Jim, with nose in air instead of to the ground, set off at a gallop down the shore in the direction of the outlet.
The Deputy turned about.
“Dan,” he shouted peremptorily. “Come back here. I want ye!”
Instead of obeying, Black Dan dashed up the bank, running like a deer, and vanished into the bushes.
“I knew it! That’s the skunk, boys. Go home, you Billy!” cried Blackstock, and started after the fugitive. The rest followed close on his heels. But Jackson cried:
“Ye’d better call off Jim quick. Dan’s got a gun on him.”
The Deputy gave a shrill whistle, and Jim, who was just vanishing into the bush, stopped short. At the same instant a shot rang out from the bushes, and the dog dropped in his tracks with a howl of anguish.
Blackstock’s lean jaws set themselves like iron. He whipped out his own heavy “Colt’s,” and the party tore on, till they met Jim dragging himself towards them with a wounded hind-leg trailing pitifully.
The Deputy gave one look at the big black dog, heaved a breath of relief, and stopped.
“’Tain’t no manner o’ use chasin’ him now, boys,” he decreed, “because, as we all know, Dan kin run right away from the best runner amongst us. But now I know him—an’ I’ve suspicioned him this two month, only I couldn’t git no clue—I’ll git him, never you fear. Jest now, ye’d better help me carry Jim home, so’s we kin git him doctored up in good shape. I reckon Nipsiwaska County can’t afford to lose Mr. Assistant-Deputy Sheriff. That there skunk-oil on Dan’s moccasins fooled both Jim an’ me, good an’ plenty, didn’t it?”