Read Ginger Pye for Free Online Page B

he might find a little speck that Gramma had shaken from the rugs. "Ah-h, Bubbah!" he would exclaim and gather it fondly up.
    There had been a time when he plucked the wool not only off his old pink blanket, his
real
bubbah, but off the camel's-hair rugs from the Orient also. Gramma finally had to store these rugs away before they should disappear in thin air. She bade Uncle Bennie to be economical, to save his bubbah, and use only the little bits he found here and there instead of always plucking new bits to tickle his nose. She said, "Bubbah will wear out and then you will not have Bubbah anymore."
    But Uncle Bennie was spendthrift. He did not look to the future, and he still plucked at his bubbah and tickled his nose with it. But he had agreed to leave it home and not take it with him anymore, now he was a big boy of three.
    So now Bubbah made up to Uncle Bennie for the departure of the puppy and Jerry and Rachel, and he solemnly, tickling his nose, watched them prepare to leave.
    "We'll see you next week," Rachel called to him.
    "Go church again?" asked Uncle Bennie.
    "Maybe."
    "See puppy again?"
    "Sure. He's our puppy now."
    "'Bye."
    "'Bye."
    By the time Rachel and Jerry started on the long way home, way over on the other side of town, it had grown dark. Whenever they came to a streetlamp they put the little dog down so he could stretch his legs, and they kept exclaiming over all the wonderful things about him—his ears, his eyes, his softness, his roundness, his whole self. The puppy did not seem to miss his life in the barn at all. He was happy to belong to Jerry and Rachel and he kept frisking about.
    "He likes me," said Jerry happily.
    "Oh-h. Isn't he cunning!" admired Rachel.
    "And smart, too. He's going to do tricks. I'll teach him everything," said Jerry proudly.
    "Gracie can open the front door," Rachel reminded Jerry. It was true. Gracie could leap in the air and turn the doorknob and, as she came down, let her weight fall against the door in such a way the door would fly open. It was a very smart thing to do, and far more pleasant to hear about than catching rats for Mama.
    "Yes, Gracie's smart," agreed Jerry. "But this dog can go everywhere with me."
    "Yes," said Rachel. And they walked along happily and silently.
    Suddenly, Jerry realized that he heard footsteps behind him, that, furthermore, he had been hearing these footsteps for some time and thinking nothing of them. Only now did he realize that someone was following them.
    It had grown very dark, especially under the great elm trees that arched Second Avenue, the street they were now on. Whenever Jerry turned around to see who, if anyone, was following them, he could see no one. The street was not a straight one. It curved and twisted, and he couldn't see far enough back to make out anything. When he and Rachel were walking, however, he was certain he could hear the footsteps behind them. When he and Rachel stopped, the footsteps stopped.
    Shucks,
said Jerry to himself.
I'm as bad as Rachel, always thinking things.
But he no longer put the puppy down on the ground. "It's getting awfully late," he said to Rachel. "We better hurry home or Mama will be wondering where we are."
    "M-m-m," said Rachel absentmindedly.
    Now Rachel had been hearing the footsteps, too.

    But she had said nothing because Jerry always thought she was imagining things. She didn't think she was imagining these footsteps though she certainly hoped she was. If there were real footsteps behind them, walking when they walked, stopping when they stopped, why she and Jerry didn't just sprint for home was more than she could tell. Jerry probably had not heard them, that was why. They probably weren't there.
    Meanwhile Jerry was saying to himself, "I have to see who this is that's following us. I bet it's that stranger fellow, the one who wanted to buy my puppy. And I bet it was him racing across the telephone poles in back of Speedys' barn and not someone after milk. Maybe it was even him,