The pup, who probably had tried to retrieve the fish a dozen times, was not working blindly. Having learned from past mistakes, he was planning this new attempt in a brand new way. Rather than go straight down, he turned, swam four feet away, then turned again and dived at a forty-five degree angle.

This time he aimed at the willow stalk rather than the anch.o.r.ed fish. He struck with his shoulder so hard that the willow's topmost leaves rattled, but the stalk moved aside and the fish floated free.

Floating slowly upward, the fish was within three inches of the surface when it was seized by a swift little current and whisked away. Breaking water exactly where the sucker should have been, the pup was bewildered.

But he remained at a loss for only a split second.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Splashing for the first time, he churned mightily, raised his forequarters high, looked all around, and sighted the fish. Now it was about a dozen feet away. The pup overtook it, grasped it in his mouth, and circled back toward sh.o.r.e.

With one mighty leap, Harky landed in knee-deep water. He hadn't dared move while the pup was in the shallows near the bank, for there was too much chance that it might slip around him, run into the brush, and escape. But not even a pup as talented as this one could swim fifteen feet and get away.

The water rose to Harky's thighs, then to his belt. Watching him, but not dropping the sucker, the pup made a downstream circle designed to carry him around Harky and into the willows. His eyes were calculating, his manner the calm and detached air of one who knows exactly what he's doing.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

Water lapped Harky's armpits, and he knew that he was going to win but not by a comfortable margin. With another foot or so of lead, or a second more, the pup would get away.

When a yard and a half separated them, Harky flung himself forward, enfolded the pup with both arms, and clasped it to his chest. Being caught, the pup dropped his fish. Sinuous as a snake and swift as a hummingbird, he brought his head around, scored Harky's arm with needle-sharp puppy teeth, and blood seeped out of the scratches.

"Ouch!" Harky gritted. "Leetle devil!"

Holding the pup with his right arm, he clamped his left hand around its neck so the pup could not turn and bite again. The pup whined. When Harky petted him gently, his whine changed to a warning growl. Harky pondered the entire situation.

Here was the proper place to teach manners, but the pup was not without justice on his side. He had located the fish and worked hard to get it.

Therefore he should have it. Now in quiet water, the fish was bobbing against Harky's chest. He let go of the pup's neck, grabbed at the fish, and the pup bit him again before he was able to grasp it.

"Cut it out!" Harky e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "I'm just trying to help you!"

Now that the fish was in Harky's hand, the pup forgot all about biting.

He extended his muzzle, licked his chops, and wriggled. When Harky held the fish near enough, the pup bit off a chunk of tail and swallowed it whole. Three bites later, the fish was eaten.

"You ain't just hungry," Harky commented. "You're starved."

The pup sighed, snuggled against Harky's chest, and then turned to look him full in the face. Harky looked back. The pup was Sue all over again except for his eyes. Hers were gentle. His could be, but they could also be proud and fierce. Harky thought of Mun.

"I think you'd as soon be friends," Harky said, "but something tells me n.o.body will ever take a switch to you. Whoever thinks you need a hiding had best use a club."

Oddly as though he wanted to shake hands, the pup raised a forepaw to Harky's left palm. Harky's heart skipped a beat. He gulped, wondering if he felt what he thought he did and not daring immediately to feel again.

Then he did and almost threw the pup back into the pool.

"If I hadn't felt it!" he gasped, "I couldn't no ways believe it!"

No lightning flashed in the blue sky and no thunder pealed. Bright day did not turn to black night. Harky felt the paw again, then steeled himself to look. He gulped, but because no supernatural forces descended upon him, he first felt and then looked at the pup's other three paws.

There was no shade of doubt. Each of the pup's toes was joined to the next by a webbing of skin. Sue had given birth to a duck-footed hound!

Suddenly it occurred to Harky that he was still waist-deep in Willow Brook, and that nothing special was to be gained by staying there.

Carrying the pup, who seemed satisfied to be carried now that he was no longer so hungry, Harky waded back to the bank. His awe mounted. Since he was born with a duck's feet, no wonder Sue's pup could swim like a duck. Dripping water, Harky climbed the bank.

"What are we going to do with you, Duckfoot?" he asked.

Duckfoot answered that question by wriggling, rolling sidewise, and jumping to the ground. Harky sighed with relief. If the pup was allied with witches--and how else could duck feet on a dog be explained?--now was the time for him to disappear in a flash of flame and a cloud of smoke and return to the infernal regions from which he had emerged.

He did nothing except sit down, blink solemnly at Harky, and wag his tail. Harky had a fleeting thought that almost frightened him all over again. Duckfoot had certainly been touched by sinister forces that no man ever saw.

Man sometimes heard them when they shrieked on the midnight wind or moaned among the forest trees, and decidedly they were better left alone. But suppose, just suppose, that Duckfoot was more hound than spirit? What if the good, as embodied in the hound, was powerful enough to overcome the bad, which was surely represented in webbed feet on a dog? If Duckfoot gave his allegiance to any man ...

Harky trembled when he considered such possibilities. Old Joe himself, who'd been running the Creeping Hills for all of time, could not run away from a duck-footed hound!

In sudden near panic Harky swooped, caught Duckfoot, clutched him tightly, and raced up Willow Brook. He needed experienced counsel. Mun, who knew far more than he about such matters, was the man to advise him.

It never occurred to Harky that deserved punishment awaited his return.

And it never occurred to Mun, who knew the ways of his son, that Harky would even think of coming home until he had enjoyed his full day. The hiding wouldn't be any harder.

Mun's first fleeting thought was that Harky had gone insane. Then he noticed the pup in Harky's arms and came incredulously forward.

"What the blazes?"

"Look!"

Harky put Duckfoot down. The pup gave Mun a sober and very critical inspection, then came forward to sniff his shoes.

"Sue's pup!" Mun e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

Harky looked curiously at his father. He'd never thought much about Mun except that, when it came to running away from trifling farm tasks to engage in worthwhile pursuits, he was a mighty hard man to fool. All he knew at the moment was that, for the first time since that dreadful night when Sue disappeared, Mun looked happy.

Harky fidgeted. He'd like it well enough if Mun always looked happy, but he dared not a.s.sume the fearful responsibility of p.r.o.nouncing judgment on Duckfoot. Nor was it for him to bring a hound that was only part hound into the household. Not even if the hound part was all Precious Sue. Harky steeled himself, caught up Duckfoot, and extended his paw.

"Look!"

For a moment Mun did not speak. Then he discovered his voice.

"Goshamighty! Whar'd ye git that pup?"

"In the pool by the shale bank he was, trying to get a sucker from beneath that crookety willow--"

Mun listened attentively, and when Harky finished he cleared his throat.

But he did not speak for a full forty-five seconds.

"I got it figgered now," he said seriously. "When Sue run off that night, she missed Old Joe, but now I know how come she didn't drown. A duck pulled her out of the water."

"A duck?" Harky questioned.

"Not jest a barnyard duck," Mun said, "an' not jest a wild duck neither.

It was some big ol' duck, mebbe bigger'n Sue herself, what's been settin' back in the woods for no man knows how many years, jest waitin'

to put a spell on Sue."