“That guy’s no good,” said the head porter to assistant, when Del Mar had departed.  “He’s greasy.  I never liked greasy brunettes anyway.  My wife’s a brunette, but thank the Lord she ain’t greasy.”

“Sure,” agreed the assistant.  “I know his kind.  Why, if you’d stick a knife into him he wouldn’t bleed blood.  It’d be straight liquid lard.”

Whereupon the pair of them immediately presented Michael with vaster quantities of meat which he could not eat because the desire for Steward was too much with him.

In the meantime Del Mar sent off two telegrams to New York, the first to Harris Collins’ animal training school, where his troupe of dogs was boarding through his vacation: 

“Sell my dogs.  You know what they can do and what they are worth.  Am done with them.  Deduct the board and hold the balance for me until I see you.  I have the limit here of a dog.  Every turn I ever pulled is put in the shade by this one.  He’s a ten strike.  Wait till you see him.”

The second, to his booking agent: 

“Get busy.  Book me over the best.  Talk it up.  I have the turn.  A winner.  Nothing like it.  Don’t talk up top price but way over top price.  Prepare them for the dog when I give them the chance for the once over.  You know me.  I am giving it straight.  This will head the bill anywhere all the time.”

CHAPTER XXIII

Came the crate.  Because Del Mar brought it into the baggage-room, Michael was suspicious of it.  A minute later his suspicion was justified.  Del Mar invited him to go into the crate, and he declined.  With a quick deft clutch on the collar at the back of his neck, Del Mar jerked him off his footing and thrust him in, or partly in, rather, because he had managed to get a hold on the edge of the crate with his two forepaws.  The animal trainer wasted no time.  He brought the clenched fist of his free hand down in two blows, rat-tat, on Michael’s paws.  And Michael, at the pain, relaxed both holds.  The next instant he was thrust inside, snarling his indignation and rage as he vainly flung himself at the open bars, while Del Mar was locking the stout door.

Next, the crate was carried out to an express wagon and loaded in along with a number of trunks.  Del Mar had disappeared the moment he had locked the door, and the two men in the wagon, which was now bouncing along over the cobblestones, were strangers.  There was just room in the crate for Michael to stand upright, although he could not lift his head above the level of his shoulders.  And so standing, his head pressed against the top, a rut in the road, jolting the wagon and its contents, caused his head to bump violently.

The crate was not quite so long as Michael, so that he was compelled to stand with the end of his nose pressing against the end of the crate.  An automobile, darting out from a cross-street, caused the driver of the wagon to pull in abruptly and apply the brake.  With the crate thus suddenly arrested, Michael’s body was precipitated forward.  There was no brake to stop him, unless the soft end of his nose be considered the brake, for it was his nose that brought his body to rest inside the crate.