teeth into me once, and then I
got him by the nape of the neck. Lop-Ear and I sat down, and held the
puppies up, and looked at them, and laughed.

They were snarling and yelping and crying. Lop-Ear started suddenly.
He thought he had heard something. We looked at each other in fear,
realizing the danger of our position. The one thing that made animals
raging demons was tampering with their young. And these puppies that
made such a racket belonged to the wild dogs. Well we knew them, running
in packs, the terror of the grass-eating animals. We had watched them
following the herds of cattle and bison and dragging down the calves,
the aged, and the sick. We had been chased by them ourselves, more than
once. I had seen one of the Folk, a woman, run down by them and caught
just as she reached the shelter of the woods. Had she not been tired out
by the run, she might have made it into a tree. She tried, and slipped,
and fell back. They made short work of her.

We did not stare at each other longer than a moment. Keeping tight hold
of our prizes, we ran for the woods. Once in the security of a tall
tree, we held up the puppies and laughed again. You see, we had to have
our laugh out, no matter what happened.

And then began one of the hardest tasks I ever attempted. We started to
carry the puppies to our cave. Instead of using our hands for climbing,
most of the time they were occupied with holding our squirming captives.
Once we tried to walk on the ground, but were treed by a miserable
hyena, who followed along underneath. He was a wise hyena.

Lop-Ear got an idea. He remembered how we tied up bundles of leaves to
carry home for beds. Breaking off some tough vines, he tied his puppy's
legs together, and then, with another piece of vine passed around his
neck, slung the puppy on his back. This left him with hands and feet
free to climb. He was jubilant, and did not wait for me to finish tying
my puppy's legs, but started on. There was one difficulty, however. The
puppy wouldn't stay slung on Lop-Ear's back. It swung around to the side
and then on in front. Its teeth were not tied, and the next thing it did
was to sink its teeth into Lop-Ear's soft and unprotected stomach. He
let out a scream, nearly fell, and clutched a branch violently with both
hands to save himself. The vine around his neck broke, and the puppy,
its four legs still tied, dropped to the ground. The hyena proceeded to
dine.

Lop-Ear was disgusted and an