ture falling; faint groans and deep growls.
Lips dared not speak, but eyes met and said: "The dog's done what we
couldn't do."

Silence had fallen long before Von Busche's fellow officers came home;
such silence as that town knew, where bombardment ceased not by day or
night. Before dawn, a bomb fell on the roof of the house, which till
then had never been touched, and the officers all scuttled out to save
themselves; all but Von Busche. Whether in the confusion he was
forgotten, or whether it was thought he had not come home, no one could
tell. He was not seen again till after the Germans had packed up in
haste and decamped, which they did a few hours later, leaving the
townsfolk to shelter in cellars. It was only when the British arrived,
and Siegfried limped out from the battered house, that the dog's
existence was recalled--and the sounds in the night. Then the house was
searched, and Von Busche's body found, half buried under fallen tiles
and plaster. There were wounds in his throat, however, not to be
accounted for by the accident. The dog's broken leg was also a mystery.
"I had the poor boy mended up by a jolly good surgeon," Jack Curtis
finished his story. "He's as sound as ever now. He attached himself to
me from the first, as if he knew he had to thank me for his cure, but he
wasn't enthusiastic. I couldn't flatter myself that I was loved! I had
the idea I wasn't what he wanted--that he'd like to tell me what he
_did_ want, and politely bid me good-bye forever."

"You don't know where Von Busche got hold of the dog, do you?" Brian
asked.

"Only what his orderly told people, that it was in Flanders, close to
some ruined, burnt-up chateau that he could hardly be forced to leave,
though he was starving."

"I thought he'd get back there!" Brian said. "As for Von Busche--I
wonder--but no! If it had been he the first time, would the dog have
waited all those weeks for his revenge?"

"I don't understand," said the war correspondent.

"I don't myself," answered Brian. "But maybe the dog will manage to make
me, some day. I was thinking--how I found him, tied to a table in a
burning room. If Von Busche---- But anyhow, Sirius, you're no assassin!
At worst, you're an avenger."

The dog leaped upon Brian at sound of the remembered name. Odd that
three of his names, chosen by different men, should begin with "S"!

He's going to be an exciting passenger for the Becketts' car I foresee.
But Brian can make him do any