“Will a sponge boiled in oil really kill a dog?” I asked, for I had heard so often since beginning to work in the tenements that such was the case. The old man’s face ceased to twinkle; Julie cast down her eyes and picked at her bed. “It does worse’n kill ’em,” she told me in a piping whisper. “It make’s ’em pine away and they suffer so, howlin’, squirmin’ with pain, until you’re glad to see ’em die.” “You see it’s the sponge swellin’ inside ’em,” the tinker supplemented. “When you boils a sponge it natu’ly shrivels up to a hard knot. The dog gnaws it to get the oil,—swallows it. There ain’t nothin’ to be done unless you take all ’is insides out. We lost four that way before we got Buster.” Though I received four other pencilled scrawls written by the same hand I paid no attention to them. The matter faded from my mind. When I covered my district I turned about, and again beginning on the north side of East Fourteenth Street, worked my way up-town. When I reached the tinker’s address I crossed the little back yard and stopped in the door of his shop. He was busy mending a leak in an agate saucepan. “You see I’m back again,” I announced cheerfully. “No use asking if you have renewed Buster’s license.” “Yes. I got it out,” he replied, and though he paused in his work long enough to glance up at me he did not smile. Such a different tinker! Something must have gone wrong. I glanced about the little shop. The place had been stripped. Except for the saucepan, a couple of pots, and his tools, all on the work-bench at his side, there was no evidence of his trade. The heaps of old brass, copper, and wrought iron that had filled all the corners were gone. “You’ve had a clearing out,” I said, letting him see me looking about the shop. “Thieves,” he replied, in the same colorless tone. “Broke in and carried off everything. These are new.” He motioned to the few tools beside him. “Where was Buster?” “I had him killed.” I could not believe my ears. And the tragedy of the man’s eyes! “You had Buster killed! What had he done?” “He hadn’t done nothin’ but what he had oughter do—what I’d taught ’im to do.” His tone reminded me of a dense fog so saturated with grayness. “He bit a postman.” Pushing aside the two pots I took my seat on his work-bench. “How did he happen to bite the postman?” I asked, thinking it might do him good to talk his trouble out. “I thought Buster and the postman understood each other?” “He was a new postman, one of them fresh guys. Buster barked at ’im, and Julie called to ’im—warned ’im that the dog would bite. ’Stead of ’im doin’ what he was told he tried to step into the room.” He straightened up and his eyes flashed with pride. “Buster pounced on ’im, ’most tore his shirt offen ’im. I wish to God he’d a tore his liver out, so I do.” “If he didn’t draw blood why did you have him killed?” I demanded sternly, for in spite of my sympathy with the old man it appeared to me that the dog hadn’t had a square deal.