University of Virginia Library

33. CHAPTER XXXIII.
A FOUR-FOOTED PRODIGAL.

THERE was dismay and confusion in the old Vanderheyden
house, this evening. Mrs. Betsey sat
abstracted at her tea, as one refusing to be comforted.
The chair on which Jack generally sat alert and cheerful
at meal times was a vacant chair, and poor soft-hearted
Mrs. Betsey's eyes filled with tears every time she looked
that way. Jack had run away that forenoon and had not
been seen about house or premises since.

“Come now, Betsey,” said Miss Dorcas, “eat your
toast; you really are silly.”

“I can't help it, Dorcas; it's getting dark and he
doesn't come. Jack never did stay out so long before;
something must have happened to him.”

“Oh, you go 'way, Miss Betsey!” broke in Dinah,
with the irreverent freedom which she generally asserted
to herself in the family counsels, “never you fear but
what Jack 'll be back soon enough—too soon for most
folks; he knows which side his bread 's buttered, dat dog
does. Bad penny allers sure to come home 'fore you
want it.”

“And there's no sort of reason, Betsey, why you
shouldn't exercise self-control and eat your supper,” pursued
Miss Dorcas, authoritatively. “A well-regulated
mind”—

“You needn't talk to me about a well-regulated mind,
Dorcas,” responded Mrs. Betsey, in an exacerbated tone.
“I haven't got a well-regulated mind and never had, and
never shall have; and reading Mrs. Chapone and Dr.

Watts on the Mind, and all the rest of them, never did
me any good. I'm one of that sort that when I'm anxious
I am anxious; so it don't do any good to talk that
way to me.”

“Well, you know, Betsey, if you'll only be reasonable,
that Jack always has come home.”

“And good reason,” chuckled Dinah. “Don't he
know when he's well off? you jest bet he does. I know
jest where he is; he's jest off a gallivantin' and a prancin'
and a dancin' now 'long o' dem low dogs in Flower
Street, and he'll come back bimeby smellin' 'nuff to
knock ye down, and I shall jest hev the washin' on him,
that's what I shall; and if I don't give him sech a soapin'
and scrubbin' as he never hed, I tell you! So you jest
eat your toast, Mis' Betsey, and take no thought for de
morrer, Scriptur' says.”

This cheerful picture, presented in Dinah's overpoweringly
self-confident way, had some effect on Mrs. Betsey,
who wiped her eyes and finished her slice of toast
without further remonstrance.

“Dinah, if you're sure he's down on Flower Street,
you might go and look him up, after tea,” she added,
after long reflection.

“Oh, well, when my dishes is done up, ef Jack ain't
come round, why, I'll take a look arter him,” quoth
Dinah. “I don't hanker arter no dog in a gineral way,
but since you've got sot on Jack, why, have him you
must. Dogs is nothin' but a plague; for my part I's glad
there won't be no dogs in heaven.”

“What do you know about that?” said Mrs. Betsey,
with spirit.

“Know?” said Dinah. “Hain't I heard my Bible
read in Rev'lations all 'bout de golden city, and how it
says, `Widout are dogs'? Don't no dogs walk de golden
streets, now I tell you; got Bible on dat ar. Jack 'll hev

to take his time in dis world, for he won't get in dere a
promenadin'.”

“Well then, Dinah, we must make the most we can
of him here,” pursued Miss Dorcas, “and so, after you've
done your dishes, I wish you'd go out and look him up.
You know you can find him, if you only set your mind
to it.”

“To think of it!” said Mrs. Betsey. “I had just
taken such pains with him; washed him up in nice warm
water, with scented soap, and combed him with a finetooth
comb till there was n't a flea on him, and tied a
handsome pink ribbon round his neck, because I was
going to take him over to Mrs. Henderson's to call, this
afternoon; and just as I got him all perfectly arranged
out he slipped, and that's the last of him.”

“I'll warrant!” said Dinah, “and won't he trail dat
ar pink ribbon through all sorts o' nastiness, and come
home smellin' wus 'n a sink-drain! Dogs hes total depravity,
and hes it hard; it's no use tryin' to make Christians
on 'em. But I'll look Jack up, never you fear.
I'll bring him home, see if I don't,” and Dinah went out
with an air of decision that carried courage to Mrs. Betsey's
heart.

“Come, now,” said Miss Dorcas, “we'll wash up the
china, and then, you know, it's Thursday—we'll dress
and go across to Mrs. Henderson's and have a pleasant
evening; and by the time we come back Jack 'll be here,
I dare say. Never mind looking out the window after
him now,” she added, seeing Mrs. Betsey peering wistfully
through the blinds up and down the street.

“People talk as if it were silly to love dogs,” said
Mrs. Betsey, in an injured tone. “I don't see why it is.
It may be better to have a baby, but if you haven't got
a baby, and have got a dog, I don't see why you shouldn't
love that; and Jack was real loving, too,” she added,

“and such company for me; he seemed like a reasonable
creature; and you were fond of him, Dorcas, you just
know you were.”

“Of course, I'm very fond of Jack,” said Miss Dorcas,
cheerfully; “but I'm not going to make myself miserable
about him. I know, of course, he'll come back
in good time. But here's Dinah, bringing the water.
Come now, let's do up the china—here's your towel—and
then you shall put on that new cap Mrs. Henderson
arranged for you, and go over and let her see you in it.
It was so very thoughtful in dear Mrs. Henderson to do
that cap for you; and she said the color was very becoming.”

“She is a dear, sweet little woman,” said Mrs. Betsey;
“and that sister of hers, Miss Angelique, looks like
her, and is so lovely. She talked with me ever so long,
the last time we were there. She isn't like some young
girls, she can see something to like in an old woman.”

Poor good Miss Dorcas had, for the most part, a very
exalted superiority to any toilet vanities; but, if the truth
were to be told, she was moved to an unusual degree of
indulgence towards Mrs. Betsey by the suppressed fear
that something grave might have befallen the pet of the
household. In a sort of vague picture, there rose up before
her the old days, when it was not a dog, but a little
child, that filled the place in that desolate heart. When
there had been a patter of little steps in those stiff and
silent rooms; and questions of little shoes, and little
sashes, and little embroidered robes, had filled the mother's
heart. And then there had been in the house the
racket and willful noise of a school-boy, with his tops,
and his skates, and his books and tasks; and then there
had been the gay young man, with his smoking-caps and
cigars, and his rattling talk, and his coaxing, teasing
ways; and then, alas! had come bad courses, and irregular

hours, and watchings, and fears for one who refused
to be guided; night-watchings for one who came late,
and brought sorrow in his coming; till, finally, came a
darker hour, and a coffin, and a funeral, and a grave,
and long weariness and broken-heartedness,—a sickness
of the heart that had lasted for years, that had blanched
the hair, and unstrung the nerves, and made the once
pretty, sprightly little woman a wreck. All these pictures
rose up silently before Miss Dorcas's inner eye as
she busied herself in wiping the china, and there was a
touch of pathos about her unaccustomed efforts to awaken
her sister's slumbering sensibility to finery, and to
produce a diversion in favor of the new cap.

The love of a pet animal is something for which people
somehow seem called upon to apologize to our own
species, as if it were a sort of mésalliance of the affections
to bestow them on anything below the human race; and
yet the Book of books, which reflects most faithfully and
tenderly the nature of man, represents the very height
of cruelty by the killing of a poor man's pet lamb. It
says the rich man had flocks and herds, but the poor man
had nothing save one little ewe lamb, which he had
brought and nourished up, which grew up together with
him and his children, which ate of his bread, and drank
of his cup, and lay in his bosom, and was to him as a
daughter.

And how often on the unintelligent head of some
poor loving animal are shed the tears of some heart-sorrow;
and their dumb company, their unspoken affection,
solace some broken heart which hides itself to die alone.

Dogs are the special comforters of neglected and forgotten
people; and to hurt a poor man's dog, has always
seemed to us a crime akin to sacrilege.

We are not at all sure, either, of the boasted superiority
of our human species. A dog who lives up to the

laws of his being is, in our view, a nobler creature than
a man who sinks below his: he is certainly a much more
profitable member of the community. We suggest,
moreover, that a much more judicious use could be
made of the city dog-pound in thinning out human brutes
than in smothering poor, honest curs who always lived
up to their light and did just as well as they knew how.

To say the honest truth about poor Jack, his faults
were only those incident to his having been originally
created a dog—a circumstance for which he was in no
way responsible. He was as warm-hearted, loving, demonstrative
a creature as ever wagged a tail, and he was
anxious to please his mistress to the best of his light and
knowledge. But he had that rooted and insuperable objection
to soap and water, and that preference for dirt and
liberty, which is witnessed also in young animals of the
human species, and Mrs. Betsey's exquisite neatness was a
sore cross and burden to him. Then his destiny having
made him of the nature of the flesh-eaters, as the canine
race are generally, and Miss Dorcas having some strict
dietetic theories intended to keep him in genteel figure,
Jack's allowance of meat and bones was far below his
cravings: and so he was led to explore neighboring
alleys, and to investigate swill-pails; to bring home and
bury bones in the Vanderheyden garden-plot, which
formed thus a sort of refrigerator for the preservation of
his marketing. Then Jack had his own proclivities for
society. An old lady in a cap, however caressing and
affectionate, could not supply all the social wants of a
dog's nature; and even the mixed and low company of
Flower Street was a great relief to him from the very
slelect associations and good behavior to which he was restricted
the greater part of his time. In short, Jack, like
the rest of us, had his times when he was fairly tired out
of being good, and acting the part of a cultivated drawing-room

dog; and then he reverted with a bound to his
freer doggish associates. Such an impulse is not confined
to four-footed children of nature. Rachel, when mistress
of all the brilliancy and luxury of the choicest salon in
Paris, had fits of longing to return to the wild freedom
of a street girl's life, and said that she felt within herself a
“besoin de s'encanailler.” This expresses just what Jack
felt when he went trailing his rose-colored bows into the
society of Flower Street, little thinking, as he lolled his
long pink ribbon of a tongue jauntily out of his mouth,
and enjoyed the sensation he excited among the dogs of
the vicinity, of the tears and anxieties his frolic was creating
at home. But, in due time, the china was washed,
and Mrs. Betsey entered with some interest into preparations
for the evening.

Miss Dorcas and Mrs. Betsey were the earliest at the
Henderson fireside, and they found Alice, Angelique and
Eva busy arranging the tea-table in the corner.

“Oh, don't you think, Miss Dorcas, Mary hasn't come
back yet, and we girls are managing all alone,” said Angelique;
“you can't think what fun it is!”

“Why didn't you tell me, Mrs. Henderson?” said
Miss Dorcas. “I would have sent Dinah over to make
your coffee.”

“Oh, dear me, Miss Dorcas, Dinah gave me private
lessons day before yesterday,” said Eva, “and from
henceforth I am personally adequate to any amount of
coffee, I grow so self-confident. But I tried my hand in
making those little biscuit Mary gets up, and they were
a failure. Mary makes them with sour milk and soda,
and I tried to do mine just like hers. I can't tell why,
but they came out of the oven a brilliant grass-green—
quite a preternatural color.”

“Showing that they were the work of a green hand,”
said Angelique.

“It was an evident reflection on me,” said Eva.
“At any rate, I sent to the bakery for my biscuit
to-night, for I would not advertise my greenness in
public.”

“But we are going to introduce a novelty this evening,”
said Angelique; “to wit: boiled chestnuts; anybody
can cook chestnuts.”

“Yes,” said Eva; “Harry's mother has just sent us a
lovely bag of chestnuts, and we are going to present
them as a sensation. I think it will start all sorts of
poetic and pastoral reminiscences of lovely fall days,
and boys and girls going chestnutting and having good
times; it will make themes for talk.”

“By the by,” said Angelique, “where's Jack, Mrs.
Benthusen?”

“Oh! my dear, you touch a sore spot. We are in
distress about Jack. He ran away this morning, and we
haven't seen him all day.”

“How terrible!” said Eva. “This is a neighborhood
matter. Jack is the dog of the regiment. We
must all put our wits together to have him looked up.
Here comes Jim; let's tell him,” continued she, as Jim
Fellows walked up.

“What's up, now?”

“Why, our dog is missing,” said Eva. “The pride
of our hearts, the ornament of our neighborhood, is
gone.”

“Do you think anybody has stolen him?” said Alice.

“I shouldn't wonder,” said Mrs. Betsey; “Jack is a
dog of a very pure breed, and very valuable. A boy
might get quite a sum for him.”

“I'll advertise him in our paper,” said Jim.

“Thank you, Mr. Fellows,” said Mrs. Betsey, with
tears in her eyes.

“I don't doubt he'll get back to you, even if he has

been stolen,” said Harry. “I have known wonderful
instances of the contrivance, and ingenuity, and perseverance
of these creatures in getting back home.”

“Well,” said Jim, “I know a regiment of our press
boys and reporters, who go all up and down the highways
and byways, alleys and lanes of New York, looking
into cracks and corners, and I'll furnish them with a
description of Jack, and tell them I want him; and I'll
be bound we'll have him forthcoming. There's some
use in newspaper boys, now and then.”

And Jim sat down by Mrs. Betsey, and entered into
the topic of Jack's characteristics, ways, manners and
habits, with an interest which went to the deepest heart
of the good little old lady, and excited in her bosom the
brightest hopes.

The evening passed off pleasantly. By this time, the
habitual comers felt enough at home to have the sort of
easy enjoyment that a return to one's own fireside
always brings.

Alice, Jim, Eva, Angelique, and Mr. St. John discussed
the forthcoming Christmas-tree for the Sunday-school,
and made lists of purchases to be made of things to be
distributed among them.

“Let's give them things that are really useful,” said
St. John.

“For my part,” said Eva, “in giving to such poor
children, whose mothers have no time to entertain them,
and no money to buy pretty things, I feel more disposed
to get bright, attractive playthings—dolls with fine, fancy
dresses, and so on; it gives a touch of poetry to the poor
child's life.”

“Well, I've dressed four dolls,” said Angie; “and I
offer my services to dress a dozen more. My innate love
of finery is turned to good account here.”

“I incline more to useful things,” said Alice.

“Well,” said Eva, “suppose we do both, give each
child one useful thing and one for fancy?”

“Well,” said Alice, “the shopping for all this list of
eighty children will be no small item. Jim, we shall
have to call in your services.”

“I'm your man,” said Jim. “I know stores where
the fellows would run their feet off to get a good word
from us of the press. I shall turn my influence in to the
service of the church.”

“Well,” said Alice, “we shall take you with us, when
we go on our shopping tour.”

“I know a German firm where you can get the real
German candles, and glass balls, and all the shiners and
tinklers to glorify your tree, and a little angel to stick on
the top. A tip-top notice from me in the paper will
make them shell out for us like thunder.”

Mr. St. John opened his large, thoughtful, blue eyes
on Jim with an air of innocent wonder. He knew as
little of children and their ways as most men, and was as
helpless about all the details of their affairs as he was
desirous of a good result.

“I leave it all in your hands,” he said, meekly;
“only, wherever I can be of service, command me.”

It was probably from pure accident that Mr. St. John
as he spoke looked at Angie, and that Angie blushed a
little, and that Jim Fellows twinkled a wicked glance
across at Alice. Such accidents are all the while happening,
just as flowers are all the while springing up by
the wayside. Wherever man and woman walk hand in
hand, the earth is sown thick with them.

It was a later hour than usual when Miss Dorcas and
Mrs. Betsey came back to their home.

“Is Jack come home?” was the first question.

No, Jack had not come.