pack, and after a short parley, he lifted his nose high and
started away without looking back, while the other dogs silently trotted
after him. With a mystified yelp, Satan ran after them. The cur did not
take the turnpike, but jumped the fence into a field, making his way by
the rear of houses, from which now and then another dog would slink out
and silently join the band. Every one of them Satan nosed most
friendlily, and to his great joy the funeral dog, on the edge of the
town, leaped into their midst. Ten minutes later the cur stopped in the
midst of some woods, as though he would inspect his followers. Plainly,
he disapproved of Satan, and Satan kept out of his way. Then he sprang
into the turnpike and the band trotted down it, under flying black
clouds and shifting bands of brilliant moonlight. Once, a buggy swept
past them. A familiar odor struck Satan's nose, and he stopped for a
moment to smell the horse's tracks; and right he was, too, for out at
her grandmother's Dinnie refused to be comforted, and in that buggy was
Uncle Billy going back to town after him.

Snow was falling. It was a great lark for Satan. Once or twice, as he
trotted along, he had to bark his joy aloud, and each time the big cur
gave him such a fierce growl that he feared thereafter to open his
jaws. But he was happy for all that, to be running out into the night
with such a lot of funny friends and not to know or care where he was
going. He got pretty tired presently, for over hill and down hill they
went, at that unceasing trot, trot, trot! Satan's tongue began to hang
out. Once he stopped to rest, but the loneliness frightened him and he
ran on after them with his heart almost bursting. He was about to lie
right down and die, when the cur stopped, sniffed the air once or twice,
and with those same low growls, led the marauders through a rail fence
into the woods, and lay quietly down. How Satan loved that soft, thick
grass, all snowy that it was! It was almost as good as his own bed at
home. And there they lay--how long, Satan never knew, for he went to
sleep and dreamed that he was after a rat in the barn at home; and he
yelped in his sleep, which made the cur lift his big yellow head and
show his fangs. The moving of the half-breed shepherd and the funeral
dog waked him at last, and Satan got up. Half crouching, the cur was
leading the way toward the dark, still woods on top of the hill, over
which the Star of Bethlehem was lowly sinki