“Yes,” agreed Dreiser. “Be polite to your mother, or I’ll give you the back of my hand-unofficially, of course. If there is one thing I can’t abide it’s a boy who is rude to his elders.” He unbuttoned his tunic, pulled out a folded paper. “Sergeant Mendoza told me about the quibble you pulled the other day. . . so I came prepared. There’s my warrant. Now, will you come? Or will I drag you?”
He stood there, slapping the paper against his palm, but did not offer it to John Thomas. But when John Thomas reached for it, he let him have it and waited while he read it. At last Dreiser said, “Well? Are you satisfied?”
“This is a court order,” John Thomas said, “telling me to appear and requiring me to bring Lummox.”
“It certainly is.”
“But it says ten o’clock. It doesn’t say I can’t eat breakfast first.., as long as I’m there by ten.”
The Chief took a deep breath, expanding visibly. His face, already pink, got red, but he did not answer.
John Thomas said, “Mum? I’m going to fix my breakfast. Shall I fix some for you, too?”
She glanced at Dreiser, then back at her son and bit her lip. “Never mind,” she said grudgingly. “I’ll get breakfast. Mr. Dreiser, will you have coffee with us?”
“Eh? That’s kind of you, ma’am. I don’t mind if I do. I’ve been up all night.”
John Thomas looked at them. “I’ll run out and take a quick look at Lummox.” He hesitated, then added, “I’m sorry I was rude, Mum.”
“We’ll say no more about it, then,” she answered coldly.
He had been intending to say several things, in self-justification, but he thought better of it and left. Lummox was snoring gently, stretched half in and half out of his house. His sentry eye was raised above his neck, as it always was when he was asleep; it swiveled around at John Thomas’s approach and looked him over, but that portion of Lummox that stood guard for the rest recognized the youth; the star creature did not wake. Satisfied, John Thomas went back inside.
The atmosphere mellowed during breakfast; by the time John Thomas had two dishes of oatmeal, scrambled eggs and toast, and a pint of cocoa inside him, he was ready to concede that Chief Dreiser had been doing his duty and probably didn’t kick dogs for pleasure. In turn, the Chief, under the influence of food, had decided that there was nothing wrong with the boy that a firm hand and an occasional thrashing would not cure. . . too bad his mother had to raise him alone; she seemed like a fine woman. He pursued a bit of egg with toast, captured it, and said, “I feel better, Mrs. Stuart, I really do. It’s a treat to a widower to taste homecooking. . . but I won’t dare tell my men.”
Mrs. Stuart put a hand to her mouth. “Oh, I forgot about them!” She added, “I can have more coffee in a moment. How many are there?”
“Five. But don’t bother, ma’am; they’ll get breakfast when they go off duty.” He turned to John Thomas. “Ready to go, young fellow?”
“Uh. . .” He turned to his mother. “Why not fix breakfast for them, Mum? I’ve still got to wake Lummox and feed him.”
By the time Lummox had been wakened and fed and had had matters explained to him, by the time five patrolmen had each enjoyed a second cup of coffee after a hot meal, the feeling was more that of a social event than an arrest. It was long past seven before the procession was on the road.
It was nine o’clock before they got Lummox backed into the temporary cage outside the courthouse. Lummox had been delighted by the smell of steel and had wanted to stop and nibble it; John Thomas was forced to be firm. He went inside with Lummox and petted him and talked to him while the door was welded shut, He had been worried when he saw the massive steel cage, for he had never got around to telling Chief Dreiser that steel was less than useless against Lummox.