muscle torn raggedly across by Peg's one snap. Once more Breed
was indebted to Shady and his coyote followers.

But Breed was far gone. He struggled to rise but fell back again and lay
still, the blood oozing from the rents in his tattered pelt. He raised
his head and looked at Shady, and for a single instant his mouth opened
and his red tongue lolled out in friendly greeting, showing his spirit
still intact even though his body was slit in ribbons; then he lowered
it flat between his paws and moved nothing but his eyes.

Shady crept close to him and licked his wounds. The coyote pack came up
in pairs and circled about their stricken leader, some of them squatting
on their haunches as they regarded his plight, others moving restlessly
about; all of them silent as the grave, the only sound in the notch
being Shady's continuous low wails as she implored her mate to rise and
follow her.

The bitter frost claimed Breed's swollen foot and stiffened it, numbing
all sense of pain. He felt comfortable and content. Then Peg moved up
and sniffed critically at the trapped foot. He set his teeth in it but
Breed did not flinch. The three-legged coyote crouched beside him and
turned his head sidewise, the right side of his jaws flat on the trap,
his teeth sliding along the cold steel and shearing away the frozen
flesh. The leg was dulled to all sensations and Breed felt no pain.
Shady viewed this amputation closely and whined with anxiety as it
proceeded. Peg sliced the meat from the two toes, set his teeth firmly
across the bones and crunched just once. Then he hooked one forepaw over
the trap and scratched it away from Breed's sprawling hind leg, two
severed toes remaining in the trap.

Peg's lips and gums along the right side of his face were seared and
burned from contact with the chilled steel of the trap, raw patches of
flesh showing where the skin had adhered to the frosted springs and had
been wrenched loose. He nursed these wounds with his hot tongue, and
fiery twinges of pain racked him but he did not whine. He curled up and
slept for an hour, then rose and nipped Breed's flank. The cold had
stopped the flow of blood from Breed's cuts and the pain of the nip
roused him from the stupor. He struggled to his feet and stood swaying
while Shady bounced around him with joyous yelps. Then he set off for
the hills, moving at a walk, with his head drooping weakly.

The next morning Collins stood and looked down at the two great