“He never turned on anybody when I was with him,” said Squib; “though I know people called him fierce. But Moor is very good and gentle. You should have seen how he took care of Seppi.”
And then Squib went to his room, nurse coming with him to help him to unpack a few things that he was anxious about, and to get to bed; and whilst she did this he told her the story of little Seppi, and how good and faithful Moor had always been. So that nurse was quite reconciled to the idea of a nursery dog, and Moor slept contentedly at the night-nursery door, with his eyes (when he was awake) on that of his little master’s room.
How exciting it was, waking up the next morning, to find himself really at home!
Squib leaped out of bed the moment he thoroughly realized this, and began dressing in great haste, without even looking at his precious watch. When he did look at it at last, he found it was only six o’clock.
“But never mind,” he said to himself; “I shall have all the more time to see everything.”
Moor jumped eagerly up when his master appeared, and was delighted to accompany him out of doors.
“Things have a different smell here,” was Squib’s first thought as he let himself out into the fresh, morning air; “I should know I wasn’t in Switzerland by that. I wonder if Moor notices the difference.”
Moor was at any rate immensely interested in this place, which Squib was careful to explain to him was his home now. He raced hither and thither, with his nose to the ground, and sniffed eagerly at everything.
Squib’s first journey was to the paddock where Charger was generally to be found when he was turned out. The nights had been so warm that he did not think he would have been taken in for shelter; and when he neared the place, sure enough there was Charger quietly cropping the dewy grass, and flicking off the flies with his tail; but as Squib ran forward, calling out his name, he threw up his head, and came trotting up to the fence.
“Good old Charger! nice old horse!” cried Squib, caressing the soft nose and feeding his favourite with lumps of sugar from his pocket. He had brought home some of the funny French sugar on purpose for Charger, and very much the good horse seemed to like it.