“I’ll steal a bunch of carrots for you from some vegetable stand,” he barked back.
Billy fussed and fussed and kicked around until the cabin looked as if a whole drove of kicking mules had been shut in it. Then all of a sudden he stopped and said to himself,
“What a fool I am, kicking and butting things around here! Why don’t I butt down that old door? It will be easy to do and then I too can go up into the city.”
To think was to do with Billy. And crash! went the door and out through the wreck went Billy. When he arrived at the top of the hatchway he met One-Eyed Dick coming down to see what had caused all the noise. On seeing Billy, he tried to shut the hatchway to keep Billy in by sitting on it. But the next thing he knew the door was lifted up under him and he found himself slipping off. Before he could get to his feet Billy was out and off the boat, and that was the last he saw of Billy for that day.
Duke had just reached the front door of his old home when who should come out of the house but his old master, the one who had taken him to war with him and made him a Red Cross dog.
“Duke, you old sport, where have you been and how did you happen to turn up here just now when I was returning to the front and planning to stop at the dog hospital to get you?”
His master picked him up in his arms and hugged and hugged him until Duke thought his ribs would be crushed in.
“I am so glad you came for now I shall not have to go out of my way to get you. We are on the eve of a big battle and we will both be needed at the front.”
“Here is where I give up going to America,” thought Duke. “But it is all for the best, for since I have seen my old master again and found how he loves me, I think it would have been a mean trick to desert him while he is in danger of his life every moment. But I do wish I could have gone back first and said good-by to Billy, Stubby and Button. They are the three finest friends a dog ever had.”