"Rope it," said Joel firmly, shaking out his own lasso. "If it gets into that corral it will kill a dozen cattle. That I've got a live horse under me this minute is because that wolf missed Rowdy's neck by a hand-breadth."
The trampled condition of the snow around the corral favored approach. Dell made a long but perfect throw, the wolf springing as the rope settled, closing with one foot through the loop. The rope was cautiously wrapped to the pommel, could be freed in an instant, and whirling Dog-toe, his rider reined the horse out over the lane leading to the herd's feeding ground to the south. The first quarter of a mile was an indistinct blur, out of which a horse might be seen, then a boy, or a wolf arose on wings and soared for an instant. Suddenly the horse doubled back over the lane, and as his rider shot past Joel, a fire of requests was vaguely heard, regarding "a noose that had settled foul," of "a rope that was being gnawed" and a general inability to strangle a wolf.
Joel saw the situation in an instant. The rope had tightened around the wolf's chest, leaving its breathing unaffected, while a few effectual snaps of those terrible teeth would sever any lasso. Shaking out a loop in his own rope, as Dell circled back over the other trail, Rowdy carried his rider within easy casting distance, the lasso hissed through the air, settled true, when two cow-horses threw their weight against each other, and the wolf's neck was broken as easily as a rotten thread.
"A little of this goes a long way with me," said Joel from the safety of his saddle.
"Oh, it's fine practice," protested Dell, as he dismounted and kicked the dead wolf. "Did you notice my throw? If it was an inch, it was thirty feet!"
In its severity, the winter of 1885-86 stands alone in range cattle history. It came rather early, but proved to be the pivotal trial in the lives of Dell and Joel Wells. Six weeks, plus three days, after the worst blizzard in the history of the range industry, the siege was lifted and the Beaver valley groaned in her gladness. Sleet cracks ran for miles, every pool in the creek threw off its icy gorge, and the plain again smiled within her own limits. Had the brothers been thorough plainsmen, they could have foretold the coming thaw, as three days before its harbingers reached them every lurking wolf, not from fear of poison, but instinctive of open country elsewhere, forsook the Beaver, not to return the remainder of the winter.
"That's another time you counted the chickens too soon," said Joel to his brother, when the usual number of baits failed to bring down a wolf.
"Very good," replied Dell. "The way accounts stand, we lost twelve cattle against one hundred and eighteen pelts taken. I'll play that game all winter."