s seemed to
smoke.

I looked back to the road again, an' there was the pup, standin' down
by the road watchin' the hoss runnin' toward him. I touched Bill on the
shoulder, an sez, "Can the pup do anything, Bill?" Bill gave a sigh as
though he had just come back from the dead, an' in a voice that wavered
an' trembled, but still rang out like a trumpet, he yelled: "Throw him,
Cupid, throw him!" Lord, man! I wish you could have seen it. The mane
bristled up on that dog's back an' his muscles bulged out till he
looked like a stone image. We heard him give a low whine, like as if he
knowed it was too big a job for a little feller like him. But did he
try to flunk it? Not him. Then I knew 'at he wasn't neither a bulldog
nor a bull-terrier, but a little sixty-pound hero, willin' to pass out
his life any time 'at Bill would draw a check for it.

We fair helt our breath as he backed away from the road an' took a
little easy gallop until the hoss was near even with him. Another dog
would have blown his lungs loose, tellin' what he was a-goin' to do;
but Cupid never said a word. His lip curled up till you could catch the
glisten of those wicked white teeth of his, an' then when the hoss was
right alongside an' it looked as if he had lost his chance, he gave a
couple of short jumps an' threw himself for the critter's nose.

Well, I can't rightly tell you just what did happen then. I saw him
make his spring an' swing around full sweep, hangin' on to the hoss's
nose; but from that on the whole earth seemed to be shook loose. The
boss keeled over like he was shot, the girl seemed to turn a somerset
in the air, an' light all in a heap, with one arm hangin' over the edge
of the cliff. We heard a shriek, a little smothered yelp, an' then we
ran down to them.

Bill looked first toward the girl an' then toward the pup, an' it was
tearing his heart apart to tell which one he would go to first. Finally
he ran to the girl an' carried her back from the cliff. He knelt an'
put his ear to her heart, then he took her wrist an' after what seemed
a mighty long time, he gave a little sigh, an' sez, "Kid, run for some
water. Run! What do you stand lookin' at me for?"

The Kid, he certainly did run, while Bill stepped over to where Cupid
was layin', still an' quiet, but with a piece o' the hoss's nose still
in his grip. The hoss's right shoulder was broke an' he couldn't get
up, but was thrashin' an' strugglin' around. "Get your gun an' put that