Page:Poor Cecco - 1925.djvu/55

Rh The first passer-by paid no attention at all, but strode by in a great hurry without even looking their way. The second paused and stared, but just as Poor Cecco was getting his half tail ready to wag, he too passed on. But the third one stopped long enough to put his hand in his pocket and drop a penny into the tin cup, and thump went Poor Cecco’s tail on the pavement, just as the little black dog had told him. He couldn’t wag it sideways, for it wasn’t made that way, but he lifted it up and let it drop—bang—just like a door-knocker, and that did quite as well.

“That’s a fine sort of dog you’ve got,” said the stranger, who had the look of a countryman.

The blind man aroused, and nodded his head.

“He’s a good enough dog,” he said.

“And he won’t eat you out of house and home either, I’ll be bound,” said the man.

“He eats what he can get,” returned the blind man, “but we must all do that.”

“That’s the sort of dog I wouldn’t mind keeping myself,” said the countryman. “I suppose you wouldn’t be wanting to sell him?”

“No, I wouldn’t sell him,” said the blind man. “We’ve been friends too long, and you don’t find a dog like him every day.”

Poor Cecco thought the little black dog might well be pleased to hear that, for of course the blind man couldn’t