George said he would, and he did.
It so befell one day, as the fruit of this comradeship, that George changed the channel of Anna Marie's manly determination, and caused her to abandon the rôle of a new woman. This is the story, and it all taught Anna Marie, with the rush of a landslide, that, however industriously she might prune and train her habits to the trellis of the male, she would never be able to bring her nature to that state of icy, egotistical, cold-blooded hardihood absolutely necessary to the perfect man, and therefore indispensable to the new woman. But the story.
“Anna Marie,” said George, coming on her one day, “Anna Marie, me and Billy Sweet wants you.”
“What is it, George?” asked Anna Marie.
“We're going to hang a dog out back of the barn,” explained George. “Me and Billy are to be the jury, and we want you for judge. Hurry up, now! that's a good fellow!”
Anna Marie felt a shock at thought of taking the life of anything. Her first feeling was that George was a brute—a mere animal himself. But Anna Marie quickly reflected, that, whatever George might be, at least his hardened sex was the promontory the new woman must steer by. She put down the garment she was sewing and sought the scene of canine trial.
“You see, Anna Marie!” explained George, pointing to a saffron-coloured dog, which stood with dolorous tail between his legs and looked very repentant, “he murdered a kitten, and we are going to try to convict and hang him. You sit down there by the fence, and the trial won't take a minute. Billy and me have got our minds made up, and we won't take no time to decide. There's the rope, and we're going to hang him to the limb of that maple.”
Anna Marie felt worried. Still, she allowed herself to be installed, and the trial proceeded. It was very brief. George produced the defunct kitten,—which looked indeed, very dead,—with the remark, “Say, you yellow dog! you're charged with murdering this cat; have you got anything to say against being hung?”
The yellow cur feebly wagged his disreputable tail, and looked at Anna Marie in a fashion of sneaking appeal. He said as plain as words: “Save me!”
“I wouldn't hang the poor thing, George,” said Anna Marie, and she began to pat the felon yellow cur.