He’s OK After a Four-Dog Night

--Two-year-old Sean Keyton of Keedysville, Md., spent the night in the middle of a country road in near-freezing weather, clad only in pajamas. But he had plenty of help staying warm--from the family’s four dogs. Donald Canfield, a neighbor, found Sean near the Antietam National Battlefield, 1 1/2 miles from the boy’s home--but getting past the growling sentinels, described as mutts, was no mean feat. “He (Canfield) actually had to use a club to get in there and get the child,” said Maryland State Police trooper Harry Smith. Even as ambulance workers wrapped Sean in blankets, the loyal canines stood guard. The boy, who was treated for exposure to the 35-degree weather, had wandered from his home and had been reported missing. “I don’t know the dogs were heroes. Other people are saying that,” Smith said. “But the dogs definitely protected the child. Last week, he wouldn’t have made it.” The temperature then was 15 degrees.

--”You get the cat and walk around, you know, and hearing it purr against you . . . . Man, it feels so good, knowing you’re responsible for this cat, that you help feed it and love it and it’s loving you.” Meet Alfonza Mason, who spoke those loving words. He is serving three life terms for armed rape, kidnaping and robbery at the Caledonia Prison Unit in Tillery, N.C. Mason, who smuggles kittens into his cell by cutting a slit in the lining of his jacket, and other inmates--a group called the Caledonia Catmen--are up in arms because prison officials are trying to rid the premises of the 20 or more strays that live in a pipe near the prison gym. They say the cats carry lice and disease, but the inmates say the cats have a soothing effect on them. They argue that there has been a reduction in violence inside the prison. “We don’t have the money to vaccinate, feed, clothe and take care of cats,” said Charles Creecy, superintendent of Caledonia. Cats are not prohibited from the prison yard, authorities said, but it is against the law for inmates to take care of them.

--Julie Hill, 19, of Claremore, Okla., is the reigning “Miss Indian U.S.A.” but she clearly sees herself more as a role model than a beauty queen. Hill, a Cherokee, won the second annual pageant at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C. “With so many problems, there’s a lot of apathy among Indian young that needs to get out. I want to impress on them that if I made it, there’s no reason they can’t,” said Hill, whose prizes included a $27,000 scholarship to Pennsylvania State University and $20,000 in cash.