Ted Strong in Montana Part 48

"Yes. I crawled to their camp, and heard them talk. I tried to get close to my blother, to cut him loose, but they saw me and drove me away, and shot at me."

"Mercy! But I don't see why they didn't see through your disguise. It wouldn't fool any one."

"It was the half dark."

"Oh, yes. But why didn't you get out of the skin when you came within sight of the house?"

"I not have the strength. I climb the hill and see the house. Then I fall down, and not can rise again. All what I can do is to wave my handkerchief. Then I faint."

"You are a brave and lovely girl, and I already love you like a sister,"

said Stella warmly. "You shall stay here, and need not be afraid. We will be ready for the Gray Wolves, and they will not kill either us or you. Your warning comes just in time."

CHAPTER XXIII.

BAGGING THE GRAY WOLVES.

That night Ted Strong went on watch himself in the cupola, while Bud and Clay Whipple marched around the house in opposite directions.

Until the threatened attack took place Ted determined that he would watch the house personally, in addition to the regular guard.

About midnight Ted heard a slight noise out on the prairie.

The night was bright and frosty, and the stars shone with a peculiarly brilliant radiance, seemingly larger, brighter, and nearer the earth than in more northern climes.

Instantly his acute senses located the place whence the noise had come.

It was merely a slight rustling, but as there was no wind Ted knew instantly that it had been made by some creature.

His eyes, fixed on the spot, soon became accustomed to the faint light, and he saw an indistinct form that was so near the color of the earth that a pair of eyes not so sharp as his would have failed to detect it.

So indistinct was it that it looked almost like a wraith of grayish-blue smoke by the starlight.

Presently, as he still stared closely at it, he saw another form much like it steal through the dead gra.s.s toward it.

Then, over the hills on the east, rose the moon in its first quarter, shedding a pale light over the prairie.

Ted was now able to see that there was a pack of wolves, instead of two, as he at first thought.

The boys on the ground could not see the wolves on account of the tufts of gra.s.s that scattered over the prairie, and, had they seen them, would not have been able to distinguish one from the other.

It seemed strange to Ted that the wolves had not yet given voice. It was unusual for wolves to come so near a ranch house in numbers without giving warning by howling.

Suddenly the reason why they did not dawned upon him.

They were not wolves, but men in wolves' clothing.

Ted chuckled at the thought.

The "wolves" did not know yet that they were discovered, for they could not see Ted in his cupola watch-house, although they could easily see Bud and Clay as they walked around the house, now in the full light of the moon.

Ted was suddenly startled by hearing a noise to the left, and at the same time he heard Bud stop in his march. Evidently he had been attracted by the sound also.

As Ted looked he saw the cause of the noise. It was a wolf, larger than the others, which had crept closer to the house.

As he was looking at it he was astonished to see it rise up.

Then he caught the glint of a revolver barrel in the moonlight.

In an instant he knew the meaning of it.

With the precision of a machine his own rifle rose to his shoulder, and, without a second's hesitation, a streak of flame belched from it, followed by the roar of the report.

Looking closely through the smoke, Ted saw the "wolf" straighten up to the full stature of a man, then fall to the ground, over which it went writhing and tossing, while at the same time the most human of yells expressing agony came from it.

This was the signal for the other "wolves" to howl, and the most unearthly noise come from all sides of the house.

These were followed by a perfect fusillade of rifle and revolver shots from everywhere, most of them aimed at the cupola.

But as soon as Ted had fired the shot that had brought down the man wolf he had jumped through the scuttle into the attic of the house, and the b.a.l.l.s harmlessly riddled the cupola.

From a window on the second floor Ted saw a score or more of forms leap into prominence; the forms of men who cast aside their skins of wolf, and who had turned their wolfish howls into the scarcely less fiendish yells of men.

At the sight he rushed downstairs, and found the boys hastily gathering in the dark living room, arming themselves from the gun rack, and taking their places beside the windows.

In the middle of the room stood the major, supporting with one arm the unsteady form of his brother Frederic, who had risen at the first alarm in spite of his wound, and who insisted upon fighting with the rest.

"The Gray Wolves have come," he said. "They will be hard to drive off.

But you must do it, or go yourselves."

Stella and the young j.a.panese girl were standing at one of the windows peering fearfully out.

"Come away from there, Stella," said Ted. "They might see you and fire."

"All right, Ted, but you can bet that I will be in this somewhere," said Stella. "It's my business to defend this girl, and I'm going to do it."

Ted smiled, but said nothing, and pa.s.sed on around the room, seeing that the boys were properly placed to resist the attack when it came.

Outside all was quiet again. The howls had ceased, and not a man was in evidence anywhere. It was the calm before the storm.

"What's the plan?" said Bud, coming up to Ted, for he and Clay had run into the house at Ted's shot from the cupola.

"I hardly know," answered Ted. "My plan is somewhat upset. I thought at first that they were going to attack us immediately in this room. But they seem to have changed their minds."

"I've got a hunch," said Bud, scratching his head in a meditative way.