THE LAME COYOTE
Rose had, of course, heard of coyotes. She had heard them talked about
here at Cowboy Jack's ranch. But she had not caught a glimpse of one
before. Nor did she know this slinking creature behind the bushes was
that animal which ranchmen consider such a pest.
Although coyotes are very cowardly by nature and will seldom attack
human beings, even if starving or enraged, the beasts do kill young
calves and lambs and raid the ranch hen-houses just as foxes do in the
East.
Besides, on the open range, the coyotes howl and whine all night,
keeping everybody in camp awake; so the cowboys have a strong dislike
for Mr. Coyote and have not a single good word to say for him. Indeed,
the coyote seems to possess few good traits.
But Rose Bunker called the creature that had startled her a dog.
"If I could run I know that dog would chase me!" she sobbed. "I wonder
who it belongs to? It must be a runaway dog, to be away out here where
there are no houses. I'm afraid of that dog."
For this Rose was not to be much blamed. This was a strange country to
her, and almost everything she saw was different from what she was used
to back in Pennsylvania. Even the trees and bushes were different. And
she never had seen a dog just like that tawny one that dragged itself
behind the hedge of bushes.
The strange part of it was--the thing that frightened Rose most--was
that the animal seemed trying to hide from her. And yet she felt that it
must be dangerous, for it was big and had long legs. She was quite right
in supposing that if she had undertaken to run, under ordinary
circumstances, the animal could have overtaken her.
But Rose's ankle throbbed and ached, and she cried out whenever she
rested that foot upon the ground. She just couldn't run! So she began
cajoling the supposed dog, hoping that it was not as savage as she
really feared it was. One thing, it did not growl as bad dogs often did,
as Rose Bunker very well knew.
"Come, doggy! Nice doggy!" she cooed. And then she was suddenly afraid
that it really would come! If it had leaped up and started toward Rose
the little girl would have fallen right down--she knew she would!
But the yellow-looking creature only tried to creep farther under the
scrubby bushes. Rose began to think that maybe it was more afraid of her
than she was of it.
"Poor doggy!" she said, hobbling around the end of the hedge of scrubby
bushes.
There she saw its head and forepaws. And it was not until then that she
discovered what was the matter with the coyote. Its right fore paw was
fast in a steel trap. A chain hung from the trap. It had broken the
chain and hobbled away with the trap--no knowing how far it had come.
"The poor thing!" Rose said again, at once pitying the coyote more than
she was afraid of it.
Yet when it saw the little girl looking at him it clashed its great jaws
and grinned at her most wickedly. It was not a pleasant thing to look
at.
"But he is hurt, and 'fraid, I suppose," Rose murmured. "Why! he's just
as lame as I am. I guess his foot hurts him in that awful trap a good
deal more than my ankle hurts me. The poor thing!"
The coyote was evidently quite exhausted. It probably had come a good
way with that trap fastened to its paw. But it showed Rose all its
teeth, and they did look very sharp to the little girl.
"I would not want him to snap at me," thought Rose. "And if I went near
enough I guess he would snap. I'll keep away from the poor dog, for I
would not dare try to get the trap off his foot."
She moved away; but she kept the crouching coyote in sight. She did not
like to feel that it was following her without her seeing it do so. And
the coyote seemed to feel that it wanted to keep her in sight. For it
raised its head and watched her with unwinking eyes.
This incident had given Rose something to think about besides her own
lost state and her lame ankle. The latter was not paining as badly as
at first. Still, she did not feel that she could hobble far. And she was
not quite sure now in which direction Pinky, the pony, had run. She
really did not know which way to go.
"It is funny Russ didn't come after me," thought the little girl. "Maybe
those Indians got him. But, then, there was the white man. I thought he
was setting off dynamite. But there wasn't any explosion. I guess I ran
away too quick. But Russ might have followed me, I should think."
She could not quite bring herself to blame her difficulties on Russ,
however, for she very well knew that her own panic had brought her here.
Russ had been brave enough to stay. Russ was always brave. And then, she
had blindly ridden off the trail and come to this place.
"I guess I won't say Russ did it," she decided. "It wouldn't be so. And
I expect right now he is hunting for me, and is worried 'most to death
about where I am. And daddy--and Mother Bunker! I guess they will want
to know where I've got to. This--this is just dreadful. Maybe I shall
have to stay here days and days! And what shall I ever eat, if I do?
And I haven't even any bed out here!"
The lost girl felt pretty bad. It seemed to her, now that she thought
more about it, that she was very ill used. Russ did not usually desert
her when she was in trouble. And Rose Bunker felt that she was in very
serious trouble now.
She sat down again in plain view of the lame coyote and cried a few more
tears. But what was the use of crying when there was nobody here to
care? The lame coyote had its own troubles, and although it watched her,
it did not care a thing about her.
"He is only afraid I might do something to hurt him," thought Rose. "And
I wouldn't do a thing to hurt the poor doggy. I wonder if he is
thirsty?"
The stream of water into which Rose had tumbled from Pinky's back was
only a few yards away, and perhaps the wounded coyote had been trying to
get to it before the little girl and the pony came to this place. But
the animal was too wary to go down to drink while Rose was in sight. And
fortunately there was nothing Rose could take water to the coyote in.
For she certainly would have tried to do that, if she could. She was
just that tender-hearted.
But it would have been unwise, for the coyote's teeth were as sharp as
they looked to be, and it would not have understood that the little girl
merely wished to help.
Rose sat and watched the beast, and the lame coyote crouched under the
bushes and watched her, and it grew into mid-afternoon. Rose felt very
sad indeed. She did not see how she could walk back to the ranch house,
even if she knew the way. And she could not understand why Russ did not
come for her.
Meanwhile Russ was urging his pinto pony as fast as he could after
Cowboy Jack and Daddy Bunker. They followed the regular wagon-track
through the valley and over the ridge which had now become quite
familiar to the little boy. They passed the cabin by the stream and then
came to the knoll from which that morning Russ and Rose had seen the
moving picture cameras.
But neither those machines nor the men who worked them nor the Indians
on the hillside were now in sight. Cowboy Jack, however, seemed to know
just where to find the moving picture company, for he kept right on
into the ravine.
"I reckon this is about where you saw the Indians and the camera men,
Son?" the ranchman said to Russ.
"Yes, sir," said Russ. "But Rose left me right on this hill. I thought
she went back----"
"I didn't notice any place where she left the trail," interposed Cowboy
Jack. "But I reckon Black Bear can find where she went. You have to hand
it to those Injuns. They can see trailmarks that a white man wouldn't
notice. And going to college didn't spoil Black Bear for a
trail-hunter."
"He is quite a wonderful young man," Daddy Bunker said.
But Russ was only thinking about his sister. He wondered where she could
have gone and what had happened to her. Pinky's coming back to the ranch
alone made Russ believe that something very terrible had happened to his
sister.
He urged his pinto pony on after the ranchman and daddy, however, and
they all entered the ravine. It was a very wild place--just the sort of
place, Russ thought, where savage Indians might have lain in wait for
unfortunate white people. He was very glad that Black Bear's people were
quite tame. At least, they could not be accused of having run away with
Rose.
In a few minutes Cowboy Jack had led them up through the ravine and out
upon what he called a mesa. There were patches of woods, plenty of grass
that was not much frost-bitten, and a big spring near which a number of
ponies were picketed. There was a traveling kitchen, such as the Army
used in the World War. Men in white caps and jackets were very busy
about the kitchen helping the moving picture company to hot food.
And the actors and Indians were all squatting very pleasantly side by
side eating and talking. The Indians wore their war-paint, but they had
drawn on their shirts or else had blankets around their shoulders. Russ
saw Black Bear almost at once. He stood talking with some of the white
men--notably with the one who was the commander of the soldiers, the man
with the plume in his hat.
But it seemed that a little man sitting on a campchair off to one side
and talking to a man who had a lot of papers in his hands was the most
important person in view. It was to this man that Cowboy Jack led the
way.
"That is Mr. Habback, the director," Russ heard the ranchman tell daddy.
"We must get him to let us have Black Bear, or somebody."
The next moment he hailed the moving picture director.
"Can you spare some of your Injuns for an hour?" asked Cowboy Jack.
"There's a little girl lost, and I reckon an Injun can find her trail
better than any of my cholos or punchers. How about Black Bear?"
The young Indian whose name he had mentioned came towards the group at
once. Mr. Habback looked up at Chief Black Bear.
"Hear what this Texas longhorn says, Chief?" he said to the Indian. "A
little girl lost somewhere."
"I can show you about where she left the trail," explained the ranchman
earnestly.
"Was she over at my wikiup the other evening?" asked Black Bear, with
interest.
"She--she's my sister," broke in Russ anxiously. "And she was scared by
your Indian play, and the pony must have run away with her."
"Hullo!" said Chief Black Bear. "I remember you, too, youngster. So your
sister is lost?"
"Well, we can't find her," said Russ Bunker.
"I will go along with them, Mr. Habback," said the Indian chief,
glancing down at the director. "I'll take Little Elk with me. You won't
need us for a couple of hours, will you?"
"It's all right," said the director. "Go ahead. We can't afford to lose
a little girl around here, that is sure."
"You bet we can't," put in Cowboy Jack. "Little girls are scarce in this
part of the country."
Black Bear spoke to one of his men, who hurried to get two ponies. The
Indians leaped upon the bare backs of the ponies and rode them just as
safely as the white people rode in their saddles. This interested Russ a
great deal, and he wondered if Black Bear would teach him how to ride
Indian style.
But this was not the time to speak of such a thing. Rose must be found.
For all they knew the little girl might be in serious trouble--she
might be needing them right then!
The two Indians and the ranchman and Daddy Bunker started back through
the ravine. None of them was more worried over Rose's disappearance than
was Russ. He urged his pinto pony after the older people at the very
fastest pace he could ride.