On the bank hopped and wriggled a woman in vivid garments,--a woman who waved a broken parasol and seemed to be practicing an Indian war-howl. Elbow deep in the placid waters of the lake floundered another woman almost as wonderfully attired as the first, and quite as vocal. On either side of her was a drenched and gesticulating man. In the background bobbed an upset canoe.
Between the two disrupted factions of the happy picnic party stood Lad.
The collie had ceased to growl; and, with head on one side, was looking in eager inquiry at the Master. Lad had carried this watchdog exploit to a point where the next move was hard to figure out. He was glad the Master had arrived, to take charge of the situation. It seemed to call for human, rather than canine, solution. And Lad was profoundly interested as to the sequel. All of which showed as clearly in the collie's whimsically expressive face as ever it could have been set forth in print.
Both men began to talk at once; with lurid earnestness and vast wealth of gesture. So did the women.
There was no need. The Master, already, had caught sight of the half-spread lunch on the grass. And it was by no means his first or his tenth experience with trespassers. He understood. Snapping his fingers, to summon Lad to his side, he patted the dog's silken head; and strove not to laugh.
"And just as we was sitting down, peaceful, to eat, and not harming no one at all and minding our own business," came a fragment of one man's oration, above the clamor of the others, "that big dark-sable collie of yours came tearing down on us and--"The triple opposition of outcry and complaint blurred the rest of his enraged whine. But the Master looked out at him in new interest. The man had used the term, "dark-sable collie"; which, by the way, was the technical phrase for Lad's coloring. Not one non-collie-man in a thousand would have known the meaning of the term; to say nothing of using it by instinct. The Master stared curiously at the floundering and sputtering speaker.
"Aren't you the manager of the Lochaber Collie Kennels, up at Beauville?" he asked, speaking loud enough to be heard above the subsiding din. "I think I've seen you at Westminster and at some of the local shows. Higham is your name, isn't it?""Yes, it is," returned the kennel man, truculent, but surprised almost into civility. "And this is my assistant, Mister Rice. And these two young lady friends of ours are--Say!" he broke off, furiously, remembering his plight and swinging back to rage, as he began to wade shoreward. "We're going to have the law on you, friend! Your collie tackled us when we was peaceably-""When you were peaceably ignoring this trespass sign of mine?"finished the Master. "Don't forget that. If you didn't have these girls with you, I'd keep my hands off Lad's collar and let him hold you out in the lake till it freezes for the winter. As it is, one of you men can swim out for your canoe and tow it in; and then the rest of you can bundle aboard it and finish your picnic on somebody else's land.""Well!" shrilled the wet damsel, striding shoreward like some sloppily overdressed Venus rising from the sea. "Well! I MUSTsay! Nice neighborly, hospitable way to treat poor unfortunate--!""Trespassers?" suggested the Master, as she groped for a climax word. "You're right. It is no way to treat a woman who has fallen into the lake; trespasser or not. If you and this other young lady care to go up to the kitchen, the maids will see that your clothes are dried; and they'll lend you other clothes to go home in. Lad won't hurt you. And in this hot weather you're in no danger of catching cold. While you're gone, Higham and Rice can get hold of the canoe and right it and bail it out. And, by the way, I want one of you two men to clear that litter of food and greasy paper off my lawn. Then--""Into the kitchen!" snorted the wet maid. "Into the KITCHEN? I'm a lady! I don't go into kitchens. I--""No?" queried the Master, trying once more not to laugh. "Well, my wife does. So does my mother. I spoke of the kitchen because it's the only room with a fire in it, in this weather. If you'd prefer the barn or--""I won't step one foot in your house!" declaimed the girl. "Nor yet I didn't come here to be insulted. You've gone and spoiled our whole day, you big brute! Boys, go get that canoe! We won't lower ourselves by staying another minute on his rotten land.
Afterward, our lawyer'll see what's the penalty for treating us like this! Hurry up!"Rice had clumped along shore until he found a dead branch washed up in a recent rainstorm. Wading back into deeper water he was just able to reach the gunwale of the drifting canoe with the forked end of the bough and, by careful jockeying, to haul it within hand-grasp.
Aided by Higham, he drew the overturned craft to the beach and righted it. All the time, both men maintained a half-coherent diatribe, whose language waxed hotter and hotter and whose thunderbolts centered about the Master and his dog;--particularly about Lad;--and about the dire legal penalties which were to be inflicted on them.
The Master, still holding Lad's ruff, stood to one side during the work of salvaging the canoe; and while Rice replaced the paddles and cushions in it. Only when the two women were helped sputteringly aboard did he interfere.
"One minute!" he said. "I think you've forgotten your lunch. That and the ream or two of newspapers you've strewn around: and a few wooden dishes. I--""I picked up all the lunch that was worth saving," grunted Rice.
"Your mangy collie trampled the rest of it, when he ran down here at us. I wisht it'd had strychnia in it and he'd et it! We'll go eat our dinner over to the village. And, before we go, I got this much more to say to YOU:--If--""Before you go," interrupted the Master, shifting himself and Lad between Higham and the canoe, "before you go, let me remind you that you've left a lot of litter on my clean lawn; and that Iasked you to clean it up."
