University Missourian. [volume] (Columbia, Mo.) 1908-1916, 1915-09-12

there's any OF you small enough to
want your money back you can git it
as you go out. The dogs laid down
on us, that's all. We amt to blame
The little man was edging his way
between the chairs, accompanied by
the sergeant of police. With his pale
face close to the sapling bars of the
cage he looked at Kazan and the big
Dane.
II guess we'll be good friends" he
said, and he spoke SO low that only
the dogs heard his voice. "It's big
price, but we'll charge it to the Smith
sonian, lads. I'm going to need q
couple of four-footed friends of your
moral caliber."
And no one knew why Kazan and
the Dane drew nearer to the little
scientists side of the cage as he
pulled out a big roll of bills ami
counted out six hundred dollars for
Harker and Sandy McTrigger.
CHAPTER XIV
Alone In Darkness
Never had the terror and loneliness
of blindness fallen upon Gray Wolf as
In the days that followed the shooting
of Kazan and his capture by Sandy
McTrigger. For hours after the shot
she crouched in the bush back from
the river, waiting for him to come TO
her. She had faith that he would
come, as he had come a thousand
times before, and she lay close on her
belly, shifting the air, and whining
when it brought no scent of her mate.
Day and night were alike and endless
chaos of darkness to her now. but she
knew when the sun went down. She
sensed the first deepening shadows of
evening, and she knew that the stars
were out, and that the river lay in
moonlight. 1t was a night to roam,
and after a time she moved restlessly
about in a small circle on the plain,
and sent out her first inquiring call
for Kazan. Up from the river came
the pungent odor of smoke, and in
stinctively she knew that 1t was this
smoke, and the nearness of man, that
was keeping Kazan from her. But she
went no nearer than that first circle
made by her padded feet. Blindness
had taught her to wait. Since the
day of the battle on the Sun Rock.
when the lynx had destroyed her eyes,
Kazan had never failed her. Three
times she called for him in the early
night. Then she made herself nest
under a banskian shrub, and waited
until dawn.
Just how she knew when night
blotted out the last glow of the sun,
so without seeing she knew when day
came. Not until she felt the warmth
of the sun on her back did her anxiety
overcome her caution. Slowly she
moved toward the river. shifting the
air and whining. There was no long
er the smell of smoke in the air, and
she could not catch the scent Of man.
She followed her own trail back to the
sand-bar, and in the fringe Of thick
bush over-hanging the white shore of
the stream she stopped and listened.
After little she scrambled down and
went straight to the spot where she
and Kazan were drinking when the
shot came. And there her nose struck
the sand still wet and thick with Ka-
zan's blood. She knew it was the
blood Of her mate, for the scent Of
him was all about her in the sand,
mingled with the man-smell Of Sandy
McTrigger. She shifted the trail of
his body to the edge of the stream,
where Sandy had dragged him to the
canoe. She found the fallen tree to
which he had been tried. And then
she came upon one of the two clubs
that Sandy had used to beat wounded
Kazan into submissiveness. 1t was
covered with blood and hair, and all at
once Gray Wolf lay back on her
launches and turned her blind face to
the sky, and there rose from her
throat cry for Kazan that drifted for
miles on the wings of the south wind
Never had Gray Wolf given quite that
cry before. 1t was not the "call" that
comes with the moonlit nights, and
neither was it the hunt-cry, nor the
she-wolf's yearning for matehood. 1t
carried with it the lament of death.
And after that one cry Gray Wolf
skunk back to the fringe Of bush over
the river. and lay with her face turned
to the stream.
A strange terror fell upon her. She
had grown accustomed to darkness.
but never before had she been alone
in that darkness Always there had
been the guardianship of Kazan's