But Flora did not understand anything about parole, or reservations in pardon. With a succession of joyous bounds at her release, she spurned all efforts to detain her, and never stopped till she had pushed her way, worn and dishevelled as she was with unrest, hunger, and the constant agitation of eight-and-forty hours, into her offended judge’s august presence, leaping upon her and the curate—up to their very shoulders and heads—in her fond gladness, licking the hem of Mrs. Bloomfield’s garment, falling grovelling at her feet, whining in a very passion of gratitude and delight.
What was to be done? It was not in hearts which were not steel to resist such unbounded dependence on their regard and their goodness. Mrs. Bloomfield professed to frown and pull away her gown from the dog’s touch; Mr. Bloomfield pshawed and read on at his paper; but I believe both secretly caressed the confiding culprit. Certainly no more notice was taken of her misdemeanours. As for Master Harry, on his return he had the coolness to take high ground, and maintain that the accidents were all owing to the ignorance and carelessness of the dog’s keepers, and that if he had been at home, and had Flora in charge, not a single misadventure would have happened.
Soon after this escapade, changes occurred in the curate’s family which established Flora’s position there so firmly that nothing short of a capital crime could have dislodged her. Flora’s character was far removed from a capital crime; she was an honest, worthy dog, noble and sterling in her unaffected humility and steadfast attachment. She had laid aside her youthful indiscretions—whether the probations and penalties of these days had anything to do with the peculiar staidness and propriety which ultimately, except on rare and exceptional occasions, distinguished her bearing. The dog, that was at first permitted to live as a favour, and brought up under protest, reached at last to as high honour as ever dog attained.
However, it was long previous to this climax that Flora had many happy days with Harry, attending him sedulously, and assisting him with all her ability in his raids on rabbits, hares, pheasants, wild ducks, or rats in the barn. Flora was not particular; any game came right to her, which was one advantage of her mixed descent. Harry averred that she would have gone at a deer had she got the chance of deer-stalking. He was proud of her skill in pointing and in bringing him the game, though he was free to admit that she was not probably just such a dog as that which the poet Earl of Surrey—with the true poetic insight into animal nature, and power of drawing forth and tutoring animal gifts—first taught to point.
I don’t know whether Harry or Flora enjoyed most those early autumn mornings, when the silvery white mist drew a bridal veil over the orange and tawny woodlands, when the young man’s foot crushed out the aromatic fragrance from the thyme and mint in the pasture; or those winter and spring afternoons, when the sunset reddened the prevailing gray, and the two crouched, stiff but staunch, among the frozen sedges by the silent brook, and trudged home content—although they had got but a single green-necked duck, or were empty-handed—in the gathering darkness, with the stars coming out and twinkling over their heads. The two were excellent company, and in room of speech Harry whistled—oh! with what untiring wind, and how cheerily—in a way that it would have done Lady Margaret’s heart good to hear, leaving echoes which rang pathetically in other hearts throughout the long years.
The first great change which made good Flora’s footing in the curate’s family, was Harry’s ultimate choice of the navy for a profession. He had delayed his resolve out of a regard to his father and mother’s reluctance to grant their consent. They were quite elderly people, and were loath to agree to the son of their old age following a rough and dangerous vocation, which, at the best, would take him far from those who had not much time left to spend on earth. But Harry’s bent was too strong, and his father and mother were too wise and kind long to resist the clear inclination, or to call on their son to sacrifice it, with its inspiration of hearty liking, to the growing timidity of their years, and the very clinging love they bore him.
It was not the less a trial, which so broke down even the younger and stronger of the two, that Mrs. Bloomfield, who had been known as a highly practical woman, actually took to discoursing to Flora on the subject, doubtless since she could not trust herself to speak to more responsive auditors—least of all to her equally interested old husband. “We’ll miss him, Flora. Ay, you need not wag your tail; there will be few waggings of the tail in the dull days that are coming. I thought you had more sense, old dog. But perhaps you mean that he’ll serve his Maker and his fellow-men as well in a ship as in an office, even as in a church, where I would fain have seen my Harry—only Providence has settled it otherwise, and Providence knows best. We are following unerring guidance; that is one thing to be thankful for. Some old sailor—I daresay Harry could tell me his name and all about him—said he was as near heaven on sea as on land, and so it will be with my boy.”
It was after the wrench of Harry’s departure, for many months, that Flora was first seen to assume that attitude of supreme watching and expectation in which she has been painted. She had been shut up to keep her from running off to the railway station—just as I have known another faithful dog go regularly and take up his position at a particular hour, in order to be present on the arrival of a coach by which his master had been wont to return home. The dog was under the impression that the man would make his appearance in the old accustomed fashion, and, although he was doomed to disappointment night after night, he kept up the bootless practice for weeks.
The attitude expressive of suspense became frequent, almost habitual, with Flora. In the early days of Harry’s service, he happened to have tolerably frequent opportunities of coming home, so that his dog grew familiar with arrivals and departures. And Harry’s father and mother, now cherishing Flora as a relic of their absent son, were fain to allege that she showed marvellous, certainly superhuman, if not supernatural, discrimination in detecting the most distant signs of her master’s approach; and that they were often made aware of Harry’s unexpected nearness, before they could otherwise have known it, simply by the actions of the dog.