"If you will hold up the shafts and pull a little, I'll push behind, and we can take the buggy through the woods. After we get it up out of this hollow, and well into the road, it will be down-hill the rest of the way."
"You want to make a horse of me, do ye?" cried the boy. "I wasn't born in a stable!"
"Neither was I," said Jack. "But I don't object to doing a horse's work. I'll pull in the shafts."
"O good!" screamed the boy, making his switch whistle about his head. "And I'll get on the seat and drive!" And he made a spring at the wagon.
But Lion had something to say about that. Having been placed on guard, and not yet relieved, he would permit no hand but his master's to touch anything in his charge. A frightful growl made the boy recoil and go backwards over the dead deer.
"Here, Lion! down with you!" cried Jack, as the excited dog was pouncing on the supposed intruder.
The boy scrambled to his feet, and was starting to run away, in great terror, when Jack, fearing to lose him, called out,—
"Don't run! He may chase you if you do. Now he knows you are my friend, you are safe, only stay where you are."
"Blast his pictur'!" exclaimed the boy. "He's a perfect cannibal! What does anybody want to keep such a savage critter as that for?"
"I had told him to watch. Now he is all right. Come!"