Alfred laughed. “Fits! That’s a funny name, isn’t it? Does he have them often?”
“She means Fritz, dear,” said his mother. “Here, Fritz, come and see me.”
So I went, but I wouldn’t let Alfred touch me, and he didn’t like it a bit. He fed candy to Freya and she fairly licked his shoes! Girl-dogs have no pride. It so disgusted me that I turned right around and went down to the stable and crawled behind the flower-pots.
Even Father and Mother seemed to like Alfred, and they and Freya played with him and the Baby a lot. I didn’t. I stayed away. It was pretty lonesome, though. Now and then Alfred would try to make friends with me. He begged cake from Cook and tried to get me to take it, but I wouldn’t. I’m fond of cake, too. I spent a good deal of time behind the flower-pots those days. You see I was afraid that some time when I was fearfully hungry Alfred would offer me cake and I’d take it. And I didn’t want to, for I had made up my mind not to be friends with him. One morning he and the Baby came out of the house when we were having breakfast at the back door and called to us. Of course Father and Mother and Freya trotted right over to them, but I stayed and made believe I had found something more to eat in the dish. When Freya saw that she came back, but I growled at her and she went off again.
“Come, F’itz!” called the Baby. “Come F’itz, booful dogums!”
And Alfred called me too, but I wouldn’t go, and finally Alfred said: “Oh, come on. We don’t want him anyway!”
So they went off toward the orchard to hunt squirrels. Of course I felt pretty lonesome and wanted to go with them very much. Hunting squirrels is awfully exciting, even though we never catch any. I licked the breakfast dish quite clean and then went to the corner of the house and peeked around. They were all over in the orchard and Father was barking at a great rate, making believe he had found a fox’s nest or something, and Freya was trotting behind Alfred and trying to lick his hand. The Baby was toddling along, laughing, and Mother was barking at a bird. It looked very jolly and I crept along after them, keeping out of sight.
They didn’t find any squirrels. I never saw but one in the orchard and he wasn’t much to look at, having almost no hair on his tail. But we always pretended the trees were full of them. After they had been all around the orchard they climbed the wall on the other side, which they were not allowed to do, and went into the thicket over there where the ground is all soft and squishy. I could have told them that they would soon find themselves in trouble, and I came very near barking and warning them, but I didn’t. It was no affair of mine.