“All right, Kid,” responded Joe, complying instantly. “Here Sonny, Sonny, come an’ git acquainted with the Kid!”
“Yes, come and see the Kid, Sonny!” reëchoed the woman, devouring the little yellow head with her eyes. His real name was Alfred, but Joe had called him “the Kid,” and that was to be his appellation thenceforth.
Hearing his name called, Sonny emerged from his kennel and came forward, but not with his wonted eagerness. Very soberly, but with prompt obedience he came, and thrust his massive head under Joe’s hand for the accustomed caress. But the caress was not forthcoming. Joe simply forgot it, so absorbed was he, his gaunt, weather-beaten face glowing and melting with smiles as he gazed at the child.
“Here’s your dawg, Kid!” said he, and watched delightedly to see how the little one would go about asserting proprietorship.
The woman was the more subtle of the two in her sympathies. “Sonny,” she said, pulling the dog forward, “here’s the Kid, yer little master. See you mind what he tells you, and see you take good keer o’ him.”
Sonny wagged his tail obediently, his load of misery lightening under the touch of his mistress’s hand. He leaned against her knees, comforted for a moment, though his love was more for the man than for her. But he would not look at the Kid. He shut his eyes with an expression of endurance as the little one’s hand patted him vehemently on the face, and his stub tail stopped wagging. In a dim way he recognized that he must not be uncivil to this small stranger who had so instantaneously and completely usurped his place. But beyond this he could think of nothing but his master, who had grown indifferent. Suddenly, with a burst of longing for reconciliation, he jerked abruptly away from the child’s hands, wriggled in between Joe’s legs, and strove to climb up and lick his face.
At the look of disappointment which passed over 279 the child’s face Joe Barnes felt a sudden rush of anger. Stupidly misunderstanding, he thought that Sonny was merely trying to avoid the child. He straightened up his tall figure, snatched the little one to his breast, and exclaimed in a harsh voice, “If ye can’t be nice to the Kid, git out!”
The words “Git out!” with the tone in which they were uttered, would have been comprehensible to a much meaner intelligence than Sonny’s. As if he had been whipped, he curled down his abbreviated tail, and ran and hid himself in his kennel.
“Sonny didn’t mean to be ugly to the Kid, father,” protested Ann, “He jest don’t quite understand the situation yet, an’ he’s wonderin’ why ye don’t make so much of him as ye used to. I don’t blame him fer feelin’ a leetle mite left out in the cold.”