with infinite cunning; the moment when he felt most secure in his stall
and ate with his head down, blinded by the manger, was the very moment
which the Mexican had often chosen to play some cruel prank. The lip of
Alcatraz twitched back from his teeth as he remembered. This lesson was
written into his mind with the letters of pain: in the moment of
greatest peace, beware of man!

That day he journeyed towards the mountains; that night he chose the
tallest hill he could find and rested there, trusting to the wide
prospect to give him warning; and no matter how soundly he slept the
horrid odor of man approaching would bring him to his feet. No man came
near but there were other smells in the night. Once the air near the
ground was rank with fox. He knew that smell, but he did not know the
fainter scent of wildcat. Neither could he tell that the dainty-footed
killer had slipped up within half a dozen yards of his back and crouched
a long moment yearning towards the mountain of warm meat but knowing
that it was beyond its powers to make the kill.

A thousand futile alarms disturbed Alcatraz, for freedom gave the nights
new meanings for him. Sometimes he wakened with a start and felt that
the stars were the lighted lanterns of a million men searching for him;
and sometimes he lay with his head strained high listening to the
strange silence of the mountains and the night which has a pulse in it
and something whispering, whispering forever in the distance. Hunted men
have heard it and to Alcatraz it was equally filled with charm and
terror. What made it he could not tell. Neither can men understand.
Perhaps it is the calling of the wild animals just beyond ear shot. That
overtone of the mountains troubled and frightened Alcatraz on his first
night; eventually he was to come to love it.