Читать книгу Dogtown. Being Some Chapters from the Annals of the Waddles Family Set Down in the Language of Housepeople онлайн

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Though Waddles seldom forgot his dignity sufficiently to play with the twins, he allowed them to take morsels from his dish, and was always close at hand if their shrill cries told that they were in trouble, and the slightest look from Happy brought him to her aid.

Lumberlegs, on the contrary, delighted to gambol with them, and his clumsy bounds and imitations of their gestures usually ended in his overthrow, when he would lie on his back with a most idiotic grin upon his face, fanning the air with his paws, while the twins gnawed at his great tail with mock fierceness.

Now the race law for puppies and grown dogs is quite different, even as are those laws that govern childhood and manhood among House People. Actions that are tolerated and even encouraged in puppyhood are read as insults when done by a dog of two years, and bear a penalty.

In spite of Waddles’s instructions and warnings, Lumberlegs was either heedless of the law, often deliberately breaking it, or else from his size and strength felt himself superior to it; which it was Anne could never tell. Perhaps it was because he was unevenly developed, for he had all a man dog’s jealousy and craving for the exclusive attention of his owners, while he kept his baby playfulness and total disregard of food rights. So trouble befell one fine day, like rain from sudden clouds that no one has noticed gathering.