This excited the two young scamps, and they began throwing themselves against the door and kicking at it.
“You mustn’t do that,” she exclaimed, “breaking into a house is a penitentiary offence.”
Dud and Tike were pretty well worked up now. They knew their case was desperate. They must get hold of me, and rush off to New York. The shock had sobered them, and one of them smashed the hall window with his fist, and ran his hand in to unlock the door.
“Don’t do that,” said the widow much more calmly, “don’t do that,” and she threw the door wide open. “Come in.”
They were a very cunning pair. Dud stood outside, while Tike entered. He came right to the bed, snatched a key from his pocket, and unlocking my collar, released me from the bar and chain, and took me in his arms.
“Come, come, young man,” said the widow coaxingly, “that dog is afraid of you. Leave him with me.”
I felt Tike give a kind of jerk. He had sense enough to know that he should not leave a suspicious person behind him. He wanted to find out what she had in her mind.
“I hope in future you’ll mind your own business,” he said roughly, “and not take in a runaway dog.”
“But I like dogs,” she said gently, and as she spoke, she laid a hand on Oscar’s collar. The intelligent dog stood watching her. At a word, he would have leaped on Tike, and Tike knew it.