him at
the kill.

Breed was mystified by this strange thing. Here was meat yet the
meat-eaters would not come in and feed. Coyotes had fed with him long
ago but shunned him now. Breed could not know that then he had been
accepted as one of them, having grown to maturity among them and so
become known to every coyote on his range; that they had forgotten him
as an individual, as he had also forgotten them. If there were any old
friends among those who circled round him now he did not know them as
such, only as a companionable whole; and they knew him for a wolf,--a
wolf at least in size and strength. There was a coyote note in his call
but not one of them would venture in to feed with the great yellow beast
that was tearing the steer.

At last a grizzled old dog coyote drew up to within ten yards. He had
lived to the limit of all experiences which a coyote can pass through
and still survive. He had even known the crushing grip of a
double-spring trap, a Newhouse four. This misadventure had occurred in
midwinter when the range was gripped by bitter frost. The cold had
numbed the pain and congealed the flesh to solid ice. He had cut through
the meat with his keen-pointed teeth, and one desperate wrench had
snapped the frozen bone and freed him. There were many of his kind so
maimed, and the wolfers, abbreviating the term peg-legs, called these
three-footed ones "pegs."

A second coyote joined Peg near the steer. He too had lived long and
hard. He had been shot at many times and wounded twice. A shattered
foreleg had healed with an ugly twist, the foot pointing inside and
leaving only the prints of two warped toe pads when it touched the
ground.

Peg and Cripp circled twice round the steer at a distance of thirty
feet. They had known other breeds and had found that some would share
their kills. Breed went out to greet them and they sidled away as he
advanced, stopping when he stopped and turning to face him. Cripp
allowed him to draw close, his teeth bared in warning against a too
effusive greeting, while Peg drew swiftly in behind the wolf. The
peg-leg coyote stretched forth his nose for one deep sniff, then sprang
ten feet away as Breed whirled. Cripp drew up for a similar sniff as
Breed faced Peg, then leaped away as Peg had done. Nature has endowed
the members of each animal tribe with a different scent, and most
animals identify enemies and friends with nose instead of eyes. That one
deep inhalation had assured