"It would be tough work getting over," said the engineer, "especially with what is coming from the direction of the house." Jim looked and pulled his friend down behind the parapet of stone in which the iron fence was set.
"Perhaps it won't see us," said Jim in a low voice. But they were a wee bit too late to escape detection. Between the shrubbery there came at a menacing lope, a huge, yellow-white, bloodhound, with hanging dew laps, and following him a great Dane whose velvety black form held a real ferocity. They leaped high with their forefeet against the iron fence, striving frantically to reach the two men on the other side.
"They are more dangerous than the mountain lion, those dogs," said Berwick.
"I'm very glad to be on this side of the fence," admitted Jim. "We wouldn't stand much show without our guns."
"I thought you ate them alive," laughed John Berwick, referring to the incident in the wood.
"It was to keep you from being eaten up yourself," grinned Jim. "Say, Chief, let's move out of range, or these beasts will rouse the whole country."
"All right, Captain," agreed Berwick, using Jim's sea title, and as they were rather at sea, it was quite appropriate. They reached a large rock that stood out on the plain away from the house, and sat down on it, until the noise of the baying had ceased.
"Did you think to fetch a lunch with you on this festive occasion, James?" inquired Berwick.
"Bah Jove, old chap," replied James, "we left in such haste that it slipped my mind, don't yer know."
"I wish your mind hadn't been so slippery," remarked the engineer. "If you could only have had presence of mind enough to have brought an olive or two."