"Well!--coyote catchem," was all Sing would say.

"Yes!--and I suppose coyote leave bones in the garbage heap at your back door? Look here, Sing!--next time Chinese coyote take any more chicken, I fill him up buck shot out of that gun. No more chicken for you,--see!"

"All light!" conciliated the wily Chinaman, rising to go now that the discussion had come a bit too near home for his comfort. "I tell you quick next time coyote come--you fill him belly buck shot, heap plenty."

Two hours later, when the moon came up, the coyotes certainly provided entertainment. They howled and laughed, taunting an old terrier dog which belonged to the ranch and had neither the speed nor the inclination to try its mettle against its vicious enemies. It growled and barked a-plenty, but the coyotes sensed their safety and ventured the closer and yelped the louder in sheer deviltry.

Jim and Phil got down their guns, in the hope of bagging at least one of the brutes, but before they got outside, a wild frightened squawking and a tremendous to-do of fluttering told its own story.

They raced round, but by the time they got to the rear of the house the squawking was quite a bit away, and the moon, ere it shot behind a cloud, showed two distant, shadowy forms scurrying quickly over the hill with their kill.

Phil fired a shot, but it did not seem to take any effect.

"I guess we put too much blame on poor old Sing after all," said Jim, "but I could have sworn he was meddling with these hens. I never knew the c.h.i.n.k yet that could resist a chicken coop. He's even worse than the n.i.g.g.e.r is for that.

"I can hear music down at Sing's now; let us go quietly along and see what he is up to."

They went on to Sing's shack and peeped cautiously in at the window.

The Chinaman was sitting in a chair before his stove, sc.r.a.ping away on a Chinese fiddle, bringing the most unearthly cat-calls from the thing and singing to himself in a thin falsetto voice.

"He's nothing if he is not musical," remarked Jim.

Suddenly Sing stopped and laid down his fiddle. He rose, opened the oven door and brought out two beautifully roasted chickens, laid the pan down on top of the stove and rubbed his hands in pleasant antic.i.p.ation.

"Well I'll be darned!" whispered Jim.

"And we blamed it on the coyotes," answered Phil. "Let us go in and scare the daylights out of him."

For a moment Jim seemed inclined to follow Phil's suggestion, but he relented.

"Och!--what's the good? The poor deevil hasna a body to make frien's o', nor a thing to do to keep himsel' out o' mischief. Besides it is Christmas Eve. Let us bide in the spirit o' it and leave the poor heathen to enjoy himsel' for this once.

"Come on up hame to our virtuous cots!"

CHAPTER XXI

A Maiden, a Lover and a Heathen Chinee

Next morning, while inspecting the ravaged chicken coop and endeavouring to follow the trail of the light-footed coyotes, Jim and Phil discovered a trickle of blood here and there on the snow on top of the knoll, telling them that Phil's flying shot had come much nearer its billet than they had at first surmised.

"By jove!--what do you think of that, Philly, my boy? You pinked one of those brutes after all. What do you say to following up a bit?"

Sing had promised to look after the cooking of the Christmas dinner, so, as there was nothing in particular for them to do for the next few hours, Phil readily agreed. They went back for their rifles, m.u.f.fled themselves up a bit more and donned their heavy boots.

It was a glorious morning when they set out from the ranch. A fresh fall of snow the night before had already been crusted over by the cold north wind which so often tore in through the rifts in the hills at that time of the year, squeezing the thermometer almost to disappearing point at twenty-five to thirty below. The sun's brightness looked eternal. The sky was never so blue. Great fleecy clouds rolled and frolicked in well-nigh human abandon. Almost everywhere, when looking upward, the eyes rested against snow-white hills with their black reaching spars of spa.r.s.e fir trees; while below and stretching away for miles--winding and twisting between the hills--the flat, solidly-frozen Kalamalka Lake, with its fresh, white coating, caught the sun's rays and threw them back in a defiant and blinding dazzle. At intervals, in unexpected places and along the sh.o.r.e line, smoke curled up cheerily from the snug little homes of the neighbouring ranchers and settlers.

As the two men trudged along, with the old terrier dog at their heels, the frozen air crackled in their nostrils. They smoked their pipes, however, and threw out their chests in sheer joy of living, for a winter's day, such as this was, did not freeze young blood, but rather sent it sparkling and effervescing like ten-year-old champagne.

They followed the red stains on the snow and finally came to a spot in a gulley where the coyote evidently had disposed of its steal, for feathers lay about in gory profusion. They continued through the thicket, where they lost all track of further blood-stains. To add to their worries, the old terrier disappeared.

"He must have got scared and beat it for home," said Phil.

"Looks like it! I guess we should follow his lead, for Mister Coyote seems to have got pretty well away."

"Let us go down toward the lake then and home along the sh.o.r.e line. It is easier travelling that way."

They went down the incline together, digging with their heels at times to stop them up, and slipping in fifteen feet lengths at other times.

When they neared the bottom they heard a loud yelp, as of a dog suddenly hit by a missile of some kind. They looked out in the direction of the lake and away in the middle of it, half a mile from sh.o.r.e, their eyes sighted two dark objects rolling over and over each other.

A yelp, sharper than the first, came again.

"By jingo!" shouted Jim, "what do you know about that? It's our supposed yellow-livered terrier. He's got the coyote. Come on! The brute will have him eaten alive."

They plunged down the remainder of the hill, through another thicket of pines, along the sh.o.r.e and out on to the lake. The ice was several feet thick and as solid as the land itself. Time and again both Phil and Jim stepped up in order to try a shot, but it was impossible to get one in without endangering the life of the plucky old dog.

They slid and scurried along, full speed--while the terrier seemed to be hanging on gamely to the coyote, or else the coyote had such a hold on the terrier that the latter was unable to shake it. They continued to roll over and over in a whirling bundle of fur.

"Better try a shot anyway, Phil," cried Jim in desperation. "You are surer with the gun than I am. The dog is all in and it looks as if it didn't really matter now which you hit anyway."

Phil threw the gun to his shoulder, took almost careless aim and fired. It was a long shot and a difficult one for even an expert.

For a moment, it looked as if the bullet had gone wide. The next moment it could be seen that something had been hit, but it was hard to tell what. Then out of the scurry and whirl, the old terrier was observed to get on top.

"Good boy!" cried Jim. "You got the right one!"

As they came up on the scene of the fight, they found their dog mauled almost to ribbons, but he was still clinging gamely and worrying at the throat of the dead coyote.

Jim spoke a word of praise to that remnant of a dog and separated it from its late antagonist.

The excitement over, it wagged its stump of a tail, staggered for a little, trembled, then lay down on the ice with a little whimper, in absolute exhaustion.

The coyote was a huge brute of its kind and its coat was in perfect condition.

Phil's shot of the previous night had pa.s.sed through a fleshy part of its hind quarters, without breaking any bones on its journey, but the coyote had evidently bled almost to death before the terrier got at it. This alone accounted for its inability to beat the old dog at the very first turn of the encounter. The shot which killed it had gone clean through its eye and out behind its ear.

Jim got out his knife and started in to skin the animal, while Phil did what he could in the matter of lending first aid to the wounded terrier.

On glancing casually along the surface of the ice, then away toward their ranch, Phil noticed a vehicle drawn up at the front door.

"Jim,--there's a rig of some kind at our door. Looks as if we had visitors!"

"Now who the d.i.c.kens can it be?" queried Jim, scratching his head as he knelt beside the carca.s.s of the coyote. "It's a sleigh. Christmas Day and n.o.body to welcome them! Phil, you beat it back. I'll finish this job and follow after you with the dog. He won't be able to go fast and it is no use both of us waiting."

"All right!"