This is positively Chum's last appearance in print--for his own sake
no less than for yours. He is conceited enough as it is, but if once
he got to know that people are always writing about him in the papers
his swagger would be unbearable. However, I have said good-bye to
him now; I have no longer any rights in him. Yesterday I saw him off
to his new home, and when we meet again it will be on a different
footing. "Is that your dog?" I shall say to his master. "What is he? A
Cocker? Jolly little fellows, aren't they? I had one myself once."
As Chum refused to do the journey across London by himself, I met him
at Liverpool Street. He came up in a crate; the world must have seemed
very small to him on the way. "Hallo, old ass," I said to him through
the bars, and in the little space they gave him he wriggled his body
with delight. "Thank Heaven there's _one_ of 'em alive," he said.
"I think this is my dog," I said to the guard, and I told him my name.
He asked for my card.
"I'm afraid I haven't one with me," I explained. When policemen touch
me on the shoulder and ask me to go quietly; when I drag old gentlemen
from underneath motor-'buses, and they decide to adopt me on the spot;
on all the important occasions when one really wants a card, I never
have one with me.
"Can't give him up without proof of identity," said the guard, and
Chum grinned at the idea of being thought so valuable.
I felt in my pockets for letters. There was only one, but it offered
to lend me £10,000 on my note of hand alone. It was addressed to "Dear
Sir," and though I pointed out to the guard that I was the "Sir," he
still kept tight hold of Chum. Strange that one man should be prepared
to trust me with £10,000, and another should be so chary of confiding
to me a small black spaniel.
"Tell the gentleman who I am," I said imploringly through the bars.
"Show him you know me."
"He's _really_ all right," said Chum, looking at the guard with his
great honest brown eyes. "He's been with us for years."
And then I had an inspiration. I turned down the inside pocket of my
coat; and there, stitched into it, was the label of my tailor's with
my name written on it. I had often wondered why tailors did this;
obviously they know how stupid guards can be.
"I suppose that's all right," said the guard reluctantly. Of course I
might have stolen the coat. I see his point.
"You--you wouldn't like a nice packing case for yourself?" I said
timidly. "You see, I thought I'd put Chum on the lead. I've got to
take him to Paddington, and he must be tired of his shell by now. It
isn't as if he were _really_ an armadillo."
The guard thought he would like a shilling and a nice packing case.
Wood, he agreed, was always wood, particularly in winter, but there
were times when you were not ready for it.
"How are you taking him?" he asked, getting to work with a chisel.
"Underground?"
"Underground?" I cried in horror. "Take Chum on the Underground?
Take--Have you ever taken a large live conger-eel on the end of a
string into a crowded carriage?"
The guard never had.
"Well, don't. Take him in a taxi instead. Don't waste him on other
people."
The crate yawned slowly, and Chum emerged all over straw. We had an
anxious moment, but the two of us got him down and put the lead on
him. Then Chum and I went off for a taxi.
"Hooray," said Chum, wriggling all over, "isn't this splendid? I say,
which way are you going? I'm going this way?... No, I mean the other
way."
Somebody had left some of his milk-cans on the platform. Three times
we went round one in opposite directions and unwound ourselves the
wrong way. Then I hauled him in, took him struggling in my arms and
got into a cab.
The journey to Paddington was full of interest. For a whole minute
Chum stood quietly on the seat, rested his fore-paws on the open
window and drank in London. Then he jumped down and went mad. He tried
to hang me with the lead, and then in remorse tried to hang himself.
He made a dash for the little window at the back; missed it and
dived out of the window at the side; was hauled back and kissed me
ecstatically, in the eye with his sharpest tooth ... "And I thought
the world was at an end," he said, "and there were no more people.
Oh, I am an ass. I say, did you notice I'd had my hair cut? How do
you like my new trousers? I must show you them." He jumped on to my
lap. "No, I think you'll see them better on the ground," he said, and
jumped down again. "Or no, perhaps you _would_ get a better view if--"
he jumped up hastily, "and yet I don't know--" he dived down, "though
of course, if you--Oh lor! this _is_ a day," and he put both paws
lovingly on my collar.
Suddenly he was quiet again. The stillness, the absence of storm
in the taxi was so unnatural that I began to miss it. "Buck up, old
fool," I said, but he sat motionless by my side, plunged in thought. I
tried to cheer him up. I pointed out King's Cross to him; he wouldn't
even bark at it. I called his attention to the poster outside the
Euston Theatre of The Two Biffs; for all the regard he showed he might
never even have heard of them. The monumental masonry by Portland Road
failed to uplift him.
At Baker Street he woke up and grinned cheerily. "It's all right,"
he said, "I was trying to remember what happened to me this
morning--something rather-miserable, I thought, but I can't get hold
of it. However it's all right now. How are _you_?" And he went mad
again.
At Paddington I bought a label at the bookstall and wrote it for him.
He went round and round my leg looking for me. "Funny thing," he said
as he began to unwind, "he was here a moment ago. I'll just go round
once more. I rather think ... _Ow!_ Oh, there you are!" I stepped off
him, unravelled the lead and dragged him to the Parcels Office.
"I want to send this by the two o'clock train," I said to the man the
other side of the counter.
"Send what?" he said.
I looked down. Chum was making himself very small and black in the
shadow of the counter. He was completely hidden from the sight of
anybody the other side of it.
"Come out," I said, "and show yourself."
"Not much," he said. "A parcel! I'm not going to be a jolly old parcel
for anybody."
"It's only a way of speaking," I pleaded. "Actually you are travelling
as a small black gentleman. You will go with the guard--a delightful
man."
Chum came out reluctantly. The clerk leant over the counter and
managed to see him.
"According to our regulations," he said, and I always dislike people
who begin like that, "he has to be on a chain. A leather lead won't
do."
Chum smiled all over himself. I don't know which pleased him
more--the suggestion that he was a very large and fierce dog, or the
impossibility now of his travelling with the guard, delightful man
though he might be. He gave himself a shake and started for the door.
"Tut, tut, it's a great disappointment to me," he said, trying to
look disappointed, but his back _would_ wriggle. "This chain
business--silly of us not
* * * * *
[Illustration: THE BLACK MAN'S BURDEN.