CHAPTER V

AN OLD FRIEND, AND AN ADVENTURE

Before I had time to dodge under the lap-robe, Miss Bright-Eyes caught sight of me.

That was what I always called her, because she had such piercing shoe buttons of eyes. Her real name was Pursell, and she was a native daughter of the Golden State. Her grandfather had been an old forty-niner who had made a fortune in land.

“Why, Mrs. Granton,” she giggled, “I think I see an old friend with you. Where did you get him?”

Mrs. Granton did not at first understand her, then she said, “Oh! you mean the dog. Louis, make him stand up, so Miss Pursell can see him. Do tell us something about him.”

“See him wiggle and fawn,” said Miss Bright-Eyes. “Oh! he is a rogue. I had him for a whole year, and gave him the best time a dog ever had. We never could make out why he ran away from us.”

Mr. Granton spoke up. “Do you mean to say you had this dog out in California?”

“Yes,” she replied, “in Los Angeles. We used to have such fun. We’d motor to Santa Monica, and go in bathing, and doggie had such good times. What made you leave me, pup?” and she surveyed me good-naturedly.

How I longed for the power of speech! She was a fresh air and fresh water fiend. She used to take me in bathing with her and make me dive under the breakers, and she put cotton wool in her own ears but never a spear in mine, and I got deaf; and then her old man-servant used to bathe me in the garage and get soap in my eyes with his wobbly old hands, and I got angry, and cleared out. I am a clean dog, but I don’t want the hide scoured off me.

Mr. Granton gave me one of his penetrating glances, then he said to Miss Bright-Eyes, “Do you think the dog was happy with you?”

“Happy, certainly,” she replied. “Everything was done for him.”

I barked protestingly.

“Tell us how you treated him,” said Mr. Granton.

“Well, as soon as I had my breakfast, he was with me till lunch time, walking or driving, then he spent the rest of the day with the servants.”

“Interesting servants?” pursued Mr. Granton.

“Well, not particularly. All old ones--they belonged to my grandmother.”

“H’m,” murmured Mr. Granton thoughtfully, “and he would be younger then than he is now, and he’s lively yet. Where did you get him?”

“Bought him from a man in the street,” said Miss Pursell. “He said he found him running about without a collar. He has lots of tricks. Jump out, dog, and let me put you through some of your stunts.”

I was quite stiff from sitting so long, but I wanted to please Mr. Granton, so I sprang out to a bit of level ground and danced on my hind legs, rolled over, did dead dog, howled an operatic air with one paw on my chest, and wound up with double somersaults.

The Grantons laughed heartily, but Beanie was nearly suffocated with jealousy, and when I got back beside him and Louis, he bit me.

What a nip he got in return! Mrs. Granton screamed at his loud howl, and turning round, reproached Louis for not taking better care of him.

Louis pressed his gloved hand to his mouth and said in a choked voice, “Beg pardon, ma’am. I accidentally squeezed his ear with my arm.” Then he gave me a poke with his elbow and said, “No more of that, you young Spitfire.”

We went spinning toward Yonkers after we left Miss Pursell, and just after getting beyond it, had an adventure.

We were on a fine piece of road--what magnificent roads they are building, and so quickly too, outside most American cities--when we came to a big, powerfully ugly, red brick house, standing in its own grounds.

“Oh!” exclaimed Mrs. Granton, “Suppose we call on the Johnsons. It’s just about afternoon tea time.”

Mr. Granton didn’t want to, but she made him do it. We rolled up to the _porte-cochère_, but master was going to have his own way in something, and when she wanted to take Beanie in, he wouldn’t let her.

So Louis and I and Beanie were instructed to take a little spin down the road, and come back in twenty minutes.

Just after we left the red brick house, we came to a long, level bit of road, and Louis was speeding up a bit when I pulled his sleeve. Off on our right was a sheet of water, with a man in it, yelling his head off for help.

Louis was out of the machine like a shot, and I after him. Beanie sat blinking. I can see him now, the silly ass.

The little French chauffeur danced about at the edge of the water, like a monkey on hot bricks. Before I came to New York, there had been quite a time of sharp weather, and ice had formed. This foolish fellow in the water had taken his skates and gone off to have a little fun by himself. Now he was splashing about, postponing his final going under as long as possible.

“Hold on, hold on,” called Louis; “I’m coming,” but instead of coming, he went smashing through the thin ice just as often as he stepped on it.

I learned afterward, that he was a fine swimmer, and quite an athlete, but what could he do when he couldn’t get to the man?

He had thrown his cap and coat on the ground, and seizing his hair by both hands, he whirled round and round in the road, in his uncertainty. Not a soul was in sight. Fortunately his desperate eyes fell on the extra tire at the back of the car.

In a twinkling, he had it off, and lashed to it a rope that Mr. Granton always has him carry in the car. The marvellous thing was, that he hadn’t thought of the rope at first. Master would have, if he’d been there. Well, it wasn’t too late now, and didn’t he hurl that tire at the poor drowning man who had just enough strength left to cling to it. Then Louis, playing the man as one would a salmon, tried to haul him in.

He is as slight as a girl, and couldn’t do it. He tugged and panted, and groaned, and called out, but no one came, and I suppose we had passed thousands of cars that afternoon.

Finally, Louis had another bright idea. He tied the rope to the car, sprang to his seat, and off he started, looking frequently over his shoulder.

He easily motored the man to land, then springing from the car, took hold of him to support his half-fainting body to the car.

It isn’t necessary to report what he said when he found the man was an enormously fat lady with bloomers on. However, with some help from her, he tugged her into the car and laid her on the floor of it, under the surprised Beanie who sat on the seat looking as if he had seen a ghost.

Then didn’t we fly to the brick house. I ran after the car, and hadn’t a bit of breath left when we got there.

The people came running out, and lifted the fat lady in, who, it seems, was a very important person--an English suffragette who had come to this country because she wouldn’t stop throwing bricks at shop windows in England. She was a guest in the house and her name was Lady Serena Glandison. She was also to give a lecture that night in New York. I heard the Grantons talking about it afterward, and master said she was a dead-game sport, for she persisted in giving the lecture.

She wanted to reduce her flesh, and had gone off to have a quiet little skate by herself, not being particularly beautiful in bloomers. Wasn’t she grateful to Louis! She said most undoubtedly she would have drowned, but for him. She sent him a cheque for a thousand dollars, and he is to get more later on, when women get the vote in England and she doesn’t have to spend so much in fines for her pastime of window smashing.

“If they ever do,” said my master.

I may add that Lady Serena is an ultra who wouldn’t stop her militant work on account of the war. She says she can see lots of reasons for smashing windows, but none for smashing men’s ribs. So she came to America to wait for the fighting to be over in Europe.