Gringo wanted to come too, but Mr. Bonstone said, “Go back, your face might frighten it.”
Gringo wasn’t very well pleased, though he saw the wisdom of this remark. I often had long arguments with him about the bulldog visage. I claimed that bulldogs, Boston terriers, any dogs with lay-back noses and undershot jaws, were displeasing and terrifying to timid human beings. Give me a dog with a good facial expression, and a head not running all to jaws. Of course, I loved Gringo because he was my friend, but I would rather have had him a long-headed, amiable-looking fellow, if I’d been making him.
I scampered down the steps and out-of-doors like the wind, and was waiting by the taxi when Mr. Bonstone came. One would have thought that his wife would have accompanied him on so important a quest, but strange to say she did not seem to want to come, and Gringo, who heard her talking to herself after we left, said that her staying behind was a bit of feminine mother-wit. She wanted a little poor child to make it happy. There was no doubt of her loving it, but she wasn’t so sure of her husband. If he chose it, he would be more interested, and if at any time he found fault with the child, she could say, “Why, it was your choice.”
It didn’t take us very long to get to old Ellen’s avenue, which was quite bright and lively, but her flat was dark and quiet, when we mounted the long stairs. She had evidently gone to bed.
Mr. Bonstone had a hard time to find the bell, for, as he was not a smoker, he did not carry matches. After a long time of ringing, Robert Lee appeared and asked drowsily what was wanted.
As Mr. Bonstone spoke to him, he flashed me a glance of recognition, then went to his mother’s bed-room, where Beanie was barking lustily.
Mr. Bonstone and I entered, and he sat in Ellen’s rocker while I ran to greet Beanie, and talk over the joyful news with him. The dog was, as I thought he would be, wild with delight.
“I want to see it—I want to see it,” he said over and over, and I promised that by hook or by crook, I would manage so that he might see this little baby of his dearly loved mistress.
“I should think you’d be jealous,” I said. “Mistress will never want you home again, if she has a baby to play with.”
He looked thoughtful, but he said bravely, “I can’t help that. The main thing is to have her happy.”