“Have they got Jack?”

“No, Chad,” said the school-master.  “He’s safe—­tied up in the stable.”  Chad started out, and no one followed but Melissa.  A joyous bark that was almost human came from the stable as Chad approached, for the dog must have known the sound of his master’s footsteps, and when Chad drew open the door, Jack sprang the length of his tether to meet him and was jerked to his back.  Again and again he sprang, barking, as though beside himself, while Chad stood at the door, looking sorrowfully at him.

“Down, Jack!” he said sternly, and Jack dropped obediently, looking straight at his master with honest eyes and whimpering like a child.

“Jack,” said Chad, “did you kill that sheep?” This was all strange conduct for his little master, and Jack looked wondering and dazed, but his eyes never wavered or blinked.  Chad could not long stand those honest eyes.

“No,” he said, fiercely—­“no, little doggie, no—­no!” And Chad dropped on his knees and took Jack in his arms and hugged him to his breast.

CHAPTER 13.  ON TRIAL FOR HIS LIFE

By degrees the whole story was told Chad that night.  Now and then the Turners would ask him about his stay in the Bluegrass, but the boy would answer as briefly as possible and come back to Jack.  Before going to bed, Chad said he would bring Jack into the house: 

“Somebody might pizen him,” he explained, and when he came back, he startled the circle about the fire: 

“Whar’s Whizzer?” he asked, sharply.  “Who’s seen Whizzer?”

Then it developed that no one had seen the Dillon dog—­since the day before the sheep was found dead near a ravine at the foot of the mountain in a back pasture.  Late that afternoon Melissa had found Whizzer in that very pasture when she was driving old Betsy, the brindle, home at milking-time.  Since then, no one of the Turners had seen the Dillon dog.  That, however, did not prove that Whizzer was not at home.  And yet,

“I’d like to know whar Whizzer is now!” said Chad, and, after, at old Joel’s command, he had tied Jack to a bedpost—­an outrage that puzzled the dog sorely—­the boy threshed his bed for an hour—­trying to think out a defence for Jack and wondering if Whizzer might not have been concerned in the death of the sheep.

It is hardly possible that what happened, next day, could happen anywhere except among simple people of the hills.  Briefly, the old Squire and the circuit-rider had brought old Joel to the point of saying, the night before, that he would give Jack up to be killed, if he could be proven guilty.  But the old hunter cried with an oath: 

“You’ve got to prove him guilty.”  And thereupon the Squire said he would give Jack every chance that he would give a man—­he would try him; each side could bring in witnesses; old Joel could have a lawyer if he wished, and Jack’s case would go before a jury.  If pronounced innocent, Jack should go free:  if guilty—­then the dog should be handed over to the sheriff, to be shot at sundown.  Joel agreed.