"Why did you leave that thing to come back to me, sir? You could have caught it if you had kept right on after it, and you might have known I'd get along all right without your help. Now, do you go and find it, sir!" and I pointed imperatively, if rather vaguely, towards the jumble of rocks. The chicken's cries had ceased; there was now nothing to guide the dog, even if he understood, which I, having great faith in his intelligence, believed he did. He ran along the trail for a few yards, stopped, gave a joyful bark, and came running back to me with a stick in his mouth. I had been trying to teach him to retrieve, and my order, "go find it," suggested that pastime to him. When he laid the stick at my feet, wagging his tail and looking up in hopeful anticipation of the praise that he felt to be his due, I could not find it in my heart to withhold it. Besides, the chicken thief was, no doubt, safe in his lair at this time, so, abandoning the hopeless pursuit, we made our way homeward. When Joe came in, and I related our adventure to him, he said: "Yo' may t'ank yo' sta'hs, Miss Leslie, dat yo' done got dat tumble w'en yo' did! Dat feller wif de black coat, trimmed in yeller, was a lynx--dat's his'n's dress ebbery time--an' I'd 'a' heap rudder meet up wif a mountain lion, any day, dan one 'o' dem ar! Land, chile! Ef hit had 'a' been me, down dar by de ribber, I'd 'a' helt Guard to keep him still, an' I'd 'a' kep' out o' sight. Dat's w'at I'd 'a' done, honey." "Do you recollect, Leslie," Jessie chimed in, "what Mrs. Loyd told us about her encounter with a lynx, last year? She said that she was in the house one day, when she heard a great outcry among her chickens, right close at hand, in the yard. She ran to the door, and there was a great lynx, chasing the chickens around. The minute the door was opened, they ran toward it, and into the house. The lynx was right behind them, but it stopped as the chickens crowded around her, and she seized the broom and struck at it. Instead of running, it stood its ground and showed its teeth, bristling up and growling. She dropped the broom and sprang into the house, slamming the door shut just as the lynx hurled itself against it. She said that she was almost scared to death. She locked the door, and scrambled up into the loft--she said that she was afraid the cat would take a notion to break in at one of the windows--and the creature stayed outside and killed chickens as long as he pleased, while she stayed up there, trembling, until her husband came home. She said that the next time a bob-cat wanted one of her chickens it could have it, for all of her." "I would hate to have Guard get hurt," I said, looking affectionately at our follower. CHAPTER XIII JOE DISAPPEARS The plowing was done--had been done for some days, indeed--and the time set for our offering final proof was close at hand. But Jessie and I, going about our household tasks with sober faces, had hardly a word to say to each other.