They followed the tracks for a short distance, seeing red spots here and there, but nothing of the beast itself.
Back to the camping place they walked when they saw it would be useless to follow further, and here they discussed the matter, deciding that a guard had to be placed for the night.
“How did you know it wasn’t a man?” asked Paul Bird of Frank.
“I didn’t, except that the eyes were so bright. But I believe I would have fired anyhow, because if it were a man he had no business at this hour of the night lurking around a camp when the fire is dying out and we could be plainly seen.”
They drew lots, and Buster Billings lost, but Frank, looking at his watch and seeing that the hour was only eleven, decided that the watches should be short, this decision causing a second drawing, the lot falling to Lanky Wallace.
Paul started the watch by building up the fire with branches from one of the near-by bushes, and Lanky did the same when it came his turn to take the watch, Paul calling him at three o’clock in the morning. The two boys stood whispering awhile before Paul wrapped up for his sleep.
During the early morning the snowstorm abated, and when the first streaks of dawn came Lanky awakened the other boys, after having built the fire into a roaring one. No snow was falling, and there was promise of a bright sun.
Frank’s first thought when he awoke was about the animal. He asked both Paul and Lanky whether there had been any more prowling around.
“Neither of us saw anything,” said Lanky Wallace, speaking for both.
The boys gathered about the roaring fire, and then got out their food packs, making ready for breakfast.