he'd have him taken round to Police-station C, where, if he wasn't
claimed in four days, he'd be taken care of.

"'I knew well enough how they'd take care of him at Station C. They'd
shoot him--that's what they do to stray dogs without any friends. But
anyhow, I could keep him over night, for mother would think it was all
right, now father had said so. So I took him to the shed-chamber and
gave him a good supper,--how he did eat!--and I found an old mat for him
to lie on, and got a basin of warm water and some soap, and washed him
as clean as I could and rubbed him dry, and made him warm and
comfortable: and he licking my hands and face and wagging his stump of
a tail and thanking me for it as plain as though he could talk.

"'But oh, how he hated to be tied up! Fact is, he made such a fuss I
stayed out there with him till past my bed-time; and when at last I had
to go I left him howling and tugging at the string. Well, I went to
sleep, and, after a while, I woke up, and that dog was at it still. I
could hear him howl just as plain, though the shed-chamber was at the
back of the house, ever so far from my room. I knew mother hadn't come
upstairs, for the gas was burning in the halls, as she always turned it
off the last thing; and I thought to myself: "If she hears the dog when
she comes up, maybe she'll put him out, and I never shall see him
again." And before I knew what I was about I was running through the
hall and the trunk-room, and so out into the shed. It was pitch dark
out there, but I found my way to Grip easy enough by the noise he made
when he saw me; and it didn't take long to untie the string and catch
him up and run back with him to my room. I knew he would be as still as
a mouse in there with me. You were lonesome out there in the shed,
weren't you, Grip?