At last they reached the hills. Dismounting, they hobbled their ponies, removed the saddles and bridles sticky with lather, and then broke out some lunch which they ate ravenously, despite the fact that their mouths were almost parched.
Greatly refreshed by the food, the boys decided to follow the trail of the cattle till they could get some idea of its direction.
"Let"s go on foot," suggested Tom. "The ponies will be all right, the rest will do them good, and we can get through the brush and over the rocks with less noise."
Readily his companions agreed, and picking up their rifles, they quickly found the tracks made by the cattle.
For some distance the trail seemed more like an abandoned wood road than anything else. But gradually it began to grow narrower and at last became no more than a path winding in and out among the rocks.
Several times some sound caused the boys to raise their guns to their shoulders and peer about in all directions, but nothing could they see save the trees and rocks, and they ascribed the noises to some denizen of the forest roaming about.
Of a sudden Tom, who was in the lead, stopped.
"I smell something awful queer," he whispered.
The trail wound along the edge of a sharp descent and just ahead was an abrupt turn.
Ere either Larry or Horace could reply to their companion"s announcement all three were dumb-founded to see a big, s.h.a.ggy brown head appear round the turn in the trail.
"It"s a bear!" gasped Horace.
At the sight of the three boys the big head had paused in surprise.
Then its lips began to curl, disclosing a wicked looking set of teeth, and finally it broke into a savage snarl, at the same time rising in the air.
"He"s getting to his hind legs. That means fight!" breathed Horace. "Come on, let"s run!"
"But he"d overtake us and beat us down with his paws," returned Larry. "We"ve got to kill him."
Less time did the action consume than is required to describe it, and the boys were standing terror stricken when the bear charged upon them, making vicious lunges at them with his huge paws.
Roused from his fright by the imminence of his peril, Tom raised his rifle, only to have it knocked from his hands by a swing of one of the bear"s paws.
[Ill.u.s.tration: The rifle was knocked from his hand.]
"Drop down! drop down so I can shoot!" yelled Larry as he saw the desperate situation in which his brother was placed.
Instantly Tom obeyed, throwing himself to one side as he fell.
But as the younger of the brothers dropped the bear, as though singling him out for his particular antagonist, also dropped to all fours, and Larry"s shot went over him.
Horace, however, shot lower, and a terrible roar told them that the bullet had struck home.
In the fury of his pain the bear seemed to think that the boy lying flat on the rocks was the cause of his suffering, and, with mouth distended, charged upon him.
In a frenzy lest they might not be able to save Tom, Larry and Horace both fired.
At the impact of the bullets the bear rose on his hind legs, swung wildly with his paws at the steel barrels that were pouring the terribly painful things into him and fell p.r.o.ne, the huge carca.s.s missing Tom by less than a foot.
CHAPTER XVII
LOST!
From the moment when his brother had cried to him to drop, Tom had kept his eyes on the bear, and when he saw the beast plunge forward and realized that it was dead, he leaped to his feet, his pale face telling of the awful strain under which he had been.
The reaction from their excitement made Larry and Horace tremble and, for the time, they could only look from their companion to the carca.s.s of the bear, too unnerved to speak.
Tom was the first to recover from the fright, and he thanked the others for what they had done.
"Let"s not talk about it," interposed Larry. "The thing for us to do is to get out of here lively. The reverberations from those shots are echoing yet. The raiders must have heard them, and they"ll know some one is on their trail, so they will either come back to sec who it is or else hide to waylay us."
Tom and Horace were perfectly willing to give up following the trail farther, and all three were retracing their steps when the elder of the chums cried:
"The rifle! Tom, you forgot to pick up your rifle."
"Which shows I was some scared," and he smiled apologetically.
"But it"s a worse one on Larry and me," protested Horace. "There"s some excuse for you. But the bear wasn"t charging us."
"Oh, well there"s no harm done," returned Larry, pleased at the spirit Horace"s words showed. "We can go back and get it. It"s a mighty good thing, though, that we thought of It before we reached the ponies. From the looks of the sky and the shadows it won"t be long before dusk, and Mr. Wilder told us night comes quickly in the mountains."
Ere Larry had finished speaking they had started back to the scene of their encounter.
Yet when they reached the spot Tom"s rifle was nowhere to be seen.
In dismay the boys looked at one another. Already the mountains were turning purple-black in the twilight, the shadows transforming the trees and rocks into weird figures.
"Perhaps it"s under the bear," hazarded Horace, his low voice evidencing the awe which the silence and the surroundings inspired in him.
"Then give a hand while we move him," commanded Larry. "It won"t do to stay here long or we may lose our way as well as the rifle."
Little relishing the thought of wandering through the woods in the dark, the boys seized one of the paws and pulled with all their might.
But, to their surprise, they could move the carca.s.s scarcely at all.
"My, but he"s a monster!" gasped Larry. "It"s only a waste of valuable time to try to lift him or even move him. The only thing we can do is to try to feel under him with our hands."
Dropping to their knees, the lads thrust their arms under the s.h.a.ggy fur, being able to reach far; enough to make sure that the much-wanted rifle was not beneath the body of the bear.
"Bet he knocked it over the cliff," declared Horace. "From which side did he strike it, Tom?"
"More than I know. All I could see was paws. The air was full of them and they seemed to come from all directions at once."
This explanation brought laughter to Larry and Horace, which ceased abruptly, however, as from somewhere on the mountains there suddenly rang out a low wail, more like the howl of a coyote than anything else, yet with a certain difference that even the chums were able to distinguish.
"Whatever that is, I don"t care to meet it," exclaimed Horace.