Lad was old--very, very old. He had passed his sixteenth birthday. For
a collie, sixteen is as old as is ninety-five for a human.
The great dog's life had been as beautiful as himself. And now, in the
late twilight of his years, Time's hand rested on him as lovingly as
did the Mistress's. He had few of the distressing features of age.
True; his hearing was duller than of yore. The magnificent body's lines
were blurred with flesh. The classic muzzle was snow white; as were the
lashes and eyebrows. And the once mighty muscles were stiff and
unwieldy. Increasing feebleness crept over him, making exercise a
burden and any sudden motion a pain. The once trumpeting bark was a
hollow echo of itself.
But the deep-set dark eyes, with a soul looking out of them, were as
clear as ever. The uncannily wise brain had lost not an atom of its
power. The glorious mahogany-and-snow coat was still abundant. The
fearlessly gay spirit and loyal heart were undimmed by age.
Laddie resented angrily his new limitations. From time to time he would
forget them; and would set off at a run in the wake of Bruce and Wolf,
when the sound of a stranger's approach made them gallop up the
driveway to investigate. But always; after the first few stiff bounds,
he would come to a panting halt and turn back wearily to his resting
place in the veranda's coolest corner; as indignant over his own
weakness, as he would have been at fetters which impeded his limbs.
He was more and more sensitive about this awkward feebleness of his.
And he sought to mask it; in ways that seemed infinitely pathetic to
the two humans who loved him. For instance, one of his favorite romps
in bygone days had been to throw himself down in front of the Mistress
and pretend to bite her little feet; growling terrifically as he did
it. Twice of late, as he had been walking at her side, his footing had
slipped or he had lost his balance, and had tumbled headlong Instantly,
both times, he had begun to growl and had bitten in mock fury at the
Mistress's foot. By this pitiful ruse he strove to make her believe
that his fall had been purposeful and a part of the olden game.
But worst of all he missed the long walks on which, from puppyhood, he
had always accompanied the Mistress and the Master. Unknown to the old
dog, these walks had been shortened, mercifully, and slowed down, to
accommodate themselves to Lad's waning strength: But the time came when
even a half-mile, at snail-pace, over a smooth road, was too much for
his wind and endurance.
Nowadays, when they were going for a walk, Lad was first lured into the
house and left there. The ruse did not fool him, any more than it would
have deceived a grown man. And his feelings were cruelly hurt at every
instance of this seeming defection on the part of his two worshiped
human chums.
"He still enjoys life," mused the Master, one day in late summer, as he
and the Mistress sat on the veranda, with Lad asleep at their feet.
"And he can still get about a bit. His appetite is good, and he drowses
happily for a good deal of the day; and the car-rides are still as much
fun for him as ever they were. But when the time comes--and he's
breaking fast, these past few months--when the time comes that life is
a misery to him--"
"I know," interposed the Mistress, her voice not quite steady. "I know.
Do you suppose I haven't been thinking about it, on the hot nights when
I couldn't sleep? But, when the time comes--when it
comes--you'll--you'll do it, yourself, won't you?"
"Yes," promised the Master, miserably. "No one else shall. I'd rather
cut off one of my own hands, though. I'VE been doing a bit of thinking,
too--at night. It's nobody's job but mine. Laddie would rather have it
that way, I know. And, by a bullet. He's a gallant old soldier. And
that is the way for him to go. Now, for the Lord's sake, let's talk
about something else! A man or woman is a fool to care that way about
any mere dog. I--"
"But Lad isn't a 'mere' dog," contradicted the Mistress, stooping to
pet the collie's classic head as it lay across her foot. "He's--he's
Laddie."
The sound of his name pierced the sleep mists and brought the dog to
wakefulness. He raised his head inquiringly toward the Mistress, and
his plumed tail began to thump the floor. The Mistress patted him
again; and spoke a word or two. Lad prepared to drowse once more. Then,
to his dulled ears came the padding of little bare feet on the grass.
And he glanced up again, this time in eager interest.
Across the lawn from the orchard came trotting a child; carrying a
basket of peaches toward the kitchen. The youngster wore but a single
garment, a shapeless calico dress that fell scarcely to her knees. She
was Sonya, the seven-year-old daughter of one of the Place's extra
workmen, a Slav named Ruloff who lived in the mile-distant village,
across the lake.
Ruloff, following the custom of his peasant ancestors, put his whole
family to work, from the time its members were old enough to toddle.
And he urged them against the vice of laziness by means of an
ever-ready fist, or a still readier toe or a harness strap--whichever
of the trio of energy producers chanced to be handiest. In coming over
to the Place, for a month's labor, during the harvest season, he
brought along every day his youngest and most fragile offspring, Sonya.
Under her father's directions and under his more drastic modes of
encouragement, the little girl was of much help to him in his doily
toil.
Twice, the Master had caught him punishing her for undue slowness in
carrying out some duty too heavy for her frail strength. On both times
he had stopped the brutal treatment. On the second, he had told Ruloff
he would not only discharge him, but assist his departure from the
Place with a taste of boot-toe medicine, if ever the Slav should lay a
hand on the child again during his period of employment there. The
Place's English superintendent had promised like treatment to the man,
should he catch him ill treating Sonya.
Wherefore, Ruloff had perforce curbed his parental urgings toward
violence;--at least during the hours when he and the child were on the
Place.
Sonya was an engaging little thing; and the Mistress had made a pet of
her. So had the Master. But the youngster's warmest friend was old
Sunnybank Lad.
From the first day of Sonya's advent in his life, Lad had constituted
himself her adorer and constant companion.
Always his big heart had gone out to children; as to everything weak
and defenseless. Not always had his treatment at the hands of children
encouraged this feeling of loving chivalry and devotion. But Sonya was
an exception. Whenever she could steal a minute of time, away from her
father's glum eyes and nagging voice and ready fist, she would seek out
Lad.
She was as gentle with the grand old dog as other children had been
rough. She loved to cuddle down close beside him, her arms around his
shaggy neck; and croon queer little high-voiced songs to him; her thin
cheek against his head. She used to save out fragments from her own
sparse lunch to give to him. She was inordinately proud to walk at his
side during Lad's rare rambles around the Place. Child and dog made a
pretty picture of utter chumship.
To nobody save the Mistress and the Master had Laddie ever given his
heart so completely as to this baby.
Hurried though she was, today, Sonya set down her basket of peaches
and, with a shy glance of appeal at the two humans, reached across the
veranda edge to stroke Lad's head and to accept in delight his
proffered paw. Then, guiltily, she caught up her basket and sped on to
the kitchen.
Lad, slowly and with difficulty, got to his feet and followed her. A
minute later the Mistress watched them making their way to the orchard,
side by side; the child slackening her eager steps in order to keep
pace with the aged dog.
"I wish we could arrange to take her away from that brute of a father
of hers, and keep her here," said the Mistress. "It's horrible to think
of such a helpless wisp of a baby being beaten and made to work, day
and night. And then she and Laddie love each other so. They--"
"What can we do?" asked the Master, hopelessly. "I've spoken to the
village authorities about it. But it seems the law can't interfere;
unless brutal cruelty can be proved or unless the parents are unfit to
bring up the child."
"Brutal cruelty?" echoed the Mistress. "What could be more brutal than
the way he beats her? Why, last week there was a bruise on her arm as
big--"
"What can we prove? He has a legal right to punish her. If we got them
up in court, he'd frighten her into swearing she hurt her arm on a
fence picket and that he never harms her. No, there's no sort of cure
for the rotten state of affairs."
But the Master was mistaken. There was a very good cure indeed for it.
And that cure was being applied at the moment he denied its existence.
Sonya had disappeared from view over the crest of the lawn: Down into
the orchard she went, Lad at her side; to where Ruloff was waiting for
her to lug another full basket back to the house.
"Move!" he ordered, as she drew near. "Don't crawl! Move, or I'll make
you move."
This threat he voiced very bravely indeed. He was well out of sight of
the house. The superintendent and the two other men were working on the
far side of the hill. It seemed an eminently safe time to exercise his
parental authority. And, hand uplifted, he took a threatening step
toward the little girl.
Sonya cowered back in mortal dread. There was no mistaking the import
of Ruloff's tone or gesture. Lad read it as clearly as did the child.
As Sonya shrank away from the menace, a furry shoulder was pressed
reassuringly against her side. Lad's cold muzzle was thrust for the
merest instant into her trembling hand.
Then, as Ruloff advanced, Lad took one majestic step forward; his great
body shielding the girl; his dark eyes sternly on the man's; his lips
drawing back from his blunted yellow fangs. Deep in his throat a growl
was born.
Ruloff checked himself; looking doubtfully at the shaggy brute. And at
the same moment the superintendent appeared over the ridge of the hill,
on his way to the orchard. The Slav picked up a filled basket and
shoved it at Sonya.
"Jump!" he ordered. "Keep moving. Be back here in one minute!"
With a sigh of enormous relief and a pat of furtive gratitude to Lad,
the child set forth on her errand. Yet, even at risk of a sharper
rebuke, she accommodated her pace to Lad's stately slow steps.
Hitherto she had loved the dog for no special reason except that her
heart somehow went out to him. But now she had a practical cause for
her devotion. Lad had stood between her and a fist blow. He had risked,
she knew not what, to defy her all-terrible father and to protect her
from punishment.
As soon as she was out of Ruloff's sight, she set down her basket, and
flung both puny arms about the dog's neck in an agony of gratitude.
Her squeeze almost strangled the weak old collie. But there was love in
it. And because of that, he reveled in the hurt.
"You won't let him thump me!" she whispered in the dog's ear. "You
won't let him. I'd never be afraid of him, if you were there. Oh,
Laddie, you're so darling!"
Lad, highly pleased, licked her wizened little face and, sitting down,
insisted on shaking hands with her. He realized he had done something
quite wonderful and had made this little chum of his proud of him.
Wherefore, he was proud of himself; and felt young and gay
again;--until his next strenuous effort to walk fast.
All night, in her sleep, in the stiflingly hot loft of her father's
hovel, which served her and the five other Ruloff children as a
dormitory, Sonya was faintly aware of that bright memory. Her first
waking thought was of the shaggy shoulder pressed so protectingly
against her side; and of the reassuring thrust of Lad's muzzle into her
cupped palm. It all seemed as vividly real as though she could still
feel the friendly contact.
On the next morning, Ruloff alone of all the village's population went
to work. For it was Labor Day.
Ruloff did not believe in holidays,--either for himself or for his
family. And while wages were so high he was not minded to throw away a
full day's earnings, just for the sake of honoring a holiday ordained
in a country for which he felt no fondness or other interest. So, with
Sonya tagging after him, he made his way to the Place, as usual.
Now, on Labor Day, of that year, was held the annual outdoor dog-show
at Hawthorne. Lad, of course, was far too old to be taken to a show.
And this was one of the compensations of old age. For Laddie detested
dog shows. But, abnormally sensitive by nature, this sensitiveness had
grown upon him with failing strength and added years. Thus, when he saw
Bruce and Bob and Jean bathed and groomed and made ready for the show,
he was sad at heart. For here was one more thing in which he no longer
had any share.
And so he lay down in his cave, under the piano, his head between his
absurdly small white forepaws; and hearkened sadly to the preparations
for departure.
Bruce ("Sunnybank Goldsmith") was perhaps the most beautiful collie of
his generation. Groomed for a show, he made most other dogs look
plebeian and shabby. That day, one may say in passing, he was destined
to go through the collie classes, to Winners, with a rush; and then to
win the award and cup for "Best Dog Of Any Breed In The Show."
Bruce's son and daughter--Bobby and Jean were to win in their
respective collie classes as Best Puppy and Best Novice. It was to be a
day of triumph for the Sunnybank Kennels. Yet, somehow, it was to be a
day to which the Mistress and the Master never enjoyed looking back.
Into the car the three dogs were put. The Mistress and the Master and
the Place's superintended got aboard, and the trip to Hawthorne began.
Laddie had come out from his cave to see the show-goers off. The
Mistress, looking back, had a last glimpse of him, standing in the
front doorway; staring wistfully after the car. She waved her hand to
him in farewell. Lad wagged his plumed tail, once, in reply, to the
salute. Then, heavily, he turned back again into the house.
"Dear old Laddie!" sighed the Mistress. "He used to hate to go to
shows. And now he hates being left behind. It seems so cruel to leave
him. And yet--"
"Oh the maids will take good care of him!" consoled the Master. "They
spoil him, whenever they get a chance. And we'll be back before five
o'clock. We can't be forever looking out for his crotchety feelings."
"We won't be 'forever' doing that," prophesied the Mistress, unhappily.
Left alone the old dog paced slowly back to his cave. The day was hot.
His massive coat was a burden. Life was growing more of a problem than
of old it had been. Also, from time to time, lately, his heart did
queer things that annoyed Lad. At some sudden motion or undue exertion
it had a new way of throbbing and of hammering against his ribs so
violently as to make him pant.
Lad did not understand this. And, as with most things he did not
understand, it vexed him. This morning, for example,--the heat of the
day and the fatigue of his ramble down through the rose garden to the
lake and back, had set it to thumping painfully. He was glad to lie at
peace in his beloved cave, in the cool music-room; and sleep away the
hours until his deities should return from that miserable dog-show. He
slept.
And so an hour wore on; and then another and another.
At the show, the Mistress developed one of her sick headaches. She said
nothing of it. But the Master saw the black shadows grow, under her
eyes; and the color go out of her face; and he noted the little
pain-lines around her mouth. So, as soon as the collie judging was
over, he made her get into the car; and he drove her home, meaning to
return to Hawthorne in time for the afternoon judging of specials and
of variety classes.
Meanwhile, as the morning passed, Lad was roused from his fitful
old-age slumber by the sound of crying. Into his dreams seeped the
distressing sound. He woke; listened; got up painfully and started
toward the front door.
Halfway to the door, his brain cleared sufficiently for him to
recognize the voice that had awakened him. And his leisurely walk
merged into a run.
Ruloff and Sonya had been working all morning in the peach orchard. To
the child's chagrin, Lad was nowhere in sight. Every time she passed
the house she loitered as long as she dared, in hope of getting a
glimpse of him.
"I wonder where Laddie is," she ventured, once, as her father was
filling a basket for her to carry.
"The dogs have gone to a silly show," grunted Ruloff, piling the
basket. "The superintendent told me, yesterday. To waste a whole day
with dogs! Pouf! No wonder the world is poor! Here, the basket is full.
Jump!"
Sonya picked up the heavy load--twice as big as usual were the baskets
given her to carry, now that the interfering Master and the
superintendent were not here to forbid--and started laboriously for the
house.
Her back ached with weariness. Yet, in the absence of her protectors,
she dared not complain or even to allow herself the luxury of walking
slowly. So, up the hill, she toiled; at top speed. Ruloff had finished
filling another basket, and he prepared to follow her. This completed
the morning's work. His lunch-pail awaited him at the barn. With nobody
to keep tabs on him, he resolved to steal an extra hour of time, in
honor of Labor Day--at his employer's expense.
Sonya pattered up the rise and around to the corner of the house.
There, feeling her father's eye on her, as he followed; she tried to
hasten her staggering steps. As a result, she stumbled against the
concrete walk. Her bare feet went from under her.
Down she fell, asprawl; the peaches flying in fifty directions. She had
cut her knee, painfully, against the concrete edge. This, and the
knowledge that Ruloff would most assuredly punish her clumsiness, made
her break out in shrill weeping.
Among the cascaded peaches she lay, crying her eyes out. Up the hill
toward her scrambled Ruloff; basket on shoulder; yelling abuse better
fitted for the ears of a balky mule than for those of a hurt child.
"Get up!" he bawled. "Get up, you worthless little cow! If you've
spoiled any of those peaches or broke my basket, I'll cut the flesh off
your bones."
Sonya redoubled her wailing. For, she recognized a bumpy substance
beneath her as the crushed basket. And these baskets belonged to
Ruloff; not to the Place.
For the accidental breaking of far less worthwhile things, at home, she
and her brothers and sisters had often been thrashed most unmercifully:
Her lamentations soared to high heaven. And her father's running feet
sounded like the tramp of Doom.
There is perhaps no other terror so awful as that of an ill treated
child at the approach of punishment. A man or woman, menaced by danger
from law or from private foe, can either fight it out or run away from
it. But there is no hiding place for a child from a brute parent. The
punishment is as inevitable and as fearsome as from the hand of God.
No; there is no other terror so awful. And, one likes to think, there
is no other punishment in the next world so severe as that meted out to
the torturers of little children. For this hope's basis there is the
solemn warning voiced by the All-pitying Friend of children;--a threat
which, apparently, was unfamiliar to Ruloff.
Down upon the weepingly prostrate Sonya bore the man. As he came toward
her, he ripped off the leathern belt he wore. And he brandished it by
the hole-punch end; the brass buckle singing ominously about his head.
Then, out from the house and across the wide veranda flashed a giant
tawny shape.
With the fierce speed of his youngest days, Lad cleared the porch and
reached the crying child. In the same instant he beheld the advancing
Ruloff; and the wise old brain read the situation at a glance.
Stopping only to lick the tear-streaked little face, Lad bounded in
front of Sonya and faced the father. The collie's feeble old body was
tense; his eyes blazed with indignant fury. His hackles bristled. The
yellowed and useless teeth glinted from beneath back-writhed lips. For
all his age, Lad was a terrible and terrifying figure as he stood guard
over the helpless waif.
Ruloff hesitated an instant, taken aback by the apparition. Sonya
ceased shrieking. Lad was here to protect her. Over her frightened soul
came that former queer sense of safety. She got up, tremblingly, and
pressed close to the furry giant who had come to her rescue. She glared
defiantly up at Ruloff.
Perhaps it was this glare; perhaps it was the knowledge that Lad was
very old and the sight of his worn-down teeth; perhaps it was the need
of maintaining his hold of fear over the rebellious child. At all
events, Ruloff swung aloft the belt once more and strode toward the
two; balancing himself for a kick at the thundrously growling dog.
The kick did not land. For, even as Sonya cried out in new terror, Lad
launched himself at the Slav.
All unprepared for the clash, and being an utter coward at heart--if he
had a heart--the father reeled back, under the impact. Losing his
balance, he tumbled prone to earth.
By the time his back struck ground, Lad was upon him; ravening
uselessly at the swarthy throat.
But, yelling with fright, Ruloff fended him off; and twisted and
writhed out of reach; bunching his feet under him and, in a second,
staggering up and racing for the shelter of the nearest tree.
Up the low-stretching branches the man swarmed, until he was well out
of reach. Then, pausing in his climb, he shook his fist down at the
collie, who was circling the tree in a vain attempt to find some way of
climbing it.
Chattering, mouthing, gibbering like a monkey, Ruloff shook an impotent
fist at the dog that had treed him; and squalled insults at him and at
the hysterically delighted child.
Sonya rushed up to Lad, flinging her arms around him and trying to kiss
him. At her embrace, the collie's tension relaxed. He turned his back
on the jabbering Ruloff, and looked pantingly up into the child's
excited face.
Then, whimpering a little under his breath, he licked her cheek; and
made shift to wag his plumed tail in reassurance. After which, having
routed the enemy and done what he could to comfort the rescued, Laddie
moved heavily over to the veranda.
For some reason he was finding it hard to breathe. And his heart was
doing amazing things against his ribs. He was very tired--very drowsy.
He wanted to finish his interrupted nap. But it was a long way into the
house. And a spot on the veranda, under the wide hammock, promised
coolness. Thither he went; walking more and more slowly.
At the hammock, he looked back: Ruloff was shinnying down from the
tree; on the far side. All the fight, all the angry zest for torturing,
seemed to have gone out of the man. Without so much as glancing toward
Sonya or the dog, he made his way, in a wide detour, toward the barn
and lunch.
Sonya ran up on the veranda after Lad. As he laid himself heavily down,
under the hammock, she sat on the floor beside him; taking his head in
her lap, stroking its silken fur and beginning to sing to him in that
high-pitched crooning little voice of hers.
Laddie loved this. And he loved the soft caress of her hand. It soothed
him to sleep.
It was good to sleep. He had just undergone more vehement exertion and
excitement than had been his for many a long month. And he had earned
his rest. It was sweet to doze like this--petted and sung to.
It was not well to exercise body and emotions as he had just done. Lad
realized that, now;--now that it was all over and he could rest. Rest!
Yes, it was good to rest,--to be smoothed and crooned at. It was thus
the Mistress had stroked and crooned to him, so many thousand times.
And always Lad had loved it.
It was well to be at home and to be sinking so pleasantly to sleep;
here at the Place he had guarded since before he could remember--the
Place where he and the Mistress and the Master had had such splendid
times; where he and his long-dead mate, Lady, had romped; where he had
played with and trained his fiery little son, Wolf; and where every
inch of the dear land was alive with wonderful memories to him.
He had had a full, happy, rich life. And now, in its twilight, rest was
as grateful as action once had been.
The morning air was warm and it was heavy with flower and field,
scents; and with the breath of the forests where so often Lad had led
the tearing run of the collie pack and in whose snowy depths he once
had fought for his life against Wolf and the huge crossbreed, Rex. That
was ever so long ago.
The Mistress and the Master were coming home. Lad knew that. He could
not have told how he knew it. In earlier years, he had known their car
was bringing them home to him, while it was still a mile or more
distant from the Place;--had known and had cantered forth to meet it.
He was too tired, just now, to do that. At least, until he had slept
for a moment or two. Always, until now, the Mistress and the Master had
been first, with Lad. Now, for some odd reason, sleep was first.
And he slept;--deeply, wearily.
Presently, as he slept, he sighed and then quivered a little. After
that, he lay still. The great heart, very quietly, had stopped beating.
Into the driveway, from the main road, a furlong above, rolled the
homecoming car. At sight of it, Sonya started up. She was not certain
how the car's occupants would take her preempting of the veranda in
their absence. Letting Lad's head gently down to the floor, she slipped
away.
To the barn she went, ignorant that her father had not returned to the
orchard. She wanted to get herself into a more courageous frame of mind
before meeting Ruloff. By experience she judged he would make her pay,
and pay dear, for the fright the collie had given him.
Into the barn she ran, shutting fast its side door behind her. Then,
midway across the dusky hay-strewn space, she came to a gasping stop.
Ruloff had risen from a box on the corner, had set down his lunch pail,
moved between her and the door and yanked off his brass-buckled belt.
The child was trapped. Here there was no earthly chance for escape.
Here, too, thanks to the closed door, Laddie could not come to her aid.
In palsied dread, she stood shaking and sobbing; as the man walked
silently toward her.
Ruloff's flat face widened in a grin of anticipation. He had a big
score to pay. And he was there to pay it. The fear of the dog was still
upon him; and the shame that this child, the cause of all his
humiliation, should have seen him run yelling up a tree. It would take
a mighty good flogging to square that.
Sonya cried out, in mortal terror, at his first step. Then--probably
only in her hysterical imagination, though afterward she vowed it had
actually happened--came rescue.
Distinctly, against her quivering side, she felt the pressure of a warm
furry bulk. Into her paralyzed hand a reassuring cold muzzle was
thrust. And, over her, came a sense of wonderful safety from all harm.
Facing her father with a high-pitched loud laugh of genuine courage,
she shrilled:
"You don't dare touch me! You don't dare lay one finger on me!"
And she meant it. Her look and every inflection of the defiant high
voice proved she meant it; proved it to the dumfounded Ruloff, in a way
that sent funny little shivers down his spine.
The man came to a shambling halt; aghast at the transfigured little
wisp of humanity who confronted him in such gay fearlessness.
"Why don't I dare?" he blustered, lifting the brass-buckled weapon
again.
"You don't dare to!" she laughed, wildly. "You don't dare, because you
know he'll kill you, This time he won't just knock you down. He'll KILL
you! He'll never let you hit me again. I know it. He's HERE! You don't
dare touch me! You won't ever dare touch me! He--"
She choked, in her shout of weird exultation. The man, ridden by his
racial superstition, stared open-mouthed at the tiny demon who
screeched defiance at him.
And, there, in the dim shadows of the barn, his overwrought fancy
seemed to make out a grim formless Thing, close at the child's side;
crouching in silent menace.
The heat of the day--the shock of seeing Lad appear from nowhere and
stand thus, by the veranda, a few minutes earlier--these and the
once-timid Sonya's confident belief in Lad's presence,--all wrought on
the stupid, easily-thrilled mind of the Slav.
"The werewolf!" he babbled; throwing down the belt, and bolting out
into the friendly sunlight.
"The werewolf! I--I saw it! I--at least--God of Russia, what DID I see?
What did SHE see?"
Over a magnificent lifeless body on the veranda bent the two who had
loved Lad best and whom he had served so worshipfully for sixteen
years. The Mistress's face was wet with tears she did not try to check.
In the Master's throat was a lump that made speech painful. For the
tenth time he leaned down and laid his fingers above the still heart of
the dog; seeking vainly for sign of fluttering.
"No use!" he said, thickly, harking back by instinct to a
half-remembered phrase. "The engine has broken down."
"No," quoted the sobbing Mistress, wiser than he. "'The engineer has
left it.'"
THE END
End of Project Gutenberg's Further Adventures of Lad, by Albert Payson Terhune