"No," said Mr. Black, "this is Terrible Tim, the watchdog. Stationed at this point, he'll keep all intruders at bay."
Terrible Tim, however, looked the mildest of beasts by this time, for with quills lowered, he was cowering bashfully among the shrubbery.
CHAPTER XIX
A Belated Traveler
A BRILLIANT moon had aided Dave in the latter portion of his journey to Lakeville. The following night, a similarly illumined sky was of great assistance to another solitary wayfarer, for the man in leather leggings, misdirected that morning by Mabel and Henrietta, was laboriously making his way back toward Pete's Patch. Before he had quite reached the end of the unspeakable road over which the girls had sent him, he had met a camping fisherman who had given him explicit directions for finding Mr. Black's land.
At ten o'clock that night, having at last reached Barclay's Point, he urged his patient horse along the beach until he came to the embers of a dying camp fire, and noted, on the bank above, a number of white tents gleaming like ghosts in the moonlight. Tying his weary steed to a convenient log, the man, very stiff and sore from his long ride, clambered up the sand bank, only to fall prone at the top over a strange and most alarmingly prickly object that stood directly in his path.
Rising with considerable difficulty and separating himself as speedily as possible from Terrible Tim, who was emitting queer, frightened grunts, the surprised traveler moved cautiously along the path, shouting, in a voice that quavered persistently in spite of his manly efforts to control it:
"Mr. Black! Oh, Mr. Bla—ack!"
Mr. Black, only half awake, sat up to listen. The call came again.