Shortly after the incident narrated in the last chapter the squatters of the Mustang Valley lost their leader.  Major Hope suddenly announced his intention of quitting the settlement and returning to the civilized world.  Private matters, he said, required his presence there—­matters which he did not choose to speak of, but which would prevent his returning again to reside among them.  Go he must, and, being a man of determination, go he did; but before going he distributed all his goods and chattels among the settlers.  He even gave away his rifle, and Fan and Crusoe.  These last, however, he resolved should go together; and as they were well worth having, he announced that he would give them to the best shot in the valley.  He stipulated that the winner should escort him to the nearest settlement eastward, after which he might return with the rifle on his shoulder.

Accordingly, a long level piece of ground on the river’s bank, with a perpendicular cliff at the end of it, was selected as the shooting-ground, and, on the appointed day, at the appointed hour, the competitors began to assemble.

“Well, lad, first as usual,” exclaimed Joe Blunt, as he reached the ground and found Dick Varley there before him.

“I’ve bin here more than an hour lookin’ for a new kind o’ flower that Jack Morgan told me he’d seen.  And I’ve found it too.  Look here; did you ever see one like it before?”

Blunt leaned his rifle against a tree, and carefully examined the flower.

“Why, yes, I’ve seed a-many o’ them up about the Rocky Mountains, but never one here-away.  It seems to have gone lost itself.  The last I seed, if I remimber rightly, wos near the head-waters o’ the Yellowstone River, it wos—­jest where I shot a grizzly bar.”

“Was that the bar that gave you the wipe on the cheek?” asked Varley, forgetting the flower in his interest about the bear.

“It wos.  I put six balls in that bar’s carcass, and stuck my knife into its heart ten times, afore it gave out; an’ it nearly ripped the shirt off my back afore I wos done with it.”

“I would give my rifle to get a chance at a grizzly!” exclaimed Varley, with a sudden burst of enthusiasm.

“Whoever got it wouldn’t have much to brag of,” remarked a burly young backwoodsman, as he joined them.

His remark was true, for poor Dick’s weapon was but a sorry affair.  It missed fire, and it hung fire; and even when it did fire, it remained a matter of doubt in its owner’s mind whether the slight deviations from the direct line made by his bullets were the result of his or its bad shooting.

Further comment upon it was checked by the arrival of a dozen or more hunters on the scene of action.  They were a sturdy set of bronzed, bold, fearless men, and one felt, on looking at them, that they would prove more than a match for several hundreds of Indians in open fight.  A few minutes after, the major himself came on the ground with the prize rifle on his shoulder, and Fan and Crusoe at his heels—­the latter tumbling, scrambling, and yelping after its mother, fat and clumsy, and happy as possible, having evidently quite forgotten that it had been nearly roasted alive only a few weeks before.