CHAPTER VII
RED BEN IS ALONE
Nervously Red Ben wandered out of the laurel and up the Ridge. Something seemed to lead him in that direction. Ahead rang the clear notes of the eager hound and another sound, the sharp yelp of Shep; the fox terrier had dropped far behind. Then Red Ben caught a glimpse of a brilliantly red body weaving its way among the laurel clumps, his mother, at last!
Down the Ridge he loped to meet her, into her path, directly before her. Joyfully he sprang to lick her lips in greeting.
She stopped, but only for an instant. Her mouth was open, the hot breath came in quick pants, and her beautiful tail dragged the ground.
Had something gone wrong? Red Ben had only to listen to the coming hound to know. In her own hilly country beyond the river, the mother could have dodged the dogs and lost them among the rocks, but on this luckless morning in the flat Barrens, when there was no wind, and when the damp ground held the scent no matter how she broke and twisted the trail, they could not be shaken off.
She loped bravely on, with Red Ben close behind. On the Ridge, every part of which she knew so well, it might be possible to fool the hound before her strength gave way. She went to the top, then tried the trick of making two circles and running back on her trail until there was a good chance to leap far to one side. If the dogs did not see her, nor find where the trail began again after her great leap, she would be safe. Up to this time Red Ben had stayed with her, listening, watching, scheming as he ran. Now he deliberately went in the other direction, leaving the double track just in time to miss being seen. Up the Ridge behind him rushed the dogs in full cry. But suddenly there was quiet; they were trying to unravel the trail at the place where the foxes doubled back.
When next Red Ben heard them they were strangely near. He ran to the other side of the Ridge, but heard them still—they were following him! No longer was the mother between. It was Red Ben now who had to show his cunning.
Down to Cranberry Swamp he ran and through it to a log he knew about, which lay across Goose Creek. Beyond this was more swamp and then another long stretch of the Pine Barrens.
Red Ben, hot, mud splashed and winded, was loping through the Barrens, clambering under fallen trees, running along the tops of logs and doing everything else he could think of to make the trail hard to follow, when all at once an animal sprang up from its bed almost under his nose.
Red Ben whirled back as he recognized the furious snarl of Gray Fox! The hound and Shep could be no worse than this enemy. What ill luck had brought him here? He ran the way he had come, dodging under the fallen trees as before, until close ahead he heard the dogs, coming surely and fast. Then with a mighty leap to one side, such as his mother had made, he left a gap in the trail and ran in a new direction. The hound lost his trail, found the fresh one of Gray Fox, and after a moment’s hesitation followed it straight away into the Pine Barrens. Red Ben was saved!