He paused. For Lad had moved forward to where the infant collie was trying valiantly to walk on the slippery boards. The big dog regarded the puppy; his head on one side, his tulip ears cocked; his deep-set eyes friendily curious. This was Lad's first experience with one of the young of his species. And he was a bit puzzled; albeit vastly interested. Experimentally, he laid one of his tiny white forepaws lightly on the mite's fuzzy shoulder. Instantly, the puppy growled a falsetto warning to him to keep his distance. Lad's plumed tail began to wag at this sign of spirit in the pigmy. And, with his curved pink ribbon of tongue, he essayed to lick the shivering Lady. A second growl rewarded this attention. And Lady sought to avoid further contact with the shaggy giant, by scrambling at top speed to the edge of the veranda. She miscalculated the distance or else her nearsighted baby eyes failed to take account of the four-foot drop to the gravel drive below. Too late, she tried to check her awkward rush. And, for a moment, her fat little body swayed perilously on the brink. The Mistress and the Master were too far away to catch her in time to prevent a fall which might well have entailed a broken rib or a wrenched shoulder. But Lad was nearer. Also, he moved faster. With the speed of lightning, he made a dive for the tumbling Lady. As tenderly as if he were picking up a ball of needles, he caught her by the scruff of the neck, lifting her in the air and depositing her at the Mistress's feet. The puppy repaid this life-saving exploit by growling still more wrathfully and by snapping in helpless menace at the big dog's nose. But Lad was in no wise offended. Deaf to the praise of the Mistress,--a praise which ordinarily threw him into transports of embarrassed delight,--he stood over the rescued pup; every inch of his magnificent body vibrant with homage and protectiveness. From that hour, Lad was the adoring slave of Lady. He watched over her, in her increasingly active rambles about the Place. Always, on the advent of doubtful strangers, he interposed his own furry bulk between her and possible kidnaping. He stood beside her as she lapped her bread-and-milk or as she chewed laboriously at her fragment of dog-biscuit. At such times, he proved himself the mortal foe of Peter Grimm, the Mistress's temperamental gray kitten, with whom he was ordinarily on very comfortable terms. Peter Grimm was the one creature on the Place whom Lady feared. On the day after her arrival, she essayed to worry the haughty catkin. And, a second later, the puppy was nursing a brace of deep red scratches at the tip of her inquiring black nostrils.