Langdon went up for the guns.  When he returned Bruce led the way down the mountain, carrying Muskwa by the buckskin thong.  For a few moments they paused on the blood-stained ledge of rock where Thor had wreaked his vengeance upon his tormentors.  Langdon bent over the dog the grizzly had decapitated.

“This is Biscuits,” he said.  “And we always thought she was the one coward of the bunch.  The other two are Jane and Tober; old Fritz is up on the summit.  Three of the best dogs we had, Bruce!”

Bruce was looking over the ledge.  He pointed downward.

“There’s another—­pitched clean off the face o’ the mount’in!” he gasped.  “Jimmy, that’s five!”

Langdon’s fists were clenched tightly as he stared over the edge of the precipice.  A choking sound came from his throat.  Bruce understood its meaning.  From where they stood they could see a black patch on the upturned breast of the dog a hundred feet under them.  Only one of the pack was marked like that.  It was Langdon’s favourite.  He had made her a camp pet.

“It’s Dixie,” he said.  For the first time he felt a surge of anger sweep through him, and his face was white as he turned back to the trail.  “I’ve got more than one reason for getting that grizzly now, Bruce,” he added.  “Wild horses can’t tear me away from these mountains until I kill him.  I’ll stick until winter if I have to.  I swear I’m going to kill him—­if he doesn’t run away.”

“He won’t do that,” said Bruce tersely, as he once more swung down the trail with Muskwa.

Until now Muskwa had been stunned into submissiveness by what must have appeared to him to be an utterly hopeless situation.  He had strained every muscle in his body to move a leg or a paw, but he was swathed as tightly as Rameses had ever been.  But now, however, it slowly dawned upon him that as he dangled back and forth his face frequently brushed his enemy’s leg, and he still had the use of his teeth.  He watched his opportunity, and this came when Bruce took a long step down from a rock, thus allowing Muskwa’s body to rest for the fraction of a second on the surface of the stone from which he was descending.

Quicker than a wink Muskwa took a bite.  It was a good deep bite, and if Langdon’s howl had stirred the silences a mile away the yell which now came from Bruce beat him by at least a half.  It was the wildest, most blood-curdling sound Muskwa had ever heard, even more terrible than the barking of the dogs, and it frightened him so that he released his hold at once.

Then, again, he was amazed.  These queer bipeds made no effort to retaliate.  The one he had bitten hopped up and down on one foot in a most unaccountable manner for a minute or so, while the other sat down on a boulder and rocked back and forth, with his hands on his stomach, and made a queer, uproarious noise with his mouth wide open.  Then the other stopped his hopping and also made that queer noise.