instinct urged him to retreat, and he
went higher until he came to a part of the mountain that was rough and
broken, where once more he halted.

This time he waited. Whatever the menace was it was drawing nearer with the
swiftness of the wind. He could hear it coming up the slope that sheltered
the basin from the valley.

The crest of that slope was just about on a level with Thor's eyes, and as
he looked the leader of the pack came up over the edge of it and stood for
a moment outlined against the sky. The others followed quickly, and for
perhaps thirty seconds they stood rigid on the cap of the hill, looking
down into the basin at their feet and sniffing the heavy scent with which
it was filled.

During those thirty seconds Thor watched his enemies without moving, while
in his deep chest there gathered slowly a low and terrible growl. Not until
the pack swept down into the cup of the mountain, giving full tongue again,
did he continue his retreat. But it was not flight. He was not afraid. He
was going on--because to go on was his business. He was not seeking
trouble; he had no desire even to defend his possession of the meadow and
the little lake under the mountain. There were other meadows and other
lakes, and he was not naturally a lover of fighting. But he was ready to
fight.

He continued to rumble ominously, and in him there was burning a slow and
sullen anger. He buried himself among the rocks; he followed a ledge with
Muskwa slinking close at his heels; he climbed over a huge scarp of rock,
and twisted among boulders half as big as houses. But not once did he go
where Muskwa could not easily follow. Once, when he drew himself from a
ledge to a projecting seam of sandstone higher up, and found that Muskwa
could not climb it, he came down and went another way.

The baying of the dogs was now deep down in the basin. Then it began to
rise swiftly, as if on wings, and Thor knew that the pack was coming up the
green slide. He stopped again, and this time the wind brought their scent
to him full and strong.

It was a scent that tightened every muscle in his great body and set
strange fires burning in him like raging furnaces. With the dogs came also
the _man-smell_!

He travelled upward a little faster now, and the fierce and joyous yelping
of the dogs seemed scarcely a hundred yards away when he entered a small
open space in the wild upheaval of rock. On the mountainside was a wall
that rose perpendicularly.