a mountain-lion check itself mid-leap and slink
back to its lair. In such a voice he answered Kate, and then sank down,
gradually. And he lay still.

So simply, and yet so mysteriously, she was admitted to the partnership.
But though one member of that swift, grim trio had accepted her, did it
mean that the other two would take her in?

A weight sank on her feet and when she looked down she saw that Black
Bart had lowered his head upon them, and so he lay there with his eyes
closed, dreaming in the sun.

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE TRAIL

Bandages and antiseptics and constant care, by themselves could not have
healed Black Bart so swiftly, but nature took a strong hand. The wound
closed with miraculous speed. Three days after he had laid his head on
the feet of Kate Cumberland, the wolf-dog was hobbling about on three
legs and tugging now and again at the restraining chain; and the day
after that the bandages were taken off and Whistling Dan decided that
Bart might run loose. It was a brief ceremony, but a vital one. Doctor
Byrne went out with Barry to watch the loosing of the dog; from the
window of Joe Cumberland's room he and Kate observed what passed. There
was little hesitancy in Black Bart. He merely paused to sniff the foot
of Randall Byrne, snarl, and then trotted with a limp towards the
corrals.

Here, in a small enclosure with rails much higher than the other
corrals, stood Satan, and Black Bart made straight for the stallion. He
was seen from afar, and the black horse stood waiting, his head thrown
high in the air, his ears pricking forward, the tail flaunting, a
picture of expectancy. So under the lower rail Bart slunk and stood
under the head of Satan, growling terribly. Of this display of anger
the stallion took not the slightest notice, but lowered his beautiful
head until his velvet nose touched the cold muzzle of Bart. There was
something ludicrous about the greeting--it was such an odd shade close
to the human. It was as brief as it was strange, for Black Bart at once
whirled and trotted away towards the barns.

By the time Doctor Byrne and Whistling Dan caught up with him, the
wolf-dog was before the heaps and ashes which marked the site of the
burned barn. Among these white and grey and black heaps he picked his
way, sniffing hastily here and there. In the very centre of the place he
sat down suddenly on his haunches, pointed his nose aloft, and wailed
with tremendous dreariness.

"Now,"