So we fell over Buster for the rest of the morning. I never saw a dog before nor since who could so successfully get under your feet as Buster. If I started upstairs with the frame of a pine bureau on my back, Buster was on the third step, between my legs. If I was carrying in a stack of plates from the barrel of crockery, Buster was wedged in the screen door, pushing it open ahead of me, to let it snap back in my face. When I scolded him, he undulated his silly yellow body, sprang upon his hind legs, and licked my hands. If I tried to kick him, he regarded it as a game, and bit my shoe lace. Peter’s shoe laces, I noted, were in shreds. But Buster disappeared after a time, and Peter and I got the china and kitchenware all in, and Mrs. Pillig had it washed and in the cupboards before he reappeared. He came down the front stairs with one of my bath slippers in his mouth, and, with a profoundly proud undulation of tail and body, laid it at my feet for me to throw, barking loudly. We all laughed, but I took the slipper and beat him with it, while Peter appeared on the verge of tears.
“No, Buster,” I cried. “You keep out of doors. Peter, put him out.”
Peter resentfully deposited the pup on the porch, and took my slipper back upstairs. Meanwhile, Buster, after looking wistfully through the screen door a second, pushed it open with his nose and paw and reëntered, immediately sitting up on his hind legs and gazing into my eyes with the most human look I ever saw.
“Buster,” said I, “you are the limit. Very well, stay in. I give up!”
Buster plopped down on all fours, as if he understood perfectly, and took a bite at my shoe string. I patted his head. I had to. The pup was irresistible.
“And what time will you have your dinner?” asked Mrs. Pillig. “There’s no meat in the house. Guess you forgot to order the butcher to stop; but there’s eggs.”
“Eggs will do,” said I, “and one o’clock. Bert has his at twelve, but I want mine at one. Maybe I shall have a guest.”
“A guest!” she cried. “You wouldn’t be puttin’ a guest on me the first mornin’!”
“Well, it’s doubtful, I’m afraid,” I answered. “Perhaps I’ll wait till to-morrow night, and have three guests for supper–just Bert and his wife and their boarder–sort of a housewarming, you know. I want you to make a pie.”
“Well, I reckon I can wait on table stylish enough for Mrs. Temple,” said she, “and I’ll make a lemon pie that’ll make Bert Temple sorry he didn’t marry me.”