all
the storm in with him.

"Why, Pilot, what's the news?" Asher asked. "Jim's sent him, Virgie. He's
done this trick often."

Pilot slipped to the warm stove and shook a whole shower out of his long,
wet hair, while Asher carefully untied a little leather bag fastened to
the collar under the dog's throat.

"You brave fellow. You've come all the way in the rain to bring me this."

He held up a little metal box from which he took a bit of paper. Bending
close to the lamp, he read the message it contained.

"Something is wrong, Virginia. He says, 'I need you.' What's the matter
with Jim, Pilot? Come here and get up in the chair!"

The dog whimpered and sat still.

"Come out here, then! Come on, I tell you!" Asher started as if to open
the door, but the dog did not move.

"He's not out of doors, and he isn't sitting up in a chair. Tell me, now,
Pilot, exactly where Jim is! Jim, mind you!"

The dog looked at him with watchful eyes.

"Where's Jim? Poor Jim!" Asher repeated, and Pilot, with a sorrowful yelp,
stretched himself at full length beside the stove.

"Jim's sick, then?"

Pilot wagged his tail understandingly.

"Virgie, Jim needs me. I must go to him." Asher looked at his wife.

"If Jim needs you, you'll need me," she replied.

"And we'll both need Pilot. So we'll keep all the human beings together,"
Asher said, as he helped his wife to fasten her heavy cloak and tie a long
old-fashioned nubia about her head.

Then they went out into the darkness and the chilling rain, as neighbor to
neighbor, answering this cry for help.

Pilot ran far ahead of them and was waiting with a dog's welcome when they
reached Shirley's cabin. But the master, lying where he caught the chill
draught from the open door, was rigid with cold. A sudden attack of
pneumonia had left him helpless. And tonight, Pilot, doing a dog's best,
did not understand the danger of leaving doors open, and of joyously
shaking his wet fur down on the sick man to whom help was coming none too
soon.

"Hello, Jim! We're all here, doctor, nurse, cook, and hired man, and the
little dog under the wagon," Asher said cheerily, bending over Jim's bunk.
"That pup pretty nearly killed you with kindness, didn't he?"

Jim smiled wanly, then looked blankly away and lay very still.

The plains frontier had no use for the one talent folk. People must know
how to take care of life there. Asher's first memory of Virginia was when
she bent over him, fightin