Spring came on, and the quiet bungalow was all a-voice with loud talk,
the creaking of wheels, and the stamping of people moving heavy things.
The owners had arrived from the city, a whole merry troop of grown-up
people, of half-grown ups and children, all intoxicated with the air,
the warmth and the light. Some shouted, some sang, and some laughed
with shrill female voices.
The first with whom the dog made acquaintance was a pretty girl, who
ran out into the garden in a formal, cinnamon-coloured dress.[3]
Greedily and impatiently desiring to seize and hug in her embrace
everything visible, she looked at the clear sky, at the reddish cherry
twigs, and lay quickly down on the grass with her face towards the
burning sun. Then she got up again as suddenly, and hugging herself,
and kissing the Spring air with her fresh lips, said expressively and
seriously:
“Well, this _is_ jolly!”
She spoke, and then suddenly turned round. At this very moment the dog
noiselessly approached, and furiously seized the extended skirt of her
dress in its teeth and tore it, and then as noiselessly disappeared
into the thick gooseberry and currant bushes.
“Oh! bad dog!” cried the girl, running away, and for long might be
heard her agitated voice: “Mamma! children! don’t go into the garden.
There is a dog there, such a great, big, fierce one!”
At night the dog crept up to the sleeping bungalow, and noiselessly lay
down in its place under the verandah. It smelt of people, and through
the open windows was borne the soft sound of gentle breathing. The
people were asleep, they were powerless and no longer terrible, and the
dog jealously guarded them. He slept with one eye open, and at every
rustle stretched out his head with its two motionless phosphorescent
eyes. But the alarming noises were so many in the sensitive Spring
night: in the grass something small and unseen rustled, and came quite
close to the shiny nose of the dog; last year’s twigs crackled under
the feet of sleeping birds, and on the neighbouring road a cart
rumbled, and heavily-laden wains creaked. And afar off round about in
the motionless air was diffused the sweet, fresh scent of resin, and
lured one into the lightening distance.
The owners who had arrived at the bungalow were very kind people, and
all the more so now that they were far from the city, breathing pure
air, seeing around them everything green, and blue and harmless. The
sunlight went into them in warmth, and came out again in laughter and
goodwill towards all things living. At first they wished to drive away
the dog, of which they were afraid, and even shot at it with a
revolver, when it would not take itself off; but later they became
accustomed to its barking at night, and even sometimes remembered it in
the morning:
“But where’s our Snapper?”
And this new name “Snapper” stuck to it. Sometimes even by day they
would notice among the bushes its dark body, which would fall flat on
the ground at the first motion of a hand throwing bread—as though it
were a stone, not bread,—and soon all became accustomed to Snapper, and
called him “our dog,” and joked about the cause of his shyness and
unreasonable fear. Each day Snapper diminished by one step the distance
which separated him from the people; he grew accustomed to their faces,
and adopted their habits. Half an hour before dinner he would be
already standing in the shrubs, blinking with a conciliatory air. And
that same little schoolgirl it was, who, forgetting the former outrage,
brought the dog definitely into the happy circle of cheerful, restful
people.
“Snapper, come here,” said she, calling him. “Good dog, come here. Do
you like sugar? I’ll give you a lump. Come along, then.”
But Snapper would not come; he was afraid. Then cautiously patting her
knee, and speaking with all the caressing kindness of a beautiful voice
and a pretty face, Lelya approached the dog, but was in her turn
afraid; suddenly he snapped.
“I am so fond of you, Snapper, dear; you have such a nice little nose,
and such expressive eyes. Won’t you trust me, Snapperkin?”
Lelya raised her eyebrows, and her own little nose was so pretty and
her eyes so expressive, that the sun acted wisely in covering all her
little youthful, naïvely charming face with hot kisses, till her cheeks
were red.
Snapper for the second time in his life turned on his back and closed
his eyes, not knowing for a certainty whether he was to be kicked or
petted. But he was petted. Small warm hands touched irresolutely his
woolly head, and as though this were a sign of undeniable authority,
began freely and boldly to run over the whole of his hairy body,
rumpling, petting, and tickling.
“Mamma! children! look here, I’m petting Snapper,” cried Lelya.
When the children ran up, noisy, loud-voiced, quick and bright as drops
of uncontrollable mercury, Snapper cowed down in fear and helpless
expectancy: he knew that if any one struck him now, he would no longer
be in a position to fix his sharp teeth in the body of the offender:
his unappeasable malice had been taken from him. And when they all
began to vie in caressing him, he for a long time could not help
trembling at each touch of the caressing hand, and the unwonted
fondling hurt him as though it had been a blow.
[3] Such as is worn by schoolgirls and girl students.—TV.]