And what is a week? Poof— and like that a week is gone by. Poof— there is a good week, and poof -- there it is gone. But a week doesn't go by, and do… - Meindert DeJong

No one in that countryside really knew the dog existed. No one was sure. Still the dog had lived there for a year.

Back and back the planes had come with their hail of bullets, while sampans sank and went under. Back and back until there was but one empty sampan left drifting on the water. Then the planes had come no more— not for one empty sampan. It had drifted silently— empty.

Hunger haunted the dog. It sat like an agony back of his eyes. Hunger ached out of his ladder-rack ribs, those lean ribs that threatened to break through the stretched, shivering skin. Always the dog shivered. When at rest he shivered. Not from cold necessarily, but from hunger, from fear, from loneliness, and from lovelessness— mostly, perhaps, from lovelessness, for the dog had nothing but himself.