“Come down!” he decreed. “It’s safe. So long as you get out of here, now!” Mouthing, gobbling like some distressed turkey, Eben Shunk proceeded to let his bulk down from the limb. He groaned in active misery as his bitten legs were called upon to bear his weight again. He stood for a moment glowering from Link to the disgruntedly passive collie. Chum returned the look with compound interest, then glanced at Ferris in wistful appeal, dumbly begging leave to renew the chase. Shunk still fought for coherent utterance and weighed in his bemused brain the fact that he had overstepped the law. Before he could speak, a pleasant diversion was caused by Olive Chatham. The little girl had been a happily interested spectator of the bout between her adored Chum and this pig-eyed fat man. But the coat-rolling episode had been beyond her comprehension. She had trotted away, after Link’s explanation of it, and her mind had cast about for some new excitement. She had found it. The bony yellow horse had been left untied; in Shunk’s haste to annex a dog-catching dollar. Therefore the horse, after the manner of his kind, had begun to crop the wayside grass. But this grass was close cut and was hard for his decaying teeth to nibble. A little farther on, just within the limits of the lane, the herbage grew lusher and higher. So the horse had strayed thither, trundling his disreputable wagon after him. Olive’s questing glance had fallen upon horse and cart, not ten feet away from her, and several yards inside of the farm’s boundary line. She heard also that pitiful sound of whimpering from within the canvas-covered body of the wagon. And she remembered what Link had said about the dogs imprisoned there. She hurried up to the vehicle and circumnavigated it until she came to the grating at the back. Clambering up on the rear step, she looked in. At once several pathetically sniffing little noses were thrust through the bars for a caress or a kind word in that abode of loneliness and fear. This was too much for the child’s warm heart. She resolved then and there upon the rôle of deliverer. Reaching up to the grated door, she pushed back its simple bolt. Instantly she was half-buried under a canine avalanche. No fewer than seven dogs—all small and all badly scared—bounded through the open doorway toward freedom. In their dash for safety they almost knocked the baby to the ground. Then with joyous barks and yelps they galloped off in every direction. This was the spectacle which smote upon the horrified senses of Eben Shunk as he fought for words under the tree that had been his abode of refuge.