Buff: A Collie and Other Dog-Stories — Human-Interest Stuff, Part 2

Crowds of onlookers had already begun to filter through the aisles.

Jeff heard someone say that the judging was about to begin, and that collies were to be among the first breeds shown.

His general curiosity sated, Titus fell to examining the dogs which were to be Robin’s competitors.

And at once his mountaineer scowl merged into a grin.

Here, forsooth, was nothing wherewith the splendid Robin need fear comparison.

Why, of all the nineteen collies on exhibition, there was not one within three inches of Robin’s height, nor one which bore any real resemblance to him.

These others were strongly slender chaps, with thin heads and tapering noses and tulip ears and slant eyes.

Whereas, Robin’s mighty head was almost as broad and heavy as a Newfoundland’s;

his ears were pricked like a wolf’s, and his honest brown eyes were large and round.

No, most assuredly he was not in the very least like any other collie entered in the show--or in any exhibition of thoroughbreds since the birth of time.

Poor old Robin Adair was probably more collie than anything else; he may even have been a shade more than half-collie.

But in his veins ran also the mixed blood of many another breed, Newfoundland predominating.

“Look over there!

” Jeff heard a dapper collie-handler in a linen duster say in guarded tones to a woman who was sifting talcum powder into her gold-and-white collie pup’s fluffy coat.

“Over at Bench 89!

What is that Thing?

A dog--or a hippopotamus?

” As the woman turned to observe the luckless Robin, Jeff Titus strolled across to the man who had called her attention to the dog.

His eyes were glinting flares behind their lowered lids, and his lips twisted into something which looked like a smile and wasn’t. He said softly: “Beggin’ you-all’s pardon, mister, what was you a-happenin’ to call my dawg?

” The man in the linen duster gave one glance at the leathern face peering down so intensely into his.

Then, shakily, he made reply: “I--I wasn’t speaking of your dog, sir.

I was speaking of the dog in the next bench to his.

I--I read the number wrong.

Yours is--a--a grand--a grand--collie, sir.

” He gulped, and sped down the aisles on a new-remembered errand somewhere.

Jeff turned back to Robin, his mind freed of its momentary angry doubt.

The collie classes were called a few minutes later.

The first to be judged were, as usual, the male puppies.

Jeff, watching the performance of the entrants, saw how the judging was done.

First the dogs were made to march around the ring.

Then, in ones or twos, they were placed on the platform while the little tweed-clad judge studied them and felt them all over.

After that, the judge wrote certain numbers in the ring-steward’s book and handed to the owner of the winning dog a blue ribbon.

A red ribbon went to the owner of the second best, a yellow ribbon to the third, and a white ribbon to the fourth.

Every one of the several collie classes, it seemed, must be judged in that same deliberate way; before the winners of all classes could compete for a rosette, whose acquisition meant also the winning of the silver cup.

Jeff began to chafe at the needless delay which must ensue before Robin could receive his merited prize.

Then, directly after the judging of the puppies, came the novice class.

Along with only two other entries, Jeff Titus led the majestically unconcerned Robin into the ring.

As he passed, a titter swept the quadruple line of railbirds outside the inclosure.

Jeff did not so much as look about him to locate the cause of the mirth.

These fool city-folks were always laughing at nothing.

Nor did he note the glare, almost of horror, which the little tweed-clad judge bestowed upon Robin; as Eve’s adored pet paced into the ring.

The judge eyed him with much the expression one might expect to see in the visage of a Supreme Court justice who has been asked to hand down an official opinion on a nursery rhyme.

“Walk your dogs, please!

” rasped the judge.

The parade started.

Robin strolled unconcernedly at his lanky master’s side.

As he was not a thoroughbred, his nerves were not of the hair-trigger order.

The racket and the crowd and the new surroundings did not excite or terrify or make him profoundly miserable; as they did some of the high-strung collies about him.

Jeff observed this calm demeanour and was proud of his dog’s bearing.

The parade was halted.

The judge motioned Robin’s two competitors to the platform, squinted at them for a moment, ran his hand over them, examined the spring of their ribs, then their teeth, and various other details,--stood back and studied them--then handed to the owner of one a blue ribbon and to the other a red.

The third-prize yellow ribbon he tossed back onto the steward’s table.

The winners of the first and second prizes departed with their collies.

The steward chalked up the next class on the blackboard.

But Jeff Titus did not leave the ring.

Eyes bulging, cheeks slowly turning from tan to brick-hue, he strode over to the judge.

“Look-a-here, you!

” he rumbled in a blend of wrath and dazed incredulity.

“What’s the meanin’ of this-yer?

Are you aimin’ to doublecross me?

My dawg’s wuth ten of them ornery critters.

He’s a heap bigger’n an’ huskier, an’ he’s purtier to look at, too!

What the blue blazes do you-all mean by treatin’ him thisaway, you hard-biled shrimp?

He----” With much dignity the little judge turned his back on the angry Titus and started across the ring.

But before he had gone two steps Jeff was once more confronting him.

“Look-a-here!

” snarled Titus, again, striving to keep himself in hand, “I ain’t goin’ to lay down under no frame-up!

You judged crooked, with my dawg.

I c’n prove it.

Even if you didn’t have the sense to see he was the best of the hull bilin’, you was bound, anyhow, to give him the yaller ribbon fer third prize.

An----” “I was bound to do nothing of the sort!

” rapped out the exasperated judge.

“I am here to judge collies, not dinosaurs.

I refuse to countenance the claim that your dog is a collie, by giving him a third-prize ribbon; even in a class of three.

So, in this class, I have deliberately withheld the third prize.

Your dog is not a collie.

The Lord alone knows what he is, but he’s no collie.

That’s all.

Clear out!

” For a man with heart or imagination, there is no ordeal more irksome than to judge dogs.

For, in almost every division, there is some such beast as Robin Adair;--a dog loved by his owners, who know nothing of shows or of show points.

A judge, in fairness to the better exhibits, must pass over these poor animals; and thereby must cause heartache and shame to their pathetic owners.

It is not a pleasant task.

Nor is any phase of dog-judging pleasant.

It is a thankless and nerve-racking job, at best; and it has a magic quality of turning one’s friends into enemies.

The little judge at the Duneka show was hardened by long practice.

Also, he had all the bristling pluck of a rat-terrier.

And he needed it in facing this lean giant in whose slit-eyes the murder-light was beginning to smoulder.

Jeff half extended one windmill arm in the general direction of the judge’s throat.

Then he checked himself.

* * * * * It was going to be bad enough to slink home with no cup, but it would be ten-fold worse to go to the hoosgow for mayhem.

He pictured sick Eve’s grief over such a disgrace, and his clenched hand dropped again to his side.

Grappling with his temper, the mountaineer wheeled about and led the disqualified Robin out of the ring and back to the bench.

A sweet mess he had made of everything; he and that parson, up yonder!

They had wrought on Eve’s hopes and had made her so gloriously confident that her dear dog was going to sweep all before him and win the cup!

She was lying at home, this minute, her big eyes shining with anticipation, her vivid mind picturing the triumph-scene at the show.

How confidently she would be waiting for that cup!

Jeff had sought so enthusiastically to work out Stair’s theory of a “good news” cure!

And how was the experiment to result?

He must go home on the morrow and tell Eve not only that he had no cup to show her, but that the judge had actually refused Robin a third-prize ribbon, on the ground that the dog was a mongrel!

What effect was that news going to have on a sick woman whose swift recovery depended on her spirits?

Knowing Eve as he did, Jeff was ready to believe it would undo most of her hard-won convalescence.

And at the very least, in her weak state, it was certain to make her cry.

Jeff would rather have faced a machine-gun nest than make his gallant little sweetheart cry.

He began to swear, very softly but very, very zealously.

And then his resourceful mountaineer brain unlimbered and went into action.

Presently, he arose from the bench, patted Robin absentmindedly on the head and slouched off towards the end of the hall, where, in a high glass case, were displayed the prize cups and the other trophies.

Long and minutely he scanned the glittering prizes, especially the cup engraved “Best Collie.

” And he spelled out the printed legend over the case--which proclaimed that the cups were supplied by the long-famous jewellery firm of Pinkus Bernstein, of Republic Street, Duneka, Kentucky.

Ten minutes later, leaving Robin to shift for himself on his bench, Jeff was hiking towards the business streets of the mountain metropolis.

He paused, for a space, at the bank, where he had a carefully scraped-together little account, and he drew forth a goodly share of that sum.

Then he made his way to the jewellery-store.

After a half-hour of dickering, he emerged from the shop, bearing a bumpy parcel.

Returning to the Agricultural Hall, he seated himself once more on the narrow bench beside the exultantly welcoming Robin, and proceeded to unwind the tissue wrappings of his package.

Robin looked on in mild curiosity.

His sense of smell had already told the dog that the parcel contained nothing of vital interest to him.

Yet, because he had been lonely and a little worried by Jeff’s long absence, Robin evinced a polite concern in the undoing of the wrappings.

The last layer of paper was removed.

To the dog’s view was exposed a huge and gleaming silver cup, a cup with much chasing on its polished surface and with three handles and an ebony base.

It was at least double the size of the cup offered by the committee for “best collie.

” “See that?

” questioned Titus, holding the trophy aloft for Robin’s inspection.

“Forty-one dollars, that set me back.

An’ it’d a’ been a heap more, only it was a left-over, an’ had that one little gouge under the aidge.

Robin, if that cup don’t tickle her, suthin’ terrible, I’m a clay-eater!

You-all won this yer vase, to-day, Robin;

by bein’ ‘best collie.

’ Jes’ keep a-rememberin’ that.

I ain’t never put nothin’ over on her, b’fore.

You-all knows that, Robbie.

But--I reckon it’s wuth doin’, this yer time.

She----” He paused in his low-pitched confidence to the blinking, sympathising dog.

Two men had halted just in front of him.

One of them was carrying an apparatus which movie-camp memories told Jeff was a camera.

It chanced to be a moment when no less than two “Winners’ Classes” were on in the showrings.

Accordingly the ring-sides were banked deep with onlookers, and this secluded section of the aisles was almost wholly stripped of spectators.

That was why Jeff had ventured to bring forth the cup from its wrappings.

The sight of the two keenly interested men set him to scowling in dire embarrassment.

* * * * * The chairman of the dog-show committee was also one of the chief stockholders of the Duneka _Chronicle_.

Wherefore, the dictum had gone forth to the _Chronicle_ city-room that the show was to be played up, big, in both morning and evening editions.

And the paper’s best descriptive writer, one Graham, had been assigned to do some “human-interest stuff” about it, in addition to the sporting editor’s regulation account.

Graham was a good reporter, and he had a genius for human-interest yarns.

But of dogs he knew little, and of dog-shows he knew even less.

Yet, gleaning such information on the subject as he could, he had set forth for the show this morning; taking along the paper’s sole photographer.

After pausing near the front entrance to accustom their ears to the frightful din and to take a snapshot of the trophy-case, the two newspaper men had wandered down the first aisle into which their non-enthusiastic feet had chanced to stray.

There, suddenly, Graham saw one of the “human-interest bits” for which he was always hunting.

Midway in an aisle labelled COLLIE SECTION sat a tired man, a typical mountaineer, beside a huge collie.

And to the civilly interested dog the mountaineer was exhibiting pridefully a silver cup; larger than any in the trophy-case.

He was talking to the dog, too, in a confidential whisper; evidently telling the collie what a splendid victory he had scored and how proud of him his master was.

Here was human-interest stuff, if ever Graham had seen it!

* * * * * “Cup for best collie in the show?

” asked Graham of the scowling hill-billy.

“Yep!

” snapped Jeff Titus, defiantly.

“Good boy!

” exclaimed Graham, seeking by effusive geniality to break down the mountaineer’s surly reserve.

“He’s sure one peach of a dog!

What’s his name?

And what’s yours?

” “His name,” said Jeff with perilous courtesy, “is Robin--Robin Adair.

He b’longs to my wife, Miz Jeff Titus--up Keytesville-way.

She’s sick, to home.

I’m showin’ him fer her.

Got any more questions to pester me with, b’fore----” “Would you mind holding up the cup, a second?

” wheedled Graham, scribbling with a chewed pencil on a doubled wad of copy paper.

“So!

Thanks!

” Still defiantly, Jeff had held forward the cup for inspection, his free arm around the majestic Robin’s shoulders.

The camera clicked.

Titus did not hear it, through the noise of a hundred barks and yelps.

Besides, he was focusing his indignant attention on this slick-spoken opponent of his.

“Wal?

” he demanded truculently.

“Anything more you-all wants o’ me?

He’s _our_ dawg.

An’ he’s good enough for _us_.

If you-all don’t like him none----” “But I do!

” effused Graham.

“A great dog, Mr. Titus!

And”--his eye running along the collie section--“he must be close to championship standard, to have beaten all of these beauties.

I’d like to ask you----” “I ain’t got nothin’ more to say!

” growled Jeff, half rising, and his yellow eyetooth began to show under his upcurling lip.

“An’ if you-all is aimin’ to start trouble ’bout this yer cup----” Graham was not aiming to start trouble.

Not at all did he like the new expression, nor the voice, of this sulking hill-billy he had sought to patronise.

With a signal to the photographer he moved rapidly away, continuing his progress down the aisle.

* * * * * Jeff glared after him.

If the man were going to inform the committee that Titus had bought a cup when he had not been able to win one, why, let him do it!

Jeff wasn’t going to run away.

So he held his ground, feeling very wrathful, but somewhat scared.

He restored the cup to its wrappings.

It would be handier to carry it, that way, should he be ejected from the show on account of his fraud.

But no one ejected him.

Except that people paused now and then, through the course of the day, to stare amusedly at poor Robin (and to straighten their faces in comical haste as they encountered Jeff’s glower), no one molested Titus.

At four in the afternoon Jeff’s raw nerves could stand the strain no longer.

Untying Robin from the bench, he led him to the entrance of the hall.

There he sought the superintendent of the show.

“When c’n me an’ my dawg git outen here an’ traipse home?

” he asked.

“No dog is supposed to leave the building before ten o’clock to-night, when the show ends,” replied the superintendent, adding with a cryptic glance at Robin: “But I don’t think I need hold your entry to those rules.

Go when you like.

” The cup under his arm and Robin at his heels, Jeff departed.

He had come to town on mule-back, the dog running alongside.

Even at the best pace he could scarce hope to get home very much before midnight.

He had come to Duneka on the preceding day and had planned to stay until next morning.

But, already, his imagination was afire with the thought of bursting in on Eve that very night, with the glittering trophy.

So he bent his steps towards the stable where he housed his mule.

* * * * * Across the fair-grounds, from the cityward gate, a bevy of barelegged newsboys was scampering, with armfuls of newspapers--copies of the _Chronicle’s_ first afternoon edition.

One of them ran past Jeff.

Jeff’s keen mountaineer eyes chanced on a dark blotch near the bottom of the swaying sheet’s first page.

With an unbelieving gasp, he stopped short in his tracks and bawled to the fleeing newsboy to come back.

The boy returned, holding out the paper.

Jeff snatched it from him, riveting his incredulous gaze upon that dark blotch on the front page.

The blotch, at close range, resolved itself into a two-column cut--a picture of Robin, lying majestically at full length in his bench, his trustful gaze fixed on the lank man who squatted beside him and who held aloft an ornate silver cup!

Above the cut ran the caption: “A PRIZE-WINNER AND HIS PRIZE.

” Beneath the picture were the lines: “_Mrs.

Jeff Titus’ Robin Adair; Winner of cup for Best Collie in Show.

_” Doubled, in single-column space under this, was one of the two-stick “human-interest” stories with which Graham was wont to strew the _Chronicle’s_ pages.

Jeff’s fascinated eyes tore themselves from the picture and caught a glimpse of his own name midway of this explanatory yarn.

He read the sentence containing the name, then the next line or so.

Slowly and painfully he spelled out: Mr. Titus exhibited the dog for his wife, who is ill at their Keytesville home.

With characteristic mountaineer modesty, Mr. Titus refused to sound his splendid exhibit’s praises.

When congratulated by throngs of admirers who paid homage to the peerless Robin Adair, Mr. Titus’ sole comment on Robin’s sensational victory was: “He’s good enough for us!

” Robin Adair was good enough for the judges, too, and good enough to win over one of the finest aggregations of high-bred collies ever shown in this part of the South.

The brief story switched back to the human-interest note--to the man’s evident rapture in the triumph of his sick wife’s pet, and his shy pride in the magnificent cup.

But Jeff read no more just then.

Whirling on the impatiently waiting newsboy, he demanded thickly: “Gimme all them newspapers you’re totin’!

An’ then scuttle off an’ fetch me a dozen more!

Scat!

” Again he stared in idiotic bliss at the smudged two-column cut.

What did it matter to Jeff Titus that the picture and its erroneous caption were to be “lifted out” of the next edition, and that Graham was to incur the sharpest call-down of his career, for the break he had made?

Not three copies of the _Chronicle_ a week made their way to Keytesville.

And, even should the next day’s full account of the dog-show reach the Titus region, no mountaineer in the State would possess the technical show-lore to decipher the cryptic “summary of wins” and thus learn of Robin’s defeat.

No: in the mountains, the printed word was accepted as gospel fact--by those who had education to read it.

And its pictures were accepted as such by those who had not bothered to master the effete arts of reading and writing.

Jeff was going to take home enough papers to go around the whole sparse neighbourhood, in addition to those which were to be mailed to Eve’s people at Louisville and to any other distant kin or friends of hers.

Not in the very least did Jeff Titus understand the meaning of this newspaper tribute.

Nor did he bother his overwrought brain about it.

He had the required “good news” for Eve.

He had printed and pictured proofs thereof.

If this didn’t help along her tardy cure, by leaps and bounds-- “I ain’t never lied to her yet, Robin!

” he informed the prize-winner as they ambled homeward at dusk over the purpling miles of hilly trail.

“Nor yet I don’t aim to, now.

We’ll walk in on her, with the cup.

An’ when she asks, all pleased an’ tickled-like, ‘Why, whatever is this yer fer?

’ we’ll jest stick a copy of the noospaper up in front of her.

I’m bettin’ the R’cordin’ Angel is due to strain his pore ears till they ache him, if he ‘lots on ketchin’ _me_ tellin’ a lie to that Gawd-blessed gal!

”