Carolyn of the Corners Part 24

"Oh, but Mr. Parlow," gasped Carolyn May, quite amazed, "it isn't for Uncle Joe, you know!"

"What ain't for your Uncle Joe?" demanded Mr. Parlow.

"The dog-house."

"Why ain't it? His money's goin' to pay for it, I reckon!"

"Oh, yes, that's so," admitted Carolyn May. "But Prince is going to live in it, and, you know, Prince is a friend of yours, Mr. Parlow."

"Wal, no gittin' around sich logic, I do allow," grunted the old man, his eyes twinkling, and the flush of anger dying out of his cheeks. "I s'pose it is fur the dog. And the poor beast ain't n.o.body's enemy. Wal!"

So Prince had his warm house for the winter. Now Carolyn May put on her rubber boots and warm coat and hood and went out to release the dog for his morning run. His "morning scramble" would be the better term on this occasion. Why, at the first bound he was buried in a drift!

"Isn't it lucky," said Carolyn May to Aunty Rose, who stood in the doorway, "that Prince can smell his way around so well? If it wasn't for his nose, he'd never be able to find his way out of those drifts. If _I_ fell down in one, I know I wouldn't be able to smell my way out again."

But after Chet Gormley had come and dug the paths, and the ox-teams had come along with ploughs to break out the roads, she found it possible to go to school. She took Prince with her.

Prince had learned to behave very well at school now. He was not allowed in the schoolroom, but he remained on the porch or went back home, as he pleased. But he was always waiting at the door for his little mistress at recess and when the session closed.

At noon Uncle Joe came home, dragging a sled-a big roomy one, glistening with red paint. Just the nicest sled Carolyn May had ever seen, and one of the best the hardware dealer carried in stock.

"Oh, my, that's lovely!" breathed the little girl in awed delight.

"That's ever so much better than any sled I ever had before. And Prince could draw me on it, if I only had a harness for him. He used to drag me in the park. Of course, if he saw a cat, I had to get off and hold him."

Mr. Stagg, once started upon the path of good deeds, seemed to like it.

At night he brought home certain straps and rivets, and in the kitchen, much to Aunty Rose's amazement, he fitted Prince to a harness which the next day Carolyn May used on the dog, and Prince drew her very nicely along the beaten paths.

"But, if anybody would have told me, I'm free to confess I would not have believed it," Aunty Rose declared, referring to Mr. Stagg's actions in stronger language than Carolyn May had ever heard her use before.

Carolyn May made a practice now of kissing Uncle Joe good-night when he started for the store after supper. "'Cause I'm always in bed when you get home," she explained.

Aunty Rose appeared not to notice this display of affection, and after a time Mr. Stagg got so used to it that he positively did not blush. But she climbed right into his lap and kissed him for the harness and sled, and the housekeeper felt in duty bound to comment upon it.

"You're on the road to spoil that child, Joseph Stagg," she said.

"Ahem!" coughed the hardware dealer, eyeing her with more boldness than he was usually able to display. "Ahem! I reckon somebody else around here began the spoiling-if any-Aunty Rose."

And the woman smiled grimly. "Well," she said, "_you_ should not be in your second childhood-at your age."

By Sat.u.r.day the roads were in splendid condition for sleighing. The heavy sleds, transporting timber or sawed planks from the camps and mills to town, packed the snow firmly.

So Carolyn May went sledding. Soberly, Prince drew the new red sled and his little mistress along the road towards Miss Amanda's. Of late the little girl wanted to see the carpenter's daughter just as frequently as possible. There was a secret understanding between Miss Parlow and Carolyn May-something both thought of continually, but of which neither spoke directly.

Carolyn May knew that the pretty lady was glad that Uncle Joe had come to love her. Every mark of affection that the hardware merchant showed his little niece the latter retailed to Miss Amanda, and each event lost nothing in the telling.

Now she desired to show her friend the new sled and Prince's harness.

Mr. Stagg might still pa.s.s the Parlow house with his face averted; nevertheless, his praises were sung to Miss Amanda continually by Carolyn May.

"Now, Prince," said the little girl as they set forth, "I do hope we don't meet any cats-or other dogs, either. Dogs are bad enough; but, you know, if you see a cat you can_not_ keep your mind on what you are doing."

Prince whined and wagged his ridiculous tail. It did seem as though he knew just what she was talking about.

However, until they got away from The Corners, at least, they met with no adventure. The blacksmith hailed Carolyn May-he was a jolly fellow-and asked her if she wanted to have her horse sharpened.

"No, thank you, Mr. Lardner," the little girl replied. "You see, Prince has got his claws, so he _can't_ slip on the hard snow. He doesn't need to be sharpened like the horses."

It was not altogether a pleasant afternoon, for there was a curtain of haze being drawn over the sun, and the wind was searching. And not only did the wind cut sharply, but it blew clouds of light snow from the tops of the drifts into one's face and eyes. Carolyn May almost wished she had not started for Miss Amanda's house-and this before she was halfway to her destination.

Prince, however, did not seem to mind it much. The sled slipped easily over the beaten snow, and Carolyn May was a light load for him, for Prince was a strong dog.

Out of sight of the houses grouped at The Corners the road to town seemed as lonely as though it were a veritable wilderness. Here and there the drifts had piled six feet deep, for the wind had a free sweep across the barrens.

"Now, there's somebody coming," said Carolyn May, seeing a moving object ahead between the clouds of drifting snow spray. "Is it a sleigh, Princey, or just a man?"

She lost sight of the object, then sighted it again.

"It must be a man. It can't be a bear, Princey." Everybody had told her there were no more bears left in the woods about Sunrise Cove.

"And, anyway, I'm only afraid of bears at night-when I go up to bed in the dark," Carolyn May told herself. "Here it is broad daylight!"

Besides, if it were any such animal, Prince would surely give tongue. He only sniffed and p.r.i.c.ked up his ears. The strange object had disappeared again.

It was just at the place where the spring spouted out of the rocky hillside and trickled across the road. There was a sort of natural watering trough here in the rock where the horses stopped to drink. The dog drew the little girl closer to the spot.

"Where _has_ that man gone to? If it was a man."

Prince stopped suddenly and whined.

"What is the matter, Princey?" demanded Carolyn May, really quite disturbed. There was something in the drift that the wind was heaping beside the beaten track. What could it be? "Prince!"

The dog barked, and then looked around at his mistress, as though to say: "See there!"

Carolyn May tumbled off the sled in a hurry. When she did so she slipped on a patch of snow-covered ice and fell. But she was not hurt.

"There! that's where the water runs across the road. It's all slippy-Oh!"

It was the sleeve of a man's rough coat thrust out of the s...o...b..nk that brought this last cry to the child's lips. In a very few moments the sign of the unfortunate wayfarer would have been completely covered in the drifting snow.

"Oh, oh! It's a man!" burst from Carolyn May's trembling lips. "How cold he must be!"

She was cold herself-and frightened. She had heard of people dying in the snow; and this person seemed perfectly helpless.

"Oh, dear me, Prince!" she cried, recovering a measure of her courage.

"We can't let him die here! We've just _got_ to save him!"

She plumped down on her knees and began brushing the snow away. She uncovered his shoulder. She took hold of this with her mittened hands and tried to shake the p.r.o.ne figure.

He moved. It was ever so little, but it inspired Carolyn May with hope.

She was not so much afraid of him now, she told herself. He was not dead.