Kentuck neighed. Jones saw his black ears go up. Danger
threatened. For a moment the hunter's blood turned chill, not
from fear, for he never felt fear, but because he thought the
Indians were returning to ruin his work. His eye swept the plain.
Only the gray forms of wolves flitted through the grass, here,
there, all about him. Wolves! They were as fatal to his
enterprise as savages. A trooping pack of prairie wolves had
fallen in with the herd and hung close on the trail, trying to
cut a calf away from its mother. The gray brutes boldly trotted
to within a few yards of him, and slyly looked at him, with pale,
fiery eyes. They had already scented his captive. Precious time
flew by; the situation, critical and baffling, had never before
been met by him. There lay his little calf tied fast, and to the
north ran many others, some of which he must--he would have. To
think quickly had meant the solving of many a plainsman's
problem. Should he stay with his prize to save it, or leave it to
be devoured?

"Ha! you old gray devils!" he yelled, shaking his fist at the
wolves. "I know a trick or two." Slipping his hat between the
legs of the calf, he fastened it securely. This done, he vaulted
on Kentuck, and was off with never a backward glance. Certain it
was that the wolves would not touch anything, alive or dead, that
bore the scent of a human being.

The bison scoured away a long half-mile in the lead, sailing
northward like a cloud-shadow over the plain. Kentuck,
mettlesome, over-eager, would have run himself out in short
order, but the wary hunter, strong to restrain as well as impel,
with the long day in his mind, kept the steed in his easy stride,