The Corner House Girls Under Canvas

“Tom Jonah came to our house in Milton,” began Ruth, when again the man interrupted with:

“Of course. He was on his way home to me. I sold him to a man who lives forty miles beyond Milton.”

“Then you do not own him?” Ruth said, with a feeling of relief.

The man looked at her steadily for a minute. Ruth had recovered her self-possession. Tess and Dot were now on either side of Tom Jonah, with their arms about the dog’s neck. Agnes was very angry, but remained silent.

“I raised that dog from a pup, Miss. I owned his mother. I raised him. I put his name on his collar. He has it there yet, hasn’t he?”

“Yes, sir,” admitted Ruth.

“He’s always been a good dog. He’s a gentleman if ever a dog was! He had the run of the house. My wife and the girls made a great pet of him. But by and by they said he was too big and clumsy for the house. They have a couple of little fice– lap-poodles, or the like. Tom Jonah was put out, and he got jealous. Yes, sir!” and the man laughed. “Just as jealous as a human.”

“Oh!” gasped Agnes. She disliked that man!

“My name’s Reynolds,” said the man. “Everybody knows me about Shawmit. I run a lumber-yard there.

“Well! Tom Jonah got to running away to the neighbors. Stayed a while with one, then with another. Always liked kids, Tom Jonah did, and he’d stay longest where there were kids in the family.

“But it got to be a nuisance. I didn’t know whether the dog belonged to me or somebody else. So I sold him to a relative of my wife’s who came on visiting us, and took a fancy to Tom Jonah, and who lives – as I said – forty miles beyond Milton. So the old fellow was on his way back home when you took him in, eh?”

“He came to us at Milton,” Ruth replied. “He wanted to stay. I brought him down here to take care of my little sisters. We’re living in a tent down on the shore yonder – ”

“And we’re going to keep him!” interrupted Agnes, angrily.

“Hush! Be still, Aggie!” begged Ruth, in a low tone.

“You don’t claim you bought him, I suppose?” said the man who called himself Reynolds.

“But we will!” cried Ruth, instantly. “We will gladly pay for him.”

“Oh, he’s not for sale again,” laughed the man. “I sold him once and he wouldn’t stay sold, you see.”

“Then he doesn’t belong to you now, any more than he does to us, really,” Ruth hastened to say.

“Well – that’s so, I suppose,” admitted the man.

“We won’t give Tom Jonah up to anybody,” said Agnes again.

Dot was crying and Tess could scarcely keep from following her lead. Tom Jonah stood solemnly, his eyes very bright, his tail waving slowly. He looked from the girls to the man in the runabout, and back again. He knew they were discussing him; but he did not know just what it was all about.

“If we have to,” said Ruth, with much more confidence in her voice than she felt in her heart, “we will give Tom Jonah up to the person who really owns him. We do not know you, sir. We do not know if what you say is true. You must prove it.”

“Well! I like that!” said the man in a tone that showed he did not like it at all. “You are a pretty pert young lady, you are. I guess I’ll take my own dog home. I heard he was over here to the beach and I drove over particularly to get him.”

“Take him, then!” exclaimed Ruth, desperately. “If Tom Jonah will go with you, all right. You call him.”

“Come here, boy!” commanded the man.

Tom Jonah did not move. Ruth took a hand of each of the smaller girls and led them away from the big dog.

“Come, children,” she said. “We’ll go on. If Tom Jonah really loves us, he’ll come, too.”

The dog whined. He looked from the red-faced, angry man to the four girls who loved him so well.

“Come here, Tom Jonah!” commanded the man again. He had turned his horse and was evidently headed for home. “Come, sir!”

The Corner House girls were moving sadly away. Agnes glanced back and actually made a face at the man in the runabout. Fortunately he did not see it.

“Come on, Tom Jonah!” said the man for the third time.

The dog was perplexed. He showed it plainly. He started after the man; he started back for the girls. He whined and he barked. He was torn by the conflicting emotions in his doggish soul.

“What’s the matter with him?” exclaimed the man, and snapped his whiplash at Tom Jonah.

At that, Dot uttered a shriek of anguish. Tess burst into tears. Agnes started back as though to protect the dog. Even Ruth could not forbear to utter a cry.

“Here, Tom Jonah! here, sir!” Agnes shouted. “Come on, you dear old fellow.”

The dog barked, circled the moving carriage once, and then raced down the road toward the Corner House girls. The man shouted and snapped his whip. Tom Jonah did not even look back at him when he caught up with the girls.

“Hurry up! let’s run with him, Ruthie,” begged Agnes.

But there was no need of that. The man did not turn his horse and follow. He was quickly out of sight and Tom Jonah gave no sign of wishing to follow his old master.

The incident troubled the Corner House girls vastly. Even Ruth was devoted to the good old dog by this time. If he were taken away by this Mr. Reynolds, it would be like losing one of the Corner House family.

Ruth feared that Mr. Reynolds would find some legal way of getting possession of Tom Jonah. She wished Mr. Howbridge were here to advise them what to do. She even wished now that she had not brought Tom Jonah to Pleasant Cove to act as their “chaperon.”

The smaller girls dried their eyes after a time. Agnes, “breathing threatenings,” as Ruth said, promised Tess and Dot that the man never should take Tom Jonah away. But Ruth wondered what they would do about it if Mr. Reynolds came to Willowbend Camp with a police constable and a warrant for the dog?

And, too, who had sent Mr. Reynolds word that Tom Jonah was at the beach? He particularly said that he had been informed of the fact. It seemed to Ruth that the informer must be their enemy.

Then, out of a dust cloud that had been drawing near the Corner House girls for some few moments, appeared the forefront of a big touring car. In it were Trix Severn and some of her friends from the Overlook House.

“Oh! there’s Trix!” murmured Agnes to her older sister.

The hotel-keeper’s daughter would not look at the Corner House girls. She, certainly, had proved herself their enemy. Ruth wondered if Trix had had anything to do with bringing Mr. Reynolds to Pleasant Cove, searching for his dog.

Ruth knew that the hotel-keeper’s daughter often rode over to Shawmit; she was probably on her way there now with her party. And after the way Trix had acted at the time the Spoondrift bungalow was burned, one might expect anything mean of Trix. For once Ruth allowed her suspicions to color her thoughts.

“She has awfully good times, just the same,” murmured Agnes.

“Who does?” demanded Ruth, tartly.

“Trix.”

“I declare!” exclaimed Ruth, with more vexation than she usually displayed. “I’d be ashamed that I ever knew her after the way she’s acted. And I believe, Agnes, that we can thank her for setting that man after Tom Jonah.”