“Oh, Mr. Holroyd, you offered to help; help me to dig him out,” said the girl, seizing a spade. “I will do anything for you if you will only save him. Pat, I will give you five shillings! he is choking in there,” she went on distractedly. “Listen to his bark, how faint it is, fainter than it was an hour ago. He is dying, I am sure of it.” And she burst into fresh tears. George Holroyd leant his gun against a tree, and promptly took hold of a spade, and commenced operations with a will. Beauty in distress must ever appeal to the heart of a young man; only this was not Beauty--far from it--but Beauty’s cousin--besides, George loved dogs, and he worked with all his zeal and strength for the sake of the sporting little terrier, whilst Pat laboured and grubbed, and carried out earth with hard horny hands. After twenty minutes’ incessant toil, through moss and roots, and frost-bound earth, there was a scream of delight from Betty, and a very dirty, frightened terrier struggled forth, and was clasped instantly in her arms. “Oh, you bad, bad dog,” she murmured ecstatically, as she kissed the top of his head: “how dare you give me such a fright? What should we have done if you had been lost, and spoiled the set? You shall be kept in the stable for a week, on bread and water, for this.” And she set him down to receive the boisterous congratulations of “Brown” and “Robinson.” “I don’t know how to thank you,” she said, now turning to Mr. Holroyd--“nor Pat.--Pat, come up to the house this evening for your five shillings.” “And my reward,” enquired George. “I worked twice as hard as Pat!” Thinking that despite her fiery nose and eyes, she had pretty white teeth and a singularly sweet smile. “You know you said I might have anything I asked for.” “Oh! that was in the agonies of the moment!” “Then you would repudiate your offer. Miss Betty, I am surprised at you!” “No, no, I never, as the people here say, ‘go back from my word;’ only I have so little worth offering,” now following happy Pat, who slouched along, laden with the gun and rabbits. “I have no possessions of the smallest value, nothing but an old watch that goes for about three hours, and a battered locket, that Jones has chewed.” “Well, I will not enforce my claim now. I shall bide my time, and remind you of your promise some day. Perhaps I had better have it down in writing?” “Perhaps you had,” she answered with a laugh. “You appear to be very fond of dogs,” he remarked, as he walked beside her. “I am indeed. I look upon them almost as if they were my relations. I have----” and she paused. “You were going to say something,” he suggested politely. “I have so few relations.” “Mrs. and Miss Redmond.” “Very distant connections by marriage. I have one uncle in India, whom I have never seen; he is my only near kith or kin.” “Perhaps what you lack in relatives, you make up in friends; some people think _they_ are the best of the two.”