Aleko found the water, and was just putting the pitcher back in its place, when he heard a series of short sharp barks in the distance. Instead of passing out of the house door, before which the old man was sitting, he vaulted out of the low kitchen window and went tearing down the street. "Aleko!" called Kyr Themistocli who heard the clatter. "Aleko! Where are you?" But there was only silence. He sighed and leaned back in his chair crossing his hands. "Of course the boy cannot stay long; it is well he comes at all," and he sighed again. Suddenly he felt something warm, and soft, and alive on his hands. He was startled. "What is it?" "It is only Solon," said Aleko. "Did you not hear me return? He was barking down the street and I knew he had strayed again from the cook--Anneza--and I brought him for you to see." Kyr Themistocli always talked of "seeing" and Aleko had got into the same habit. "Put your hands over him,--so,--Is he not soft? And clever! as clever as a Christian! Whatever I tell him he understands." Kyr Themistocli smiled. "He is not yours?" "Mine! No! He belongs to the big house higher up, the one which has the garden. Do you know it? Someone lives there who is called 'Spinotti.'" "Kyrios Spinotti, the banker; he is a very rich man." "Is he?" said Aleko indifferently. "Well, Solon is his dog, and he is so fond of him that he fears lest the wind should blow or the rain should drop on his body; and he often goes into the kitchen to see what he eats, and Anneza says that if all poor people fared as well as this dog does, it would be well. So that is why he is so fat, you see! And when Anneza goes out, her master says she must take the dog with her for exercise, and if she does not ... bad luck to her! But he is always straying. She is a stupid woman and Solon will not stay with her. Some day she will lose him and never find him again, and then there will be trouble. Now I must take him back." "His master," said the old man slowly, "is so fond of the dog because it was his wife's dog, and she is dead." Aleko, with Solon contentedly tucked under his arm, stopped short. "You know him then?" "This house in which I live, is his, and because of that, I pay very little rent for it. He, Nico Spinotti, is my old pupil from Cephalonia, of whom I told you; he who took me to the oculists. Once, a long time ago, when I first came to Athens, when I could still see, I went to his house. His wife was alive then--a beautiful woman, of one of the first names of the island--and as she was talking to me and smiling, she had the little dog, who was but a puppy, in her arms. She died--God rest her soul--of typhoid fever. Since then I have not seen Nico often, but he never forgets his old master." "Of course not," said Aleko, "why should he?" "Many would, my boy; many would. But he is a good man; take his dog back to him that he may not be anxious."