“Hm! You did, did you? Well, you tell Betsy for me that she may keep dogs all over the place if she wants to. By the way, tell her to bring him back again. I didn’t get a good look at him.”
And the beauty of the wee rascal did the rest.
Dr. Johns practically gave him the keys of the castle. He graduated by leaps and bounds from first lessons in the kitchen, where a basket was installed for him, and where he slept at night. As soon as he was big enough to climb up and down the steps of the honeysuckle porch, the world outside was his also.
He was too small to take it all in as yet, for a scamper across the grounds would have been a good half-mile. There were four great buildings of brick and stone, and all around them grew noble trees and beautiful flowers on green, velvety lawns. There were ponds, too, swarming with gleaming goldfish and pollywogs of all sizes, where the big and little frogs croaked in the warm spring evenings. Then there were long processions of people,—patients from the Hospital, who went out to walk every day when the sun shone. Van liked these, and would stand and bark with joy every time they went past. Also he barked at the red squirrels that chattered back at him from the trees, at the fat robins, who pulled countless fat worms out of the ground to feed to their greedy babies, and at the stately blackbirds who stalked around on the same errand. Together Betsy and Van roamed the place over, unmolested.
It was joy to Van, just being alive. The sunshine seemed to sparkle around his little white body, as he rolled on the grass, or pawed at the loose loam in the flower-beds; and it was a warm caress, when, tired after a chase for butterflies, he dropped, panting, at the foot of the steps where Betsy sat.
Besides Dr. and Mrs. Johns and Betsy, and Treesa the maid, there was in the house a cook, Mary, who made nice things for people to eat, and who was one of those dear Irish souls of whom the world cannot have too many. She knew where to place a cooky jar so that a little girl could find her way to it unhindered, and she knew also how to smuggle tid-bits to a little dog who was supposed to live entirely on dog-biscuit and milk. Then there was Thatcher, a convalescent patient, who came over every day from the Hospital to help with the work. Thatcher welcomed the Prince as one who is grounded in the knowledge of dogs.
“My father used to train dogs, Mrs. Johns, and you’ll want him trained right, or he’ll be good for nothing. I’d like to do what I can.”
“I shall be so thankful if you will. Now is the time for his character to be made or unmade.”
“I’ll be glad to train him, ma’am.” Thatcher straightened up and looked very grand and important, and Aunt Kate felt a load roll from her shoulders; for it was no mean responsibility to bring up a puppy so that he should be an honor to his fathers and an ornament to society.
So Thatcher began his own particular system of training. His first idea was that a dog should be taught the art of swimming.