“Bloodhounds! And they’ve loosed them! Oh, me darlin’ colleen! Ill to me that I let ye go wanderin’ thus with that miserable Eyetalian! But I’m comin’! Tim’s comin’!” he yelled, adding his own part to the wild chorus above.
He reached the broad paved space before the great door none too soon, and though, ordinarily, he would have given the yelping hounds a very wide berth, he did not hesitate now. Huddled together in a group, with the frantic animals bounding and barking all around them, though as yet not touching them, stood the terrified Luigi and his friends; realizing what vagrancy means in this “land of the free,” and how even to earn an honest living one should never dare to “trespass.”
But even as Timothy forced his stalwart frame between the children and the dogs, the great door opened and a white-haired gentleman came hurrying out. Thrusting a silver whistle to his lips he blew upon it shrilly, and almost instantly the uproar ceased, and the three hounds sprang to his side, fawning upon him, eager for his commendation. Instead of praise, however, they were given the word of command and crouched beside him, licking their jaws and expectant, seemingly, of a further order to pounce upon the intruders.
“Who loosed the dogs?” demanded the gentleman, in a clear-ringing, indignant tone.
Now that he seemed displeased by their too solicitous obedience, none of the gathering servants laid claim to it; and while all stood waiting, arrested in their attitudes of fear or defense, a curious thing happened. Glory Beck threw off the protecting arms of Timothy Dowd and, with Bonny Angel clasped close in her own, swiftly advanced to the granite step where the white-haired gentleman stood. Her face that had paled in fear now flushed in excitement as with a voice unlike her own she cried:
“You, sir! You, sir! What have you done with my grandfather?”
The gentleman stared at her, thinking her fright had turned her brain; but saying kindly, as soon as he could command his voice:
“There, child. It’s all right. The dogs won’t touch you now.”
“The dogs!” retorted the child, in infinite scorn. “What do I care for the dogs? It’s you I want. You, that ‘Snug-Harbor’-Bonnicastle-man who coaxed my grandpa Simon Beck away from his own home an’ never let him come back any more!”
Then her anger subsiding into an intensity of longing, she threw herself at his feet, clasping his knees and imploring, piteously: