“There you are, Donald,” said Mrs. Cressey, at last. “You can hardly tell where he was cut. Your birthday Dog is as good as ever.”
“Oh, Mother! I’m so glad!” cried the little boy. “Now I can play with him and have fun.”
The Woolly Dog was glad to feel himself in Donald’s arms again, and he hoped Jane would let him alone.
“But, all the same,” thought the Woolly Dog to himself, “there is a queer, ticklish feeling inside me. I’m not the same Dog I was before, and I know it. That queer, tickling feeling—I wonder what it is?”
But there seemed no way of finding out.
When Donald’s father came home that evening the new toy was shown to him, and he was told what Jane had done. Jane was a little ashamed of herself and hung her head.
“I not hurt your Doggie any more, Don,” she promised.
That evening, after supper, the two children played with their toys, and Donald even let Jane hold his Woolly Dog for a while. And Jane was very careful.
“But it’s the funniest thing about that tickling feeling inside my ribs,” thought the Dog to himself. “I didn’t have it before Jane cut me open.
“I guess some of my cotton stuffing didn’t get put back just straight, as it was before,” he thought. “Well, no matter, I suppose I ought to consider myself lucky not to be in the hospital.”