“No doubt, back Earthside. Charlie, I’m not being
arbitrary. I don’t want your dog to get hurt.”
“He won’t get hurt! — He’s real smart.”
The Scoutmaster frowned. Hans Kuppenheimer spoke up. “I think Nixie could come along, Mr. Qu’an.”
“Eh?” — The Scoutmaster looked at Hans thoughtfully.
“You’ll have your hands full with Chuck, since it’s his first time out.”
Hans had a habit of saying nothing when he had nothing to say; — he did so now. Mr. Qu’an persisted, “You’d have to look out for them both, you know.”
Hans still kept quiet. “Well,” Mr. Qu’an said doubtfully, “Nixie is a member of the troop. If you can take care of him — and Charlie, too — I’ll let him come.”
“Yes, sir.”
The — Scoutmaster turned away. Charlie whispered, “Thanks, Hans. That was swell.” Hans said nothing.
Hans had surprised Charlie by his first reaction to Nixie the night Nixie had been taken into the troop. While other boys were clustering around making much of Nixie, Hans had stayed a wary distance away. Charlie had felt offended. Since he was assigned with Hans as a buddy team, Charlie decided to do something about it.
After the meeting he sought out Hans. “Don’t be in a hurry, Hans. I want you to get acquainted with Nixie.”
The country boy still avoided the dog. “Does it bite?”
“Huh? Nixie? Of course not. Well, he would if you took a poke at me. — Not otherwise.”
“I thought so. And suppose I gave you a friendly slap on — the back. He could kill a man, huh?”
Nixie had listened, tense and watchful. He could feel the fear in Hans’ mind; he understood, without understanding why, that his boy was arguing with this other boy. Charlie did not seem in immediate danger, but Nixie stayed at yellow alert.
It showed. The savage carnivores who were Nixie’s remote ancestors showed in his stance and his watchful eyes. The Venus-born jungle rat, drilled since babyhoo~ to keep his eyes open for just such unknown dangers could see the carnivore — and failed to see the gentle household pet. He watched the dog carefully.
Charlie said, “Why, that’s nonsense, Hans. Pat him Rough him up a bit. Shake hands with him. Let hin learn your smell.” When Hans still did not move Charlie asked incredulously, “Don’t you like dogs?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never seen one before, up close.” Charlie’s jaw dropped. But Hans had spoken thc simple truth. Some town boys in the troop, immigrant~ like Charlie, had once owned dogs Earthside. Others had friends among the handful of dogs in Borealis. But Hans alone, born on Venus and living outside town, knew so little of dogs that they were as strange to him as a tiger shark would have been.
When Charlie finally got this incredible fact firmjyin his mind he persisted even more strongly inJiis — ~fibrt to get his team buddy acquainted witJi-his~ther partner. Before Hans went home that nght he had touched the dog, patted him, even picked hith up and held him. Nixie could feel the fear go away, to be replaced by a sudden warm feeling. So Nixie snuffled Hans and licked his chin.
Hans showed up the next day at Charlie’s home. He wanted to see Nixie.
In the two weeks that followed before the hike, Nixie adopted Hans as another member of Charlie’s family. Subject always to his first loyalty, he accepted the other boy, took orders from him, even worked to hand signals, which he had never done with anyone but Charlie. At first he did it to please Charlie, but in time he was doing so because it was right and proper in his doggy mind, as long as it was all right with Charlie.
The troop set out on the hike. Before they reacbed~ the jungle at the edge of town Hans said to Charlie, “Better have him heel.”
“Why? He likes to run around and poke his nose into things. But he always stays in earshot. He’ll come if he’s called.”
Hans scowled. “Suppose he can’t? Maybe he goes into bush and doesn’t come out. You want to lose him?”