72 "SUSPENSE."
 Though Mrs. Bloomfield said nothing, she let her hand,
which had been resting lightly on Harry's jacket sleeve,
tighten its grasp. Thus she marched the boy to the house.
Flora, who had taken guilt to herself, stopped short in her
headlong career, let the plundered and insulted hen go, and
slunk at a safe distance after the mother and son to the
parsonage.
 Now, Harry, what have you to say for yourself and that
brute of yours?" asked Mrs. Bloomfield, in the tone of a
righteous and relentless judge.
 I had nothing to do with it, mother," cried Harry in
desperation; and Flo is only a dog."
 Flo is only a dog," echoed his mother severely; and
those who should know better, and keep her to the injury of
poor helpless fowls, and the destruction of as fine a brood of
chickens as cook ever set, have the more to answer for.
Harry, Flora goes this very night."
 Mother, it is the first time," pled Harry faintly.
 The first and the last," said his mother. I have heard
that a taste for eggs, not to say chickens, is never eradicated
in a dog."
 Oh no, mother, you are wrong there," cried Harry
eagerly. Tom Cartright's Juno was as destructive a beast
to turkeys and geese, even to lambs, when he was half-
grown--
 Hold your tongue, Harry, and don't contradict your
mother."
 Harry was cut short in his argument, and submitted more
unresistingly than usual.
 "I cannot have the dog about the place for another night,"