Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 244, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 October 1911 — HER FATAL MAD DOG SCARE [ARTICLE]

HER FATAL MAD DOG SCARE

Woman Obtains the Assistance of a Policeman to Rescue Her Little Toodles. Everybody along the street conid see that the woman was in the throes of some great emotion. She ran up to the corner drug store and Into the telephone booth, but the ‘phone happened to be of the variety that is now giving extremely alow service, and she was in too much of a nervous state to wait for the girl to answer. She Continued up the street until she came to a policeman. Then, as soon as she had caught her breath, she told him the story that she had deelrdd to telephone to the precinct lieutenant. As near as he could make out there was a mad dog in her back yard forthlng at the mouth and carrying on something awful. In the same yard was her little dog Toodles, and she dared not go out to rescue the dear little pet for fear of being bitten by the rabies victim. Oh, and if the mad dog wasn’t shot pretty quickly It would be too late to eave Toodles, and—dear, oh, dear, but she was in a fearful state. The cop accompanied her back to her home at top speed. She pointed to the back yard and told him to let her know when he bad exterminated the mad dog, for she was too unstrung to« witness the shooting. The patrolman saw a small, brownish dog trotting about the yard, as if trying to get out. Over in a far corner, apparently limp with fear, sat even smaller dog—a white one. This, undoubtedly, was Toodles. There was nothing to indicate that the latter dog had been bitten yet, for the brownish one was paying no attention to him, his sole effort; being to find a place to get out. < - He didn’t look like a mad dog, the brownish one didn’t; but the woman had seen him frothing at the mouth, and it was only a poor, unpedlgreed cur dog, .anyway, so the officer decided to shoot him and be on the safe side. * After the alleged mad dog was quite dead, the cop put away his revolver and went over to loo* at the cringing canine figure in the fence corner. “Guess he ain’t been bit,’’ .the cop muttered, “just scared to death. Wonder if he knew he’d catch the rabies if the other fellow bit him?” He gave him a pat on the head, went over and picked up the late mad dog by the tail and carried him around to the front door. "Well, this fellow won’t scare your' little dog any more,” said the cop with a smile, after the woman had come to the front steps. The woman looked at him with a wild stare. She gasped, stood speechless, gasped'again, clutched her bosom and stammered huskily: "You’ve—you’ve shot my little Toodles!”