II
A sound of footfalls, hesitating but apparently making no attempt at concealment, came from the bend of the trail beyond the wallow; and the great white bull wheeled savagely to see what was approaching. As he glared, however, the angry ridge of hair cresting his neck sank amiably. A young cow, attracted by his calls and the noise of the battle, was coming around the thicket.
At the edge of the thicket, not a dozen paces from the black ooze-bed of the wallow, the cow paused coyly, as if doubtful of her welcome. She murmured in her throat, a sort of rough allurement which seemed to the white bull’s ears extraordinarily enticing. He answered, very softly, and stepped forward a pace or two, inviting rather than pursuing. Reassured, the young cow advanced confidently and eagerly to meet him.
At this moment, out from the heart of the thicket 263 plunged a towering black form, with wide, snarling jaw’s agleam in the moonlight. It seemed to launch itself through the air, as if from a height. One great, taloned paw struck the young cow full on the neck, a crashing blow, shattering the vertebrae through all their armour of muscle. With a groan the stricken cow sank down, her outstretched muzzle smothered in the ooze of the wallow; and the monstrous bulk of the bear fell upon her, tearing the warm flesh hungrily.
In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, the most hot-headed and powerful bull of the caribou will shrink from trying conclusions with a full grown black bear. The duel, as a rule, is too cruelly one-sided. The bear, on the other hand, knows that a courageous bull is no easy victim; and the monster ambuscaded in the thicket had been waiting for one or both of the rivals to be disabled before making his attack. The approach of the young cow had been an unexpected favour of the Powers that order the wilderness; and in clutching his opportunity he had scornfully and absolutely put the white bull out of the reckoning.
But this bull was the exceptional one, the one that confounds generalizations, and confirms the 264 final supremacy of the unexpected. He was altogether fearless, indifferent to odds, and just now flushed with overwhelming victory. Moreover, he was aflame with mating ardour; and the mate of his desire had just been brutally struck down before his eyes. For a moment or two he stood bewildered, not daunted, but amazed by the terrific apparition and the appalling event. Then a mad fire raged through all his veins, his great muscles swelled, the stiff hair on his neck and shoulders stood straight up, his eyes went crimson––and without a sound he charged across the wallow.
When the bulls of the caribou kin fight each other, the weapons of their sole dependence are their antlers. But when they fight alien enemies they are wont to hold their heads high and strike with the battering, knife-edged weapons of their fore-hoofs. The bear, crouched upon his quivering prey, was too absorbed and too scornful to look for any assault. The bull was upon him, therefore, before he had time to guard his exposed flank. From the corner of his eye, he saw a big glistening shape which reared suddenly above him, and, clever boxer that he was, he threw up a ponderous forearm to parry the blow. But he was too late. With 265 all the force of some seven hundred pounds of rage, avenging rage, behind him, these great hoofs, with their cutting edges, came down upon his side, smashing in several ribs, and gashing a wide wound down into his loins. The shock was so terrific that his own counter stroke, usually so swift and unerring, went wild altogether, and he was sent rolling clear of the body of his prey.
Instantly upon delivering his stroke, the white bull had pranced lightly aside, knowing well enough the swift and deadly effectiveness of a bear’s paw. But he struck yet again, almost, it seemed, in the same breath, and just as the bear was struggling up upon his haunches. Frantically, out of his astonishment, fury, and pain, the bear attempted to guard. He succeeded, indeed, in warding off those deadly hoofs from his flank; but he caught an almost disabling blow on the point of the left shoulder, putting his left forearm out of business. With a squawling grunt he swung about upon his haunches, bringing his right toward the enemy, and sat up, savagely but anxiously defensive.
Sore wounded though he was, the bear was not yet beaten. One fair buffet of his right paw, could he but land it in the proper place,––on nose, or 266 neck, or leg––might yet give him the victory, and let him crawl off to nurse his hurts in some dense covert, leaving his broken foe to die in the wallow. But the white bull, though he had underrated his former antagonist, was in no danger of misprizing this one. He was now as wary as he had, in the previous case, been rash. Moreover, he had had a dreadful object lesson in the power of the bear’s paw. The body of the cow before him kept him from forgetting.
Stepping restlessly from side to side, threatening now with hoof and now with antlers, he seemed each instant upon the point of a fresh attack; and the bear, with swaying muzzle and blazing, shifting eyes, kept following his every motion. Again and again he gathered his muscles for a fresh charge––but each time he checked himself with a realization that the body of the slain cow was exactly in his way, hampering his avoidance of a counter-stroke.
After some minutes of this feinting, the caribou stood still, deliberating some new move. Instantly the bear, also, became motionless as a stone. The sudden peace was like a shock of enchantment, a violent sorcery, and over it the blue-white, flooding shine of the moonlight seemed to take on some 267 sinister significance. The seconds lengthened out as a nightmare, till at last the stupendous stillness was broken by the wild clamour of a loon, far down on the lake. As the distant cry shrilled up the mountainside, the white bull stirred, shook his antlers, and blew loudly through his nostril. It was a note of challenge––but in it the bear divined a growing hesitancy. Perhaps, after all, this fight, which had gone so sorely against him, might not have to be fought out! He dropped, whirled about so quietly one could hardly follow the motion––and in a flash was up again on his haunches, right paw uplifted, eyes blazing vigilant defiance. But he had retreated several feet in that swift manœuvre! His move was a confusion of defeat––but his attitude was a warning that he was dangerous in defeat. The bull followed, but only for a couple of steps, which brought him so that he bestrode the body of the cow. Here he halted, still threatening; and again the two confronted each other motionlessly.
This time, however, the spell was broken by the bear himself. Suddenly he repeated his former manœuvre; and again turned to face his adversary. But the bull did not follow. Without a movement he stood, as if content with his victory. And after a few moments the bear, as if realizing that the fight was over, flung himself aside from the trail and went limping off painfully through the bushes, keeping a watchful eye over his shoulder till he vanished into a bunch of dense spruce against the mountainside.
“IN A FLASH WAS UP AGAIN ON HIS HAUNCHES.”
The white bull eyed his going proudly. Then he looked down at the torn and lifeless body between his feet. He had not really taken note of it before. Now he bent his head and sniffed at it with wondering interrogation. The spreading blood, still warm, smote his nostrils; and all at once, it seemed, death and the fear of death were borne in upon his arrogant heart. He tossed his head, snorting wildly, flung himself clear of the uncomprehended, dreadful thing upon the ground, bounded over the wallow as if it, too, had grown terrifying, and fled away up the trail through the merciless, unconcealing moonlight, till he reached the end of the open shelf and a black wood hid his sudden fear of the unknown.