tal of Chum's cleverness. One of them,
who, it seemed, was an expert in dog lore, told him how to teach the
collie to shake hands and to lie down and to "speak." They were
magnificent men, in every way. Link was ashamed to have forgotten his
earlier meetings with such paragons.

But the call of duty never quite dies into silence. And finally Link
remembered he had still his store bill to pay and his supplies to
order. So he announced that he must go. The store, he knew, closed at
nine. He looked up at the barroom clock. But its face was hazy and it
seemed to have a great many hands. There was no use trying to learn the
hour from so dissolute a timepiece.

His two friends persuaded him to have one more drink. Then they
volunteered to go across to the store with him. He left the tavern,
with one of the two walking on either side of him. He was glad to be in
the center of the trio; for, as the night air struck him, he became
unaccountably dizzy. His friends' willing arms were a grand support to
his wavering legs.

On the unlighted threshold of the tavern Link stumbled heavily over
something--something that had been lying there and that sprang eagerly
toward him as he debouched from the doorway. The reason he stumbled
over it was that the creature, which had bounded so rapturously toward
him, had come to a sharp halt at noting his condition. Thus, Ferris
stumbled over it; and would have fallen but for the aid of his friends.

The single village street was pitch black. Not a light was to be seen.
This puzzled Link; who had no means of knowing that the time was close
on midnight. He started toward the store. At least that was the
direction he planned to take. But when, at the end of five minutes, he
found he was outside the village and on a narrow road that bordered the
lake, he saw his friends had mistaken the way. He stopped abruptly and
told them so.

One of them laughed; as if Link had said something funny. The other did
something quickly with one foot and one arm. Ferris's legs went from
under him. The jar of his fall shook from him a fraction of his
drunkenness, and it gave him enough sense to realize that the man who
had laughed was trying to unfasten the pinned inner pocket of the
fallen man's vest.

Now for years that pocket had been the secret repository of Link
Ferris's sparse wealth. The intruder's touch awakened him to a drowsy
sense of peril. He thrust aside the fumbling hand and made a herculean
effort