But at this drowsy hour of the day, most of them were
resting from their hunting of the previous night and early morning, and
were sleeping in their lairs. Boola and her family were curled up in the
cool chamber at the end of the hole. Baltook was taking a light nap in a
shady spot he knew of among a cluster of shumacks a quarter of a mile
from the den. Goshmeelee sat in huge contentment in the edges of the
swamp--sitting up commodiously on the well-cushioned and very wide
sitting-down part of her, and rocking herself slowly to and fro with a
pleasant sense of the damp and slimy cosiness to be had in the swampy
parts of the world. While the squirrels, chipmunks, and blue jays, and
all other small watchers and warners of danger coming, or to come,
perched on shady look-out points, and blinked their eyes a little in the
drowsy warmth.

As soon as Lone Wolf left the open mountain side and entered the
out-lying edges of the spruce woods, he was fully aware that he was
being watched by many pairs of eyes. And he had not gone very far before
he had annoying proof of this in the defiant chatter of a chipmunk which
was taking noon-tide observation on a hollow log. Above all things, Lone
Wolf wanted to go secretly. As he passed the log, he shot a murderous
look at its occupier out of his cruel grey-green eyes; but he knew
better than to waste his energy by making a leap at that alert bundle of
fur-covered springs, and so went softly on his way, while the chipmunk
sent its angry warning out to all forest-folks within earshot that
murder was on the trail.

He had reached a spot about a mile from the camp when he came to an
abrupt stand. There not fifty paces away, he saw a big wolf, with
another creature beside it which was certainly not a wolf. Both were
travelling quickly eastward. He remained motionless till they had
disappeared and then took up the fresh trail. Its mingled beast and
human smell disturbed him. He had met Red men before, and detested them.
He still carried the mark and the memory of an Indian tomahawk which had
slashed him in the neck, when, running one hard winter with a
desperately hungry pack, he had attacked a solitary Indian travelling
across the frost-bound levels of the lakes. Now, as the mixed smell of
the wolf-breed, and hated man-breed, rose to his nostrils, the old
enmity slumbering within him leaped again to life.

For the rest of that day, he dogged the footsteps of the pair; and when
they separ