Further Adventures of Lad | Page 9

be coaxed into coming to play with
him every night--!
But presently he noted that the other seemed to have wearied of the
game. After plunging through the air and landing on all fours with his
grasping hands closing on nothingness, the man had remained thus, as
if dazed, for a second or so. Then he had felt the ground all about him.

Then, bewildered, he had scrambled to his feet. Now he was standing,
moveless, his lips working.
Yes, he seemed to be tired of the lovely game;--and just when Laddie
was beginning to enter into the full spirit of it. Once in a while, the
Mistress or the Master stopped playing, during the romps with the
flannel doll. And Laddie had long since hit on a trick for reviving their
interest. He employed this ruse now.
As the man stood, puzzled and scared, something brushed very
lightly,-even coquettishly,--against his knuckles. He started in nervous
fright. An instant later, the same thing brushed his knuckles again, this
time more insistently. The man, in a spurt of fear-driven rage, grabbed
at the invisible object. His fingers slipped along the smooth sides of the
bewitched bag that Lad was shoving invitingly at him.
Brief as was the contact, it was long enough for the thief's sensitive
finger tips to recognize what they touched. And both hands were
brought suddenly into play, in a mad snatch for the prize. The ten avid
fingers missed the bag; and came together with clawing force. But,
before they met, the finger tips of the left hand telegraphed to the man's
brain that they had had momentary light experience with something
hairy and warm, --something that had slipped, eel-like, past them into
the night;--something that most assuredly was no satchel, but ALIVE!
The man's throat contracted, in gagging fright. And, as before, fear
scourged him to feverish rage.
Recklessly he pressed the flashlight's button; and swung the muffled
bar of light in every direction. In his other hand he leveled the pistol he
had drawn. This time the shaded ray revealed to him not only his bag,
but,--vaguely,--the Thing that held it.
He could not make out what manner of creature it was which gripped
the satchel's handle and whose eyes pulsed back greenish flares into the
torch's dim glow. But it was an animal of some kind;--distorted and
formless in the wavering finger of blunted light; but still an animal. Not
a ghost.
And fear departed. The intruder feared nothing mortal. The mystery in
part explained, he did not bother to puzzle out the remainder of it.
Impossible as it seemed, his bag was carried by some living thing. All
that remained for him was to capture the thing, and recover his bag.
The weak light still turned on, he gave chase.

Lad's spirits arose with a bound. His ruse had succeeded. He had
reawakened in this easily-discouraged chum a new interest in the game.
And he gamboled across the lawn, fairly wriggling with delight. He did
not wish to make his friend lose interest again. So instead of dashing
off at full speed, he frisked daintily, just out of reach of the clawing
hand.
And in this pleasant fashion the two playfellows covered a hundred
yards of ground. More than once, the man came within an inch of his
quarry. But always, by the most imperceptible spurt of speed, Laddie
arranged to keep himself and his dear satchel from capture.
Then, in no time at all, the game ended; and with it ended Lad's baby
faith in the friendliness and trustworthiness of all human nature.
Realizing that the sound of his own stumblingly running feet and the
intermittent flashes of his torch might well awaken some light sleeper
in the house, the thief resolved on a daring move. This creature in front
of him,--dog or bear or goat, or whatever it was,--was uncatchable. But
by sending a bullet through it, he could bring the animal to a sudden
and permanent stop.
Then, snatching up his bag and running at top speed, be himself could
easily win clear of the Place before anyone of the household should
appear. And his car would be a mile away before the neighborhood
could be aroused. Fury at the weird beast and the wrenching strain on
his own nerves lent eagerness to his acceptance of the idea.
He reached back again for his pistol, whipped it out, and, coming to a
standstill, aimed at the pup. Lad, waiting only to bound over an
obstruction in his path, came to a corresponding pause, not ten feet
ahead of his playmate.
It was an easy shot. Yet the bullet went several inches above the
obligingly waiting dog's back. Nine men out of ten, shooting by
moonlight or by flashlight, aim too high. The