"Run risks!" he
broke out suddenly: "That was it from beginning to end of that poor
beast's sufferings, fear! From that fellow on the bicycle, afraid of the
worry and expense, as soon as it showed signs of distemper, to myself and
the man with the pitch fork--not one of us, I daresay, would have gone
out of our way to do it--a harm. But we felt fear, and so by the law of
self-preservation, or what ever you like--it all began, till there the
poor thing was, with a battered head and a hole in its neck, ravenous
with hunger, and too distraught even to lap my bread and milk. Yes, and
there's something uncanny about a suffering animal--we sat watching it,
and again we were afraid, looking at its eyes and the way it bit the air.
Fear! It's the black godmother of all damnable things!"
Our friend bent down, crumpling and crumpling at his dog's ears. We,
too, gazed at the ground, thinking of, that poor lost puppy, and the
horrible inevitability of all that happens, seeing men are what they are;
thinking of all the foul doings in the world, whose black godmother is
Fear.
"And what became of the poor dog?" one of us asked at last.
"When," said our friend slowly, "I'd had my fill of watching, I covered
it with a rug, took this fellow away with me, and went to bed. There was
nothing else to do. At dawn I was awakened by three dreadful cries--not
like a dog's at all.
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