"Hark!" exclaimed Peggy, her eyes round and her pulses beating wildly. "Wasn't that a shout? Listen, there it is again!"
"I heard it that time, too," exclaimed Roy.
"And I!" cried Jess.
"It came from down the canyon where those coyotes are," went on
Peggy.
"That's right, sis, and it complicates our search," said Roy, "but we've got to go on now. You girls wait here for me while I investigate, and—and you'd better take those rifles out of the other aeroplane."
"Oh, Roy, you're not going alone?" Peggy appealed.
"I'm not going to let you girls take a chance till I see what's ahead, that's one sure thing," was the rejoinder.
Before another word could be said the boy, revolver in hand, vanished round the big rock. Hardly had he done so, when there was borne to the girls' ears the most appalling confusion of sounds they had ever heard. The bedlam was, punctuated by several sharp shots, and Roy appeared running from round the rock. His hat was off, and as he approached he shouted:
"Get back to the aeroplanes! The pack's after us!"
At the same instant there appeared the leaders of the onrush. Great, half-famished looking brutes, whose red mouths gaped open ferociously and whose eyes burned wickedly.