Page:Gray Eagle (1927).pdf/129

 mark. But the hand that fumbled for the cartridge belt fumbled in vain; and Cam cursed again as he remembered that when he had sat down to rest under the sycamore he had removed the belt because it chafed his side.

It would take ten minutes or more to get the belt and return, but there was nothing else to be done. Turning, he stumbled over Brutus, the lanky black mongrel, sitting just behind him, as always eagerly awaiting his commands. An idea flashed into Cam's muddled brain. Stooping, he spoke to the dog, patting the animal's sleek head and pointing out over the lagoon.

Black Brutus knew instantly what was expected of him. And instantly he obeyed. The love that he bore this surly master of his was a strange thing, and not less strange was the boundless faith which now sent him unfaltering into waters where he would never have ventured of his own accord. A Low Country dog, whelped and reared in the Low Country and all his life a rover of the Low Country woods, he knew the dangers which lurked for him and all his race in the dark wine-colored waters of the cypress lagoons. But his master had spoken—the master who was his only friend—who sometimes beat and kicked him but who had never failed him in the woods; and he knew, as he plunged in and started swimming towards the log where the ibis