Twice more the dog threw himself through the air and twice more the Japanese moved just enough to let him slide by while he whacked him on the nose. Graceful! Well, I never saw anything like it. And cool! He was that cool you could almost feel a chilly breeze blowing off him.
That dog was mad. He didn’t seem to understand just how it happened he wasn’t chewing the man, and the more he thought about it the madder he got. But he saw that just going it blind and leaping for the man’s throat wasn’t going to do him any good. He crouched for a minute and then began to creep ahead, slow, slow. The Jap stood grinning down at him and talking all the time.
“Naughty big dog. What for do you bite to eat me? Must I box-fight you on the nose? Ho! You jump so slow. You must jump with more fastness if you catch me. Make jumping now. Come!”
But the dog didn’t jump. He crawled nearer and nearer, but the man didn’t move. Of a sudden, before I had any idea what he was going to do, the dog rushed, but this time he didn’t jump. He came close to the floor and straight for the Jap’s legs. I was looking right at that man, but he moved so fast I couldn’t follow him. The next thing I knew the dog was rolling over and yowling, for the Jap had suddenly shifted somehow and kicked the dog right under the chin with a kick like a flash of lightning. He had a chance to run out and slam the door then, but he didn’t move—just stood there and grinned at Mr. Dog.
Well, sir, that dog went crazy. He yelled and made another spring. This time the man bent backward and cut the dog just behind the ears with the edge of his hand. It was the same blow some folks use to kill rabbits. It stopped that jump right in the middle, and the dog slumped down to the floor limp and kind of dazed, for he laid there a few seconds, growling low in his throat, and acting like he wasn’t quite sure whether he was a dog or a sack of potatoes.
But he had courage, that dog. He didn’t quit. He struggled up to his feet and started in again. This time Mr. Jap stood with his back to the bay-window, and when the dog jumped he went down on one knee, letting the dog go right over his head. But he didn’t wait for him to go way over. He rose right up in the middle of that dog and heaved with his arms and his back, and the dog just turned a cart-wheel in the air and went smash! through glass and window-sash and everything. Out he went, bag and baggage. And he didn’t try to come back. He was satisfied.
The Jap looked out of the window to see the dog pick himself up and limp away; then he turned to us with the grin still on his face and says:
“The dog he learn how to know better, I feel unreasonable certain.”
“Yes,” says Mark, “I calc’late he’s added to h-his education some.”
“I have gone through your hotel from the beginning of it to the opposite endings, but there is not anywhere therein a Japanese boy. I am surprised with astonishment. He came by toward this way in a similar direction. Maybe he makes a hiding in the woods. But I am much obliged with thankfulness to you, to be sure. Now good day and pleasant fishings to you. Yours very truly.”