he avoided his daughter's gaze. So she turned her level eyes on
Link.

"Mr. Ferris," she said very quietly, "do you mean to say, when
this dog came back to you, you were actually going to return him
to us, instead of hiding him somewhere till the search was over?"

"I'm here, ain't I?" countered Ferris defiantly.

"But why?" she insisted. "WHY?"

"Because I'm a fool, I s'pose," he growled. "I guess Chum
wouldn't care much 'bout livin' with a thief. Take him up there
with you on the seat. Don't let him fall out. An'"--his voice
scaling a half octave in its pain--"keep him to home after this.
I ain't no measly angel. I can't swear I'd have the grit to fetch
him back another time."

He stopped, to note a curious phenomenon. There were actually
tears in the girl's big grave eyes. Link wondered why. Then she
said:

"Cavalier isn't my father's dog. He is mine. My father gave him
to me when he bought him, last spring. Colonel Marden seemed to
have forgotten that to-day. And I didn't want to start a squabble
by reminding him of it. After all, it's my father's affair, and
mine. Nobody else's. My father got me another collie last spring
to take Cavalier's place. A collie I'm ever so fond of. So I
don't need Cavalier. I don't want him. I tried to find you to
tell you so. But you had gone. So I got my father to drive me to