“We are too few to attack a herd,” they said. “We must watch for the stragglers which may be grazing on the slopes. Go very quietly and do not raise your voices. Follow us and leave the waggons here.” They moved on their horses again at a quick walk, and the white men did the same, till they had gone nearly half round the base of the hill, when the Pawnees pulled up with a jerk, and one of them spoke hurriedly to George Dumont, who rode immediately behind the guides.
On the hillside about twenty bisons were grazing; and it seemed the easiest thing in the world to cut them off from the rest of the herd, which, to the number of three or four hundred, were moving slowly towards the river, now plainly to be seen flashing in the far distance.
“Look here,” said George, turning to the Englishmen, and speaking with evident embarrassment. “They mean to make us prove our pretensions to being mighty hunters. Two of them are going round the farther side to keep the bulls from wandering, and this chap is going to captain us. We’ve got to guard the valley and this side of the hill; but 185 as you fellows are new to it—if you’d rather not be in it——”
“Oh, bosh!” said Coke; “we’re going to stand by you and get our share of the fun.”
“Oh—of course; if you feel sure of yourselves. Well; keep an eye open for the game beyond. They have a nasty trick of coming to each other’s assistance.” He made a sign to the two foremost Indians, who galloped away without a word, and were soon invisible behind the loitering bisons. Then the Englishmen saw what sort of sport they were letting themselves in for. They were to stop the probable downward and sideward rush of twenty bulls, killing as many of them as they could, and be prepared at the same time for an attack by the remaining hundreds that, at the first gunshot, might turn on them in a body. Daily, for the past fortnight, both of them had zealously practised shooting with a rifle while at the gallop; but what sort of experience was that to bring to a task which the Canadians, used from boyhood to bison-hunting, admitted was a dangerous one?
Low as the voices had been, the stragglers had heard them and were beginning to look nervously from side to side. Suddenly a white streak darted through the air, and with an awful bellow one of the bisons fell, pierced through the eye by an arrow, and began to roll helplessly down the grassy slope. The remaining Pawnee had drawn first blood. But a second after, the four Canadians brought their guns to the shoulder and fired one after the other; two beasts fell dead and two more showed by their groaning that they were badly wounded.
“Here goes,” said Fred; and in another moment he had shot his first bison.
“Get more to your left, or they’ll bolt yet,” shouted Dominique Dumont; and Coke, with an uncomfortable impression that the whole herd was charging upon him from the rear, nevertheless spurred his horse sidewards for several yards; then fired at a bull which was endeavouring to flee down the near side of the hill; and with a thrill of pride saw him fall on his knees and then roll over.
The excitement of the hunt was on him now and he thought no more of the herd behind him. Had he looked back he might have seen that alarms on that score were groundless; for, contrary to their usual custom, at the first shot they had fled in a body. But it was their desertion that made the loiterers so determined to escape and rejoin them. Three more of their number had fallen dead or disabled before the arrows of the Pawnees on the farther side, who could now be seen pressing the game more closely; and, at a sign from the other Indian, the party in the valley now spurred up the hill, the six guns all crashing out together.