"You've put the Indian sign on him, all right," said French, the Devonshire man. "It must have taken some doing to lick him into that shape."
"There's no Indian sign about it, old man," said Dick. "It isn't any lambasting Jan's afraid of. You watch his face now, when I lift this stick."
The men all watched, and noted that Jan did not move so much as an eyelid in response to the lifting of a stick.
"Well, that's queer," said old Cartier, the French-Canadian dealer, who was visiting a friend in the barracks. "Don't seem as though that dog ever was licked."
"And so far as I know," said Dick, "he never has been. But, mind you, that's not to say he never will be. I'd never hesitate to thrash a dog if he deserved it, and thrash him good and hard, too. But so far Master Jan has never asked for lickings. Have you Jan? That's why he's not afraid of a stick; for I'd never hit a dog or a horse unless really to punish him, so that he'd know it was a thrashing—not just a bit of bad luck for him, or temper in me."
"H'm! I believe you could get two hundred an' feefty dollar for that dog, up north," said Cartier, musingly; "maybe three hundred, if you broke him to harness."
Dick smiled quietly, and nodded.
"No, no," said O'Malley, the man of Cork; "he's going to stay right here an' be our mascot. Aren't ye, Jan?" And Jan affably signified his agreement.
"That's all right," said French, knocking his pipe out against the heel of his boot. "But what's going to happen to-morrow when Sergeant Moore gets back with his Sourdough? You'll see some fun then, I fancy. Old Sourdough's been boss dog around here a goodish while now, you know. He won't stand for having this chap put his nose out of joint. And, mind you, there's no dog in Regina can cock his tail at Sourdough. I saw him knock the stuffing out of that big sheep-dog of MacDougall's last year, and I tell you he'd have buried the sheep-dog before he left him, if Sergeant Moore hadn't managed to get a halter through his collar and pretty near choked him. It was a close thing; an' they reckoned the sheep-dog had never met his master till then."
"Yep, that's a fact," said another man. "There'll be trouble with Sourdough if you're not careful, Vaughan. He's a demon of a dog, an', by gee! he's sourer than his boss, an' that's saying something."