"Now, you let ME do the talking, Sade!" he insisted, half-
grinning, yet more than half grimly. "I'm the boss here. If I'm
not, then it's safe to listen to me till the boss gets here. And
we're goin' to do whatever I say we are--without any back-talk or
sulks, either. It's this way: Your brother gave the boy a
birthday check. We promised he could spend it any way he had a
mind to. He said he wanted a dog, didn't he? And I said, 'Go to
it!' didn't I? Well, he got the dog. Just because it happens to
be a she, that's no reason why he oughtn't to be allowed to keep
it. And he can. That goes."

"Oh, Dad!" squealed Dick in grateful heroworship. "You're a
brick! I'm not ever going to forget this, so long as I live. Say,
watch her shake hands, Dad! I've taught her, already, to--"

"Ed Hazen!" loudly protested his wife. "Of all the softies! You
haven't backbone enough for a prune. And if my orders to my own
son are going to be--"

"That'll be all, Sade!" interposed the man stiffly--adding: "By
the way, I got a queer piece of news to tell you. Come into the
kitchen a minute."

Grumbling, rebellious, scowling,--yet unable to resist the lure
of a "queer piece of news," Mrs. Hazen followed her husband
indoors, leaving Dick and his pet to gambol deliriously around
the clothes-festooned yard in celebration of their victory.

"Listen here, old girl!" began Hazen the moment the kitchen door
was shut behind them. "Use some sense, can't you? I gave you the