His Dog | Page 7

assuredly, was not black
and white. So the advertisement could not possibly refer to him. The
reverend gentleman, not being a dog fancier, of course had no means of
knowing that "sable", in collie jargon, means practically every shade of
color except black or gray or white.
Link was ashamed of his own delight in finding he need not give up his
pet--even for seventy-five dollars. He tried to recall his father's
invectives against dogs, and to remind himself that another mouth to
feed on the farm must mean still sharper poverty and skimping. But
logic could not strangle joy, and life took on a new zest for the lonely
man.
By the time Chum could limp around on the fasthealing foreleg, he and
Link had established a friendship that was a boon to both and a stark
astonishment to Ferris.
Link had always loved animals. He had an inborn "way" with them.
Yet his own intelligence had long since taught him that his "farm
critters" responded but dully to his attempts at a more perfect
understanding.
He knew, for example, that the horse he had bred and reared and had
taught to come at his call, would doubtless suffer the first passing
stranger to mount him and ride him away, despite any call from his
lifelong master. He knew that his presence, to the cattle and sheep,
meant only food or a shift of quarters; and that an outsider could drive
or tend them as readily as could he on whose farm they had been born.
Their possible affection for him was a hazy thing, based solely on what
he fed them and on their occasional mild interest in being petted.
But with Chum it was all different. The dog learned quickly his new
master's moods and met them in kind. The few simple tricks Link
sought to teach him were grasped with bewildering ease. There was a
human quality of sympathy and companionship which radiated almost
visibly from Chum. His keen collie brain was forever amazing Ferris
by its flashes of perception. The dog was a revelation and an endless
source of pleasure to the hermit-farmer.
When Chum was whole of his hurt and when the injured leg had knit so

firmly that the last trace of lameness was gone, Link fell to recalling his
father's preachments as to the havoc wrought by dogs upon sheep. He
could not afford to lose the leanest and toughest of his little sheep
flock--even as price for the happiness of owning a comrade. Link
puzzled sorely over this.
Then one morning it occurred to him to put the matter up to Chum
himself. Hitherto he had kept the dog around the house, except on their
daily walks; and he had always tied him when driving the sheep to or
from pasture. This morning he took the collie along when he went out
to release the tiny flock from their barnyard fold and send them out to
graze.
Link opened the fold gate, one hand on Chum's collar. Out billowed the
sheep in a ragged scramble. Chum quivered with excitement as the
woolly catapults surged past him. Eagerly he looked up into his
master's face, then back at the tumbling creatures.
"Chum!" spoke Ferris sharply. "Leave 'em be! Get that? LEAVE 'EM
BE!"
He tightened his hold on the collar as he gave the command. Chum
ceased to quiver in eagerness and stood still, half puzzled, half grieved
by the man's unwonted tone.
The sheep, at sight and smell of the dog, rushed jostlingly from their
pen and scattered in every direction, through barnyard and garden and
nearer fields. Bleating and stampeding, they ran. Link Ferris blinked
after them, and broke into speech. Loudly and luridly he swore.
This stampede might well mean an hour's running to and fro before the
scattered flock could be herded once more. An hour of panting and
blasphemous pursuit, at the very outset of an overbusy day. And all
because of one worthless dog.
His father had been right. Link saw that--now that it was too late. A
dog had no place on a farm. A poor man could not afford the silly
luxury of a useless pet. With whistle and call Ferris sought to check the
flight of the flock. But, as every farmer knows, there is nothing else on
earth quite so unreasonable and idiotic as a scared sheep. The familiar
summons did not slacken nor swerve the stampede.
The fact that this man had been their protector and friend made no
difference to the idiotic sheep. They were frightened. And, therefore,
the tenuously thin connecting line between them and their human

master had snapped. For the moment they were merely wild animals,
and he was a member of a hostile race--almost as much as was