That thrice accursed poodle which I had been insane enough to attempt to foist upon the colonel must, it seems, have buried his supper the night before very near the spot in which I had laid Bingo, and in his attempts to exhume his bone had brought the remains of my victim to the surface!
There the corpse lay, on the very top of the excavations. Time had not, of course, improved its appearance, which was ghastly in the extreme, but still plainly recognisable by the eye of affection.
"It's a very ordinary hole," I gasped, putting myself before it and tryingto turn them back. "Nothing in it--nothing at all!""Except one Algernon Weatherhead, Esq., eh?" whispered Travers, jocosely, in my ear.
"No; but," persisted the colonel, advancing, "look here! Has the dog damaged any of your shrubs?""No, no!" I cried, piteously; "quite the reverse. Let's all go indoors now; it's getting so cold!""See, there /is/ a shrub or something uprooted," said the colonel, still coming nearer that fatal hole. "Why, hullo, look there! What's that?"Lilian, who was by his side, gave a slight scream. "Uncle," she cried, "it looks like--like /Bingo/!"The colonel turned suddenly upon me. "Do you hear?" he demanded, in a choked voice. "You hear what she says? Can't you speak out? Is that our Bingo?"I gave it up at last; I only longed to be allowed to crawl away under something! "Yes," I said in a dull whisper, as I sat down heavily on a garden seat, "yes . . . that's Bingo . . . misfortune . . . shoot him . . . quite an accident!"There was a terrible explosion after that; they saw at last how I had deceived them, and put the very worst construction upon everything. Even now I writhe impotently at times, and my cheeks smart and tingle with humiliation, as I recall that scene--the colonel's very plain speaking, Lilian's passionate reproaches and contempt, and her aunt's speechless prostration of disappointment.
I made no attempt to defend myself; I was not, perhaps, the complete villain they deemed me, but I felt dully that no doubt it all served me perfectly right.
Still I do not think I am under any obligation to put their remarks down in black and white here.
Travers had vanished at the first opportunity--whether out of delicacy, or the fear of breaking out into unseasonable mirth, I cannot say; and shortly afterward the others came to where I sat silent with bowed head, and bade me a stern and final farewell.
And then, as the last gleam of Lilian's white dress vanished down thegarden path, I laid my head down on the table among the coffee-cups, and cried like a beaten child.
I got leave as soon as I could, and went abroad. The morning after my return I noticed, while shaving, that there was a small square marble tablet placed against the wall of the colonel's garden. I got my opera-glass and read--and pleasant reading it was--the following inscription:
IN AFFECTIONATE MEMORY OF
B I N G O,
SECRETLY AND CRUELLY PUT TO DEATH, IN COLD BLOOD,BY A
NEIGHBOUR AND FRIEND. JUNE, 1881.
If this explanation of mine ever reaches my neighbours' eyes, I humbly hope they will have the humanity either to take away or tone down that tablet. They cannot conceive what I suffer when curious visitors insist, as they do every day, on spelling out the words from our windows, and asking me countless questions about them!
Sometimes I meet the Curries about the village, and as they pass me with averted heads I feel myself growing crimson. Travers is almost always with Lilian now. He has given her a dog,--a fox-terrier,--and they take ostentatiously elaborate precautions to keep it out of my garden.
I should like to assure them here that they need not be under any alarm. I have shot one dog.