the two animals be named in the same breath? One was a slacker: the other a brave and faithful servant of a great cause. One was an ornament in a dog show: the other guarded⁠—with his life if necessary⁠—the grazing flocks. From dawn till dark he was at his toil, through the blasting heat of summer and the bitter winter cold, watching through the night and running through the day. Hugh was not blind to the fact of his present fidelity: that although his master lay murdered and he himself had been slightly wounded, the brave animal still kept his watch over the sheep. He had been busy at it when the two men had come, and even now his intelligent eyes studied the shadows of the encroaching forest. Hugh felt a sudden glow in his heart. His hands pressed tighter at the soft ears.

A word came to Hugh’s lips and he spoke it in the silence. “Service,” he said softly. “Old fellow, you give service.” Suddenly he knew that this was the great debt that all living things owed: service in the great cause of existence that no man fully understands. He tried to remember what service he himself had given. Dim regrets swept over him.

He rose to throw more wood upon the fire; then stood listening to the voices of the forest. They were so faint and obscure that he had to strain to hear them. It was strange that he had been deaf to them before. They came whispering through the mighty silences, and they filled him with haunting memories. At first the crackle of the fire had obscured them, but as he waited the separate tones became more distinct and permitted some measure of interpretation. He heard the rustling of the thickets, the noise of flicking leaves dim as eyelids winking against a pillow, the sad murmur of the pine limbs, scraping together. Behind them all was the faint murmur of the wind⁠—a little wind that had sprung up in the snow fields and was making a secret march down through the thickets.

Something of the same sense of familiarity that had come to him on first observing the sheep returned to him now. It seemed wholly natural that he should be sitting here in the silence, beside the flocks.⁠—Throughout the ages men of his breed had sat the same way, the firelight playing on them, the faithful dog beside them. The wind whispered and stirred in the wilderness just the same, the white sheep slept. Watching the flocks⁠—the phrase was as old as the mountains themselves.

Yet for a moment he found it hard to believe in the dangers of which the guide had spoken: dangers that would soon exterminate the flock except for the protection of herders and dogs. No scene could be more peaceful: the dark forest so lightly stirred by the wind, the river singing past, the soft firelight, the stars in the sky. The breath of the night was sweet and cool; surely there would be no hurry about notifying the flock owner of the herder’s death. He turned again to the dog. “You can take care of them, can’t you, boy?” he asked.

He glanced down, then stiffened with excitement. For once the dog did not seem to hear him. The animal had got up and now was standing braced, every nerve and muscle alert, gazing into the shadows beyond the river. Hugh’s hand fell on the shaggy neck, but the animal didn’t start. And the hair stood stiff like quills at the shoulders.

“What is it, boy?” Hugh asked.

The dog made no answer. Instead, a strange and terrible reply came from the wilderness. It was a dreadful, a commanding voice, and it seemed to freeze the whole forest world with horror. It obliterated the wind and silenced all the little voices to which Hugh had listened with such delight a moment before. It was a long, wild scream, beginning low in the scale and rising to an incredible height.

For innumerable seconds, it seemed to Hugh, the same crescendo note was maintained. The air seemed to shudder. Then, with great soaring leaps, the scream dropped away into a long, singsong whine. Slowly this faded, growing dim and more dim, until it was just a dying whimper in the air. Hugh couldn’t tell exactly when the voice ceased. He had a strange impression that it still continued, only so dim and fine that human ears were not tuned to receive it. Then the wilderness silence closed down again.

The dog leaped forward, barking, and Hugh found himself erect, with his rifle in his hands. In his own heart he knew this wilderness voice. If he did not know the breed that uttered it, at least he realized its savagery, its age-old menace. There is no utterance that pen can describe more wild and weird than some of the twilight cries of the coyotes; yet Hugh was inclined to think that another, more deadly animal had spoken in this case. On a few occasions he had heard members of his club⁠—back from hunting trips in the West⁠—describe the cries of the cougars or pumas: one of the most distinctive and awe-inspiring of all the wilderness voices. It is not heard often. Many men have lived years in the forest without ever hearing it at all. But once heard it is never forgotten. Hugh believed that he had heard it now.

And it had meant more to him than the mere night cry of an animal. It typified to him the very spirit of the wilderness. It was the voice not alone of a hungry creature, stalking in the shadows, but⁠—in his thought⁠—it expressed all the ancient terror of the darkness, the primeval forces that war with man.

Nothing had changed. Still the sheep slept in the meadow and a great beast of prey menaced them from the shadowed forest. The long conflicts against the powers of the wilderness had not yet been won: the shepherds of Judea might have

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