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Its absolute poise of bearing brought into his mind the opium-eater's words that "no dignity is perfect which does not at some point ally itself with the mysterious"; and he became suddenly aware that the presence of the dog in this foggy, haunted room on the top of Putney Hill was uncommonly welcome to him. He was glad to feel that Flame's dependable personality was with him.
Dusky lock for dusky lock, dreamy eye for dreamy eye, smoking lamp for smoking lamp, it might have been a short-haired replica of Flame herself. "Oh if Flame had only been 'set' like the maternal side of the house!" reasoned Flame's Mother. "Or merely dreamy like her Father! Her Father being only dreamy could sometimes be diverted from his dreams! But to be 'set' and 'dreamy' both?
With fluctuant blackness against immutable blackness great sweeping pine trees swished weirdly into the horizon. Where the hobbly lane curved darkly into a meadow through a snarl of winter-stricken willows the rattle of a loose window-pane smote quite distinctly on the ear. It was a horrid, deserted sound. And with the instinctive habit of years Flame's little hand clutched at her heart.
Absolutely 'set' on being absolutely 'dreamy'? That was Flame!" With renewed tenacity Flame's Mother reverted to Truth as Truth. "Dogs do not take houses!" she affirmed with unmistakable emphasis. "Eh? What?" jumped her husband. "Dogs? Dogs? Who said anything about dogs?" With a fretted pucker between his brows he bent to his work again. "You interrupted me," he reproached her.
To her startled mind two answers only presented themselves.... Should she say "Oh, she's only just weaned," or "Well, she was invented about 1406?" Between these two dilemmas a single compromise suggested itself. "She's awfully wrinkled," said Flame; "that is her face is. All wizened up, I mean." "Oh, then of course she must be respectable," twinkled Flame's Father.
With a crisp flutter of skirts Flame's Mother, herself, appeared abruptly in the door. Her manner was very excited. "Why wherever in the world have you people been?" she cried. "Are you stone deaf? Didn't you hear the telephone? Couldn't you even hear me calling? Your Uncle Wally is worse! That is he's better but he thinks he's worse! And they want us to come at once!
"Yet all the time he persists," frowned Flame's Mother, "that there is some one in the world who can give a perfectly good explanation if only, he won't even say 'he or she' but 'it', if only 'it' would." Something in the stricken expression of her daughter's face brought a sudden flicker of suspicion to the Mother's eyes. "You don't know anything about this, do you, Flame?" she demanded.
Don't slow up!" shouted Tad. "Keep going!" "I am. Wat's matter with you?" "I don't see what you had to come tumbling into this mess for," objected Tad. "Didn't tumble in. Rode in. Came to help you " "Precious lot of help you'll be to me. Lucky if we're not both burned with our boots on. See! The flame's narrowing in on us. More steam, Chunky! More steam!" urged Tad. "Can't.
"There's the doctor, over there; that man is a doctor; he knows," repeated Plank with studied deliberation, looking down at Leila's deathly face. "He says it's all right; he says he'll get a candle, and that he can tell by the flame's effect on the pupils of the eyes what exactly is the matter.
Pushed the sun-dial through a bulkhead! If it snows to-night the cellar'll be a Glacier! And " "Dogs do not take houses," persisted Flame's mother. She was still persisting it indeed when she returned to her husband's study. Her husband, it seemed, had not noticed her absence.
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