Part 38 (1/2)

”He's the finest rabbit dog ever was, Ma! Oh, golly, he can follow a trail! I never see anything like it, Ma, I never did! I'll skin 'em an'

clean 'em after supper. You ought to have saw him, Ma! Golly!”

And while he chopped the wood and milked the cow and fed the mule, and skinned the rabbits, he saw other days ahead like this, and whistled and sang and talked to the hound, who followed close at his heels every step he took.

Then one afternoon, while he was patching the lot fence, with Buck sunning himself near the woodpile, came Old Man Th.o.r.n.ycroft. Davy recognized his buggy as it turned the bend in the road. He quickly dropped his tools, called Buck to him and got behind the house where he could see without being seen. The buggy stopped in the road, and the old man, his hard, pinched face working, his buggy whip in his hand, came down the walk and called Mrs. Alien out on the porch.

”I just come to tell you,” he cried, ”that your boy Davy run off with my dog las' Friday evenin'! There ain't no use to deny it. I know all about it. I seen him when he pa.s.sed in front of the house. I found the block I had chained to the dog beside the road. I heered Squire Jim Kirby talkin' to some men in Tom Belcher's sto' this very mornin'; just happened to overhear him as I come in. 'A boy an' a dog,' he says, 'is the happiest combination in nater.' Then he went on to tell about your boy an' a tan dog. He had met 'em in the road. Met 'em when? Last Friday evenin'. Oh, there ain't no use to deny it, Mrs. Allen! Your boy Davy--he _stole_ my dog!”

”Mr. Th.o.r.n.ycroft”--Davy could not see his mother, but he could hear her voice tremble--”he did _not_ know whose dog it was!”

”He didn't? He didn't?” yelled the old man. ”An' him a boy that knows ever' dog for ten miles around! Right in front of my house, I tell you--that's where he picked him up--that's where he tolled him off!

Didn't I tell you, woman, I seen him pa.s.s? Didn't I tell you I found he block down the road? Didn't know whose dog it was? Ridiculous, ridiculous! Call him, ask him, face him with it. Likely he'll lie--but you'll see his face. Call him, that's all I ask. Call him!”

”Davy!” called Mrs. Allen. ”Davy!”

Just a moment the boy hesitated. Then he went around the house. The hound stuck very close to him, eyes full of terror, tail tucked as he looked at the old man.

”There he is--with my dog!” cried the old man. ”You didn't know whose dog it was, did you, son? Eh? You didn't know, now, did you?”

”Yes!” cried the boy ”I knowed!”

”Hear that, Mrs. Allen? Did he know? What do you say now? He stole my dog, didn't he? That's what he done, didn't he? Answer me, woman! You come here!” he yelled, his face livid, and started, whip raised, toward boy and dog.

There were some smooth white stones the size of hen eggs arranged around a flower bed in the yard, and Davy stood near these stones--and now, quick as a flash, he stooped down and picked one up.

”You stop!” he panted, his face very white.

His mother cried out and came running toward him, but Th.o.r.n.ycroft had stopped. No man in his right mind wants to advance on a country boy with a rock. Goliath tried it once.

”All right!” screamed the old man. ”You steal first--then you try to a.s.sault an old man! I didn't come here to raise no row. I just came hear to warn you, Mrs. Allen. I'll have the law on that boy--I'll have the law on him before another sun sets!”

He turned and hurried toward the buggy. Davy dropped the rock. Mrs.

Allen stood looking at the old miser, who was clambering into his buggy, with a sort of horror. Then she ran toward the boy.

”Oh, Davy! run after him. Take the dog to him. He's terrible, Davy, terrible! Run after him--anything--anything!”

But the boy looked up at her with grim mouth and hard eyes.

”I ain't a-goin' to do it, Ma!” he said.

It was after supper that very night that the summons came. Bob Kelley, rural policeman, brought it.

”Me an' Squire Kirby went to town this mornin',” he said, ”to look up some things about court in the mornin.' This evenin' we run into Old Man Th.o.r.n.ycroft on the street, lookin' for us. He was awful excited. He had been to Mr. Kirby's house, an' found out Mr. Kirby was in town, an'

followed us. He wanted a warrant swore out right there. Mr. Kirby tried to argue with him, but it warn't no use. So at last Mr. Kirby turned to me. 'You go on back, Bob,' he said. 'This'll give me some more lookin'

up to do. Tell my wife I'll just spend the night with Judge Fowler, an'

git back in time for court in Belcher's sto' in the mornin'. An', Bob, you just stop by Mrs. Allen's--she's guardian of the boy--an' tell her I say to bring him to Belcher's sto' to-morrow mornin' at nine. You be there, too, Mr. Th.o.r.n.ycroft--an,' by the way, bring that block of wood you been talkin' about.”

That was all the squire had said, declared the rural policeman. No, he hadn't sent any other message--just said he would read up on the case.

The rural policeman went out and closed the door behind him. It had been informal, hap-hazard, like the life of the community in which they lived. But, for all that, the law had knocked at the door of the Widow Allen, and left a white-faced mother and a bewildered boy behind.

They tried to resume their usual employments. Mrs. Allen sat down beside the table, picked up her sewing and put her gla.s.ses on, but her hands trembled when she tried to thread the needle. Davy sat on a split-bottom chair in the corner, his feet up on the rungs, and tried to be still; but his heart was pounding fast and there was a lump in his throat.