His howls of agony brought Mrs
Catanach out in her petticoats. She flew at the hound, which Lady
Florimel was in vain attempting to drag from the cur, and seized
him by the throat.
"Take care; he is dangerous!" cried the girl.
Finding she had no power upon him, Mrs Catanach forsook him, and,
in despairing fury, rushed at his mistress. Demon saw it with one
flaming eye, left the cur--which, howling hideously, dragged his
hind quarters after him into the house--and sprang at the woman.
Then indeed was Lady Florimel terrified, for she knew the savage
nature of the animal when roused. Truly, with his eyes on fire as
now, his long fangs bared, the bristles on his back erect, and his
moustache sticking straight out, he might well be believed, much
as civilization might have done for him, a wolf after all! His
mistress threw herself between them, and flung her arms tight round
his neck.
"Run, woman! Run for your life!" she shrieked. "I can't hold him
long."
Mrs Catanach fled, cowed by terror. Her huge legs bore her huge
body, a tragicomic spectacle, across the street to her open door.
She had hardly vanished, flinging it to behind her, when Demon
broke from his mistress, and going at the door as if launched from
a catapult, burst it open and disappeared also.
Lady Florimel gave a shriek of horror, and darted after him.
The same moment the sound of Duncan's pipes as he issued from
the town gate, at which he always commenced instead of ending his
reveille now, reached her, and bethinking herself of her inability
to control the hound, she darted again from the cottage, and flew
to meet him, crying aloud,--"Mr MacPhail! Duncan! Duncan! stop
your pipes and come here directly.
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