One night I got very late to Marsfield by the last train, and, letting myself in with my key, I found Chucker‑out waiting for me in the hall, and apparently in a very anxious frame of mind, and extremely demonstrative, wanting to say something more than usual—to confide a trouble, to confess!
We went up into the big music‑room, which was still lighted, and lay on a couch together; he, with his head on my knees, whimpering softly as I smoked and read a paper.
Presently Leah came in and said:
"Such an unfortunate thing happened; Marty and Chucker‑out were playing on the slope, and he knocked her down and sprained her knee."
As soon as Chucker‑out heard Marty's name he sat up and whined piteously, and pawed me down with great violence; pawed three buttons off my waistcoat and broke my watch‑chain—couldn't be comforted; the misadventure had been preying on his mind for hours.
I give this subject to Mr. Briton Riviere, who can paint both dogs and children, and everything else he likes. I will sit for him myself, if he wishes, and as a Catholic priest! He might call it a confession—and an absolution! or, "The Secrets of the Confessional."
The good dog became more careful in future, and restrained his exuberance even going down‑stairs with Marty on the way to a ramble in the woods, which excited him more than anything; if he came down‑stairs with anybody else, the violence of his joy was such that one had to hold on by the banisters. He was a dear, good beast, and a splendid body‑guard for Marty in her solitary woodland rambles—never left her side for a second. I have often watched him from a distance, unbeknown to both; he was proud of his responsibility—almost fussy about it.
I have been fond of many dogs, but never yet loved a dog as I loved big Chucker‑out—or Choucroûte, as Coralie, the French maid, called him, to Fräulein Werner's annoyance (Choucroûte is French for sauerkraut); and I like to remember him in his splendid prime, guarding his sweet little mistress, whom I loved better than anything else on earth. She was to me a kind of pet Marjorie, and said such droll and touching things that I could almost fill a book with them. I kept a diary on purpose, and called it Martiana.
She was tall, but lamentably thin and slight, poor dear, with her mother's piercing black eyes and the very fair curly locks of her papa—a curious and most effective contrast—and features and a complexion of such extraordinary delicacy and loveliness that it almost gave one pain in the midst of the keen pleasure one had in the mere looking at her.
Heavens! how that face would light up suddenly at catching the unexpected sight of some one she was fond of! How often it has lighted up at the unexpected sight of "Uncle Bob"! The mere remembrance of that sweet illumination brightens my old age for me now; and I could almost wish her back again, in my senile selfishness and inconsistency. Pazienza!