“Yes,” nodded Henry, “but do you remember that time when in the house we took the place of the man, his wife and children, just before the Indians came?”
“Yes,” said Paul.
“We'll treat them wolves the same way,” said Shif'less Sol.
“I'm glad of the chance,” said Long Jim.
“Me, too,” said Tom Ross.
The five rose up to sitting positions against the board wall, and everyone held across his knees a long, slender barreled rifle, with the muzzle pointing toward the forest. All accomplished marksmen, it would only be a matter of a moment for the stock to leap to the shoulder, the eye to glance down the barrel, the finger to pull the trigger, and the unerring bullet to leap forth.
“Henry, you give the word as usual,” said Shif'less Sol.
Henry nodded.
Presently in the darkness they heard the pattering of light feet, and they saw many gleaming eyes draw near. There must have been at least thirty of the wolves, and the five figures that they saw reclining, silent and motionless, against the unburned portion of the house might well have been those of the dead and scalped, whom they had found in such numbers everywhere. They drew near in a semicircular group, its concave front extended toward the fire, the greatest wolves at the center. Despite many feastings, the wolves were hungry again. Nothing had opposed them before, but caution was instinctive. The big gray leaders did not mind the night or the wind or the rain, which they had known all their lives, and which they counted as nothing, but they always had involuntary suspicion of human figures, whether living or not, and they approached slowly, wrinkling back their noses and sniffing the wind which blew from them instead of the five figures. But their confidence increased as they advanced. They had found many such burned houses as this, but they had found nothing among the ruins except what they wished.
The big leaders advanced more boldly, glaring straight at the human
figures, a slight froth on their lips, the lips themselves curling
back farther from the strong white teeth. The outer ends of the concave
semicircle also drew in. The whole pack was about to spring upon its
unresisting prey, and it is, no doubt, true that many a wolfish pulse
beat a little higher in anticipation. With a suddenness as startling
figures raised themselves, five long, dark tubes leaped to their
shoulders, and with a suddenness that was yet more terrifying, a gush
of flame shot from five muzzles. Five of the wolves-and they were the
biggest and the boldest, the leaders-fell dead upon the ashes of the
charred timbers, and the others, howling their terror to the dark,
skies, fled deep into the forest.