"Oh, I can't stand this," said Tom, jumping up, and hurriedly beginning
to dress, after throwing open his window to see the east gradually
turning red, and the clouds far up tinged and necked with orange.
Then there was another low, piteous howling.
"Lie down, you brute!" he shouted out of the window, to be answered by a
quick, yelping bark.
"Perhaps Pete is not about, and the dog really is starving," thought
Tom; and he finished dressing as another howl broke out, more piteous
and mournful than ever.
"Will you be quiet!" he shouted from the window. "Lie down, and I'll
bring you a bone, you ugly, rat-tailed, low-bred dog-ruffian."
He was interrupted by a joyous, yelping bark.
"That dog does want to be friends with me, but I can't have him here,"
thought Tom, who now opened his door as quietly as he could, but it gave
a loud creak, so did one of the boards, as he walked towards the
staircase.
"That you, Tom?" came from his uncle's room.
"Yes, uncle."
"There's a dog making a miserable noise. Try and drive it away."
"Just going to, uncle," said Tom. Then to himself, as he went
down-stairs--"Driving's no good, or old Dave would have got rid of him
yesterday. I shall have to try him with a bone."
He laughed to himself as he made his way into the larder, wondering what
Mrs Fidler would say if she could see him; and after looking beneath
two or three wire covers, he pounced upon a bladebone of a shoulder of
mutton, pretty literally a bone, and bore it away, taking his cap and
going out into the garden, getting to the side gate in the lane, and
passing out just as the sun rose above the horizon.
"Here, hi! ugly!" he cried, breaking into the midst of a howl; and the
dog came bounding toward him with its yelping bark. "There; it's very
stupid of me, but just you take that and be off into the woods, and if
you come here again look out for squalls."
The dog made a fierce snap at the bone, upon which its sharp teeth
clapped, and then with a growl bounded off, but stopped and came back,
dropped the bone in the sand, looked up at Tom, and threw up its head to
howl again.
"Why, halloo! what's the matter then?" cried Tom, holding out his hand;
"got another adder-bite in the nose?"
"Ow--ow!" moaned the dog, pressing its head up against the hand. Then
it started away, barked sharply, turned, and looked at Tom.
"Here, let's have a look," he cried; and the dog uttered an eager bark.
"Come here."
The dog ran to him directly, and after a momentary hesitation Tom took
hold of its head, and held up its muzzle without the slightest
resistance being offered.
"Well, we seem to have got to be pretty good friends," said Tom, as he
looked carefully, and then let go; "but I don't see anything wrong.
Besides, it isn't swollen."
The dog barked loudly now, and started away for a few yards.
"Here, here! Don't leave your sandy bone," cried Tom, and the dog ran
back. "Here, catch hold."
Then there was a snap made at the tempting morsel, but it was dropped
again directly, for the poor brute to throw up its muzzle and give forth
another piteous howl.
"Oh, I say, don't do that," cried Tom; and this was responded to by a
burst of barking.
"Why, what's the matter with you? Mouth sore? Toothache?"
There was another burst of barking, and the dog ran on a few yards, and
looked back to bark again.
"I don't understand your language, old chap," cried Tom. "What do you
want? Found a rabbit round here?"
Another eager bark, and the dog pricked up its ears, and looked more and
more excited.
"All right, come and pick this up then. It's too good to leave."
The dog rushed at the bone as Tom turned it over with his foot, seized
it, and ran on again, dropped it, and barked. Then, as the boy
advanced, it seized the bone and ran on farther, to go through the same
performance.
"Very well, I'll come," cried Tom. "Bound to say he has found an adder
somewhere, and wants me to kill it, though I should hardly think there
are any about now," and he set off at a trot after the dog, whose whole
manner changed at this, for it went bounding off along the road,
stopping every now and then to drop the bone and bark excitedly; twice
over it left the meat and ran on, but at a word it came back, picked it
up, and went on as before, with tail and ears erect, looking as full of
business as could be.
"Isn't this very stupid?" muttered Tom; "me running after this
miserable-looking brute. He's going to change masters, and wants me to
go hunting with him--that's what it is. Pete has knocked him about once
too often. Wonder what uncle would say if I took such an object back.
And old David!"
He laughed heartily as he pictured the gardener's disgust, but somehow
he could not help feeling satisfied by the dog's show of affection.
At this point he stopped, for they had gone some distance along beside
the fir-wood, and to try how the animal would behave, he called it.
The bone was dropped, and the animal rushed back to him barking
excitedly, allowing itself to be patted, and then jumping up and butting
its head against him in a way more eager than pleasant.
"Well, isn't that enough?" cried Tom, giving the dog a few friendly
pats, which made it dart on again barking.
"Here! hi! The bone!" and the dog dashed back, picked it up, and bolted
steadily on again, till at about a mile from Heatherleigh it stopped by
an opening into the wood, bounded up the sandy bank, and stood there
barking as it looked back.
"Look here," cried Tom, as he came up, and talking to the dog as if it
understood him. "No treachery, old chap; Pete hasn't sent you, has he,
to lure me into the wood for another fight? Because if that's it I'm
going back. I don't want to knock myself about again--or be knocked,"
he added merrily.
There was a volley of barks here, and the dog was going to plunge into
the depths of the fir-wood without the dropped bone, but a word checked
it, and it picked up its mouthful and went on, while Tom hesitated at
the edge.
"I'm not going any farther," he muttered. "What's the good?" but the
dog was back, looking wilder and more excited than ever. "All right! go
on then; I'm after you," he cried. "It will be a grand run before
breakfast, and there's plenty of time."
From this moment, as Tom trotted quickly over the fir-needles at the
dog's heels, the poor brute went steadily on, uttering a low, muffled
bark every now and then as it threaded its way in and out among the
fir-trees as if bound for some particular spot.
This began to impress Tom now, and he wondered why his companion did not
begin to hunt about; then this wonder increased as first one and then
another rabbit was put up, to dart away, eliciting low growls from the
dog, but that was all. It showed not the slightest disposition to dash
after them.
"Can dogs think?" said Tom to himself, with a new interest now in his
pursuit. "He must mean something. Is it an adder? I'll be bound to
say he is going right away to that open place where he was stung, to
show me the dead viper that he has killed."
The farther they went on, the more convinced Tom felt that this was the
case, for they were going right in the direction, and making good
progress too, the dog never stopping for a moment, but just swinging its
ugly head round to see if it was followed before settling to its steady
trot once more.
This went on for quite half-an-hour, and Tom was pretty well breathless
as he stopped to have a bit of rest, while the dog halted, dropped its
bone, turned up its head, and howled again dismally.
"I can't help it, old chap," cried Tom; "I haven't got four legs to run
with; I must walk now."
As the dog saw him advance it barked joyously again, and trotted on once
more, but more slowly as it found that it was not followed so swiftly.
Then all at once a fresh idea flashed through Tom's brain, and he fell
a-wondering whether he could be right. He had never been across the
wood this way before, but it was undoubtedly in the direction of Pete's
lurking-place under the great pine-tree, and it seemed possible that the
dog was making for there.
But why? For what reason?
Tom felt uneasy, and involuntarily, in spite of a slight sensation of
shrinking, began to trot once more, while the dog seemed to gladly
increase its pace after a look back.
"It must be," thought Tom; "he is leading me straight to the sandy cave.
What for?"
An undefined sensation of uneasiness began to increase upon him. He was
getting hot with exercise, but his blood was quite cool. Imagination
had not stirred him; he had had no breakfast; and if a fight was before
him, he felt most decidedly that he would rather not. In this spirit
then he kept on telling himself that he might as well turn back now, but
all the same he kept trotting on after the dog, putting off the return
till he had gone a little farther and a little farther, and always
keeping on, till all at once it seemed to be a little lighter on ahead,
and he strained his eyes in the full expectation of seeing Pete Warboys
waiting for him.
"And if he is," he half thought, half muttered, "as sure as I live I'll
get David to help me, and we'll trap and half kill this treacherous
brute."
Another hundred yards, and he was looking wonderingly about him, for the
place was strange. He had never been there before.
Then he grasped the meaning of the strangeness. The storm had evidently
come down here with terrific force, making a path through the
pine-forest, some of whose trees were laid like wheat after a heavy
wind; while just in front one huge tree had been blown right over, and
in falling had crushed down a dozen or more in the path of its fall,
letting in light, and strewing the soft earth with broken limbs, and
trunks lying like jack-straws on the ground.
"That's why he has brought me," said Tom, half aloud. "Halloo, where is
he? Here! here! old boy, here!"
He was answered by a furious barking, and the dog sprang up into sight
on the trunk of the big tree close up to its roots, barking furiously at
him, and then turning and leaping down out of sight; while Tom felt as
if all of a sudden his blood had begun to turn cold, and his legs
beneath him had grown weak.
For a horrible thought had suddenly flashed across his mind, like a
meteor over the field of the great telescope. He knew now the dumb
language of the dog, and why it had fetched him; and as if to endorse
his thought, there came from about a dozen yards away so wild and
blood-curdling a yell, that for the moment he could not believe it to be
the dog, but that it came from some one in mortal peril.