For an instant Sam clutched the pillow as if he would obey the command; but Tim had his arms around Tip’s neck, ready to save him from any injury, even if he was obliged to suffer himself.
“Why don’t you drive him out?” cried Mrs. Simpson, after she had vainly waited to hear the sound of her son’s battle with the animal.
“Why—why—why—” stammered Sam, at a loss to know what to say, and trembling with fear.
“Are you afraid of him?”
“No, marm,” was the faltering reply.
“Then why don’t you do as I tell you?”
“Why—why, Tim won’t let me,” cried Sam, now so frightened that he hardly knew what he did say.
“Why, what’s the matter with the boy?” Tim heard the good woman say; and then the sound of rapid footsteps on the stairs told that she was coming to make a personal investigation.
Sam, in a tremor of fear, rolled over on his face and buried his head in the pillow, as if by such a course he could shelter himself from the storm he expected was about to break upon him.