results of the change. Sodid the meager hill farm. So did Link's system and his pocketbook.
As he was a real, live human and not a temperance tract hero, therewere times when he girded bitterly at his self-enforced abstinence.Where were times, too--when he had a touch of malaria and again whenthe cutworms slaughtered two rows of his early tomatoes--when heyearned unspeakably for the solace of an evening at the Hampton tavern.
He had never been a natural drinker. Like many a better man he haddrunk less for what he sought to get than for what he sought to forget.And with the departure of loneliness and the new interest in his home,he felt less the need for wet conviviality and for drugging his fits ofmelancholy.
The memory of Chum's grieving repulsion somehow stuck in Ferris's mind.And it served as a brake, more than once, to his tavernward impulses.Two or three times, also, when Link's babyish gusts of destructive badtemper boiled to the surface at some setback or annoyance, much thesame wonderingly distressed look would creep into the collie'sglance--a look as of one who is revolted by a dear friend's failure toplay up to form. And to his own amused surprise, Ferris found himselftrying to curb these outbursts.
To the average human, a dog is only a dog. To Ferris, this collie ofhis was the one intimate friend of his life. Unversed in the ways ofdogs, he overestimated Chum, of course, and valued his society and hisgood opinion far more highly than the average man would have done.Thus, perhaps, his desire to stand well in the dog's esteem had in itmore that was commendable than ludicrous. Or perhaps not.
If the strange association did much for Link, it did infinitely morefor Chum. He had found a master who had no social interests in lifebeyond his dog, and who could and did devote all his scant leisurehours to association with that dog. Chum's sagacity and individualityblossomed under such intensive tutelage, as might that of a cleverchild who is the sole pupil of its teacher.
Link did not seek to make a trick dog of his pet. He taught Chum toshake hands, to lie down, to "speak" and one or two more simpleaccomplishments. It was by talking constantly to the collie, as to afellow human, that he broadened the dog's intelligence. Chum grew toknow and to interpret every inflection of Ferris's voice, every simpleword he spoke and every gesture of his.
Apart from mere good fellowship the dog was proving of great use on thefarm. Morning and night, Chum drove the sheep and the cattle to theirrespective pastures and then back to the barnyard at night. At theentrances to the pastures, now, Ferris had rigged up rude gates with"bar catch" fastenings--simple contrivances which closed by gravity andwhose bars the dog was readily taught to shove upward with his nose.
It was thus a matter of only a few days to teach Chum to open or closethe light gates. This trick has been taught to countless collies, ofcourse, in Great Britain, and to many here. But Link did not know that.He felt like another Columbus or Edison, at his own genius in devisingsuch a scheme; and he felt an inordinate pride in Chum for learning thesimple exploit so quickly.
Of old, Link had fretted at the waste of time in taking out the sheepand cows and in going for them at night. This dual duty was now a thingof the past. Chum did the work for him, and reveled in the excitementof it. Chum also--from watching Link perform the task twice--hadlearned to drive the chickens out of the garden patches whenever any ofthem chanced to stray thither, and to scurry into the cornfield withharrowing barks of ejection when a flock of crows hovered hungrilyabove the newly-planted crops.
All of which was continual amusement to Chum, and a tremendous help tohis owner.
Link, getting over his initial wonder at the dog's progress, began totake these accomplishments as a matter of course. Indeed, he wassometimes perplexed at the otherwise sagacious dog's limitations ofbrain.
For example, Chum loved the fire on the chilly evenings such as creepover the mountain region even in midsummer. He would watch Linkreplenish the blaze with fresh sticks whenever it sank low.
Yet, left to himself, he would let the fire go out, and he never knewenough to pick up a stick in his mouth and lay it on the embers. Thislack of reasoning powers in his pet perplexed Ferris.
Link could not understand why the same wit which sent Chum half a mile,of his own accord, in search of one missing sheep out of the entireflock, should not tell him that a fire is kept alive by the putting ofwood on it.
In search of some better authority on dog intelligence, Link paid hisfirst visit to Hampton's little public library. There, shamefacedly, heasked the boy in charge for some books about dogs. The youth lookedidly for a few minutes in a crossindex file. Then he brought forth atome called "The Double Garden," written by someone who was evidentlyan Eyetalian or Polack or other foreigner, because he bore thegrievously un-American name of "Maeterlinck".
"This is all I can find about dogs," explained the boy, passing thelinen-jacketed little volume across the counter to Link. "First storyin it is an essay on 'Our Friend, the Dog,' the index says. Want it?"
That evening, by his kitchen lamp, Ferris read laboriously the Belgianphilosopher's dog essay. He read it aloud--as he had taken to thinkingaloud--for Chum's benefit. And there were many parts of the immortalessay from which the man gleaned no more sense than did the collie.
It began with a promising account of a puppy named Pelleas. But midwayit branched off into something else. Something Link could not make headnor tail of. Then, on second reading, bits of Maeterlinck's meaning,here and there, seeped into Ferris's bewilderedly groping intellect.
He learned, among other things, that Man is all alone on earth; thatmost animals don't know he is here, and that the rest of them have nouse for him. That even flowers and crops will desert him and run againto wildness, if Man turns his back on them for a minute. So will hishorse, his cow and his sheep. They graft on him for a living, and theyhate or ignore him.
The dog alone, Link spelled out, has pierced the vast barrier betweenhumans and other beasts, and has ranged himself, willingly andjoyously, on the side of Man. For Man's sake the dog will not onlystarve and suffer and lay down his life, but will betray his fellowquadrupeds. Man is the dog's god. And the dog is the only living mortalthat has the privilege of looking upon the face of his deity.
All of which was doubtless very interesting, and part of which thrilledFerris, but none of which enlightened him as to a dog's uncanny wisdomin certain things and his blank stupidity in others. Next day Linkreturned the book to the library, no wiser than before, albeit with ahigher appreciation of his own good luck in being the god of onesplendid dog like Chum.
July had drowsed into August, and August was burning its sultry waytoward September. Link's quarterly check from the Paterson Marketarrived. And Ferris went as usual to the Hampton store to get itcashed. This tine he stood in less dire need of money's life-savingqualities than of yore. It had been a good summer for Link. The liquorout of his system and with a new interest in life, he had worked with asnap and vigor which had brought results in hard cash.
None the less, he was glad for this check. In another month the annualinterest on his farm mortgage would fall due. And the meeting of thatpayment was always a problem. This year he would be less cruellyharassed by it than before.
Yet, all the more, he desired extra money. For a startlingly originalambition had awakened recently in his heart--namely, to pay off alittle of the mortgage's principal along with the interest.
At first the idea had staggered him. But talking it over with Chum andstudying his thumbed-soiled ledger, he had decided there was a barechance he might be able to do it.
As he mounted the steps of the store, this evening in late August, hesaw, tacked to the doorside clapboards, a truly gorgeous poster. By thelight of the flickering lamp over the door, he discerned the vividscarlet head of a dog in the upper corner of the yellow placard, andmuch display type below it.
It was the picture of the dog which checked Link in passing. It was afancy head--the head of a stately and long muzzled dog with a ruff andwith tulip ears. In short, just such a dog as Chum. Not knowing thatChum wa
s a collie and that poster artists rejoice to depict collies, byreason of the latter's decorative qualities, Ferris was amazed by thecoincidence.
After a long and critical survey of the picture, he was moved to runhis eye over the flaring reading matter.
The poster announced, to all and sundry, that on Labor Day a mammothdog show was to be held in the country club grounds at Craigswold--ashow for the benefit of the Red Cross. Entries were to be one dollarfor each class. "Thanks to generous contributions, the committee wasenabled to offer prizes of unusual beauty and value, in addition to thecustomary ribbons."
Followed a list of cups and medals. Link scanned them with no greatinterest, But suddenly his roving gaze came to an astonishedstandstill. At the bottom of the poster, in forty-eight-point bold-facetype, ran the following proclamation:
COL. CYRUS MARDEN OF CRAIGSWOLD MANOR OFFERS A
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