own.

'Just this side,' was the answer. 'That's where our factory is--half a
mile this side of Barton. And every day of every week, for fifteen years
or more, I've driven round the country with this van.'

'Are you going back to-night?' I inquired.

'Why, of course,' he exclaimed. 'Back by the straight road, after I've
done my round.'

We had already left the wider road, and as the driver spoke he pulled up
the horse at the door of a small rustic inn. Fastening his reins to a
hook on his seat, he slowly dismounted, took a box of bottles from the
van, carried it into the inn, returning after a short interval with the
same box filled by a similar number of empty bottles. Then he climbed up
to his seat again, unhooked the reins, and cried 'Gee-up' to the horse,
which at once started at a smart trot along the lane.

'Now about this dog,' he began. 'Mr. Westrop used to live at the Beacon
on Ramleigh Forest--I can remember before the house was built. He moved
out last Friday to a house near Barton, and sure enough he has lost his
terrier. Where did you find him? That's what I should like to know.'

'I don't know whether the house was called the Beacon,' I answered,
'because I didn't see any name. Patch had got locked in the
drawing-room.'

'Well, now!' cried the driver, 'who would have thought the dog was fool
enough for that! Locked in the drawing-room, were you, Sam, old chap?
And how did you get him out?'

When at some length I explained how I had been caught in the storm, and
sought shelter in the empty house, and slept in the kitchen, and had
been frightened by the ghostly noises in the middle of the night, the
driver leaned forward and laughed so uproariously that I felt afraid
lest he should fall from his seat on to the horse: and as soon as his
merriment permitted him to speak, he turned to me with his great red
face redder than ever.

'Well,' he cried, 'you are a nice young man for a small party, you are!
A nice young burglar, to be sure! Going and breaking into people's
houses, cool as you please, and stealing their dogs. Howsoever,' he
added, 'Mr. Westrop will be no end glad when I take Sam back to him
to-night.'

I clasped Patch more closely.

'You're--you are not going to take him back?' I said.

'Why, what do you think?' he demanded. 'You wouldn't go and keep a dog
that didn't belong to you!'

I am afraid I might have been tempted to keep Patch or Sam, whichever he
ought to be named, on any term