It was late that night when Trask slouched wearily into his own house and laid aside his gun.
“Any trace of him?” asked Mildred, eagerly.
“Not a trace,” answered Frayne. “I quartered the range, farther back than we ever hunted before. And I asked a lot of questions at that God-forsaken mountaineer settlement, up there. That’s all the good it did. I might hunt for a year and not get any track of the beast. Those mountaineers are all liars, of course. Not one of ’em, would admit they’d ever seen or heard of the dog. If I’d had Tam with me, I might have caught the trail. To-morrow, I’ll see he goes along. He——”
“Tam?” repeated Mildred, in surprise. “Why, wasn’t he with you? He hasn’t been home all day. He——”
“Hasn’t been home? Do you mean to say he didn’t come back?”
“No,” said his wife, worriedly. “When I got up this morning and found you both gone, I thought of course you’d taken him along, as you said you were going to. Didn’t——”
“He wasn’t anywhere around when I started,” replied Frayne. “He’s—he’s never been away for a whole day, or even for a whole hour, before. I wonder——”
“Oh, do you suppose that horrible brute has killed Tam, too?” quavered Mildred, in new terror.
“Not he,” Trask reassured her. “Not he, or any other mortal dog. But,” he hesitated, then went on, shamefacedly, “but I’ll tell you what I do think. I believe Tam has gone hunting, on his own account. I believe he’s trailing that mongrel. If he is, he has a man’s size job cut out for him. For the Black is as tricky as a weasel. Tam thought more of Wisp than he thought of anything else. And he was like another animal when he found what had happened, down yonder. Take my word for it, he is after the dog that murdered his chum. Whether he’ll ever get him, is another matter. But, if he really is after him, he’ll never give up the hunt, as long as he has a breath of life left in him. Either he’ll overhaul the cur or—well, either that or we’ll never see him again. There’s no sense in my poking around in the mountains without him. All we can do is wait. That and try to find Tam and chain him up till he forgets this crazy revenge-idea.”