“’What would mother say?  Well, you see, I meant to keep awake till she came upstairs and tell her all about it; but I was so tired I dropped asleep in a minute, and the first thing I knew I was dreaming that I was running up Brooks Street with Grip in my arms, and the bull-dog close after us, and just as he was going to spring mother screamed, and somebody kept saying, “’St, boy! ’st, boy! stick to him, good dog! stick to him!” And then I woke up, and mother really was screaming, and ’twas Fred who was saying, “Stick to him! stick to him!” And the gas was lit in the hall, and there was a great noise and hubbub out there, and I rushed out, and there was a man on the floor and the yellow dog had him by the throat.  Father stood in the door-way with his pistol cocked, and he said in a quiet kind of way (just as father always speaks when he means business):  “If you stir you are a dead man!” But I should like to know how he could stir with that grip on his throat!

“’Then there came a banging and ringing at our front door, and Fred ran to open it, and in rushed our policeman—­I mean the one that takes our street on his beat.  He had heard the noise outside, you see, and, for a wonder, was on hand when he was wanted; and he just went for that fellow on the floor and clapped a pair of handcuffs on his wrists as quick as you could turn your hand over; and when he got a look at him he says:  “Oh, it’s you, Bill Long, is it?  We’ve been wanting you for some time at the lodge (that was his name for the police-station).  Well, get up and come along!”

“’But I called the dog off.

“’We didn’t one of us go to bed again that night.  Father and Fred looked through the house, and father said it was the neatest piece of work in the burglary line he ever saw done—­real professionals, they were.  There was two of ’em.  They’d taken plenty of time.  The forks and the spoons and the two hundred dollars in money was all done up in neat packages, and they’d been through father’s desk and the secretary drawers; and they’d had a lunch of cold chicken and mince-pie, and left the marks of their greasy hands on the best damask napkins Bridget had ironed that day and left to air by the kitchen range.  And then, you see, while one stayed below to keep watch, the other went up to finish the job; and he would have finished it, too, and both would have got away with all the things if it hadn’t have been for that dog.  Look at him! will you?  I believe he understands every word I say as well as you do.

“’Well, right at the door of father’s room, Grip took him.  How did he lay the fellow on his back?  We suppose he was creeping into the room on his hands and knees,—­they often do, father says,—­and the dog made a rush at him in front and gripped him in the throat, and the weight of the dog threw him backward; and once down, Grip kept him there—­see?