Phyllis Harrington, rather regretfully, hooked a dog-chain to the porch railing of the cottage she and her husband had just hired. It was an entirely unnecessary part of the family bull-terrier's wardrobe, and she intended to use it as an instrument of justice. So she called her small son. She believed in making the punishment fit the crime, and Philip had flagrantly run away, quite against orders, the evening before.
He appeared at her summons, smiling angelically. Philip Harrington had not the smallest visible excuse for being the son of his parents, for his father was not particularly dark, and his mother distinctly gold-blond. Philip threw back, it was supposed, to the family Pirate, a semi-mythical person whom Phyllis said she'd had some thirteen generations ago. Phyllis was a New Englander. The Pirate must have been dark; at least Philip had tragic, enormous brown eyes with dense lashes, a mop of straight black hair, and a dusky skin, deeply rose-red at cheeks and lips. He also possessed the gentle, solemn courtesy of a Spanish grandee, which the Pirate may or may not have been. He was full of charm of manner, and combined a spirit of fearless loving-kindness to all the world with an inability to see why he shouldn't always have his own way; which made him difficult to manage.
"You goin' to chain me up, Mother?" he inquired affectionately, nestling up to her.
"Yes," explained his mother, hardening her heart, "little boys who run away from home like little dogs have to be treated like little dogs."
"Oh, I'll be a little dog," replied Philip, entering agreeably into the idea, and backing up to be chained. "No, I'll be a big dog. I'll run around an' jerk my chain an' say 'Woof! Woof!' like the Hewitts' setter. And Foxy 'n I'll have bones together!" His small Velásquez face lighted rapturously at the prospect. "Here, Foxy, Foxy!"
The black French bull whose chain Philip was using dashed up at the summons. He was middle-aged, but he had a young heart still, and his tail vibrated madly as he bounded between Phyllis and her son.
"Oh, he's got a bone!" exclaimed Philip, gleefully dropping on all fours.
Phyllis stood up from chaining her child, and turned appealingly to her husband, coming down the steps of the little bungalow with two-and-a-half-year-old Angela on his shoulder.
"You look like a colored illustration from the Graphic," she said irrelevantly. "You're just in time to assist discipline. Look!" she pointed tragically to her victim.
He would have been happily disputing the opportune bone with Foxy, had not that faithful animal's devotion led him to hand it over at once.