Produced by Bill Tozier, Barbara Tozier, Ed Casulli and
the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
https://www.pgdp.net
[Illustration: Frontispiece]
JAN
A DOG AND A ROMANCE
BY
A.J. DAWSON
NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS
Published by Arrangement with Harper & Brothers
JAN: A DOG AND A ROMANCE
Copyright, 1915, by Harper & Brothers
Printed in the United States of America
Published October, 1915
_CONTENTS_
I. HOW FINN CAME HOME
II. NUTHILL AND SHAWS
III. INTRODUCING THE LADY DESDEMONA
IV. THE OPEN-AIR CALL
V. DESDEMONA'S WANDERINGS
VI. HOW DESDEMONA FOUND HER NEST
VII. DESDEMONA FORGETS HER MANNERS
VIII. FINN IS ENLIGHTENED
IX. THE LONE MOTHER
X. FAMILY LIFE--AND DEATH
XI. JAN GOES TO NUTHILL
XII. SOME FIRST STEPS
XIII. SAPLING DAYS
XIV. WITH REFERENCE TO DICK VAUGHAN
XV. JAN'S FIRST FIGHT
XVI. GOOD-BY TO DICK
XVII. JAN BEFORE THE JUDGES
XVIII. FIT AS A TWO-YEAR-OLD
XIX. DISCIPLINE
XX. SUSSEX TO SASKATCHEWAN
XXI. INTRODUCING SOURDOUGH
XXII. MURDER!
XXIII. THE FIGHT ON THE PRAIRIE
XXIV. PROMOTION
XXV. JAN GOES ON HIS TRAVELS
XXVI. THE RULE OF TRACE AND THONG
XXVII. MUTINY IN THE TEAM
XXVIII. THE FEAST AND THE FASTER
XXIX. THE FIGHT IN THE WOODS
XXX. REAL LEADERSHIP
XXXI. THE COST OF INCOMPETENCE
XXXII. JAN OBEYS ORDERS AT THE GREAT DIVIDE
XXXIII. BACK TO THE TRAIL
XXXIV. THE PEACE RIVER TRAIL
XXXV. THE END OF JAN'S LONE TRAIL
XXXVI. "SO LONG, JAN!"
XXXVII. BACK TO REGINA
XXXVIII. THE FALL OF SOURDOUGH
XXXIX. HOW JAN CAME HOME
_JAN_
I
HOW FINN CAME HOME
Rightly to appreciate Jan's character and parts you must understand
his origin. For this you must go back to the greatest of modern Irish
wolfhounds, Finn; and to the Lady Desdemona, of whom it was said, by
no less an authority than Major Carthwaite, that she was "the most
perfectly typical bloodhound of her decade." And that was in the
fifteenth month of her age, just six weeks before Finn's arrival at
Nuthill.
When the Master was preparing to leave Australia with Finn he said,
"It's 'Sussex by the sea' for us, Finn, boy, in another month or so;
and, God willing, that's where you shall end your days."
Just fourteen weeks after making that remark (and, too, after a deal
more of land and sea travel for Finn than comes into the whole lives
of most hounds) the Master bought Nuthill, the little estate on the
lee of the most beautiful of the South Downs from the upper part of
which one sees quite easily on a clear day the red chimneys and white
gables of the cottage in which Finn was born. But at the time of that
important purchase Finn was lying perdu in quarantine, down in
Devonshire; a melancholy period for the wolfhound, that. The Master
spent many shipboard hours in discussing this very matter with the
Mistress of the Kennels on their passage home from Australia, and he
tried hard to find a way out of the difficulty, for Finn's sake. But
there it was. You cannot hope to smuggle ashore, even in the most
fashionably capacious of lady's muffs, a hound standing thirty-six
inches high at the shoulder and weighing nearer two hundred than one
hundred pounds. It was a case of quarantine or perpetual exile, and so
Finn went into quarantine. But, as you may guess, there were pretty
careful arrangements made for his welfare.
The wolfhound had special quarters of his own in quarantine, and his
enforced stay there had just this advantage about it, that when the
great day of his release arrived there was no more travel and hotel life
to be suffered, for by this time the Master was thoroughly settled down
at Nuthill, the Mistress of the Kennels had made that snug place a real
home, and her niece, Betty Murdoch, was already an established member of
the household. So Finn went straight from quarantine at Plymouth to the
best home he had ever known, and to one in which his honored place was
absolutely assured to him.
But it must not be supposed that, because of his much-honored place in
the Master's world, Finn had entirely put behind him and forgotten his
strange life among the wild kindred in Australia. That could hardly be.
The savor of that life would remain for ever in his nostrils, no matter
how ordered and humanized his days at Nuthill; just as consciousness of
human cruelty and the torture of imprisonment had been burned into his
memory and nature, indelibly as though branded there by the hot irons of
the circus folk in New South Wales. Finn adapted himself perfectly to
the life of the household at Nuthill, and with ease. Had he not a
thousand years of royal breeding in his veins? But he never forgot the
wild. He never forgot his days of circus imprisonment as a wild beast.
He never for one instant reverted to the gaily credulous attitude toward
mankind which had helped the dog-stealers to kidnap him after the first
great triumph of his youth, when he defeated all comers, from puppy and
novice to full-fledged champion, and carried off the blue riband of his
year at the Crystal Palace. Well-mannered he would always be; but in
these later days his attitude toward all humans, and most animal folk
outside his own household, was characterized by a gravely alert and
watchful kind of reserve. As the Master once said, in talking on his
homeward way to England of that dog-stealing episode of the wolfhound's
salad days:
"It would take a tough and wily old thief to tempt Finn across a
garden-path nowadays, with the best doctored meat ever prepared. And as
for really getting away with him--well, they're welcome to try; and I
fancy they'd get pretty well all they deserve from old Finn, without the
law's assistance."
Betty Murdoch--round-figured, rosy, high-spirited, a great lover of out
of doors, and aged now twenty-two--had been much exercised in her mind
as to what Finn would think of her, when he arrived at Nuthill, after
the long railway journey from Plymouth. She had seen the wolfhound only
once before, when she was somewhat less grown-up and he was still in
puppyhood, before the visit to Australia. The Master, who went specially
to Plymouth to fetch Finn, said Betty must expect a certain reserve at
first in the wolfhound's attitude.
"He can't possibly remember you, of course, and, nowadays, he is not
effusive, not very ready to make new friends."
The Mistress of the Kennels, on the other hand--she still was spoken of
as "the Mistress," though at Nuthill there never were any
kennels--insisted that Finn would know perfectly well that Betty was one
of the family; as, of course, he did. Apart from her physical
resemblance to her aunt, Betty had very many of the Mistress's little
ways, and especially of her ways in dealings with and thinking of animal
folk.
Finn's heart had swelled almost to bursting when the Master came to him
in the quarantine station at Plymouth, for, to tell the truth, he never
had been able to make head or tail of being left alone in this place,
though the Master had tried hard to explain. But he had been well
treated there, and was certain the Master would eventually return to
him. Yet, when the moment came, there was a sudden overwhelming swelling
of his heart which made Finn gasp. He almost staggered as the Master
greeted him. The emotion of gladness hurt him, and his dark eyes were
flooded.
After that there were no further surprises for Finn. Once he had felt
the Master's hand burrowing in the wiry gray hair of his neck, Finn knew
well that they were homeward bound, that the unaccountable period of
separation was over, and that he would very presently see the Mistress
of the Kennels; as in fact he did, that very night, at Nuthill by the
Downs. And Betty--well, it was perfectly clear to Finn that she was
somehow part and parcel with the Mistress; and whilst never now effusive
to any one, he made it clear at once that he accepted Betty as one of
his own little circle of human folk, to be loved and trusted, and never
suspected. In the evening the great hound lay extended on the hearthrug
of the square, oak-paneled hall at Nuthill. (He occupied a good six feet
of rug.) Betty stepped across his shoulders once, to reach matches from
the mantel; and Finn never blinked or moved a hair, save that the tip of
his long tail just languidly rose twice, ever so gently slapping the
rug. The Master, who was watching, laughed at this.
"You may account yourself an honored friend already, Betty," he said.
"I'll guarantee no other living soul, except the Mistress or I, could
step over old Finn like that without his moving. In these days he
doesn't unguard to that extent with any one else."
"Ah, well," laughed Betty; "even less wise dogs than Finn know who loves
them--don't they, old man?"
Finn blinked a friendly response as she rubbed his ears. But as yet it
was not that. Finn had given no thought to Betty's loving him; but he
had realized that she was kin to the Mistress and the Master, and
therefore, for him, in a category apart from all other folk, animal or
human; a person to be trusted absolutely, even by a hound of his unique
experience.
II
NUTHILL AND SHAWS
In a recess beside the hearth in the hall at Nuthill Finn found an oaken
platform, or bench, five feet long by two and a half feet wide. It stood
perhaps fifteen inches from the floor, on four stout legs, and its two
ends and back had sides eight inches high. The front was open, and the
bench itself was covered by a 'possum-skin rug.
"This, my friend, is your own bed," said the Master, when he showed the
bench to Finn, after all the household had retired that night. "You've
slept hard, old chap, and you've lived hard, in your time; but when you
want it, there will always be comfort for you here. But you're free, old
chap. You can go wherever you like; still, I'd like you to try this.
See! Up, lad!"
Finn sniffed long and interestedly at the 'possum-rug which had often
covered the Mistress's feet on board ship and elsewhere. Then he stepped
on to the bed and lowered his great bulk gracefully upon it.
"How's that?" asked the Master. And Finn thrust his muzzle gratefully
into the hand he loved. The bed was superlatively good, as a matter of
fact. But when, in the quite early morning hours, the Master opened his
bedroom door, bound for the bath, he found Finn dozing restfully on the
doormat.
So that was the end of the hall bed as a hall bed. That night Finn
found it beside the Master's bedroom door; and there in future he
slept of a night, when indoors at all. But he was allowed perfect
freedom, and there were summer nights he spent in the outer porch and
farther afield than that, including the queer little Sussex slab-paved
courtyard outside the kitchen door, where he spent the better part of
one night on guard over a smelly tramp who, in a moment unlucky for
himself, had decided to try his soft and clumsy hand at burglary. The
gardener found the poor wretch in the morning aching with cramp and
bailed up in a dampish corner by the dust-bin, by a wolfhound who kept
just half an inch of white fang exposed, and responded with a truly
awe-inspiring throaty snarl to the slightest hint of movement on the
tramp's part.
"Six hours 'e's kep' me there, an', bli'me, I'd sooner do six months
quod," the weary tramp explained, when the Master had been roused and
Finn called off.
On the morning of his third day at Nuthill it was that Finn first met
the Lady Desdemona. And it happened in this wise: Colonel Forde, of
Shaws, which, as you may know, lies just across the green shoulder of
Down from Nuthill--its fault is that the house is reached only by the
westering sun, while Nuthill's windows catch the first morning rays on
one side and hold some of any sunshine there may be the day
through--wrote, saying that he had heard of Finn's arrival, and would
the Master come across to luncheon with the Mistress and Miss Murdoch,
and bring the wolfhound.
"I hope you will have a look through my kennels with me in the
afternoon," added the Colonel; and that was the kind of invitation
seldom refused by the Master.
It is, of course, a good many years now since the Shaws kennels first
earned the respect of discerning breeders and lovers of bloodhounds. But
to this day there is one kind of doggy man (and woman) who smiles a
shade disdainfully when Colonel Forde's name is mentioned.
"Very much the amateur," they say. And--"A bit too much of a
sentimentalist to be taken seriously," some knowing fellow in a kennel
coat of the latest style will tell you. Perhaps they do not quite know
what they mean. Or perhaps they are influenced by the known fact that
the Colonel has more than once closed his kennel doors to a long
string of safe prizes by refusing to exhibit a second time some hound
who, on a first showing, has won golden opinions and high awards. But
these refusals were never whimsical. They were due always to the
Colonel's decision, based upon close and sympathetic observation,
that, for the particular hound in question, exhibition represented a
painful ordeal.
Among the breeders who at one time or another have visited the Shaws
kennels are a few of the knowing fellows who smile at mention of the
Colonel's name. Well, let them smile. It is perhaps as well for them
that the Colonel is pretty tolerably indifferent alike to their smiles
and to the awards of show judges; for, if Colonel Forde were seriously
bent upon "pot-hunting," there would not be anything like so many "pots"
about for other people; and these particular gentry would not at all
like that.
"Kennels!" said one of them at a dog-show in Brighton, "why, it's more
like a kindergarten. There's a sitting-room, a kind of drawing-room, if
you'll believe me, in the middle of the kennels, for tea-parties! And as
for the dogs, well, they just do whatever they like. As often as not the
kennels are empty, except for pups, and the hounds all over the garden
and house--a regular kindergarten."
It will be seen then that the Colonel must clearly have merited the
disdainful smiles. But I am bound to say I never heard of any one
being bitten or frightened by a dog at Shaws, and it is notorious
that, difficult though bloodhound whelps are to rear, the Colonel
rarely loses one in a litter. Still, "kindergarten" is certainly a
withering epithet in this connection; and one can perfectly understand
the professional's attitude. A sitting-room, nay, worse--"A kind of
drawing-room," in the midst of the kennels! Why, it almost suggests
that, forgetful of prize-winning, advertising, and selling, the
Colonel must positively have enjoyed the mere pleasure of spending a
leisure hour among his dogs; not at a show or in the public eye, but
in the privacy of his own home! Glaring evidence of amateurishness,
this. The knowing ones, as usual, were perfectly correct. That is
precisely what the Colonel was; a genuine amateur of hounds.
III
INTRODUCING THE LADY DESDEMONA
April was uniformly dull and wet that year, but May seemed to bring full
summer in her train; and it was on the morning of the third of May that
Finn went to Shaws with the Nuthill house party.
The turf of the Downs was so springy on this morning that one felt
uplifted by it in walking. Each separate blade of the clover-scented
carpet seemed surcharged with young life. The downland air was as a
tonic wine to every creature that breathed it. The joy of the day was
voiced in the liquid trilling of two larks that sang far overhead. The
place and time gave to the Nuthill party England at her best and
sweetest, than which, as the Master often said, the world has nothing
more lovely to offer; and he was one who had fared far and wide in other
lands.
There is the tiny walled inclosure above the stables at Shaws, once used
as a milking-yard, and just now a veritable posy of daisies, buttercups,
rich green grass, and apple-blossom. For in it there are six or seven
gnarled and lichen-grown old apple-trees, whose fruit is of small
account, but whose bloom is a gift sent straight from heaven to gladden
the hearts of men and beasts, birds and bees. The big double doors in
the ivy-grown flint wall of this inclosure stood wide open. Humming bees
sailed booming to and fro, like ships in a tropical trade-wind. And
through the lattice-work of the gray old apple-trees' branches (so
virginally clothed just now) clean English sunshine dappled all the
earth and grass in moving checkers of light and shade.
When the Nuthill party looked in through the gates of this delectable
pleasaunce they beheld in its midst the Lady Desdemona, gazing solemnly
down her long nose at the moving checkers of sunlight on the grass. Her
head was held low--the true bloodhound poise--and that position
exaggerated the remarkable wealth of velvety "wrinkle" with which her
forehead had been endowed by nature, after the selective breeding of
centuries. Low hung her golden dewlap over the grass at her feet; and
all across the satin blackness of her saddle intricately woven little
patterns of sunlight flicked back and forth as the breeze stirred the
branches overhead.
"There's all the wisdom and philosophy of the ancients in her face,"
said the Master, as the beautiful young bloodhound bitch winded them and
raised her head.
As a fact, her thought had been far from abstruse. She was merely
watching the moving patches of sunlight, and not reflecting upon it as
humans do, but feeling the joyousness and beauty of that time and place.
She gave no thought to these matters, but was, as it were, inhaling
them, and enjoying them profoundly; more profoundly than most men-folk
would.
Finn eyed her gravely, appraisingly, yet also without thought. He, too,
had been unreflectingly absorbing the beauty of the morning; and now his
enjoyment became suddenly narrowed down and concentrated. The rest of
the world dropped out of the picture, or rather it became merged for
Finn in the picture he beheld of the Lady Desdemona; a study in tawny
orange-gold and jetty black, gleaming where the sun touched her and
embodying the quintessence of canine health, youth, and high-breeding.
So the world stood still for a moment while all concerned felt, without
thought, how good it was. Then her youth and sex spoke in the
bloodhound, and Lady Desdemona, head and stern uplifted now, came
passaging gaily, proudly forward down the grassy slope to the gateway,
entirely ignoring the human people, as was natural, and making direct
for Finn, the tallest, most stately representative of her own kind she
had ever seen. The Master stepped aside, with a smile, the better to
watch the meeting of the hounds. It was worth watching. Till they met,
the movement, the provocativeness was all on Lady Desdemona's side, Finn
standing erect and still as graven bronze. Then they met, and at a given
signal the tactics of each were sharply reversed. The signal consisted
of a little flicking contact, light as thistle-down. As Desdemona
curveted down past Finn the tip of her gaily-waving tail was allowed
once to glance over the Irish wolfhound's wiry coat; the merest
suggestion of a touch. But it seemed this was a magic signal, converting
the dancing Desdemona into a graven image and transforming the
statuesque Finn into a hound of abounding and commanding activity.
They made quite a notable picture. The Lady Desdemona stood now, tense,
rigid, immobile as any rock, though instinct with life in every hair.
Finn became the very personification of action, eager movement, alert
interest. Inside of one minute he had examined the motionless Desdemona
(by means of the most searchingly concentrated application of his senses
of sight and smell) at least as thoroughly as your Harley Street expert
examines a patient in half an hour. Finn needed no stethoscope to assure
him of Desdemona's soundness. But, having seen her in the inclosure, and
been interested so far, he now examined her with his keen eyes and
nostrils at close quarters, in order that he might know her. And so
superior to our own faculties are some of a hound's senses, that at the
end of this examination Finn the wolfhound actually did know Lady
Desdemona the bloodhound quite as thoroughly as humans know anybody
after a dozen or so of meetings and much beating of the air in speech.
This process ended, the two hounds turned and, with many friendly nudges
and shoulder-rubbings, proceeded up the meadow together in the wake of
the Nuthill party, toward the house of Shaws. One cannot translate
precisely Finn's remark to Desdemona at the end of the examination, but
the sense of it was probably something of this sort:
"Yes, you are all right. I like you. Let's be friends."
IV
THE OPEN-AIR CALL
That meeting with Desdemona in the walled inclosure at Shaws was the
beginning of many jolly days for Finn. Colonel Forde and his family were
both interested and amused by the warm friendship struck up between
their beautiful young bloodhound and the famous Finn, with his long
record of unique experiences on both sides of the world. Neither hound
found any meaning whatever, of course, in the laughing remark made to
the Master by Colonel Forde that afternoon, as they strolled round the
kennels, followed by the now inseparable Finn and Desdemona. The Colonel
paused to lay a hand affectionately on Finn's head, and, with a smile in
the Master's direction, he said:
"I suppose it's the old Shakespearian story over again, eh, Finn?
Desdemona loves you for the dangers you have passed--is that it? Well,
your friendship will have to be strictly platonic, my son, for this
particular Desdemona is pledged to no less puissant a prince than
Champion Windle Hercules, the greatest bloodhound sire of this age. 'A
marriage has been arranged,' as the papers say, Finn; and I hope it
won't put your long muzzle too badly out of joint--what?"
The Master laughed, and both men passed on, Finn following cheerfully
enough by Desdemona's side, conscious only that the men-folk were
talking in friendly, kindly fashion, and reeking nothing of the meaning
of their words. From his point of view, men-folk use such a mort of
words at all times, most of them quite unnecessary, and only a few of
them comprehensible. To folk accustomed, like the dog people, to
intercourse confined chiefly to looks and movements, the continuous
babble of words which humans indulge in is one of their most puzzling
attributes. When the Master really wanted Finn to understand anything,
the wolfhound very rarely failed him. But Colonel Forde's references to
Othello--well, it was all so much puppy talk, just amiable, meaningless
nickering to Finn and Desdemona.
That evening, while the Master and his folk were dining at Nuthill, Finn
arose from a nap in the hall and, strolling out through the garden,
loped easily away across the shoulder of Down betwixt Shaws and Nuthill
to visit Desdemona. He found her close to the walled inclosure by the
stable, and together they whiled away a couple of evening hours on the
springy thyme-and-clover-scented turf of the Downs. Just as darkness was
taking the place of twilight the scuttering of an over-venturesome
rabbit's tail caught Finn's eye, and cost that particular bunny its
life. Desdemona, to whom this little event opened up a quite new chapter
in life, was hugely excited over the kill, and could hardly allow Finn,
with his veteran's skill, to tear the pelt from the creature's warm body
before she made her first meal of rabbit's hind quarters.
It was a trivial episode enough, and especially so for a hunter of
Finn's experience, who, in his time, had pulled down dozens of old-men
kangaroos, not to mention the smaller fry of the Australian bush. And
yet, though he did not show it as Desdemona did, this trifling incident
was of quite epoch-marking importance for Finn, and stirred him
profoundly.
"Hullo, old friend! What of the hunting? I declare, you've quite the old
bush-ranging air to-night. Where have you been?" asked the Master, when
Finn rejoined his own family circle in the hall at Nuthill, toward
bedtime that night. Finn silently nuzzled the under side of the Master's
right wrist; but, though his dark eyes were eloquent, it was beyond him
to explain either his doings or his emotions. Yet the Master was not
altogether without understanding of these.
"Fact is," he said to Betty Murdoch, as he affectionately rubbed one of
Finn's ears, "I believe this old gallant has quite fallen in love with
Miss Desdemona, and I could swear he's been hunting in her company
to-night. He has all the look of it. I suspect it carries him back to
old days, past the quarantine, past even Australia--eh, old chap?--and
back to his hunting days about these very Downs, when we were at the
cottage, you know. I had to be a great deal in town in those days,
before we went to Australia, and Finn ran pretty much wild through his
last summer in England."
So the Master did know something of what passed in the wolfhound's mind,
though they had no common language. As a matter of fact, the evening
meeting with Desdemona, the frolic on the Downs, and, at the last, the
running down of that rabbit, had combined to stir Finn more than
anything else had stirred him since he had fought for the Master's life
in a drought-smitten corner of the bush in Australia. Much that had lain
dormant in the great hound since the adventurous days of his leadership
of a dingo pack had waked into active, insistent life that evening, and,
brushing aside the habits of a year's soft living, had filled him once
more with the keenness of the hunter and the fire of the masterful mate
and leader.
It must not be supposed that nostalgia is a modern weakness, or the
monopoly of human minds. When Finn looked out across the moonlit Downs
that night, while strolling round the house with the Master before going
to bed, nostalgia filled his heart to aching-point and clouded his mind
with its elusive, tormenting vapors as surely as ever it clouded the
brain of any human wanderer. It was the nostalgia of the wilderness, of
the life of the wild; and, as he looked out into the moonlight, Finn saw
again in fancy, the boundary-rider's lonely humpy, the rugged, rocky
hills of the Tinnaburra; a fleeing wallaby in the distance, himself in
hot pursuit. He smelt again the tang of crushed gum-leaves, and heard
the fascinating rustle which tells of the movements of game, of live
food, over desiccated twigs and leaves, in bush untrodden by human feet.
Yes, Finn tasted to the full that night the nostalgia of the wilderness.
But if it stirred him deeply, it by no means made him unhappy. Across
the Downs' shoulder there was Desdemona; and he was free, save for the
ties of affection--stronger these than any dog-chain--which bound him to
the Nuthill folk. And as for Desdemona; owing to what many fanciers
would have regarded as the reprehensible eccentricity of the owner of
Shaws, Desdemona was almost as free as Finn.
V
DESDEMONA'S WANDERINGS
A week later, even easy-going Colonel Forde was a little perturbed by
the news that Lady Desdemona had been away all night and that nobody
knew of her whereabouts. However, the bitch strolled into the house
during the forenoon, looking none the worse for her night out, and, much
to his kennelman's annoyance, the Colonel refused to have her confined
to the kennels. He did not know that Finn was schooling this blood-royal
princess in the ways of the wild; but he could see that she looked fit
as a fiddle and was obviously very much enjoying her life. And so he
turned a deaf ear to his kennelman, even when the good fellow said,
protestingly:
"You don't see such a bitch once in twenty years, sir. She's just on her
eighteenth month and she's worth taking care of."
"She certainly is, Bates," replied the Colonel, "and you must keep a
sharp lookout. Look to her each day. But, upon my word, I think she's
also worth giving a good time to. Give her her head, and I don't think
she will ever disappoint us. Thank goodness, there are no traps or
poison about here, or none that I ever heard of."
"No, it's not that, sir," persisted the kennelman; "but Desdemona she's
good enough to win in the best company, and to mother winners, too. And
you know, sir, if a dog's to do hisself justice on the bench, you can't
let him go skirmishing around the country like a gipsy's lurcher. It
sorter roughs 'em somehow. The judges don't like it, and the Fancy
don't, neither, sir. Look at the chalk an' that on her coat this
morning, sir."
"Ah well," said the Colonel, with a little laugh, "we never have bred
for the judges, Bates; nor yet for the Fancy, either; and if they can't
recognize the merits of a bitch like that because she's been living a
natural, happy sort of life, instead of a cage-life--why, then, that's
their loss, not ours, and we must chance it."
And so the kennelman shrugged his shoulders and the Lady Desdemona
continued to enjoy life, the new and wider life to which she was being
introduced by that hardened wanderer and past-master in the lore of the
wild--Finn.
It may be that Colonel Forde himself was more than a little worried
about it when, a week later, the young bloodhound disappeared one
afternoon and did not show up again next day. There had been further
communications with the house of the redoubtable champion Windle
Hercules in Hampshire. The Lady Desdemona's line of travel had been
chosen. Bates was to escort her on the nuptial journey, and all
arrangements for the wedding of the distinguished pair had been
completed. And now--"Just as if she mighter bin any tramp's cur," as
Bates feelingly put it--Desdemona had elected to stay away and to remain
away. And the news from Nuthill showed that--"That there plaguy great
wolfhound" was also on the missing list.
On the fourth day of absence, all search having proved unsuccessful, the
police were notified. Then, bright and early on the morning of the fifth
day, the Lady Desdemona walked quietly up to the kitchen door at Shaws,
followed leisurely by Finn, who, after seeing his mate welcomed with
some enthusiasm by the cook and several members of her excited staff,
turned about and loped easily away in the direction of Nuthill.
But to the experts concerned it speedily became apparent that the
alliance with Champion Windle Hercules must be indefinitely postponed.
Lady Desdemona would have none of him. It seemed she knew her own mind
very well, was perfectly calm and content, but quite determined in her
opposition to any hint of matrimonial _pourparlers_ with the admitted
champion of her race. Bates the kennelman pished and tushed, and thought
he knew all about it. The Master felt pretty sure he knew all about it.
The Colonel just smiled and said that Desdemona was young yet, and that,
for his part, he always had thought two years a better marrying age than
eighteen months.
Meantime, you could not have found a more placidly happy and contented
hound in England than the Lady Desdemona; and there were very few days
on which she did not meet Finn, either at Nuthill or at Shaws.
The beautiful early summer weeks slid by, and the young bloodhound grew
more sedate and less given to violent exercise. And then Bates succeeded
in persuading the Colonel into allowing him to kennel the Lady
Desdemona. It is true the kennel given her was pretty nearly the size of
a horse's loose box, and had a little covered outside yard of its own.
But it was a kennel, and securely inclosed. Despite the watchfulness of
Bates, Finn the wolfhound came nuzzling round its sides fairly often in
search of the prisoner.
After four days of confinement the bitch was released by Colonel Forde's
orders. For two days she had taken no food; and as she obviously fretted
when Finn was kept away from her, the wolfhound was allowed to come and
go at Shaws as he chose, and as he did at Nuthill.
Thus a week passed, and it was seen that the Lady Desdemona grew
restless and uneasy.
"Take my advice and leave them severely alone," said the Master. "Finn
will go his own way whether we like it or not. He's too old a hand to be
cajoled, and I've sworn I'll never coerce him. The bitch will be better
left to go her own way. She's got a good mate."
Bates sighed, but the Colonel agreed; and very little was said about it
when, a few days later, Desdemona passed out beyond the ken of her
friends at Shaws and Nuthill, and for the time was seen no more.
What did rather surprise the Master, however, was that after an absence
of a few hours, on the day of Desdemona's disappearance, Finn turned up
as usual in the evening at Nuthill, and spent the night on his own bed.
This fact did strike the Master as odd when he heard that nothing had
been seen at Shaws of the bloodhound.
"Evidently, then, Finn has nothing to do with her disappearance," said
Colonel Forde next day.
"Ah!" replied the Master, musingly. "I wonder!" And he thoughtfully
pulled Finn's ears, as though he thought this might extract information
regarding the whereabouts of Desdemona. But Finn, as his way was, said
nothing. He maintained in this matter a policy of masterly reserve.
VI
HOW DESDEMONA FOUND HER NEST
It would, of course, be highly interesting if one were able to map out
precisely the effect produced in Desdemona's mind by the influence of
Finn the wolfhound. One would very much like to trace the mental
process; to know exactly how much and in what manner the influence of
the wolfhound, with his experiences of life among the wild kindred of
Australia, affected the development of the highly domesticated, the
thoroughly sophisticated, young bloodhound. This one cannot pretend to
do. But, as it happens, one is able faithfully to record the Lady
Desdemona's actions and experiences; and from that record, in the light
of her previous intercourse with the Irish wolfhound, one is free to
draw one's own conclusions as to motives and inspirations.
During the course of their various absences from Shaws and Nuthill, Finn
and the Lady Desdemona very thoroughly scoured the South Downs within a
radius of a dozen miles from home. In the beginning of their longest
jaunt, which kept the pair of them five days away, Desdemona made a
discovery that greatly interested both of them.
It happened that Finn ran down and killed a rabbit, rather, perhaps,
from lightness of heart, or by way of displaying his powers to
Desdemona, than from any desire for food. And so it fell out that,
having slain the bunny, the hunter and his mate proceeded to amuse
themselves in the vicinity, leaving the rabbit lying where it had
received its _coup de grâce_, at the foot of a stunted, wind-twisted
thorn-bush.
It might have been an hour later when (with appetites whetted, no doubt,
by exercise in the finest air to be found in southern England) Finn and
Desdemona forsook their play and made for the thorn-bush, with a view to
a cold rabbit supper. But a glance at the spot showed that the very
thoroughly killed rabbit was no longer there. Finn's eyes blazed for a
moment with the sort of masterful wrath he had not shown since his
dingo-leading days in the Tinnaburra. Desdemona noticed this exhibition
of lordly anger and thought it rather fine. But, being female, she was
more practical than Finn; and being a bloodhound, she had a sense of
smell by comparison with which Finn's scenting powers were as naught--a
mere gap in his equipment; and this despite the fact that the training
his wild life had given him in this respect placed him far ahead of the
average wolfhound. But by comparison with bloodhounds, the fleet dogs
who hunt by sight and speed--deerhounds, greyhounds, Irish wolfhounds
and the like--have very little sense of smell.
Now the Lady Desdemona, having no experience of wild life, did not know
in the least what had become of that rabbit. She formed no conclusions
whatever about it. But obeying one of her strongest instincts, she
picked up a trail leading in the direction opposite to that from which
Finn had overtaken the bunny, and, with one glance of encouragement over
her shoulder at Finn, began to follow this up at a loping trot. As she
ran, her delicate, golden-colored flews skimmed the ground; her
sensitive nostrils questioned almost every blade of grass, her brain
automatically registering every particle of information so obtained, and
guiding her feet accordingly. Her strong tail waved above and behind her
in the curve of an Arab scimitar. She ceased to be the Lady Desdemona
and became simply a bloodhound at work; an epitome of the whole complex
science of tracking. Finn trotted admiringly beside her, his muzzle
never passing her shoulder; and now and again when he happened to lower
his head from its accustomed three-foot level, his nostrils caught a
whiff or two of something reminiscent of long-past hunting excursions
when he was barely out of puppyhood.
The dog-folk are not greatly given to discussion. It was obvious that
Desdemona had some purpose earnestly in view. (As a fact, she herself
did not as yet know what that purpose was.) And that was enough for
Finn. The bloodhound's pace was slow, and Finn could have kept up this
sort of traveling for a dozen hours on end without really exerting
himself.
But this was not to be a long trail as the event proved, though it was
mostly up-hill. Before a mile and a half had been covered Desdemona
began to show excitement and emitted a single deep bay, mellow as the
note of an organ. Finn remarked her fine voice with sincere approval.
Like all hounds, he detested a sharp, high, or yapping cry. A few
seconds later Desdemona came to a standstill beside the stem of a
starveling yew-tree, and just below the crest of the Down. Her muzzle
was thrust into an opening in the steep side of the Down, over which
there hung a thatch of furze. But though her head entered the opening,
her shoulders could not pass it and there was wrath and excitement in
the belling note she struck as she drew back.
This was Finn's opportunity and, stepping forward, he attacked the
overhanging furze and stony chalky earth with both his powerful fore
feet. He had winded now a scent that roused him; and what is more, he
remembered precisely what that twangy, acrid scent betokened. The chalky
earth flew from under his great paws faster than two men could have
shifted it with mattocks; and, as the shelving crust was thin, it took
him no more than one or two minutes to make an opening through which
even his great bulk could pass with a little stooping.
Another moment and Desdemona had forced her way past Finn, baying
hoarsely, and was inside the cave. There followed a yowling, snarling
cry, a scuffling sound, and a big red fox emerged, low to the ground
like a cat, his brush between his legs, fight in his bared jaws, and
flight in his red rolling eyes. But fate had knocked at Reynard's door,
and would not be denied. His running did not carry him far. It is
probably somewhat disturbing to be rooted out of one's own particular
sanctuary by a baying bloodhound. But it is worse to find at one's front
door a vision of vengeance and destruction in the shape of a giant Irish
wolfhound whose kill one has purloined.
In Finn's salad days it might have meant a fight. As things were, it was
rather an execution; and though the fox died snapping, his neck was
broken before he had decided upon his line of action. As Finn flung the
furry corpse aside, Desdemona appeared in the mouth of the cave with
most of the stolen rabbit between her jaws. It was noteworthy that she
gave no heed at all to the fox. Her business as a tracker had been with
her mate's stolen kill. In the absence of Finn, Reynard would have paid
no other penalty for his theft than the loss of the rabbit. As it was,
the incident cost him his life; and he was a master fox, too, who had
ranged that countryside with considerable insolence for some years; a
terribly familiar foe in a number of neighboring farm-yards.
Neither Finn nor Desdemona ate the remains of that rabbit. For one
thing, they were not yet really hungry, and for another thing they did
not relish the musky tang left by Reynard's jaws. Apart from this (and
despite its strong scent) they were both keenly interested in the cave
which had been Reynard's home; especially Desdemona.
It seemed the bloodhound would never tire of investigating the cave,
once she had satisfied herself as to Finn fully understanding that she
alone, unaided, and with most complete success, had tracked down and
retrieved the stolen rabbit. This fact had to be clearly appreciated
before Desdemona could bring herself to lay aside the mangled rabbit.
Then she invited Finn's attention to the interior of the cave. Together
they explored its resources till Finn felt almost nauseated by the smell
of fox which filled the place. But Desdemona, with her far more delicate
sense of smell, seemed quite unaffected by this. To and fro she padded,
closely examining every inch of the place, and dragging out into the
open scores of bones and other oddments which told of its long
occupancy.
It really was a rather fascinating lair, despite its musky smell; and
its position was superb. Being on a southern slope, and just below the
crest of the highest point of Downs thereabouts, one plainly saw the
sparkle of sunlight on the waters of the Channel from the mouth of this
cave. On the other hand, an obliging cup-shaped hollow of the Downs,
some hundred yards away to the west, gave one a vista of Sussex
farm-lands extending over scores of miles; a view that many a caveless
millionaire would give a fortune to secure for his home.
Again, the extreme steepness of the particular little spur, or swelling
of the Downs, in which this cave had been formed, made it highly
improbable that the feet of man would ever come that way. The
surrounding turf had doubtless known the sharp little feet of many
hundreds of generations of sheep; but it had never known the plow. It
was the same unbroken turf which our early British ancestors knew in
these parts, and had remained unscathed by any such trifling happenings
as the Roman invasion, the Fire of London, the Wars of the Roses, or the
advent of Mr. Lloyd George. The very cave itself may easily have been
older than Westminster Abbey; and if there is a lord in the land whose
ancestral hall can boast a longer record of un-"restored" antiquity, he
may fairly claim that his forebears built most superlatively well.
At all events, the place appealed most strongly to the Lady Desdemona,
and since her heart seemed set upon it, Finn cheerfully endeavored to
forget the foxy smell, busied himself in securing a fresh, rabbit for
supper, and generally behaved as a good mate should in the matter of
helping to make a new home. And that is the plain truth in the matter of
how Desdemona found her nest.
VII
DESDEMONA FORGETS HER MANNERS
It has been recorded that, as the weeks slipped by after Desdemona's
first little term of absence from her home at Shaws, she grew daily more
sedate in her manner and less given to the irresponsible activities of
hound youth.
It was also noticed that she developed a habit of carrying off all her
best bones, or other solid comestibles, instead of despatching them
beside her dish as her sophisticated habit had always been. What was not
known, even to the astute Bates, was that the most of such eatables were
laboriously carried over close upon four miles of downland by the Lady
Desdemona, for ultimate storage in her cave, where, a little
reluctantly, she devoured some of them and stowed away others to be more
or less devoured by insects, and, it may be, by prowling stoats and
other vermin, during the bloodhound's periods of residence in her own
proper home.
Finn accompanied his mate, as a matter of course, upon most of her
pilgrimages to the cave. But, somewhat to his chagrin, he found, as time
went on, that Desdemona became less and less keen upon his company.
Latterly, in fact, she came as near as so courtly a creature could to
sending him about his business flatly, and she formed a habit of lying
across the mouth of her cave in a manner which certainly suggested that
she grudged Finn entry to the old place--a thing which ruffled him more
than he cared to admit.
As a matter of fact, the Lady Desdemona had not the faintest idea why
she should adopt this tone and manner toward her mate. She admired Finn
as much as ever; she liked him well, and had no shadow of a reason for
mistrusting him. But she had her own weird to dree; and inherited
memories and instincts far stronger than any wish or inclination of her
daily life, were just now dominating her utterly.
She was full of a vague anxiousness; a sense of impending difficulties;
a blind but undeniable determination to be forearmed against she knew
not what dangers and needs. And among other things, other vague
instincts the which she must obey with or without understanding, there
was the desire to store up food, and to preserve intact her sole command
of the privacy of her cave. If Finn had been human, he would have
shrugged his shoulders, and in private given vent to generalizations
regarding the inscrutability of females. As it was, he very likely
shrugged his great gray shoulders, but went his way without remark.
Then came the day upon which Desdemona disappeared from Shaws, and Finn,
to the Master's surprise, slept in his own proper bed at Nuthill.
The fact was he had parted with Desdemona that evening under rather
painful circumstances. In the early evening he had journeyed with her to
the cave--she carrying a large mutton-bone which she made no pretense of
offering to share with her mate--and her attitude throughout had been
one of really unaccountable chilliness and reserve. They had drunk
together--the cold nectar of a prehistoric dew-pond that lay within a
hundred yards of the cave--and Desdemona had turned away curtly and
hurried back to the cave, with never a lick or a look in Finn's
direction, as though she feared he might take the place away in his
teeth. Finn had noticed that she moved wearily, as though action taxed
her strength; yet he thought her unaccountably ready to walk away from
him.
He ran down a rabbit for his mate, and deposited it before her at the
cave's mouth in the most friendly manner. Then, before he could get time
to tear the pelt off for her, the Lady Desdemona, with a snappishness
more suggestive of a hedge-side cur than of a hound of her rank,
actually snatched away the rabbit, and with never a "Thank you," or a
"By your leave," carried it right inside the cave, dropping it there and
returning to bar the entrance, with a look in her red-hawed eyes and a
lift of her golden flews which, if not actual snarling, was, as folks
say, near enough to make no difference. At least it very plainly told
Finn he was not wanted there; and the limits of his punctilious courtesy
having now been passed, he had turned away without look or sound and
descended the Down in high dudgeon.
It was clear to Finn that his mate needed a lesson in manners, and so,
moodily, he stalked away and went hungry to bed like the illogical male
creature he was, vaguely surmising that in his discomfort there must be
something of retribution for Desdemona. Had he but known it, he had a
long line of human precedents in the matter of this particular piece of
foolishness, even to the detail of the untasted dinner-dish which he
left in the back porch when he went to bed at Nuthill.
VIII
FINN IS ENLIGHTENED
Next morning courtesy demanded that Finn should accept Betty Murdoch's
invitation to accompany her on a rather long walk. She had bills to pay
and calls to make in the village. Finn went, of course, stalking
silently beside pretty, cheery Betty. But he made a poor companion, and
Betty even told the Master at luncheon that she thought Finn was not
very well, so dull and uninterested in anything he had appeared all the
morning.
"H'm! I suspect he misses Lady Desdemona," said the Master. "Puzzling
thing, that. I can't make out why they're not together."
The fact was, Finn found the nursing of his offended dignity a wearisome
task. It was all very well to rebuke Desdemona by ignoring her
existence; but could he be quite sure that she noticed his absence or
cared about it? And in any case, whether or not it affected her, it
certainly bored him very much. He missed greatly the companionship of
his mate, and not a bit the less because she had been so rude to him the
day before.