ay to find a man in a valley is to get up on a
hill. They ain't no such thing as a smokeless campfire invented yet,
though, if a man rustles dry sticks and does his cookin' at noon of a
bright day, he don't make much smoke. A feller fooled me once that way.
He didn't take a chance on noon, but done his cookin' at night, down in
a hole. Only way I got him, the fire burned in under a rock into some
old roots, and sorter smudged along one mornin' when he was asleep."

Casey glanced up at the bulk of the ranges outlined in blackness
against the sky. "If you say so, sheriff, we'll climb."

"I hate to," the sheriff admitted. "Couldn't you make a good guess?"

"No. I don't know any more than you do."

"Well," said the sheriff thoughtfully, "we'll try the valley first. We
may come on some sign. It's bound to take time, anyway. There's a whole
heap of country here if it was smoothed out and stretched level."

He knocked out his pipe and pulled his blanket around him, for down in
that deep, watered valley the nights were cold. Casey followed his
example. In two minutes both men were asleep, with the rush of the
water and the crunch-crunch of the horses' teeth cropping the grasses
in their ears.

They breakfasted in the dawn, saddled, and took a course downstream,
The trail petered out; the hoof marks vanished. They rode with care
through thick brush, and more easily in open, parklike glades. Grouse
rose almost under their horses' hoofs, to sit bright-eyed on adjacent
limbs, watching the travellers. Occasionally deer by twos and threes
bounded springily away, white flags waving. Once the horses snorted and
showed a disinclination to proceed, sniffing the air nervously.

"Bear," said Casey.

"Down among them berry bushes, I reckon," said the sheriff.

As he spoke, a black, furry head, short ears, and sharp muzzle rose
above the tangled bushes. A narrow, red tongue licked out. Cunning
little eyes regarded them with indignant suspicion.

"Woof!" said the bear. The sound was something between the snort of a
hog and the first interrogative note of a watchdog, which hears a noise
that requires explanation.

"Well, sport," said the sheriff, "berryin' good this mornin'?"

But at the sound of the human voice the black head disappeared beneath
the surface of foliage. There was a momentary swaying of bushes in one
spot, like the swirl of disturbed water after a fish; but there was
nothing to mark the line of the beast's flight.