realizing, perhaps, that he had nothing to lose and
everything to gain, the little vagabond played his last card--he
wagged his stubby tail.

A harder heart than Bucks's might have been touched. The operator held
out his hand. No more was needed; the melancholy tramp stepped
cautiously forward waving his alert flag of truce. He sniffed long and
carefully as he neared Bucks, looked solicitously into the boy's eyes,
and then smelt and licked the proffered hand. It was a token of
submission as plainly expressed as when Friday, kneeling, placed
Robinson Crusoe's foot on his head. Bucks reached into a paper bag
that Bill Dancing had left on the table and gave the dog a cracker.

Scuffy snapped up the offering like one starving. A second cracker and
a third disappeared at single gulps. For the length of the dog, the
size of his mouth appeared enormous. In a moment the cracker-bag was
emptied and Scuffy again licked the friendly hand. It did not take
Bucks long to decide what to do. In another moment he had resolved to
adopt his tramp visitor. The day happened to be Friday, and Bucks at
once renamed him Friday. When Dancing, who had been with Bob Scott
hunting, came in late that night he found Bucks asleep and Scuffy
lying in Dancing's own bed, from which he was ejected only after the
most vigorous language on his own part as well as on that of the
lineman. Even then, Scuffy retreated only as far as Bucks's feet,
where he slept for the rest of the night undisturbed.

"Where did he come from?" growled Dancing in the morning as he sat
with his pipe regarding the intruder, who acted quite at home, with a
critical eye.

Bucks explained that this was the tie foreman's runaway dog, Scuffy,
and beyond Scuffy's first appearance at the tent door he could tell
him nothing. Scuffy simply and promptly assumed a place in camp and
Bucks became, willy-nilly, his sponsor. But his effort to rename him
came to nothing. Scuffy gave no heed when called "Friday," but for
"Scuffy" he sprang to attention instantly.

Bill Dancing decided, off-hand, that "the pup" was worthless. Scott,
whose smile was kindly even when sceptical, only corrected Bill to the
extent of saying that Friday or Scuffy, whoever or whatever he might
be, was no pup; that he was a full-grown dog and in Bob's judgment he
would need no guardian.

One day, shortly after Scuffy had been put upon the pay-roll, Scott
came in from a trip after venison with word that there were b