nnie Bell. "Don't let that dog come over in our
yard, whatever you do."

All at once he broke out a-laughing.

"I'll take care of him," says he. "I wouldn't take a thousand for that
dog. They didn't want to keep him, but I said they'd have to. That was a
good fight they had in the house," says he, and laughed again.

Bonnie Bell she got red, and says she:

"I'm awfully sorry. That dog of ours is a terror to fight. We can't
break him of it any way. I hope you'll apologize to your people," says
she--"that is, if they wouldn't take it wrong of us to have it
mentioned. I don't know."

"Oh, no; I guess that'll be all right," says he. "I've been with 'em so
long, you see, I can kind of make free about it. If you feel bad about
it I'll tell 'em; but it wasn't your fault."

"It would be just like that bunch of yours," says she, "not to let on
that they had heard from us that I was sorry. I oughtn't to say it
maybe, but----"

"Well now," says the hired man, frank-like enough, "that's just the way
I feel. I often tell the old man, myself, that he ain't so much--he come
from Iowa once when he didn't have a cent to his name, and yet he puts
on more side now than anybody else on the street."

"Did you ever dare to say that to him?" says Bonnie Bell.

"I certainly did, and more than once. I ain't afraid to say anything to
either one of 'em," says he. "They don't dare say much to me. I know too
much about 'em. But, say now--about that fight," says he. "I want to
tell you that new dog we've got is some peach. Give him a year or so and
he'll eat up that pup of yours."

"He never seen the day he could and he never will!" says Bonnie Bell.
"If you feel that way about it----"

"Well," says he, "our dog is more of a trench fighter. He got under the
tables where them old hens was playing bridge and he held out until your
pup flanked in on him."

"Did you see the fight?" says Bonnie Bell.

"Sure I did! I was right there."

"Yes?" says she. "In such clothes?"

"Just like I am. I happened to be going past the room where they was
holding their party and just then the dogs came in. Believe me, it was
more fun than there has been in our house for a good many years. Of
course it was some informal."

"Well," says Bonnie Bell, "I can see you must of been in the family a
long time or you wouldn't feel the way you do."

"Twenty-odd years," says he, drawing hisself up. "I was taken captive in
my early youth, and I have been in serv