And then out upon that white finger of sand came other things that dreaded the water as Gray Wolf dreaded it:  a big fat porcupine, a sleek little marten, a fisher-cat that sniffed the air and wailed like a child.  Those things that could not or would not swim outnumbered the others three to one.  Hundreds of little ermine scurried along the shore like rats, their squeaking little voices sounding incessantly; foxes ran swiftly along the banks, seeking a tree or a windfall that might bridge the water for them; the lynx snarled and faced the fire; and Gray Wolf’s own tribe—­the wolves—­dared take no deeper step than she.

Dripping and panting, and half choked by heat and smoke, Kazan came to Gray Wolf’s side.  There was but one refuge left near them, and that was the sand-bar.  It reached out for fifty feet into the stream.  Quickly he led his blind mate toward it.  As they came through the low bush to the river-bed, something stopped them both.  To their nostrils had come the scent of a deadlier enemy than fire.  A lynx had taken possession of the sand-bar, and was crouching at the end of it.  Three porcupines had dragged themselves into the edge of the water, and lay there like balls, their quills alert and quivering.  A fisher-cat was snarling at the lynx.  And the lynx, with ears laid back, watched Kazan and Gray Wolf as they began the invasion of the sand-bar.

Faithful Gray Wolf was full of fight, and she sprang shoulder to shoulder with Kazan, her fangs bared.  With an angry snap, Kazan drove her back, and she stood quivering and whining while he advanced.  Light-footed, his pointed ears forward, no menace or threat in his attitude, he advanced.  It was the deadly advance of the husky trained in battle, skilled in the art of killing.  A man from civilization would have said that the dog was approaching the lynx with friendly intentions.  But the lynx understood.  It was the old feud of many generations—­made deadlier now by Kazan’s memory of that night at the top of the Sun Rock.

Instinct told the fisher-cat what was coming, and it crouched low and flat; the porcupines, scolding like little children at the presence of enemies and the thickening clouds of smoke, thrust their quills still more erect.  The lynx lay on its belly, like a cat, its hindquarters twitching, and gathered for the spring.  Kazan’s feet seemed scarcely to touch the sand as he circled lightly around it.  The lynx pivoted as he circled, and then it shot in a round snarling ball over the eight feet of space that separated them.

Kazan did not leap aside.  He made no effort to escape the attack, but met it fairly with the full force of his shoulders, as sledge-dog meets sledge-dog.  He was ten pounds heavier than the lynx, and for a moment the big loose-jointed cat with its twenty knife-like claws was thrown on its side.  Like a flash Kazan took advantage of the moment, and drove for the back of the cat’s neck.