But a warning snap answered the frenzied thrust of the hand.

His teeth closed lightly on the glove-fingers, just as Higham, in fear, jerked back his arm.
The loose glove came away in the dog's mouth.
Colonel Osbourne, wheeling about to demand some explanation of his kennel-manager, beheld a bare hand as vividly crimson as Lochaber King's ruined coat.
"Laddie," observed the Mistress, that evening, as she placed on the top trophy-shelf an embossed silver cup, antique, and nine inches high, and stood back pride fully, to note the effect.

"Laddie, I know--I just KNOW,--you'd have won it, even if poor Lochaber King had competed.
But,--oh, I wish I could make head or tail of any of the things that have happened, today! How do you suppose it all started, anyhow, dear ?" she asked, turning to her husband for help in the riddle.
"I'd be willing to bet a year's pay it 'all started' about six feet from shore in this lake," responded the Master, "and about a fortnight ago." But he spoke it in the depths of his own guiltily exultant heart.
Outwardly, he merely grinned; and said with vacuous conviction: "Laddie, you're a grand dog.

And,--if you didn't win that cup from Lochaber King in one way, you certainly won it in another!".