Cameron set his traps towards evening in a circle with a bait in the centre and then retired to rest. Next morning he called Joe Blunt and the two went off together.
“It is strange that these rascally white wolves should be so bold when the smaller kinds are so cowardly,” remarked Cameron, as they walked along.
“So ’tis,” replied Joe, “but I’ve seed them other chaps bold enough too in the prairie when they were in large packs and starvin’.”
“I believe the small wolves follow the big fellows and help them to eat what they kill, though they generally sit round and look on at the killing.”
“Hist!” exclaimed Joe, cocking his gun, “there he is, an’ no mistake.”
There he was, undoubtedly. A wolf of the largest size with one of his feet in the trap. He was a terrible-looking object, for, besides his immense size and naturally ferocious aspect, his white hair bristled on end and was all covered with streaks and spots of blood from his bloody jaws. In his efforts to escape he had bitten the trap until he had broken his teeth and lacerated his gums, so that his appearance was hideous in the extreme. And when the two men came up he struggled with all his might to fly at them.
Cameron and Joe stood looking at him in a sort of wondering admiration.
“We’d better put a ball in him,” suggested Joe after a time. “Mayhap the chain won’t stand sich tugs long.”
“True, Joe; if it breaks we might get an ugly nip before we killed him.”
So saying Cameron fired into the wolf’s head and killed it. It was found, on examination, that four wolves had been in the traps, but the rest had escaped. Two of them, however, had gnawed off their paws and left them lying in the traps.