Never before had he been confined by a leash, as if he were a desirable dog.
Opposite the Mansion House, Newbern's chief hotel, Frank gave signal proof of his intelligence.

From across River Street he had been espied by Boodles, the Mansion House dog, a creature of dusty, pinkish white, of short neck and wide jaws, of a clouded but still definite bull ancestry.

Boodles was a dog about town, wearing many scars of combat, a swashbuckler of a dog, rough-mannered, raffish; if not actually quarrelsome, at least highly sensitive where his honour was concerned.
He made it a point to know every dog in town, and as he rose from a sitting posture, where he had been taking the air before his inn, it could be observed that Frank was new to him--certainly new and perhaps objectionable.

He stepped lightly halfway across the now empty street and stopped for a further look.

He seemed to be saying, "Maybe it ain't a dog, after all." But the closer look and a lifted nose wrinkling into the breeze set him right.