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Have to keep limber," he said, smiling. He didn't talk about Ricky's being gone. He didn't say that a man eighty years old learns to live with pain and disappointment. He said very little at all, and, after a few days, he began taking walks again〞alone.It was on a night about two weeks later〞an evening when Lucy and John were out〞that he heard it, the soft scratching at his door. He waited, his heart pounding, not daring to believe his ears. Then the soft, familiar scratching came again, and with a sudden trembling joy he went to the door and opened it.Ricky was weary and travel-worn, but his amber eyes were alight. And as Mark looked at him, he lifted one side of his mouth in the eager, homely smile."You didn't forget!" Mark whispered. "You've come back-come back to me〞" But he knew this was not right. Though his hands ached to pat the setter's head, he held back. One rapturous welcome from him and Ricky would be a tramp. The two of them could be friends, sharing loneliness, while the setter lived close by; but now his rightful home was miles away, and a dog so divided in allegiance was no dog at all. Perhaps he understood Ricky better than the Wilsons did, Mark thought, but the Wilson children loved the dog.Mark forced himself to remember Billy Wilson with his arms about Ricky, forced himself to think of Ricky hunting quail and pheasant on forest trails, and romping in wide-open fields amid the excitement of country sounds and smells.As the dog whined softly and drew closer to Marks, the old man's heart was torn between joy and anguish. He drew back from the door and closed it. After a few moments he went to the telephone."I guess he missed your old house," he said, when he had Mrs. Wilson on the wire. "I thought I'd call before you worried."When Mr. Wilson arrived, Ricky still lay outside Mark's door, his tail quite, his eyes bewildered."What'll I do?" Mr. Wilson said gruffly to the dog. "Tie you up out there in the country?"Except to say good morning and good evening, Mark had never talked to Mr. Wilson before. Now he said, "That's a fine dog. I know you got him for your children, but part of him needs you too, if you don't mind an old man telling you this." He paused a moment, embarrassed, and then went on.: "Talk to him. Let him lie by your fire at night. Walk through the woods with him. Take him hunting. Get to know him, and you'll never regret it. Two children, country freedom, a man for steadiness〞that's heaven for a dog."Mr. Wilson listened. He had obviously been angry at having to make the long trip into town, but as he gazed at Mark and then down at the waiting dog, his expression changed. "I think you're right. Mr. Tyler," he said. "I〞hadn't thought about that."He reached down and stroked the setter's head. "Well, old fellow, how about going home?" he said.Ricky hesitated and then looked up at Mark, his eyes uncertain. With a hollow sense of loss, Mark knew it was over: he'd never see the setter again."Go home, Ricky," he said with quiet authority. "Go home, boy"
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