Buz and Fury

Contents

Foreword Page

Something About it All. 7

Chapters

CHAPTER I The City of Refuge

From the City of Refuge, Fury looked out on the big and beautiful world; and he smiled. It was the con¬ fidential sort of smile which waits for encouragement before getting any broader. There was something a bit plaintive about it, and at the same time something not very far from impudent. The truth is, Fury didn’t smile because he was happy. He smiled because he was safe and wanted to pretend he was happy.

If it had not been for the City of Refuge, the world wouldn’t have looked beautiful to-day, nor would it have been nearly big enough for purposes of run¬ ning. Buz stood in the doorway, almost within reach, watching angrily. That was why Fury felt safe without being happy. Sooner or later, he would have to leave the City of Refuge. And who could guess what might happen then?

Fury thought about this, though he didn't say anything. Perhaps one rea¬ son for his silence was that he didn’t trust Buz to agree with his point of view; and he was too well-behaved to talk to himself. When they wanted to understand each other, they didn’t need words. There had been this very City of Refuge, for instance.

Really, it was an old box, half-filled with hay, left in a corner of the car¬ riage-house.

A couple of days before, Fury had been naughty, and Buz was going to punish him, and he had run to the box and jumped in just for the sake of gaining time. Buz had come up and peeped over the edge, and had spoken in a way which sounded new, and then had gone out again.

“Splendid!” Fury had thought. “He’s forgotten.”

Yet when Fury had skipped gaily out into the garden, supposing his troubles ended, Buz had punished him all the same.

So that box had some mysterious property about it which protected you only while you were there.

What helped Buz and Fury to under¬ stand each other, probably, was that in appearance they had some things which were just the same, though they had some things which were different.

Both had hair that couldn’t be parted; but Fury’s was white and made short so it never would grow long, while Buz’s was dark and made long so it was cut ever so often to keep it ever so short.

Both had eyes that were very large and very brown and very bright, but Buz’s were larger than Fury’s, and Fury’s were browner than Buz’s.

Both had a pair of lips rather large for their owner’s size, but Buz’s were full and red and did quite a lot of work for him, while Fury’s were thin and black and wouldn’t have been of much use if he hadn’t had an ex¬ ceptionally long, limber tongue.

Both had teeth that were nice and white and even, but Buz cleaned his and Fury never could be induced to trouble about his; which wasn't fair because Fury's stayed smooth and presentable all by themselves, and Buz's would give him away if he acci¬ dentally forgot there was such a thing as a tooth-brush, on mornings of un¬ usual hurry when something was wrong with all the clocks in the house.

Both, of course, had a head, and a body, and four limbs. And it would never do to forget a nose and two ears. But the head, body, four limbs, nose, and two ears of Buz weren't to the slightest degree like the head, body, four limbs, nose, and two ears of Fury.

The biggest difference was that Fury had a tail and Buz hadn't. Oh, it wasn't so very much of a tail. It was such a little one, in fact, that it was the very first thing you noticed when Fury bounced into sight, partly be¬ cause of its size, and partly because it stood up on his back like a lightningrod on a cottage roof, and partly be¬ cause it seemed to be stuck on with a round black sticking-plaster at the root. Fury had black and tan spots on his head and ears too. Buz didn’t have any spots—except the kind which come off if you scrub hard enough.

But if you think you know all about Fury now, you’re mistaken. He wasn’t merely a fox-terrier. He was an Australian fox-terrier, who might have grown up to chase buck and rabbits and kangaroos over the plains and into the bush, if it hadn’t so happened that his father and mother had been brought over the seas to America in a basket— or perhaps in two baskets. As for Buz, he had only one particular purpose as far as Fury knew or cared, and that was being Fury’s master.

Buz and Fury may not have looked alike, particularly. But just at the moment I was speaking about, they wore the same sort of expression on their faces, as if they knew what they wanted and were going to get it if they could. Which isn’t always healthy for dogs, though they be good little dogs; nor is it for boys, either. Not that Fury was so very little; and not that Buz was so very good.

To-day, at all events, Fury had been far from good. He had chewed up a pair of new slippers sent home for Buz. They were so new that they still had the nice white paper wrapped round them, tied with pretty pink string. Fury got the string caught in his claws and the paper stuck in his teeth before he could begin to eat properly. Often and often he’d tasted shoes, and had gnawed the toes of a few, and had got spanked to teach him better. But he hadn’t ever eaten slippers, and it seemed worth trying. He had time to wonder, now, if it had really been worth while. Although he’d finished only the top of one and had barely started on' the other, when he was interrupted by Buz, he had a most uncomfortable feeling inside. And things outside didn’t promise to be more cheerful, since Buz wouldn’t go away from the door.

“Boys never stay still for long,” Fury reflected wisely. “He’ll get tired, by and bye, and run away. I’m per¬ fectly comfortable here.”

He was not comfortable, though. Reaching up to look over the edge of the box, he nearly broke his neck; and the feeling inside him grew more and more peculiar. Moving made it worse; but keeping quiet didn’t make it better. He couldn’t help wondering if he mightn’t feel stronger after eating something nourishing. Shoe-leather was great fun, but beef and bones and potatoes were surely healthier for dogs who had hard work to do like running and jumping. All which made Fury think harder and harder.

“If I wait here till he goes, it may be for the rest of the day. That means missing dinner. If I choose the beat¬ ing, I’ll forget about it, after a while, and one beating more or less won’t matter so much. But if I miss dinner, I’ll never, never, never make up for that, so long as I live, because I can’t have more than one dinner a day!”

No. Buz did not have the vaguest intention of going away. While the name he had given to this place was rather long and complicated, and might be puzzling to any one who had not been able to read the Bible and learn about Horns of the Altar and Cities of Befuge, yet Fury had grasped the laws of the game. Buz thought it fair for a dog to have a place to go to and be quite safe against teasing or punishing.

Fury was always telling himself that he must behave like a big dog and not whimper next time he was whipped. But somehow, this time was always so very bad that he would cry out most dreadfully, and would do his best to gain just a minute or two—oh, please!

So he knew now that he was merely putting off his punishment; but he was luckier than some boys in being able to do that. And he had something plaintive in his looks, and something almost impudent too, because he was safe for a few minutes more, or at least until he chose to come out—pro¬ vided he did without dinner.

All of a sudden, Fury noticed a change in Buz. Buz was getting tired; he called sharply. When Fury didn’t move, Buz glanced over his shoulder towards the trees beyond the lawn, as if thinking*of switches.

“He doesn’t like this,” Fury said to himself. “If I want my dinner, then the sooner I get out, the easier he’ll be on me.—Here goes!”

His innocent air, as he jumped from the box and sidled across the floor of the carriage-house, might have deceived anybody except Buz. (I don’t like to believe it was because Buz had tried such things too.) With an air so inno¬ cent that Buz read a very guilty con¬ science underneath, Fury came out, wagging his absurd tail which he’d dropped as low as possible, considering how short it was.

Buz showed that the surrender had soothed him. He said:

“Come on, sir! Come on!”

But his voice wasn’t so stern as it had been.

If Buz had known it was greediness rather than obedience which brought Fury out, perhaps he would have spanked harder than he did. That would have been a pity, though, because the one or two little slaps he gave on Fury’s flank were enough.

Fury never ate shoes or slippers again. He learned that what had brought him pleasure was not the leather at all, but the sweet taste of the blacking, even if it did leave a little bite behind. And he could taste black¬ ing at any time, without risking more than a stuffy feeling inside, by using the tip of his long, limber tongue.

CHAPTER II At the Rat-wall

Fury snarled and growled in his sleep, and twitched his legs and tail. He was dreaming he’d chased a great horrid rat into the loose bricks of an old wall at the far end of the garden; and as long as he watched, the rat would hide away, and as soon as he started to go, the rat would show its nose again. It was a most unpleasant sort of dream, and it changed to some¬ thing worse. He dreamed that he stayed there to watch, and each time the rat would come out and look at him he would fall asleep, instead of jump¬ ing up as it was his duty to do.

He made more noise and disturbance than he knew, whining and kicking on the rug at Buz’s feet while in his dreams he couldn’t move at all. Presently Buz punched him softly in the ribs with the toe of one shoe. (I believe it was the identical shoe Fury had tried to gnaw before having a try at slippers.) Buz explained to himself that he was considerately stopping Fury’s misery. But it was also true that Buz could do his Latin lesson bet¬ ter when Fury was quiet.

This changed Fury’s dream. He thought a ball struck him and knocked him over, and then the wall turned up¬ side down; and half a minute later, only a heavy lump of sleep was left where Fury and the wall and the rat had been.

After a short time, Fury came out of the lump, breathed deeply, yawned widely, sneezed sharply—it was a particularly refreshing sneeze — and stretched lazily. Then he raised his head and looked in Buz’s face.

What he saw didn’t please him. Buz had his nose pointed to a book. Fury didn’t know that it was Caesar’s very interesting story of the Gallic Wars. Buz himself may not have known it was interesting, though he was work¬ ing at it as hard as ever he could. All Fury cared about, was that when Buz took the book with the green back and the red-edged leaves, there was no play¬ ing. That is, there wasn’t unless—

Fury got up and slipped gently out of the room. Anybody who had watched him could have seen a naughty little wrinkle on the very tip end of his nose. But nobody was watching.

He didn’t make a single sound, while he was in the hall. He picked up one hind leg and ran on three feet, as his mother had taught him that dogs of his race ought to do when there was no special hurry. He glided swiftly and silently, not letting his toe-nails scratch until he reached the verandah. Then he scratched briskly across the wooden flooring until he reached the top of the steps. And then he got to the bottom, down the fourteen steps, in what looked like a single jump, though he made as much noise as if a pound of nails had been flung down hard. He stopped a couple of seconds to twirl round in the tall grass, which hadn’t been cut be¬ cause Buz wanted to do it but was always too busy to begin. And then at last he dashed off to the wall he’d been dreaming about, and gave a short, sharp yelp.

It was the yelp he kept for the very wonderful days when he spied a mouse or a cat, or sometimes even a rat. Buz knew that yelp; and having yelped it, Fury sat down on his hind quarters before the wall.

Buz was a long, long time in com¬ ing. Fury feared to fall asleep once more, while waiting there patiently. Yet Buz was on the way.

Fury heard something drop, perhaps the stupid book with the green back and the red-edged leaves; then a chair squeaked on the floor and hit wood, as if pushed hard against the library sofa; and now Buz’s shoes were pattering through the hall. But a boy’s two legs, good as they may be, don’t com¬ pare with a dog’s four legs, or even a dog’s three legs, if that dog is a Fury. So it seemed to take a very long while, though it was not really more than one minute and twenty seconds and onequarter beat of another second, by the little second hand of a big gold watch with a double gold chain and a lapis lazuli seal on the end.

When near the wall, Buz slowed down and crept as softly as Fury had crept to leave the library. He didn’t want to frighten away the creature, whatever it was. Fury knew Buz be¬ lieved that special yelp had meant a rat or something. And so, like any honest person who has made a fool of anybody else, Fury began to feel very much of a fool, too. Buz was kind, and played nicely; and it was ungrate¬ ful to play tricks on him. Besides, when you begin to act fibs, just as when you begin to tell fibs, you’ve got to carry them on in many complicated ways, getting deeper and deeper into a tangle until you’re caught sooner or later, sure as a gun.

“If I go away now,” Fury thought, “Buz will think I’ve lost the rat. If I stay, he’ll think the same. And he’ll call me stupid, and go back to his horrid green book with the red-edged leaves.”

So he couldn’t make up his mind what to do. But being a sensible dog, he did the very sensiblest thing imaginable. He kept perfectly still, without moving a hair—not a single one of his short white hairs. Buz kept quite still too, not moving a hair either —not a single one of his short dark ones. Only, Fury’s nose was quiet too, because he didn’t expect anything to happen, while Buz’s nostrils—

—(By the way, did I think of men¬ tioning that Buz’s nose was turned up just a tiny bit, and had seven freckles on the end, nearest the sun?)—

—Buz’s nostrils quivered every once in a while, because he was excited, ex¬ pecting extraordinary exertions every moment.

Staying still is a thing dogs can do, occasionally, and then they’re called clever. I’ve heard say it’s a thing boys can do, too, more rarely, and then they are called wise. As for me, I’ve seen so few boys stay still that I don’t dare say anything about it.

Anyhow, the result for Buz and Fury was this:

They hadn’t been there together longer than the time Fury would have taken to wag his tail six times—and since it was a very short tail, that wasn’t very long (I mean the time wasn’t)—when, to Buz’s great satis¬ faction and to Fury’s immense amaze¬ ment, a large he-rat came sure enough, and peeped out from among the loose bricks with his sharp beady eyes!

Now, Fury had had quite a lot of experience catching mice, and had al¬ ways wanted a chance at a big, fierce rat. Whenever old black Aunt Dimpsey called him to the kitchen because of a mouse, he would pretend it was a rat to put up a proper fight and let him prove what a plucky Australian fox-terrier he was. But he wished his first rat might have come some other day than to-day. He had slept too soundly, and didn’t feel very well. You never do, if you sleep soundly after eating a good dinner. It was entirely a matter of health, this feeling he had. He knew, because it was in his insides, and made him think something was slipping and slipping away, while his legs got all tottery.

By a strange coincidence, he had heard, only yesterday, stories about rats which really deserved considering before he tried to fight one. And by a stranger coincidence, he kept remem¬ bering details of those stories now.

Two dogs had been talking in the street. They said that rats scooted when they could, but if you cornered them they sprang at you and bit you. And their bite wasn’t like a dog’s or a cat’s, or a mouse’s; their teeth were so foul that their bite was like poison, almost as bad as a snake’s bite. Fury didn’t know what a snake was, but the very sound of it made him shiver.

How was he to tackle a rat almost as bad as a snake?

Buz crouched behind him, scarcely breathing, waiting. So Fury waited too, hoping and hoping that the horrid thing would slip away to the other side of the wall, as so many rats had done before.

And this one would have done that too, if it had been an ordinary rat. But there was something not at all ordinary about it: it was a big old he-rat with extremely wicked eyes. The wall was an old, tumblety-down brick wall, with a new brick wall built up behind it. Buz knew that his mother had not allowed it to be pulled down because staghorn fern grew over it and made that end of the garden look pretty. But all Fury cared about was that, the wall being double with a space in the middle, any rat could have got away that wanted to—and this one didn’t want to.

Cold shivers kept running along Fury’s spine. He didn’t let Buz guess what they were; he had enough presence of mind to wiggle his tail each time, pretending it was all excitement. And he stayed there, like the good dog he was, just as many a boy has stayed for a fight, and many a man too, because he had to.

Then the whole business was over before Fury knew how it had started. The rat leaped out from the wall straight at Fury’s face, and Fury dodged and caught him with his teeth in the very middle of the back. That would have been just right for a mouse; but the rat turned like a flash and bit his lip. Fury screamed with pain and shut his eyes, but only closed down tighter with his sharp teeth. The rat bit again, this time on the very end of Fury’s nose.

It was not only the most awful pain he’d ever felt, but he was smothered by a warm, sticky liquid. He had to open his jaws to breathe. At that, the rat got away. But Fury was on him again in a flash; and in spite of pain and of blood, he had done some think¬ ing. This time, he caught the rat by the neck, close behind the head, and bit—bit just as hard as he knew how, not letting anything interfere until the rat had stopped wiggling.

Buz ran away and came back with a bowl of water and a sponge to bathe

Fury’s wounds. But Fury didn’t mind being hurt. He’d almost been a coward, but all the same he’d done what he had to do; and he would never again be afraid of a rat or anything else. It’s a way some dogs have, and a way some boys have too—when they’re no longer afraid of one thing, they really believe they’ll never be afraid of anything else. And it’s per¬ fectly true that the less they are afraid of, the less they will be afraid of.

Next day, Buz was away at school an hour later than usual, and when he came home, he kicked the book with the green back and the red-edged leaves, and sent it zipping under a chair as if it had stung him. Fury looked on, from the hearth rug; and though he thought of the rat he’d killed to get Buz to drop that book, he couldn’t make out what might be wrong now, and so he wasn’t the least bit sorry.

*

*

X

CHAPTER III The Moonlight Dreams

There was moonlight, that night. A bright, full, silvered Southern moon peeped in at the windows, though its beams couldn’t quite reach the bed. Buz knew he must not sleep in the light of the moon. Somebody had told him that lunatic meant moon-struck. That must have been a joke. But everybody agreed to say he must keep out of the way of moon-beams when he slept, because the light would make him think, and so he would dream too much.

And, in fact, though the moon could not quite reach him, the room was filled with brightness; and so, while he lay busily sleeping, he dreamed strange dreams.

One dream put him in a wonderful enchanted garden blazing with lights that bloomed like flowers and burned like suns. (That was entirely the moon’s fault for lighting up the room as if it were day; but he didn’t know it.)

Another dream put him deep down in a terribly black pit; and when he got down, down, down, he found it was not black at all, but so far away from the air and the sky that he couldn’t breathe, and must smother if he stayed there one minute longer. (That was principally the fault of the mosquito-net hanging round his bed and keeping away what little breeze there was; but he didn’t know it.)

A third dream set him to fighting with a fierce animal that was some¬ thing like an elephant and something like a porcupine, and it sang its warsong with a voice that sounded like ten hundred trumpets blown all to¬ gether. (That was largely the fault of a mosquito humming as it tried to find a hole in the net to fly in and bite him; but he didn’t know it.)

He wasn’t quite sure, when he thought about it all next morning, if he finished this third dream. The animal certainly hadn’t eaten him, and he couldn’t believe he had been enough of a hero to conquer it. Anyhow, he knew he couldn’t have run away, be¬ cause in the dream there was nowhere to run to.

Well, when this third dream had ended, or when it changed just because it wanted to, in the irritating manner dreams have, a fourth dream came. And it surprised him very very much more than any of the others.

All the chairs, and beds, and tables, and book-cases, and general furniture and odd fittings throughout the house —so he dreamed—were tumbling down the stairs as hard and as loud and as fast as ever they possibly could. The very last of all, when the rooms were stripped bare, Buz saw his father’s large mahogany book-case, which reached nearly up to the library ceil¬ ing, go clattering in the wake of the rest, its doors wide open as it scat¬ tered the books along the way. And each book would pick itself up as soon as it had fallen, and would go on bounding and rolling down like a ball.

< < There, that ends the noise, at least,’ ’ he said to himself, vastly relieved. Be¬ cause though he didn’t mind noise as a rule, he felt it could be too much of a good thing when other people made it. As for this particular noise, it had been so terrific that, after everything else had grown quiet, the drums of his ears kept on drumming from excite¬ ment. (That was part of the dream, of course, but it seemed perfectly real —as real as the books which bounced and rolled like balls, and he’d never seen anything more lifelike than that.)

“How sorry Father will be,” Buz thought. And then a good idea came to him. He might go down and see which of the things had got all broken and would have to be thrown away— (“I hope they’ll let me help, that would be fun,” he added)—and which of the things could be patched and mended and used again—(“I hope I won’t have to help with that, I wouldn’t know how,” he added).

So he made up his mind to get up.

But that was easier to think than to do. (It wasn’t the first time Buz had found a thing easier to think than to do.) For his bed had somehow got out into the sky, and was sticking there all by itself!

Getting up was of no use, then. He lay there wondering what would hap¬ pen to him if he tumbled out before the ladder came. (He didn’t know which ladder, when he tried to remember, next day. Perhaps it was only the garden ladder; or perhaps he expected the firemen to bring their hook-andladder; or else, being so high in the sky, perhaps nothing could have helped but Jacob’s ladder.)

He was struggling to untangle his hands and feet from the yards of sheet which had got wrapped round and round him, making him feel like a snail in the shell, when—

When he heard another noise which made him hold his breath and muffle his ears and roll his head in the pillows, and he very glad his bed was out of the house, even if it had got blown into the sky and been caught up there so he couldn’t get down.

Big and awful as this new noise was, nobody could have mistaken it:

The house was tumbling down its own stairs!

Leaning over the edge of the bed, he peeped down, trembling with excite¬ ment. (Of course it was excitement: no boy worth the name was ever afraid when alone in the night, whatever might happen.)

Yes, he was absolutely right about the house. The ceilings and floors, the windows and doors, the carpets and rugs, the pitchers and mugs, the plaster and lath, the railings and bath, the basement and roof, and—well, that’s enough!—were pouring downstairs just exactly as the furniture had poured a few minutes before; and they were doing it every particle as easily, al¬ though the house, in order to get through its own stairs, had to turn it¬ self inside out. Yes it did—like a glove passing through one of its own fingers!

Then, just as he was about to slip over the edge of the bed, forgetting all the sky that lay between him and the earth, luckily he woke up, all of a sudden, with a violent start. Next instant, the bed seemed to drop like a shot, landing in the very middle of the broken furniture and gloved house. (In his dream he called it a gloved house.)

He saw the moonbeams; and he felt the mosquito-net; and he heard the mosquito singing.

Really and truthfully, he was half out of bed, and a most peculiar noise did fill the house, and something had rattled all the way downstairs and had landed with a crash and a bang at the bottom.

For some seconds, he sat quite still. He knew it wasn’t the house turning inside out; and he knew it wasn’t any¬ thing so big as a book-case, and there weren’t as many things as if the books were bouncing and rolling like balls; and he knew the noise wasn’t bad enough to make the drums of his ears go on drumming by themselves when there was nothing left to drum on them. But all this didn’t keep him from know¬ ing that it was very strange and—and exciting.

He sat on the edge of the bed, with his bare feet on the floor, and listened.

The night was very quiet and very silent. There wasn’t any more breeze, and people had long since stopped pass-, ing in the street. Even the mosquito had given up singing, now that Buz had crept outside the net. That mosquito had found a better employ¬ ment than singing. It was peacefully eating away at Buz’s nice white knee, while Buz was so busy listening for sounds from downstairs or from the garden, that he didn’t feel what was going on against his skin.

Ah!