Mahlon Spellman sat at his desk facing a sheaf of bills—heavy ones from the East for spring dry goods, smaller ones from town connected with Mahala’s graduation. He lifted his head, a harassed look upon his face, when the bookkeeper from the bank delivered Mr. Moreland’s message. Instinctively, his hands reached for his hair, and then paused in arrested motion. How did it come that Martin Moreland was sending for him as if he were a servant? What right had he to undertake to dictate? Nervously glancing at the row of ledgers facing him, and the overflowing pigeonholes before him, a wave of nausea swept his middle. He got up, and for the first time in years, he put on his hat and left the store without looking in the mirror. He found that his hands were trembling as he climbed the broad stone steps, flanked on either side by huge dogs—big bronze creatures of exaggerated proportions, with distended nostrils that seemed to be scenting dollars instead of any living thing, their chests broad, their abdomens drawn in, their tails stiffly pointing. Cordially Mahlon Spellman hated them. He remembered the day upon which they had stood crated on the sidewalk before the bank and he had said to the banker: “Why dogs, Martin?” There had been the hint of a snarl in Martin’s voice as he had answered: “You’d prefer the conventional lion, would you, Mahlon? Well, give me a dog of about that size and build every clip. Especially a dog that I’ve trained myself. Watch dogs of the Treasury. Instinct may be all right, but I prefer training when it comes to guarding the finances of the community!” There was nothing he could do to them with his hands. As Mahlon Spellman passed between the unyielding metal moulded in the form of powerful hunters, he felt as if he were a creature at bay, in danger of being torn and rended by their merciless jaws. He could not remember ever before in his life having wanted to kick anything. He would have considered such a manifestation as extremely distasteful on the part of any gentleman; and he almost recoiled from himself as he stepped over the threshold with the realization strong upon him that he would have given a fine large sum, if he had had it to give, in order to have been able to kick both of those menacing big bronze animals off their pedestals and into the farthest regions of limbo.