"Many have found it quite so," I said, ordering Jim to charge at my
feet, "but it's a great bore, I assure you."
I needed not to be told that she envied me my power, and so deep and
genuine appeared to be her love for him that secretly I hoped he would
again be amiable to her during my absence on the morrow. The contrast of
his manner on my return would further chasten her.
From the porch we both watched her move across the little stretch of
lawn, and, at my whispered suggestion, Jim rose to his feet and barked
her insultingly over the last twenty feet of it. I was delighted to note
that this induced a shamed acceleration of her pace and a tighter
clutching of her skirts. I thought it important to let her know clearly
and at once just who was the master in my own house.
CHAPTER XXIV
THE LOYALTY OF JIM
If it must be my lot to dream out a life of insubstantial visions, that
were well. But it appeared not unreasonable that I should keep at least
one ponderable dog by me, as an emblem of something I had missed through
one too many shuffle of the cards before this big game began. Yet Miss
Lansdale had clearly resolved to deprive my dreaming of even this slight
support of realness.
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