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Liosha took calm stock of us, and seeing that we were a pleasant-faced and by no means an antagonistic assembly even Doria's curiosity lent her a semblance of a sense of humour she relaxed her Olympian serenity and laughed a little, shewing teeth young and strong and exquisitely white. "I am here, Jaff Chayne," she said, "because Euphemia is a damn fool.
"My dear Jaff," she said, "what kind of a dinner do you eat when you are hungry?" Barbara having freed Jaffery from immediate anxieties with regard to Liosha, easily persuaded him to pay a longer visit than he had proposed.
"Oh, Uncle Jaff, you are strong!" Doria smiled at him admiringly and declared she couldn't lift the thing an inch from the ground with both her hands. "Do you know," she laughed, "when he used to carry me about, I felt as if I had been picked up by an iron crane." Jaffery beamed with delight. He was just a little vain of his physical strength.
"I know you love her dearly, old man," said I, "but is life the best thing you can wish for her?" "Why not?" "Isn't it obvious? She recovers she will, most probably, recover; Jephson said so this morning she comes back to life to find what? The shattering of her idol. That will kill her. My dear old Jaff, it's better that she should die now."
"I said you would make a fool of yourself one of these days if I didn't play dragon," he said, at a sudden halt. "I've come to play dragon with a vengeance." He marched on Fendihook. "Now you." "How d'ye do, old cock? Didn't expect you here," he said jauntily. "Don't be insolent," replied Jaffery in a remarkably quiet tone. "You know very well why I'm here." "Jaff Chayne " Liosha began.
I did not want anything foolish. I saw jewels that would buy up the whole of Albania. But I didn't want to buy up Albania. Not yet. But I saw a glass cage in a shop window full of little chickens, and I said to Euphemia: 'I want that. I must have those chickens. I said, 'Give me money to go in and buy them. Do you know, Jaff Chayne, she refused.
It was true that her father had stuck pigs in the stockyards; but he was of an old Albanian family, quite as good a family as Jaff Chayne's. It had numbered princes and great chieftains, the majority of whom had been most gloriously slain in warfare. She would like to know which of Jaff Chayne's ancestors had died out of their feather beds.
She put out a hand. "Oh, don't do that, Jaff. You might fall over. It makes me so nervous." He checked himself and stood up quite straight. Again he felt as if she had dealt him a slap in the face. "You know very well what I mean," he repeated. "I love you and I want you and I'll never be happy till I get you." She looked away from him and lifted her slender shoulders.
And as for Adrian I'm sick of his name and if I am, what must poor old Jaff be?" This she said during a private discussion that night on the whole situation.
"Uncle Jaff, are you going to eat all that?" she asked in an audible whisper. "Yes, and you too," he roared, "and mummy and daddy and Uncle Adrian, if I don't get enough to eat!" "And Aunt Doria?" Again he reddened but he turned to Doria and bowed. "In my quality of ogre only a bonne bouche," said he. It was said very charmingly, and we laughed.
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