“What’d you think? African?” retorted Hosmer. “But, no jokin’, don’t think Rocky Mountain lions is pet Malteses. We knowed this all right. So we kept our eyes open. Fin’ly we got up to the Bench and findin’ footin’ we took off our snowshoes an’ crawled up on the first ledge ur step. We could see the lions had jist done the same thing. We wuz trailin’ single file, me in front, an’ at the first bend I come on a picter ’at’ll be hard to furgit. The point o’ the next shelf above us had broke off, likely by snow ur ice, and they wuz a slice gone out o’ the face o’ the Bench. It made a precipice above us not less ’an fifty feet high an’ the slice fallin’ out made a kind o’ plateau mebbe two hundred feet long endin’ in a wall at the other end.
“Close to the wall wuz two as fine painters as I ever seen. We measured ’em later on—one o’ ’em nine feet from tip to tip. They wuz crouched fur business all right, their long yellow winter hair on end an’ their bellies on the rocks. Side by side, their long heavy tails beatin’ the rocks, they wuz weavin’ for’ard like snakes. An’ at the fur end o’ the plateau wuz what they wuz lookin’ fur—a herd o’ about twenty sheep a lyin’ in the sun.
“The sheep must hev got there over the trail we wuz follerin’. They had wind o’ no danger yit but they was trapped. O’ course it wasn’t as bad as that ’cause there wuz me an’ Jack behind the big cats but the sheep didn’t know that. I hadn’t no sooner give Jack the signal afore he caught my arm an’ p’inted up’ard. Fur a minute them painters went out o’ my mind. It was another picter ’at beat the first one. Right on the edge o’ the cliff ur precipice and no less ’an fifty feet above us, stood Ol’ Baldy. We seen him well an’ I’m tellin’ ye he looked as big as a cow. What we seen Ol’ Baldy seen too. He was standin’, his four feet in a p’int together, his big horns a reachin’ out like he was agoin’ to fly and that black cross o’ his hangin’ over the aidge o’ the rocks. An’ it was a warnin’ fur them crawlin’ lions, but they didn’t know it no more’n we did.
“‘There he is,’ whispered Jack to me. ‘Ye can’t mistake him. That’s Ol’ Baldy that ye’ve heerd about.’
“‘An’ I reckon that’s his tribe,’ I whispered. ‘Ye kin bet he’s goin’ to hev a few less subjecks in about a minute.’
“‘He’s on guard,’ said Jack.
“‘I reckon so,’ I said. ‘But he’d better be down here whar the doin’s is goin’ to come off.’
“Then we lost sight of Ol’ Baldy fur a minute. Them innocent, sleepin’ sheep had got wind ur warnin’ o’ the danger nigh ’em an’ in about two seconds they wuz all on their feet, backed together in a bunch an’ facin’ the lions. But them lions wasn’t disturbed. I reckon they seen they had ever’thing their own way. They jist laid their heads flatter on the rocks an’ a cat sneakin’ a bird wasn’t no easier nor quieter than they wuz.