Elias frowned and pondered. He was grieved not to have discovered "the Gibbage," but he would do the handsome thing by Romeo Augustus.
Half an hour later the jolly old moon nearly fell out of the sky for laughing. There were Elias and Romeo Augustus straining and tugging, coaxing and scolding, trying with might and main to stifle the expostulations of Mephibosheth, as they bore him down to an unmowed meadow.
The ox-eye daisies opened their sleepy petals to see what all the stir was about. The buttercups and dandelions craned themselves forward to peep.
Down in the meadow the boys drove a stake, and to it they fastened Mephibosheth. It was no joke taking food to him now. The unmowed meadow was in sight of the house, and it seemed as if one or another of the boys was always at the window. But Elias aided Romeo Augustus, and between them Mephibosheth got his daily rations. Surely he was safe at last. Far from it.
"Who has been trampling the grass in the north pasture?" asked Romeo Augustus's father, a fortnight later. "I followed the path made by feet that had no right there. At the end I found a stake. Tied to the stake I found a—"
Solomon and Isaac looked surprised. John and Philemon shook their heads. They knew nothing of the matter. Elias and Romeo Augustus quaked.
"At the end I found a—" repeated their father, gazing sternly round the table—"I found a—"
"Pig," said Romeo Augustus, in the smallest possible voice; and he fled from the table in an agony of tears. His labor had been in vain. After all, Mephibosheth must die. How could he endure it? He dared not glance out of the window of the chamber where he had taken refuge, lest he should behold Mephibosheth led to slaughter. It seemed as if his heart would break in two.
But listen! What is that noise? A clatter as of falling boards. There is a sound as of hammering. At first it seems to Romeo Augustus like Mephibosheth's death-knell. Thud, thud, thud, go the blows. Drawn almost against his will, Romeo Augustus stealthily approaches the window. He glances fearfully out. What does he see? His father pounding busily, making—what is he making? Can it be? It is—it is a pen.
"Father!" gasps Romeo Augustus.