But, for all his burst of speed, he was too late to avenge; even as he had been too late to save. By the time he could reach the spot where Lady lay crumpled and moveless in the ditch, the runabout had gathered full speed and was disappearing down the bend of the highway.
After it flew Lad, silent, terrible,—not stopping to realize that the fleetest dog,—even with all four of his legs in commission,—cannot hope to overhaul a motor-car driven at fifty miles an hour.
But, at the end of a furious quarter-mile, his wise brain took charge once more of his vengeance-craving heart. He halted, snarled hideously after the vanished car, and limped miserably back to the scene of the tragedy.
There, he found the Mistress sitting in the roadside dust, Lady's head in her lap. She was smoothing lovingly the soft rumpled fur; and was trying hard not to cry over the inert warm mass of gold-and-white fluffiness which, two minutes earlier, had been a beautiful thoroughbred collie, vibrant with life and fun and lovableness.
The Master had risen from his brief inspection of his pet's fatal injuries. Scowling down the road, he yearned to kick himself for his stupidity in failing to note the Juggernaut's number.
Head and tail a-droop, Lad toiled back to where Lady was lying. A queer low sound, strangely like a human sob, pulsed in his shaggy throat, as he bent down and touched his dead mate's muzzle with his own. Then, huddling close beside her, he reverted all at once to a trait of his ancestors, a thousand generations back.
Sitting on his haunches and lifting his pointed nose to the summer sky, he gave vent to a series of long-drawn wolf howls; horrible to hear. There was no hint of a housebred twentieth century dog in his lament. It was the death-howl of the primitive wolf;—a sound that sent an involuntary shiver through the two humans who listened aghast to their chum's awesome mourning for his lost mate.
The Master made as though to say something,—in comfort or in correction. The Mistress, wiser, motioned to him not to speak.
In a few seconds, Lad rose wearily to his feet; the spasm of primal grief having spent itself. Once more he was himself; sedate, wise, calm.
Limping over to where the car had halted so briefly, he cast about the ground, after the manner of a bloodhound.