Chapter 4

After a pleasant breakfast, in the course of which my wife read the social news in the New York Herald-Tribune and I the business news in the New York Times, I excused myself and returned to my bedroom. Winnie’s bathroom was fitted with all the gadgets, too, and there was an abundant choice of razors, from the old-fashioned straight-edge suicide’s favorite to the 1941 stream-lined electric Yankee clipper. I tried out the scales and found that my involuntary host weighed over 195 pounds--a good deal of it around the middle. Oh, well, a few weeks of setting up exercises would take care of that. A cold shower and a brisk rub made me feel a little more presentable and I climbed shamelessly into Winnie’s most manly tweeds.

“Are you catching the ten o’clock, dear?” Germaine called from her bedroom.

“No such luck!” I warned her. “Phone the office, will you, and tell them I’m feeling under the weather and won’t be in till sometime tomorrow.”

This seemed like a good chance to do some exploring--since the Rutherfords had temporarily abandoned the field--though I needn’t have bothered since I had seen photographs of suburban houses like Pook’s Hill in a score of different slick-paper pre-war magazines. There was the inevitable colonial-type dining-room, with dark wainscoting below smooth oyster-white plaster, electric candle-sconces, and the necessary array of family silver on the antiqued mahogany sideboard. The windows gave a vista of brown lawn, with the grass still blasted by winter. There was the inevitable chintzy living-room, with a permanently unemployed grand-piano, two or three safely second-rate paintings by safely first-rate defunct foreigners. There was the usual array of sofas, easy chairs, small, middle-sized and biggish tables, with lots of china ash-trays, and a sizable wood-burning fireplace. Of course, you entered the living-room by two steps down from the front hall and there was a separate up-two-steps-entrance to my den. And sure as death and taxes, there was a veritable downstairs lavatory.

I slipped on my coat and hat and stepped out through a French window which led from the living-room to the inevitable paved stone terrace. There were galvanized iron fittings for a summer awning and in the center was a cute little bronze sun-dial. This had an exclamation point and the inscription, “Over the Yard-Arm” at the place where noon should be, and a bronze cocktail glass instead of the sign for four p.m. All the way around the rest of the circle was written in heavy embossed capitals, “The Hell With It!”

My meditations on this facet of the Tompkins character--and I wondered whether I oughtn’t to spell ‘facet’ with a u’--were interrupted by Myrtle.

“Oh, Mr. Tompkins,” she called from the kitchen window, in complete repudiation of her earlier appearance as Watson, third lady’s maid at Barony Castle, “the man from the kennels is here with Ponto. Where shall I tell him to take the dog?”

I hurried back indoors--there was still a chill in the air and I really prefer my trees with their clothes on--and found a gnarled little man who reeked of saddle-soap and servility.

“Well, sir, Mr. Tompkins,” he beamed the Old Retainer at me. “That dog of yours had a close call, a mighty close call. Thought he was a sure-enough goner. Tried everything: injections, oxygen, iron lung, enema. No dice. Then yesterday afternoon he just lay down and went to sleep and I thought, ‘My! Won’t Mr. Tompkins feel bad!’ But he woke up, large as life and twice as natural, and began carrying on so that I guess he wanted to come home to his folks. He’s a mite weak, Mr. Tompkins, very weak I might say, but he’ll get well quicker here than at my place and I’ll pop in every other day to keep track of him. Never did see anything like the recovery that dog made in all my born days. Now about his bowels--”

I waited until he had to draw a breath and made swift to congratulate him on his professional skill. “I wouldn’t have lost Ponto for a thousand dollars,” I said. “Let’s get him out of your car and up in my bedroom,” I added. “He’s been like a member of the family and--”

A series of deep bass backs interrupted me, followed by ominous sounds of a heavy body hurling itself recklessly around inside a small enclosed space.

“There!” said the vet. “He recognized your voice. Come on, Ponto. I’ll fetch you. He’s pretty weak, Mr. Tompkins, but he’ll get strong fast if you feed him right.”

The vet twinkled out the front door and returned shortly, leading a perfectly enormous coal-black Great Dane on a plaited leather leash. Ponto did not look very weak to me, but I’ve always been fond of dogs and I figured that kindness to animals might count in my favor. “Good dog,” I condescended. “Poor old fellow!”

The poor old fellow gave a low but hungry growl and lunged for me with bared teeth, dragging the vet behind him like a dory behind a fishing schooner. I jumped into the den and slammed the door, while Ponto sniffed, snapped and grumbled on the far side of my defenses.

“Tell you what, doctor,” I called through the panels. “Take him upstairs and put him in my room. It’s the one to the right at the head of the stairs. He’s just excited. Shut him in and as soon as he’s calmed down I’ll make him comfortable.”

While this rather cowardly solution was being put into effect, I sat down and thought it over. Apparently Winnie had been the kind of man whose pet dog tried to rip his throat out. That was puzzling, since from what I remembered of him at school, he had if anything been only too amiable. I waited out the vet’s last-minute report and instructions, and then rang the bell for the maid.

“Mary,” I said, “will you help the doctor with his hat and coat and then take Ponto a bowl of water. The poor old fellow’s had a rough time.”

The vet departed and I listened while the maid went upstairs. Then there was a scream, the crash of breaking china and the sound of a door being slammed. I bounded up the steps to find Mary, white-faced and trembling, looking stupidly at the broken remains of a white china bowl and a sizeable puddle of water on the hardwood floor outside my bedroom.

The door of my wife’s room burst open and Jimmie appeared with a wild “What on earth!”

“It’s that dog, sir,” gasped Myrtle. “When I come--came--in with the bowl of water like you said, there he was lying on--on--your bed, like a Human, and--and--”

“And what?” I demanded.

“And he was wearing your pyjamas, sir,” she sobbed. “It’s--it’s--”

“Uncanny,” Germaine supplied the word.

I gave a hollow laugh. “He probably remembers that he isn’t allowed to lie on the beds, Mary, and may have dragged my pyjamas up there to lie on. Whenever I let him up on the furniture I always make him lie on some of my clothes.”

“Oh,” Myrtle said, suddenly calm. “Is that it? It was just that it looked sort of queer to see his legs in the pyjama trousers.”

“Well, don’t worry about it now, Myrtle,” my wife remarked firmly. “I’m not surprised it gave you a shock. He’s such a big dog. I’ll go in and see that he’s comfortable. Come on, Winnie! Let’s take a look at him. What’s the matter?” she added, noticing a certain reluctance in my attitude.