Miss Clementina looked with dismay at the much battered object the
little brown dog had just brought in and laid at her feet. It was all
that remained of Mr. Maclin's best Panama hat.
Miss Clementina picked it up gingerly. She crossed the strip of lawn
between the two houses and rang her neighbor's doorbell.
"I'm so sorry," she said, extending the hat to its owner. "It's really
_too_ bad of the little dog."
"It's of not the very slightest consequence," returned Mr. Maclin,
gallantly.
"Oh, but I think it is," Miss Clementina insisted. "He's a very bad
little dog, really. Don't you think perhaps you ought to whip him--not
hard, but just enough to make him remember?"
"Whip him! Whip your dog! My dear Miss Liddell, I couldn't think of
such a thing."
Miss Clementina's eyes seemed very wide indeed.
"But he's not my dog at all," she protested. "Isn't he _yours_, Mr.
Maclin?"
"I never laid eyes on him," said Mr. Maclin, "until I moved here. The
first time I saw him he was digging in your geranium bed."
"Oh!" said Miss Clementina, and began to laugh.
"And to think," she said, "of all the outrageous things he has done!
And neither of us daring to say a word because we each thought he
belonged to the other."
Mr. Maclin laughed with her. "I think," he said, "that from now on the
little brown dog will have to reform."