Beautiful Joe - An Autobiography of a Dog by Marshall Saunders
page 19 of 308 (06%)
page 19 of 308 (06%)
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There was a young man going by on a bicycle. He heard my screams and springing off his bicycle, came hurrying up the path, and stood among us before Jenkins caught sight of him. In the midst of my pain, I heard him in say fiercely "What have you been doing to that dog?" "I've been cuttin' his ears for fightin', my young gentleman," said Jenkins. "There is no law to prevent that, is there?" "And there is no law to prevent my giving you a beating," said the young man, angrily. In a trice he had seized Jenkins by the throat, and was pounding him with all his might. Mrs. Jenkins came and stood at the house door, crying, but making no effort to help her husband. "Bring me a towel," the young man cried to her, after he had stretched Jenkins, bruised and frightened, on the ground. She snatched off her apron, and ran down with it, and the young man wrapped me in it, and taking me carefully in his arms, walked down the path to the gate. There were some little boys standing there, watching him, their mouths wide open with astonishment. "Sonny," he said to the largest of them, "if you will come behind and carry this dog, I will give you a quarter." The boy took me, and we set out. I was all smothered up in a cloth, and moaning with pain, but still I looked out occasionally to see which way we were going. We took the road to the town and stopped in front of a house on Washington Street. The young man leaned his bicycle up against the house, took a quarter from his pocket and put it in the boy's hand, and lifting me gently in his arms, went up a lane leading to the back of |
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