"What an old nuisance of a dog!" cried Peter; "just as we'd got to goin' on the right road." "Be still, Peter Grant! Hush your mouth! If you say a word against my dog you'll catch it. Poor little Pincher!" said Horace, patting him gently and laying his cheek down close to his face. The suffering creature licked his hands, and said with his eloquent eyes,-- "Dear little master, don't take it to heart. You didn't know I'd get hurt! You've always been good to poor Pincher." "I'd rather have given a dollar," said Horace; "O, Pincher! I wish 'twas my foot; I tell you I do!" They tried again, but the trap held the dog's paw like a vice. "I'll tell you what," said Peter; "we'll leave the dog here, and go home and get somebody to come." "You just behave, Peter Grant," said Horace, looking very angry. "I shouldn't want to be _your_ dog! Just you hold his foot still, and I'll try again." This time Horace examined the trap on all sides, and, being what is called an ingenious boy, did actually succeed at last in getting little Pincher's foot out. "Whew! I didn't think you could," said Peter, admiringly. "_You_ couldn't, Peter; you haven't sense enough." The foot was terribly mangled, and Pincher had to be carried home in arms. "I should like to know, Peter, who set that trap. If my father was here, he'd have him in the lock-up." "Poh! it wasn't set for dogs," replied Peter, in an equally cross tone, for both the boys were tired, hungry, and out of sorts. "Don't you know nothin'? That's a bear-trap!" "A bear-trap! Do you have bears up here?" "O, yes, dear me, suz: hain't you seen none since you've been in the State of Maine? I've ate 'em lots of times." Peter had once eaten a piece of bear-steak, or it might have been moose-meat, he was not sure which; but at any rate it had been brought down from Moosehead Lake. "Bears 'round here?" thought Horace, in a fright. He quickened his pace. O, if he could only be sure it was the right road! Perhaps they were walking straight into a den of bears. He hugged little Pincher close in his arms, soothing him with pet names; for the poor dog continued to moan. "O, dear, dear!" cried Peter, "don't you feel awfully?" "I don't stop to think of my feelings," replied Horace, shortly. "Well, I wish we hadn't come--I do." "So do I, Peter. I won't play 'hookey' again; but I'm not a-goin' to cry." "I'll never go anywheres with you any more as long as I live, Horace Clifford!" "Nobody wants you to, Pete Grant!" Then they pushed on in dignified silence till Peter broke forth again with wailing sobs. "I dread to get home! O, dear, I'll have to take it, I tell you. I guess you'd cry if you expected to be whipped." Horace made no reply. He did not care about telling Peter that he too had a terrible dread of reaching home, for there was something a great deal worse than a whipping, and that was, a mother's sorrowful face.