> - -<p>When, at last—battered and bruised and bleeding—the collie staggered -to his feet, the enemy sprawled inert and lifeless, ten feet away from -him; and the cave was reverberant with the bleating of panic sheep.</p> - -<p>On another night, two coyotes approached the cave. Treve stood his -ground in the narrow passageway, resisting their lures to venture -forth; that they might take him from opposite sides. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p> - -<p>One of them, feinting a dash, in hope of drawing him out, ventured -too close. The next moment he went howling back to his mate; a broken -forepaw dragging limp.</p> - -<p>The two marauders contented themselves with lurking out of reach for -the rest of the night. In the dawning they set off in search of easier -prey. Nor did they return.</p> - -<p>Luckily for Treve, the wolves and the bulk of the other large beasts of -prey had not yet crossed the rivers or come down over the ledge, for -the winter. As it was, his labors were wearing enough; in leading his -hungry flock to stretches of snow not too deep or too hard for them to -dig through in search of grass.</p> - -<p>Then dawned a morning when the temperature was many degrees below -zero. It was the third morning of the first real ice-grip weather of -the young winter. Another night or so of such awful cold would bring -the hungry wolf-packs down from their higher hunting grounds;—down to -where the scent of sheep would muster them to the slaughter.</p> - -<p>On that morning the hollow, below the spring-trickle, was frozen solid. -Perforce, Treve led his sheep afield in search of water. He led them to -the Chiquita River, a quarter mile below the ledge. As they neared it, -he left them and bounded forward. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></p> - -<p>To his amazed near-sighted eyes, there was a wide and solid bridge -spanning the stream at this narrow point;—a bridge which, assuredly, -had not been there when last he visited the river. It shone like white -flame in the bitter cold sunrise.</p> - -<p>The freshet had long since subsided. The freezing of the pools near the -summit, for two nights, had made the stream sink still lower. Here, the -queer trend of the water into a cataract, and the sudden visitation of -the supreme cold had caused a phenomenon familiar to every one who has -seen northern waterfalls in winter. An ice-bridge had formed over the -shallow cataract.</p> - -<p>Now, Treve had no method of knowing whether this seemingly firm bridge -was strong enough to hold an army or too fragile to support a mouse. -Nor did he stop to test it. Enough for him to realize that he and his -sheep were no longer cut off from the world.</p> - -<p>Wheeling, he bunched his flock, with clamorous barks and with flying -feet; and fairly hurled them at the bridge. Laggards and cowards were -nipped or hustled. Fearing their guard more than they feared the -uncertain ice, the forty-seven wethers rushed the bridge; slipping and -slithering across it, helter-skelter, singly and in twos and threes. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span></p> - -<p>Over they surged, in safety; the big young dog driving them fast and -mercilessly.</p> - -<p class="space-above">Early winter dusk had fallen. Royce and Fenno were entering the ranch -house at the close of their day’s chilly work, when a shout from Toni, -at the barns, made them stop and turn around.</p> - -<p>Up the meadow, from the direction of the foothills, a scarred and thin -collie was driving a bunch of thinner and leg-weary sheep. All day and -at a racking pace Treve had driven them; giving them no semblance of -rest; keeping them at a gallop whenever he could urge their tired legs -into such violent action.</p> - -<p>Now, at sight of Mack, the collie left his detested charges to the -oncoming Toni; and galloped ecstatically up to Royce; leaping on the -dumbfounded man and licking his hands and making the icy air reëcho -with his rapture-barks.</p> - -<p>While master and dog were greeting each other, Toni counted the sheep -and made report to Fenno.</p> - -<p>“Where—where the blue blazes have you been, old friend?” Mack was -demanding of the excited dog. “And where’d you lose all that flesh and -get all those scars? You poor boy! Where you been?”</p> - -<p>“Huh!” scoffed Joel, blowing his nose and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> forcing his shaky voice -to its wonted growl of complaint. “Best ask him what he done with -that other sheep. There was forty-eight of ’em, when him and them -disappeared. There’s only forty-seven now. I’m wonderin’—”</p> - -<p>“I’m wondering, too!” flared the indignant Royce, pausing in the -petting of Treve, to whirl angrily on his partner. “I’m wondering -what’d happen if some one should return a thousand-dollar roll of -banknotes to you, that you’d lost. I’m wondering what you’d say to him. -No, I’m not wondering, either. I <i>know</i>. You’d say: ‘What became of -the nice rubber band that used to be fastened around this roll?’ Gee, -but you’re a grateful soul, partner! Lost forty-eight sheep; and Treve -pretty near gets himself scarred and starved to death getting ’em back -for you! And all you do is to kick because one of ’em’s lost!”</p> - -<p>He strode contemptuously into the house, whistling the collie to -follow. But Joel Fenno surreptitiously laid a detaining hand on Treve’s -neck.</p> - -<p>“Trevy,” he cooed, hoarsely, bending low over the happy dog and petting -him with clumsy fervor, “I—I reckon <i>you</i> understand, don’t you? Lord, -but I’ve missed you!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER IV: THE KILLER</h2> - -<p>The rainy season was coming to an end—the season as nastily -disagreeable as it was needful. Spring was at hand. And the folk on -the Dos Hermanos ranch rejoiced almost as much as did their thousands -of chronically damp sheep and their soggy acres of mud-tormented range -land.</p> - -<p>To Treve the winter had passed pleasantly enough. He had had more time -for cross-country rambles and for jack rabbit chasing than was at his -command during the year’s three other and busier seasons.</p> - -<p>The soaking rains bothered him not at all. True, his mighty outer coat -was often drenched and flattened by the wet. But the queerly woven and -downy mist-hued undercoat served him as well as could any mackintosh. -It was waterproof and all but coldproof.</p> - -<p>The occasional snowfalls exhilarated him. The glare and tingle of them -went to his head and made him frisk and roll in puppylike glee and -snatch up mouthfuls of the stinging white flakes as they lay for a -brief space on the sodden or half-frozen earth. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p> - -<p>True, hard snow-lumps had an annoying way of forming between his pads; -so that he had to halt in his romps or his runs, every few minutes, to -gnaw them out. But these were petty drawbacks. The snow, for the most -part, was Treve’s loved playfellow.</p> - -<p>Royce Mack was as enthusiastic over the snowfalls as was Treve himself. -They reminded him of the jolly winter sports in the Vermont hills -he had left so far behind him. He and Treve used to tramp for miles -through the glistening whiteness; just for the fun of it.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno had never in his long and grouchy life done anything “just -for the fun of it.” Fun had no place in his meager workaday vocabulary. -Sourly he used to watch Royce and young Treve set forth together on -their snow-tramps, in the rare hours of worklessness, that winter.</p> - -<p>He grudged the idea of any energy not directed to the piling up of -dollars and cents. Moreover, he had grown to care queerly much for the -big collie that once had saved him from death. He was vaguely annoyed -by the dog’s evident preference for Mack; and the gay romps and rambles -they enjoyed.</p> - -<p>To Royce, the old chap grumbled loudly about the folly of wasting time -in such fashion. He used to scowl in disgust at Treve and make as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> -though to repel the collie’s playful offers of friendship. Not to Royce -or to any one else would Fenno have admitted that he had so far broken -the crust of his own grouchiness as to entertain a genuine yearning for -the comradeship of a mere dog.</p> - -<p>Mack was deceived by Joel’s attitude of lofty contempt; even though -Treve was not. The fact that Joel ignored him or glowered at him, in -public, did not offset to Treve the pleasanter fact that he fed him -choice bits from his own dinner plate or patted his head with awkward -furtiveness when Royce’s back was turned.</p> - -<p>One morning, as spring was dawning, the two partners sat at their -sunrise breakfast, preparatory to starting out for a day of “marking,” -at their Number Three camp. Treve’s usual place, at meals, was on the -puncheon floor; to the left of Royce Mack’s seat at the table. This -morning, the big dog was absent.</p> - -<p>“Where’s Treve?” asked Fenno, with elaborate carelessness; adding, -surlily: “It’s good to have one meal in peace, without a measly cur to -take away my appetite by scratchin’ fleas and watchin’ every mouthful I -eat.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know where he is,” Mack answered. “Around, outside, somewhere, -most likely. These warm spring nights when we leave the doors open, -he’s apt to trot out, as soon as he’s awake.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> If it takes your appetite -away to have him here when we eat, I can tell him not to come in at -meals. He never needs to be told anything but once.”</p> - -<p>Royce spoke, aggrievedly. Treve was his chum, his loyal and loved -comrade. It irked him to hear Fenno’s incessant grumblings at the great -dog’s presence as a housemate.</p> - -<p>“Oh, let him keep on comin’ to table if you’re a mind to!” muttered -Joel, ungraciously. “If it makes a hit with you to have him spraddled -out on the floor beside you when you eat an’ at the foot of your bunk -at nights and traipsin’ along after you all day—why, go ahead. We -settled that, long ago. I’d rather put up with it than have you sore -about it or bickerin’ an’ jawin’ at me all the time, because your purp -can’t be treated like he was folks. I c’n go on standin’ it, I reckon. -I used to figger that this outfit was a workin’ proposition; an’ that -every man and every critter on the Dos Hermanos ranch was s’posed to -hustle all day and every day fer his board and keep. But if it amooses -you to keep a dog that’s just a silly pet an’ to waste a lot of good -work-time playin’ around with him—”</p> - -<p>“Treve does his share of the ranch work, and more than his share!” -declared Royce. “You know that as well as I do. And you wouldn’t have -been here, grouching and whining, if he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> hadn’t saved you from dying, -out on the Ova trail. Yes, and we’d have been shy forty-seven sheep, -last fall, if he hadn’t herded ’em safe home here, when they got lost -up on the Peak. Oh, what’s the use? We’ve been over all this a trillion -times. Either say outright you don’t want him in the house at meals and -at night; or else quit nagging about it.”</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno rebuked this unwonted tirade from his pleasant-tempered -partner by sinking into grieved silence. Surreptitiously, he hid under -a slice of bread two tempting morsels of pork that he had been saving -to give to Treve.</p> - -<p>Seldom was the collie absent from meals, and Fenno missed him. He -enjoyed feeding the big young dog on the sly, when Mack was not -looking. The loveless, sour old man had never before made a pet or a -chum of any dumb animal. He was unreasonably vexed that Treve should -not be there to eat the bits of meat he had set aside for him.</p> - -<p>As Mack wiped his mouth and got up from the deal table, Joel took -occasion to slip the two fragments of pork into his own shirt pocket, -on the chance of being able to give them to Treve, unnoticed, during -the morning. Then he swore at himself for a slobbery old fool, for -doing such a thing.</p> - -<p>He and Royce left the house. As usual, they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> made their way toward the -ramble of adobe outbuildings which served as barn, garage, storerooms, -stable and “home-fold.” As they neared this straggling group of shacks, -two men came in sight, over the low swell of ground from the southward.</p> - -<p>The men were mounted, and they rode fast. As they sighted Mark and -Fenno, they left the trail-like road and cantered across the three-acre -dooryard toward them.</p> - -<p>At a glance, both partners had recognized the riders. They were Bob -Garry, of the Golden Fleece sheep-ranch, five miles to southward, and -Garry’s foreman.</p> - -<p>“I tried to get you boys on the phone,” hailed Garry, as he drew near. -“But you didn’t answer. So we rode over. I—”</p> - -<p>“Phone’s been out of kilter, for three days,” said Mack. “They’re -sending a man out from Santa Carlotta, to-day, to fix it. What’s wrong?”</p> - -<p>He noted both horses had been ridden hard and their riders’ faces were -grim.</p> - -<p>“What’s wrong?” echoed Garry. “’Nough’s wrong. We came over to see if -he’d visited Dos Hermanos, yet. Has he?”</p> - -<p>“Who?” snapped Joel; continuing crankily: “We don’t hone for vis’tors. -Not in a rush season like this. Who’s due to come a-visitin’?” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p> - -<p>“If you don’t know,” retorted Garry, nettled at the inhospitable tone, -so rare in that region of roughly eager hospitality, “if you don’t -know, then it’s a cinch he didn’t come here. Your herders would have -reported him, before now. He—”</p> - -<p>“Who?” insisted Fenno, trying to stem the flood of angry garrulity and -to glean the facts. “Who’s—?”</p> - -<p>“The Killer,” replied Garry. “First one that’s hit the Dos Hermanos -valley, since—”</p> - -<p>“Killer?” babbled Royce Mack, aghast. “Good <i>Lord</i>, man!”</p> - -<p>He and Joel stared at the riders and then at each other, in slack-jawed -dismay. Well did they understand, now, the grim look on the faces of -Garry and his foreman. Well did they realize what was implied to all -sheepmen by that sinister word, “Killer.”</p> - -<p>From time to time, throughout the annals of Western shepherding, flocks -have been devastated by some predatory dog or wolf; whose murders have -been wrought on a wholesale basis and have piled up a cash loss of -many thousands of dollars, before he could be destroyed. Not a mere -mischievous mongrel, which perhaps managed to kill a sheep or two and -then was tracked down and shot; but a genuine Killer.</p> - -<p>Such a Killer was the famed “Custer wolf” of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> the Black Hills country, -whose depredations cost more than $25,000 in slaughtered livestock, -and whose killing, by Harry Williams, in November, 1920, was greeted -by a local celebration which eclipsed that of Armistice Day. Such a -Killer was the dread “black greyhound” of Northern California, with his -hideous toll of slain and mangled young cattle and sheep.</p> - -<p>Killers seem to be inspired by a devilish ingenuity which for a time -gives them charmed lives and renders useless the cleverest efforts of -ranchers and professional hunters to track and slay them. Tidings that -such dog or wolf has begun operations in any particular region is cause -for tenfold more alarm than would be the news of a smallpox epidemic. -For it means grave loss to the community and to all the community’s -stockmen.</p> - -<p>Small wonder that Royce and Joel gaped blankly at each other, on -hearing Garry’s announcement! Mack was the first to recover his tongue.</p> - -<p>“Every time a lamb is missing or a wether gets gouged on a barbed -wire,” he said, with an effort at banter, “the yell of ‘Killer’ goes -up. Most likely this is—”</p> - -<p>“Most likely you’re talking like a wall-eyed ijit!” cut in Garry. -“Eleven of my sheep found, an hour ago, with their throats torn out.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Huh?” grunted Fenno, with much the sound that might have been expected -had he been kicked in the stomach.</p> - -<p>“Eleven of ’em!” reiterated Garry. “Down in my Number Two range. I -had a bunch of five hundred wethers and old ewes down there. My poor -collie, Tiptop, was in charge of ’em. We found him with both forelegs -broke and his jugular slit. He’d done his best. I c’d see that, by the -way the soft ground was mussed up, all around him. But he’s a little -feller; and pretty old, besides. So the Killer got him. And then he got -eleven of my sheep. Simmons found what’d happened, when he made his -rounds, at sunrise. He came, lickety-split, to me. I phoned up and down -the line; but the Golden Fleece seems to be the only ranch he came to.”</p> - -<p>“He didn’t come here,” said Royce. “We’d have got word, before now, if -he’d done any killing at one of the outlying ranges. He—”</p> - -<p>“That’s the Killer of it!” commented Fenno, savagely. “I know. I’ve -been in sections where one of ’em worked. Never visit the same place -twice in the same month. Never go back to their kill. Clean up at one -ranch to-night; then at another, twelve miles away, to-morrow night; -then maybe a week later at one that’s fifty miles away; then back -next door to where they killed fust. No way to dope out where they’ll -land<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> next. They’re wise to pizen an’ traps an’ guns an’ sich. Send -out parties to track ’em, an’ they give ’em the slip an’ double back -an’ kill, right behind ’em. Put night guards on the ranges, an’ next -mornin’ you’ll find dead sheep not fifty feet from where the guards was -posted. Killers are smarter than folks are. We’re sure in for a passel -of trouble—the lot of us. That’s the way with luck!” sighed the old -pessimist with the sorrily triumphant air of one whose worst fears are -realized. “Yep, that’s what I always say about luck. It’s pretty bad, -for a while. Then all at once it begins to get a heap worse. Now—”</p> - -<p>“Well, I’m out to round up a posse of hunters,” interrupted Garry. -“That’s the only hope. Post good shots everywhere, on every range; and -then let a posse comb the country for the Killer’s lair. Most likely -he has a hide-out, somewheres along the foothills of the Dos Hermanos -peaks, or maybe down in the coulée. And maybe, with the right men, we -can root him out. Anyhow, with men hunting him all day and with the -ranges close-guarded all night, he’s li’ble to figger that this ain’t a -healthy region for his work; and he’ll shift to somewheres else.”</p> - -<p>“You said just now that my partner is a wall-eyed ijit,” drawled Fenno. -“I’m not denyin’ it. Lord knows he is. I found it out, a long while<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> -back. But he’s plumb sensible, compared to you, Mister Garry; with -your talk of trackin’ down a Killer or makin’ the region too hot to -hold him. Why, that sort of a thing is meat an’ drink to a Killer! -That’s what a Killer likes better’n to be ’lected Pres’dent. It gives -him a chance to amoose himself by gettin’ the best of folks. He’ll run -circles around your posse an’ he’ll toll it into a swamp. He’ll sneak -behind your range-guards; just like I said; an’ they’ll find a bunch of -killed sheep, next mornin’, not fifty feet from where they was standin’ -guard. You’re wastin’ your time, a whole lot and you’re losin’ sleep. -No, sir, it’s you that’s the wall-eyed ijit; not Royce Mack;—when you -hand out that line of chatter. Why, son, you couldn’t even strike the -Killer’s trail; let alone foller it! He’ll—”</p> - -<p>“Maybe there’s <i>three</i> wall-eyed ijits, then,” spoke up the Golden -Fleece foreman, “with you for the middle one, Mister Fenno. ’Cause -we’ve found his trail, as plain as if it was wrote in big print. -Likewise we follered it. Follered it clean to the main road; and lost -it, there, on a ridge of hardpan and rock that didn’t leave any marks -like the wet ground did. Headed for the coulée, I’ll bet he was. It’s a -trail that ain’t to be mistook for any other, neither.”</p> - -<p>“Huh?” grunted Joel, with reluctant interest.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> “If it’s a queer trail, -maybe that’ll help. Did—?”</p> - -<p>“It’s a queer trail, all right,” said Garry. “It’s a three-legged -trail.”</p> - -<p>“A <i>which</i>?”</p> - -<p>“A three-legged trail,” repeated Garry. “Left front foot don’t touch -ground at all.”</p> - -<p>“A lame Killer!” ejaculated Mack. “That’s something new.”</p> - -<p>“Maybe so. Maybe not,” said Garry. “It struck me queer, first-off. But -I got figgering on it. If it’s a wolf or a coyote that’s hurt its left -front foot, that means it can’t run as fast as it used to; and it can’t -run down its food in the hills. The only way it can get square meals is -to slink down to the ranges and stalk a bunch of sleeping sheep. That’s -simple enough, ain’t it? My foreman’s right. We studied those tracks of -the Killer, in the mud of the range and in the muck at the edge of the -road. Three legs. I c’n swear to that. Left forefoot off the ground.”</p> - -<p>“Some sheep dog, gone bad, most likely!” ruminated Mack, half to -himself. “I’ve read about such. And—”</p> - -<p>“Nope,” denied Garry. “Nothing like it. I thought of that, too. But it -ain’t.”</p> - -<p>“How d’<i>you</i> know?” challenged Fenno, ever eager for argument. “Can’t a -sheep dog hurt his left front foot as easy as a wolf can? Huh?<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> Tell me -that! Is there anything in the Constitootion that forbids a—”</p> - -<p>“Sure he can,” assented Garry. “Only, this time he didn’t. A dog -that’s spent his life running, thirty miles a day, over this country’s -hardpan, after straying or bolting sheep—that dog’s feet gets as -splayed as a cimmaron bear’s. A wolf’s don’t. A wolf don’t have to run, -except when he wants to. And his pads don’t splay, to any extent. No -more’n a house dog’s feet splay. These tracks was of feet that weren’t -hardly splayed at all. So that’s the answer to that.... Well, we’re -wasting time. I wanted to pass the word to you boys, and I wanted to -see if one of you or both of you would maybe join up with the posse -we’re going to form. How about it?”</p> - -<p>Before either of the partners could answer, the Golden Fleece foreman -cried out and pointed a stubby forefinger, dramatically. Around the -corner of the farthest outbuilding, from the direction of the coulée, -appeared a bedraggled figure.</p> - -<p>The newcomer was Treve. His golden-tawny coat and his immaculate white -ruff and frill were stained with mire and blood. Bloodstreaks marred -his classic muzzle and his jaws.</p> - -<p>He was hobbling on three legs; his left forepaw dangling helpless in -air. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p> - -<p>The dog made straight for Mack and Fenno; his plumed tail essaying to -wag greeting to his masters. He was a sorry sight. In his dark deepset -eyes lurked the glint of half-shame, half-fun, which is the eternal -expression of a collie that has been in delightful mischief and fears a -scolding for his pranks.</p> - -<p>After that first loud exclamation from the foreman, none of the -onlookers spoke or moved; for the space of perhaps ten seconds. Frozen, -wide-eyed, jaws adroop, they stared at the oncoming Treve.</p> - -<p>In every brain raced the same line of glaringly simple logic. And in -every brain was registered the dire word: “Guilty!”</p> - -<p>Treve, ignoring the battery of horrified eyes, came limping up to Royce -Mack, and stood in front of the younger man, gazing in friendly fashion -into the whitened face and holding out for sympathy his sprained -foreleg.</p> - -<p>But, for once in his life, Treve received from his adored god neither -sympathy nor a pat, nor any other sign of welcome. Royce simply blinked -down at him in unbelieving horror.</p> - -<p>As Mack gave no response to his overtures, Treve limped over to Joel -Fenno, thrusting his bloodstained muzzle affectionately into the -oldster’s cupped palm. At the touch, a violent shudder wrenched Joel’s -whole meager body.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> He did not withdraw his hand from the caress. But -he turned his sick eyes miserably toward Bob Garry. In response to the -look, Garry said curtly:</p> - -<p>“The Killer’s found; sooner’n I thought. I’m sorry, boys. I know what -store you set by the brute. But there’s only one thing to do. You know -that, as well as I do.”</p> - -<p>There was no answer. Royce Mack took an impulsive half-step between the -speaker and the wondering collie. Fenno did not speak nor stir. His -sick old eyes were still fixed on Garry with a world of appeal in them. -Garry spoke again; this time with a tinge of angry impatience in his -tone.</p> - -<p>“Well,” he rasped, “I’m waiting to see it done. I reckon I’ve paid -for my seat to the show. I paid for it with eleven killed sheep. And -I don’t aim to go from here till I make sure the Killer is put out -of the way for good. We can settle, later, for the sheep of mine he -slaughtered and for my good little old collie, too. But that can wait. -Just now, the main thing is to see he don’t do any more killing.”</p> - -<p>Neither partner answered. Garry laid a hand on the rifle he had -strapped across his saddlebow when he had started forth on the -Killer-hunt. The gesture made old Fenno shake from head to foot as with -a congestive chill. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></p> - -<p>Royce Mack, hollow-eyed and desperate, pushed the amazed collie behind -him; and stood shielding him with his own athletic body.</p> - -<p>“That won’t get you nowheres!” sternly reproved Garry, noting the -instinctive motion, and unstrapping his rifle as he spoke. “You know -the law as well as I do. You ought to be thankful we’ve nailed him -before he could do any more killing. It isn’t once in a blue moon that -a Killer is nabbed at the very start; before he c’n get away to the -hills. We’re plumb lucky. Now, then, will you shoot him; or do you want -me to do it? Which’ll it be? Speak up, quick!”</p> - -<p>“Wait!” sputtered Royce, stammering in his heartsick eagerness. “Wait! -This dog’s my chum. He’s never done anything like this, before. He’d -never have done it, now; if he hadn’t gone crazy, some way. I’ve read -about sheep dogs ‘going bad,’ like this. It isn’t their fault. Any -more’n it’s a human’s fault, if he goes crazy. Folks don’t shoot a -human that’s lost his wits. They shut him up somewheres and treat him -kind; and then, like as not, he gets his mind back again. It’s likely -the same with a dog. I—”</p> - -<p>“It’s <i>you</i> that’s lost your mind!” scoffed Garry, angrily, as he -fingered his rifle. “If you haven’t the whiteness or the nerve to shoot -him, stand clear; and I’ll do it, myself. He—” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Wait!” implored poor Mack, the sweat running down his tortured face. -“Hold on! Let me finish. Here’s my proposition:—I’ll pay you double -market price on your eleven killed sheep and on your dog he killed. -And I’ll put up a thousand-dollar bond to keep Treve tied or else in -the house, all the time. I’ll do this, if you and your man will call -it square and keep your mouths shut about his going bad. I’m offering -this, on my own hook. My partner hates Treve, anyhow. So I’m not asking -him to share the cost or the responsibility. How about it, Garry? Is it -a go?”</p> - -<p>“It is—<i>not</i>!” refused Garry, his voice like the scraping of a file -upon rust. “I’m not in the bribe-taking game. Besides, I’d feel grand, -wouldn’t I, first time the cur sneaked loose and began killing sheep -again, all up and down the Valley? Nice responsibility I’d have, hey? -And that’s what he’d do. Once a Killer, always a Killer. I’m clean -s’prised at you for making such a crack as that! Clean <i>s’prised</i>! -Stand clear, there! I’m going to put a stop to this Killer danger, here -and now. The law will uphold me. Stand clear of him, unless you want me -to take a chance at shooting him between your knees.”</p> - -<p>He swung the rifle to his shoulder, as he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> spoke. Then it was that Joel -Fenno came out of his brief trance of dumbness.</p> - -<p>“You’re right,” agreed Fenno, grumpily. “The law’ll uphold you. But the -law gives a owner the right to shoot his own dog, if he’s willin’ to. -Royce, here, ain’t willin’ to. But I am. And I’m the cur’s joint owner.”</p> - -<p>“Go ahead and do it then,” ordered Garry forestalling a fierce -interruption from Royce Mack. “Only, cut out the blab; and <i>do</i> it. I -got a morning’s work to catch up with. And I don’t stir from here till -the dog’s dead.”</p> - -<p>“All right!” agreed Joel; a tinge of gruff anticipation in his surly -voice. “That suits me. An’ when you tell this yarn around, jes’ bear -witness that <i>one</i> of the Dos Hermanos partners was willin’ and ready -to obey the law; even if t’other one was too white-livered. Gimme the -rifle. My own gun’s up to the house.”</p> - -<p>He reached out for the weapon; and snatched, rather than accepted it, -from Garry’s hands. Hefting it, and turning toward Treve, he grumbled:</p> - -<p>“I never did get the right hang of a rifle. A pistol’s a heap handier. -Got a pistol along, either of you?”</p> - -<p>“No,” said Garry.</p> - -<p>The foreman shook his head. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span></p> - -<p>“<i>That’s</i> all right, then,” cheerily remarked Fenno. “I—”</p> - -<p>“You’ll shoot Treve, through <i>me</i>!” panted Royce, shoving the collie -behind him again; and advancing in hot menace on his detested partner. -“It’s bad enough to have—”</p> - -<p>He got no further. Eyes abulge, he stared at Fenno.</p> - -<p>Joel had caught the rifle deftly in both hands and was hard at work -pumping the cartridges from its magazine. In clinking sequence they -fell to earth. Three seconds later, he picked up and pocketed the -shells and laid the empty and useless gun on the ground. Then he faced -the loudly blaspheming Garry.</p> - -<p>“I’ll send the rifle back to you by one of the men,” said he. “I’m not -givin’ it to you, now; for fear you may have a spare ca’tridge or two -in your jeans. I was afraid maybe one of you had packed a revolver, -too. That’s why I made sure. Your teeth is drawed, friends. S’pose you -traipse off home?”</p> - -<p>“Joel!” cried Mack, overjoyed, incredulous. “<i>Joel!</i>”</p> - -<p>The old man spun about on him; scowling, shrill with peevish wrath.</p> - -<p>“What’ve I always told you about that dog?” he accused. “Didn’t I -always say he wa’n’t wuth his salt? You’ve cosseted him an’ you’ve<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> -made much of him an’ you’ve sp’iled him. Not that he ever ’mounted to -anything, to begin with. An’ now you see what you’ve brang him to. Made -a Killer of him! He—”</p> - -<p>“I’m going to have the sheriff here, inside of one hour!” the enraged -Garry was declaiming, unheeded, at the same time. “And after the Killer -is shot by an off’cer of the court, I am going to bring soot agin you -for impeding the course of the law and likewise for stealing my gun. -Then I’m going to sue you both, in the Dos Hermanos County Court, for -the loss of my sheep and—”</p> - -<p>“Likewise,” snarled on old Joel Fenno, still haranguing his partner, -“this comes of tryin’ to make a dog a c’mpanion instead of a beast -of burden, like the Almighty intended him to be. I hope you’re plumb -sat’sfied with the passel of trouble you’ve yanked down onto us, an’—”</p> - -<p>“My foreman, here, is witness to it all,” raged on Garry, in the same -breath. “He’ll test’fy how you d’prived me of my rifle, by trick’ry; -and then—”</p> - -<p>“Don’t go pirootin’ off with the idee I put Friend Garry’s gun out of -c’mission, jes’ to save Treve from the death he’s deservin’,” orated -Joel, to his dizzy partner. “I didn’t crave to have outsiders come here -an’ give me orders. And if I help you hide Treve away somewheres<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> or -ship him East to my nephew, before the sheriff gets here, it’ll only be -because—”</p> - -<p>The advent of two new figures, around the corner of the barns, cut -short the dual flood of oratory.</p> - -<p>Toni, the Basque chief herder of the Dos Hermanos ranch, came into -view. He was bent far forward under the weight of something that was -balanced across his spine and which dangled lifelessly to either side -of his ox-like shoulders.</p> - -<p>Close behind him walked a smaller man, in soiled khaki and puttees; a -repeating rifle slung by a bandolier athwart his back.</p> - -<p>At sight and scent of the thing, carried by the big herdsman, Treve -abandoned his puzzled efforts to make out what all the din and -elocution were about. Wheeling, he bared his teeth and lowered his -blood-stained head.</p> - -<p>Then and only then did his human companions make out the nature of -Toni’s burden. It was the scarred and lifeless body of a giant gray -wolf.</p> - -<p>The partners, at the same time, recognized the slender khaki-clad -rifleman who moved lightly along in the herdsman’s wake. Twice, on his -journeys, this man had stopped at the ranch for a meal. For hundreds of -miles in all directions, he was known and admired.</p> - -<p>For this was Eleazar Wilton, of the “Hunters’<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> and Trappers’ Service,” -operated by the governmental Biological Survey;—one of the best shots -in the West; and a huntsman who had done glorious work from Texas to -northern Wyoming, in ridding the range country of predatory wolves. His -fame was sung at a score of campfires and bunkhouses. He was a royally -welcome guest wherever he might choose to set foot.</p> - -<p>At sight of him, now, Bob Garry shouted aloud:</p> - -<p>“Here’s the man who’ll do the job you tricked me out of doing! Cap’n -Wilton, this dog has kilt eleven of my sheep! I call on you, in the -name of the law, to put a bullet through his head. I’d ’a’ done it -myself; if these fellers hadn’t fooled me out of it. He—”</p> - -<p>“This dog, here?” asked Wilton in his quietly uninterested voice; as he -strolled past Toni and up to Treve.</p> - -<p>“Yep! That’s the one!” trumpeted Garry. “See? He’s still got their -blood all over him. And his forefoot’s bit and chawed where my collie -died fighting him. There’s other bitemarks on him, too. He—”</p> - -<p>Royce and Fenno, by common consent, moved in front of their imperilled -chum. But, before either of them could speak, Wilton interrupted -Garry’s harangue by stepping past the two <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span>partners and laying his -bronzed hands on Treve’s blood-streaked head.</p> - -<p>There was greeting—almost benediction—in the gesture. At the touch, -Treve left off growling at the huge dead wolf which Toni was laying -on the ground, nearby; and glanced quickly up at the stranger who had -offered him this unwonted familiarity.</p> - -<p>At what he read behind Wilton’s steady eyes, the collie’s glint of -suspicion softened to friendliness. His tail wagged, hospitably; and he -laid his cut head against the huntsman’s khaki knee.</p> - -<p>Meantime, Wilton was turning to the gesticulating Garry.</p> - -<p>“They ‘fooled you’ out of shooting this collie, did they?” he asked. -“Then it was the luckiest bit of fooling done in Dos Hermanos County -for a long time. I was afraid of something like that. So I came on -here, as soon as I could. I got that double-sized herder to give me a -lift with the wolf; so we could get here quicker.”</p> - -<p>He nodded over his shoulder, as he spoke. The others, for the first -time, took full cognizance of the wolf that Toni was stretching out on -the muddy ground.</p> - -<p>The giant animal measured well over six feet from muzzle to tail-tip. -His hide was plentifully scored with olden wounds and with very new -gashes. But it was Bob Garry who, with a gasp<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> of amaze, pointed out -the beast’s most striking peculiarity.</p> - -<p>His left forefoot was gone.</p> - -<p>It had been cut off, clean, at the ankle-joint. The injury had occurred -long ago, for the skin and the hair had grown over the wound.</p> - -<p>“Ever hear of him?” asked Wilton.</p> - -<p>Nobody answered. Wilton continued:</p> - -<p>“No, you wouldn’t have been likely to hear. But, up in the Mateo -country, there isn’t a sheepman or a cattleman that hasn’t heard of -him. I was sent up there, to get him. He had visited every range from -San Mateo to Hecker’s. Always they could trace him by his three-footed -track. Must have been caught in a steel trap, years ago, and got loose -by gnawing his foot off. He seems to have navigated faster on three -legs than most animals can, on four. He was a ‘lone wolf,’ too. And he -had all the sense of a dozen stage-detectives. Never tackled the same -place twice in succession. Poison-wise and trap-wise. He could throw -off pursuit as easily as any dime-novel Sioux. They sent me up to the -Mateo district to get him. He fooled me, every time. Then he started -south. The rains helped me track him. I suppose he didn’t bother to -confuse his trail or to double, on a long hike like that. More than a -hundred miles, it was. And I could never catch up with him. Sometimes I -lost his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> trail, altogether; and I’d pick it up, more by chance than by -any skill.”</p> - -<p>A second time his hand dropped caressingly on Treve’s head. The collie -paused in the task of licking his own various flesh wounds and licked -the caressing hand. Wilton smiled, rubbed clean his licked hand with -his other sleeve, and resumed:</p> - -<p>“Last night, at dusk, I lost the trail again. He was beginning to get -cautious, once more. I figured that meant he was planning to stop and -do some raiding. There was no use looking for tracks in the twilight. -He couldn’t be very far ahead of me. So I rode on. I rode till I got -to the coulée, beyond here. It’s a great place for any animal to hide -out in;—with all those rocks and bushes. It struck me that would be -just the lair for him to crawl into, daytimes; while he was ravaging -this part of the world. Besides, it was right in his line of march. So -I spent the night there; waiting for him. I was pretty sure I’d gotten -in front of him; and that he’d stop there, to hide or else to sleep; -before he went farther. Well, he did.”</p> - -<p>Again he paused, as if for dramatic effect.</p> - -<p>“I watched, from before daybreak,” he continued, presently. “No sign -of him. I had crawled into a little niche between two bowlders, at the -top of the coulée, just at its mouth. I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> couldn’t miss him there. Then, -about an hour ago, I got sight of him. He was pelting away, at top -speed, on those three pins of his. And he wasn’t using any craftiness, -either. He was running, full tilt. And, not a hundred yards behind him, -a collie was tearing along. This collie dog, here.”</p> - -<p>“They hunted together, hey?” exclaimed Garry. “I knew this cur was—”</p> - -<p>“No,” denied Wilton. “Dogs don’t hunt with wolves. Coyotes do, but not -dogs. The collie was hunting the wolf. He was after him, with every -ounce he had. I take it the collie had been out on an early morning -stroll, not far from his own home; when he got sight or scent of the -wolf as he was coming this way from a kill And the dog gave chase. -The wolf was all blood; so I knew he’d been at a bunch of livestock, -somewhere. The dog hadn’t a mark on him. There was light enough for me -to see that.”</p> - -<p>“Good old Treve!” applauded Mack. “But, Captain, if—”</p> - -<p>“Wasn’t the dog even running on three legs?” despairingly asked Garry.</p> - -<p>“He was,” admitted Wilton; adding: “And on the fourth leg, too. -No lameness, then. I wondered, at first, why a Killer, like the -three-legged wolf, should run away from a dog smaller and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span> lighter than -himself. But I made a guess; and the guess was right. Dawn had come. -People were likely to be astir. It was no time to be caught in the -open, in a fight. The wolf was looking for cover. After he found it, -there’d be time enough to dispose of the collie. That’s wolf-nature.”</p> - -<p>“He—”</p> - -<p>“The wolf got to the mouth of the coulée; where another ten steps -would hide him in the undergrowth and the rock holes so safely that no -hundred hunters could root him out. He was right below me. I drew a -bead on him. But I didn’t shoot. Because just then, the collie overtook -him. And I saw the prettiest battle ever. It would have been a crime to -spoil it by a shot.”</p> - -<p>“Lord!” breathed Royce Mack. “Why wasn’t I there?”</p> - -<p>“The wolf spun around on him,” went on Wilton, “and made a dive, -wolf-fashion, for the collie’s foreleg; to break it. The collie was -going too fast to dodge, altogether. But he did his best. And he got -off with nothing worse than a pinched left forefoot. Then the fun -began. The old wolf was as quick as lightning. But the collie—well, -the collie was as quick as—as a collie. I don’t know anything quicker. -He got a slash or two; and once he was bowled over in the mud and the -wolf got a throat grip.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span></p> - -<p>“But—”</p> - -<p>“But the collie tore free, by leaving a handful of mattress-hair and -skin in the wolf’s jaws. And before the wolf could spit it out and -get his jaws into action again, the collie had flashed in and gotten -to the jugular. He hung on, like grim death; grinding those slender -jaws of his deeper and deeper; while the wolf kept thrashing about -and hammering him against rocks and against the ground; to make him -let go. But the collie hung on. That’s the collie of it. That’s the -thoroughbred of it, too. He knew he had the one hold he could hope to -win by. And he held it. At last his teeth ground their way down to the -jugular and through it. That’s all there was to that fight.”</p> - -<p>“Treve!” babbled Joel. “<i>Trevy!</i>”</p> - -<p>His unconscious exclamation went unheard in the hum of excitement.</p> - -<p>“The collie lay down for a minute, panting,” finished Wilton. “Then -he got up and sniffed at the dead wolf. Then, before I had the sense -to try to stop him, he limped off, in this direction. It seemed to -me I remembered him, when I was at Dos Hermanos, last time. I got to -wondering if he’d be shot, by mistake, when news came of killed sheep -and when he was all bloody. So I hustled on here, after him. A dog, -like that, is too plucky to let die.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Mister Bob Garry, Esquire,” drawled Fenno sourly, as Royce bent in -keen solicitude over his battered collie chum. “You was sayin’ suthin’, -awhile back, ’bout having a mort of work to do, at your own ranch, this -mornin’. Well, friend, the mornin’s joggin’ on. Here’s your pop-gun. -Here’s your pretty ca’tridges. <i>Scat!</i>”</p> - -<p>“You’ll come to the house for some breakfast, won’t you, Captain?” -asked Royce, as the disgruntled Garry and his foreman rode off. “Chang -can rustle you some grub, in no time. Come on, Treve. I want to wash -out those bites of yours; and fix up your paw.”</p> - -<p>He set off toward the house, at Wilton’s side. But Joel Fenno, behind -their backs, buried his fingers lovingly in the collie’s bloody and -muddy ruff.</p> - -<p>“Trevy,” he whispered, the other hand groping in his shirt pocket, -“here’s some grand lumps of pork I saved out for you, from my -breakfast. An’—an’, Trevy, that Garry blowhard would ’a’ had to shoot -me as full of holes as these last year’s pants of mine; before I’d -’a’ let him git you. Yep—an’ Wilton, too. Of all the dogs that ever -happened, Trevy—you’re that dog.... Hey!” he called grumpily after the -departing Royce. “Here’s your cur. Take him along to the house with -you. He’s jes’ in my way, down here!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER V: A SECRET ADVENTURE</h2> - -<p>“The only place where two can live as cheap as one,” ruminated old Joel -Fenno, pointing with his chewed pipestem, “is right yonder.”</p> - -<p>He indicated Treve, lounging on the puncheon floor in front of the -group. Treve had awakened with some abruptness from a snooze and was -scratching busily; driving his right hindfoot with great vigor and -speed into his furry body in the general direction of the short ribs. -On the collie’s wontedly wise face was the grin of idiotic vacuity -which goes with flea-scratching.</p> - -<p>He was not looking his best or gracefulest or most sagacious, at the -moment. Joel Fenno was sharply aware of his chum’s absurd aspect. For -the benefit of the ranch guest, he sought to forestall any unfavorable -comment on the dog.</p> - -<p>“Yep,” he resumed, as Davids, the guest, eyed him in mild curiosity, -“the only two, that can live as cheap as one, is not a spouse an’ a -spousess; but a flea an’ a dog.”</p> - -<p>Davids smiled politely. Royce Mack had read this joke aloud to his -partner, from a year-old copy of <i>The Country Gentleman</i>, a month -before.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> He forbore to encourage the old fellow’s rare trip into the -realms of humor, now, by so much as a grin. But Davids followed up his -own civil smile by saying:</p> - -<p>“I’ve been looking at that collie of yours, off and on, ever since I -got here. He’s a beauty. How’s he bred?”</p> - -<p>“They say there’s beautiful things an’ useful things,” answered Fenno, -surlily. “An’ I’ve allus found the beautiful things is no use and the -useful things ain’t wuth lookin’ at. Yep, Treve must be ‘a beauty,’ all -right, all right. For he’s no use to anybody. Jes’ eats and snores and -loafs; an’ hunts fleas instead of sheep; an’ tries to make busy folks -romp with him. Likewise he succeeds in making ’em do it; so far as -Royce, here, is concerned. The work hours my partner wastes in playin’ -and trampin’ an’ skylarkin’ with that measly cur—”</p> - -<p>“How’s he bred?” repeated Davids, to stem the tide of Joel’s chronic -complaints against Mack and the collie.</p> - -<p>“Bred?” echoed Fenno. “Who? Royce? All fired <i>ill</i> bred, when he has a -mind to be. An’ that’s about all the time. He—”</p> - -<p>“I mean the collie. What is it you call him? Treve?”</p> - -<p>“Treve? Bred? I don’t—”</p> - -<p>“He means,” spoke up Royce Mack, from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> boyhood memories of pedigreed -animals, in the East, “he means, who were Treve’s ancestors? We don’t -know, Davids. A queer sort of English tourist hobo came here and sold -him to us. The man absconded with all the cash in Joel’s vest and left -the pup behind. As far as we know, Treve’s pedigree began on the ranch, -here. Why?”</p> - -<p>“Because,” said Davids, “he’s a high-bred dog. What’s more, he’s the -true show-type of collie. He’s good enough to win a blue ribbon at any -bench show in America. The hobo, most likely, stole him. Such dogs -aren’t left to roam at will.”</p> - -<p>Treve had ceased to pursue the wicked flea; or else his frantic -clawing had dislodged the pest. For, with a lazy sigh, he resumed -his nap on the cool puncheon. Stretched out there on his left side, -silhouetted against the floor, he presented a picture to stir the heart -of any collie-judge. The classic head might have been chiseled by a -master-hand. The frame was mighty, yet as graceful as any greyhound’s. -The coat was unbelievably heavy and it shone like burnished copper.</p> - -<p>Joel eyed the couchant dog with outward sourness of visage; but with -inward pride that Treve should have won such praise from this Eastern -engineer who had halted at the Dos Hermanos<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> ranch for the night. It -was part of Fenno’s life-creed to maintain a continuous and universal -grouchy disapproval of everything and everybody.</p> - -<p>“Just what I’ve always said!” exulted Mack, at Davids’ endorsement of -his pet. “I’ve always told Joel the dog was good enough to go to any A. -K. C. show. He’s—”</p> - -<p>“Yep!” snarled Fenno, “he’d make a show of us, all right. Why, most -prob’ly they’d laugh him out of the place. Unless it was a flea-chasin’ -match. Then he might—”</p> - -<p>“If I were you,” put in Davids, addressing Mack and ignoring the -peevish oldster, “I’d enter him for the big Dos Hermanos Show, up at -La Cerra, next month. I was reading about it, on the way here. Quite -a ‘spread’ on it in the Sunday <i>Clarion</i>. I’ll leave my copy of it -with you, if you’d like to glance over it. They’re trying for a record -entry. A big English judge is going to handle collies and one or two -sporting breeds. On another page of the paper is a sort of primer for -novice exhibitors; telling them how to enter their dogs for the show, -whom to write to for premium lists and blanks, and all that, and how -to make out the blanks. A lot of people don’t understand how to do it. -Take my tip and enter Treve at La Cerra.”</p> - -<p>“Huh!” snorted Joel, loudly. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p> - -<p>“It’s only about a hundred miles from here,” pursued Davids. “You can -make most of the trip by train; and get there in less than a day. Think -it over. It’d be a fine thing to bring Treve home with a bunch of blue -ribbons and maybe a big silver cup; and have all the papers printing -his name. It’s as much of a triumph for a dog to win first prizes at -such a show as for a man to be elected to Congress.”</p> - -<p>Another derisive snort from Joel Fenno interrupted his homily and made -Royce frown apologetically at the annoyed guest.</p> - -<p>Now there was harrowing ridicule in Fenno’s snort. But in the heart -of Fenno an astonishing impulse had swirled into life. The snort was -designed to frighten this yearning impulse to death. It could not.</p> - -<p>Whenever any one looked or spoke approvingly of Treve, old Fenno -had something of the thrill that might come to a man at praise of -a cherished brother. While he girded at this feeling, as babyishly -absurd, he could not check it. He loved the big collie; and he was -inordinately proud of him. That others should admire Treve seemed in a -way a sort of backhanded compliment to himself—to Joel who had never -in his life been admired or complimented.</p> - -<p>And now, at Davids’ careless words, a glowing picture leaped into -Fenno’s dazed mental vision<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span>—a picture of cheering throngs at the La -Cerra show, all admiring and praising his victorious Treve. This and a -crazy desire to take the collie there.</p> - -<p>As if in contempt for his companions’ chatter about a mere dog, Joel -got up, presently, and sauntered into the house. He strolled through -the room he and Royce Mack had assigned to Davids for the night. There -on the floor, alongside the engineer’s kitbag, lay the crumpled copy -of the <i>Clarion</i>. Furtively, Joel pouched it and bore it to his own -cubbyhole room. There, that night, long after the others were asleep, -he crouched on his bunk and read and reread and sought to master the -many bewildering bits of information as to the show and as to the mode -of conducting dogshows in general.</p> - -<p>Much was as Greek to him; until he figured it out with painful -patience. Twice he flung the paper on the floor with a grunt of -disgust. But ever that glowing vision of his chum’s triumphs goaded him -on. Through the silent hours he continued to wrestle with the details; -as simplified for the benefit of novices.</p> - -<p>Once, during his reading, he looked up guiltily. In the doorway of -his little room stood Treve, gravely inspecting him. The soft sound -of rustled paper had roused the collie from his nightly slumber -alongside Royce’s bunk. He had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> set forth to investigate. As Joel -peered blinkingly toward him, Treve wagged his plumed tail and came -mincing forward; thrusting his classic muzzle into the hand which Fenno -instinctively stretched forth.</p> - -<p>“Trevy,” whispered the old man, “how’d you like to hear all them folks -clappin’ you an’ sayin’ what a grand dog you are? Hey? Think it over, -Trevy. There needn’t anybody know, but you and me, Trevy. Royce has -got to go to Omaha, with them sheep, next month. He’ll be gone for two -days before this show-date an’ for a couple of days after it. Nobody’ll -ever know, Trevy. I’ll tell the hands I’m goin’ to run up to Santa -Clara to see about a bunch of merinos an’ that I’m totin’ you along -to herd ’em. I—Oh, Trevy, we’re a pair of old fools, you an’ me! I -never thought I’d be such a dodo-bird as to waste time an’ cash on a -dog. I’m gettin’ in my dotage. Granther Hardin used to think he was a -postage stamp, when he got old, Trevy. An’ he used to putter around, -lookin’ for a env’lope big enough to stick himself to. They put him in -a foolish house. I reckon I’m qualifyin’ for one, all right, all right. -But—you’re sure a grand dog, Trevy!”</p> - -<p class="space-above">The modernized old Spanish city of La Cerra, at the westerly end of -Dos Hermanos County,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> had come to life in a rackety way, as it did -once a year when the annual three-day show of the Dos Hermanos Kennel -Association brought to town thoroughbred dogs and humans of all shades -of breeding.</p> - -<p>It was to this show, two years earlier, that Fraser Colt had been -taking his collie pup when the latter’s clash with a police dog in the -baggage car had led to the temporary wrecking of one of his tulip ears; -and when his resentment of Colt’s kick had led his owner to hurl him -bodily out through the car’s open side door.</p> - -<p>The memory of his own treatment at the hands—and boot toe—of the -gross brute who had bought him on speculation and who had been taking -him showward, rankled ever in the far-back recesses of Treve’s brain. -Which is the way of a collie. The harsh memory had been glozed over -by two years of friendly treatment. Treve himself was not aware it -existed. But it was there, none the less.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno, daily, had been more and more ashamed of his queer -impulse to take Treve to the show. But, daily, also, the show-virus -had infected him, more and more. Any one who has shown dogs will -understand. Ever he visualized a more and more gorgeous triumph for his -secret chum.</p> - -<p>The first twelve miles of the trip were made in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> the Dos Hermanos -ranch’s wheezy little car—the same in which Joel had piloted his -partner to Santa Carlotta, the day before; when Royce set forth on his -Omaha journey. Treve sat proudly beside the ever-more nervous Fenno, on -the car’s one shabby seat.</p> - -<p>The dog was delighted at the jaunt, as is nearly every collie who is -taken by his master on an outing. Instinctively, too, he felt Joel’s -grouchily suppressed thrill of excitement, and responded to it with a -quick gayety. Apparently this was some dazzlingly jolly adventure he -and his friend were embarking on.</p> - -<p>At Santa Carlotta they took the spur line train for an eighty-mile run. -Sixty of these eighty miles were across dreary greenish gray desert, -flower-splashed, yet as dismal as the Mojave itself;—rolling miles of -sick alkaline sand, skunk-infected, habitat of rattlesnakes—a waste -strewn with sagebrush and Joshua trees. A dead and fearsome stretch; -steel-hard of outline, shrilly vivid of coloring.</p> - -<p>Then came the steep upgrade, over an elephant-backed mountain’s -swordcut pass; and a pitch down into the fertile valley whose nearest -city was La Cerra.</p> - -<p>Joel did not crate his dog; but sat on a trunk in the baggage car, with -the collie curled up comfortably at his feet. The train-ride woke<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> dim -and not wholly pleasing memories in Treve. Something unpleasant had -befallen him on such a ride. Once or twice he glanced up worriedly at -the old man; only to be reassured by an awkward pat on the head or a -grumbled word of friendliness.</p> - -<p>It was so, too, after they had debarked and had found their way to the -armory where the dogshow was in progress. As they entered the vast -barnlike building, Treve’s ears and nostrils were assailed in a way -that made him halt abruptly in his stately advance at Fenno’s side.</p> - -<p>To him gushed the multiple plangent racket of hundreds of dogs barking -in hundreds of keys. To a dog, even more than to a dogman, each bark -carries its own translation. Treve read excitement in many of these -barks that now yammered about his sensitive ears. In more, he read -terror and loneliness and worried apprehension.</p> - -<p>Also, the myriad blended odors of fellow-dogs rushed in upon him, -dazing his senses with their incredible volume. It is through ears and -nostrils that a dog receives his strongest impressions. And Treve was -receiving more than he could assimilate.</p> - -<p>His troubled, deepset eyes scanned Joel Fenno’s gnarled face for -reassurance. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> oldster was wellnigh as confused and scared as -his dog. He was a dweller in the lonely places. Crowds confused and -frightened him. Yet he rallied enough to pass his hand comfortingly -over the silken head of the collie and to mutter something by way of -encouragement. Then man and dog marched valiantly down the intersecting -aisles of barking or yelling or silently unhappy exhibits, to the -section labeled “Collies.”</p> - -<p>There, Joel motioned Treve to jump up on the straw-littered bench that -bore his number. He tied him; and tipped a lounging boy to get a panful -of fresh water. The collie drank feverishly; but would touch none of -the tempting meat scraps which Fenno produced from a greasy newspaper -parcel for his benefit.</p> - -<p>The great young dog did not cringe or shiver, amid this bedlam which -tortured his sensitive soul and which was so hideous a contrast to his -wonted life amid the sweet-scented silences. His head was erect. His -dark eyes were steady. He was a good soldier. But—well, it was out of -the question for him to swallow food, at such a place.</p> - -<p>Joel looked about him. On either side of Treve’s bench, and across -the aisle, other collies were tied in their stall-like benches. Fenno -counted eighteen of them, in all. Some were snipe-nosed and fragile. -Some were deep of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> chest and massive of coat and had strongly classic -heads, much like Treve’s.</p> - -<p>A few were snub-nosed and round-eyed and broad of skull. Old-fashioned -types, these, and without chance of victory in any contested class.</p> - -<p>Their like is seen at nearly every show. They are pets, loved by their -masters or mistresses (oftenest mistresses), who think them wonderful. -They are brought to shows in the futile hope that a blue ribbon or a -cup may lend zest to their owners’ pride in them. To a judge who is -luckless enough to have a soft heart, these poor dogs and their cruelly -disappointed owners are the saddest features of an exhibition which, at -best, is never lacking in sad features.</p> - -<p>Fenno stood, eyeing the dogs around him. He had a refreshing ignorance -of everything which constitutes a collie’s good or bad show points. All -he knew was that Treve was the grandest dog on earth. He had come here -to prove it to mankind at large. And the belief did not waver. Yet as -he watched the handlers prepare their collies for the ring, he scowled. -He had slicked Treve’s glorious coat down smooth, with much water. He -knew that humans are supposed to have their hair slicked down when they -want to look their best. And he supposed it was the same with dogs.</p> - -<p>But now he saw men currying their dogs with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> expert touch; brushing -the hair up and out; so that it should not cleave to the body and -so that its texture and abundance might be fully seen by the judge. -After watching this process for several minutes and catching sight -of a collie poster on one of the benchbacks, Joel unearthed a mangy -dandy-brush from his kitbag; and proceeded to fall to work right -vigorously on Treve. The water had, for the most part, evaporated from -the slicked coat. What was left of it made the coat and frill stand out -with redoubled luxuriance as Joel brushed it upward.</p> - -<p>Then Fenno scanned his neighbors, once more, for further tips in -collie-dressing. He was vaguely aware that several spectators had -paused at Treve’s bench, as they drifted past. They were eyeing the dog -in open admiration. This pleased Joel, but it did not surprise him. To -him it seemed only natural that people should stop to admire such a -dog. Then he heard one of the spectators read aloud to another from a -gray-backed catalog he held:</p> - -<p>“<i>‘217. J. Fenno. TREVE. Particulars Not Given. Entered in Class 68.’</i></p> - -<p>“That’s funny!” went on the reader, looking up from the catalog’s -meager information and studying afresh the collie in front of him. -“That’s mighty funny, Chris! Here’s one of the best collies I’ve set -eyes on. Class in every<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> inch of him. He’ll give Champion Howgill Rival -the tussle of his life, for Winners, to-day. And yet he isn’t even -registered. ‘Particulars not given.’ It doesn’t seem possible the owner -of a championship-timber collie, like that, shouldn’t know his pedigree -and his breeder’s name. ‘Particulars not given.’ Gee! That’s the stock -phrase they use for mutts. This dog’s a second Seedley Stirling. It -doesn’t make sense. Who’s ‘J. Fenno,’ anyway? Ever hear of him?”</p> - -<p>“Some yap, out here, who bought the dog as a month-old pup, I s’pose,” -answered the man addressed, “and who doesn’t know what he’s got. I’m -going to hunt him out, before the judging; and see what I can buy this -collie for. Maybe I can pick him up for a song. It’s a cinch his value -will boom, after he’s been judged. Everybody’ll be wanting him, then. -I’m going on a still hunt, right away, for J. Fenno.”</p> - -<p>“Meanin’ me?” asked Joel, turning on him with a sour suddenness that -made the Easterner recoil an involuntary step. “I’m Fenno. An’ I’m the -man you’ve got to go on a still hunt for, to buy this dog for a song.”</p> - -<p>“No offense,” disclaimed the other, mistaking Joel’s normal manner for -snarling displeasure. “I like this dog of yours. That is,” he hedged, -craftily, “I like him in spots. He’s more good than bad. I don’t mind -making you an offer for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> him, if you’ve got the sense to sell him -cheap. How about it?”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know how much cash you’re packin’ in that greasy old -ill-fitting handmedown suit you’re wearin’,” replied Joel, with his -wonted exquisite courtesy. “Nor yet I don’t know what value you place -on the mortgaged hencoop you live in, back home. But the whole price -won’t buy this collie of mine. Not if you throw in the million dollars -diff’rence between your valuation of yourself and my valuation of you. -Have I made it plain, friend? If I haven’t, I’ll try to speak less -flatterin’ and talk turkey to you.”</p> - -<p>Without awaiting reply he turned his lean back to the flustered -Easterner. The move brought Fenno face to face with a stout man in -vivid raiment.</p> - -<p>“Selling that dog of yours?” queried the stout man, catalog in hand.</p> - -<p>“Oh, <i>you’re</i> looking for a bargain, too, from the ‘yap,’ are you?” -snorted Joel. “Before the judge c’n tell him he’s got a good dog? Well, -the yap don’t need to be told. He knows it. That’s why he brang Treve -here to-day. If your fat was wuth a hundred dollars a pound, you’d be a -billionaire. But you wouldn’t be able to buy my dog. Get that?”</p> - -<p>He was about to turn away from the stout personage, as from his -former interlocutor, when<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> he noted the man was no longer looking -at him Instead, oblivious of the grouchy old hurler of insults, the -stranger was once more studying Treve. In his plump face was a glint of -perplexity, of struggling recollection.</p> - -<p>Fraser Colt had an excellent memory. And the more he examined Treve, -the closer he came to verifying a most improbable idea that had come -to him, to-day, when first he caught sight of the collie reclining -unhappily on the bench.</p> - -<p>Back into his trained mind came the picture of a highbred collie pup, -lying thus sorrowfully in Colt’s stuffy kennel yard, some two years -earlier, after Fraser had picked him up at his first master’s forced -sale. The dog’s markings and facial expression were unusual. It seemed -impossible. Yet—</p> - -<p>Half-unconscious of his own gesture, Fraser Colt stretched out his hand -toward Treve’s shapely left ear. If there were sign of break or of -ancient teeth-marks therein, the mystery was solved. If not—</p> - -<p>Treve had lain resignedly in this place of turmoil, consoling himself -by following with his sorrowful eyes the master who, for some -unexplainable reason, had brought him here. Then, amid the million -disturbing odors of the show, one special scent came to his nostrils in -a way to annihilate his heed of all the rest. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span></p> - -<p>Suspiciously, his eyes clouding with half-formulated and long-sleeping -recollections, he sniffed the heavy air. At the same instant, came the -sound of a voice that was more than vaguely distasteful to him. Into -his friendly heart sprang a righteous anger—but against what or whom -he scarcely knew.</p> - -<p>Then he saw Colt. And sound and scent and sight brought his dormant -memories wide awake. He knew the man. Even as he would have recognized -Royce and Joel, whom he loved—even as he would have recognized and -loved them after two years of absence—so now he knew and hated the man -who had maltreated him so abominably as a defenseless puppy. Into the -soft eyes flamed red rage.</p> - -<p>All ignorant of the emotion he had aroused, Fraser Colt had stretched -forth his plump hand, confidently, to inspect the collie’s left ear. -The expert big fingers turned over the ear-tip. A glance showed Colt -what he sought. There, faintly white, on the ear’s pinkish underside, -were the harrow-marks of the police dog’s teeth. There, too, was a far -fainter groove-mark where the plaster and splints had once remained for -weeks on the healing ear. There could be no doubt.</p> - -<p>This in less than a second. Before the big hand could be withdrawn, -Treve had completed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> his recognition. More, he realized what liberty -this loathed ex-owner of his was taking with him. The outstretched -hand, too, was reminiscent of the brute blow that once had crashed -against that mangled ear. And the dog’s hatred flamed into life.</p> - -<p>His white eyeteeth slashed murderously. Colt’s thick sleeve and silken -cuff were shorn, as by a razor-sweep. So little did cloth and silk -deflect the slash that the eyetooth scored deep in the wide wrist; -missing artery and major veins by a hairbreadth.</p> - -<p>With a yell, Fraser Colt yanked back his hurt wrist. Yet swift as was -his motion, it could not keep pace with the motion of the furious -collie’s head. And, before the hand was out of reach, Treve’s front -teeth had almost met in the fleshy heel of the thumb.</p> - -<p>“You leave my dog be!” shrilled Joel, taking in only the fact that Colt -had reached out and done some presumably painful thing to Treve, which -the collie was trying angrily to punish.</p> - -<p>He spoke too late. At the dog’s assault, Colt’s readily mislaid temper -scattered beyond control. Still yelling with pain he kicked with all -his might at the collie who ravened at him far over the pine footboard -of the bench.</p> - -<p>The kick was less well calculated than fervent. The fury-driven toe -hit the top of the footboard;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> shattering the wood to splinters. But -it missed Treve. As the leg was withdrawn, Treve exacted tribute from -the ankle of the loud-patterned trousers; and his jaws raked the man’s -shin, agonizingly.</p> - -<p>But not until later did Fraser Colt have chance to note this latest -hurt. For scarcely was the kick delivered when a lanky and wrinkled -bulk had hurled itself cursingly at his fat throat.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno prided himself on his surly self-control. Yet when this big -stranger kicked his beloved chum, self-control burst into a maniacal -wrath that could find vent only in homicide.</p> - -<p>He flung himself at the big man’s throat; gouging, tearing, hammering; -and all the while keeping up a gruesome whimpering noise from between -his hard-clenched teeth; unpleasantly like the sound made by a rabid -beast worrying its prey.</p> - -<p>Back, under that crazy onslaught, staggered the unprepared Colt. His -heel caught in a bench support, before he could rally his balance. -And he pitched backward onto the aisle floor. Not once had Fenno -relinquished his attack on the face and throat of his foe. Now, landing -atop the squirming bulk, he drove his fists madly into the upturned -visage. As Colt sought to fend off the flailing fists, Joel lunged at -his neck with yellowed teeth. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span></p> - -<p>Above them, lurching far over the edge of the bench, Treve tugged and -struggled roaringly to free himself and to join in the carnage. Foam -spattered from his back-writhen lips. Added to his own hate of Colt was -the fact that this man was fighting with Fenno, whom the dog loved. -With all his weight and all his might be strove to break free from his -chain. A hundred dogs added their din to his.</p> - -<p>All at once, the bystanders stirred from their momentary trance of -amaze. As crowds came running to the scene of strife, fifty hands -dragged Joel away from his enemy and lifted him, yelling and twisting, -to his feet. Others helped Fraser Colt to rise. Still others hung -officiously to the arms of both combatants, to prevent a resumption of -warfare. Scores of voices vociferated and questioned and babbled. Every -dog in the show took up the racket, with full-throated barks and howls. -Every human jabbered. No human could be heard.</p> - -<p>Presently, into the ruck, two policemen shouldered their way; followed -by the show’s superintendent. Out of the myriad simultaneous efforts -at explanation and accusation, the police could gather only that a -lantern-jawed old rancher had committed flagrant assault and battery -upon Mr. Fraser Colt, a man well known to dozens present and vouched -for by the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span>superintendent. The rancher, presumably, was either drunk -or insane.</p> - -<p>His first madness dissipated, Joel stood trembling and sick; scared to -the point of horror at what he had let himself in for; yet furious as -ever at the assailant of his collie.</p> - -<p>A policeman ended the uproar by taking hold of Joel’s collar and -propelling him through the milling crowd to the door of the armory -and thence out into the street, where a commandeered automobile bore -captive and captor to the police station a mile away.</p> - -<p>Twice, on his forced progress through the armory and once during the -horrible station-ward drive, Fenno tried to plead with the officer to -let him make some arrangement for the comfort of his dog, before going -to jail. But the policeman, every time, shut him up and would not let -him speak.</p> - -<p>Joel sank down in a miserable and all but sobbing heap on the slat -bed of his cell. Not for himself was his woe. He foresaw a long jail -sentence. In the meantime, what was to become of Treve? Who would feed -him? Who would see he got back to the ranch? At the close of the show, -would the beautiful collie be thrust out into the streets of this -strange city, a hundred miles from home; to fend for himself—he who -had always been so well cared for? </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span></p> - -<p>Worse yet, would he fall into the hands of the man who had kicked -him—the man who seemed all-powerful there at the show—the man who had -secured Fenno’s arrest and who had, himself, gone scot free? He had -kicked the collie; in the presence of Fenno. What might he not do to -luckless Treve, now there was no one to protect the dog?</p> - -<p>At the searing thought of his chum’s defenselessness, Joel groaned -aloud, rocking back and forth on his hard seat.</p> - -<p>“An’ it was all my own fault!” he mumbled, brokenly. “All my own -foolishness! What’n blue blazes can I do? What—what <i>IS</i> there to do? -Oh, Trevy, you trusted me! You was glad to come along with me. An’ see -what I’ve made happen to you!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER VI: DESERTED</h2> - -<p>A day earlier, Joel Fenno had been happily, if always grouchily, the -master of his own actions.</p> - -<p>To-day, Joel Fenno sat huddled miserably in a police station cell, at -La Cerra, a hundred miles from home.</p> - -<p>The man did not know how long he crouched there in growing mental -torment, on the hard cell bench. It seemed to him a handful of -centuries in duration. Actually, it was something under an hour.</p> - -<p>Then a policeman came to lead him to the captain’s room at the front of -the station. Besides the captain, two other men were in the room. One -of them was jolly and elderly. The captain treated him with grudging -respect and addressed him as “Judge.” The other was a lazy-looking -chap, much younger, with a shock of red hair and a snub nose. The -awesome police captain, apparently, was on comradely terms with him.</p> - -<p>As Joel shuffled miserably into the private room, it was this -red-headed youth who greeted him. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Well, old-timer,” he said, breezily, “it sure was one grand and -wakeful little scrap while it lasted. I was in the gallery, looking at -the chows benched up there. And I got a fine view of it. But I couldn’t -work my way through the crowd, till after you’d been gathered in. I -thought they’d just turned you out of the place; till one of the bulls -told me, a few minutes ago, that he’d cooped you. Then I hustled for -Judge Brough and came here on the run.”</p> - -<p>He talked fast and with easy good-fellowship, undeterred by Fenno’s -sour glare. Scarcely had he paused for breath when Joel, ignoring him, -turned to the uniformed captain in tremblingly eager appeal.</p> - -<p>“Mister,” he pleaded, “my dog got left alone there at that show. He’s -li’ble to starve or get lost or stole or hurt, without me to watch out -for him. I—I’m kind of—kind of fond of him,” he mumbled shamefacedly; -adding in a more normal tone: “I got forty-one dollars in my pocket, -here. It’s yourn, if you’ll see he’s looked out for an’ shipped back to -the ranch, while I’m servin’ my term. If that ain’t enough, I’ll write -a check for—”</p> - -<p>“You’ll come around to court with me,” interposed Judge Brough, “and -write out a check for five dollars, for your fine. Then you can go and -look after your own dog. I’m holding special<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> court for your benefit, -my man. Because this nosey reporter friend of mine is pestering me to. -Come along. My car’s outside.”</p> - -<p>“I—I don’t—I don’t just rightly understand!” sputtered Fenno, -incredulous, as ever, that any such golden good luck could sift into -his morbid life-lot. “I—”</p> - -<p>“Gladden, here, was in the gallery,” explained the judge. “Just as he -told you. He saw it all. He gives me his word that you didn’t tackle -Mr. Colt, till Colt kicked your collie. Of course, that doesn’t excuse -you for breaking the law. But—well, I’m glad it was your collie, and -not mine, that was kicked. I’m getting too old to punch my fellow-man. -Come along.”</p> - -<p>In a trance, Joel Fenno trailed to the car, in the wake of Brough and -Gladden. In a trance, he answered the Judge’s few official questions, -in Brough’s chambers, back of the deserted courtroom. He paid his fine, -and then asked, uncertainly:</p> - -<p>“C’n I go, now?”</p> - -<p>At Brough’s assenting nod, the old man set forth at a shambling run. -Too long Treve had been left there, lonely and unhappy, among that mob -of strange dogs and stranger men, and possibly at the mercy of Fraser -Colt. He must get back to the collie as fast as a lanky pair of legs -could carry him. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Hold on!” called the reporter, hurrying after him. “Judge Brough says -I can take you back to the show in his car. It’s a couple of miles from -here. Jump in.”</p> - -<p>Gladden had been sent to the dogshow, by his paper, <i>The Clarion</i>, in -quest of human interest items that might brighten up the technical -account of the exhibition. He was not minded to let slip this chance of -getting more material for the most worthwhile human interest item the -day thus far had produced. Wherefore, he stuck to the excited oldster.</p> - -<p>During the drive to the armory, he fired adroit questions at the -taciturn and worried Fenno; most of which the old man did not trouble -to answer. But, from a word or two forced from Joel’s overburdened -soul, the lad gathered something of Fenno’s dread lest harm had -befallen Treve through Colt’s ill-will.</p> - -<p>“You can go to sleep over that, brother!” Gladden reassured him. “You -and Treve, between you, managed to make Friend Colt one hundred per -cent eligible for first aid treatment. Before I left, he had been -helped across to the hotel and a doctor had been sent for. By the time -Doc gets through stitching and bandaging him, Colt will be glad enough -to stay in bed for the rest of the day and probably to-morrow, too.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> -He’s in no shape to carry on a canine vendetta, just now. Sleep easy!”</p> - -<p>Joel sighed in deep relief and turned upon his companion a look that, -in a less forbidding old face, would have been classified as one of -gratitude.</p> - -<p>“You been mighty decent to me, young feller,” he muttered, grudgingly, -as though the effort at graciousness were physically painful. “An’—I’m -thankin’ you. Let it go at that.—Say! Can’t this chuffer make his car -move a wee peckle faster?”</p> - -<p>“Not unless we want to go back to court again for wearing holes in the -speed limit,” said Gladden.</p> - -<p>Joel sighed, rustily. Speaking to himself rather than to the reporter, -he grumbled:</p> - -<p>“I’d counted a hull heap on Treve’s winnin’ all them ribbon-gewgaws -an’ sich. Most likely the judgin’s been goin’ on while I was to the -hoosgow. Luck couldn’t ever hand me out a hundred p’cent parcel but -there’d be sure to be a hole punched into it somewheres. I s’pose me -an’ Treve has got to lay away them grand hopes of our’n, like they was -the pants of some dear dead friend; as the feller said. But if he could -’a’ won just a single ribbon or a—”</p> - -<p>“Buck up!” exhorted Gladden, who had caught<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> not a distinct word of the -mumbled soliloquy but who saw the old man’s first glow of relief was -beginning to merge with his chronic gloom. “Buck up, brother. Jail’s -better than a lot of dogshows I’ve covered. It’s a funny thing! I’ve -covered every line of sport from cockfighting to horse-racing. And I’ve -found more bad feeling and less true sportsmanship in the dog game than -in all the rest put together. More slams and knocks and poor losers and -petty meanness than in every other form of sport, combined.”</p> - -<p>Fenno continued to fidget, unheeding. Less to distract the oldster from -his worries than to air his own views, the reporter went on:</p> - -<p>“I’ve figured it out. I mean the reason for the dog-game’s -unsportsmanliness. And I think I’ve hit on the answer. It’s because -there are so many women in it.”</p> - -<p>He paused, waiting for the exclamation which usually followed this pet -speech of his. Fenno was deaf to the harangue. Undeterred, Gladden -resumed:</p> - -<p>“My wife says I’m a crank for thinking that. But it’s true. In the old -days we men were out fighting or fishing or hunting or doing other -stunts that call for sportsmanship. The women were at home taking -care of the house and the kids. During the centuries, men learned to -be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> sportsmen. They learned to lose gracefully and to win modestly. -They had to. They had thousands of years start on women in mastering -sportsmanship. It wasn’t till a very few years ago that women at large -took any part at all in sport. They had to learn it from the beginning. -Or rather, they still have to. Most of them haven’t made much of a -start at it yet.”</p> - -<p>“Uh-huh,” grunted the unhearing Fenno.</p> - -<p>“Women don’t take a general part in any forms of sport, even yet,” -pursued the reporter, “except dogshowing and tennis. At least those -are almost the only sports they’ve achieved any prominence in. And -look at the result! The dog game is full of squabbles and backbiting -and poor sportsmanship. But for the A. K. C.’s wise guidance it would -have gone to pot, long ago. As for women in tennis—well, maybe you’ve -read of the Mallory-Lenglen mixups and others of the same sort. There -couldn’t be anything like that, on the same scale, in baseball or -pugilism or boating. Only in tennis. Because women are prominent in it. -And in dog-breeding-and-showing. Not that I’m knocking women. It isn’t -their fault. Sportsmanship is a thing that takes hundreds of years to -acquire. They’ve been at it for less than a quarter-century. At that, -they do fifty times better at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> it than any man could hope to, in some -purely feminine art he was just learning. And many of them are clean -sportsmen—these women. Better than most men. But some few of them—”</p> - -<p>“Say!” exploded Joel. “You tol’ me that armory wa’n’t but two miles -away. We been ridin’ in this open hearse for a—”</p> - -<p>“We’ll be there in a minute now,” said Gladden, swallowing the rest of -his oration. “It’s just around that corner. Don’t worry about your dog. -He’s all right. You won’t even miss the collie judging. It won’t begin -for another half-hour. Plenty of time to— Here we are!” he finished, -as the car swung a corner and stopped in front of the armory.</p> - -<p>Joel scarce waited for the machine to halt; before scrambling out and -making his way, at a run, up the steps and into the rackety building. -Gladden followed as fast as he could; amusedly interested in the -prospect of watching the grouchy old man when he should rejoin his -belovèd dog.</p> - -<p>This meeting was scheduled to be the most pathetic or the most humorous -point in the story the reporter was planning. Would Fenno be as glum in -that big moment as in the moment of his release from the cell? Gladden -hoped so. He hated to think that the keynote of the story was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> to be -spoiled by Fenno slopping babyishly over his restored collie chum.</p> - -<p>Down the crowded aisles sped Joel; Gladden close in his wake. They -reached the collie section. There Fenno came to a standstill with an -abruptness that all but threw him off his balance and sent Gladden -colliding against him.</p> - -<p>Treve’s straw-cluttered bench was empty.</p> - -<p>It was the same bench, with the same printed number tacked to it; the -same splintered pine footboard that Fraser Colt had kicked. But Treve -was no longer there.</p> - -<p>Gladden’s trained reportorial eye fixed itself upon another detail of -the deserted bench, a fraction of a second earlier than did Fenno’s. -The stout chain, affixed to the bench staple, was pulled to its full -length and hung over the splintered top of the footboard. From the -chain’s snap hung a dog collar—broken. The collie’s frantic plunges -had at last made the decaying leather give way.</p> - -<p>A man, working over a dog on the adjoining bench, glanced up at -sound of Gladden’s ejaculation. He noticed the reporter and the -horror-petrified old ranchman. He addressed them, impersonally; though -keeping a wary eye on Joel, as though fearing a fresh outbreak of -assault and battery on the part of the newly released prisoner. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span></p> - -<p>“He’s gone,” announced the man. “Kept lunging and tugging at his chain -all the time the cop was taking you out. Kept it up afterward, too. All -at once, the collar bust; and he was off after you, quicker’n scat. I -made a grab for him as he went past me. But I missed him. I thought -it’d be kind of neighborly to catch him for you. When I got to the -front door, though, he wasn’t anywheres in sight. The doorman told me -the dog had gone whizzing out into the street, like greased lightning. -No sign of him anywheres. That must ’a’ been—le’s see—that must ’a’ -been about three or four minutes after you was took away by the cop. -Er—I’m glad to see you back,” he ended politely, as Fenno did not -cease from staring in blank despair at the empty bench and the riven -collar.</p> - -<p>Gladden made as though to speak. But he had no time to form the -well-meaning words he was groping for. With a galvanic start, Joel -wheeled and headed for the armory doorway. Gladden made after him, once -more taxing his own young speed to keep close to the oldster.</p> - -<p>At the front steps, he overhauled the ranchman.</p> - -<p>“I’ll phone the pound and then send word to the police to keep their -eyes open for him,” said the reporter, genuinely touched by the ghastly -face of his companion. “And we’ll advertise,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> too. Oh, we’ll find him, -all right! You mustn’t worry.”</p> - -<p>Joel did not answer. Joel did not hear. All his days, he had lived in -the open spaces and far from the peopled haunts of life. To him there -was terror in the sight of such crowds as now moved past the armory. -There was double terror in the spectacle of the thick-built city which -harbored the crowds. He had a born and reared countryman’s distrust -and dislike for populous streets. To him they held mystery—sinister -mystery.</p> - -<p>Somewhere in these unfriendly and confusing and perilous streets his -beautiful collie chum was wandering in search of the master who was -responsible for his misfortune;—was seeking Fenno, wistfully and in -vain, amid a million dangers.</p> - -<p>A score of whizzing automobiles, flashing in and out, in front -of Joel—the clang of trolley cars and the onrush of a passing -fire-engine—all these were possible instruments of death to the -ranch-raised collie who was straying out yonder, perplexed and aimless, -hunting for the man who was his god.</p> - -<p class="space-above">Treve had crowded into two brief minutes more agonizing excitement and -drama than had been his in the past two years. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span></p> - -<p>He had met and attacked his olden tyrant. He had seen his master in -life-and-death battle with that tyrant. Fifty-fold worse than all else, -he had seen that cherished master overpowered and dragged away; and had -had no power to fly to his assistance.</p> - -<p>Small wonder the frenzied dog had hurled himself with all his might -against the collar that held him back from battling for his master’s -release! Then, at last, the collar had broken; leaving Treve free to -follow and to rescue the captured man. Down the aisle he tore; and out -through the gateway and down the steps. It was in this direction they -had taken Fenno. Treve had seen him go. And he ran by eye and not by -scent.</p> - -<p>But, when he reached the sidewalk and saw no trace of Joel, he reverted -to first principles; and dropped his muzzle earthward.</p> - -<p>Hundreds of people had traversed that stone pavement during the past -minutes. But through the welter of scents Treve’s keen nostrils had -scant difficulty in picking up Joel Fenno’s long-familiar trail. -Rapidly he followed it;—but only for a yard or so. It led to the curb. -There the policeman had bundled Joel into the car that was to bear him -to the mile-off station. There, of course, the trail ceased. And there -the dog paused, wholly checkmated. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span></p> - -<p>After the fashion of his kind, he wasted no time in standing -nonplussed. Instantly, he set off at a hand-gallop, nose to ground, -running in a wide circle; in the hope that some arc of that circle -might intersect Fenno’s lost trail. It was a ruse he had employed a -hundred times in seeking for strayed sheep. But always his questing -nostrils, at such times, had inhaled the good clean smell of earth and -herb. Now they were filled with the stench of spilled gasoline and of -grease. They were baffled by the passing of countless feet and by the -numberless and nameless reeks of the city streets.</p> - -<p>Undeterred by the sickening strange odors, he continued his hunt; -galloping in the broad circle he had begun. Head down, all his senses -concentrated on the finding of the trail he sought, he was completing -the circle when his nerves were jarred by a yelling voice just above -him. There were menace and vexation in the voice. It was accompanied by -a deafening blare. Instinctively, Treve shrank aside as he looked up to -discern the dual noise’s origin.</p> - -<p>The sidewise move saved him from a hideous and too-common form of -death. For, as he shifted his direction, a fast-going limousine’s -fender grazed his flank with such force as to send him rolling over -and over in the filth of the asphalt roadway. The chauffeur, who -had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> shouted and honked at him, yelled back a mouthful of oaths. But -Treve did not hear them. Scrambling to his feet, jarred and muddied -and breathless, he was barely in time to dart out of the way of a -motor-truck that was bearing heavily down upon him.</p> - -<p>The wide street was alive with these engines of destruction, all -seemingly bent upon his death. Bewilderment swept the luckless dog’s -brain. For an instant he stood, glancing pitiably to left and right; -trying to find a pathway of escape from among the tangle of vehicles.</p> - -<p>Then the ever-ready wit of a trained collie came to his aid. This -mid-street, assuredly, was no place for him. The sidewalk offered -shelter, with no worse perils than the stream of passing pedestrians. -Toward the sidewalk he made his way.</p> - -<p>It is in such safety-seeking efforts that the average dog, in like -conditions, becomes confused and is run over. Treve was not confused. -With the skill and dexterity of a timber wolf he sped in and out of -the traffic, timing his every step to a nicety; enacting prodigies of -time-and-distance gauging.</p> - -<p>In another few seconds he was on the sidewalk; nearly a block distant -from the armory.</p> - -<p>The collie was panting; but not from fatigue. He was panting through -excitement and <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span>nervousness. Light froth gathered on his lips and -tongue. His rich coat was one smear of muck and mud. He was collarless. -His aspect was ferocious and disreputable. People made plenty of room -for him as he swung on down the sidewalk, nose to ground, still seeking -Fenno’s lost trail.</p> - -<p>His dangerous circling of mid-street had failed to locate that trail. -Collie-like, he knew there was no use in casting back over the same -ground again. Henceforth, he must hunt on mere chance and with nothing -to guide him. It was not a hopeful prospect. Fenno had left the armory. -That much Treve’s eyes and nose had told him. Fenno had walked as far -as the curbstone. There his trail had ended.</p> - -<p>Gallantly, the collie kept on, along his aimless route, still sniffing -the ground; pedestrians giving him the widest possible berth and -turning to look back apprehensively at him.</p> - -<p>A man came briskly out of a store. So suddenly did he debouch onto the -pavement that the dog had no room to avoid him. The man felt something -collide glancingly with his knee; and peered down. He beheld a huge -collie; mud-coated and bleeding from a graze on the flank.</p> - -<p>Panic possessed the newcomer as he recalled the impact at his knee. -By every law of fiction,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> this was a mad dog. The dog, of course, had -bitten or at least tried to bite him, in passing—which was also the -way of fictional mad dogs.</p> - -<p>The man, like most of the world, was actuated by what he had read, -rather than by what he had learned, or should have learned, from real -life experience. Hence, he did the one regulation thing that was to be -done, under the circumstances. He screeched at the top of his lungs:</p> - -<p>“<i>Mad dog! MAD DOG!</i>”</p> - -<p>A hundred persons stopped and stared apprehensively around them. They -saw a chalk-faced man clutching at his left knee with one hand while -with the other he pointed dramatically at the harmlessly-trotting -Treve. Again and again he waked the echoes with that imbecile bellow of -“Mad Dog!”</p> - -<p>Only a few times did he have a chance to warble the fool-cry as a -solo. In a moment or so, voices from everywhere had caught up the -shriek. The street reëchoed to the multiple howl. People ahead turned -in fright as they heard it. Then they saw the mud-streaked and bloody -collie trotting in their direction; and they scattered squawkingly to -the refuge of shop doors or parked cars. (Two local newspapers, next -day, printed strong editorials on the menace of allowing dogs to roam, -unmuzzled, in the city.)</p> - -<p>Treve was unaware of the furor he was <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span>creating. For all he knew, -this sort of bedlam might be an ordinary phase of street life. In any -event, it was no concern of his. And he padded unconcernedly on; still -sniffing in vain for his lost master’s footsteps.</p> - -<p>His progress received a rude check, as a sharper note mingled with -the looser volume of his pursuer’s yells. Some born idiot had drawn a -pistol and had opened fire on him. A bullet spatted the stone pavement -just in front of him; a pin-tip of the scattered lead stinging his -sensitive nose. Treve stopped, and looked back, in mild wonder.</p> - -<p>Then, for the first time, he realized that everybody in the world was -racing along at his heels; waving umbrellas or canes or any other -weapon. One youth had even snatched up a half-full tin ash-can and -was brandishing it above his head; while a halo of blown ashes sifted -lovingly down upon him and blew into the eyes of those nearest him.</p> - -<p>The pistol-wielder, luckily for Treve, chanced just then to be nearest -the can-brandisher. He halted and took aim at the momentarily moveless -dog. Providence sent an eddying breeze from heaven which gathered up a -spoonful of ashes from the tilted can and whirled them blindingly into -the marksman’s eye. The bullet sped skyward. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span></p> - -<p>A policeman, then another, appeared from nowhere and joined the chase.</p> - -<p>It dawned on Treve, belatedly, that it <i>was</i> a chase; and that he was -its quarry. With no fear, but with a strong determination not to let -these people catch him and thus prevent him from continuing his search -for Fenno, the dog quickened his swinging wolf-trot into a hand-gallop.</p> - -<p>One of the policemen was stopping at every third jump to rap for -reënforcements. In response to these raps and to the clamor of the -pursuit, a bluecoat rounded a corner, on the run, just in front of -Treve. He made a noteworthy effort to brain the collie with his club. -Treve saw the blow coming and he dodged it with perfect ease. Then, -diving between the policeman’s threateningly outstretched legs, and -upsetting him, the dog continued on his way; though at a faster pace. -Passersby, in front, gave him a world of room.</p> - -<p>Pausing only at street crossings, to avoid passing motors, he fled at a -mile-eating run; leaving the chase far behind. He was hot and worried -and cruelly thirsty. Yet the sound of pursuit warned him not to slacken -pace.</p> - -<p>At last, this sound grew fainter. For no running men can hope to keep -within hailing distance of a running collie.</p> - -<p>Treve slackened speed. He glanced around<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> him. The houses had grown few -and straggling. He was on the compact little city’s outskirts. Ahead -of him arose green foothills. Toward them he bent his pavement-bruised -feet.</p> - -<p>Assuredly there was no sense in trying to find Joel Fenno in that hell -of unfriendly humans behind him. There was no trace of the old man. And -Treve did what the wisest of lost collies usually do. He headed for -home.</p> - -<p>On he went, until he had breasted the nearest green slope of the ridge -which divided the fertile valley from the desert beyond. Almost at the -summit, he found a little trickle of water, from a hilltop-spring not -yet dried by the approaching summer. There he paused; and drank long -and greedily. His thirst assuaged, he stretched himself and clambered -to the crest of the ridge.</p> - -<p>Pausing again, he lifted aloft his dainty muzzle; and sniffed. For -perhaps two minutes he stood thus, testing the breeze with quick, -comprehensive intakes of breath. From side to side he moved his head -and forequarters; until presently he stood still; verifying the hint -the air had brought him.</p> - -<p>Then, without a shadow of indecision in mind or in gait, he set off -down the desertward side of the ridge. He knew the course he must take.</p> - -<p>(If perhaps this action of Treve’s be scoffed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> at, as nature-faking, -there are a dozen authentic cases of the sort. How a collie can get his -direction in the way just described, is past human knowledge. But that -such direction <i>is</i> gotten in that way cannot be denied.)</p> - -<p>Thus it was that the great dog began his hundred-mile homeward journey, -across unknown land and guided solely by his mysterious sixth sense. -Down the hill he went, never breaking that deceptively rapid choppy -wolf-trot of his. In another half hour his feet had left the springy -turf and ridges of the hill and were pattering across the prickling -gray sands of the desert.</p> - -<p>On he went; while the sun dipped past the meridian; on into sweltering -afternoon. Here was no chance for thirst-quenching; no chance for -adequate shade; no chance for anything but grim endurance. The collie’s -pink tongue lolled far out. His eyes were bloodshot from sand and from -heat. The mud on his coat had caked and dried; as had the blood from -the graze on his flank. He was suffering from thirst, from fatigue, -from reaction. But he kept on.</p> - -<p>At sunset, he had his first alleviation of discomfort. Trotting -exhaustedly over the top of a gray sand dune he saw at its base, in -front of him, a black and white animal, about the size of a cat. The -animal saw and heard him. Yet it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> made no hurry to get out of his way. -Skunks know from experience that few larger animals willingly take a -chance of attacking them.</p> - -<p>But Treve was as hungry as he was thirsty. All day he had been on the -move; and he had eaten nothing. With express train speed he dashed -downward, at this possible dinner. The skunk wheeled, bracing its four -feet firmly in the sand; tail aloft.</p> - -<p>But this was not the collie’s first encounter with such opponents. Ten -feet from the tensely waiting skunk, Treve leaped high in the air and -far to the left. Then, before the skunk could get opportunity to brace -itself a second time, he veered as rapidly to the right; and slashed -as he sprang. The skunk lay lifeless at his feet, its back broken. And -Treve feasted in luxurious comfort.</p> - -<p>An hour later he came to the railroad track. Here, it seemed, was -surcease for his aching pads, from the teasing desert sands. Gladly he -trotted along the ties, in the exact middle of the track. But after the -first mile, the bite of cinders on his sore feet grew more unbearable -than were the sand-grains. And he shifted from track to right-of-way.</p> - -<p>Not five minutes later, the Limited came thundering past, shaking -the earth and almost knocking him down by the suction of its nearby -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span>passage. Truly, those foot-cutting cinders had done Treve a good turn, -by driving him from between the steel rails and out of the path of -annihilation.</p> - -<p>It was wolf instinct that guarded him from his next mortal danger.</p> - -<p>In early dusk he was padding wearily along the sage sprinkled gray -plain when something buzzed like fifty windblown telegraph wires, from -beneath a sagebush directly in front of him. There was no time to -dodge. Without stopping to plan his own action, he gathered his tired -muscles and leaped; clearing the two-foot bush with several inches -to spare. So instant-quick had been the move that the rattlesnake -beneath the bush missed him by a clean six inches as it struck at his -approaching bulk.</p> - -<p>The great white desert stars came out in a black velvet sky. The torrid -heat of day merged into a dampish chill which helped to assuage the -collie’s burning thirst. On he stumbled. Then his wornout frame took a -new brace. From far off, the night wind brought him the craved scent of -running water—the Dos Hermanos River.</p> - -<p class="space-above">It was two nights later when Joel Fenno came home to the ranch, after -raking the city of La Cerra, hysterically, with a fine-tooth comb, for -his lost dog;—after posting deliriously <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span>exorbitant rewards whose -payment would have bankrupted him.</p> - -<p>He halted the wheezy car at the gate and stumped up the walk. The dazed -old man’s spirit was dead within him. He hoped Royce Mack might not yet -have gotten back from Omaha. He himself wanted to gather up some money -and some clean clothes, before returning to La Cerra to continue the -hopeless hunt.</p> - -<p>As he started up the walk, something furry and cyclonic burst out of -the house;—dashed limpingly down the walk to meet him and flung itself -at his breast, barking ecstatic welcome to the wanderer.</p> - -<p>“Treve!” gasped the unbelieving Fenno, chokingly. “Oh—oh, <i>Trevy</i>!”</p> - -<p>That was all. But he gathered the gayly dancing collie into his arms in -a bear hug that well-nigh crushed the victim’s ribs.</p> - -<p>The man’s heart seemed likely to burst, from sheer joy and relief. He -wanted to dance; or else to pray. He was not sure which. Then, of a -sudden, he straightened himself and drew a long breath. Out onto the -porch, from the living room, his partner, Royce Mack, was sauntering.</p> - -<p>“Hello!” hailed Royce. “You’ve been to Santa Clara, Toni says. Treve -must have gone on a rampage while we were both away. When I got<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> back, -this morning, he was lying at the door, all in. Cut and muddy and lame -and—”</p> - -<p>“Don’t waste breath, gassin’ about the measly cur!” rasped Fenno, with -all his wonted grouchiness, as he fended off Treve’s welcoming advances -in much show of disgust. “Get busy an’ tell me what prices you got -for them sheep, down to Omaha. A business man’s got no time to jabber -dogtalk, when there’s prices to be quoted.”</p> - -<p>“Say!” retorted Royce, nettled. “If I hated anything as much as you -hate that grand collie of ours, I’d just bite myself and die of -hydrophobia. Isn’t there any heart in you for a dog like that?”</p> - -<p>“No!” grunted Joel. “There ain’t. Dogs is pests. An’ this dog is the -peskiest of the lot.”</p> - -<p>But in the darkness, he was furtively drawing a hoarded lump of sugar -from his pocket and slipping it to the playfully eager Treve.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER VII: THEFT AND UNTHEFT</h2> - -<p>“That cat of yours,” commented Royce Mack,—as he paused beside the -adobe shelf on his way into the kitchen of the Dos Hermanos ranch -house, and addressed the slant-eyed Chang, who served him and Fenno as -cook and handy man,—“that cat of yours must have more suction power -than a three-horse-power gas pump. She draws up milk the way the sun -draws up water. And what the skinny brute does with it all, is more -than I can figure out.”</p> - -<p>As the young rancher spoke, he nodded critically toward a -pinkish-grayish-white cat that crouched in morbid indolence on the edge -of the high adobe shelf, alongside an empty tin dish. She was a forlorn -and gloomy thing, of scrawny ludicrousness and nasty temper. Chang -loved her, beyond words.</p> - -<p>The Chinaman wiggled apologetically, as always he did when either of -the partners said more than he could understand. His slitted eyes -strayed protectingly toward his beloved cat. She looked like the kind -of a cat a Chinaman like Chang might be expected to own and cherish.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> -Royce went on, in banter that his servitor took as solemn earnest:</p> - -<p>“Twice to-day I’ve happened to see you fill that dish with milk. There -must have been a quart of it, each time. It’s barely noon and the dish -has been emptied again. That makes half a gallon of new milk your -rainbow-colored cat has absorbed, since breakfast. Why, man, that bag -of bones couldn’t <i>hold</i> half a gallon of milk! She must cart it off -somewhere and sell it. Lucky for you that both our milch cows happen to -be ‘fresh,’ just now. Or lucky for Mr. Fenno and me. Otherwise, we’d be -drinking our coffee straight; and all the milk’d go to that miserable -cat.”</p> - -<p>“She good cat,” expostulated Chang, in his high voice. “Vel good catty. -Catch mice. Catch lats. Keep house flee of ’em. Gland cat. Can’t get um -fat; no matt’ how much eat. Not built fat. Just like Mist’ Fenno.”</p> - -<p>A grunt of disgust from behind him made Chang spin about in -apprehensive haste.</p> - -<p>Old Joel Fenno had come padding up to the house for dinner, from one of -the sheep pastures. He arrived at the kitchen stoop in time to hear his -spare figure compared by the Chinaman to that of the scarecrow cat.</p> - -<p>Though without normal vanity, Joel was not pleased. And the grunt would -have been <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span>followed by more vehement expressions of distaste had not -Chang scuttled nervously into the kitchen, tucking the multicolored -cat under his yellow arm as he ran. Presently, out through the doorway -issued the sound of many pans clattering. Dinner was in active -preparation.</p> - -<p>Joel poured water from a pail into a tin basin on the stoop-floor; and -began to scrub his dirty hands with a lump of smelly yellow soap. Royce -had washed; and was starting into the house when a scamper of galloping -feet announced the arrival of Treve.</p> - -<p>The dog had been helping Toni, the chief shepherd, and the latter’s -squat black collie, Zit, in No. 3 pasture, that morning with the -management of a new and fractious bunch of merinos. But—as ever, -unless he had orders to the contrary—the big dog had trotted home, -promptly at lunch-time. Always he lay on the floor, at Royce Mack’s -left side, during meals; and occasionally a scrap of food from his -master’s plate rewarded his presence.</p> - -<p>Royce stooped to pat the dog, as Treve pattered to the porch. The -collie looked past his master, up at the narrow adobe shelf which -stood fully four feet above the level of the floor. He seemed keenly -interested in that shelf. There was a glint of mischief in his dark -eyes. Joel Fenno, gouging the soapy water out of his own<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> eyes, caught -the dog’s expression. Following the collie’s quizzical gaze, Joel noted -that the edge of the tin dish projected an inch or so over the edge of -the shelf. In picking up the cat, Chang unconsciously had joggled it -forward.</p> - -<p>While Fenno still watched, Treve arose upon his hindlegs, his white -forepaws resting lightly against the wall. Taking the edge of the -tin dish daintily between his jaws he dropped to earth again; -depositing the dish on the floor in front of him. Then, after a single -disappointed glance at the empty receptacle, Treve walked away.</p> - -<p>Royce Mack looked after him, with speculative amusement. Then an idea -dawned on him. He picked up the dish and turned to the open doorway.</p> - -<p>“Chang!” he called. “Fill this.”</p> - -<p>The Chinaman, delighted that his adored cat was apparently arousing -so much interest in Royce, hastened to fill the dish to the brim and -replace it on the high shelf. After which he returned to the kitchen to -find the cat and bring her out to feast. Meantime, Joel Fenno snorted -contempt at his partner’s prodigal waste of milk and at his interest in -a mere cat.</p> - -<p>“Lord!” he exclaimed. “Ain’t it enough for you to pamper that measly -collie all the time, without dry-nursin’ Chang’s cat, too? Don’t<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> you -know, the more good milk she drinks the fewer rats she’ll bother to -catch? She ain’t wuth her salt, now. You’ll make her wuth even less’n -that if—”</p> - -<p>He stopped abruptly his flow of chronic complaint. Treve had seen the -Chinaman place the refilled dish on the shelf. Instantly, and with no -hint of concealment or of snooping, the collie trotted over to the -wall, upreared himself again and once more caught the edge of the dish -in his teeth. A second time he lowered it carefully to the floor, -not spilling a drop. Then he proceeded to lap appreciatively at its -contents, his pink tongue busily emptying the dish as fast as possible.</p> - -<p>The dog had an inordinate fondness for milk. Indeed, it was because of -this fondness and to insure his cat from loss of her meals that Chang -had formed the habit of placing the milk dish on the shelf, presumably -well out of the dog’s reach. Finding it, empty, but upright, on the -porch floor, several times, the Chinaman supposed the cat had knocked -it thither in jumping on or off the shelf.</p> - -<p>Chang appeared now, in the kitchen doorway, a fatuous smile on his -yellow face and with the cat in his arms. He arrived just in time to -see Treve lift down the dish to the floor and begin to drink. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span></p> - -<p>The Chinaman’s little eyes bulged. His nerveless arms let the cat slump -to the ground. To him, the simple spectacle he was witnessing had all -the earmarks of black magic.</p> - -<p>This was not the first time he had suspected Treve to be a devil in -guise of a furry dog.</p> - -<p>He had thought it when the collie learned to manipulate the kitchen -door latch with his forepaw and let himself into the house. He had -thought it when Treve had sniffed disdainfully at a bit of tempting -looking meat the Chinaman had drenched in carbolic acid solution with -the idea of getting rid of him. The dog had sniffed, then stared coldly -from the meat to its giver, and had walked off in icy contempt. (Not -knowing it was the rank smell of the acid which revolted the dog, Chang -had supposed Treve realized the meat was poisoned and that he knew -who had poisoned it. Wherefore he forbore to try to poison him again; -deeming such efforts useless.)</p> - -<p>Chang had been even more assured the dog was a demon when once he -chanced to see Joel Fenno—who blatantly and eternally professed -dislike for the collie—surreptitiously slip Treve the choicest meat -morsels from his own plate; and pat his head.</p> - -<p>Now the Chinaman’s last doubts were removed. It was not in nature that -a dog could<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> reach up, forty-eight inches, and lift down from a shelf a -full dish of milk; setting it unspattered on the floor. It didn’t make -sense. The dog was a devil. It was not well to abide in the house with -a devil. Yet the ranch job was one that Chang did not like to lose. -Something must be thought up. Something must be done! Meantime, Chang -retired into his kitchen.</p> - -<p>Royce Mack was laughing loudly at his canine chum’s exploit. Joel -glowered at the placidly drinking dog.</p> - -<p>“Gee, but that was clever!” Mack declared. “It took a lot of thinking -out, too. Treve, you’ve sure got brains! So that’s where all the -cat-milk has been going! I wondered—”</p> - -<p>“Clever, nuthin’!” grumbled Joel. “Any fool would have sense enough to -steal food when he’s hungry. He’s stoopid. An’ he’s lazy, too. If I had -my way—”</p> - -<p>To shut off his partner’s eternal invective against the dog, Mack -passed on into the house, leaving Joel in mid-swing of his diatribe. -Chang happened to glance apprehensively out of the window, a second -later. He saw Joel bend over the lapping dog, a silly grin of -admiration on his wizened face, and pat the collie’s head in approving -friendliness.</p> - -<p>“Trevy,” the old man was whispering, “it <i>was</i> clever of you. One of -the plumb cleverest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> things I ever seen you do. An’ I’ve seen you do a -passel of slick things. You know more’n ten humans an’ a Chink, Trevy.”</p> - -<p>Treve wagged his tail vigorously at the praise and caress. He even -paused in his stolen meal long enough to lick milkily the petting hand. -Joel, grinned, resentless of the milk spattered on his sleeve. Then, -catching sight of Chang’s bobbing head, through the window, the old man -favored Treve with a glare of utter detestation; and stumped into the -house and slammed the door.</p> - -<p>When the partners had bolted dinner and, with Treve at their heels, had -gone back to work, Chang repaired to his own cubbyhole room under the -roof. There, in front of his bash-nosed Joss, he proceeded to burn a -flight of faintly perfumed prayer-papers, accompanying the process with -certain pious “setting-up exercises” before the idol.</p> - -<p>To his Joss and to the spirits of his innumerable ancestors, Chang -offered orisons for the instant vanishing of that devil collie.</p> - -<p>The dog’s size and buoyantly noisy ways had jarred him, from the first. -Then the collie had taken sinful pleasure in treeing Chang’s dear cat; -and in making playful little rushes at her, even when she sought refuge -on her master’s thin shoulder. The uncanny wisdom of the dog<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> had long -ago completed the wreck of Chang’s nerves. The big beast, assuredly, -was a devil; and might in time be expected to wreak awesome torments -upon the Chinaman himself.</p> - -<p>Not a week earlier, on ironing day, Chang had burned a hole in the arm -of Royce Mack’s only silk shirt. To hide his fault, he had taken the -ruined shirt out back of the stables and had buried it. Then he had -gone smugly to his kitchen, prepared to deny with innocent smiles that -he had ever set eyes on the garment.</p> - -<p>Indeed, an hour later, he was in the midst of that convincing denial, -when Treve frisked up to the credulous Royce, shaking merrily between -his jaws the muddy and burnt shirt he had exhumed. Nothing short of a -demon could have done that!</p> - -<p>Yes, Treve must go. And Chang prayed fervently and burned many scented -papers. Then, hoping, yet doubting, the efficacy of his devotions, he -went down again to his kitchen.</p> - -<p>Seldom is such immediate and complete answer vouchsafed to -prayer-papers and Joss-genuflections as was granted to Chang.</p> - -<p>Scarcely had he been puttering around the kitchen for three minutes, -when a car stopped at the gate and a fat man in fine raiment came -striding up the walk. Chang was alone in the house. Neither of the -partners could be <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span>expected to return until supper-time. The Chinaman -desisted from his task of dishwashing; wiped his wet yellow arms on -a drying flannel shirt of Joel’s, and shuffled forward to meet the -stranger.</p> - -<p>Fraser Colt had come three hundred miles, to claim his collie.</p> - -<p>Recovering from his rough treatment at the hands of Fenno and at the -teeth of Treve, at the Dos Hermanos dogshow, he had returned to the -show, next day, only to learn that collie and rancher had departed.</p> - -<p>To trace them had been a simple enough matter. In the back of every -show catalog are the names and addresses of the exhibitors. Thus, to -locate the owner of Treve was the work of a minute. “<i>J. Fenno, c/o Dos -Hermanos Ranch, Dos Hermanos County.</i>” That was the line at the back of -the book. And a score of people at La Cerra knew the exact location of -the partners’ ranch.</p> - -<p>A telegram had called home the bitten and bruised Colt, on the second -day of the show. And the business involved therein had kept him -occupied for the next few months. But in the first lull of work, he -prepared to get back the collie whose cash value would make worth while -any trouble involved in the quest. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span></p> - -<p>By law, Treve belonged to Fraser Colt. Colt held the bill of sale -whereby he had bought the dog, as an eight-month pup. He had lost him; -and now had found him again. Any law-court on earth would uphold his -claim to the collie’s ownership.</p> - -<p>So, with no fear of successful opposition he had come to the wilderness -to recover his property. If Fenno should refuse, he could take the -case to court and make the rancher not only give up the dog but pay -trial costs. Several folk could swear to Treve’s identity as the collie -bought by Colt.</p> - -<p>Then, when at last he should have the costly animal safe in his own -kennel—well, it would be time to pay a little personal bill of his. At -the thought, Colt was wont to glance at his bite-mangled hand and then -swing his arm viciously; as though it already wielded a blood-flecked -rawhide. Yes, there would be a sweet little hour of revenge for the way -the dog had attacked him.</p> - -<p>“I want to see Fenno,” announced Colt, as the smiling Chang confronted -him at the ranch house door.</p> - -<p>“Not in,” cooed the Chinaman. “And Mist’ Loyce Mack not in. Not in till -sup’ time he come.”</p> - -<p>Colt did not reply at once. But neither did<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> he depart. Instead, he -stood surveying the Chinaman’s face, from between thoughtfully squinted -lids.</p> - -<p>Fraser Colt was a good deal of a scoundrel. He was a good deal of a -brute. But his worst foe never doubted his queer power of reading -human nature. Especially, could he read crookedness in the face of his -fellow-man. He had an unerring eye for that quality—long possession of -it having made him expert.</p> - -<p>So now he was reading Chang as though the Celestial’s usually -inscrutable visage had been a printed page. Colt’s alert brain was -working fast.</p> - -<p>He had come hither prepared for a scene of possible violence; perhaps -for a long legal delay to follow it. And now appeared the chance for a -short cut out of all that. If he could secure the dog without giving -Treve’s owners a chance to protest, then so much the better. Back at -home he could register the collie under another name. If, in future, -Joel should chance to recognize Treve at some show, there would be no -redress for the rancher. The dog was Colt’s. Chang was to be the means -to this easy end.</p> - -<p>As the Chinaman still wiggled nervously from one felt-slippered foot to -the other, under the silent appraisal of Colt’s eyes, the fat man drew -forth a lump of bills; and began to riffle them.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> Chang’s eyes beamed -admiration on the handful of money.</p> - -<p>“Listen, Chink!” said Colt, at last. “There’s a collie dog lives here. -He’s mine. And I want him. Get that?”</p> - -<p>“Tleve?” quavered Chang, wonderingly.</p> - -<p>“Yep. Treve. That’s his name in the catalog. It wasn’t his name when I -had him. And it won’t be when I get him back. He—”</p> - -<p>“You want—you want take Tleve away—to take him away, so he not be -heah no longeh, at all?” demanded Chang, dizzy with the speed wherewith -his prayer-papers were paying double dividends.</p> - -<p>“That’s it,” assented Colt. “And you’re the man to help me. It’s worth -just—just fifty dollars to me to get that cur, without any fuss being -made. To get him, quiet, and get him <i>away</i>, quiet. Want to earn that -fifty, Chink? Nobody’ll ever know.”</p> - -<p>Now, Chang was a man of much finesse. But this delirious prospect of -having his prayer answered and of getting fifty whole dollars, to boot, -drove him for once to simple directness.</p> - -<p>“Yes-s-s,” he simmered, ecstatically; his claw-hand outstretched for -the money.</p> - -<p>Into his moist palm, Fraser Colt laid a ten-dollar bill. The rest of -the roll he pocketed. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span></p> - -<p>“You get the other forty when I get my dog,” said he. “Where is he, -now? In the shack?”</p> - -<p>“Nope. He out with Mist’ Loyce Mack, Tleve is,” replied Chang. “Not -back till sup’ time. At lanch house allee night, though,” he added, -consolingly.</p> - -<p>“Good!” resumed Colt. “Now, let’s you and me go into executive session. -This thing ought to be easy to fix up. Do you get a chance at the dog, -alone, any time;—when the others aren’t likely to horn in?”</p> - -<p class="space-above">At supper, that evening, Treve lay as usual on the floor beside Royce’s -chair. He was more or less tired from a hard workday on the range, and -he looked forward with joy to his own approaching supper.</p> - -<p>Apart from such stray tidbits as Mack might happen to toss to him at -the table, Treve had but one daily meal;—one big meal a day being -ample for any grown dog and far better for his health and condition -than is more frequent feeding. This one meal was always served to Treve -on the kitchen hearth, by Chang, when the partners’ supper was ended.</p> - -<p>To-night, when Joel and Royce pushed back their chairs and lighted -their pipes and Chang began to clear the table, Treve as usual arose -and made his way to the kitchen. As a rule, his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> supper was awaiting -him on the hearth. But to-night Chang had not placed it there.</p> - -<p>As the dog turned toward the adjoining room in surprise at the -omission, Chang came scuttling into the kitchen, laden with dishes. -These dishes he set down, then tiptoed back to the door and shut it. -From a cupboard he took Treve’s heaped supper plate and set it on the -hearth bricks.</p> - -<p>The dog wagged his tail in appreciation and followed the Chinaman to -the hearth; his white paws beating out an anticipatory little dance on -the puncheon floor. He neither liked nor disliked this shuffling and -queer-smelling Celestial. But always he was keenly interested in the -plate of table-scraps Chang gave him at night.</p> - -<p>Hungrily, now, he set to work on his supper. Eating with odd -daintiness, yet with egregious speed, the dog became oblivious to -everything around him.</p> - -<p>Chang stepped back to the cupboard and drew therefrom a huge canvas -bag and a length of thin rope. Then, with an apprehensive glance at -the door of the adjoining room, he set ajar the outer kitchen door and -stole over to where the collie was eating. Holding the bag and rope -ready, he came up behind Treve.</p> - -<p>There were several prayer-papers and three anti-devil charms in -the bag. In one lightning<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> move, Chang slipped the sack over the -unsuspecting dog’s head and forequarters; jamming a double handful of -the loose canvas, gag-wise, into the protestingly parted jaws of the -victim.</p> - -<p>Swiftly and dextrously the man trussed up his prisoner; pinioning his -indignant struggles with wily twists of the rope. Then, in the same -scared haste, and murmuring Chinese spells, he heaved the squirming -burden over his shoulder; and ran staggeringly from the house.</p> - -<p>Across the dooryard he ran and out into the road. There, though the -load was heavy and restless, he continued at as rapid speed as he -could, through the darkness, until he came to the bend of the road, a -furlong beyond; where the coulée began.</p> - -<p>Just beyond the bend waited a car with dimmed lights; a bulky man -crouching beside it. With an exclamation of joy, Fraser Colt hurried -forward to meet the burden-bearer.</p> - -<p>Eagerly, he snatched from Chang the indignantly tossing bag, and -heaved it into the tonneau. Jumping to the driver-seat, he pressed the -self-starter.</p> - -<p>“Hey!” squealed Chang, as the machine woke into motion. “Hey, Mist’! -Fo’ty doll’ I get, now. Gimme!”</p> - -<p>He caught hold of the door, as he spoke, lifting himself to the running -board. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Sure!” pleasantly assented Colt. “You get what’s coming to you, -Chinkie.”</p> - -<p>As he spoke, he slugged his plump right fist to the point of the -unsuspecting Chinaman’s jaw; and at the same time stepped on the -accelerator. The car lurched forward. The Chinaman lurched back.</p> - -<p>On into the night sped the automobile, at as fast a pace as Colt dared -to drive it along that bumpy twisting road, at the coulée-edge. Chang -slumped, half-senseless, into a wayside clump of manzanita.</p> - -<p>Colt had taken no foolish chances when he gave the Chinaman a -fist-punch instead of the promised forty dollars. He was thrifty, was -Fraser Colt. He was averse to unnecessary expense. He knew Chang would -not dare betray him to Fenno or to Royce; and thus confess his own -share in the kidnaping. With a smile of pure happiness, he drove on, -not troubling to look back at his dupe.</p> - -<p>Now, Treve was anything but a fool. When frantic struggles availed only -to enmesh him the tighter and to exhaust what little air could still -seep into the close-woven canvas sack—when his growls of wrath were -smothered in the almost sound-proof bag—he sought the next expedient -for escape.</p> - -<p>By the time he had reached the gate, on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> Chang’s shoulders, the dog -had rid his mouth of the stuffed folds of cloth which had been thrust -therein as a gag. The first use he made of this freedom of teeth was to -seize the nearest fold of canvas between his scissors-sharp incisors; -and begin to gnaw.</p> - -<p>Any one who has watched a mischievous puppy gnaw holes in a mat can -imagine the power exerted by the skilled and mighty jaws of a grown -collie; if put to such infantile use. By the time he was flung into the -tonneau, Treve had worked a hole in the canvas, wide enough to permit -his protruding nose to escape.</p> - -<p>Wasting no time in vain howls, he wrought furiously and deftly on such -portions of bag and rope as seemed to bind him most tightly. When it -came to severing the twined rope, he resorted again to gnawing tactics. -But with the rest of the bag, his curved tusks as well were brought -into play.</p> - -<p>Twice he heaved himself upright, only to find some part of him was -still fast to the bag. Both times, he whirled about and bit fiercely -into the trammeling folds or rope. He worked now with added zest of -fury. For his nostrils had caught the hated scent of Fraser Colt, the -man he detested above all the world. The man who had maltreated him -and had fought with Joel Fenno,—the only unfriendly human the dog had -known!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> And he saw and smelt that his mortal enemy was in the seat just -in front of him.</p> - -<p>Too wise to risk attack until he should be free, he continued to rend -loose his bonds. The car was jolting and bumping and rattling at first -speed over the bad bit of climb in the trail-like road; rendering its -driver deaf to the muffled sounds behind him.</p> - -<p>Then, as Colt bent forward over the wheel, to negotiate a particularly -tricky twist of the climbing road, something silent and terrible -launched itself upon him from behind.</p> - -<p>Sixty-odd pounds of furry muscular weight crashed against his fat -shoulders. A double set of razor-teeth sheared like red-hot iron into -the back of his fat neck.</p> - -<p>With a yell, Colt threw back both clawing hands, instinctively, to fend -off this unseen and agonizing Horror.</p> - -<p>It is not well to abandon the wheel of a light touring car, just as one -is driving around a right-angle pitch in an uneven road, by night;—the -less so if the gully-sides of a steep coulée are within six inches of -one’s left wheel.</p> - -<p>The left tire struck glancingly against a wayside bowlder. The impact -twisted both front wheels sharply to the left. There was no hand at the -wheel to correct the wrenching shift of direction. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span></p> - -<p>Obliquely, the machine shot over the edge of the coulée and down its -abrupt side. Ten feet farther on, the fender smote a scrub-tree. The -tree was smashed. The speeding car turned turtle.</p> - -<p>Before Fraser Colt was well aware of what had happened, the -down-plunging car came to a jarring stop, then rose in air and fell on -him, pinioning him beneath it. Treve was flung clear of the car and -landed in a scratchy mass of greasewood. Beyond a bruise or so, both he -and Colt were unhurt.</p> - -<p>The man had been caught in the front seat-well of the topless little -car; alongside and under the steering wheel. One side-door was jammed -irremediably shut. The other had been knocked clean off. Through the -aperture thus left, Colt began to squeeze his rotund bulk, to reach -firm ground and to get free of the imprisoning car. But, as his head -protruded, turtle-like, from its shell, something whizzed at it through -the darkness; and two sets of teeth raked the fat face in a laudable -effort to tear it off.</p> - -<p>Back shrank Fraser Colt, screeching. Blocking the outlet as best he -could with the torn seat cushion, he cowered in his tiny prison; while -outside ravened and snarled the great dog who hated him.</p> - -<p>Colt fumbled for his pistol. Somehow, in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> course of the wholesale -spill, it had fallen out of his pocket. Once he reached out a -tentatively feeling hand from behind the leathern barrier of cushion. -Swiftly as he yanked it back, Treve’s raking teeth were a fraction of a -second swifter.</p> - -<p>Around and around his barricaded foe whirled the roaring collie. Then, -failing to get at or dislodge the man, Treve accepted the situation. He -lay down at full length, alongside the car, as close as possible to the -blocked aperture behind which the cramped and bleeding Colt was huddled.</p> - -<p class="space-above">Joel Fenno was awake at grayest dawn. He woke with a vague memory of -unpleasantness. Then he located the cause.</p> - -<p>Treve had strayed away after supper, the night before; and had not -showed up as usual at bedtime. This was not the dog’s habit. Always he -was in the house and on his mat beside Royce Mack’s bunk, before the -partners went to sleep.</p> - -<p>Royce had asked Chang if he knew what had become of their collie. Chang -said he had given Treve his supper and that the dog had then strolled -out of the kitchen, into the yard; and had not returned. Fenno had -sneered ostentatiously at his partner’s solicitude over the beast. But, -secretly, he had worried.</p> - -<p>Now, waking, he peeped into Mack’s room.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> No, Treve was not lying on -his mat at the snoring Royce’s feet. Joel dressed and went out into the -dim morning.</p> - -<p>A very few miles up the coulée was the southern boundary of the Triple -Bar cattle range. Chris Hibben’s Triple Bar outfit, like most cow-men, -had no use for sheep ranchers or for sheep-ranchers’ dogs. If, by any -chance, Treve had strolled over their line and should be seen by any -gun-packing puncher—</p> - -<p>Joel set off at a worried walk, towards the coulée. The farther he went -the faster he walked; the while cursing himself for a silly old fool, -for wasting good sleep and good exercise on such a wild-goose chase.</p> - -<p>At last, giving up the idea of squandering his energy by a trudge to -the boundary of the Triple Bar, he stopped and made as though to turn -back. As a salve to his feelings, he peeped over the wooded edge of -the coulée, on the chance that Treve might be coursing jack rabbits -somewhere along its dry bed. At the same time he bawled, perfunctorily:</p> - -<p>“<i>Treve!</i>”</p> - -<p>To his amaze, there was an answering bark, from somewhere along the -coulée’s upper sides, not a hundred yards ahead of him. Joel broke into -a shambling run.</p> - -<p>Around the sharp turn in the road, just in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> front of him, appeared -Treve. After a glance of appeal at his master, and a pleading bark, -the collie turned and vanished into the chaparral along the lip of -the gorge. Joel knew enough of the dog to read this plea aright. He -followed, and, at the road-turn, he peered once more over the edge, -along the general direction in which the dog had disappeared.</p> - -<p>There, before him, he saw an upside-down and badly smashed automobile. -Treve was mounting guard alongside. From an opening in the inverted -front section of the car, as Joel crashed through the chaparral toward -the wreck, appeared a blood-splotched and distorted face.</p> - -<p>At sight of the face, Treve charged. The head was withdrawn, and a -doubled seat-cushion was thrust hurriedly into its place. But not -before Fenno had recognized the ample features of Fraser Colt.</p> - -<p>The old man stood, blinking down at the upset car. Then his gaze fell -upon a badly torn canvas bag, lying nearby; a bag whose few remaining -bindings of rope showed sure signs of having been gnawed asunder by -teeth. Joel whistled, long and low.</p> - -<p>“I c’n understand how he cotched you, all right, Mister Colt,” said -he, addressing the invisible occupant of the car. “Trevy c’n do ’most -anything, when he reely puts his mind to it. But<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> how <i>you</i> ever -managed to ketch <i>him</i> is beyond me. He—”</p> - -<p>“Grab your dog and help me out of here!” bleated Colt, feebly, his -nerve gone. “I’ll—I’ll make it worth your while.”</p> - -<p>“Why should I butt in to help a dirty dog-stealer?” snarled Joel. “Tell -me that, Mister. Why—?”</p> - -<p>“I didn’t steal him!” wailed Colt. “He’s mine. He— Say, here’s his -bill of sale to prove it, friend!”</p> - -<p>Cautiously, he shoved forth through a cranny in the cushions a crumpled -paper. Joel picked it up and read it, at the same time mechanically -ordering Treve back from an abortive charge at the disappearing fingers.</p> - -<p>“H’m!” grunted Joel, after a long pause for thought. “The dog seems to -b’long to you, all right. Selling him?”</p> - -<p>“No!” whined Colt, in a last flare of spirit.</p> - -<p>“All right,” acquiesced Fenno, with something akin to geniality in his -grouchy voice. “I’ll drop around, in a day or two, and see if you’ve -changed your mind. Nobody’s li’ble to find you, down here in the -chaparral, till then. Watch him, Trevy! Watch him, till I get back.”</p> - -<p>He started off, up the coulée side. A pitiful howl from the prisoner -recalled him.</p> - -<p>“Hold on!” wheedled Colt. “Don’t leave me<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span> here, with this rabid brute. -I— What’ll you gimme for him? I paid—”</p> - -<p>“I’m not honin’ to hear what you paid; or even what you <i>say</i> you -paid,” retorted Joel, scribbling a line or two on the bottom of the -bill of sale. “I’ll buy him from you for one dollar in cash an’ for the -priv’lege of taking him away; so you c’n crawl out an’ get to a place -where they’ll fix up your car an’ lift it to the road again. Take my -bid or leave it.”</p> - -<p>Colt “left” it. He did so, right blasphemously. Joel said nothing, -except: “Watch him, Trevy!” and strolled away. He had reached the road -before Colt recalled him.</p> - -<p>“Good!” approved Joel. “Lucky I got my fount’n pen, in this vest. -Here’s the bill of sale. Here’s the pen. Here’s the dollar. Sign under -where I’ve writ that you’ve sold him to me. It’ll keep you from comin’ -back to claim him ag’in. In this neck of the woods, my word’s better’n -any stranger’s, like yours. An’ I’m p’pared to depose in court that you -sold him to me of your own free will. If you try to steal him a second -time, it’ll sure mean jail for you. Not that you wouldn’t be more to -home there, than where decent folks is. C’mon, Trevy. Le’s you and me -go to breakfast. So long, stranger. There’s a garage jes’ up the road. -Not more’n about nine miles. By-by.” </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span></p> - -<p>As Joel and the collie neared the ranch house, Treve beheld the scrawny -cat dozing on the kitchen stoop. In playful mischief, he rushed at -her. The cat ran back into the kitchen, spitting blasphemously. Chang -appeared on the threshold to learn the cause of his pet’s fright.</p> - -<p>One look at the approaching dog, and the Celestial grabbed up his cat -and ran gibbering from the house. Nor did he stop in his headlong -flight from the supposed devil, until he had left the Dos Hermanos -ranch far behind him.</p> - -<p>“We’re out one good Chink,” mused Joel Fenno to himself, as he and Mack -prepared their own breakfast, at sunrise. “But we’re <i>in</i> one grand -dog. An’ I’m figgerin’ that’s nineteen times better.”</p> - -<p>“Here, Trevy!” he called, slyly, taking advantage of Mack’s momentary -departure from the kitchen. “Here’s a big hunk of fried pork for -you—the kind you’re always beggin’ for. Ketch it!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER VIII: IN THE HANDS OF THE ENEMY</h2> - -<p>Joel Fenno was wading almost thigh-deep in a billowing and tossing -grayish sea. Here and there, near him, arose the upper two-thirds of -other men—his young partner, Royce Mack; their chief herder, Toni, the -big Basque; and the other Dos Hermanos shepherds.</p> - -<p>The tossing gray-white sea was made up of sheep;—hundreds upon -hundreds of milling and worried sheep. Through its billows, like -miniature speed-boats of black and of red-gold, dashed Zit, the squat -little black “working collie” and his little black mate, Zilla, and the -glowingly tawny bulk of Treve.</p> - -<p>The three sheepdogs had their work cut out for them. Drouth had come -with an unheard-of earliness to the Dos Hermanos Valley, that spring. -And, now, in the past week, fire from some herder’s carelessly thrown -cigarette had kindled a blaze in the tinder-dry buffalo grass, which -a steady north gale had whipped into a very creditable little prairie -fire.</p> - -<p>The men of the Dos Hermanos ranch had fought back the crawling Red -Terror, foot by foot; beating it to a sullen halt with brush, saving -the ranch buildings by a cunningly managed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> backfire; and frantically -digging and dampening shallow ditches in the path of the creeping -scarlet line.</p> - -<p>The ranch houses had been saved. The course of the fire had been -deflected up the coulée. The dogs had been able, by working twenty-four -hours a day, to hold in bounds the smoke-scared sheep.</p> - -<p>But the range in many places was burned as bare of grass as the palm of -one’s hand. True, this area would bear all the richer verdure, later -on. In the meantime, however, the innumerable sheep must be fed. And -there was not grazing enough left standing to keep one-third of the -ranch’s stock.</p> - -<p>Wherefore, the one possible recourse was adopted. Fully a month ahead -of the usual time, the flocks were to be driven to their summer -pasturage along the grassy upper slopes of the Dos Hermanos peaks.</p> - -<p>This entailed much bustle and some confusion. For the ordinary -preparations, to smooth the yearly exodus, had not been made.</p> - -<p>Range pasture after range pasture had been denuded of its woolly -population. All the mass of sheep had been rounded up into the Number -Three field; and now men and dogs were steering them toward the -gateway, which opened direct on the trail they were to take for the -hills. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span></p> - -<p>An outsider, watching the scene, would have beheld merely a handful -of excited men, waving staves and yelling and making uncouth and -apparently unheeded gestures; and three panting and galloping dogs -making crazy dashes through the tight-crowding multitude of sheep.</p> - -<p>As a matter of fact, not one gesture of the men and not one step of -the running dogs was without direct purpose. By degrees the sheep were -bunched and headed for the wide-flung gateway, beyond which waited a -shepherd.</p> - -<p>At one moment, everything seemed hopeless confusion. The next, a -disorderly but steadily progressing throng of sheep were headed for -the open gate; and their leaders had begun to trot bleatingly out into -the trail; started in the right direction by the shepherd who stood -outside. The rest surged on in their wake.</p> - -<p>By the time a half hundred of the pioneers essayed a scrambling rush -from the trail, up a bank toward a burned and still smoking field -beyond, Treve had cleared the pasture’s high wire and had flung himself -ahead of them; noisily yet deftly driving them back to the trail; -rounding up strays; keeping the huddle in the right direction and -giving wide berth to the gateway that continued to vomit forth more and -more woolly imbeciles.</p> - -<p>Treve had been far inside the pasture when the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> sheep at last consented -to head for the gate. In order to obey Royce Mack’s shouted command to -guide aright those already outside, he had been forced to leap on the -backs of the tight-jammed sheep nearest him; and to run lightly along -on a succession of bumpy hips, until he could spy an opening on the -ground of sufficient size for him to pursue his race on solid earth -instead of sheepback.</p> - -<p>While Zit and Zilla continued to herd and drive forward the remaining -foolish occupants of the field, Treve was here and there and everywhere -in general and nowhere in particular; among the debouching and ever -more numerous sheep that had hit the trail.</p> - -<p>It was a time for lightning action—for incessant motion;—for the use -of the queer hereditary sheepdog instinct. There was no question of -merely obeying shouted orders, now, nor of following the direction of -a waved hat. Treve was working “on his own.” He was using his native -genius as a herder; keeping that wild bunch headed aright and in the -trail; and cutting short abortive efforts of the whole mass to cascade -out on to the burnt fields on either side or to bolt for the smoking -coulée.</p> - -<p>His flying feet spurned the ground, scarcely seeming to touch it. His -tawny-gold body<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> flashed in and out; seemingly in ten parts of the -trailside at once.</p> - -<p>Then all at once the nerve-racking job was done. The whole flock was -out of the gateway and safe on the trail; with Zit and Zilla weaving in -and out, steering them straight; and the herdsmen in their places along -the pattering ranks. Treve could change his flying zigzag gallop to a -wolf-trot. He could even brush his panting muzzle against Royce Mack’s -hand as he trotted past the busy rancher.</p> - -<p>Up the coulée-side trail moved the sheep; the myriad patter of their -hoofs sounding on the rutted roadbed like cloudburst rain on a shingle -roof.</p> - -<p>Deep in the bottom of the coulée, to left of the twisting trail, the -fire still snapped and flickered. Its smell and sight and smoke sent -recurrent panic waves over the army of sheep. The three dogs seemed to -know in advance when these efforts at bolting would begin.</p> - -<p>Treve’s white paws were grimed and sore from frequent dashes along -the coulée-side; where he needs must run on the steep scorched bank -paralleling the trail; turning back any loose edges of the gray-white -flock that sought to scamper down the incline.</p> - -<p>“Keep it up, Trevy,” whisperingly encouraged<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> old Joel Fenno, as the -collie whisked past him on such an errand. “Another mile, an’ the -road’s due to shift to the right, away from this smoke-hole. Then it’ll -be plain goin’.”</p> - -<p>Treve caught the low sound of his own name; and wagged his plumed tail -in reply, as he ran on.</p> - -<p>“Be past the coulée in a little while, now!” sang out Royce Mack, to -his partner. “The dogs are holding them, great!”</p> - -<p>“Yep,” growled Fenno. “The two black ones are. Treve’s loafin’ on the -job, as usual. I’m hopin’ he won’t do some fool stunt, when we get to -the crossroad, up yonder, an’ hustle a bunch of the sheep onto the -Triple Bar range. I wouldn’t put it past the chucklehead.”</p> - -<p>Royce Mack did not answer, but hurried on to his own new place in the -tedious procession. Fenno had touched on a theme that worried him. Not -that either Royce or Joel really thought Treve would “do some fool -stunt,” at the spot where the trail crossed the road that led to the -Dos Hermanos peaks, nor at any other place or time. But both of them -dreaded that bit of crossroad territory, which bordered the Triple Bar -range.</p> - -<p>The Triple Bar was a cattle outfit. Like most other aggregations of -cattlemen, its men held<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> sheep and sheep ranchers in sharper abhorrence -than they held rattlesnakes and skunks.</p> - -<p>More than once had a serious clash been narrowly averted, between the -Dos Hermanos partners and Chris Hibben of the Triple Bar, their nearest -neighbor to the north. It was understood, without need of words, that -any Dos Hermanos sheep or sheepdog, setting foot on the Triple Bar -range, would be courting swift and certain death.</p> - -<p>To-day the continued reek of smoke and the crackle and smolder of fire, -in the coulée below them, served to fray the sheep’s bad nerves and to -deprive them of what little sense they had. The work of the dogs and -the shepherds grew increasingly difficult, as the trail mounted high -and higher alongside the burning gorge.</p> - -<p>At length, in front, appeared the open space at the coulée-head; the -space where ran the road toward the peaks; and beyond which stretched -the Triple Bar range.</p> - -<p>The foremost dozen sheep caught sight of the cleared space. Perhaps -with an idea that it signified an end of their smoky and terrifying -climb, they bolted frenziedly toward it. Those behind them followed -suit. A veritable tidal wave of sheep surged galloping toward the -clearing; deaf and blind to all coercion. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span></p> - -<p>Springing on the backs of the close-packed runaways nearest him, Treve -tore forward to head off the stampede. He reached ground in front of -the onrushing wall of sheep, at a spot where the bank rose high on the -right side and where the pit-like top of the coulée fell in almost -sheer precipice for fifty feet on the left.</p> - -<p>Wheeling to face his panic-charges, Treve barked thundrously. But -before he completed the bark or the wheel, the sheep were upon him. -Unable to stop their own gallop and pushed on resistlessly by those -behind, the front line smote against the whirling collie with the force -of a catapult.</p> - -<p>Knocked clean off his feet, Treve rolled writhingly to one side, to -avoid being trampled to death. Over the coulée-lip he rolled; and -crashed down the steep side of the gorge.</p> - -<p>He landed on his back in the midst of a brush-fire, at the bottom; -breathless and half-stunned. Joel Fenno cried aloud, as he saw the dog -reel over the cliff-edge. He ran forward, kicking aside the encumbering -sheep that tangled his progress. He reached the lip of the gorge just -in time to see the dog come charging up the precipitous slope, his -beautiful coat smeared by soot and with sparks still crackling here and -there in it.</p> - -<p>Gaining the summit, Treve wasted not a <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span>second; but forged ahead toward -the front of the stampede. He was too late.</p> - -<p>The few seconds of leeway had permitted the galloping sheep to reach -the clearing, unchecked. The two black collies were far behind, with -the main flock. Nor were any of the men far enough forward to stem the -rush. As a result, the first hundred sheep struck the cleared space at -a speed which they could not check. Across the narrow highroad they -hurled themselves blindly, shoved on by those behind them.</p> - -<p>They crashed into a tall barbed wire fence on the far side of the -road;—the boundary fence of the Triple Bar. They hit it with the -impact of a battering ram. The front rank were ripped and torn on the -jagged wires. But their weight and their blind momentum sagged the wire -and snapped the nearest worm-gnawed post. A whole panel of fence gave -way; falling obliquely backward, almost onto the grass. Through the gap -and over the bodies of their wire-entangled comrades, swept scores of -sheep. On they rushed; scattering into a ragged fan-shaped formation as -they found themselves in the open range.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno went green-white with horror. Mack groped feebly for a -gun at his belt. But, as usual, his gun hung forgotten from a peg -in his bedroom. Indeed the whole party could not<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> muster any weapon -more lethal than a staff. The shepherds involuntarily came to a dazed -standstill.</p> - -<p>But Treve did not hesitate, for the space of an instant. Hurdling -the sheep which struggled in the strands of wire, he cleared the -low-slanted broken panel and sprang into the forbidden range of the -enemy. His singed coat almost sweeping the ground as he sped, he bore -down upon the hundred strays.</p> - -<p>The boundary range of the Triple Bar was perhaps two miles wide by -three miles in length. Dotted along its expanse numbers of cattle were -grazing. Also, entering through a gateway, three-quarters of a mile up -the field, rode Chris Hibben.</p> - -<p>Fate had brought Hibben to this especial field at this especial minute, -during his leisurely tour of inspection of the Triple Bar herds.</p> - -<p>Hibben pulled his pinto pony to a standstill. Open-eyed and -open-mouthed he sat staring; unable to believe what his goggled eyes -told him.</p> - -<p>There, inside the road-end of his sacred range, cavorted something like -a hundred detestable sheep! There, too, among them, galloped an equally -detestable dog! The thing was impossible!</p> - -<p>To add insult to injury, a panel of his barbed wire was down; and men -of the loathed Dos<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> Hermanos ranch were disentangling from it still -more sheep; while two herdsmen were seeking to steer something like a -billion other vile sheep aside from following their brethren into the -field!</p> - -<p>All this, in almost no space of time, did Chris Hibben see. Then back -to him came his senses and with them his flaming temper. He whipped out -a heavy-caliber pistol and struck spurs deep into his pinto.</p> - -<p>Down the field, like a cyclone, came the infuriated cattle king; -whooping, Comanche-fashion, and brandishing his drawn gun.</p> - -<p>Meantime, in other parts of the field, other things had been happening. -It was mere child’s play for Treve to round up and turn his runaways. -It was the work of almost no time. Driving them headlong, he put them -at the gap in the fence. Sharply checking their repeated tendency to -loosen the close bunch into which he had welded the scattered hundred, -he sent them at top speed toward the gap.</p> - -<p>Through it he hustled them, just as the wire-tangled sheep had been -cleared therefrom. Back into the mass of their fellows, Treve galloped -the loudly baa-ing runaways. Then, collie-fashion, he whizzed about and -stood midway in the gap, to prevent their doubling back.</p> - -<p>He had worked fast and he had worked well.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> Mildly, he was pleased with -himself. He glanced from one to the other of his two masters for a word -of approval. But no such word was spoken. Aghast, dumbfounded, Joel and -Mack were gaping at the oncharging Chris Hibben.</p> - -<p>Toni, the chief herdsman, had presence of mind to grab Treve by the -ruff and to yank the indignant collie back from the fence gap, out -onto the neutral ground of the road. As he did so, one of the restored -runaways exercised his inborn traits of idiocy by breaking from his -subdued mates and scampering again through the gap, into the field. -To avert capture, he continued to run, even after he had achieved his -escape. Others made as though to follow. But the shepherds beat them -back.</p> - -<p>Treve noted the single sheep’s flight. It outraged all his native -prowess as a herder that he should be held ignominiously by the scruff -of the neck while such a thing went on. Twisting suddenly, he wrenched -free from Toni’s careless grip; and rushed back into the field after -the stray. Toni snatched belatedly at the golden swirl of fur that -flashed past him. So did Joel Fenno.</p> - -<p>The sheep, hearing his pursuer behind him, veered to the left; making -for a right-angle niche that indented one edge of the side fence, -perhaps a hundred yards from the gap;—a sort of <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span>alcove; where cattle -had formerly been herded in bunches of two or three, to pass on through -a gate whose place had since been taken by the high barrier of wire.</p> - -<p>With Treve not three feet behind him, the sheep reached this -cul-de-sac; discovered that it led nowhere; and turned to get out -of it. At his first shambling step he rolled heels over head in a -somersault; a .45 bullet drilling him clean.</p> - -<p>Chris Hibben had gone into action. As soon as the hard-ridden pony had -brought him within range, he had opened fire. His first bullet found -its mark; but—as he himself knew—more by luck than by skill. For, -only in motion pictures and in Buffalo Bill shows can a man hope to -take any sort of accurate aim from the back of a jerkily running pony.</p> - -<p>Moreover, this pinto of Hibben’s was but half-broke. At sound of the -shot, the pony swerved, spun about on the pivot of his own bunched -hindlegs; and then sought to get the bit between his teeth and run -away. Failing, he resented curb and spur by a really brilliant -exhibition of bucking.</p> - -<p>Enraged, and by no means intending that his prey should escape or -that the wizened old Fenno should complete his rheumatic run across -the corner of the field in time to save the collie,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span> Hibben sprang to -earth, flinging the reins over his pinto’s head.</p> - -<p>A trained cow-pony will stand for hours if the rein is thus flung. But -the pinto was not yet well trained. Also, he had been bewildered by the -shot and by the spurring, into a forgetfulness of all he had learned. -He set off at a panicky canter, the loose rein catching in his forefoot -and snapping.</p> - -<p>Unheeding, Chris Hibben ran forward to the niche where Treve was -standing in grieved amaze above the body of the slain sheep. Halting -just within the outer opening of the alcove, Hibben leveled his gun, -using his left forearm as a rest; and pulled the trigger.</p> - -<p>He was not twenty feet from the motionless dog; and he was a good shot. -Yet he missed Treve by at least six feet. This by reason of a fragile -old body that hurled itself against him from behind.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno had made the last few rods of the distance between the gap -and the indented niche in something like record time; his stiff muscles -stirred to incredible power by the imminent danger of his chum. The -others from the Dos Hermanos ranch, Royce Mack among them, were still -standing stupefied and inert. Joel struck up the pistol arm and in the -same move banged his own full weight against the broad back of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> -cattleman. The result was a lamentable miss; and the saving of the -collie’s life.</p> - -<p>The impact and the heavy-caliber pistol’s own recoil, knocked the gun -from Hibben’s hand. Chris turned, cursing. His left elbow caught Fenno -in the chest and knocked the little old rancher flat. Then Hibben -stooped to regain the pistol.</p> - -<p>But he was met and driven backward by a flamingly wrathful mass of -fur and whalebone strength that smote him amidships, in an effort to -seize his throat. Treve, seeing his loved master knocked down, had left -his post beside the dead sheep and launched himself like a vengeful -avalanche upon Joel’s assailant. Here lay his first duty; and he wasted -no time in fulfilling it.</p> - -<p>Hibben staggered backward, clawing at the furious brute which sought to -rend his throat. In the same instant, a scream of mortal terror from -Joel Fenno was taken up by the far-off group at the gap. At the sound, -Treve forsook his prey and spun about to face the slowly rising Joel. -Hibben, too, forgot his own danger, in the stress of that shriek; and -turned to look.</p> - -<p>The drouth and the eternal smell of smoke had gotten on the nerves of -the three hundred cattle pastured in the field. To-day, the inrush -of the strange and repellent-smelling grayish creatures upon their -territory had agonized those raw<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> nerves to frenzy. On top of all this, -the scent of fresh-spilled blood had the effect that so often it has on -overwrought range cattle.</p> - -<p>Something like fifty white-fronted Hereford steers suddenly lowered -their horns and, by common consent, charged that blood-reek. In other -words, Joel Fenno, in trying to get up, had seen coming toward the -alcove-space a tumble of lowered heads and express-train red bodies. -Though he was a sheepman, he knew what a cattle charge meant. And he -screamed horrified warning to his fellow-human in that death-trap.</p> - -<p>Old cattleman though he was, Chris Hibben stood frozen to stone at the -sight. Then he glanced toward the alcove fence behind them. Seven feet -of close-meshed barbed wire—coyote-proof, bull-tight, horse-high. No -man might hope to scale so bristling a stockade. Hibben himself had -ordained that fence in the days when this end of the range had been -given up to calves, and when wolves and rustlers abounded.</p> - -<p>Subconsciously, the two men stood close beside each other, as they -faced the thundrous charge. Their hands met in a moment’s tight grip. -Treve did nothing so professionally melodramatic. He saw the peril -quite as clearly as did Joel or Hibben. But his duty was to avert -it; not to stand supine or to make stagey gestures. In the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> wink of -an eye, he was off on his gay dash toward the on-thundering bunch of -blood-crazed steers.</p> - -<p>Treve had had no experience in driving cattle. But his wolf ancestors -had known crafty ways of their own, in dealing with wild cows. Into -their descendant’s wise brain their spirits whispered the secret, now; -even as Treve’s collie ancestors had told him, from the first, how -sheep must be herded.</p> - -<p>Tearing along toward the galloping phalanx of horned and lowered heads, -the collie burst into a harrowing fanfare of barks. Straight at the mad -steers he ran; barking in a way to rouse the ire of the most placid -bovine. Nor did he check his flying run, until he was almost under -the hoofs of the foremost steer—a mighty Hereford which ran well in -advance of his crowding companions.</p> - -<p>To the lowered nose of this leader, Treve lunged; slashing the -sensitive nostril; and then, by miraculous dexterity, dodging aside -from the hammering hoofs. Not once did he abate that nerve-jarring bark.</p> - -<p>The hurt steer swerved slightly, in an effort to pin the elusive collie -to earth. The dog swerved, too—barely out of reach of the horns. As he -dodged, he slashed the bleeding nostril afresh. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span></p> - -<p>It was pretty work, this close-quarters flirting with destruction. The -fearless dog was enjoying the gay thrill and novelty of it as seldom -had he enjoyed anything.</p> - -<p>Under the repeated onslaught, the steer definitely abandoned his former -course; and set about to demolish the dog. But Treve, always a bare -inch or two out of reach, refused to be demolished. Indeed, he ducked -under the lumberingly chasing body and flew at the two nearest steers -that pressed on behind their leader. The nose of one of these he -slashed deeply. The second steer of the two was too close upon him for -such treatment. Treve leaped high in air, landing on the back of the -plunging animal, and nipping him acutely in the flank before jumping -off to continue his nagging tactics.</p> - -<p>That was quite enough. The steers had some definite object, now, in -their charge. Following their three affronted leaders, the whole -battalion of them bore down upon the flying collie. Forgotten was their -vague intent to charge the alcove space and trample the blood-soaked -earth around the dead sheep. There was a more worthy object now for -their rage.</p> - -<p>Treve noted his own success in deflecting the rush. Blithely he fled -from before his bellowing foes. But he fled at an increasing angle from -the direction in which first they had been going.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> The steers hammered -on in his wake. He kept scarcely five feet of space between himself and -their front rank. Head high, plumed tail flying, he galloped merrily -along, barking impudent insult over his shoulder; and leading the chase -noisily down the field.</p> - -<p>Treve was having a beautiful time.</p> - -<p>Nearly a mile farther on, he tired of the sport. His ruse had -succeeded. Putting on all speed, he drew away easily from the wearying -cattle; made a wide detour and trotted back to his master. The winded -steers had had quite enough. Finding at length that the dog had -swiftness they could not hope to equal, they shambled to a halt. One -by one they stopped staring sulkily after their tormentor; and fell to -cropping grass. Steers are philosophers, in their way.</p> - -<p>Treve found Joel and Hibben standing with the herdsmen at the fence -gap. They were waiting only for his return to lift the broken-posted -panel to place again, as best they could.</p> - -<p>“If you’re still honin’ to shoot him, Mister Hibben—” began Fenno, -sourly, as Treve came up.</p> - -<p>“I—I left my gun back yonder,” muttered Hibben, in reply, his tall -body still shaking as with a chill. “And, anyhow— Say, put a price -on that collie of yours! Don’t haggle! Put a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> price on him. If I c’n -help it, no such grand dog is going to have to live with a passel of -sheepmen, no longer. He—”</p> - -<p>“This here’s only a dog,” gravely interrupted Fenno, “a no-’count dog, -for the most part. But we-all don’t aim to humiliate him by makin’ him -’sociate with cowboys an’ steers and suchlike trash. He ain’t wuthless -enough for that. So long, neighbor! We’ll be on our way, now. Any time -you want to reform an’ buy a nice bunch of sheep, jes’ give us a call. -C’m’on Trevy!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER IX: HIS MATE</h2> - -<p>When Treve saved Chris Hibben from a peculiarly hideous death under the -hoofs of Chris’s own Triple Bar steers, he did more to patch up a truce -between the Dos Hermanos and the Triple Bar outfits than could a score -of peace conferences.</p> - -<p>From the beginning, throughout the West, sheepmen and cattlemen have -been mortal enemies. Seldom has this eternal feud blazed hotter than -between Chris Hibben’s cattle ranch and the nearby Dos Hermanos sheep -ranch of Joel Fenno and Royce Mack.</p> - -<p>Ever there had been a grim understanding that a sheep or sheepdog -straying over the line into the Triple Bar range was a sheep or -sheepdog killed. More than once this understanding had been justified.</p> - -<p>Then, too, a year before, a bunch of six yearling beef cattle had -strayed through a fence gap and down the coulée into Number Six camp of -the Dos Hermanos. There all trace of them was wiped out;—except that -Toni and the other Dos Hermanos herdsmen varied their dreary<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> fare of -tinned goods and tough mutton by a prolonged fresh-beef debauch.</p> - -<p>Then had come the day when Treve unwittingly played the rôle of Dove -of Peace by turning a cattle stampede and saving the dismounted Hibben -from being trampled into the next world. After which Chris gave terse -command to his cowboys that the pesky Dos Hermanos sheep could come -along and chew the barbs off the wire of the Triple Bar home corral if -they chose to; and if need be they were to be escorted back in safety -and in cotton wool.</p> - -<p>Nor did Hibben stop there. From that one briefly terrific moment of -the turned stampede, he had seen what a collie could accomplish with -cattle. He saw more. He saw that two or three well-trained collies -could do the work of a dozen cowboys. Yes, and they could and would do -it on board wages and without threats of going on strike or complaints -about the grub. Nor would they vanish on pay-day and show up a week -later with delirium tremens. It would be a tremendous saving. Anyhow, -the experiment was worth trying.</p> - -<p>It was not Hibben’s custom to do anything rashly. Thus he planned to -begin in a small way; by the purchase of a single collie. If that first -dog should do the work satisfactorily it would be time to buy more. -With this in view<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> he surprised the Dos Hermanos partners, one evening, -by riding across to their ranch-house. Mack and Fenno were sitting on -the handkerchief-sized porch, smoking a before-bedtime pipe. At Royce’s -feet lay Treve.</p> - -<p>On sound of Hibben’s approach, the big collie was awake and alert. Down -the path he dashed, to meet, and if need be stop, the intruder. Then, -recognizing the man he had rescued, the collie drew aside and let Chris -proceed up the path to the porch.</p> - -<p>“Evening,” said Hibben, stiffly uncertain of his welcome.</p> - -<p>“Evening,” replied Mack, with cold civility, while old Joel Fenno sat -still and scowled mute query.</p> - -<p>“Have you eaten?” went on Royce, in the time-honored local phrase of -hospitality.</p> - -<p>“Yep,” said Chris; adding: “Not cawed mutton, neither.”</p> - -<p>He caught himself up, belatedly recalling that he was at peace with -these sheepmen; and he hurried on to ask:</p> - -<p>“Will you boys set a price on that collie of yours? Nope, I’m not -joshing. I don’t know how such critters run in price. But I’ve got a -couple of hundred dollars in my jeans, here, that I’ll swap for him.”</p> - -<p>“Treve’s not for sale,” was Royce Mack’s curt<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> retort. “We told you -that, the day he kept your steers out of your hair. He—”</p> - -<p>“Hold on!” purred Joel, smitten with one of his rare and beautiful -ideas. “Hold on, Friend Hibben. Trevy ain’t for sale. Just like -my partner says. Not that he’s wuth any man’s money—not even a -cattleman’s. But we’ve got kind of used to his wuthless ways and we aim -to keep him. But if you’re honin’ for a collie, I c’n tell you where to -get one. Always s’posin’ you’re willin’ to pay fair for a high-grade -article. I c’n give you the <i>ad</i>dress of the feller who used to own -Treve.”</p> - -<p>“That’s good enough for me,” returned Chris. “The feller that bred this -dog of yours sure knew how to breed the best. I’ll hand him that much. -And it’s the best I want. Who is he and where does he hang out?”</p> - -<p>“Wait,” said Fenno, with amazing politeness, as he heaved his rheumatic -frame up from his chair and pottered away into the house. “I’ve got his -<i>ad</i>dress in here. I’ll write it down for you.”</p> - -<p>With as near an approach to a grin as his surly leathern mask could -achieve he made his way to his own cubbyhole room. There he dug out the -battered gray catalog of the Dos Hermanos dogshow to which he had taken -Treve. Riffling its pages, he came to the list of <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span>exhibitors’ names at -the back. One of these he jotted down with a pencil stump on a dirty -envelope and returned with it to the porch.</p> - -<p>The name he had found and scribbled was “Fraser Colt.” After it he had -copied the man’s address, from the catalog.</p> - -<p>It seemed to Joel the acme of refined humor to steer this once-hostile -cowpuncher up against the man of all others who seemed most likely -to cheat him. Judging from his own experience with Colt, he felt -reasonably certain the dog-breeder could be relied on to whipsaw any -trusting customer; especially when that customer was so far distant as -to make it necessary to buy, sight unseen.</p> - -<p>Royce Mack gave a low whistle of amaze as Fenno showed the name and -address to him, on the way across the porch to hand it to Hibben. Then -Mack choked back a half-born expostulation. He remembered the loss of -sheep after sheep at the hands of the Triple Bar outfit. He saw no -reason to spoil his partner’s joke.</p> - -<p>A week later, in response to a letter of inquiry, Chris received -word from Fraser Colt that the latter had no full-grown and trained -cattle-herding collies in stock, just then; but that he had an -unusually promising thoroughbred female collie puppy which could -readily be taught<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> to work cattle, since both her parents had been -natural cattle workers.</p> - -<p>As Mr. Fraser Colt was closing out his kennels and moving East, Mr. -C. Hibben was at liberty to avail himself of this really remarkable -chance for a bargain, by purchasing the puppy in question (“Cirenhaven -Nellie”) at the ridiculously low price of seventy-five dollars; payable -in advance. If this generous proposition interested Mr. C. Hibben, -would Mr. C. Hibben kindly forward his check (certified) for the above -sum; along with shipping directions? If, on the contrary, Mr. C. Hibben -was a mere “shopper” or was inclined to haggle, this letter required no -answer.</p> - -<p>Now Chris Hibben could no more have been cheated or overcharged on -a consignment of beef cattle than could a bank cashier be hoaxed by -a leaden half-dollar. But, on the subject of dogs he was woefully -ignorant. Moreover, there was a curtly self-assured and businesslike -tang to the letter, which impressed him. Besides, hadn’t the Dos -Hermanos outfit a wonder-dog, acquired from the same man? Surely it was -worth the gamble.</p> - -<p>Chris sent the certified check, as soon as he could get it from the -Santa Carlotta bank.</p> - -<p>A week later arrived a matchwood crate, containing the collie pup. -Hibben himself motored<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> across to Santa Carlotta to bring home his -purchase. His homeward road led past the Dos Hermanos ranch. He saw the -two partners washing up, on the steps, preparatory to supper. Beside -them stood Treve; mildly tired and more than mildly hungry after a long -day on the range.</p> - -<p>Chris turned in at the gate and hailed Fenno and Mack, pointing with -pride to the crate.</p> - -<p>“Oh, you got her, hey?” said Joel, with much interest. “I’ll come out -and have a look at the pup. Fraser Colt sure knows a collie. Pretty -near as intimate as a vivisector is due to know the smell of brimstone. -This dog will be a treat to see.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll save you the trouble of comin’ out here,” called back Hibben, -lifting the crate and its light burden out of the truck. “I’ll fetch -her up there, onto your stoop. I haven’t even had a chance to look at -her yet. We’ll have an inspection bee. I want your opinion of her.”</p> - -<p>As he talked, he was carrying the crate along the path. Joel astounded -Royce Mack by going out to meet him and by carrying one end of the box -up the steps. Joel was not wont to lend an unasked hand.</p> - -<p>On the porch floor the crate was set. Hibben undid its crazy catch and -opened its door.</p> - -<p>Slowly, uncertainly, a half-grown collie pup stepped out and stood -before them. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span></p> - -<p>Hibben nodded appreciatively. He was no dog judge. But he could see -that this was a really handsome puppy. Her coat was dense and long. -It was a rich mahogany in hue; save for the snowy chest and paws -and tailtip. An expert might have found the pretty head too broad -and the ears too large and low for show-purposes or even for a show -brood-matron’s career. But the newcomer was decidedly good-looking. She -seemed not only intelligent but strong.</p> - -<p>Joel puckered his forehead. The unaccustomed smirk fled from his -leathern face. The joke was turning out to be no joke at all. This -strikingly handsome youngster appeared to be well worth seventy-five -dollars.</p> - -<p>Mack was loud in his praise. But, like Fenno, he could not reconcile -the pup’s excellent value with his own theories of Colt.</p> - -<p>“Yep,” pursued Hibben, “that’s Cirenhaven Nellie. A beauty, ain’t she? -I’m sure your debtor for sickin’ me onto that Colt chap. I wish now I’d -ordered a couple more of ’em.”</p> - -<p>Treve had watched with keen interest the opening of the crate. Now he -came forward eagerly and touched noses with the bewildered pup. His -plumed tail was wagging in friendly welcome.</p> - -<p>“He won’t bite Nellie, will he?” asked Hibben, a trifle anxiously. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span></p> - -<p>“No,” answered Royce Mack. “Man is about the only animal that mistreats -the female of his race. Treve’s making friends with her. See, Joel? -He’s making more friends with her than ever he’s made with any of the -range collies. He acts like he knew she was helpless and that he had to -protect her. He—”</p> - -<p>Mack broke off in his lecture. The new puppy had begun to move about, -on the porch, with a queer wariness. Now, coming to its edge, she did -not observe that there was a two-foot drop to the yard below; and she -was stepping out into space when a quick intervention of Treve’s shaggy -shoulder turned her back to confused safety.</p> - -<p>“Hold on!” exclaimed Joel, suddenly. “I knew there was a catch in it, -somewheres. An’ her eyes have a funny look, too! Watch me.”</p> - -<p>He struck a match and held it scarcely an inch from the puppy’s wide -eyes; twitching the flame back and forth in the windless air, so close -to her unflinching pupils that the lashes were all but singed. Nellie -did not so much as blink.</p> - -<p>“Blind!” diagnosed Joel, with grim satisfaction. “Stone blind. I knew -there was suthin’ queer. There was bound to be. Been blind always, most -likely, if she’s only six months old. Hibben, you’re stung all the way -acrost the board. Your Cirenhaven Nellie couldn’t ever be learned<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> to -herd anything—without it was the three blind mice the feller writ the -song about. You’re seventy-five dollars in the hole!”</p> - -<p>The poor blind pup seemed to sense the ridicule in his tone. She shrank -back a little in her groping approach toward the speaker. Instantly, -Treve licked her face reassuringly, as though he were comforting a -scared child. The big dog had known instinctively that this newcomer -was afflicted and unable to look after herself. And his great heart had -gone out to her in loving protectiveness.</p> - -<p>Now, before Joel had fairly stopped speaking, the sensitive Nellie -shrank even more appealingly against Treve’s shaggy side. For Chris -Hibben was waking the echoes with a salvo of profanity that shook the -house. Fenno listened with real interest to the outburst. He had the -air of one who is acquiring many new and valuable words. As Chris -paused for breath, Joel said sanctimoniously to Treve:</p> - -<p>“Best run indoors, Trevy. You’re learnin’ language that won’t do you no -reel good. You’ve been brought up by a couple of God-fearin’ sheep men. -This blasphemious cattle talk is new to you. Best run away till he—”</p> - -<p>A sharp gesture from Hibben interrupted him. The cattleman whipped out -his heavy pistol and leveled it at the hapless little female collie as -she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> crouched shivering and frightened before him.</p> - -<p>Nellie had had bruisingly terrible experience with Fraser Colt’s brutal -rages. To her, the sound of an angry voice meant a fast-ensuing kick—a -kick her blind eyes could not tell her how to avoid.</p> - -<p>Treve, too, understood Chris Hibben’s volley of fury; and he understood -the deadly gesture which was its climax. In an instant he was ready for -what might follow.</p> - -<p>“Stand clear!” bawled Hibben, dropping his pistol muzzle to cover the -quivering Nellie’s head. “You boys tolled me into gettin’ this cur. Now -you boys c’n have the job of buryin’ her an’ of mopping up your stoop. -Stand clear, I said! And haul Treve out of the way; unless you want me -to drill him, too.”</p> - -<p>For the tawny gold collie had stepped quietly between Chris and the -puppy. Steadfastly, his mighty body guarding the cowed little Nellie, -he was gazing at the furious cattleman.</p> - -<p>Hibben took a stride nearer his victim. With his free hand and one -booted foot, he thrust Treve sharply from between him and Nellie; -leveling the pistol afresh as he did so.</p> - -<p>Now, it was not on the free list to lay menacing hands upon Treve; to -say nothing of booting him. The thing had never before been done. Added -to his natural resentment was his keen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> urge to save Nellie from the -fate he fore-read in Hibben’s glance and in the leveled pistol. Once -before had he seen the man fire that pistol; and he had seen a Dos -Hermanos sheep fall dead from its bullet.</p> - -<p>Before Chris could shoot, a furry thunderbolt launched itself on him; -lethal as a flung spear; silent with concentrated wrath.</p> - -<p>Under that fierce impact the unprepared Hibben reeled back; his finger -spasmodically pressing the trigger as he threw both arms up to shield -his menaced throat.</p> - -<p>The bullet rent a splintering hole in the porch roof. The marksman, in -his staggering retreat, slipped off the edge of the top step and bumped -backward to earth; with a thud that knocked the breath out of him.</p> - -<p>Scarce had his lean shoulders touched ground when Treve was on him; -ravening for his throat.</p> - -<p>Mack watched, dumbfounded. Joel, quicker-witted, yelled to the dog. -Reluctantly, Treve quitted his prey; and in a bound was back at -Joel’s side; while Royce Mack with profuse apologies was helping the -sputteringly infuriated Hibben to his feet.</p> - -<p>Joel surreptitiously picked up the fallen pistol from the floor and -pocketed it. Then he turned to look at Treve, who had left his side and -had moved across to Nellie. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span></p> - -<p>The puppy, frightened out of all self-control, had bolted. Her -blundering rush had brought her up against the house door with a force -that knocked her down. Now, shaking all over and moaning softly, she -crouched with her head hidden in the angle of porch and door.</p> - -<p>Above her stood Treve; his eyes fixed on Hibben in cold menace. The big -dog knew well that it was not permissible to attack a human; least of -all a human who was the guest of his two masters. Perhaps swift death -might be the punishment for his deed. But he did not falter.</p> - -<p>His body shielding the wretched puppy, he stood there, tensely ready -for Hibben’s next assault. Joel Fenno read the dog’s purpose and his -thoughts; as he might have read those of a fellowman. The collie was -playing with possible death, to guard something that could not defend -itself. Fenno’s gnarled old heart gave a queer twist.</p> - -<p>“Trevy!” he breathed, under cover of Hibben’s loudly truculent return -to the porch.</p> - -<p>At sound of Joel’s voice, Treve shifted his stern gaze from Chris to -the old man. And in the collie’s sorrowful dark eyes, now, was an agony -of appeal. So might the eyes of a mother be raised to the doctor who -alone could save her sick child.</p> - -<p>Joel Fenno’s thin lips set tightly. His old<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> eyes were slits. He was -about to do the foolishest thing of his career. The saner half of him -told him so and reviled him scathingly for it. But sanity went by the -board, in face of that awful pleading in his belovèd dog’s eyes.</p> - -<p>“Hold on, friend!” he interposed, as the cursing Hibben peered -murderously about the floor for his lost pistol. “You’ll stop temptin’ -Providence to swat this shack with lightin’, as a punishment for that -string of hellfire words you’re bellerin’; and you’ll listen to me. -You paid seventy-five dollars for this poor sick puppy you’re tryin’ -to kill. Well, I’m buyin’ her off’n you, for seventy-five dollars. -Get that? <i>I’m buyin’ her!</i> Now shut up an’ stand quiet-like, while I -traipse indoors and git the cash for you.... I’m doin’ this out’n my -own pocket!” he snarled at the thunderstruck Royce. “Not out of the -partnership funds. Josh me all you like. I don’t care a hoot for your -blattin’. I’ve—I’ve took a sort of fancy to the pup.”</p> - -<p>Five minutes later Hibben was driving away; grumbling but appeased. -Joel, awkward and shamefaced, was guiding Nellie’s questing nose to -a saucer of bread and milk. Royce Mack was looking on, bereft of -speech and incredulous. Treve, too, was looking on; a glint of utter -contentment in his deepset eyes. Joel addressed his blank-faced -partner, glumly: </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Now I s’pose you’ll be makin’ my life rotten by hect’rin’ me ’bout -this! Well, I done it to show you there c’n be another dog on this -ranch as wuthless as your mis’ble Treve. At that, I doubt if she’s as -wuthless as what he is. She ain’t lived so long on the same ranch with -<i>you</i>.”</p> - -<p class="space-above">Followed the first peaceful, not to say beautifully happy, time that -Nellie had ever known. From the moment Fraser Colt had discovered her -blindness—and thus her absolute uselessness—she had been kicked and -maltreated and made to feel that her only use in life was to serve as a -vent for her breeder’s ill-temper.</p> - -<p>Colt had continued to feed and lodge her, only in the well-founded -hope of cheating some one into buying her. He and his kennels had -been permanently disqualified by the American Kennel Club for crooked -dealings. So, as he was forced to go out of the dog business, anyway, -he had no fear of reprisal, in selling the blind puppy to some novice.</p> - -<p>Under decent treatment now, Nellie’s brain and spirits bloomed forth. -Swift to learn and coming from a breed that has more than normal -intelligence, her progress was amazing. Ever beside her, to fend off -trouble and to show her the way, was Treve. With unfailing patience -Treve watched over her and trained her. Joel<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> looked on with secret -admiration and patiently contributed his own quota to the wise training.</p> - -<p>Nellie could never hope to see. But, with almost miraculous intuition -she learned to find her way about. A collie’s ears and nose are more to -him than are his eyes. Nellie’s absence of sight intensified tenfold -her power of scent and of hearing.</p> - -<p>She could track either of the partners for miles, nose to earth; nearly -always forewarned in some occult manner to avoid obstacles in her path. -She was even, in a small way, of help to Treve in rounding up sheep. -And ever that strange instinct—a sort of sixth sense—developed more -and more, as her brain and experience developed.</p> - -<p>Around the house she was the sweetest and most loving of pets; though -her real adoration and slavish worship were lavished on Treve alone. -She was his shadow. And to her he accorded a tender friendliness which -he had refrained haughtily from bestowing on the splay-footed little -black range collies.</p> - -<p>It was nearly six months after the coming of Nellie that the blizzard -struck the Dos Hermanos region.</p> - -<p>In that southerly and semi-arid stretch, snow was a rarity. Heavy snows -were practically unknown in the lowlands. Storms, which <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span>whitened the -Dos Hermanos peaks and slopes, fell usually as rain in the valley. But -now, in mid-February, came a genuine blizzard.</p> - -<p>It caught the ranch totally by surprise. The various bunches of sheep -were grazing wide; as usual at that rain-flecked time of year. Out -of a softly blue sky came a softer grayish haze. Two hours later the -blizzard was roaring in full spectacular fury.</p> - -<p>Every man and every dog was pressed into service. Floundering knee-deep -through drifts, the partners and their herdsmen and Sing Lee, the new -Chinese cook, sought puffingly to drive the scattered and snow-whipped -sheep to places of shelter.</p> - -<p>The dogs, half-submerged in the floury snow, staggered and fought their -way in the teeth of the blast and the stabbing cold. Their pads were -tight-packed with painful snow-lumps. There was no time to stop and -gnaw these torments out. The dogs drove on, limping, unresting.</p> - -<p>It was a madly busy three or four hours. Men and dogs alike were -blinded by the whirling tons of snow. There was no such thing as -following a scent, with any accuracy, through that smother. Nor could a -voice be heard, fifty feet away, in the screech of the gale.</p> - -<p>Spent, dizzy, numb, the partners came back at last to their snow-piled -home. The storm had<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> ceased as suddenly as it had begun. Already a -watery sunshine was beginning to glisten on the ocean of snow that -spread everywhere.</p> - -<p>“All safe except the bunch on Six Range,” reported Royce breathlessly -as he and Fenno met, near the gate. “It was touch-and-go, with the -whole lot. But those got tangled up somehow in the blizzard and bolted. -Treve and I worked for two hours to find them. But it was no good. -They’ve stampeded over the rock wall of the coulée or else over the -cliff into the river. Either way, they’re goners. In a storm like that -they—”</p> - -<p>He stopped short. The dazzling white snow around the house was darkened -by a shifting and huddling mass of dirty gray. The partners squinted -their snow-blurred eyes to see what the phenomenon might mean.</p> - -<p>There, encircling the house and pressing against it for warmth in a -world of pitiless cold, swarmed something like three hundred sheep.</p> - -<p>On the porch—worn out and panting, her pink tongue lolling—slumped -Cirenhaven Nellie.</p> - -<p>Nellie had followed Treve, as ever, into the welter of blizzard, in -pursuit of the stampeded Number Six flock. Presently she had caught the -scent on her own account; and had held it. When Treve had been lured -aside in quest of a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> handful of strays that had turned back from the -main stampede, Nellie had plodded heavily on.</p> - -<p>The scent of the main body of sheep had by this time become too badly -obliterated by snow-swirl and cross-winds, for even Treve to pick it -up. He could not scent Nellie’s own tracks through that hurricane of -whizzing snow which blotted out each footstep as fast as it was made.</p> - -<p>But to Nellie the elusive scent was still strong enough for her -preternaturally keen nose to follow it more or less correctly. When -this was at times impossible, her uncanny instinct—the instinct of the -trained blind—carried her on. Slowly, wearily, yet unfaltering, she -kept up the quest.</p> - -<p>She came staggeringly upon the sheep, at last, as they wavered on -the precipice edge of the coulée—as they waited for some leader to -be insane enough to fling himself over the brink; so that they might -follow. Nellie ran nimbly along the slippery cliff-edge; forcing them -back with bark and nip; just as one panicky wether was gathering -himself for the downward leap.</p> - -<p>Back she drove them, huddled and bleating and milling; rounding up the -exhausted beasts and heading them away from the coulée. She had no -faintest idea where they belonged; or whither to guide them. All she -knew was that she was sick and suffering and that she stood in dire<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> -need of getting home. Her Hour was close upon her. So homeward she -drove the flock; unaware that she had achieved a bit of tracking that -no normal-eyed sheepdog could have hoped to copy.</p> - -<p>Next morning, Chris Hibben started for Santa Carlotta, to direct the -unloading of freight for the Triple Bar. The snow was too deep for a -car to get through it. So Hibben rode his strongest cow-pony;—a pony -that made heavy enough going of it through the drifts. As Chris neared -the Dos Hermanos ranch house, a man came running out of the kitchen and -hailed him excitedly.</p> - -<p>The man was Joel Fenno. Never before had Hibben seen the old chap -excited. Fearing something might be amiss in the house, the rider -dismounted, tossed the bridle over his pony’s head and waded up the -walk.</p> - -<p>“What’s wrong?” he demanded, as he came face to face with Joel.</p> - -<p>“Nuthin’s wrong,” Fenno assured him, his mouth twisted in an effort to -grin. “Ev’rything’s grand—and ‘ev’rything’ incloods a bunch of three -hundred sheep that Nellie yanked out’n the blizzard yest’d’y, for us. -That dog sure paid her board yest’d’y. She—”</p> - -<p>“Say!” interposed Chris, none too graciously. “Did you stop me, when I -was in a hurry, just<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> to tell me Nellie had been wastin’ her time by -roundin’ up a lot of mangy sheep? I’m gladder’n ever that I sold her -to you, if that’s all she’s fit for. Now if it’d been a bunch of good -cattle—”</p> - -<p>“She’s fit for suthin’ else,” returned Fenno. “That wa’n’t why I -high-signed you. I wanted to show you the suthin’ else she’s fit for. -C’m’on in.”</p> - -<p>He led the way into the kitchen. There, behind the stove, was a -big box, half full of soft rags. In the box lay Cirenhaven Nellie, -reclining comfortably on her side. At sound of Joel’s step her tail -gave a lazy wag or two, by way of welcome. But at sound and scent of -the stranger behind him, her tail ceased to wave, and her lip curled in -menace. For Nellie was on guard again.</p> - -<p>This time she was not guarding silly sheep. She was guarding eight -squirming gray-brown atoms, that nuzzled close against her furry body.</p> - -<p>The baby collies were no larger than plump rats. But the way they -wriggled and drank proved them none the worse for their mother’s -gallant exploits of the preceding day.</p> - -<p>At a gentle word from Royce Mack, the collie mother dropped her tired -head back on the bed of rags and suffered the outsider to draw near and -gaze. Hibben stood looking curiously at the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> snuggling family in the -box. Treve crossed the kitchen and stood beside Mack, his head on one -side, gazing down at his babies. It was Joel who broke the silence.</p> - -<p>“Eight of ’em!” he proclaimed. “An’ they take after their ma. For -ev’ry one of ’em is as blind as a cowman’s int’llects. But in another -nine days the hull eight of ’em is due to git their eyes wide open. -That’s when they’ll commence to take after their pa an’ be a credit to -a sheep ranch. How many of ’em d’you want us to save out for you—at -seventy-five dollars per?”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER X: THE RUSTLERS</h2> - -<p>Three miles to eastward of the Dos Hermanos ranch runs the Black Angel -Trail. Far to northward it has its beginning. It cuts the state from -top to bottom, like a jaggèd swordstroke. Up above the Peixoto Range it -starts; and it runs almost due south across the Mexican border.</p> - -<p>Nearly a century ago this trail was blazed. Of old it was the chief -artery between the north counties and Mexico. The state roads and the -railways have long since taken its place; and have diverted from it the -bulk of traffic. Bumps and dips and narrow cuts between canyonsides -render it impassable to motor car or to other modern vehicle.</p> - -<p>But in spite of all this, the grass does not grow over-thick in -the Black Angel Trail. No longer a main highway, it is a mighty -convenient byway. Burro trains still traverse it. So do cattle drovers -and shepherds. So do less reputable forms of traffic. It has great -advantages over the thronged and town-fringed state roads, for the -driving of livestock as well as for the transporting of goods which -are best moved with no<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> undue publicity. Sojourners of the Black Angel -Trail have a way of minding their own business. The law seldom patrols -the backwater route or takes cognizance of it.</p> - -<p>Along this trail, from southward, one day in earliest spring, fared a -bee caravan, five wagons strong. Each wagon carried full complement of -hives.</p> - -<p>The only noteworthy detail of the procession was that it numbered -several more grown men than can usually find time to accompany such a -caravan. The chief work of the bee route can be done by women and boys; -leaving most of the men of the family or community to attend to the -crops at home.</p> - -<p>Every year, these bee caravans are loaded with hives, as soon as the -fruit blossoms in the southernmost corner of the state have been -despoiled of their honey-making possibilities. Northward move the -caravans; following the various blossom seasons; and camping in likely -spots along the way, to let their bees ravage whatever blooms happen to -be most plentiful at that place and at that time.</p> - -<p>There is a regularly marked-out rotation of blossom-ripening, in one -section of the state after the other. And this rotation the beekeepers -follow; thus gathering the choicest honey everywhere and all season -long. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span></p> - -<p>The five-wagon caravan halted and pitched camp in a sheltered arroyo, a -few miles from the borders of the Dos Hermanos ranch. It was the first -year a bee outfit had done such a thing. But then it was the first year -the new almond orchard of the Goldring ranch, a mile to east of the -arroyo, had put forth any profusion of blossoms. Thus there was nothing -remarkable about the occurrence.</p> - -<p>Indeed when Royce Mack rode back from collecting the mail at Santa -Carlotta, and told his partner about their temporary neighbors, old -Joel Fenno did not deem the news worth so much as a grunt of comment.</p> - -<p>Instead, he glared dourly at Treve, who had trotted homeward alongside -Royce’s mustang.</p> - -<p>“That cur,” he railed, “is gettin’ wuthlesser an’ wuthlesser ev’ry -day of his life. Here I go an’ train poor little blind Nellie to work -sheep with him; an’ this morning I took her along to help me shift that -Number Four bunch to Number Five. It was a two-dog job; ’count of the -twist by the coulée an’ ’count of some of the bunch bein’ new. I took -her and Zit. What d’ye s’pose? She wouldn’t work with him! Acted like -she didn’t know how. An’ no more she did, I reckon; her havin’ worked -only with Treve and only knowin’ his ways, an’ all that. I couldn’t -do a thing with her. Only that she’s<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> blind an’ that she was most -likely doin’ her best, I’d ’a’ whaled the daylights out’n her. An’ -where was Treve, all that time? Where <i>was</i> he, I’m askin’ you? He was -pirooting over to Santa Carlotta, along of <i>you</i>; pleasurin’ himself -an’ holiday-makin’, while there was work to do;—the measly slacker!”</p> - -<p>“It wasn’t Treve’s fault,” rejoined Mack, wearily. “I took him along -for comp’ny. I didn’t know you were aiming to shift that bunch till -to-morrow. You said—”</p> - -<p>“Took him ’long for comp’ny?” gibed Fenno. “<i>Comp’ny</i>, hey? You got -plenty of comp’ny here, without no useless dog traipsin’ after you. -Ain’t <i>I</i> ‘comp’ny,’ if comp’ny’s what you’re honin’ after. Ain’t I?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” said Mack, briefly. “That’s why I took Treve.”</p> - -<p>Leaving his glum partner to digest this cryptic speech, Royce stamped -off to the back steps to wash up for dinner. Left alone with Treve, the -elder partner lost his disgusted glower. Glancing furtively after Mack, -he drew something from his pocket.</p> - -<p>“Trevy!” he called under his breath.</p> - -<p>The big collie had been following Royce out of the room. At the whisper -of his name he halted and turned quickly back. Tail wagging and eyes -full of eager friendliness to the old man<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> who had just been denouncing -him so harshly, he came up to Joel and sniffed interestedly at the hand -extended to him. In the palm was a crumby and none-too-clean fragment -of cake.</p> - -<p>It was the final morsel left from a surreptitious visit to the bakery, -the last time Joel had gone to Santa Carlotta. Guiltily, the old man -had bought a whole pound of stale jumbles. He had bought them for -Treve’s sole benefit; and he had been doling them out, secretly, to -the delighted collie ever since. It was the first present of any sort -he had purchased for anybody or anything, in all his sixty-odd crabbèd -years.</p> - -<p>“Here you are, Trevy!” said Joel hospitably, as the collie made a -single dainty mouthful of the offering. “An’ when we go to town, -next time, I’ll see can I git you some pound cake. Pound cake is -dretful good. You’ll sure relish it a whole lot, Trevy. Mighty few -millionaires’ dogs gits to eat pound cake, I reckon. Then—Say, -Royce,” he broke off, snarlingly, as he caught the sound of his -partner’s return, “call this durn cuss out onto the stoop with you. -He’s tromplin’ dust all over the clean floor. Dogs don’t b’long in the -house, anyhow. You’ve got him pampered till he’s no good to no one. He -thinks he’s folks. Take him outside!”</p> - -<p>“I forgot to tell you,” said Royce, coming<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> into the room, red and -shining from his wash, “I met up with Chris Hibben, over at Santa -Carlotta. He was coming out of the sheriff’s office; and he was mad as -hops. He says thirty of his beef cattle were run off the Triple Bar -last night. Three of his cow-ponies were lifted right out of the home -corral, too, he says.”</p> - -<p>“Strayed, most likely,” suggested Joel, with no sign of interest in his -neighbor’s mishap.</p> - -<p>“Chris says not,” denied Royce. “He says they were lifted. Says it’s -rustlers.”</p> - -<p>At the ominous word, Joel Fenno’s crooked brows twitched. Nobody in the -sheep-and-cattle country, in those days, could hear the name “rustlers” -without a twinge. In spite of watchfulness and in defiance of all law, -livestock thieves had not yet been stamped out. They worked, as a rule, -in gangs and with consummate cleverness. Their system of theft might -vary, as occasion demanded. But whatever the system chanced to be, it -had a way of circumventing the best efforts of ranchers.</p> - -<p>It was easy for crafty and organized bands to lift large or small -bunches of livestock from a vast range; to drive it to the nearest safe -hiding place; and thence run it across the border or sell it to some -dishonest wholesale butcher’s agent. There was much money in such an -enterprise;—much money and occasional death. For<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> the captured rustler -expected and received short shrift. The Black Angel Trail was the local -livestock thief’s route to wealth.</p> - -<p>Long and disputatiously the Dos Hermanos partners talked over the news; -Fenno as usual discrediting its truth and Royce increasingly impressed -by it. The conference ended with an arrangement to send word to every -herder on the Dos Hermanos ranch to keep strict guard for a night or -two, and to carry a shotgun.</p> - -<p>“Treve,” said Royce, at bedtime, as the collie prepared to stretch -himself as usual on the rag mat at the foot of his master’s bunk, -“you’ve got to do guard duty to-night. It’s outdoors for yours. There -are too many sheep in the home fold, just now, for us to take any -chances. The other dogs are out on the range; and they’ve got to stay -there while this scare lasts. All but Nellie. She’s no good, Joel says, -except when you can work with her. It’s up to you to keep an eye on the -fold. Outside, son! <i>Watch!</i>”</p> - -<p>Treve did not catch the meaning of one-tenth of his master’s harangue. -But he understood enough of it to know, past doubt, that he was -expected to stay away from his cherished rag mat that night, and -stand guard over the house and the stable-buildings and the adjoining -fold. He sighed discontent at his banishment. Then obediently he -went outdoors and lay down with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> a little thump on the corner of the -porch;—a post whence he could see or hear or scent anything going on -in the clutter of outbuildings and yards in the hollow directly below.</p> - -<p>His little blind mate, Nellie, came forward from the door-mat which -was her usual bed and walked across the porch to him. Mincingly she -came; her mahogany coat fluffing in the faint breeze. She touched noses -affectionately with the big golden dog. Then, crouching, she danced her -white forepaws on the boards, excitedly, tempting Treve to a romp.</p> - -<p>But Treve was on duty, and he knew it. He resisted the temptation for -a scamper and a mock battle in the soft dust. He lay still, merely -wagging his plumed tail in recognition of the inviting dance. Failing -to lure her mate into a frolic, Nellie lay soberly down beside him, her -graceful body curled against his mighty shoulder.</p> - -<p>She loved to romp with Treve. Always he was as gentle in his play with -her as with a weak child. With her, alone of the ranch dogs, would he -unbend from his benign dignity. But since he would not play to-night, -it was next best to cuddle close to him and to join in his vigil.</p> - -<p>The long nights were a stupid and lonely time to Nellie, out there -by herself on the porch. It made her happy, now, to have Treve’s -companionship in the hours of dark. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span></p> - -<p>The two collies dozed. Yet they dozed as only a trained watch-dog knows -how to; with every sense subconsciously alert. A little after midnight -both their heads were lifted in unison, and both sets of ears were -pricked to listen.</p> - -<p>Along the road beyond the ranch-house gate came the pad-pad-pad of a -slow-ridden horse that wore no shoes.</p> - -<p>This, by itself, was not a matter for excitement. Both collies knew the -ill-kept road was public, and that passersby were not to be molested. -Thus, they did not give tongue, nor do more than look up and listen as -the horse padded by.</p> - -<p>The night was close-clouded; though there was a moon behind the -banks of gray vapor. There was light enough for even a human to -detect dimly any objects moving at a reasonable distance. To Treve’s -night-accustomed eyes there was no difficulty in making out the figures -of horse and rider as they passed the gate.</p> - -<p>The man was sitting carelessly in the saddle. His face was turned -toward the house, on whose porch-edge the two silent collies were -wholly visible to him. He watched them a moment or so, and they -returned his gaze.</p> - -<p>Then gradually his horse carried him past and on a line paralleling -the outbuildings. Treve’s eyes followed him, but only in the mildest -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span>interest, as an incident of a quiet night. Nellie’s uncannily keen -nostrils sniffed the rider’s unfamiliar scent, as the breeze bore it to -her.</p> - -<p>Then, of a sudden, Treve got to his feet; his hackles bristling. -Dutifully, Nellie followed his example.</p> - -<p>The rider had jogged on for more than a hundred yards. But at the far -end of the outbuildings he had halted his horse. Dismounting, he took -a hesitant step toward the palings which separated the ranch from -the road. Instantly, both dogs were in motion. Running shoulder to -shoulder, they bore down upon the man to resent the threat of intrusion.</p> - -<p>Now “Greaser” Todd was anything but a fool. Hence the deservedly high -place he occupied in his chosen trade. He knew dogs. A man in his line -of business must know them and know them well. Of these two dogs he had -gained casual knowledge, not only on an earlier ride past the ranch, -but from chat with one of the herders whom he had managed to engage in -idle talk that day. Thus, he was not silly enough to suppose he could -hope to climb the paling undeterred.</p> - -<p>But he had no desire to climb it just then. His plan was to get the -dogs down here, well away from the house and from any possibly wakeful -occupant thereof. Moreover, their dash<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> would unquestionably bring -forth any other of the ranch dogs which might be quartered around the -fold.</p> - -<p>As Treve and Nellie ran silently toward him, Todd sprang to the saddle -again and set his mount in motion. The two collies came alongside, -just inside the paling, as Greaser touched heel to his horse. He was -grateful that they had advanced in silence, instead of barking in a way -to disturb weary sleepers’ rest. He was a most considerate man, was -Greaser Todd.</p> - -<p>As he cantered off, he drew from his saddlebags two objects, each about -half the size of a man’s fist, and tossed them over the paling at the -angrily dancing collies.</p> - -<p>The two flung objects were hunks of cooked meat; savory and alluring. -One of them, on its downward flight, would have hit Treve in the head -had not he flashed aside from the strange missile. It struck against -a sloping stone and bounced back again through the gap between two -palings into the dust of the road. There it lay, out of his reach; -unless he should care to go all the way around to the gate and retrieve -the tempting food. There Fenno found it next day.</p> - -<p>The second bit of well-aimed meat fell to earth directly in front of -Nellie’s quivering nostrils. Lightly fed and perpetually hungry,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> she -pounced upon the titbit; guided by her powers of scent. One gulp and -she had swallowed it.</p> - -<p>Treve was of two minds as to the advisability of waking the echoes -with a salvo of barking by way of farewell insult to the intruder, -or to go around and get the delicious-smelling meat that had rolled -so provokingly out of his reach. The man was gone. His horse’s light -hoofbeats were dying away, up the coulée. The logical thing to do now -was to get that generously-given meat and devour it.</p> - -<p>Already, Nellie was beside the palings, thrusting her slender nose -through the gap, in quest of the food she could smell but could not -get. Being blind, she could not know, as did Treve, the futility of -pushing her nose through one paling-gap after another in the hope of -finding a space wide enough to let her jaws close on the meat.</p> - -<p>But as Treve set off, along the inner side of the fence, on his errand -of retrieving the fragment of cooked food, she seemed to understand his -purpose. For she trotted eagerly alongside him; her shoulder as ever -touching his, in order to guide her steps.</p> - -<p>Treve had not gone twenty feet when he felt her swing away from him, in -a lurch that almost upset her. Halting to let her catch up with him<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> -after her supposed stumble, he saw Nellie stagger sideways a step or -two, then curl back her lips from her teeth and come to a shivering -stop. She moaned once in stifled agony; then collapsed in a furry heap -on the ground.</p> - -<p>Full of keen solicitude, Treve ran over to where she lay. As he gazed -worriedly down upon the pitifully still little body, a trembling shook -him from crown to toes. Not for the first time was the great collie -looking upon Death.</p> - -<p>His adored little mate was dead;—stone dead. How or why she had been -stricken down so suddenly—she who just now had been so full of life -and of pretty, loving ways—was beyond his knowledge. But grief smote -him to the depths of his soul.</p> - -<p>Long he stood there above her; now and then touching her still little -body or face with his nose, as if entreating her to come back to him. -Then, whimpering as no physical pain could have made him whimper, he -turned and fled to the house.</p> - -<p>Even as man in dire distress turns to his God for aid, so did the -heartbroken collie turn now to his two human gods.</p> - -<p>Bounding up on the porch, he scratched imperiously at the locked door; -whining and sobbing in stark anguish of heart. Perhaps these<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> humans -could bring back to life the dear mate who had meant so much to him.</p> - -<p>Fiercely impatient in his grief, he scratched the harder at the door -panel; crying under his breath and quivering as in a death-chill.</p> - -<p>After an eternity came a slumbrous and cross voice from Royce Mack’s -room.</p> - -<p>“Shut up there, Treve!” commanded Royce, angry at being wakened. “Shut -up, you fool! No, you can’t come in! You’re spoiled—pampered—just as -Joel said. You’ll stay outside, as I told you to. Shut up!”</p> - -<p>Mack rolled over, as he finished shouting his peevish order, and sank -again into slumber, worn out by his long day in the open.</p> - -<p>Treve shrank back from the door as though his master’s angry reproof -had been a blow. Hesitant, he crouched there. He had turned to his god -in his moment of heartbreak. And his god had refused to come to his aid.</p> - -<p>Then, an instant later, the collie’s ears were raised in new eagerness. -A soft, if stumpy, footfall was crossing the kitchen floor. Joel Fenno -opened the door and slipped out onto the porch, in sketchy attire, -closing the door behind him.</p> - -<p>“What’s the matter, Trevy?” he whispered. “What’s wrong, old sonny? -Hey?”</p> - -<p>Treve caught him by the hem of his <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span>abbreviated nightshirt and tugged -at the garment, frantically; backing off the steps and seeking to drag -Fenno after him. Joel gave one sharp look at the quivering dog; then -nodded.</p> - -<p>“I’ll take your tip, Trevy,” he whispered, disengaging his shirt from -the hauling jaws. “Wait!”</p> - -<p>He tiptoed indoors. But Treve was content. He knew the man would rejoin -him.</p> - -<p>In less than a minute Joel came back. He had yanked on his trousers and -had stuck his feet into a ragged pair of carpet slippers. Under his -arm he carried a loaded shotgun. In a trouser pocket were stuck four -buckshot cartridges and a flashlight.</p> - -<p>“Now, then,” he bade the dog, “come on!”</p> - -<p>Treve waited for no second bidding. He wheeled and made for the -outbuildings. At every few rods, he would pause and look back to make -sure Fenno was following.</p> - -<p>“All right!” grumbled Joel, as if to a human companion. “All right! -I’m a-comin’, Trevy. I heard Royce call you a fool, jes’ now. Maybe -it’s me that’s the fool for trailin’ along with you. And then ag’in, -maybe not. You ain’t given to actin’ like this. Besides, with all this -rustler-talk—”</p> - -<p>He stopped short. Treve was no longer leading him on. The dog had -halted at the fence<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> edge, and was standing there, looking downward in -drooping misery at something small and dark that lay at his feet. Joel -pressed his flashlight button.</p> - -<p>Almost instantly he released the pressure. But not before he had seen -Nellie’s lifeless body and had taken cognizance of her writhen lips. -Her attitude and her convulsed mouth told their own story.</p> - -<p>“Pizen!” muttered Joel, aghast.</p> - -<p>His first sharp thought was for Treve. He went over to the disconsolate -collie and felt his head and jaws.</p> - -<p>“Nope,” he said. “She was the only one that got it. If it was strong -enough to git her as quick as that, it’d ’a’ got you, too, before now. -An’—an’, Trevy, I’m thankin’ Gawd it didn’t! I’m a-thankin’ Him, reel -rev’rent!”</p> - -<p>The old brain was working and working fast. Now that the Dos Hermanos -ranch was at peace with the Triple Bar outfit, there was no neighbor -who would poison any of the collies. The only person to do such a -damnable thing must be some one who desired to get the ranch guards out -of the way in order to rob the place.</p> - -<p>Rustlers!</p> - -<p>Joel listened. Except for an occasional bleat or stir in the nearby -fold, no sound broke the awesome stillness of the early spring night. -The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> collie stood statuelike above his dead mate, his sorrowful dark -eyes fixed on Joel in dumb appeal.</p> - -<p>“We can’t bring her back, Trevy,” said Fenno, gently, caressing the -bowed silken head with rough tenderness. “Only the good Gawd c’d do -that. An’ in His wisdom, He don’t ever do it no more—nowadays.... -<i>He</i> knows why. <i>I</i> don’t. We ain’t so lucky as them folks in Bible -times.... But maybe we c’n git the swine that killed her, Trevy!”</p> - -<p>There was a fiery thread of menace in the old voice, a note that made -the collie lift his drooping head and turn toward the rancher. Just -then, blurred and from far off, came a scent and a sound. They were -indistinguishable to gross human senses. But Treve read them aright.</p> - -<p>The sound was of three cautiously-ridden horses. The scent was of -men;—one of them the man who had loitered beside the fence and flung -the meat that had killed Treve’s mate.</p> - -<p>The dog stiffened. His teeth bared. Deep down in his throat a growl was -born. He remembered; and now he understood.</p> - -<p>This was the man who had somehow done Nellie to death. It was directly -after he stopped there, on the far side of the fence, that she had -died. Red rage flamed in the dog’s heart and eyes.</p> - -<p>“Quiet, Trevy!” breathed Joel, at the sound of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> the low growl. “Hear -suthin’, do you? Quiet, then, an’ wait!... Huh! Royce Mack called you a -fool, did he? Called <i>you</i> a fool! In the mornin’—”</p> - -<p>He fell silent. To his own straining ears now came the faint beat of -muffle-hoofed horses. Nearer they came and nearer. Joel gripped his -shotgun and peered through the high fence palings.</p> - -<p>Presently, in the dim light, he was aware of three mounted men and two -more men on foot, coming toward him from the direction of the coulée.</p> - -<p>At the same moment one of the three riders spurred forward from the -rest. Drawing his horse alongside the high fence, he vaulted lightly -from the saddle, coming to earth on the inner side of the palings.</p> - -<p>As his feet touched ground, something hairy and terrible whizzed at him -through the darkness; awful in its murderous silence. Before Greaser -Todd could get his hand to his knife or shove back his mysterious -assailant, Treve’s mighty jaws had found their goal in his unshaven -throat.</p> - -<p>The rustler crashed to earth, the mutely homicidal collie atop him; the -curved white eyeteeth grinding toward the jugular.</p> - -<p>“What’s the matter, Greaser?” queried the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> rider behind him, hearing -his leader stumble and fall. “Bootsoles too slippery?”</p> - -<p>As he spoke, he, too, vaulted the palings and dropped to his feet in -the yard. One of the unmounted men was climbing the fence in more -leisurely fashion, his head appearing now over the top.</p> - -<p>As calmly as though he were shooting quail, Fenno went into action.</p> - -<p>One barrel of his shotgun was fired point-blank at the rustler who had -just landed in the yard. Wheeling, he emptied the left barrel into the -head of the climber.</p> - -<p>There was a panic yell from the road; then pell-mell a scurry of hoofs -and of running feet. Slipping two new cartridges into the breech, Joel -Fenno climbed halfway up the fence and fired both barrels down the road -into the muddled dust-cloud that was dashing toward the coulée.</p> - -<p class="space-above">Royce Mack, still drunk with sleep, came staggering and shouting down -from the ranch house, his flashlight playing in every direction. At the -edge of the outbuildings he slithered to a dumbfounded halt.</p> - -<p>The arc of white radiance from his flashlight illumed a truly hideous -and incredible scene. Athwart the fence top, like a shot squirrel, -sprawled an all-but headless man. On the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> ground, just inside the -palings, lay another slumped figure.</p> - -<p>Somewhat nearer to Mack knelt Joel Fenno, his gun on the earth beside -him. He was stanching the blood of a third man—a man whose throat was -that of a jungle beast’s victim.</p> - -<p>Beside him, tense and raging, and held in check only by Joel’s crooning -voice, towered the huge gold-white Treve.</p> - -<p>“I reckon we c’n save this one of ’em, Royce, long ’nough for the -sheriff to git his c’nfession,” airily observed Joel, continuing his -first-aid work. “I pried Trevy loose before he got to the jug’l’r. With -Trevy standin’ by, to prompt him like, the feller’s due to talk all the -sheriff wants him to. Me an’ Trevy will see to that. As f’r them other -two—”</p> - -<p>“What—what the—?” sputtered Mack, stupid with horror.</p> - -<p>“Trevy’s a ‘fool,’ all right!” scoffed Joel. “Jes’ like I heard you -call him, awhile back. He tries to be more like you all the time. -Likewise he s’cceeds. Now run an’ phone for the sheriff. Me an’ Trevy -has had a busy night. It’s up to <i>you</i> to do the rest of the chores.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER XI: THE PARTING OF THE WAYS</h2> - -<p>Treve lay on the porch at the Dos Hermanos ranch house; his classic -head between his little white forepaws; his mighty gold-and-white body -like a couchant lion’s. A casual passerby would have said the dog was -asleep. A dog-student would have known better. Seldom do collies sleep -in that picturesque pose. Usually they slumber asprawl on one side.</p> - -<p>Neither were the collie’s deepset sorrowful eyes shut. They were -looking wearily across the heat-pulsating miles of ranch land. Nor were -they alert, as when the big dog was on guard. There was perplexed worry -in their soft gaze.</p> - -<p>Things were happening at the ranch; things Treve did not understand. -Yet his collie sixth sense told him there were change and confusion in -the air as well as in the words and voices of his two masters. These -two masters were often at odds. The dog long since had ceased to let -himself be stirred by their incessant and harmless quarrels.</p> - -<p>But they were not at odds, nowadays. Indeed, there was a new -civility—almost a sad friendliness—in their manner toward each other.</p> - -<p>We humans often grope for the solution to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> some baffling mystery which -eludes our sharpest intelligence, and whose key, could we but master -it, lies within easy reach of us. So with Treve. The key to this -disturbing new ranch development lay within six inches of his nose, in -the form of a newspaper which had fallen from the porch rocker to the -dusty floor.</p> - -<p>Had Treve been able to read type—as he could read human nature -and weather signs and danger to the Dos Hermanos flocks—a front -page news item in that paper might have told him much. The paper -was the Santa Carlotta <i>Bugle</i>. The item had been written by the -<i>Bugle’s</i> proprietor, himself, in his best florid style. The -proprietor, by the way, chanced to be the managing editor, the city -editor, the reportorial staff and the printer of the paper. Also the -business-and-advertising manager and office boy. The <i>Bugle</i> was a -one-man sheet.</p> - -<p>His front-page article ran:</p> - -<blockquote> - -<p>“Dan Cupid has been making a spring roundup of the ranch country, -this season. We have had glad occasion to announce no less than -four engagements and two marriages, in the Dos Hermanos Valley, -during the past three months. We now take personal pleasure in -retailing the latest romance from that garden spot of our fair -state. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Mr. Royce Mack, younger partner of the popular sheep-ranchers, -Fenno and Mack, of the Dos Hermanos Ranch outfit, is about to -marry Miss Reine Houston, the lovely and popular and talented -Fourth Grade teacher at the Ova school.</p> - -<p>“Miss Houston’s gain is the loss of the Dos Hermanos Valley; as -the young couple plan to leave this section (which so aptly has -been termed ‘God’s Country’), and to settle in the far and effete -East, upon a well-stocked Vermont dairy farm which was recently -bequeathed, along with a considerable cash legacy, to Mr. Mack, by -his deceased maternal uncle.</p> - -<p>“The nuptials, we understand, will occur at the bride’s parental -home in Dodge City, Kas., early next month. Miss Houston -expects to leave Ova, Friday, to go home for her final wedding -arrangements. Mr. Mack, we learn, will follow the first of the -week.”</p></blockquote> - -<p>There was more of the article, including a stanza of machine-made -poetry, with a highly original reference to two hearts that beat as -one. But no more is needed to explain the atmosphere of impending -change which had begun to grate upon the collie’s nerves.</p> - -<p>For a long time this change had been coming. Treve had trotted across -to Ova, evening after evening, for weeks alongside of Royce’s pinto.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span> -He had lain boredly on a rug in a stuffy little boarding house parlor, -while his master forgot him and everything else in chatting with a -plump girl who smelt annoyingly of lily-of-the-valley perfume. A girl -who said at the outset that she didn’t care much for dogs and who asked -if collies weren’t supposed to be treacherous.</p> - -<p>Treve had known from the first that she did not like him. This -bothered him not at all. For he didn’t like her, either. Her pungent -lily-of-the-valley perfume was as distressing to his sensitive nostrils -as would be the reek of carrion to a human nose. Moreover, she was not -the type of human that dogs like. Also, she took up too much of his -master’s attention.</p> - -<p>Intuitively, Treve realized Mack was not as fond of him as once he had -been and that the man was not the jolly chum of yore. It grieved the -sensitive collie. He sought wistfully to draw Royce’s attention more to -himself and less to this painfully-scented outsider. But it was all in -vain.</p> - -<p>Royce Mack was blindly and deliriously in love. The world, for the -time, contained for him only one person. That person was far more -like an angel than a mere woman. And she exhaled in some occult way a -faintly angelic perfume from her garments.</p> - -<p>Sheepishly, Mack told his partner of the <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span>engagement. Joel’s reply -was a grunt which implied nothing or anything. Fenno made precisely -the same reply, a week afterward, when news came to Royce of his -comfortable legacy of cash and of pleasant farmland in southern Vermont.</p> - -<p>Risking monotony, Joel had achieved a third grunt when Mack went on to -inform him of the projected eastward move. This move meant a breaking -up of the partnership. Mack could not run a dairy farm in Vermont and -also a ranch in the West.</p> - -<p>Joel came out of the silences and out of a maze of calculations long -enough to make an offer for Royce’s share of the Dos Hermanos. The -offer was as meager as was Fenno himself; but it was as reliable. Too -foolishly happy to barter, Mack closed with it. Thus, in another three -days, Joel Fenno was to become sole owner of the ranch.</p> - -<p>Both men had evaded the question of Treve’s ownership. The collie -belonged jointly to them. Yet he was not included in the list of land, -buildings and livestock set forth in the bill of sale.</p> - -<p>From the first, Mack had regarded the dog as his own, and had made -Treve his particular chum. Joel had scoffed at such folly, and had -pretended to hold the collie in utter contempt. But Treve had grown -to be everything to the gnarl-souled oldster. For the first time in -his sixty-odd warped years, he had learned to care<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> about some living -creature. It was with a twinge that he saw how much fonder the dog -seemed to be of Mack than of Fenno’s unlovable self.</p> - -<p>Now, at the possibility of parting with his loved dog-comrade, his -heart was as sore as a boil. Wherefore, as usual, he held his peace on -the theme so close to him; and he was outwardly the more savage in his -comments on Treve’s worthlessness.</p> - -<p>Treve lifted his head from between his paws, and stared down the road -toward the coulée. His trained ears not only caught the rattle and chug -of an approaching car, but they recognized it as a car belonging to the -ranch.</p> - -<p>Presently, the dusty runabout rounded the bend, a furlong beyond. -Royce Mack was driving it. At his side sat a plump and slackly pretty -figure in billowy white. Treve was too far away to catch the reek of -lily-of-the-valley. But he knew it would assail and torture his keen -nostrils soon enough.</p> - -<p>The dog got to his feet, with a bark of welcome. He was about to lope -forward to meet the car and escort Mack to the house, when Joel Fenno, -hearing the bark, stumped out of the kitchen doorway behind him.</p> - -<p>The old man had come from work, with Treve at his heels, a half-hour -early that day. Now<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span> he reappeared from his bedroom, crossly -uncomfortable in his store clothes; his neck teased by a frayed -collar-edge and further girt with a ready-made tie of awesome coloring. -If his bulls-eye emerald scarfpin had been genuine, it would have been -worth more than the entire ranch. His new boots squeaked groaningly on -the porch floor.</p> - -<p>The collie, wondering at such change in his friend’s costume and -bearing, halted in his scarce-begun journey toward the approaching car -and stared, with head on one side.</p> - -<p>“Sure!” growled Fenno. “Sure! Keep a-lookin’ at me, Trevy. I’m sure -wuth it. If ’twasn’t that he’s leavin’ here for good, in a day or two, -I’d ’a’ saw him in blue blazes before I’d ’a’ rigged me up like this, -on a hot week-day; jes’ ’cause he took a idee to ask her over to eat -supper with us, to-night. I feel like I was to a fun’ral, Trevy.”</p> - -<p>As he spoke, Joel was strolling down the dusty walk, toward the -gateway, to give such sour welcome as he might to his partner’s -sweetheart. The collie abandoned his own intent to gambol ahead; and -paced sedately along at Joel’s side.</p> - -<p>The average high-class collie has reduced snobbishness to an art. -Witness the courtesy wherewith many of them hasten to greet a -well-dressed <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span>stranger, as contrasted with their fierce rebuff of a -tramp.</p> - -<p>Perhaps it was Fenno’s unwonted splendor of raiment which made Treve -elect to continue the gateward walk in his company, rather than dash on -ahead. Yet of late, he had more than once chosen Joel’s companionship -rather than Mack’s. As they walked, Joel continued to mutter under his -breath.</p> - -<p>“She said she ‘wanted to meet her darling Royce’s dear old partner,’” -he sniffed. “Well, Trevy, the pleasure’s all her’n. (Not that I’m -a-grudgin’ her the treat of seein’ me.) Nothing’d do but she must come -over to supper with us, Trevy. And if Sing Lee don’t cook no better’n -he’s been cookin’ lately, she’s sure due to remember this supper for -quite a spell. She—Whatcher smellin’ at, Trevy?” he broke off.</p> - -<p>The dog had slowed in his walk, and was moving stiff-legged. His -nostrils were sniffing the still air with queer intensity. The car was -drawing to a stop, in front of the gate, twenty feet away;—quite near -enough for the hated lily-of-the-valley perfume to reach the collie’s -acute senses.</p> - -<p>But it was not perfume he was smelling. It was something far more -familiar and far more detested; something still too faint to reach -Fenno’s grosser powers of scent. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span></p> - -<p>The noisy little car stopped. Mack, on its far side, got out and -hurried around the runabout, to help Reine Houston to the ground. He -did not even pause in his loverly haste long enough to turn off the -noisy engine; an engine whose coughing reverberations drowned all -lesser sounds.</p> - -<p>Reine did not wait for her lover to reach her side and assist her in -the wholly simple task of opening the car door and stepping to earth. -Coming toward the gateway, from the direction of the house, were Joel -and the dog. Anxious to make a good impression on Fenno, the girl -jumped down before Mack could come around from the far side of the car. -Her plump hands outstretched in friendly greeting to Joel, she ran -forward to meet him.</p> - -<p>There was a patch of roadside tumbleweed between the car and the gate. -The girl prepared to clear this in her stride. But she did not do so.</p> - -<p>This because Treve suddenly abandoned his stiff-legged suspicious -advance and made one lightning bound at her.</p> - -<p>The dog did not growl, nor did he show his teeth. But he sprang -with the incredible speed of a charging wolf. Clearing the patch of -tumbleweed by fully twenty inches, he sent his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span> body crashing with all -its force against the white-clad girl.</p> - -<p>He did not bite. His lowered head and much of his furry body smote her -amidships. Back she shot, under that swift impact, banging hard against -the side of the car and using up what little breath she still had in a -loud screech.</p> - -<p>Royce Mack rounded the side of the car just in time to see the dog hurl -himself at the all-precious Reine.</p> - -<p>With a yell of fury at such vile sacrilege to his angel, he sprang at -Treve and kicked him.</p> - -<p>The kick struck the dog in the short ribs with an agonizing force -that doubled Treve and sent him rolling over and over in the dust. -Furiously, Mack followed him up, his boot drawn back for a second and -heavier kick. The girl did not cease from screaming as she gathered -herself up, bruised and hysterical with fright.</p> - -<p>As his foot swung back for the kick, Royce chanced to see Joel Fenno -from the corner of his eye. The old man was also in violent action. At -sight of his partner’s activities, Mack checked himself with one foot -still in air.</p> - -<p>Fenno, regardless of his own rheumatic limbs, was doing a vehement -dance in the center of the low tumbleweed patch. Beneath his stamping -feet writhed and twisted a fat four-foot rattlesnake. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span></p> - -<p>The nasty odor of crushed cucumbers—certain sign of the pit viper—was -strong enough in the air now, for even these blundering humans to get -the scent which Treve had caught twenty feet away.</p> - -<p>“I ain’t got my gun on me!” wheezed Joel, to his partner, as a final -drive of his heel smashed the rattlesnake’s evil, arrow-shaped head. -“But if you kick that dog ag’in, I swear t’ Gawd I’ll go in an’ git it, -an’ blow your mangy face off! I seen the hull thing. This gal of your’n -was jes’ a-goin’ to plant her foot in the tumbleweed, when I seen this -rattler h’ist up his dirty head an’ bend it back to strike her ankle. -Trevy seen it, too. An’ he pushed her out’n death’s way, when there -wa’n’t neither one of us humans near enough nor quick enough to. An’ -you kicked him fer savin’ her! Lord! Kicked—kicked—<i>Trevy</i>!”</p> - -<p>He had left the slain snake and was hustling across to the dog.</p> - -<p>Treve had gotten gaspingly to his feet. No whimper had been wrung from -him by the anguishing pain of the kick in his tender short-ribs. No -snarl nor other sign of wrath had shown resentment at this brutality—a -brutality for which any human stranger would have been attacked by him -right murderously.</p> - -<p>Instead, the great dog stood stock-still in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span> road, his glorious -coat dust-smeared, his mighty body a-tremble. His soft eyes were fixed -on the man who had kicked him—the man who had been his god—the man -whose sweetheart the collie had risked his own life to save.</p> - -<p>This was the man to whom he had given loyal and worshipful service -since long before he could remember. And now his god had turned on -him;—had not punished him, for punishment implies earlier fault; but -had half-killed him for no fault at all.</p> - -<p>The deepset dark eyes were terrible in their heartbreak. Royce Mack, -blinking stupidly, felt their look sear into him. Slowly he stared -from the stricken dog to the dead snake. Then his eyes fell upon Reine -Houston.</p> - -<p>At sight of the snake, and at comprehension of what Treve had averted -from her by that wild leap, Reine collapsed, blubbering and quaking, on -the running-board of the car.</p> - -<p>Drawn by supreme impulse, Royce turned his back on the collie and -hurried over to her. Treve was forgotten.</p> - -<p>With babbled love words Mack sought to reassure and comfort the girl -and to learn if she were badly hurt. In this tender employment he -was interrupted by Joel Fenno’s rasping voice. The old man had been -examining Treve, with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span> the tender touch of a nurse, and crooning softly -to the hurt collie. Now he turned grimly on his partner.</p> - -<p>“Best boost your young lady into the car,” he snarled, “an’ trundle her -back to Ova. She ain’t li’ble to have much ap’tite left, after what’s -happened. Besides, Sing Lee’s salaraytus biscuits ain’t no good example -for a new-mown bride to take to heart for future use. More’n that, -she’s met me. That’s what she come here for, wa’n’t it? She’s met me. -Likewise, she’s saw me dance. She’s met Treve ag’n, too. Met him reel -sudden an’ personal. That’s why she’s still alive. S’pose you traipse -back to Ova with her; an’ leave me an’ Trevy to ourselves. We kind of -need to be left thataway. If you don’t mind. So long!”</p> - -<p>His wizened hand on the dog’s ruff, he strode back to the house, -shutting the door loudly behind Treve and himself.</p> - -<p>It was late when Royce Mack got back from Ova, that evening. Joel was -sitting up for him. Royce said nothing to his partner, but went at once -to Treve, who had come slowly forward to meet him.</p> - -<p>His hands roamed remorsefully over the dog, and he seemed trying to -say something. Treve was looking up into Royce’s face with that same<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span> -strickenly reproachful expression that the man had not been able to get -out of his memory all evening.</p> - -<p>“If you’re huntin’ for broken ribs or for rupture,” commented Joel -as he watched his partner’s exploring hands, “there ain’t any. Small -thanks to you; an’ by a mir’cle of heaven. Treve’s all right. Except -you’ve smashed suthin’ in the heart an’ the soul of him that you can’t -unsmash. That’s all you done.”</p> - -<p>The old man’s toneless voice irked Mack.</p> - -<p>“Can you blame me?” he challenged. “What else could I do? I saw him -spring at her and knock her down. I thought he was killing her. It -seemed the only way to—”</p> - -<p>“To prove you’re a born fool?” supplemented Joel. “You didn’t need to -prove it to me. Nor, when she’s knowed you a while longer, you won’t -need to prove it to her, neither. Why would he be killin’ her? Hey? -We’ve had him all these years; an’ he never yet did a thing that wa’n’t -wiser’n the wisest thing <i>you</i> ever did. Nor yet he never did anything -that was rotten. You might ’a’ knowed he had some reason for actin’ -so. Anyhow, there’s lots better ways for a man to show he’s a dog’s -inferior, than by kickin’ him.”</p> - -<p>“Let it go at that!” muttered Royce, sullenly;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> harder hit than he -cared to show, by the look in his collie chum’s dark eyes. “I’ll make -it up to him, somehow. I—”</p> - -<p>“Make it up to him?” mocked Fenno. “How? By tellin’ him you’ve forgave -him, maybe? Or by gettin’ him a nice gold watch an’ wearin’ it for him -till he’s old enough to take care of it? ‘Make it up to him!’ <i>Lord!</i>”</p> - -<p>Royce turned wrathfully on his expressionless partner.</p> - -<p>“I don’t see what business it is of yours!” he snapped. “You’ve always -hated the dog. You’ve always called him worthless and said you wished -we could be rid of him. Well, you’ll be rid of him, all right. In less -than a week he and I will be out of here for good.”</p> - -<p>“Where do you get that stuff about ‘him and you?’ <i>You’ll</i> be gone. But -Treve’s as much mine as he’s yours.”</p> - -<p>Royce glanced at his scowling partner in genuine surprise.</p> - -<p>“You don’t mean to say you’re going to be cantankerous about <i>that</i>, -too?” he exclaimed. “Why, Joel, you hate the very sight of the dog! -You’ve hated him from the beginning. You’ve never had a decent word for -him. I don’t believe you ever spoke to him in his life, except to give -him some order or else to swear at him. And<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> now you talk about his -being as much yours as mine. Well, let’s come to a showdown. What do -you want for your share in him?”</p> - -<p>Joel made no immediate answer. He was peering through the dim -candle-light at Treve. The old man’s thin lips moved rhythmically, -as though he were chewing the mysterious cud of senility. His chin -quivered. Otherwise his leathery face was blank. It gave no sign of the -turmoil behind it.</p> - -<p>But Treve understood. With all a collie’s strange trick of reading -human emotion behind a wordless and expressionless mask, he knew his -friend was acutely unhappy. The dog got to his feet and came over to -Fenno, pressing his furry bulk against the rancher’s lean legs and -thrusting a sympathetic muzzle into the tough palm. He whined softly, -his gaze fixed on Joel’s.</p> - -<p>From long habit, in the presence of others, Fenno made as though to -repulse the dog’s friendliness. Then, with a little intake of breath, -he bent over the collie and caught the classic head almost roughly -between his hands.</p> - -<p>“Treve!” he mumbled, thickly. “Trevy, you and me know all about that, -don’t we? We’re—we’re good pals, me and you, Trevy. The best pals -there ever was.”</p> - -<p>Royce Mack looked on, dumbfounded. There<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> was caress in Fenno’s thin -voice and in his rough grasp of the dog. Treve, too, was behaving as -though he were well accustomed to such signs of affection from the man.</p> - -<p>“I—I thought—” began Mack, “I thought—”</p> - -<p>“No, ye didn’t!” crossly denied Fenno, the barriers down. “You never -‘thought,’ in all your born days. If you’d knowed what it meant to -think, you’d ’a’ knowed a white man couldn’t go hatin’ Trevy, like I -made out I hated him. Nobody could. And likewise you’d ’a’ remembered -how he kept me alive that day down by Ova, when I was throwed and -crippled up and couldn’t stir to help myself; an’ how he brang water to -me; an’ how he flagged you and brang <i>you</i> to me, besides. An’ now you -go jawin’ about takin’ him away; an’ askin’ what do I want for my share -of him. Well, I want just a even billion dollars for my share of Trevy. -I ain’t sellin’. I’m buyin’. Now whatcher want for <i>your</i> share of him? -Speak up! If I got it, I’ll pay.”</p> - -<p>Royce pondered a moment. He could not fathom this phase of the old man. -Then a solution came to him.</p> - -<p>“Remember the day we got him?” asked Mack. “Remember how we made dice -marks on a lump of sugar, out to the foreman shack, to see which owned -him? He ate the sugar, and we <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span>compromised by owning him between us. -Suppose we throw dice again to see who owns him? Loser to give up all -claim to him. How about it?”</p> - -<p>“Nope,” refused Joel, stubbornly. “Lemme buy him off’n you, Mack. I’ll -pay—”</p> - -<p>“I’m not selling him,” as stubbornly insisted Royce, enamored of his -own sporting idea. “I’m giving you your chance. Take it or leave it. -You ought to be glad I don’t suggest we let him go to whichever of us -he chooses.”</p> - -<p>Joel winced. Then, despondently, he clumped across the room to the -shelf where lay the parcheesi game. Choosing a cylinder cup and a -pair of dice, he came back to the table. On the way he paused to pat -furtively the collie’s silken ears.</p> - -<p>“Best two out of three?” suggested Royce.</p> - -<p>“Nope,” said Fenno. “One throw. When a tooth’s got to come out, a -single yank is best. You throw first.”</p> - -<p>Royce took the dice-cup and shook it with relish. Nothing could beat -him. He knew that. In his present streak of luck, when a glorious -bride and a legacy were falling to his lot, a bout of chance with his -Jonah-like old partner could not fail to bring him success—and Treve.</p> - -<p>Expertly he chucked the dice out on the table, in the flickering -candle-flare. Over and over the white cubes tumbled and hopped and -rolled; coming to a halt, at last, barely an inch from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span> the table edge -and almost side by side. Both men leaned forward to read the pips on -the exposed top surfaces of the dice.</p> - -<p>A six and a five! Eleven! Unbeatable except by a next-to-impossible -Twelve.</p> - -<p>Joel’s face set itself like wrinkled granite. He made no other outward -sign of distress. Treve, at sound of the noisily rattling dice, had -gotten interestedly to his feet, and stood with his head on a level -with the deal table, watching.</p> - -<p>Royce swept up the dice and tossed them into the cup; passing it across -to Fenno. With hand as steady as a boy’s, the old man accepted the cup -and sulkily he threw the two dice upon the board.</p> - -<p>The jar of a heavy tread on the porch made both men turn their heads. -Visitors at such an hour were unheard-of. Toni, the chief herdsman, -stamped in to report the straying of a bunch of sheep that had nosed -a hole in the rotting wattles of the home fold. Instinctively the -partners glanced back to the dice.</p> - -<p>There lay the little cubes, just under the candle’s nearest rays.</p> - -<p>Two sixes! Twelve!</p> - -<p>There had been fewer than nine chances in a hundred that Joel could -have made such a throw. Yet, his proverbial hoodoo was broken. Luck, -for once, seemed to have gravitated his way. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span></p> - -<p>Fenno made no comment, but bent over to pat Treve with an odd new air -of personal possession, while Mack listened scowlingly to Toni’s tale -of the lost sheep.</p> - -<p>“Suppose you and <i>your</i> dog chase out with Toni and round ’em up?” said -Royce, at last, turning maliciously to his partner. “They’re not mine -any longer, you know. Any more than Treve is. For once I’ll have the -fun of going to bed and letting the rest of the outfit do the hustling. -Good-night.”</p> - -<p class="space-above">At dusk, three days later, the one livery car from Santa Carlotta -stopped at the ranch gate to carry Royce Mack and his belongings to the -distant railroad, whence the night train was to bear him eastward to -his bride.</p> - -<p>Herders piled the car with luggage; then stood at the gate to say -good-by to their former boss. Joel loitered in the doorway; Treve -beside him, Fenno was frowning and fidgeting.</p> - -<p>Royce came up to him with outstretched hand. For a moment the old man -ignored the hand. Once more his jaws were at work with senility’s cud. -Suddenly he burst forth:</p> - -<p>“Trevy’s your’n! Take him along East with you!”</p> - -<p>There was a world of stifled heartache and stark misery in the grouchy -old voice. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span></p> - -<p>“What the blue blazes!” sputtered Royce in amaze. “D’you mean to say -you don’t want him, after all the fuss you made? He—”</p> - -<p>“Yep!” snarled old Fenno. “I want him more’n I want my right leg. An’ I -reckon I’ll be twice as lonesome without him as I’d be without the two -of my legs. But I—I don’t want him the way I won him. I thought I did. -But I don’t. It—it sticks in my throat. He’s a square dog, Trevy is. -He ain’t goin’ to be won by no crooked trick. So I— Oh, take him along -an’ shut up!”</p> - -<p>Royce continued to stare in bewilderment. His owlish aspect angered -Joel.</p> - -<p>“We shook dice for him,” expounded Fenno, sourly. “You throwed a six -an’ a five. I throwed a six an’ a one. You looked back to see who was -buttin’ into the room that time of night. I flicked the one-spot over, -an’ made it a six. Take him along. I—I— Trevy, son,” he ended, a frog -in his throat as he laid a shaky hand on the collie’s head, “you see -for yourself, I couldn’t keep you, that way; you bein’ so clean an’ -decent; an’ me cheatin’ to get you. I—”</p> - -<p>To his astonishment, Royce Mack broke into a shout of laughter.</p> - -<p>“When I put Reine on the Pullman to go East,” said Royce, “I told her -about our throwing dice for Treve. I was still sore over losing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> him. -D’you know what she said? Said she was tickled to death that I’d lost. -Said she can’t bear dogs, and that she’d never be able to endure having -Treve around after the savage way he upset her. She said she’d always -be afraid of him, and that she’d have insisted, anyway, on my leaving -him behind. That settles it.... Good-by, Treve, old friend. Good-by, -Joel. Luck to the pair of you!”</p> - -<p>Late into the warm evening, Joel Fenno sat silent on the porch. At his -feet, in drowsy contentment, lay Treve. The old man’s face was aglow -with wordless happiness. Every now and then he would stoop to stroke -the sleeping dog. Then he would listen delightedly to the responsive -lazy thump of Treve’s tail on the boards.</p> - -<p>Life was worth while, after all. It was great to have a chum that was -all one’s own, and to sit thus with him at the close of day. No more -bickerings, no more jawing, no more need to pretend he didn’t like this -wonderful collie of his. It was <i>fine</i> to be alive!</p> - -<p>“Trevy,” he exhorted, solemnly, as he knocked out his final pipe and -prepared to go indoors, “don’t you ever let me ketch you throwin’ dice -crooked. But if ever you do, don’t go blabbin’ about it. Not one time -in a trillion-an’-seven, c’d you expec’ to find a girl who’d square it -all for you, like that pudgy Reine person done for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span> me. An’, Trevy, -lemme say ag’in, for the sev’ralth time, right here,—of all the dogs -that ever happened—you’re—you’re that dog. Now le’s quit jabberin’ -an’ go to sleep!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CHAPTER XII: AFTERWORD</h2> - -<p>I have drawn upon one of our Sunnybank collies for the name and the -aspect and certain traits of this book’s hero. The real Treve was my -chum, and one of the strangest and most beautiful collies I have known.</p> - -<p>Dog aristocrats have two names; one whereby they are registered in -the American Kennel Club’s immortal studbook and one by which they -are known at home. The first of these is called the “pedigree name.” -The second is the “kennel name.” Few dogs know or answer to their own -high-sounding pedigree names. In speaking to them their kennel names -alone are used.</p> - -<p>For example, my grand old Bruce’s pedigree name was Sunnybank -Goldsmith;—a term that meant nothing to him. My Champion Sunnybank -Sigurdson (greatest of Treve’s sons), responds only to the name of -“Squire.” Sunnybank Lochinvar is “Roy.”</p> - -<p>Treve’s pedigree name was “Sunnybank Sigurd.” And in time he won his -right to the hard-sought and harder-earned prefix of “CHAMPION”;—the -supreme crown of dogdom.</p> - -<p>We named him Sigurd—the Mistress and I—in <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span>honor of the collie of -Katharine Lee Bates; a dog made famous the world over by his owner’s -exquisite book, “<i>Sigurd, Our Golden Collie</i>.”</p> - -<p>But here difficulties set in.</p> - -<p>It is all very well to shout “Sigurd!” to a collie when he is the -only dog in sight. But when there is a rackety and swirling and -excited throng of them, the call of “Sigurd!” has an unlucky sibilant -resemblance to the exhortation, “Sic ’im!” And misunderstandings—not -to say strife—are prone to follow. So we sought a one-syllable kennel -name for our golden collie pup. My English superintendent, Robert -Friend, suggested “Treve.”</p> - -<p>The pup took to it at once.</p> - -<p>He was red-gold-and-snow of coat; a big slender youngster, with the -true “look of eagles” in his deepset dark eyes. In those eyes, too, -burned an eternal imp of mischief.</p> - -<p>I have bred or otherwise acquired hundreds of collies in my time. No -two of them were alike. That is the joy of collies. But most of them -had certain well-defined collie characteristics in common with their -blood-brethren. Treve had practically none. He was not like other -collies or like a dog of any breed.</p> - -<p>Gloriously beautiful, madly alive in every inch of him, he combined the -widest and most irreconcilable range of traits. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span></p> - -<p>For him there were but three people on earth;—the Mistress, myself and -Robert Friend. To us he gave complete allegiance, if in queer form. -The rest of mankind, with one exception—a girl—did not exist, so far -as he was concerned; unless the rest of mankind undertook to speak to -him or to pat him. Then, instantly, such familiarity was rewarded by a -murderous growl and a most terrifying bite.</p> - -<p>The bite was delivered with a frightful show of ferocity. And it had -not the force to crush the wing of a fly.</p> - -<p>Strangers, assailed thus, were startled. Some were frankly scared. They -would stare down in amaze at the bitten surface, marveling that there -was neither blood nor teeth-mark nor pain. For the attack always had an -appearance of man-eating fury.</p> - -<p>Treve would allow the Mistress to pat him—in moderation. But if I -touched him, in friendliness, he would toss his beautiful head and dart -out of reach, barking angrily back at me. It was the same when Robert -tried to pet him.</p> - -<p>Once or twice a day he would come up to me, laying his head across -my arm or knee; growling with the utmost vehemence and gnawing at -my sleeve for a minute at a time. I gather that this was a form of -affection. He did it to nobody else. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span></p> - -<p>Also, when I went to town for the day, he would mope around for awhile; -then would take my cap from the hall table and carry it into my study. -All day long he would lie there, one paw on the cap, and growl fierce -menace to all who ventured near. On my return home at night, he gave me -scarcely a glance and drew disgustedly away as usual when I held out my -hand to pat him.</p> - -<p>In the evenings, on the porch or in front of the living room fire, he -would stroll unconcernedly about until he made sure I was not noticing. -Then he would curl himself on the floor in front of me, pressing his -furry body close to my ankles; and would lie there for hours.</p> - -<p>The Mistress alone he forbore to bite. He loved her. But she was a -grievous disappointment to him. From the first, she saw through his -vehement show of ferocity and took it at its true value. Try as he -would, he could not frighten her. Try as he would, he could not mask -his adoration for her.</p> - -<p>Again and again he would lie down for a nap at her feet; only to waken -presently with a thundrous growl and a snarl, and with a lunge of bared -teeth at her caressing hand. The hand would continue to caress; and his -show of fury was met with a laugh and with the comment: </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span></p> - -<p>“You’ve had a good sleep, and now you’ve waked up in a nice homicidal -rage.”</p> - -<p>Failing to alarm her, the dog would look sheepishly at the laughing -face and then cuddle down again at her feet to be petted.</p> - -<p>There was another side to his play of indifference and of wrath. True, -he would toss his head and back away, barking, when Robert or myself -tried to pat him. But at the quietly spoken word, “Treve!”, he would -come straight up to us and, if need be, stand statue-like for an hour -at a time, while he was groomed or otherwise handled.</p> - -<p>In brief, he was the naughtiest and at the same time the most -unfailingly obedient dog I have owned. No matter how far away he might -be, the single voicing of his name would bring him to me in a swirling -rush.</p> - -<p>In the show-ring he was a problem. At times he showed as proudly and as -spectacularly as any attitude-striking tragedian. Again, if he did not -chance to like his surroundings or if the ring-side crowd displeased -him, he prepared to loaf in slovenly fashion through his paces on the -block and in the parade. At such times the showing of Treve became as -much an art as is the guiding of a temperamental race-horse to victory. -It called for tact; even for trickery.</p> - -<p>In the first place, during these fits of ill-humor,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span> he would start -around the ring, in the preliminary parade, with his tail arched high -over his back; although he knew, as well as did I, that a collie’s tail -should be carried low, in the ring.</p> - -<p>I commanded: “Tail down!” Down would come the tail. But at the same -time would come a savage growl and a sensational snap at my wrist. The -spectators pointed out to one another the incurably fierce collie. -Fellow-exhibitors in the ring would edge away. The judge—if he were an -outsider—would eye Treve with strong apprehension.</p> - -<p>It was the same when I whispered, “Foot out!” as he deliberately turned -one white front toe inward in coming to a halt on the judging block. A -similar snarl and feather-light snap followed the command.</p> - -<p>The worst part of the ordeal came when the judge began to “go over” -him with expert hands, to test the levelness of his mouth, the spring -of his ribs, his general soundness and the texture of his coat. An -exhibitor is not supposed to speak to a judge in the ring except to -answer a question. But if the judge were inspecting Treve for the first -time, I used to mumble conciliatingly, the while:</p> - -<p>“He’s only in play, Judge. The dog’s perfectly gentle.”</p> - -<p>This, as Treve resented the stranger’s <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span>handling, by growl-fringed -bites at the nearest part of the judicial anatomy.</p> - -<p>A savage dog does not make a hit with the average judge. There is scant -joyance in being chewed, in the pursuit of one’s judging-duties. Yet, -as a rule, judges took my word as to Treve’s gentleness; especially -after one sample of his biteless biting. Said Vinton Breese, the famed -“all-rounder” dog-judge, after an Interstate show:</p> - -<p>“I feel slighted. Sigurd forgot to bite me to-day. It’s the first time.”</p> - -<p>The Mistress made up a little song, in which Treve’s name occurred -oftener than almost all its other words. Treve was inordinately proud -of this song. He would stand, growling softly, with his head on one -side, for an indefinite time, listening to her sing it. He used to lure -her into chanting this super-personal ditty by trotting to the piano -and then running back to her.</p> - -<p>Nature intended him for a staunch, clever, implicitly obedient, gentle -collie, without a single bad trait, and possessed of rare sweetness. -He tried his best to make himself thoroughly mean and savage and -treacherous. He met with pitifully poor success in his chosen rôle. The -sweetness and the obedient gentleness stuck forth, past all his best -efforts to mask them in ferocity. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span></p> - -<p>Once, when he bit with overmuch unction at a guest who tried to pat -him, I spoke sharply to him and emphasized my rebuke by a light slap on -the shoulder. The dog was heart-broken. Crouching at my feet, his head -on my boot, he sobbed exactly like a frightened child. He spent hours -trying pitifully to make friends with me again.</p> - -<p>It was so when his snarl and his nip at the legs of one of the other -dogs led to warlike retaliation. At once Treve would rush to me for -protection and for comfort. From the safe haven of my knees he would -hurl threats at his assailant and defy him to carry the quarrel -further. There was no fight in him. At the same time there was no taint -of cowardice. He bore pain or discomfort or real danger unflinchingly.</p> - -<p>One of his chief joys was to ransack the garage and stables for sponges -and rags which were stored there for cleaning the cars. These he would -carry, one by one, to the long grass or to the lake, and deposit them -there. When the men hid these choice playthings out of his way he would -stand on his hindlegs and explore the shelves and low beam-corners in -search of them; never resting till he found one or more to bear off.</p> - -<p>He would lug away porch cushions and <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span>carelessly-deserted hats and -wraps, and deposit them in all sorts of impossible places; never by any -chance bringing them back.</p> - -<p>From puppyhood, he did not once eat a whole meal of his own accord. -Always he must be fed by hand. Even then he would not touch any food -but cooked meat.</p> - -<p>Normally, the solution to this would have been to let him go hungry -until he was ready to eat. But a valuable show-and-stud collie cannot -be allowed to become a skeleton and lifeless for lack of food, any more -than a winning race-horse can be permitted to starve away his strength -and speed.</p> - -<p>Treve’s daily pound-and-a-half of broiled chuck steak was cut in -small pieces and set before him on a plate. Then began the eternal -task of making him eat it. Did we turn our backs on him for a single -minute—the food had vanished when next we looked.</p> - -<p>But it had not vanished down Treve’s dainty throat. Casual search -revealed every missing morsel of meat shoved neatly out of sight under -the edges of the plate or else hidden in the grass or under nearby -boards or handfuls of straw.</p> - -<p>This daily meal was a game. Treve enjoyed it immensely. Not being -blessed with patience, I abhorred it. So Robert Friend took the duty<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> -of feeding him. At sound of Robert’s distant knife, whetted to cut up -the meat, Treve would come flying to the hammock where I sat writing. -At a bound he was in my lap, all fours and all fur—the entire sixty -pounds of him—and with his head thrust under one of the hammock -cushions.</p> - -<p>Thence, at Robert’s call, and at my own exhortation, he would come -forth with mincing reluctance and approach the tempting dish of broiled -steak. Looking coldly upon the food, he would lie down. To all of -Robert’s allurements to eat, the dog turned a deaf ear. Once in a blue -moon, he consented to swallow the steak, piece by piece, if Robert -would feed it to him by hand. Oftener it was necessary to call on Wolf -to act as stimulant to appetite.</p> - -<p>“Then I’ll give it to Wolf,” Robert would threaten. “<i>Wolf!</i>”</p> - -<p>Treve got to his feet with head lowered and teeth bared. Robert called -Wolf, who came lazily to play his part in the daily game for a guerdon -of one piece of the meat.</p> - -<p>Six feet away from the dish, Wolf paused. But his work was done. -Growling, barking, roaring, Treve attacked the dish; snatching up -and bolting one morsel of meat at a time. Between every two bites he -bellowed threats and insults at the placidly watching Wolf,—Wolf<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> who -could thrash his weight in tigers and who, after Lad and Bruce died, -was the acknowledged king of all the Place’s dogs.</p> - -<p>In this way, mouthful by mouthful and with an accompaniment of raging -noise that could be heard across the lake, Treve disposed of his dinner.</p> - -<p>Yes, it was a silly thing to humor him in the game. But there was no -other method of making him eat the food on which depended his continued -show-form and his dynamite vitality. When it came to giving him his -two raw eggs a day, there was nothing to that but forcible feeding. In -solid cash prizes and in fees, Treve paid back, by many hundred per -cent., the high cost of his food.</p> - -<p>When he was little more than a puppy, he fell dangerously ill with some -kind of heart trouble. Dr. Hopper said he must have medicine every half -hour, day and night, until he should be better. I sat up with him for -two nights.</p> - -<p>I got little enough work done, between times, on those two nights. The -suffering dog lay on a rug beside my study desk. But he was uneasy and -wanted to be talked to. He was in too much pain to go to sleep. In a -corner of my study was a tin biscuit box, which I kept filled with -animal crackers, as occasional titbits for the collies. Every now and -then, during our two-night<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span> vigil, I took an animal cracker from the -box and fed it to Treve.</p> - -<p>By the second night he was having a beautiful time. I was not.</p> - -<p>The study seemed to him a most delightful place. Forthwith he adopted -it as his lair. By the third morning he was out of danger and indeed -was practically well again. But he had acquired the study-habit; a -habit which lasted throughout his short life.</p> - -<p>From that time on, it was Treve’s study; not mine. The tin cracker box -became his treasure chest; a thing to be guarded as jealously as ever -was the Nibelungen Hoard or the Koh-i-noor.</p> - -<p>If he chanced to be lying in any other room, and a dog unconsciously -walked between him and the study, Treve bounded up from the soundest -sleep and rushed growlingly to the study door, whence he snarled -defiance at the possible intruder. If he were in the study and another -dog ventured near, Treve’s teeth were bared and Treve’s forefeet were -planted firmly atop the tin box; as he ordered away the potential -despoiler of his hoard.</p> - -<p>No human, save only the Mistress and myself, might enter the study -unchallenged. Grudgingly, Treve conceded her right and mine to be -there. But a rush at the ankles of any one else discouraged ingress. -I remember my daughter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> stopped in there one day to speak to me; -on her way for a swim. As the bathing-dressed figure appeared on -the threshold, Treve made a snarling rush for it. Alternately and -vehemently he bit both bare ankles.</p> - -<p>“I wish he wouldn’t do that,” complained my daughter, annoyed. “He -<i>tickles</i> so, when he bites!”</p> - -<p>No expert trainer has worked more skillfully and tirelessly over -a Derby winner than did Robert Friend over that dog’s shimmering -red-gold coat. For an hour or more every day, he groomed Treve, until -the burnished fur stood out like a Circassian beauty’s coiffure and -glowed like molten gold. The dog stood moveless throughout the long and -tedious process; except when he obeyed the order to turn to one side or -the other or to lift his head or to put up his paws for a brushing of -the silken sleeve-ruffles.</p> - -<p>It was Robert, too, who hit on the scheme which gave Treve his last -show-victory; when the collie already had won fourteen of the needful -fifteen points which should make him a Champion of Record.</p> - -<p>Perhaps you think it is easy to pilot even the best of dogs through the -gruelling ordeals that go to make up those fifteen points. Well, it is -not. </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span></p> - -<p>Many breeders take their dogs on the various show-circuits, keeping -them on the bench for three days at a time; and then, week after week, -shipping them in stuffy crates from town to town, from show to show. -In this way, the championship points sometimes pile up with reasonable -speed;—and sometimes never at all. (Sometimes, too, the luckless dog -is found dead in his crate, on arriving at the show-hall. Oftener he -catches distemper and dies in more painful and leisurely fashion.)</p> - -<p>I am too foolishly mush-hearted to inflict such torture on any of -our Sunnybank collies. I never take my dogs to a show that cannot be -reached by comfortable motor ride within two or three hours at most; -nor to any show whence they cannot return home at the end of a single -day. Thus, championship points mount up more slowly at Sunnybank than -at some other kennels. But thus, too, our dogs, for the most part, -stay alive and in splendid health. I sleep the sounder at night, for -knowing my collie chums are not in misery in some distemper-tainted -dogshow-building.</p> - -<p>In like manner, it is a fixed rule with us never to ship a Sunnybank -puppy anywhere by express to a purchaser. People must come here in -person and take home the pups they buy from me. Buyers have motored to -Sunnybank for pups<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span> from Maine and Ohio and even from California.</p> - -<p>These scruples of mine have earned me the good-natured guying of more -sensible collie breeders.</p> - -<p>Well, Treve had picked up fourteen of the fifteen points needed to -complete his championship. The last worthwhile show of the spring -season—within motor distance—was at Noble, Pa., on June 10, 1922. -Incidentally, June 10, 1922, was Treve’s third birthday. His wonderful -coat was at the climax of its shining fullness. By autumn he would be -“out of coat”; and an out-of-coat collie stands small chance of winning.</p> - -<p>So Robert and I drove over to Noble with him.</p> - -<p>The day was stewingly hot; the drive was long. Show-goers crowded -around the splendid dog before the judging began. Bit by bit, Treve’s -nerves began to fray. We kept him off his bench and in the shade, and -we did what we could to steer admirers away from him. But it was no -use. By the time the collie division was called into the tented ring, -Treve was profoundly unhappy and cranky.</p> - -<p>He slouched in, with no more “form” to him than a plow horse. With -the rest of his class (“Open, sable-and-white”), he went through the -parade. Judge Cooper called the contestants one by one up to the block; -Treve last of all.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span> My best efforts could not rouse the dog from his -sullen apathy.</p> - -<p>It was then that Robert Friend played his trump card. Standing just -outside the ring, among the jam of spectators, he called excitedly:</p> - -<p>“<i>Wolf!</i> I’ll give it to Wolf!”</p> - -<p>I don’t know what the other spectators thought of this outburst. But I -know the effect it had on Treve.</p> - -<p>In a flash the great dog was alert and tense; his tulip ears up, his -whole body at attention, the look of eagles in his eyes as he scanned -the ringside for a glimpse of his friend, Wolf.</p> - -<p>Judge Cooper took one long look at him. Then, without so much as laying -a hand on the magnificently-showing Treve, he awarded him the blue -ribbon in his class.</p> - -<p>I had sense enough to take the dog into one corner and to keep him -there, quieting and steadying him until the Winners’ Class was called. -As I led him into the ring, then, to compete with the other classes’ -blue ribboners, Robert called once more to the absent Wolf. Again -the trick served. The collie moved and stood as if galvanized into -sparkling life.</p> - -<p>Cooper handed me the Winners’ rosette; the rosette whose acquisition -made Treve a Champion of Record!</p> - -<p>It was only about a year ago. In that little<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span> handful of time, the -judge who made him a champion—the new-made champion himself—the dog -whose name roused him from his apathy in the ring—all three are dead. -I don’t think a white sportsman like Cooper would mind my linking -his name with two such supreme collies, in this word of necrology. -Cooper—Treve—<i>Wolf</i>!</p> - -<p>(There’s lots of room in this old earth of ours for the digging of -graves, isn’t there?)</p> - -<p>Home we came with our champion—Champion Sunnybank Sigurd—who -displayed so little championship dignity that, an hour after our return -to the Place, he lifted my brand new Panama hat daintily from the -hall-table, carried it forth from the house with a loving tenderness; -laid it to rest in a patch of lakeside mud; and then rolled on it.</p> - -<p>I was too elated over our triumph to scold him for the costly -sacrilege. I am glad now that I didn’t. For a scolding or a single -harsh word ever reduced him to utter heartbreak.</p> - -<p>And so for a while, at the Place, our golden champion continued to -revel in the gay zest of life.</p> - -<p>He was the livest dog I have known. Wolf alone was his chum among all -the Sunnybank collies. Wolf alone, with his mighty heart and vast -wisdom and his elfin sense of fun and his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> love for frolic. Wolf and -Treve used to play a complicated game whose chief move consisted of a -sweeping breakneck gallop for perhaps a half-mile, to the accompaniment -of a fanfare of barking. Across the green lawns they would flash, like -red-gold meteors; and at a pace none of their fleet-footed brethren -could maintain.</p> - -<p>One morning they started as usual on this whirlwind dash. But at the -end of the first few yards, Treve swayed in his flying stride, faltered -to a stop and came slowly back to me. He thrust his muzzle into my -cupped hand—for the first time in his undemonstrative life—then stood -wearily beside me.</p> - -<p>A strange transformation had come over him. The best way I can describe -it is to say that the glowing inward fire which always had seemed -to shine through him—even to the flaming bright mass of coat—was -gone. He was all at once old and sedate and massive; a dog of elderly -dignity—a dignity oddly majestic. The mischief imp had fled from his -eyes; the sheen and sunlight had vanished from his coat. He had ceased -to be Treve.</p> - -<p>I sent in a rush for the nearest good vet. The doctor examined the -invalid with all the skilled attention due a dog whose cash value runs -into four figures. Then he gave verdict.</p> - -<p>It was the heart;—the heart that had been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span> flighty in puppyhood days, -but which two competent vets had since pronounced as sound as the -traditional bell.</p> - -<p>For a day longer the collie lived;—at least a gravely gentle and -majestic collie lived in the marvelous body that had been Treve’s. He -did not suffer—or so the doctor told us—and he was content to stay -very close to me; his paw or his head on my foot.</p> - -<p>At last, stretching himself drowsily to sleep, he died.</p> - -<p>It seemed impossible that such a swirl of glad life and mischief and -beauty could have been wiped out in twenty-four little hours.</p> - -<p>Not for our virtues nor for our general worthiness are we remembered -wistfully by those who stay on. Not for our sterling qualities are we -cruelly missed when missing is futile. Worthiness, in its death, does -not leave behind it the grinding heartache that comes at memory of some -lovably naughty or mischievous or delightfully perverse trait.</p> - -<p>Treve’s entertaining badnesses had woven themselves into the very life -of the Place. Their passing left a keen hurt. The more so because, -under them, lay bedrock of staunch loyalty and gentleness.</p> - -<p>I have not the skill to paint our eccentrically<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span> lovable chum’s word -picture, except in this clumsily written sketch. If I were to attempt -to make a whole book of him, the result would be a daub.</p> - -<p>But I have tried at least to make his <i>name</i> remembered by a few -readers; by giving it to the hero of this collection of stories. -Perhaps some one, reading, may like the name, even if not the stories; -and may call his or her next collie, “Treve”; in memory of a gallant -dog that was dear to Sunnybank.</p> - -<p>We buried him in the woods, near the house, here. A granite bowlder -serves as his headstone.</p> - -<p>Alongside that bowlder, a few days ago, we buried the Mistress’s hero -collie, Wolf; close to his old-time playmate, Treve.</p> - -<p>Perhaps you may care to hear a word or two of Wolf’s plucky death. Some -of you have read his adventures in my other dog stories. More of you -read of his passing. For nearly every newspaper in America printed a -long account of it.</p> - -<p>It is an account worth reading and rereading; as is every tale of clean -courage. I am going to quote part of the finely-written story that -appeared in the <i>New York Times</i> of June 28, 1923; a story far beyond -power of mine to improve on or to equal: </p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span></p> - -<blockquote> - -<p>“Wolf, son of Lad, is dead. The shaggy collie, with the eyes that -understood and the friendly tail, made famous in the stories of -Albert Payson Terhune, died like a thoroughbred. So when Wolf -joined his father, in the canine Beyond, last Sunday night, there -was no hanging of heads.</p> - -<p>“Wolf died a hero. But yesterday the level lawns of Sunnybank, the -Terhune place at Pompton Lakes, N. J., seemed empty and the big -house was curiously quiet. True, other collies were there; but so, -too, was the big bowlder out in the woods with just ‘Wolf’ graven -across it.</p> - -<p>“Ten years ago, when thousands of readers were following Lad’s -career as told by his owner, Mr. Terhune, an interesting event -took place at Sunnybank. Of all the puppies that had or have come -to Sunnybank, that group of newcomers was the most mischievous. -Admittedly, Lad was properly proud, but readers will remember his -occasional misgivings about one of the pups. The cause of parental -concern was Wolf. He was a good puppy, you know, but a trifle -boisterous; maybe—yes, he was, the littlest bit inclined to -wildness.</p> - -<p>“In 1918 Lad passed on; and the whole country mourned his -departure. Wolf succeeded his famous father in the stories of Mr. -Terhune. The son had long since <span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span>abandoned his harum-scarum ways -and had developed into a model member of the Terhune dog circle. -Wolf was the property and the pet of Mrs. Terhune.</p> - -<p>“He became the cleverest of all the collies. One could talk to -Wolf and get understanding and no back talk. One could depend on -Wolf and get full loyalty. One could like Wolf and say so; and the -soft cool nose would come poking around and the tail would begin -to wag till it seemed as if Wolf would wag himself off his feet.</p> - -<p>“Wolf constituted himself warden of the Sunnybank lawns and -custodian of the driveways. When motoring parties came in and -endangered the lives of the puppies playing about the driveways, -Wolf, at the first sound of the motor, would dash importantly down -into the drive and would herd or chase every puppy out of harm’s -way.</p> - -<p>“Each evening it was the habit of Wolf to saunter off on a long -‘walk.’ Three evenings ago he rambled away and—</p> - -<p>“Down in the darkness at the railroad station some folk were -waiting to see the Stroudsburg express flash by. It was a few -minutes late. A nondescript dog, with a hunted, homeless droop to -his tail, trotted onto the tracks.</p> - -<p>“Far down the line there came the warning screech of the express. -The canine<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span> tramp didn’t pay any attention to it, but sat down to -scratch at a flea.</p> - -<p>“The headlight of the express shot a beam glistening along the -rails. Wolf saw the dog and the danger. With a bark and a snap, -the son of Lad thrust the stranger off the track and drove him to -safety.</p> - -<p>“The express was whistling, for a crossing, far past the station, -when they picked up what was Wolf and started for the Terhune -home.”</p></blockquote> - -<p>All dogs die too soon. Many humans don’t die soon enough. A dog is only -a dog. And a dog is too gorgeously normal and wholesome to be made -ridiculous in death by his owner’s sloppy sentimentality.</p> - -<p>The stories of one’s dogs, like the recital of one’s dreams, are of no -special interest to others. Perhaps I have talked overlong about these -two collie chums of ours. Belatedly, I ask your forgiveness if I have -bored you.</p> - -<p class="right"><span class="smcap">Albert Payson Terhune.</span></p> - -<p><i>“Sunnybank,”<br />Pompton Lakes,<br />New Jersey.</i></p> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TREVE ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ -concept and trademark. 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