“Heaven be praised for savin’ him!” said Mary. “Come in, ye little spalpeen. My heart do be beatin’ that hard I can’t get me breath.”
She ran to tell the family what had happened and just then the man came back to report that the mad dog had been killed, after biting two or three other dogs.
Well, it was much to be thankful for that Van was safe, but when Betsy came back from a trip to town, she learned that an order had been issued from the powers that be, and all dogs, for the remainder of the summer, must be either chained or muzzled.
“Muzzled he shall not be,” said Mrs. Johns. “If a mad dog came along, much good would a muzzle do! The chain is better. Poor Van, it’s a burning shame, just as you were getting to be almost an angel, and now it’s confinement for you until the first of September.”
So Van’s liberty was taken away from him, and, to make it harder, his beloved Betsy fell ill. An attack of tonsilitis it was, and Van must not be allowed to disturb her. Thus, even in the house there was no liberty. Betsy’s door was shut, and the lonesome little prisoner might not have her comforting. Mary was good to him in the kitchen, but at every opportunity he would slip away upstairs and paw at Betsy’s door. There was no way to separate him from his beloved mistress, except to keep him outside the house. So all day long he ran sadly up and down, with his chain attached to a long wire that stretched from the apple tree to the honeysuckle porch. At night there was a warm bed made for him on a lounge in the shelter of the porch, and he could lie there, too, in the daytime, if he chose. But always there was the hated chain.
During the days of his imprisonment, Thatcher made it his pleasure to come for him, and take him for long walks in the woods, and these were his only really happy times. In the woods there were no mad dogs. So the chain would be loosened, and Van would enjoy a wild hour of liberty.
The days passed, and at last came one when Dr. Johns said that Betsy was better, and might sit up in bed for a little while. That day Van, after eating his dinner in the kitchen, went slyly up the back stairs, and put his paw on the door of the forbidden room. And lo! it opened to him, and there sat his mistress, propped among her pillows.
“Vanny-Boy! Dear Vanny-Boy!” cried she, and he flew on the wings of love, leaped upon the bed, and cried and moaned and kissed her ear as if she had been long away. Betsy snuggled him down by her side, and he went to sleep with his nose on her knee.
Mrs. Johns, coming in later, found him there.
“Please let him stay, Aunt Kate. I’ve missed him so, and I’m almost well now.”