ADVENTURES OF A BULL PUP
Trevor smuggled the puppy into his room undetected, against Dick’s
advice.
“If Faculty finds it out you’ll not only lose the animal, but get into
trouble. And they’re bound to learn of it before long. Why, the ‘goody’
will see the thing when she makes the beds.”
“No, she won’t; I’ll find a way to fix that,” answered Trevor
confidently.
“But how’ll you keep him alive?” asked Dick. “The poor little thing has
got to eat.”
“Oh, I can bring him something from dining-hall.”
Dick shrugged his shoulders and gave up the argument. And having
relieved his conscience by his protest, joined his roommate in teaching
the puppy to sit on his hind legs and hold a piece of cracker on
his nose: a feat which the animal could not for a long time see the
philosophy of. When, however, he discovered that obedience invariably
gave him possession of the fragment of biscuit to crumble to his
heart’s content over the hearth-rug, he began to understand the game,
and to even show a certain pleasure in it. After the work in the
gymnasium that afternoon Trevor and Dick walked to the village and the
former purchased--I regret to say on credit, thereby infringing one of
the rules--a red leather collar and a steel chain. When Trevor left
the dining-hall after supper his coat pockets bulged suspiciously, and
later the puppy feasted regally on cold roast beef and graham bread,
while the two boys watched every mouthful with delight. When bedtime
came Trevor arranged a pair of old tennis trousers by the hearth, and
placing the puppy thereon, assured him sternly that he was expected to
remain there quietly until morning.
Perhaps Trevor’s commands were not altogether clear. That as may be,
he had no sooner put out the light and snuggled himself into bed
than there arose a sound of grief and dismay in the study, followed
presently by tiny footfalls on the bedroom floor.
“Lie down!” commanded Trevor sternly.
The whining ceased for a minute, and a tail thumped the floor
delightedly. And then, as no further recognition seemed forthcoming,
the whining began again in increased volume and with added pathos.
“Puppy, go lie down,” whispered Trevor, more mildly this time. Dick was
laughing silently beyond in the darkness. The puppy again thumped the
floor with his tail.
“Perhaps he’s cold,” suggested Dick.
“The poor little fellow wants to get up on the bed, I fancy,” answered
Trevor. “I’ll spread my dressing-gown for him at the foot.” This was
done, and the disturbing element was hauled to the bed by the nape
of his neck. But stay on the dressing-gown he would not, and Trevor
finally fell asleep with the small, warm bundle of dog lying against
his breast, and a tiny, bullet-shaped head resting peacefully on his
neck.
The real troubles began next morning. When the two boys started for
breakfast they locked the door carefully, and had reached the stairs,
when, faint but unmistakable as to character, came a long howl of
grief. Fearfully, Trevor hurried back. The puppy was sitting erect
and tragic just inside the door. His delight at Trevor’s return was,
however, short-lived, for he was ignominiously shut in the closet, and
Trevor, with the key in his pocket, again set forth. But he could find
little enjoyment in breakfast, for all the while he was haunted by the
fear that the “goody” would get into the room before he could return,
hear the dog’s howls, and report the matter to Professor Tomkins,
the resident instructor. He hurried back to Masters with his meal
but half eaten, and breathed a sigh of relief when he found the beds
still unmade and the room still untidied. From the closet came eager,
questioning sniffs and whines of impatience. Trevor opened the door,
tossed in a mutton chop, and quickly secured it again. And then the
study door opened and the “goody” entered.
“Good-morning, Mr. Nesbitt.”
“Good-morning, Mrs. Pratt.”
Trevor seized a Latin book, subsided into a chair by the closet
and tried to read. From behind the locked door came sounds of busy
gnawings; once a diminutive growl was audible. But the “goody” was
in the other room and so all was safe. Trevor discovered that he was
holding the book upside down; he corrected the mistake and wondered why
it was that the beds took so long to make this morning of all others.
They were finally completed, however, and the crucial moment arrived.
Armed with dust-cloth, the woman came out and slowly began to move
about the study. Suddenly from behind the locked door came two distinct
taps; it was only the puppy worrying the mutton bone, but the “goody”
didn’t know that, and looked in alarm toward the closet.
“What was that?” she asked.
“What was what?” asked Trevor.
“That sound; them sounds--in there?”
“Pshaw, you’re dreaming; there--there’s no one in----”
Something bumped softly against the door; the woman glanced suspiciously
from Trevor to the closet. Trevor looked carelessly out the window and
began to whistle. A low whine issued from the prison. Trevor heard it,
but apparently the “goody” didn’t; he whistled louder. The whining
increased. Trevor began to sing.
Then began a most appalling series of bumps, growls, knocks, whines,
jars, gnawings, and similar disturbing noises from the closet. With
loudly thumping heart Trevor sang on, rapidly, loudly, unceasingly. The
woman turned and viewed him in astonishment not unmixed with alarm.
Trevor’s singing was more creditable from the point of vigor and
whole-souledness than on the score of harmony or rhythm. His notes were
nearly all flats, which, with the fact that he never for an instant
varied the time, made even the most joyous of ballads lugubrious when
performed by him. He had finished In the Gloaming, Way down upon
the Suwanee River, and Rule, Britannia, and was now breathlessly,
heroically thundering forth Hilltonians in tones that could be, and
probably were, heard in the next dormitory:
“Hilltonians, Hilltonians, your crimson banner fling”
(Bang! Bump! Gr-r-r-r!)
“Unto the breeze, and ’neath its folds your anthem loudly sing!”
(Whack! Bang! Bump!)
“Hilltonians, Hilltonians, our loyalty we’ll prove
Beneath the flag, the crimson flag, the bonny flag we love!”
(Gr-r-r-r! Ao-o-oow! Ao-o-o-ow! Bang!)
And then, with her hands over her ears and her dust-cloth trailing in
defeat, the “goody” fled from the room, and the day was won! Trevor
sank back exhausted. From the closet the strange sounds continued to
issue. He sat up and stared fearfully at the closed door. What, he
asked himself with sinking heart, what could they mean? He drew forth
the key, crossed the room, unlocked the door, threw it open, and--
Out tumbled the puppy and--and--could it be? It could; it was!--one of
Dick’s immaculate patent-leather pumps, torn and chewed into as sorry a
looking object as he had ever seen!
At sight of Trevor the puppy dropped his prize, put his small head on
one side, wagged his tail proudly, and gazed up at his master as though
asking “How’s that for a good job well done?”
Trevor peered into the closet and groaned. The floor was a mass of
_débris_; shoes and garments from the hooks were writhed together
madly; and everywhere was set the puppy’s mark of approval. Trevor
gathered up the garments and returned them to their hooks. A cold,
blunt nose thrust itself into the way. Trevor’s hand rose and fell
smartly twice, and with a yelp the puppy retreated to the hearth-rug,
where he turned and barked defiance.
Trevor observed him wrathfully for an instant, but his attitude
of insulted dignity and his ferocious challenge to combat were so
ludicrous that the boy subsided amid the wreckage and laughed until
the tears came. And the puppy, bounding joyfully upon him, instantly
forgiving, gurgled his pleasure and licked his hands, shoes, and face
with whole-souled impartiality.
And upon this scene entered Dick!
Let us draw the curtain.
That night, long after Dick had dropped off to slumber, he was awakened
by Trevor’s urgent voice.
“Dick! Dick! Wake up!”
“Wha-what’s the matter?” cried Dick, starting suddenly from sleep, and
sitting up in bed with confused visions of fire and flood.
“I’ve found a name for him,” answered Trevor triumphantly.
“Name? What name? Who’s name?”
“The puppy’s. I’m going to call him Muggins!”
Dick snorted wrathfully and went back to sleep.
Trevor fondled the slumberous puppy. “Isn’t he an unfeeling brute,
Muggins?” he whispered. And Muggins thumped his tail affirmatively,
sleepily.
The following night, when all was silent in the dormitory, a form
bundled against the weather in a greatcoat, and followed by a second
form, vastly smaller in outline and wearing only the coat that nature
had provided him with, might have been seen--but were not--tiptoeing
from study No. 16 and descending the creaking stairs. The door was
locked, but the key was there, and in a moment the two forms had
vanished into outer darkness and the portal had closed again.
As the discerning reader has no doubt already surmised, the mysterious
forms were those of Trevor and Muggins.
Trevor had concluded that Muggins’s health demanded more exercise
than his puppyship was getting, and so on the preceding night and
again to-night Muggins, at the end of the steel chain, had been
surreptitiously conveyed from the building for a stroll about the yard.
It was bitterly cold and Trevor shivered as he ambled slowly toward
the gymnasium followed by the dog; but since Muggins’s health demanded
exercise Muggins should have it, though the thermometer stood at miles
below zero, which luckily it didn’t to-night. Around the gymnasium
plodded Trevor, slipping, sliding on the icy walks; around trotted
Muggins, sniffing, shivering in the nipping wind. Then down the path by
Bradley to Turner, around the corner of Turner, and----
Alas, tragedy was in the air that night!
Trevor paused, listening. Footsteps sounded loudly, frostily at a
little distance, and in the darkness a dim form loomed up from the
direction of the gate. It was but the work of an instant to slink into
the recess of the building made by the protruding entrance, and to pull
Muggins after him. The footsteps drew nearer. One of the professors
returning late from the village, Trevor told himself. The form came
abreast of him, a scant two yards distant, and was almost past his
hiding-place when Muggins awoke to the demands of the occasion.
Muggins, despite his tender age, was valor to the tip of his wagging
tail. He heard strange footsteps; he saw a strange form; he feared
an attack on his master. But, what ho! was not he, Muggins, there?
Certainly! And--
Away went the chain from Trevor’s numbed fingers; away went Muggins,
dashing to the fray like a knight of old!
“_Bow! Bow-wow!_” challenged Muggins.
Trevor heard an ejaculation of alarmed surprise, saw the form of the
tall professor jump back, and then--then there was a crash, and Trevor,
seizing the opportunity, was off like the wind, and had gained the
doorway of Masters Hall ere the astonished professor had regained his
feet. For Muggins in his excess of valor had got his small body between
his adversary’s legs, and great and sudden was the fall. Trevor waited
long at the entrance of Masters Hall, standing with door ajar and
peering anxiously into the darkness; once even venturing upon a subdued
whistle and a yearning “Muggins, Muggins!” But his appeals were vain,
and after a while he crept dejectedly upstairs and back into his cold
and Muggins-less bed, wondering, sorrowful, fearful of the morrow.