A Dog's Best Friend, page 2

His step was light and his spirit joyful as the man resumed his journey. Suddenly, he stopped. There was a dog near the well. What a pitiful sight the dog was - scrawny and listless with a mournful expression. As the man approached, he realized that the dog was thirsty. The dog was panting hard, and its tongue lolled so far out of its jaws that it touched the ground. "Oh, Allah!" cried the man. "I must give this dog water." Now the man thought and thought about how he could get water up to the dog. He searched high and low for something to carry water in. Just as he was about to give up, he glanced down at his leather shoes. "Yes!" he thought. "My shoe will hold water!" He quickly climbed down into the well and filled the shoe with water. Clenching the heavy water-filled shoe between his teeth was difficult, but the man managed to get out of the well without spilling too much of the precious water. Happiness flowed through the man's heart when he saw the dog race toward him and gratefully lap up the water. When the dog finished drinking, it ran in circles around the man with its tail raised high in the air as if to say, "Thank you." For the rest of the man's journey, the dog eagerly trotted behind its new, but beloved, friend. Allah, glory be to Him, was pleased with the kind deed of the man, and for it forgave his sins and granted him paradise.