get him and explain
to my wife. Don't let it make you feel uncomfortable. We both
understand."

Which accounts for the fact that Lad, within the next half hour, was
preparing to spend his first night away from home and from the two
people who were his gods. He was not at all happy. It had been an
interesting day. But its conclusion did not please Laddie, in any
manner.

And, when things did not please Lad, he had a very determined fashion
of trying to avoid them;--unless perchance the Mistress or the Master
had decreed otherwise.

The Master had brought him to this obnoxious strange place. But he had
not bidden Lad stay there. And the collie merely waited his chance to
get out. At ten o'clock, one of the kennelmen made the night rounds. He
swung open the door of the little stall in which Lad had been locked
for the night. At least, he swung the door halfway open. Lad swung it
the rest of the way.

With a plunge, the collie charged out through the opening portal,
ducked between the kennelman's legs, reached the open gate of the
enclosure in two more springs; and vanished down the road into the
darkness.

As soon as he felt the highway under his feet, Lad's nose drooped
earthward; and he sniffed with all his might. Instantly, he caught the
scent he was seeking;--a scent as familiar to him as that of his own
piano cave; the scent of the Place's car-tires.

It had taken Harmon and the Master the best part of ten minutes to
drive through the park and to the boarding kennels. It took Lad less
than half that time to reach the veranda of the Harmon house. Circling
the house and finding all doors shut, he lay down on the mat; and
settled himself to sleep there in what comfort he might, until the
Mistress and the Master should come down in the morning and find him.

But the Harmons were late risers. And the sun had been up for some
hours before any of the household were astir.

If Lad had been the professionally Faithful Hound, of storybooks, he
would doubtless have waited on the mat until someone should come to let
him in. But, after lying there until broad daylight, he was moved to
explore this new section of the world. The more so, since house after
house within range of his short vision showed signs of life and
activity.

Several people passed and repassed along the private roadway in front
of the Harmons' door; and nearly all of these paused to peer at Lad, in
what seemed to the collie a most flattering show o