It was then the train from New York came in. And, momentarily, the sport of “mad-dog” killing was abandoned, while the crowd scattered to each side of the track. From a front car of the train the Mistress and the Master emerged into a bedlam of noise and confusion. “Best hide in the station, Ma’am!” shouted the telegraph operator, at sight of the Mistress. “There is a mad dog loose out here! He’s chasing folks around, and—” “Mad dog!” repeated the Mistress in high contempt. “If you knew anything about dogs, you’d know mad ones never ‘chase folks around,’ any more than diphtheria patients do. Then—” A flash of tawny light beneath the station lamp, a scurrying of frightened idlers, a final wasted shot from the policeman’s pistol,—as Wolf dived headlong through the frightened crowd towards the voice he heard and recognised. Up to the Mistress and the Master galloped Wolf. He was bleeding, his eyes were bloodshot, his fur was rumpled. He seized the astounded Master’s gloved hand lightly between his teeth and sought to pull him across the tracks and towards the lake. The Master knew dogs. Especially he knew Wolf. And without a word he suffered himself to be led. The Mistress and one or two inquisitive men followed. Presently, Wolf loosed his hold on the Master’s hand and ran on ahead, darting back every few moments to make certain he was followed. “_Heroism—consists—in—hanging—on—one—minute—longer_,” the Boy was whispering deliriously to himself for the hundredth time; as Wolf pattered up to him in triumph, across the ice, with the human rescuers a scant ten yards behind. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ EIGHT: Afterword ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [Illustration] EIGHT: Afterword I have drawn upon one of our Sunnybank collies for the name and the aspect and certain traits of my “Treve” book’s hero. The real Treve was my chum, and one of the strangest and most beautiful collies I have known. Dog aristocrats have two names; one whereby they are registered in the American Kennel Club’s immortal studbook and one by which they are known at home. The first of these is called the “pedigree name.” The second is the “kennel name.” Few dogs know or answer to their own high-sounding pedigree names. In speaking to them their kennel names alone are used. For example, my grand old Bruce’s pedigree name was Sunnybank Goldsmith;—a term that meant nothing to him. My Champion Sunnybank Sigurdson (greatest of Treve’s sons), responds only to the name of “Squire.” Sunnybank Lochinvar is “Roy.” Treve’s pedigree name was “Sunnybank Sigurd.” And in time he won his right to the hard-sought and harder-earned prefix of “CHAMPION”;—the supreme crown of dogdom. We named him Sigurd—the Mistress and I—in honour of the collie of Katharine Lee Bates; a dog made famous the world over by his owner’s exquisite book, “_Sigurd, Our Golden Collie_.”