CHAPTER VII
THE THROWBACK
The Place was nine miles north of the county-seat city of Paterson.And yearly, near Paterson, was held the great North Jersey LivestockFair--a fair whose awards established for the next twelve-monththe local rank of purebred cattle and sheep and pigs for thirtymiles in either direction.
From the Ramapo hill pastures, south of Suffern, two days before thefair, descended a flock of twenty prize sheep--the playthings of a manto whom the title of Wall Street Farmer had a lure of its own--a lurethat cost him something like $30,000 a year; and which made him ascourge to all his few friends.
Among these luckless friends chanced to be the Mistress and the Masterof The Place. And the Gentleman Farmer had decided to break hissheep's fair-ward journey by a twenty-four-hour stop at The Place.
The Master, duly apprised of the sorry honor planned for his home, setaside a disused horse-paddock for the woolly visitors' use. Into thistheir shepherd drove his dusty and bleating charges on their arrival.
The shepherd was a somber Scot. Nature had begun the work ofsomberness in his Highland heart. The duty of working for the WallStreet Farmer had added tenfold to the natural tendency. His name wasMcGillicuddy, and he looked it.
Now, in northern New Jersey a live sheep is well nigh as rare as apterodactyl. This flock of twenty had cost their owner their weight inmerino wool. A dog--especially a collie--that does not know sheep, isprone to consider them his lawful prey, in other words, the sight of asheep has turned many an otherwise law-abiding dog into a killer.
To avoid so black a smirch on The Place's hospitality, the Master hadloaded all his collies, except Lad, into the car, and had shipped themoff, that morning, for a three-day sojourn at the boarding kennels,ten miles away.
"Does the Old Dog go, too, sir?" asked The Place's foreman, with aquestioning nod at Lad, after he had lifted the others into thetonneau.
Lad was viewing the proceedings from the top of the veranda steps. TheMaster looked at him, then at the car, and answered:
"No. Lad has more right here than any measly imported sheep. He won'tbother them if I tell him not to. Let him stay."
The sheep, convoyed by the misanthropic McGillicuddy, filed down thedrive, from the highroad, an hour later, and were marshaled into thecorral.
As the jostling procession, followed by its dour shepherd, turned inat the gate of The Place, Lad rose from his rug on the veranda. Hisnostrils itching with the unfamiliar odor, his soft eyes outraged bythe bizarre sight, he set forth to drive the intruders out into themain road.
Head lowered, he ran, uttering no sound. This seemed to him anemergency which called for drastic measures rather than for monitorybarking. For all he knew, these twenty fat, woolly, white thingsmight be fighters who would attack him in a body, and who might evenmenace the safety of his gods; and the glum McGillicuddy did notimpress him at all favorably. Hence the silent charge at the foe--acharge launched with the speed and terrible menace of a thunderbolt.
McGillicuddy sprang swiftly to the front of his flock, staffupwhirled; but before the staff could descend on the furry defender ofThe Place, a sweet voice called imperiously to the dog.
The Mistress had come out upon the veranda and had seen Lad dash tothe attack.
"Lad!" she cried. "_Lad!_"
The great dog halted midway in his rush.
"Down!" called the Mistress. "Leave them alone! Do you hear, Lad?_Leave them alone!_ Come back here!"
Lad heard, and Lad obeyed. Lad always obeyed. If these twentymalodorous strangers and their staff-brandishing guide were friends ofthe Mistress he must not drive them away. The order "Leave themalone!" was one that could not be disregarded.
Trembling with anger, yet with no thought of rebelling, Lad turned andtrotted back to the veranda. He thrust his cold nose into theMistress' warm little hand and looked up eagerly into her face,seeking a repeal of the command to keep away from the sheep and theirdriver.
But the Mistress only patted his silken head and whispered:
"We don't like it any more than you do, Laddie; but we mustn't letanyone know we don't. Leave them alone!"
Past the veranda filed the twenty priceless sheep, and on to thepaddock.
"I suppose they'll carry off all the prizes at the fair, won't they?"asked the Mistress civilly, as McGillicuddy plodded past her at thetail of the procession.
"Aiblins, aye," grunted McGillicuddy, with the exquisite courtesy of amember of his race and class who feels he is being patronized."Aiblins, aye. Aiblins, na'. Aiblins--ugh-uh."
Having thus safeguarded his statement against assault from any side atall, the Scot moved on. Lad strolled down toward the paddock tosuperintend the task of locking up the sheep. The Mistress did notdetain him. She felt calmly certain her order of "Leave them alone!"had rendered the twenty visitors inviolate from him.
Lad walked slowly around the paddock, his gaze on the sheep. Thesewere the first sheep he had ever seen. Yet his ancestors, for athousand years or more, had herded and guarded flocks on the moors.
Atavism is mysteriously powerful in dogs, and it takes strangeforms. A collie, too, has a queer strain of wolf in him--not only inbody but in brain, and the wolf was the sheep's official murderer, asfar back as the days when a humpbacked Greek slave, named AEsop, usedto beguile his sleepless nights with writing fables.
Round and round the paddock prowled Lad; his eyes alight with a myriadhalf-memories; his sensitive nostrils quivering at the scents thatenveloped them.
McGillicuddy, from time to time, eyed the dog obliquely, and with ascowl. These sheep were not the pride of his heart. His conscientiousheart possessed no pride--pride being one of the seven deadly sins,and the sheep not being his own; but the flock represented hislivelihood--his comfortably overpaid job with the Wall Street Farmer.He was responsible for their welfare.
And McGillicuddy did not at all like the way this beautiful collieeyed the prize merinos, nor was the Scot satisfied with the strengthof the corral. Its wire fencing was rusty and sagging from longdisuse, its gate hung crookedly and had a crazy hasp.
A sheep is one of the least intelligent creatures on earth. Should theflock's leader decide at any time during the night to press his heavybulk against the gate or against some of the rustier wire strands,there would presently be a gap through which the entire twenty couldamble forth. Once outside----
Again McGillicuddy glowered dourly at Lad. The collie returned thelook with interest; a well-bred dog being as skilled in reading humanfaces as is any professional dead beat. Lad saw the dislike inMcGillicuddy's heavy-thatched eyes; cordially he yearned to prove hisown distaste for the shepherd, but the Mistress' command had immunedthis sour stranger.
So Lad merely turned his back on the man, sat down, flattened hisfurry ears close against his head, thrust his pointed nose skyward,and sniffed. McGillicuddy was too much an animal man not to read theinsult in the dog's posture and action, and the shepherd's fisttightened longingly round his staff.
Half an hour later the Wall Street Farmer himself arrived at ThePlace. He came in a runabout. On the seat beside him sat hispasty-faced, four-year-old son. At his feet was something which, atfirst glance, might have been either a quadruped or a rag bag.
The Mistress and the Master, with dutiful hypocrisy, came smilinglyout on the veranda to welcome the guests. Lad, who had returned fromthe impromptu sheep-fold, stood beside them. At sight and scentof this new batch of visitors the collie doubtless felt whatold-fashioned novelists used to describe as "mingled emotions."
There was a child in the car. And though there had been few childrenin Lad's life, yet he loved them, loved them as a big-hearted andbig-bodied dog always loves the helpless. Wherefore, at sight of thechild, Lad rejoiced.
But the animal crouching at the Wall Street Farmer's feet was quite adifferent form of guest. Lad recognized the thing as a dog--yet nosuch dog as ever he had seen. An unwholesome-looking dog. Even as thelittle boy was an unwholesome-looking child.
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nbsp; "Well!" sonorously proclaimed the Wall Street Farmer as he scrambledout of the runabout and bore down upon his hosts, "here I am! Thesheep got here all safe? Good! I knew they would. McGillicuddy's agenius; nothing he can't do with sheep. You remember Mortimer?"lifting the lanky youngster from the seat. "He teased so to comealong, his mother said I'd better bring him. I knew you'd beglad. Shake hands with them, Morty, darling."
"I wun't!" snarled Morty darling, hanging back.
Then he caught sight of Lad. The collie came straight up to the child,grinning from ear to ear, and wrinkling his nose so delightedly thatevery white front tooth showed. Morty flung himself forward to greetthe huge dog, but the Wall Street Farmer, with a shout of warning,caught the boy in his arms and bravely interposed his own fat bodybetween Mortimer and Lad.
"What does the beast mean by snarling at my son?" fiercely demandedthe Wall Street Farmer. "You people have no right to leave such asavage dog at large."
"He's not snarling," the Mistress indignantly declared, "he'ssmiling. That's Lad's way. Why, he'd let himself be cut up intosquares sooner than hurt a child."
Still doubtful, the Wall Street Farmer cautiously set down his son onthe veranda. Morty flung himself bodily upon Lad; hauling and maulingthe stately collie this way and that.
Had any grown person, save only the Mistress or the Master, attemptedsuch treatment, the curving white eyeteeth would have buriedthemselves very promptly in the offender.
Indeed, the Master now gazed, with some nervousness, at the performance;but the Mistress was not worried as to her adored pet's behavior;and the Mistress, as ever, was right.
For Lad endured the mauling--not patiently, but blissfully. He fairlywrithed with delight at the painful tugging of hair and ears; andmoistly he strove to kiss the wizened little face that was on a levelwith his own. Morty repaid this attention by slapping Lad across themouth. Lad only wagged his plumy tail the more ecstatically andsnuggled closer to the preposterous baby.
Meantime, the Wall Street Farmer, in clarion tones, was callingattention to the second of the two treasures he had brought along.
"Melisande!" he cried.
At the summons, the fuzzy monstrosity in the car ceased peeringsnappishly over the doortop at Lad, and condescended to turn towardits owner. It looked like something between an Old English sheep-dogand a dachshund; straw-colored fur enveloped the scrawny body; amiserable apology for a bushy tail hung limply between crooked hindlegs; evil little eyes peered forth from beneath a scarecrow stubbleof head fringe; it was not a pretty dog, this canine the Wall StreetFarmer had just addressed by the poetic title of "Melisande."
"What in blazes is he?" asked the Master.
"She is a Prussian sheep-dog," proudly replied the Wall StreetFarmer. "She is the first of her breed ever imported to America. Costme a clean $1100 to buy her from a Chicago man who brought herover. I'm going to exhibit her at the Garden Show next winter. What doyou think of her, old man?"
"I'd hate to tell you," said the Master, "but I'll gladly tell youwhat I think of that Chicago man. He's the original genius who soldall the land between New York and Jersey City for a thousand dollarsan acre and issued the series of ten-dollar season admission ticketsto Central Park."
Being the Wall Street Farmer's host the Master said this in therecesses of his own heart. Aloud, he blithered some complimentary lieand watched the visitor lift the scraggy nondescript out of the car.
The moment she was on the ground, Melisande made a wild dash atLad. Snarling, she snapped ferociously at his throat. Lad merelyturned his shaggy shoulder to meet the onslaught. And Melisande foundherself gripping nothing but a mouthful of his soft hair. He made nomove to resent the attack. And the Wall Street Farmer, shoutingunobeyed mandates to his pet, dragged away the pugnacious Melisande bythe scruff of the neck.
The $1100 Prussian sheep-dog next caught a glimpse of one of thehalf-grown peacock chicks--the joy of the Mistress' summer--struttingacross the lawn. Melisande, with a yap of glee, rushed off in pursuit.
The chick had no fear. The dogs of The Place had always been trainedto give the fowls a wide berth; so the pretty little peacock fell apitifully easy prey to the first snap of Melisande's jaws.
Lad growled, deep down in his throat, at this gross lawlessness. TheMistress bit her lip to keep her self-control at the slaughter of herpet. The Master hastily said something that was lost in the loudervolume of the Wall Street Farmer's bellow as he sought to call backhis $1100 treasure from further slaying.
"Well, well, well!" the guest exclaimed as at last he returned to theveranda, dragging Melisande along in his wake. "I'm sorry thishappened, but you must overlook it. You see, Melisande is so highspirited she is hard to control. That's the way with thoroughbreddogs. Don't you find it so?"
The Master, thus appealed to, glanced at his wife. She was momentarilyout of ear-shot, having gone to pick up the killed peacock andstroke its rumpled plumage. So the Master allowed himself theluxury of plainer speech than if she had been there to be grieved overthe breach of hospitality.
"A thoroughbred dog," he said oracularly, "is either the best dog onearth, or else he is the worst. If he is the best he learns to mind,and to behave himself in every way like a thoroughbred. He learns itwithout being beaten or sworn at. If he is the worst--then it's wisestfor his owner to hunt up some Easy Mark and sell the cur to him for$1100. You'll notice I said his 'owner'--not his 'master.' There'sall the difference in the world between those two terms. Anybody,with price to buy a dog, can be an 'owner,' but all the cash coinedwon't make a man a dog's 'master'--unless he's that sort of man. Thinkit over."
The Wall Street Farmer glared apoplectically at his host, who wasalready sorry that the sneer at Lad and the killing of his wife's pethad made him speak so to a guest--even to a self-invited and undesiredguest. Then the Wall Street Man, with a grunt, put a leash onMelisande and gruffly asked that she be fastened to one of the vacantkennels.
The Mistress came back to the group as the $1100 beast was led away,kennelward, by the gardener. Recovering her self-possession, theMistress said to her guest:
"I never heard of a Prussian sheep-dog before. Is she trained to herdyour sheep?"
"No," replied the Wall Street Farmer, his rancor forgotten in theprospect of exploiting his wondrous dog, "not yet. In fact, shehates the sheep. She's young, so we haven't tried to train herfor shepherding. Two or three times we have taken her into thepasture--always on leash--but she flies at the sheep and goes almostcrazy with anger. McGillicuddy says it's bad for the sheep to bescared by her. So we keep her away from them. But by next season----"
He got no further. A sound of lamentation--prolonged and leather-lungedlamentation--smote upon the air.
"Morty!" ejaculated the visitor in panic. "It's Morty! Quick!"
Following the easily traceable direction of the squalling, he ran upthe veranda steps and into the house--closely followed by the Mistressand the Master.
The engaging Mortimer was of the stuff whereof explorers are made. Nopent-up Utica--nor veranda--contracted his powers. Bored by the stupidtalk of grown folk, wearying of Lad's friendly advances, he hadslipped through the open house door into the living-room.
There, for the day was cool, a jolly wood fire blazed on thehearth. In front of the fireplace was an enormous and cavernouscouch. In the precise center of the couch was curled something thatlooked like a ball of the grayish fluff a maid sweeps under the bed.
As Mortimer came into the room the infatuated Lad at his heels, thefluffy ball lazily uncurled and stretched--thereby revealing itself asno ball, but a superfurry gray kitten--the Mistress' temperamental newPersian kitten rejoicing in the dreamily Oriental name of Tipperary.
With a squeal of glad discovery, Mortimer grabbed Tipperary with bothhands, essaying to pull her fox-brush tail. Now, no sane person needsto be told the basic difference between the heart of a cat and theheart of a dog. Nor will any student of Persian kittens be surprisedto hear that Tipperary's reception of the ruffianly bab
y's advanceswas totally different from Lad's.
A lightning stroke of one of her shapeless fore-paws, and Tipperarywas free. Morty stood blinking in amaze at four geometrically regularred marks on the back of his own pudgy hand. Tipperary had not doneher persecutor the honor to run away. She merely moved to the far endof the couch and lay down there to renew her nap.
A mad fury fired the brain of Mortimer; a fury goaded by the pain ofhis scratches. Screaming in rage he seized the cat by the nape of theneck--to be safe from teeth and whizzing claws--and stamped acrosstoward the high-burning fire with her. His arm was drawn back to flingthe squirming and offending kitten into the scarlet heart of theflames. And then Lad intervened.
Now Lad was not in the very least interested in Tipperary; treatingthe temperamental Persian always with marked coldness. It is evendoubtful if he realized Morty's intent.
But one thing he did realize--that a silly baby was toddling straighttoward the fire. As many another wise dog has gone, before and since,Lad quietly stepped between Morty and the hearth. He stood, broadsideto the fire and to the child--a shaggy wall between the peril and thebaby.
But so quickly had anger carried Mortimer toward the hearth that thedog had not been able to block his progress until only a bare eighteeninches separated the youngster from the blaze.
Thus Lad found the heat from the burning logs all but intolerable. Itbit through his thick coat and into the tender flesh beneath. Like arock he stood there.
Mortimer, his gentle plan of kitten killing foiled, redoubled hisscreeches. Lad's back was higher than the child's eyes. Yet Mortysought to hurl the kitten over this stolid barrier into the fire.
Tipperary fell short; landing on the dog's shoulders, digging herneedle claws viciously therein, and thence leaping to the floor, fromwhich she sprang to the top of the bookshelves, spitting backblasphemously at her tormentor.
Morty's interest in the fire had been purely as a piece of immolationfor the cat, but finding his path to it barred, he straightwayresolved to go thither himself.
He started to move round to it, in front of Lad. The dog took aforward step that again barred the way. Morty went insane with wrathat this new interference with his sweet plans. His howls swelled to asustained roar, that reached the ears of the grown-ups on the lawn.
He flew at Lad, beating the dog with all the puny force of his fists,sinking his milk teeth into the collie's back, wrenching and tearingat the thick fur, stamping with his booted heels upon the absurdlytiny white forepaws, kicking the short ribs and the tender stomach.
Never for an instant did the child slacken his howls as he punishedthe dog that was saving him from death. Rather, he increased theirvolume from moment to moment. Lad did not stir. The kicking andbeating and gouging and hair-pulling were not pleasant, but they werewholly bearable. The heat was not. The smell of singed hair began tofill the room, but Lad stood firm.
And then in rushed the relief expedition, the Wall Street Farmer atits head.
At once concluding that Lad had bitten his son's bleeding hand, theirate father swung aloft a chair and strode to the rescue.
Lad saw him coming.
With the lightning swiftness of his kind he whirled to one side as themass of wood descended. The chair missed him by a fraction of an inchand splintered into pieces. It was a Chippendale, and had belonged tothe Mistress' great grandparents.
For the first time in all his blameless life Lad broke the sacredGuest Law by growling at a vouched-for visitor. But surely this fatbellower was no guest! Lad looked at his gods for information.
"Down, Lad!" said the Master very gently, his voice not quite steady.
Lad, perplexed but obedient, dropped to the floor.
"The brute tried to kill my boy!" stormed the Wall Street Farmer rightdramatically as he caught the howling Morty up in his arms to studythe extent of the wound.
"He's my guest! _He's my guest!_ HE'S MY GUEST!" the Master was sayingover and over to himself. "Lord, help me to keep on remembering he'smy GUEST!"
The Mistress came forward.
"Lad would sooner die than hurt a child," she declared, trying not tothink of the wrecked heirloom chair. "He loves children. Here, let mesee Morty's hand. Why, those are claw-marks! Cat scratches!"
"Ve nassy cat scwatched me!" bawled Morty. "Kill her, daddy! I twiedto. I twied to frow her in ve fire. But ve mizz'ble dog wouldn't letme! Kill her, daddy! Kill ve dog too!"
The Master's mouth flew wide open.
"Won't you go down to the paddock, dear," hastily interposed theMistress, "and see if the sheep are all right? Take Lad along withyou."
Lad, alone of all The Place's dogs, had the run of the house, nightand day, of the sacred dining-room. During the rest of that day hedid not avail himself of his high privilege. He kept out of theway--perplexed, woe-begone, his burns still paining him despite theMaster's ministrations.
After talking long and loudly all evening of his sheep's peerlessquality and of their certain victory over all comers in the fair theWall Street Farmer consented at last to go to bed. And silence settledover The Place.
In the black hour before dawn, that same silence was split in a scoreof places--split into a most horrible cacophony of sound that sentsleep scampering to the winds.
It was the mingling of yells and bleats and barks and the scurry ofmany feet. It burst out all at once in full force, lasting for someseconds with increasing clangor; then died to stillness.
By that time every human on The Place was out of bed. In more or lessrudimentary attire the house's inhabitants trooped down into the lowerhall. There the Wall Street Farmer was raving noisily and was yankingat a door bolt whose secret he could not fathom.
"It's my sheep!" he shouted. "That accursed dog of yours has gotten atthem. He's slaughtering them. I heard the poor things bleating and Iheard him snarling among them. They cost me----"
"If you're speaking of Lad," blazed the Master, "he's----"
"Here are the flashlights," interposed the Mistress. "Let me openthat door for you. I understand the bolt."
Out into the dark they went, all but colliding with McGillicuddy. TheScot, awakened like the rest, had gone to the paddock. He had now comeback to report the paddock empty and all the sheep gone.
"It's the collie tike!" sputtered McGillicuddy. "I'll tak' oath toit. I ken it's him. I suspeecioned him a' long, from how he garred atoor sheep the day. He----"
"I said so!" roared the Wall Street Farmer. "The murderous brute!First, he tries to kill Morty. And now he slaughters my sheep. You----"
The Master started to speak. But a white little hand, in the darkness,was laid gently across his mouth.
"You told me he always slept under the piano in your music room!"accused the guest as the four made their way paddock-ward, lighting apath with the electric flashlights. "Well, I looked there just now. Heisn't under the piano. He---- He----"
"Lad!" called the Master; then at the top of his lungs. "_Lad!_"
A distant growl, a snarl, a yelp, a scramble--and presently Ladappeared in the farthest radius of the flashlight flare.
For only a moment he stood there. Then he wheeled about and vanishedin the dark. Nor had the Master the voice to call him back. Themomentary glimpse of the great collie, in the merciless gleam of thelights, had stricken the whole party into an instant's speechlessness.
Vividly distinct against the darkness they had seen Lad. Hiswell-groomed coat was rumpled. His eyes were fire-balls. And--hisjaws were red with blood. Then he had vanished.
A groan from the Master--a groan of heartbreak--was the first soundfrom the four. The dog he loved was a killer.
"It isn't true! It isn't true!" stoutly declared the Mistress.
The Wall Street Farmer and McGullicuddy had already broken into arun. The shepherd had found the tracks of many little hoofs on thedewy ground. And he was following the trail. The guest, swearing andpanting, was behind him. The Mistress and the Master brought up therear.
At every step they peere
d fearfully around them for what they dreadedto see--the mangled body of some slain sheep. But they saw none. Andthey followed the trail.
In a quarter mile they came to its end.
All four flashlights played simultaneously upon a tiny hillock thatrose from the meadow at the forest edge. The hillock was usuallygreen. Now it was white.
Around its short slopes was huddled a flock of sheep, as close-ringedas though by a fence. At the hillock's summit sat Lad. He was sittingthere in a queer attitude, one of his snowy forepaws pinning somethingto the ground--something that could not be clearly distinguishedthrough the huddle but which, evidently, was no sheep.
The Wall Street Farmer broke the tense silence with a gobbledexclamation.
"Whisht!" half reverently interrupted the shepherd, who had beencircling the hillock on census duty. "There's na a sheep gone, nor--sofar's I can see--a sheep hurted. The fu' twenty is there."
The Master's flashlight found a gap through which its rays could reachthe hillock crest. The light revealed, under Lad's gently pinioningforepaw, the crouching and badly scared Melisande--the $1100 Prussiansheep dog.
McGullicuddy, with a grunt, was off on another and longer tour ofinspection. Presently he came back. He was breathing hard.
Even before McGillicuddy made his report the Master had guessed at themain points of the mystery's solution.
Melisande, weary of captivity, had gnawed through her leash. Seekingsport, she had gone to the paddock. There she had easily worried loosethe crazy gate latch. Just as she was wriggling through, Lad appearedfrom the veranda.
He had tried to drive back the would-be killer from her prey. Lad wasa veteran of several battles. But, apart from her sex, Melisande wasno opponent for him. And he had treated her accordingly. Melisandehad snapped at him, cutting him deeply in the underjaw. During thescrimmage the panic-urged sheep had bolted out of the paddock and hadscattered.
Remember, please, that Lad, ten hours earlier, had never in his lifeseen a sheep. But remember, too, that a million of his ancestors hadwon their right to a livelihood by their almost supernatural skill atherding flocks. Let this explain what actually happened--the throwbackof a great collie's instinct.
Driving the scared and subdued Melisande before him--and ever hamperedby her unwelcome presence--Lad proceeded to round up the scatteredsheep. He was in the midst of the process when the Master calledhim. Merely galloping back for an instant, and finding the summons wasnot repeated, he returned to his atavistic task.
In less than five minutes the twenty scampering runaways were "ringed"on the hillock. And, still keeping the Prussian sheep dog out ofmischief, Lad established himself in the ring's center.
Further than that, and the keeping of the ring intact, his primalinstincts did not serve him. Having rounded up his flock Lad had notthe remotest idea what to do with them. So he merely held them thereuntil the noisily gabbling humans should decide to take the matter outof his care.
McGillicuddy examined every sheep separately and found not a scratchor a stain on any of them. Then he told in effect what has here beenset down as to Lad's exploit.
As he finished his recital McGillicuddy looked shamefacedly around himas though gathering courage for an irksome task. A sickly yellow dawnwas crawling over the eastern mountains, throwing a ghostly glow onthe shepherd's dour and craggy visage. Drawing a long breath ofresolve he advanced upon Lad. Dropping on one knee, his eyes on alevel with the unconcernedly observant collie's, McGillicuddy intoned:
"Laddie, ye're a braw, braw dog. Ou, a canny dog! A sonsie dog,Laddie! I hae na met yer match this side o' Kirkcaldy Brae. Gin ye'lltak' an auld fule's apology for wrangin' ye, an' an auld fule's handin gude fellowship, 'twill pleasure me, Laddie. Winna ye let bygonesbe bygones, an' shake?"
Yes, the speech was ridiculous, but no one felt like laughing, noteven the Wall Street Farmer. The shepherd was gravely sincere and heknew that Lad would understand his burring words.
And Lad did understand. Solemnly he sat up. Solemnly he laid onewhite forepaw in the gnarled palm the kneeling shepherd outstretchedto him. His eyes glinted in wise friendliness as they met theadmiring gaze of the old man. Two born shepherds were face toface. Deep was calling unto deep.
Presently McGillicuddy broke the spell by rising abruptly to hisfeet. Gruffly he turned to the Master.
"There's na wit, sir," he growled, "in speirin' will ye sellhim. But--but I compliment ye on him, nanetheless."
"That's right; McGillicuddy's right!" boomed the Wall Street Farmer,catching but part of his shepherd's mumbled words. "Good idea! He is afine dog. I see that now. I was prejudiced. I freely admit it. Aremarkable dog. What'll you take for him? Or--better yet, how wouldyou like to swap, even, for Melisande?"
The Master's mouth again flew ajar, and many sizzling words jostledeach other in his throat. Before any of these could shame hishospitality by escaping, the Mistress hurriedly interposed:
"Dear, we left all the house doors wide open. Would you mind hurryingback ahead of us and seeing that everything is safe? And--will youtake Lad with you?"
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