When I went over and told Brownlee, he wouldn’t believe it at first, but when I showed him Fluff, he cheered up and clapped me on the back.
“I tell you,” he exclaimed, “we have made a great discovery. We have discovered the law of scared dogs. ‘A dog is scared in inverse ratio to the number of guns!’ Now, it wouldn’t be fair to try Fluff again without giving him a breathing spell, but to-morrow I will come over, and we will try him with four guns. We will work this thing out thoroughly,” he said, “before we write to the Academy of Science, or whatever a person would write to, so that there will be no mistake. Before we give this secret to the world we want to have it complete. We will try Fluff with any number of guns, and with pistols and rifles, and if we can get one we will try him with a cannon. We will keep at it for years and years. You and I will be famous.”
I told Brownlee that if he wanted to experiment for years with Fluff he could have him, but that all I wanted was to get rid of him; but Brownlee wouldn’t hear of that. He said he would buy Fluff of me if he was rich enough, but that Fluff was so valuable he couldn’t think of buying him. He would let me keep him. He said he would be over the next day to try Fluff again.
So the next day he and Murchison and Massett came over and held a consultation on my porch to decide how many guns they would try on Fluff. They could not agree. Massett wanted to try four guns and have Fluff absent only half a day, but Brownlee wanted to have me break my shotgun in two and try that on Fluff. He said that according to the law of scared dogs, a half a gun, working it out by inverse ratio, would keep Fluff away for twice as long as one gun, which would be ninety-six hours; and while they were arguing it out Fluff came around the house unsuspectingly and saw us on the porch. He gave us one startled glance and started north by northeast at what Brownlee said was the most marvelous rate of speed he ever saw. Then he and Massett got down off the porch and looked for guns, but there were none in sight. There wasn’t anything that looked the least like a gun. Not even a broomstick. Brownlee said he knew what was the matter – Fluff was having a little practice run to keep in good condition, and would be back in a few hours; but, judging by the look he gave us as he went, I thought he would be gone longer than that.
I could see that Brownlee was worried, and as day followed day without any return of Fluff, Murchison and I tried to cheer him up, showing him how much better we all slept while Fluff was away; but it did not cheer up poor Brownlee. He had set his faith on that dog, and the dog had deceived him. We all became anxious about Brownlee’s health – he moped around so; and just when we began to be afraid he was going into a decline he cheered up, and came over as bright and happy as a man could be.
“I told you so!” he exclaimed joyfully, as soon as he was inside my gate. “And it makes me ashamed of myself that I didn’t think of it the moment I saw Fluff start off. You will never see that dog again.”
I told Brownlee that that was good news, anyway, even if it did upset his law of scared dogs; but he smiled a superior smile.
“Disprove nothing!” he said. “It proves my law. Didn’t I say in the first place that the time a dog would be gone was in inverse ratio to the number of guns? Well, the inverse ratio to no guns is infinite time – that is how long Fluff will be gone; that is how long he will run. Why, that dog will never stop running while there is any dog left in him. He can’t help it – it is the law of scared dogs.”
“Do you mean to say,” I asked him, “that that dog will run on and on forever?”
“Exactly!” said Brownlee proudly. “As long as there is a particle of him left he will keep on running. That is the law.”
Maybe Brownlee was right. I don’t know. But what I would like to know is the name of some one who would like a dog that looks like Fluff, and is his size, and that howls like him and that answers to his name. A dog of that kind returned to Murchison’s house a long time before infinity, and I would like to get rid of him. Brownlee says it isn’t Fluff; that his law couldn’t be wrong, and that this is merely a dog that resembles Fluff. Maybe Brownlee is right, but I would like to know some one that wants a dog with a richly melodious voice.
THE END
