The haunted hound; (4 page)

say, 'Well, we might as well move back to the Farm, Jon."

But he had never said it and, slowly, Jonathan stopped waiting for him to say it. Finally Mamie, who had worked for them on the Farm, explained it to him. ''He can't go back there, Jonathan. He be too lonesome. In this old stone cold city he doesn't have anything to remember except how pretty your mother was—pretty to the day she died. But out at the Farm he would be running into all sorts of things to remember about her because that was where she really Jived. She didn't do any real living here, just waiting and dying. So your dad, he's afraid that if he goes out there the memories he'll find everywhere he turns will break his heart worse than it's already broke."

Jonathan walked slowly under the pines, his feet noiseless on the needle-covered ground. He wondered what had happened to the furniture they had left in the house; and the saddles and bridles and all the toys and junk he had left behind. Stolen, he guessed.

He knew by the sound of gravel under the pine needles that he was in the driveway but for a long time he couldn't make himself raise his head and look toward the house. Instead, he walked along, one slow step at a time.

The driveway, except where the gravel was too thick, w^as overgrown with high weeds. Jonathan remembered it as it used to be. And remembered Melvyn, who had worked for them for as long as Jonathan could remember. Every time the rain rutted the drive Melvyn would get the John Deere tractor and scrape it smooth again. He would let Jonathan

ride with him on the bouncing seat and, on Jonathan's fifth birthday, Melvyn let him drive the tractor for the first time.

Now there were rain gulhes everywhere, and it was hard to see the hnes between the lawn and the drive.

At last Jonathan knew that he had come as far as he could without looking up. Standing still, he slowly raised his head and looked toward where the house had been.

It wasn't ruined at all. The paint had turned grayish and was flaking off in places. But the house wasn't ruined or rotten. It was still big and high, the columns in front standing straight, the windowpanes flashing in the sunlight.

Jonathan's throat got tight as he walked on toward it, picking out from the closed and curtainless windows the rooms which, in his mind, he could see as they had once been. His mother's room on the left—always full of colors and light and fresh air. His own room was at the back of the house. But on the ground floor were the windows of the Dirty Room. The gun cabinet was in there and he remembered when his father had let him stand his first air rifle up in the racks with all the oiled, smooth guns. He was seven years old then.

Paint had peeled from the wide, long steps, and rain had made dark patches on the wood of the porch with streaks of rust below the screens on the windows, but the house was solid and upright, just as it had been for a hundred and fifty years.

Seeing the house again made him long to come back to it and to live in it again. He remembered how he had hated

the city when they first moved, and how, every day, he had waited for his father to say that they were going back to the Farm. It had taken a long time for him to get used to the city and a longer time to stop waiting for the time to come to go back.

Step by step, slowly, Jonathan walked to the house and up the porch steps.

Then, from nowhere, and so suddenly it made his flesh prickle, a voice said, ''Halt!"

Jonathan, as though he had been hit, stepped backward down one step and looked all around.

From behind one of the columns on the porch a girl walked stiffly until she was standing exactly at the center of the steps. She had on the most faded blue jeans he had ever seen and a cut-down man's khaki shirt, the sleeves torn off raggedly above her elbows.

She had coal-black hair in two pigtails and deep-set, wide-apart dark eyes. She looked angry about something, Jonathan decided, with her lips pressed together in a straight line and her arms hanging straight and stiff at her sides.

She was, Jonathan guessed, a couple of years younger than he was—about eleven, he figured.

He started up the steps again.

She stamped her dirty bare foot on the porch. ''Halt! Halt, I say!"

CHAPTER FOUR

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ljM3HkPT[| lonathan halted, but he didn't

—^visxfNj^, ^ h^cV down the steps again. He stood his ground and looked up at the sun-browned face of the girl. ''Who're you?" he wanted to know.

She drew herself up to her full height and glared at him. 'Tm the mistress of this mansion and nobody can come here unless I invite them/'

'That so?''

*'That is so, so. And I didn't invite you. So go on away."

"What'll you do if I don't?" Jonathan asked.

''Sick my dogs on you. They'll eat you up, hair, hide, and bones."

''How many dogs you got?" Jonathan asked.

"Seven hundred."

Jonathan didn't let his smile show. "Well, I'm not going away, so start sicking 'em."

"You want to get eaten up—all the way?" the girl asked.

"You call the dogs and we'll see who eats who."

Without another word she put her two pointer fingers

between her teeth and blew. The noise she made was so loud and piercing that it hurt Jonathan's ears.

For a second he was afraid that maybe the girl wasn't kidding. Maybe she did have enough dogs to eat him.

But when nothing happened he looked up at her and smiled.

She frowned a little and whistled again.

From around the corner of the house a dog came running so fast it had to lean inward, and its feet threw dirt out to the side. It was a puppy about a foot long and it was so fat it could hardly get up the steps.

Jonathan looked right at the girl and laughed out loud.

She ignored him.

Then, from around the other corner, five or six more dogs came barreling. These were big ones—hounds—with their ears flopping.

From under the house came three bird dogs. Galloping up the drive were assorted dogs, led by a feist yelping bloody murder.

By the time all of them got there, Jonathan wasn't feeling so brave. There weren't seven hundred of them, but there were more than enough to give him a good chewing up if they felt like it.

The girl glared down at him. "There's one more, but he doesn't count," she said, and then stood, waiting, her arms crossed on her chest.

The dogs milled around, running up and down the steps past Jonathan. The feist dog sat on his haunches on the

step above him and barked steadily, snarling as hard as he could between barks. At the bottom of the steps some puppies played around, while on the porch the big hounds sat on their haunches and looked at him, their sad faces gloomy.

Finally, from the direction of the stables, one more dog came. It didn't run like the rest had; it walked slowly along and seemed to be paying no attention to anything.

It was a big black-and-white foxhound. It had tinges of brown on it and a little brown spot over each eyebrow.

Jonathan watched the hound walk slowly up the drive until it was about fifty yards from the house. Then it sat down. Its long ears drooped and it had the saddest face Jonathan had ever seen on a dog.

The girl called softly to it, snapping her fingers. Then she whistled, softly, too. ''Here, Pot, here. Come on. Pot Likker."

But no matter how friendly she talked to it, the hound wouldn't come any closer. It just sat there looking at all the other dogs.

''Is that all of them?'' Jonathan asked.

"If these aren't enough, I can call my uncle's dogs. He's got twice as many as this. So you go on away."

Jonathan shook his head.

The girl stamped her foot again. "And my aunt's got more dogs than my uncle has," she warned him.

''These are enough," Jonathan said.

This angry-faced girl had him in a tight spot, Jonathan

decided. If he backed down and went away, she'd laugh at him, and anyway he'd be pretty ashamed getting chased away from his own house by an eleven-year-old girl. On the other hand, Jonathan remembered, if he didn't go, this goofy girl might sick those dogs on him. She might have them trained to bite.

She helped him make up his mind what to do. ''Go!" she ordered, pointing with her finger.

Jonathan never had liked being bossed around, especially by a girl.

He shook his head. ''Go ahead, sick 'em on me."

"They'll gobble you up! They'll start at your toes and eat you all the way up to that bristly hair you got."

Jonathan leaned down a little and held out his hand toward the snarling feist dog. It stopped barking, smelled his hand, then jumped up and almost lieked him in the faee. Jonathan eaught him in mid-air and held him, peaeefully, in his arms.

The girl was furious. ''Spanky! Get down out of there!" she ordered, but the little mongrel dog lay in Jonathan's arms.

Jonathan felt better. He went up another step and glared at the girl. ''Dogs won't bite me," he declared. ''I know a secret way to keep them from biting me."

''I don't believe it," the girl said.

Among the hounds was one old Trombo, eyesockets drooping with age and legs gone shaky from running so many foxes. Jonathan stared at him, wondering, and then growing more sure. It must be old Mr. Blue. The markings were the same, even to the small patches of brown hair above each eye. Jonathan could hardly believe it, for Mr. Blue was older than he was. Slowly, while Jonathan stood watching, the old dog walked down to him and then pawed at Jonathan's hand. His paw was shaking and his eyes were misty.

"Mister Blue," Jonathan said, putting the paw down gently.

The dog wagged his tail and tried to lick his hand.

''How'd you know his name?" the girl demanded.

''Everybody knows Mister Blue," Jonathan said.

"Well, anyway, you can't come up any farther," the girl

said. ''This is my mansion and I don't let anybody bother it. I don't really own it. A little city boy named Jonathan Barrett owns it."

''Have you ever seen him?'' Jonathan asked. "Does he look like me?"

She stared at him. "Certainly not! He's sort of pale from living in the city all the time, and he's not very strong. And he has hair just like gold."

Jonathan's hair was brown. "He doesn't sound like much to me/' he said. "Sounds like a sissy."

"He is not! He's a wonderful boy. When he grows up, he'll come back here to live in this house all by himself, because he's always had such a sad life."

"What's the matter with his life?" Jonathan asked.

"Well, his mother died when he was very young—I know that's a sad thing because my father died when I was very young, too. But little Jonathan's father never got over being sad and little Jonathan didn't either."

"How little is he?" Jonathan asked.

"Oh, I don't mean he's a midget or anything. But from living in the city and not breathing good clean air he never grew up to be big and strong."

"He didn't?"

"How could he?" she demanded.

"Search me," Jonathan said. "Doesn't he ever come out here to talk to you about keeping his house and all?"

She shook her head, her face sad. "He never does. It would make him too sad. He couldn't bear it."

''Has he got any brothers or sisters?" Jonathan asked.

''No. He's an only ehild, hke me. That makes him sad, too."

"He sounds hke a wet smack to me/' Jonathan declared.

The girl was furious. ''You re the only wet smack! Not little Jonathan Barrett. Now get down off those steps and go away. Go so far away you won't ever find yourself again."

Jonathan went up one more step. "Stop calling me 'little Jonathan/ " he said.

"I wouldn't call you 'little' anything. Anything I called you would be big, don't you worry about that."

"You've been calling me 'little Jonathan' all day."

She glared. "I was talking about Jonathan Barrett."

"I'm Jonathan Barrett/' Jonathan told her.

She drew her breath in slowly, looking at him. Then, lowering her eyes, she said to the dogs, "Heel." One by one the dogs followed her down the porch steps and around the house. She didn't look back.

All the dogs went away except the black-and-white hound, who just glanced at the others and didn't move. When they all had gone, he turned his head and went on looking at Jonathan.