“I’m afraid they will,” agreed Skipper Ed, who had lighted a lamp and was loading the magazine of his rifle.  “Load up, partner.  Load up, Bobby.  We’ll see what we can do from cover.”

“We must have killed some of them!” Bobby exclaimed excitedly.  “I know I did!  I saw three fall when we shot!”

“Yes, of course we did,” agreed Skipper Ed, “but there are enough of them we didn’t kill.  Here, you chaps,” he added, raising a window three or four inches.  “You should get some good shots from here.  I’ll try my luck from the shed door.”

They had turned the lamp low, that they might see the better what was going on out of doors.  The wolves, baffled by the sudden disappearance of their quarry, were ranged a little distance from the porch door, save two or three of the bolder ones, which were sniffing at the door itself.  The dogs were nowhere to be seen.

“Look out!” called Bobby to Skipper Ed, who was about to open the porch door.  “Some of them are right at the door!”

Then he and Jimmy began shooting.  The wolves at the door fell, and Skipper Ed, opening the door a little way, joined in a fusillade at the main pack.  The rapid reports of the rifles at close range, together with the flashes of fire from an unseen source, struck panic to the heart of the pack.  A slightly wounded one turned and ran.  That was a signal for panic, as is the way of men and beasts, and the whole pack followed in a mad, wild rush to the cover of the woods.

An instant and the last of the pack had faded into the shadows among the trees—­all save those left sprawling and limp upon the snow, which would never roam the hills again, and one or two of the wounded, which were whining, like whipped dogs, and the clearing about the cabin was as deserted as ever it was.

“I’ll go out,” said Skipper Ed, “and end the suffering of those wounded brutes.  Build up the fire, partner, and put the kettle on, and we’ll have some tea.  Then if there’s no sign of what’s left of the pack returning, we’ll haul the carcasses into the shed, where we can skin them tomorrow.”

There was a roaring, cheerful fire in the stove when Skipper Ed returned a few minutes later to report that twelve wolves lay dead outside.

“There must be some more down where we shot them at first,” said he, as he drew off his adikey, “and some of those that got away were wounded, no doubt.  At any rate we’ve cut the pack down so far in numbers that it won’t be a menace any longer.”

“What’ll they do now?” asked Bobby, as the three settled into their easy chairs to wait for the kettle to boil.

“Go and look for caribou, and attend to their business, I suppose, and leave us quiet, peaceable folk alone,” he laughed, adding:  “I never saw such a pack before, though I’ve heard some of the old Eskimos say that years ago it used to happen now and again that packs like this appeared.  Wolves are cowardly beasts, but numbers give them courage.  When six or eight get together, you have to look out for them, and when the pack grows to a dozen they’ll attack openly, and aren’t afraid of anything—­not even man.”