With a sudden spring he turned, and barked derisively as he loped
through the forest: "Good-by, bald-hided old Bull; I will bring
harm to you because of this."

"I think you were just in time," said Shag to the Cow; "that
Dog-Wolf meant my death."

Then Shag learned from the Buffalo Cow that she was one of a Herd
of six, and that the Herd was not very far away; that they were
unguarded because of the loss of their Leader through the Death
Flower, even as she had said. Willingly Shag went with her,
making many protestations as to his disreputable appearance, and
the unfitness of his well-worn stub-horns to battle for them; but
he went.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER SIX

A'tim slunk through the forest, his lean body filled with nothing
but the rage of disappointed appetite. "I'm starving!" he gasped;
"Starving! I must have something to eat. By the feast that is in
a dead Buffalo! if that evil-minded Cow had also eaten of the
Death Flower when her Bull did, as she says, I should now be
closer friend than ever with old Shag--Shag, the Fool."

A large dead cottonwood, rotted to the heart till its flesh was
like red earth mould, lay across his path like an unburied
Redskin. "Should be Grub Worms here," muttered A'tim, sniffing
at the moss shroud which clothed the tree corpse. In famine haste
he tore with strong claws at the crumbling mass. One, two, three
large Grubs, full of a white fat, twisted and squirmed at their
rude awakening; the Dog-Wolf swallowed them greedily. "Eu-h-h!
Hi, yi! Such a tiny morsel," he whined plaintively; "they but
give life to the famine pains which were all but dead through
starvation. Wait, you, fool Bull--I'll crack your ribs with my
strong teeth yet! But small as the Grubs are there should be
more."

With swift diligence A'tim excavated, grumblingly, until his
gaunt form was half buried in the hole.

Three Gray Shadows were creeping in stealthy silence upon his
flank; owing to his anxious work A'tim was oblivious to the
approaching trouble.

"E-e-yah!" and quick as a slipping sound that fluttered his ear
A'tim was up on the dead cottonwood, only to find himself peering
into the lurid eyes of a huge Wolf.

Like war stars, four other balls of light gleamed at him from a
close crescent. The Outcast was clever. Surely this was a case
for diplomacy; he had no desire to feed three hungry Wolves with
his thin carcass.

"You startled me, Brothers," he said, grinn