“All right, wife,” said Mr. Goodman, as he started for the office.
“I suppose you want some breakfast, doggie,” said Mrs. Goodman, and she placed before Douglas a dish of meat and of milk. Douglas was too tired and too full of pain to eat much, but he felt as though a new world had opened to him. After all, there were some good people in the land, and at last he had reached them.
Dr. Thayer came, found the ball in the patient, abused animal, and the wounded shoulder soon began to heal.
When night came Mrs. Goodman made Douglas a warm bed of blankets by the kitchen stove, for she knew that a cold kennel was not a suitable place for him. Later he was washed and dried, by rubbing with cloths, till his coat was silky and black.
Teddy and the dog became inseparable companions. Wherever the child went Douglas was always close behind him, now licking his extended hand, now lying down for the child to clamber over him, or to lay his dark curls against the darker curls of the dog. They shared their food, and they frequently went to sleep together, if it could be called sleep on the part of the dog, whose eyes were usually open that his little charge might be guarded. Douglas never showed an inclination to bite unless some one touched the boy, and then he growled and looked concerned.
One summer day Teddy and a playmate wandered off with the dog during Mrs. Goodman’s absence. They sat down under a tree and all three lunched together. Then they played along the meadow till the banks of a river were reached. Two men were working near by and occasionally watched the children at their play, as they dabbled their hands in the water. Finally they heard a child scream, and before they could reach the place Douglas was dragging Teddy, dripping and frightened, from the river. The men carried the boy home to his awe-struck but overjoyed parents, and Douglas, wet and excited, was praised for his heroic conduct.
A year later, when Teddy went to school, Douglas missed his comrade, and for days whined piteously. He never failed to go, at the regular hour for closing school, to meet his little friend, and always brought home in his teeth the dinner basket of the lad. Sometimes Douglas whined in his sleep, as though he were dreaming of other days, but love for Teddy made him, on the whole, very happy.
When Teddy was seven years old diphtheria raged in the school, and marked him for one of its victims. No love or care could save him.
When conscious, he could not bear Douglas out of his sight or reach. As in the case with his former mistress, Douglas neither ate nor slept. When all was over he disappeared. Where he went nobody knew. Probably he lay upon the grave of the child, and later wandered off, thinking perchance to find again his first love.