<hr class="chap" /><p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</SPAN></span></p>
<h2><SPAN name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></SPAN>CHAPTER VII<br/> THE THROWBACK</h2>
<p>The Place was nine miles north of the county-seat
city of Paterson. And yearly, near
Paterson, was held the great North Jersey
Livestock Fair—a fair whose awards established
for the next twelve-month the local rank of purebred
cattle and sheep and pigs for thirty miles in
either direction.</p>
<p>From the Ramapo hill pastures, south of Suffern,
two days before the fair, descended a flock of
twenty prize sheep—the playthings of a man to
whom the title of Wall Street Farmer had a lure
of its own—a lure that cost him something like
$30,000 a year; and which made him a scourge to
all his few friends.</p>
<p>Among these luckless friends chanced to be the
Mistress and the Master of The Place. And the
Gentleman Farmer had decided to break his sheep's
fair-ward journey by a twenty-four-hour stop at
The Place.</p>
<p>The Master, duly apprised of the sorry honor
planned for his home, set aside a disused horse-paddock
for the woolly visitors' use. Into this their<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</SPAN></span>
shepherd drove his dusty and bleating charges on
their arrival.</p>
<p>The shepherd was a somber Scot. Nature had
begun the work of somberness in his Highland
heart. The duty of working for the Wall Street
Farmer had added tenfold to the natural tendency.
His name was McGillicuddy, and he looked it.</p>
<p>Now, in northern New Jersey a live sheep is
well nigh as rare as a pterodactyl. This flock of
twenty had cost their owner their weight in merino
wool. A dog—especially a collie—that does not
know sheep, is prone to consider them his lawful
prey, in other words, the sight of a sheep has
turned many an otherwise law-abiding dog into
a killer.</p>
<p>To avoid so black a smirch on The Place's hospitality,
the Master had loaded all his collies, except
Lad, into the car, and had shipped them off,
that morning, for a three-day sojourn at the boarding
kennels, ten miles away.</p>
<p>"Does the Old Dog go, too, sir?" asked The
Place's foreman, with a questioning nod at Lad,
after he had lifted the others into the tonneau.</p>
<p>Lad was viewing the proceedings from the top of
the veranda steps. The Master looked at him, then
at the car, and answered:</p>
<p>"No. Lad has more right here than any measly
imported sheep. He won't bother them if I tell
him not to. Let him stay."</p>
<p>The sheep, convoyed by the misanthropic McGil<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</SPAN></span>licuddy,
filed down the drive, from the highroad, an
hour later, and were marshaled into the corral.</p>
<p>As the jostling procession, followed by its dour
shepherd, turned in at the gate of The Place, Lad
rose from his rug on the veranda. His nostrils
itching with the unfamiliar odor, his soft eyes outraged
by the bizarre sight, he set forth to drive the
intruders out into the main road.</p>
<p>Head lowered, he ran, uttering no sound. This
seemed to him an emergency which called for
drastic measures rather than for monitory barking.
For all he knew, these twenty fat, woolly, white
things might be fighters who would attack him in
a body, and who might even menace the safety of
his gods; and the glum McGillicuddy did not impress
him at all favorably. Hence the silent charge
at the foe—a charge launched with the speed and
terrible menace of a thunderbolt.</p>
<p>McGillicuddy sprang swiftly to the front of his
flock, staff upwhirled; but before the staff could
descend on the furry defender of The Place, a
sweet voice called imperiously to the dog.</p>
<p>The Mistress had come out upon the veranda
and had seen Lad dash to the attack.</p>
<p>"Lad!" she cried. "<i>Lad!</i>"</p>
<p>The great dog halted midway in his rush.</p>
<p>"Down!" called the Mistress. "Leave them
alone! Do you hear, Lad? <i>Leave them alone!</i>
Come back here!"</p>
<p>Lad heard, and Lad obeyed. Lad always obeyed.<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</SPAN></span>
If these twenty malodorous strangers and their
staff-brandishing guide were friends of the Mistress
he must not drive them away. The order
"Leave them alone!" was one that could not be disregarded.</p>
<p>Trembling with anger, yet with no thought of
rebelling, Lad turned and trotted back to the
veranda. He thrust his cold nose into the Mistress'
warm little hand and looked up eagerly into her
face, seeking a repeal of the command to keep away
from the sheep and their driver.</p>
<p>But the Mistress only patted his silken head and
whispered:</p>
<p>"We don't like it any more than you do, Laddie;
but we mustn't let anyone know we don't. Leave
them alone!"</p>
<p>Past the veranda filed the twenty priceless sheep,
and on to the paddock.</p>
<p>"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 the tail of the procession.</p>
<p>"Aiblins, aye," grunted McGillicuddy, with the
exquisite courtesy of a member of his race and
class who feels he is being patronized. "Aiblins,
aye. Aiblins, na'. Aiblins—ugh-uh."</p>
<p>Having thus safeguarded his statement against
assault from any side at all, the Scot moved on.
Lad strolled down toward the paddock to superintend
the task of locking up the sheep. The Mis<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</SPAN></span>tress
did not detain him. She felt calmly certain her
order of "Leave them alone!" had rendered the
twenty visitors inviolate from him.</p>
<p>Lad walked slowly around the paddock, his gaze
on the sheep. These were the first sheep he had
ever seen. Yet his ancestors, for a thousand years
or more, had herded and guarded flocks on the
moors.</p>
<p>Atavism is mysteriously powerful in dogs, and it
takes strange forms. A collie, too, has a queer
strain of wolf in him—not only in body but in
brain, and the wolf was the sheep's official murderer,
as far back as the days when a humpbacked
Greek slave, named Æsop, used to beguile his sleepless
nights with writing fables.</p>
<p>Round and round the paddock prowled Lad; his
eyes alight with a myriad half-memories; his sensitive
nostrils quivering at the scents that enveloped
them.</p>
<p>McGillicuddy, from time to time, eyed the dog
obliquely, and with a scowl. These sheep were not
the pride of his heart. His conscientious heart
possessed no pride—pride being one of the seven
deadly sins, and the sheep not being his own; but
the flock represented his livelihood—his comfortably
overpaid job with the Wall Street Farmer.
He was responsible for their welfare.</p>
<p>And McGillicuddy did not at all like the way this
beautiful collie eyed the prize merinos, nor was the
Scot satisfied with the strength of the corral. Its<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</SPAN></span>
wire fencing was rusty and sagging from long disuse,
its gate hung crookedly and had a crazy hasp.</p>
<p>A sheep is one of the least intelligent creatures
on earth. Should the flock's leader decide at any
time during the night to press his heavy bulk
against the gate or against some of the rustier wire
strands, there would presently be a gap through
which the entire twenty could amble forth. Once
outside——</p>
<p>Again McGillicuddy glowered dourly at Lad.
The collie returned the look with interest; a well-bred
dog being as skilled in reading human faces
as is any professional dead beat. Lad saw the dislike
in McGillicuddy's heavy-thatched eyes; cordially
he yearned to prove his own distaste for the shepherd,
but the Mistress' command had immuned
this sour stranger.</p>
<p>So Lad merely turned his back on the man, sat
down, flattened his furry ears close against his
head, thrust his pointed nose skyward, and sniffed.
McGillicuddy was too much an animal man not to
read the insult in the dog's posture and action, and
the shepherd's fist tightened longingly round his
staff.</p>
<p>Half an hour later the Wall Street Farmer himself
arrived at The Place. He came in a runabout.
On the seat beside him sat his pasty-faced, four-year-old
son. At his feet was something which, at
first glance, might have been either a quadruped or
a rag bag.</p>
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</SPAN></span></p>
<p>The Mistress and the Master, with dutiful hypocrisy,
came smilingly out on the veranda to welcome
the guests. Lad, who had returned from the
impromptu sheep-fold, stood beside them. At sight
and scent of this new batch of visitors the collie
doubtless felt what old-fashioned novelists used to
describe as "mingled emotions."</p>
<p>There was a child in the car. And though there
had been few children in Lad's life, yet he loved
them, loved them as a big-hearted and big-bodied
dog always loves the helpless. Wherefore, at sight
of the child, Lad rejoiced.</p>
<p>But the animal crouching at the Wall Street
Farmer's feet was quite a different form of guest.
Lad recognized the thing as a dog—yet no such
dog as ever he had seen. An unwholesome-looking
dog. Even as the little boy was an unwholesome-looking
child.</p>
<p>"Well!" sonorously proclaimed the Wall Street
Farmer as he scrambled out of the runabout and
bore down upon his hosts, "here I am! The sheep
got here all safe? Good! I knew they would.
McGillicuddy's a genius; nothing he can't do with
sheep. You remember Mortimer?" lifting the
lanky youngster from the seat. "He teased so to
come along, his mother said I'd better bring him.
I knew you'd be glad. Shake hands with them,
Morty, darling."</p>
<p>"I wun't!" snarled Morty darling, hanging back.</p>
<p>Then he caught sight of Lad. The collie came<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</SPAN></span>
straight up to the child, grinning from ear to ear,
and wrinkling his nose so delightedly that every
white front tooth showed. Morty flung himself
forward to greet the huge dog, but the Wall Street
Farmer, with a shout of warning, caught the boy
in his arms and bravely interposed his own fat
body between Mortimer and Lad.</p>
<p>"What does the beast mean by snarling at my
son?" fiercely demanded the Wall Street Farmer.
"You people have no right to leave such a savage
dog at large."</p>
<p>"He's not snarling," the Mistress indignantly declared,
"he's smiling. That's Lad's way. Why,
he'd let himself be cut up into squares sooner than
hurt a child."</p>
<p>Still doubtful, the Wall Street Farmer cautiously
set down his son on the veranda. Morty flung himself
bodily upon Lad; hauling and mauling the
stately collie this way and that.</p>
<p>Had any grown person, save only the Mistress
or the Master, attempted such treatment, the curving
white eyeteeth would have buried themselves
very promptly in the offender.</p>
<p>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.</p>
<p>For Lad endured the mauling—not patiently, but
blissfully. He fairly writhed with delight at the
painful tugging of hair and ears; and moistly he<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</SPAN></span>
strove to kiss the wizened little face that was on a
level with his own. Morty repaid this attention by
slapping Lad across the mouth. Lad only wagged
his plumy tail the more ecstatically and snuggled
closer to the preposterous baby.</p>
<p>Meantime, the Wall Street Farmer, in clarion
tones, was calling attention to the second of the two
treasures he had brought along.</p>
<p>"Melisande!" he cried.</p>
<p>At the summons, the fuzzy monstrosity in the car
ceased peering snappishly over the doortop at Lad,
and condescended to turn toward its owner. It
looked like something between an Old English
sheep-dog and a dachshund; straw-colored fur enveloped
the scrawny body; a miserable apology for
a bushy tail hung limply between crooked hind legs;
evil little eyes peered forth from beneath a scarecrow
stubble of head fringe; it was not a pretty
dog, this canine the Wall Street Farmer had just
addressed by the poetic title of "Melisande."</p>
<p>"What in blazes is he?" asked the Master.</p>
<p>"She is a Prussian sheep-dog," proudly replied
the Wall Street Farmer. "She is the first of her
breed ever imported to America. Cost me a clean
$1100 to buy her from a Chicago man who brought
her over. I'm going to exhibit her at the Garden
Show next winter. What do you think of her,
old man?"</p>
<p>"I'd hate to tell you," said the Master, "but I'll
gladly tell you what I think of that Chicago man.<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</SPAN></span>
He's the original genius who sold all the land between
New York and Jersey City for a thousand
dollars an acre and issued the series of ten-dollar
season admission tickets to Central Park."</p>
<p>Being the Wall Street Farmer's host the Master
said this in the recesses of his own heart. Aloud,
he blithered some complimentary lie and watched
the visitor lift the scraggy nondescript out of
the car.</p>
<p>The moment she was on the ground, Melisande
made a wild dash at Lad. Snarling, she snapped
ferociously at his throat. Lad merely turned his
shaggy shoulder to meet the onslaught. And
Melisande found herself gripping nothing but a
mouthful of his soft hair. He made no move to
resent the attack. And the Wall Street Farmer,
shouting unobeyed mandates to his pet, dragged
away the pugnacious Melisande by the scruff of the
neck.</p>
<p>The $1100 Prussian sheep-dog next caught a
glimpse of one of the half-grown peacock chicks—the
joy of the Mistress' summer—strutting across
the lawn. Melisande, with a yap of glee, rushed off
in pursuit.</p>
<p>The chick had no fear. The dogs of The Place
had always been trained to give the fowls a wide
berth; so the pretty little peacock fell a pitifully
easy prey to the first snap of Melisande's jaws.</p>
<p>Lad growled, deep down in his throat, at this
gross lawlessness. The Mistress bit her lip to keep<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</SPAN></span>
her self-control at the slaughter of her pet. The
Master hastily said something that was lost in the
louder volume of the Wall Street Farmer's bellow
as he sought to call back his $1100 treasure from
further slaying.</p>
<p>"Well, well, well!" the guest exclaimed as at last
he returned to the veranda, dragging Melisande
along in his wake. "I'm sorry this happened, but
you must overlook it. You see, Melisande is so
high spirited she is hard to control. That's the way
with thoroughbred dogs. Don't you find it so?"</p>
<p>The Master, thus appealed to, glanced at his wife.
She was momentarily out of ear-shot, having gone
to pick up the killed peacock and stroke its rumpled
plumage. So the Master allowed himself the luxury
of plainer speech than if she had been there to
be grieved over the breach of hospitality.</p>
<p>"A thoroughbred dog," he said oracularly, "is
either the best dog on earth, 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 it without being beaten or sworn at. If he is
the worst—then it's wisest for 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's all the difference in the world between
those two terms. Anybody, with price to buy a
dog, can be an 'owner,' but all the cash coined won't
make a man a dog's 'master'—unless he's that sort
of man. Think it over."</p>
<p><span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</SPAN></span></p>
<p>The Wall Street Farmer glared apoplectically at
his host, who was already sorry that the sneer at
Lad and the killing of his wife's pet had made him
speak so to a guest—even to a self-invited and undesired
guest. Then the Wall Street Man, with a
grunt, put a leash on Melisande and gruffly asked
that she be fastened to one of the vacant kennels.</p>
<p>The Mistress came back to the group as the
$1100 beast was led away, kennelward, by the
gardener. Recovering her self-possession, the Mistress
said to her guest:</p>
<p>"I never heard of a Prussian sheep-dog before.
Is she trained to herd your sheep?"</p>
<p>"No," replied the Wall Street Farmer, his rancor
forgotten in the prospect of exploiting his wondrous
dog, "not yet. In fact, she hates the sheep.
She's young, so we haven't tried to train her for
shepherding. Two or three times we have taken
her into the pasture—always on leash—but she
flies at the sheep and goes almost crazy with anger.
McGillicuddy says it's bad for the sheep to be scared
by her. So we keep her away from them. But by
next season——"</p>
<p>He got no further. A sound of lamentation—prolonged
and leather-lunged lamentation—smote
upon the air.</p>
<p>"Morty!" ejaculated the visitor in panic. "It's
Morty! Quick!"</p>
<p>Following the easily traceable direction of the
squalling, he ran up the veranda steps and into the<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</SPAN></span>
house—closely followed by the Mistress and the
Master.</p>
<p>The engaging Mortimer was of the stuff whereof
explorers are made. No pent-up Utica—nor veranda—contracted
his powers. Bored by the stupid
talk of grown folk, wearying of Lad's friendly advances,
he had slipped through the open house door
into the living-room.</p>
<p>There, for the day was cool, a jolly wood fire
blazed on the hearth. In front of the fireplace was
an enormous and cavernous couch. In the precise
center of the couch was curled something that
looked like a ball of the grayish fluff a maid sweeps
under the bed.</p>
<p>As Mortimer came into the room the infatuated
Lad at his heels, the fluffy ball lazily uncurled and
stretched—thereby revealing itself as no ball, but a
superfurry gray kitten—the Mistress' temperamental
new Persian kitten rejoicing in the dreamily
Oriental name of Tipperary.</p>
<p>With a squeal of glad discovery, Mortimer
grabbed Tipperary with both hands, essaying to
pull her fox-brush tail. Now, no sane person needs
to be told the basic difference between the heart of
a cat and the heart of a dog. Nor will any student
of Persian kittens be surprised to hear that Tipperary's
reception of the ruffianly baby's advances
was totally different from Lad's.</p>
<p>A lightning stroke of one of her shapeless fore-paws,
and Tipperary was free. Morty stood blink<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</SPAN></span>ing
in amaze at four geometrically regular red
marks on the back of his own pudgy hand. Tipperary
had not done her persecutor the honor to
run away. She merely moved to the far end of
the couch and lay down there to renew her nap.</p>
<p>A mad fury fired the brain of Mortimer; a fury
goaded by the pain of his scratches. Screaming in
rage he seized the cat by the nape of the neck—to
be safe from teeth and whizzing claws—and
stamped across toward the high-burning fire with
her. His arm was drawn back to fling the squirming
and offending kitten into the scarlet heart of
the flames. And then Lad intervened.</p>
<p>Now Lad was not in the very least interested in
Tipperary; treating the temperamental Persian
always with marked coldness. It is even doubtful
if he realized Morty's intent.</p>
<p>But one thing he did realize—that a silly baby
was toddling straight toward the fire. As many
another wise dog has gone, before and since, Lad
quietly stepped between Morty and the hearth. He
stood, broadside to the fire and to the child—a
shaggy wall between the peril and the baby.</p>
<p>But so quickly had anger carried Mortimer toward
the hearth that the dog had not been able
to block his progress until only a bare eighteen
inches separated the youngster from the blaze.</p>
<p>Thus Lad found the heat from the burning logs
all but intolerable. It bit through his thick coat and<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</SPAN></span>
into the tender flesh beneath. Like a rock he stood
there.</p>
<p>Mortimer, his gentle plan of kitten killing foiled,
redoubled his screeches. Lad's back was higher
than the child's eyes. Yet Morty sought to hurl
the kitten over this stolid barrier into the fire.</p>
<p>Tipperary fell short; landing on the dog's
shoulders, digging her needle claws viciously
therein, and thence leaping to the floor, from which
she sprang to the top of the bookshelves, spitting
back blasphemously at her tormentor.</p>
<p>Morty's interest in the fire had been purely as a
piece of immolation for the cat, but finding his
path to it barred, he straightway resolved to go
thither himself.</p>
<p>He started to move round to it, in front of Lad.
The dog took a forward step that again barred the
way. Morty went insane with wrath at this new
interference with his sweet plans. His howls
swelled to a sustained roar, that reached the ears
of the grown-ups on the lawn.</p>
<p>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 tearing at the thick
fur, stamping with his booted heels upon the absurdly
tiny white forepaws, kicking the short ribs
and the tender stomach.</p>
<p>Never for an instant did the child slacken his
howls as he punished the dog that was saving him
from death. Rather, he increased their volume<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</SPAN></span>
from moment to moment. Lad did not stir. The
kicking and beating and gouging and hair-pulling
were not pleasant, but they were wholly bearable.
The heat was not. The smell of singed hair began
to fill the room, but Lad stood firm.</p>
<p>And then in rushed the relief expedition, the
Wall Street Farmer at its head.</p>
<p>At once concluding that Lad had bitten his son's
bleeding hand, the irate father swung aloft a chair
and strode to the rescue.</p>
<p>Lad saw him coming.</p>
<p>With the lightning swiftness of his kind he
whirled to one side as the mass of wood descended.
The chair missed him by a fraction of an inch
and splintered into pieces. It was a Chippendale,
and had belonged to the Mistress' great grandparents.</p>
<p>For the first time in all his blameless life Lad
broke the sacred Guest Law by growling at a
vouched-for visitor. But surely this fat bellower
was no guest! Lad looked at his gods for information.</p>
<p>"Down, Lad!" said the Master very gently, his
voice not quite steady.</p>
<p>Lad, perplexed but obedient, dropped to the floor.</p>
<p>"The brute tried to kill my boy!" stormed the
Wall Street Farmer right dramatically as he caught
the howling Morty up in his arms to study the extent
of the wound.</p>
<p>"He's my guest! <i>He's my guest!</i> <span class="smcap lowercase">HE'S MY GUEST!<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</SPAN></span></span>
the Master was saying over and over
to himself. "Lord, help me to keep on remembering
he's my GUEST!"</p>
<p>The Mistress came forward.</p>
<p>"Lad would sooner die than hurt a child," she
declared, trying not to think of the wrecked heirloom
chair. "He loves children. Here, let me see
Morty's hand. Why, those are claw-marks! Cat
scratches!"</p>
<p>"Ve nassy cat scwatched me!" bawled Morty.
"Kill her, daddy! I twied to. I twied to frow her
in ve fire. But ve mizz'ble dog wouldn't let me!
Kill her, daddy! Kill ve dog too!"</p>
<p>The Master's mouth flew wide open.</p>
<p>"Won't you go down to the paddock, dear,"
hastily interposed the Mistress, "and see if the sheep
are all right? Take Lad along with you."</p>
<p>Lad, alone of all The Place's dogs, had the run
of the house, night and day, of the sacred dining-room.
During the rest of that day he did not
avail himself of his high privilege. He kept out
of the way—perplexed, woe-begone, his burns still
paining him despite the Master's ministrations.</p>
<p>After talking long and loudly all evening of his
sheep's peerless quality and of their certain victory
over all comers in the fair the Wall Street Farmer
consented at last to go to bed. And silence settled
over The Place.</p>
<p>In the black hour before dawn, that same silence
was split in a score of places—split into a most<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</SPAN></span>
horrible cacophony of sound that sent sleep scampering
to the winds.</p>
<p>It was the mingling of yells and bleats and barks
and the scurry of many feet. It burst out all at
once in full force, lasting for some seconds with
increasing clangor; then died to stillness.</p>
<p>By that time every human on The Place was out
of bed. In more or less rudimentary attire the
house's inhabitants trooped down into the lower
hall. There the Wall Street Farmer was raving
noisily and was yanking at a door bolt whose secret
he could not fathom.</p>
<p>"It's my sheep!" he shouted. "That accursed
dog of yours has gotten at them. He's slaughtering
them. I heard the poor things bleating and I
heard him snarling among them. They cost
me——"</p>
<p>"If you're speaking of Lad," blazed the Master,
"he's——"</p>
<p>"Here are the flashlights," interposed the Mistress.
"Let me open that door for you. I understand
the bolt."</p>
<p>Out into the dark they went, all but colliding
with McGillicuddy. The Scot, awakened like the
rest, had gone to the paddock. He had now come
back to report the paddock empty and all the sheep
gone.</p>
<p>"It's the collie tike!" sputtered McGillicuddy.
"I'll tak' oath to it. I ken it's him. I suspeecioned<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</SPAN></span>
him a' long, from how he garred at oor sheep the
day. He——"</p>
<p>"I said so!" roared the Wall Street Farmer. "The
murderous brute! First, he tries to kill Morty.
And now he slaughters my sheep. You——"</p>
<p>The Master started to speak. But a white little
hand, in the darkness, was laid gently across his
mouth.</p>
<p>"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 a path with
the electric flashlights. "Well, I looked there just
now. He isn't under the piano. He—— He——"</p>
<p>"Lad!" called the Master; then at the top of his
lungs. "<i>Lad!</i>"</p>
<p>A distant growl, a snarl, a yelp, a scramble—and
presently Lad appeared in the farthest radius of
the flashlight flare.</p>
<p>For only a moment he stood there. Then he
wheeled about and vanished in the dark. Nor had
the Master the voice to call him back. The momentary
glimpse of the great collie, in the merciless
gleam of the lights, had stricken the whole party
into an instant's speechlessness.</p>
<p>Vividly distinct against the darkness they had
seen Lad. His well-groomed coat was rumpled.
His eyes were fire-balls. And—his jaws were red
with blood. Then he had vanished.</p>
<p>A groan from the Master—a groan of heartbreak<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</SPAN></span>—was
the first sound from the four. The dog he
loved was a killer.</p>
<p>"It isn't true! It isn't true!" stoutly declared
the Mistress.</p>
<p>The Wall Street Farmer and McGullicuddy had
already broken into a run. The shepherd had found
the tracks of many little hoofs on the dewy ground.
And he was following the trail. The guest, swearing
and panting, was behind him. The Mistress and
the Master brought up the rear.</p>
<p>At every step they peered fearfully around them
for what they dreaded to see—the mangled body of
some slain sheep. But they saw none. And they
followed the trail.</p>
<p>In a quarter mile they came to its end.</p>
<p>All four flashlights played simultaneously upon
a tiny hillock that rose from the meadow at the
forest edge. The hillock was usually green. Now
it was white.</p>
<p>Around its short slopes was huddled a flock of
sheep, as close-ringed as though by a fence. At
the hillock's summit sat Lad. He was sitting there
in a queer attitude, one of his snowy forepaws pinning
something to the ground—something that
could not be clearly distinguished through the
huddle but which, evidently, was no sheep.</p>
<p>The Wall Street Farmer broke the tense silence
with a gobbled exclamation.</p>
<p>"Whisht!" half reverently interrupted the shepherd,
who had been circling the hillock on census<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</SPAN></span>
duty. "There's na a sheep gone, nor—so far's I can
see—a sheep hurted. The fu' twenty is there."</p>
<p>The Master's flashlight found a gap through
which its rays could reach the hillock crest. The
light revealed, under Lad's gently pinioning forepaw,
the crouching and badly scared Melisande—the
$1100 Prussian sheep dog.</p>
<p>McGullicuddy, with a grunt, was off on another
and longer tour of inspection. Presently he came
back. He was breathing hard.</p>
<p>Even before McGillicuddy made his report the
Master had guessed at the main points of the mystery's
solution.</p>
<p>Melisande, weary of captivity, had gnawed
through her leash. Seeking sport, she had gone to
the paddock. There she had easily worried loose
the crazy gate latch. Just as she was wriggling
through, Lad appeared from the veranda.</p>
<p>He had tried to drive back the would-be killer
from her prey. Lad was a veteran of several battles.
But, apart from her sex, Melisande was no
opponent for him. And he had treated her accordingly.
Melisande had snapped at him, cutting him
deeply in the underjaw. During the scrimmage the
panic-urged sheep had bolted out of the paddock
and had scattered.</p>
<p>Remember, please, that Lad, ten hours earlier,
had never in his life seen a sheep. But remember,
too, that a million of his ancestors had won their
right to a livelihood by their almost supernatural<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</SPAN></span>
skill at herding flocks. Let this explain what
actually happened—the throwback of a great collie's
instinct.</p>
<p>Driving the scared and subdued Melisande before
him—and ever hampered by her unwelcome presence—Lad
proceeded to round up the scattered
sheep. He was in the midst of the process when
the Master called him. Merely galloping back for
an instant, and finding the summons was not repeated,
he returned to his atavistic task.</p>
<p>In less than five minutes the twenty scampering
runaways were "ringed" on the hillock. And, still
keeping the Prussian sheep dog out of mischief, Lad
established himself in the ring's center.</p>
<p>Further than that, and the keeping of the ring
intact, his primal instincts did not serve him. Having
rounded up his flock Lad had not the remotest
idea what to do with them. So he merely held
them there until the noisily gabbling humans
should decide to take the matter out of his care.</p>
<p>McGillicuddy examined every sheep separately
and found not a scratch or a stain on any of them.
Then he told in effect what has here been set down
as to Lad's exploit.</p>
<p>As he finished his recital McGillicuddy looked
shamefacedly around him as though gathering
courage for an irksome task. A sickly yellow
dawn was crawling over the eastern mountains,
throwing a ghostly glow on the shepherd's dour
and craggy visage. Drawing a long breath of re<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</SPAN></span>solve
he advanced upon Lad. Dropping on one
knee, his eyes on a level with the unconcernedly
observant collie's, McGillicuddy intoned:</p>
<p>"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'll tak'
an auld fule's apology for wrangin' ye, an' an auld
fule's hand in gude fellowship, 'twill pleasure me,
Laddie. Winna ye let bygones be bygones, an'
shake?"</p>
<p>Yes, the speech was ridiculous, but no one felt
like laughing, not even the Wall Street Farmer.
The shepherd was gravely sincere and he knew that
Lad would understand his burring words.</p>
<p>And Lad did understand. Solemnly he sat up.
Solemnly he laid one white forepaw in the gnarled
palm the kneeling shepherd outstretched to him.
His eyes glinted in wise friendliness as they met
the admiring gaze of the old man. Two born
shepherds were face to face. Deep was calling unto
deep.</p>
<p>Presently McGillicuddy broke the spell by rising
abruptly to his feet. Gruffly he turned to the
Master.</p>
<p>"There's na wit, sir," he growled, "in speirin'
will ye sell him. But—but I compliment ye on him,
nanetheless."</p>
<p>"That's right; McGillicuddy's right!" boomed
the Wall Street Farmer, catching but part of his
shepherd's mumbled words. "Good idea! He is a<span class="pagenum"><SPAN name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</SPAN></span>
fine dog. I see that now. I was prejudiced. I
freely admit it. A remarkable dog. What'll you
take for him? Or—better yet, how would you like
to swap, even, for Melisande?"</p>
<p>The Master's mouth again flew ajar, and many
sizzling words jostled each other in his throat.
Before any of these could shame his hospitality by
escaping, the Mistress hurriedly interposed:</p>
<p>"Dear, we left all the house doors wide open.
Would you mind hurrying back ahead of us and
seeing that everything is safe? And—will you take
Lad with you?"</p>
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