Evening Star Newspaper, January 11, 1931, Page 84

THE SUNDAY STAR, THE MUGGER AND THE SHADOW By R. G. Kirk. A Dark Terror in a Small Suburb and a Fearless Little Bulldog. Illustrated by Pawl Berdanier. LOOKED up from my book. “Who's there?” I called. But noone answered. Yet there was no mistaking it—that sound of labored breathing. It came distinctly through the doors that led out from the library to the covered porch. Low down, too; almost level with the brick floor outside. Only the bottom pancls of the doors are wood, the balance glass. Yet I could see no one. “Who's there?” I asked again, and got an answer this time, hoarse and gruff. 1 got up and went over to the door. .Shado big, wolflike, wolf-cruel cross-breed. Nobody knew who pwned him. No one knew whence he came. But come he did, at intervals, ! our community, and nearly always left small mourning, bewailing some pet ereature that lay dead. Tmu'.m.m-wmwm’ doors below us naméd Philomel. She was a ,-that one, and she might, with her held The Shadow, who always picked some gentle creature, smaller, weaker than himself. He almost got The Mugger. I cvame upon their first encounter just in time. The Mugger was still standing, wide- braced to the onslaught and trying valiantly for his hold. But he was swaying. He wasn't much more than a baby then and fine game for The Shadow, who was cutting him $o rib- bons. Before long one of those swift rushes would have knocked The Mugger over, turned his throat up. But I got there in time. It was his first fight, and he took a beating in it, poor littie happy-go-lucky, that would have broken the courage and ruined the trust- ing friend!iness of almost any dog. But The Mugger was a bulldog. He had had a splendid time and was genuinely sorry when I had to come along and spoil the party. And *the whole world was as much his friend after that murderots business as before. With one excep- eeption. A dog who makes old Sourmug his foe has made a foe for good. He isn’t much of a starter and, to tell the truth, he looks a poor bet up the back stretch and around the turns, but he is oné grand little finisher, and I think he knows it, for he always sticks for that, no matter how tough the going may be. And’so each time thereafter that The Shadow visitéd our neighborhood The Mugger galloped gayly into him ‘and got a lovely beating. At first The Shadow liked it, although he was sur- prised’ ahd puzzled always to see The Mugger comitig in to get it. 'The Mugger was good hunting. He was smaller; infinitely slower, and The dog couldn’t puhish with that undershot, bull- baiting jaw of ‘his. He took a fiend’s delight in Shadow sgon found that the sfuat’ Mugger grew, as & bulldog will, more un~- upsettable every day. Also the loose skin at his dew-lapped throat grew into better and better protection for the life streams beneath. And, most discouraging of all, as battle followed bat- tle, The Shadow found his foeman coming in for more with fiercer, stronger rushes, no mat- ter how the combat went. Silowly it dawned upon The Shadow that how the fight is going does not make one bit of difference to a ball- dog. And so at each succeeding time they foughi & streak of saffron started creeping, just a little earlier, up The Shadow’s backbone. And he'd quit a little sooner each time, sneering as he danced away, jeering at The Mugger as he plugged hopelessly, ridiculously after him till he was out of sight. Each time The Mugger's as he lay there on the floor and took his cleaning up without a whimper, I felt the hope rise in me that some day he his enemy cul de sac. When I was half-way finished with my job, phone rang. “Lie still there, Mugs,” I said. It was Dr. Philbin, next door, on the wire. “You, Griff?” he asked. I said, “Yes.” “Your dog all right?” There was something in his voice. “Doctor!” T cried.” “Not Midnight Dan this “Yep,” said Dr. Philbin. “Sure tough on my He was speaking shortly. Something in his voice, was right. It was telling me that this thing wasn’'t only tough on his three kids. “Your old Mugs,” said Philbin. “Just wanted I went upstairs again, ance of his disinfection. I thought about that sheep more than once of what a beautiful French is. Cul de sac. In a closet with Mugger, and the door locked; th Mugger, and no place to run. Down with the Mugger. -But, best of all, “kud’ sak!” In the bottom of a bag! With Mugger! But there came an evening, not two after Midnight Dan was murdered, when twitch of a finger would have decided the Mugger never was to avenge the slaughters of poor Philomel and Anthony and Cleopatra, and all the other helpless ones, and Dan; nor to even up, in the bottom of a bag, that cruel butchering he’d taken as a little pup, and all the rest that followed. . One night, coming home after a leisurely drive, we were surprised to see the light turned on in our garage. Hurrying up, we found The Mugger, wagging his back end and looking with expectant interest up into the muszzle of an automatic which a policeman was sighting at his head At one side was our neighbor, Dr. Philbin, kneeling by a still form on the floor. the that WDodiem Souvig HE” d Bestde Which>BF. * WASHINGTON, D. 61 e C., JANUARY 1, 1931, o As battle followed battle, the Shadow found his foeman coming in for move with fiercer, stronger rushes. where we stood, a tense “It looks bad, Griff all I can do right now. musn't move him. An hour he has rallied then, I'll take pital.” E He looked toward Steve then, who hugging the bulldog tight. Steve never forgave him for not overpowering the officer, twice his size, and taking his gun away when evidence to her. “I can't believe it, Griff,” he said to me, “but it's exactly as the officer says. Sam Tal- ford’s little girl had a fall that knocked her out this evening. They called me. When I was getting out my car I heard, it seemed to me, i Od 50 ) oW o know” WALt ¢ "flfl"." WGBTS D - [ L Ohim SGWE, Aady £ n I couldn’t blame the officer. “Sweet” Dr. esfg! 5:??531 BrEpfE Hi1T one cylinder in the well known block, she come through. often speaking of The Shadow “Cul-de-sac!” : And instantly I had it. The whole before me in & flash, as though I I knew—knew absolutely, Where else but in the bottom of the bag? I said to Officer O'Malley—that turned out to be his name—“You can put your gun up now. You'll never need it for the one that did this job.” He hesitated. So Steve, to show him that we knew, put down The Mugger, and gave him a shove right at the very muzzle of that auto- matic. “Go over there, you lamb,” she said, “and - . show the officer your weapons. . Open his mouth, and look in, will you, officer?” i an ingratiating } . He didn’t know but what the dog was' going to try to eat him. ¥ : i But just the same O’'Malley put ‘aside his° - . gun and kneeled. He must have felt ‘sure from this gesture of my wife’s, in sending Mugger - to him, that we knew something that he didn't. - *° SO he kneeled aad reached out for that charg~- opened ‘those great jaws; and looked B RS “See,” 1 said. “Undershot. Nose se Mfi = 80 he could beathe while he kept his X S “he’s &' “‘”un'tr