Sean was dazed. For a long while he had run loose in the woods, with no one except himself to depend upon. He had faced dangers and triumphed over them. Now, suddenly, he was face to face with the man to whom he would gladly have devoted every beat of the strong heart within him. He had met the being whom he could revere above all others, and the numbing shock of the encounter left him unnerved.
At the same time, he was months removed from the prize-winning dog who had romped so gaily with Billy Dash. Sean had become a wild thing. He had suffered hurt and rebuff. He had won a mate, and had become the provider for her and the pups, who were waiting for him back in the pine grove.
He retreated as far as the trap chain would let him go when Billy Dash came near, and a warning growl rumbled from his throat. It was not the snarl that would have ripped forth had Jake Busher or Crosby Marlett found him helpless. Sean growled because he could not help it. He did not want to hurt Billy Dash, but at the same time he must protect himself.
“I know, Dog,” Billy said. “But I don’t think you really mean it.”
Never moving fast, and never making an indecisive motion, Billy stepped into the little creek and waded toward Sean. The big Setter, watching him come, calculated the time to launch himself at Billy’s throat. But he could not force himself to spring.
Gently, soothingly, Billy’s supple fingers slid down Sean’s trapped leg.
The dog opened his big jaws, closed them over Billy’s arm, and pinched until the ends of his teeth met flesh. Sean did not bite any deeper. He rolled his eyes, wanting to see how Billy Dash would take this. He heard Billy laugh softly.
“Youah not goin’ to bite me, Dog.”
Sean opened his jaws. His body was tense as a fiddle string, his brain a seething whirl, when Billy lifted his trapped paw and gently laid it across his knee. His strong hands depressed both trap springs. The trap slid from his paw and Sean was free.
He knew it, but he made no instantaneous move to leap aside and put himself out of harm’s way. Instead, he lifted his great head to stare straight at Billy. Billy Dash looked back, and in that second there passed between them something that very few dogs and masters ever know. It was as though, by some magical process, each was able to communicate his thoughts to the other.
“Go ahead, Dog,” said Billy sadly.
He looked again at the snowshoe. Dogs running wild were not in the habit of carrying their food around with them until such time as they saw fit to eat. They hunted because they were hungry, and as soon as they caught something they ate it. Obviously, somewhere back in the brush, Sean had a mate and a family. Beyond doubt, Billy decided, the big Setter had taken up with a coyote or a wolf.
Sean took a step forward, picked up the snowshoe, and looked around. He leaped to the opposite bank, turned around to look once more at Billy Dash, then faded into the hemlocks. He had his choice and he had made it.
Billy swallowed the terrific lump in his throat and turned slowly away. He knew that he was in trouble. Billy had not made the slightest effort to hide his trail or conceal his actions, and Crosby Marlett was an expert at reading signs. He would know not only that his trap had been tampered with but also who had done it. Crosby would not forgive such a thing. He had been determined to kill the trap-line robber, and the fact that it was a dog would make no difference.
Billy went back to his cabin, prepared a supper for which he had little appetite, and made his decision.
Crosby Marlett had run this line yesterday. Since he ran it only every fourth day, he would not be back for two more days. When he came, Billy decided, he would meet him at Allerton Creek, explain what he had done, why he had done it, and let Crosby take any action he saw fit.
Sean was troubled and restless as he trotted toward the pines. Because he was a dog, without a human’s powers of reasoning, it never once occurred to him that there might be a satisfactory solution to his problem. Torn between a great desire to follow Billy Dash and a greater one to return to Penny, he had done what his deepest instincts told him to do. He did not think beyond that. It would be possible to take Penny and the pups to Billy Dash or to bring Billy to them, but Sean did not reason that far.
He was so disturbed that he became careless and ventured too close to the den. Penny dashed out to rake him with punishing teeth. Sean dropped the snowshoe, yelped, and fled like a chastised puppy. Tail between his legs, still-damp ears flattened against his head, he stopped only when Penny left him and returned to the cave.
Sean turned to look at her, and lay down in the pines. But not for long could he stay quiet. His paws twitched nervously and his tail wagged as pleasant memories of Billy Dash chased one another through his head. He did not take notice even when Silverwing, who had at last returned to the pines, dropped a cone on his head.
Sean padded back and forth. Again he approached the den, only to have Penny fly out and chase him away. Sean retreated to his proper distance, and turned to look back at the cave. Then he could no longer control himself.
Penny was his love and his life. He had chosen her and he would not leave her. Yet he had to know more about Billy Dash, even though he had no intention of meeting him again. There was that about the man which the big Setter just could not resist, and he set out from the pine grove because he was unable to help himself.
He raced back to the little stream and crossed it, wading cautiously around the boulder. His tail wagged, at first jerkily and then happily, as he picked up Billy Dash’s scent. Sean was not a trailing dog insofar as he had never learned to trail game. But any good dog can always find his master by trailing him, and Billy Dash’s scent was very plain on the snow.
Sean stopped to test the breezes, then swung in the direction Billy Dash had taken, straight into the wilderness. Stopping for nothing, Sean followed the trail. His tail wagged almost constantly and there was a look of sheer happiness in his eyes. He crossed and paid no attention to the fresh scents of snow-shoes and cottontails. Once he bristled, paused to sniff briefly at the track of a lynx, and sped on. There was only one goal that interested him now.
Night had come and the first quarter of a thin moon rode in the sky when Sean broke out of some sparse beeches that straggled along the top of a low, rocky ridge. Below him was a valley which rose on the opposite side to another low ridge. The smell of wood smoke hung heavily in the air, and Sean quivered excitedly.
Billy Dash’s trails and paths were everywhere. Whining under his breath, Sean trotted down the slope. Shielded by the friendly darkness, he halted twenty feet from the cabin’s door. Varied smells wafted about, but predominating was the fresh scent of the man he had been following. So tense that his muscles ached, Sean sat perfectly still. Then, slowly, carefully putting one paw in front of the other, he walked toward the cabin.
At the rear was a window, a single pane of glass through which flowed yellow light from a kerosene lamp. For a moment Sean paused beneath that window. Finally he raised himself effortlessly, put both front paws on the sill, and looked in,
His back to the window, Billy Dash was busy at the old iron stove that occupied the far end of the single room. Satisfied, Sean dropped from the window and raced into the night.
From a safe distance away, he turned to look back. Not a second time did he turn his head. The big Setter must return to Penny and the pups. He did not walk or trot now, but raced with the effortless, mile-eating, tireless lope of an Irish Setter.
A half mile from the den he halted. Sean’s hackles rose, his lips lifted from polished fangs, and he gave one rippling, savage snarl. Before him in the snow was the smoking-hot trail of Slasher. Far too close to Penny and the pups, the killer had come this way not five minutes past.
12. The Feud
SEAN BOUNDED across the night-frozen crust, leaping the logs and stumps in his path and crashing through brush. He turned aside only for whatever he could not go through or over. For the first time in his life, he was afraid. But not for himself.
He knew Slasher far better th
an any man can ever hope to know any animal. Sean’s was a beast’s understanding, uncolored by sentiment or false assumptions. Slasher was a dangerous, vindictive killer, a hybrid that was neither all dog nor all coyote, and therefore outcast by both. Belonging to nothing, loved by nothing, he found an outlet in viciousness and bitter hatred of everything that moved.
Should he find Penny and the pups before Sean got to them, Slasher would at once seek a fight. Penny would defend her babies, but only the biggest and strongest dog could hope to defeat Slasher. Penny could not. She was thirty pounds lighter than Sean, and though she had great courage, the odds would be hopeless. Penny and the pups would die if Slasher found them first.
Sean whimpered anxiously as he raced along at top speed. Slasher was heading directly up the ridge that flanked the grove of pine trees. The prevailing winds were sweeping upward out of the valley, so he could not help getting Penny’s scent. Sean leaped a huge fallen pine, balanced himself on the other side, and only with the barest whisk of a pause to regain his equilibrium, he sped on. He was running a race with death itself, and knew it.
He abandoned all attempts to follow Slasher’s trail and took a direct course for the cave, one that led him through a blackberry thicket. Thorned blackberry canes tore at him as he raced. He left tufts of hair on all the bushes but gave the raking canes no more attention than he would have paid to so many willow withes.
Sean burst into the pine grove so fast and so angrily that Silverwing and his mate, awakened from sound sleep, took raucous flight. Reaching the pines, the big Setter stood still, one forepaw lifted and nose questing. His body was stiff, his tail curved in a half circle behind him. Sean knew that Penny and the pups were safe, because the wind told him so. Now he strove for some concrete evidence of Slasher.
He knew the killer was there on the ridge, only a little distance away. But the wind swept out of the valley and straight up the slope. He could smell nothing on the ridge. He mounted a boulder to see if he could get a different breeze a little higher up. Still the winds came out of the valley.
There was motion at the den’s mouth and Penny came out to stand beside him. She could smell nothing and she had heard nothing, but she knew from her mate’s actions that some deadly danger was near. Somewhere out in the wilderness was something so terrible and so vicious that even Sean was afraid of it. Penny trembled and pressed close to his side. It was all very well to drive him away from the pups, and, as a mother with babies to defend, it was Penny’s right to do this. But in a real emergency he was still her staunch defender.
Penny looked sideways at Sean. When he paid no attention to her she trotted softly back to the den, where the nine squirming pups crawled over her. Penny stopped trembling, contented because Sean was there. He was a safe bulwark against anything that might come.
Sean stood still as a carved statue on his boulder. Fierce rage replaced the combined anger and fear he had known; anger at Slasher’s presence and fear for Penny and the pups. Now he was here, and anything that threatened his family would first have to kill him.
He was nervous and anxious, because he could see, hear, and smell nothing out of the ordinary. But he was so familiar with the winds and their tricks that he knew why that was. And he was deadly certain that Slasher was on the ridge.
Sean was sure because the past months had made him aware of the ways of wild things. A deer, following the same path Slasher had taken, would have gone up the ridge. So would a bear, a wildcat, or anything else that was not running from an enemy. The ridge was simply the easiest and most logical way to travel. It was the way Sean himself would have selected had he not been so anxious to reach the den. Slasher could not be elsewhere.
The winds waned, shifted a little, and Sean corroborated with his nose what he had known to be the truth. Faint, but certain, he caught the coy-dog’s hated scent. It came with a puff of wind and was gone almost immediately, but unmistakably it had been there.
Sean raised his head and gave voice to a great battle roar. It was a thunderous, rolling blast, a challenge directed at anything within hearing but primarily at Slasher. Hearing it, Penny curled her head to enfold the pups in a warm arc made by her own body, and felt reassured. The two ravens, down over the rim of the hill, huddled close together and were silent. In a leafy nest, the black squirrel opened his eyes and stirred uncomfortably.
Sean’s roar was thousands of years old, something that had descended through the mists of time. The first dog that had been called upon to defend its mate and young from a prowling saber-tooth tiger or dire wolf had issued the same call to fight and so had all dogs since, when they found themselves in similar circumstances. It was not a pack cry, but the proud, single voice of one strong creature. It informed all within hearing that he was willing and able to protect what he held most dear.
The final echoes of his challenge still haunted the forest when Sean leaped from his boulder and sought a place close to the den. He had flung his boast to the whole world, he had said that he was strongest, and now let Slasher try to prove otherwise. Sean was ready.
But Slasher did not show himself, because he was too wise for that. He could stand and kill two winded hounds that were supposed to kill him. He killed sheep and calves whenever he could do so without danger to himself because it was his nature to kill. But Slasher was no fool. He had fought Sean once before and he knew the big Setter as a formidable antagonist. For Penny alone he had only contempt, but Penny and Sean together would wage a ferocious battle. As they stood, the odds were heavier than Slasher liked.
A past master of wild strategy, Slasher knew how to take perfect advantage of the winds, and had no intention of letting Sean and Penny know all about him. He circled the den, always being careful to stay downwind, and after a little while he left to hunt.
Sean maintained his sentry post, and again Penny came out to sniff noses briefly with him. She retreated when the pups started mewling, and growled when Sean came near. Sean padded to the edge of the slope and looked down it.
He had to hunt because Penny needed food, but there could be no more thought of going back to Crosby Marlett’s trap line. It was too far. Slasher could slip in, do his deadly work, and be gone before Sean returned. Still, there had to be something to eat.
Sean slipped down the slope, laid an ambush in a rabbit thicket, and caught a small cottontail. He carried it back to the den, watched Penny come out to take it, and resumed his sentry duty while she ate. Not for a moment did he dare relax. The eddying breezes had carried no recent scent of Slasher, but the killer knew of the cave and that was enough.
Hungry, but not daring to hunt for himself unless the situation became desperate, Sean dozed near the den. Even while he slept, his nostrils tested and analyzed every little breeze. Should one bring any alien or dangerous scent, Sean would be on his feet in the wink of an eye and ready for anything.
The afternoon sun was waning when he went forth to hunt again. The pups were crying and Penny, hungry, was restless. Sean slipped back to the same thicket where he had caught the cottontail and settled himself in an ambush.
Like thin notes from a bugle, Penny’s shrill yelp of anger floated down the slope to him. Penny gave voice again, a high-pitched sound of sheerest rage, and Sean sprang erect. He bounded back up the slope and into the pines.
Hackles raised, fangs bared, Penny stood in front of the cave. The heavy scent of Slasher was all about. But he had fled, his trail ending a hundred feet from Penny.
Sean paused long enough to assure himself that Penny and the pups had not been harmed, then he took the battle upon himself. This had to be ended, and it could end only with the death of Slasher or himself. If Penny became hungry enough, the frozen marten was still buried where Sean had left it. Before he brought more food to his family, Sean had an enemy to hunt.
He struck Slasher’s trail and hurried along it. The killer must be pushed hard; any errors on Sean’s part and the coy-dog would have ample time to slip back to the den. There could be
no mistakes.
*
All night long and until the early hours of the morning, Billy Dash fretted in his cabin. He had been all right, sure of himself and what he was going to do, until he had again run across Sean. Then, with cruel force, all the dreams of what might have been came out of the dark shadows to torment him again.
Working for Danny Pickett, Billy had never once asked himself whether a kennel boy had a high or a low station in life. He didn’t care. What had mattered, and all that had mattered, was the fact that he had worked with Irish Setters. There was something about such dogs that represented to Billy what a collector’s finest paintings mean to him. And Sean seemed to him the finest in the collection.
More than once Billy had dreamed that Sean was his dog. If only he had been, Billy felt, he would have envied nobody else in the entire world. Sean had great intelligence, which Billy had appreciated from the first, and a magnificent body. Above and beyond that he had a certain independence of spirit that set him apart.
It had never occurred to Billy, when he had Sean alone and helpless in a trap, that he might have overwhelmed him with force, tied him up, and made him do whatever Billy wished. You just didn’t try that with dogs like Sean any more than you tried it with a certain type of man. Sean had a mind and a will of his own. It might be possible to subdue him with clubs and whips, and to break his spirit, but if that were done Sean would no longer be Sean. He would be just a dog.
A dozen times Billy lay down on his bunk, and a dozen times he got up. Everything was blurred and distorted in his mind. Morning light glowed through the cabin’s frosted window when Billy lay down again, and this time sheer weariness forced him into deep slumber.
Morning was well under way when he awakened to a loud knock on the cabin’s door. At once the dream world of a magnificent Irish Setter named Sean faded away and the stern realities of Billy Dash’s world came back. It must be the Police.
Billy glanced toward the .45 hanging in its holster from a wooden peg driven into the cabin’s wall. At once he put the thought aside. He had shot Uncle Hat, accidentally. Never, if he could help it, would he shoot anyone deliberately. He had known the risks he ran when he decided to take his chances in the wilderness. Apparently he had gambled and lost.
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