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Updated: May 24, 2025
One crunch from his broad forehead, one little push so, and the Dog-Wolf, who was A'tim, would "Spare me, Shag let me go," pleaded the mongrel again; "I brought you to this Herd to this Northland which is good. Were we not Outcast Brothers together?" Again Shag hesitated. Why not? Was he not a Buffalo Bull, a Leader of Herds?
"It is the Death Flower," declared the Cow with sententious persistence; "and this Outcast Wolf is a traitor, for if he is from the Northland he also knows that, even as in the Southland they know the Loco Plant." A'tim slunk back nervously and watched Shag with wary caution. "Do you believe this lie, Shag, my dear Friend? Ghur-r-r-ah! do you think I would do such a thing?
Slaughtered, every one of them; and so it will be again to-morrow eh, A'tim? It's the big Herd down in the good feeding they're after, I suppose." "Yes," answered A'tim; "to-morrow the whole Blood tribe, and Camous the Paleface, who is but a squaw man, living in their lodges, will make the Run."
Daily the Dog-Wolf grew into the heart of Shag, the Buffalo, who listened with eager delight to his tales of the Northland. A'tim had fared well while the meat lasted; but they were now in a land of much hunger a land almost devoid of life; and the Dog-Wolf was coming again into the chronic state of his existence famine.
"Gallop, Lone Dog; gallop, brave Pups; the scent grows strong, and we need light for our work." A'tim stretched his thin limbs in eager chase; at his shoulder now raced the Wolf Pups; the blood fever crept stronger and stronger into the hot hearts of the Gray Runners.
Poplar bluff, and jack-pine knoll, and spruce thicket, and open patch of rosebush-matted plain flitted by like the tide of a landscape through which an express speeds. Why had this silly Cow and effete old Bull traveled so far? A'tim wondered. Would they never overtake them? Suddenly a vibrating bellow echoed through the forest and halted the Wolf Runners.
The next day they trailed again toward the Northland. When they came to a river that was to be forded Shag carried the Dog-Wolf on his back; when there was presence of danger, a suspicious horseman, Shag curled up like a boulder, or crouched in a coulee, and if the Man came too near A'tim led him away on a hopeless chase.
Have a strong heart food will be sent." "Sent!" snapped A'tim crabbedly; "who will send it? Will my Gray Half-Brothers, who are Wolves, send it come and lay a dead Caribou at my feet? Will the Train Dogs, of whose kind I am, come and feed me with White Fish the dried Fish their drivers give them so sparingly?" "I cannot say, Dog-Wolf; but surely food does not come of one's own thinking.
"A good bed," quoth A'tim. "I will share it with you, Brother; close against your stomach for warmth." He took the three turns that had come to him of his Dog heritage, and curled up contentedly against the great paunch of the scarred Bull. "I can't sleep for thinking of the big Kill," murmured Shag.
Only the grass plain, and on the plain seven Buffalo; a waiting crescent of seven huge heads lined in symmetrical defense; a little in front old Shag, and behind, shoulder to shoulder, the others. With a cry of dismay, A'tim stopped. "A trick a trap!" yelped the Wolf. "I did not know of these," whined A'tim; "but it is nothing. If we charge boldly they will stampede."
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