Tito had not been idle during the time that the enemy was Horse-hunting.
Whatever Saddleback might have done, Tito would live in no fool's
paradise. Having finished the new den, she trotted back to the little
valley of feathers, and the first young one that came to meet her at the
door of this home was a broad-headed one much like herself. She seized
him by the neck and set off, carrying him across country toward the
new den, a couple of miles away. Every little while she had to put her
offspring down to rest and give it a chance to breathe. This made the
moving slow, and the labour of transporting the pups occupied all that
day, for Saddleback was not allowed to carry any of them, probably
because he was too rough. Beginning with the biggest and brightest, they
were carried away one at a time, and late in the afternoon only the runt
was left. Tito had not only worked at digging all night, she had also
trotted over thirty miles, half of it with a heavy baby to carry. But
she did not rest. She was just coming out of the den, carrying her
youngest in her mouth, when over the very edge of this hollow appeared
the mongrel Hound, and a little way behind him Wolver Jake.
Away went Tito, holding the baby tight, and away went the Dog behind
her.
_Bang! bang! bang!_ said the revolver.
But not a shot touched her. Then over the ridge they dashed, where the
revolver could not reach her, and sped across a flat, the tired Coyote
and her baby, and the big fierce Hound behind her, bounding his hardest.
Had she been fresh and unweighted she could soon have left the clumsy
cur that now was barking furiously on her track and rather gaining than
losing in the race. But she put forth all her strength, careered along a
slope, where she gained a little, then down across a brushy flat where
the cruel bushes robbed her of all she had gained. But again into the
open they came, and the wolver, labouring far behind, got sight of them
and fired again and again with his revolver, and only stirred the dust,
but still it made her dodge and lose time, and it also spurred the Dog.
The hunter saw the Coyote, his old acquaintance of the bobtail, carrying
still, as he thought, the Jack-rabbit she had been bringing to her
brood, and wondered at her strange persistence.
"Why doesn't she drop that weight when flying for her life?" But on she
went and gamely bore her load over the hills, the man cursing his luck
that he had not brought his Horse, and the mongrel bounding in deadly
earnest but thirty feet behind her. Then suddenly in front of Tito
yawned a little cut-bank gully. Tired and weighted, she dared not try
the leap; she skirted around. But the Dog was fresh; he cleared it
easily, and the mother's start was cut down by half. But on she went,
straining to hold the little one high above the scratching brush and the
dangerous bayonet-spikes; but straining too much, for the helpless cub
was choking in his mother's grip. She must lay him down or strangle him;
with such a weight she could not much longer keep out of reach. She
tried to give the howl for help, but her voice was muffled by the cub,
now struggling for breath, and as she tried to ease her grip on him a
sudden wrench jerked him from her mouth into the grass--into the power
of the merciless Hound. Tito was far smaller than the Dog; ordinarily
she would have held him in fear; but her {Illustration: Tito's Race For
Life} little one, her baby, was the only thought now, and as the brute
sprang forward to tear it in his wicked jaws, she leaped between and
stood facing him with all her mane erect, her teeth exposed, and plainly
showed her resolve to save her young one at any price. The Dog was not
brave, only confident that he was bigger and had the man behind him.
But the man was far away, and balked in his first rush at the trembling
little Coyote, that tried to hide in the grass, the cur hesitated a
moment, and Tito howled the long howl for help--the muster-call:
Yap-yap-yap-yah-yah-yah-h-h-h-h Yap-yap-yap-yah-yah-yah-h-h-h-h,
and made the buttes around re-echo so that Jake could not tell where it
came from; but someone else there was that heard and did know whence it
came. The Dog's courage revived on hearing something like a far-away
shout. Again he sprang at the little one, but again the mother balked
him with her own body, and then they closed in deadly struggle. "Oh, if
Saddleback would only come!" But no one came, and now she had no further
chance to call. Weight is everything in a closing fight, and Tito soon
went down, bravely fighting to the last, but clearly worsted; and the
Hound's courage grew with the sight of victory, and all he thought of
now was to finish her and then kill her helpless baby in its turn. He
had no ears or eyes for any other thing, till out of the nearest sage
there flashed a streak of grey, and in a trice the big-voiced coward
was hurled back by a foe almost as heavy as himself--hurled back with a
crippled shoulder. Dash, chop, and staunch old Saddleback sprang on him
again. Tito struggled to her feet, and they closed on him together. His
courage fled at once when he saw the odds, and all he wanted now was
safe escape--escape from Saddleback, whose speed was like the wind,
escape from Tito, whose baby's life was at stake. Not twenty jumps away
did he get; not breath enough had he to howl for help to his master in
the distant hills; not fifteen yards away from her little one that he
meant to tear, they tore him all to bits.
And Tito lifted the rescued young one, and travelling as slowly as she
wished, they reached the new-made den. There the family safely reunited,
far away from danger of further attack by Wolver Jake or his kind.
And there they lived in peace till their mother had finished their
training, and every one of them grew up wise in the ancient learning of
the plains, wise in the later wisdom that the ranchers' war has forced
upon them, and not only they, but their children's children, too. The
Buffalo herds have gone; they have succumbed to the rifles of the
hunters. The Antelope droves are nearly gone; Hound and lead were too
much for them. The Blacktail bands have dwindled before axe and fence.
The ancient dwellers of the Badlands have faded like snow under the new
conditions, but the Coyotes are no more in fear of extinction. Their
morning and evening song still sounds from the level buttes, as it did
long years ago when every plain was a teeming land of game. They have
learned the deadly secrets of traps and poisons, they know how to baffle
the gunner and Hound, they have matched their wits with the hunter's
wits. They have learned how to prosper in a land of man-made plenty, in
spite of the worst that man can do, and it was Tito that taught them
how.