it seems to me compact and neat and most effective. The lines which followed gave a skeleton of the story:

“‘A Well-known Gentleman killed by a Dog.

“‘Theory of the Case which appears the only one possible under the Circumstances.’

“I read the dispatch at length. A man is naturally interested in the news from his own city. It told how a popular club man had been found in the early morning lying dead in the grounds of a friend, his throat torn open by a huge dog, an Ulm, belonging to that friend, which had somehow escaped from the basement of the house, where it was usually confined. The gentleman had been a caller at the residence the same evening, and had left at a comparatively early hour. Some time later the mistress of the place had gone out to a summer-house in the grounds to see that the servants had brought in certain things used at a luncheon there during the day, but had seen nothing save the dog, which snarled at her, when she had gone into the house again. In the morning the gardener found the body of Mr.—lying about midway of an arbour leading from a gateway to the summer-house. It was supposed that the unfortunate gentleman had forgotten something, a message or something of that sort, and upon its recurrence to him had taken the shorter cut to reach the house again, as he might do naturally, being an intimate friend of the family.

“Oddly enough, I received no telegram from my wife, but under the circumstances I could do nothing else than return to my home at once. I sought my wife, to whom I expressed my horror and my sorrow, but she said very little. The dog I found in the basement, and he seemed very glad to see me. It has always been a source of regret to me that dogs cannot talk. I see that some one has learned that monkeys have a language, and that he can converse with them, after a fashion. If we could but talk with dogs!

“I saw the body, of course. I asked a famous surgeon once which would kill a man the quicker: severance of carotid artery or the jugular vein? I forget what his answer was, but in this case it really cut no figure. The dog had torn both open. It was on the left side. From this I infer that the dog sprang from the right, and that it was that big fang in his left upper jaw that did the work. Come here, you brute, and let me open your mouth! There, you see, as I turn his lips back, what a beauty of a tooth it is! I’ve thought of having that particular fang pulled, and of having it mounted and wearing it as a charm on my watch chain, but the dog is likely to die long before I do, and I’ve concluded to wait till then. But it’s a beautiful tooth!

“I’ve mentioned, I believe, that my wife was a woman of keen perception. You will understand that after the unfortunate affair in my garden our relations were somewhat—I don’t know just what word to use, but we’ll say ‘quaint.’ It’s a pretty little word, and sounds grotesque in this conversation. One day I provided an allowance for her, a good one, and came away here alone to play farmer and shoot and fish for four or five years. Somehow I lost interest in things, and knew I needed a rest. As for her, she left the house very soon and went to her own home. Oddly enough, she is in love with me now—in earnest this time. But we shall not live together again. I could never eat a peach off which the street vendors had rubbed the bloom. I never bought goods sold after a fire, even though externally untouched. I don’t believe much in salvage as applied to the relations of men and women. I’ve seen, in the early morning, the unfortunates who eat choice bits from the garbage barrels. But I couldn’t do it, you know. Odd, isn’t it, what little things will disturb the tenor of a man’s existence and interfere with all his plans?

“I came here and brought the dog with me. I’m fond of him, despite the failings in his character. Notwithstanding his currishness and the cowardly ferocity which comes out with the night, there is something definite about him. You know what to expect and what to rely upon. He does something. That is why I like Ulm.

“What am I going to do? Why, come back to town next year and pick up the threads. My nerves, which seemed a little out of the way, are better than they were when I came here. There’s nothing to equal country air. I must have that whirl in my district yet. I don’t think the boys have quite forgotten me. Have you noticed the drift at all? I could only judge from the papers. How are things in the Ninth Ward?”