said out once. I'm tired of only thinking things, even though I knew
you understood. Saying things makes them alive. They're alive now, and
always will be. So good-bye."

They stood and looked at one another for a moment in silence, then turned
and took their opposite ways.

Peter didn't go back to London till the late afternoon. He had things to
show Thomas on this his first day in the country. So he took him a long
walk, and Thomas sat in meadows and got a near view of cows and sheep,
and saw Peter paddle in a stream and try to catch minnows in an old tin
pot that he found.

Another thing that he found, or rather that found them, was a
disreputable yellow dog. He was accompanying a tramp and his wife along
the road. When the tramp sat down and untied a handkerchief full of apple
pie and cold potatoes (tramps have delightful things to eat as a rule)
the dog came near and asked for his share, and was violently removed to
a distance by the tramp's boot. He cried and ran through the hedge and
came upon Peter and Thomas, who were sitting on the other side, in a
field. Peter looked over the hedge and said, "Is he yours?" and was told,
"Mine! No, 'e ain't. 'E's been follerin' us for miles, and the more I
kick 'im the more 'e follers. Wish someone'd pison 'im. I'm sick of 'im."
His wife, who had the weary, hopeless, utterly resigned face of some
female tramps, said, "'E'll do for 'im soon, my man will," without much
interest.

"I'll take him with me," said Peter, and drew the disreputable creature
to him and gently rubbed his bruised side, and saw that he had rather a
nice face, meant to be cheerful, and friendly and hopeful eyes. Indeed,