Page:Alice Stuyvesant - The Vanity Box.djvu/204

 no one less grim than Diogenes could have hardened his heart against him. He was always ready to help Rose, when Tom was engaged in farm work, or to take Poppet for a walk in the woods, a pleasure Rose had no time to give the child on most days, until after the tea hour. Catechisms after these excursions assured Poppet's mother that the "nice grown-up" had been putting no more sly questions, but that, instead, the child's companion had told her fairy stories, or taught her how to spell words and do amusing little sums in arithmetic. Even Poppet's unfriendly little fox terrier, which invariably barked at strangers, and had objected to Gaylor, as to everybody else, on his first appearance, yielded to the charm, and became the detective's devoted adherent. Jacky made the third in all the woods walks, and enjoyed himself hugely, nosing into rabbit warrens and other private dwelling-places of retiring forest folk. To any one who had watched these excursions with curiosity, it might have seemed that there was some method in them. The young man took the child and the dog a different walk each day; and the walks were in concentric circles, leaving very little ground in the woods uncovered. Whenever Jacky excited himself over a rabbit-hole or other object of interest, Gaylor was all sympathy. If the fox terrier were inclined to dig, "Cupid" helped him, telling a fascinating tale to Poppet the while; the story of a fairy Jacky had seen disappearing into a burrow,