nsely, as their audience went into gales of
laughter, especially at the wheelbarrow episode, which Pat insisted on
telling, with grateful minuteness, to Ben's confusion. Thorny shouted,
and even tender-hearted Betty forgot her tears over the lost dog to
join in the familiar melody when Bab mimicked Pat's quotation from
Mother Goose.

"We must not laugh any more, or these naughty children will think they
have done something very clever in running away," said Miss Celia, when
the fun subsided, adding, soberly, "I am displeased, but I will say
nothing, for I think Ben is already punished enough."

"Guess I am," muttered Ben, with a choke in his voice as he glanced
toward the empty mat where a dear curly bunch used to be with a bright
eye twinkling out of the middle of it.

CHAPTER XV

BEN'S RIDE

Great was the mourning for Sancho, because his talents and virtues made
him universally admired and beloved. Miss Celia advertised, Thorny
offered rewards, and even surly Pat kept a sharp look-out for poodle
dogs when he went to market; but no Sancho or any trace of him appeared.
Ben was inconsolable, and sternly said it served Bab right when the
dogwood poison affected both face and hands. Poor Bab thought so, too,
and dared ask no sympathy from him, though Thorny eagerly prescribed
plantain leaves, and Betty kept her supplied with an endless succession
of them steeped in cream and pitying tears. This treatment was so
successful that the patient soon took her place in society as well as
ever, but for Ben's affliction there was no cure, and the boy really
suffered in his spirits.

"I don't think it's fair that I should have so much trouble,--first
losing father and then Sanch. If it wasn't for Lita and Miss Celia, I
don't believe I could stand it," he said, one day, in a fit of despair,
about a week after the sad event.

"Oh, come now, don't give up so, old fellow. We'll find him if he s
alive, and if he isn't I'll try and get you another as good," answered
Thorny, with a friendly slap on the shoulder, as Ben sat disconsolately
among the beans he had been hoeing.

"As if there ever could be another half as good!" cried Ben, indignant
at the idea; "or as if I'd ever try to fill his place with the best and
biggest dog that ever wagged a tail! No, sir, there's only one Sanch in
all the world, and if I can't have him I'll never have a dog again."

"Try some other sort of pet, then. You may have any of mine you like.