t name that
peculiarity in Breed's note, but before he could give it expression the
solution was slipping away from him as always before. He could feel the
odd quality but it defied analysis in words.

Shady too had heard the call and answered it. Breed started toward her
but stopped abruptly and tested the wind. The scent of stale meat played
on his nostrils and he veered aside to investigate. He moved along a cow
trail and peered from the edge of the sage at a ten-pound chunk of meat
that lay in the center of an open flat. He knew what that meant.
Suspicion flooded him and every hair tingled as he realized that this
was the work of man. Traps! No coyote on the range would have found need
to look twice at the tempting morsel to know that it had not come there
by accident but had been placed by some man as a coyote lure.

Breed, springing as he did from two wise tribes, had been educated in
two schools. His coyote mother had led him to meat, knowing men had put
it there to bait her, and she had taught him to detect the most
cunningly buried trap. Later he had practiced this art himself. The old
dog wolf who was his father had followed one simple rule which served
him well. He killed each meal as he felt the need of it and would touch
no other food, not even returning to previous kills of his own. Breed
was possessed of both traits in moderation, inclining to either for long
periods as his moods varied. Breed moved to within ten feet of the meat
and extended one forepaw, feeling cautiously through the carpet of dust,
then pushed it two inches ahead. For a solid hour that paw was not once
lifted from the ground except when the other was pushed forward to
replace it. He moved ahead an inch at a time, the edging forepaws
feeling through the dust for the least sign of loosened earth beneath.
He knew that the crushing jaws of a trap yawned beneath the surface
somewhere near the meat. His eyes swept every inch of ground for a sign
that differed from the rest and his nose quested for a spot which held
the taint of man. A faint trace of it pervaded the place, coming mainly
from the bait itself and almost blotted by the meat scent.

Cripp and Peg watched every move from a distance of ten feet. Two young
coyotes had come to the spot and one of them worked in toward the bait
from the opposite side, using the same tactics as those employed by
Breed. At the end of an hour Breed stood within three feet of his goal
and the out-stretc