“Mayn’t I walk home with you?” he said. And she could not think of any polite way of saying no, though she knew just how terrible Alcibiades would make the final parting.
Next morning the chain dragged by Alcibiades was slightly thicker; it also was filed, and this too Judy failed to notice. Early as it was she did not go out in the mackintosh but in something simple and blue, with kingfisher’s wings in her hat.
The morning was thinly bright. Alcibiades saw a cat and chased it towards Morden College just as Judy met Captain Graeme. It was, for her, impossible not to follow the “cur.” And how could the Captain do otherwise than follow, too? And if two people walk together it is churlish not to talk.
Next day the chain was thicker, the hour propitious, and the walk longer; that was the day when she found out that he had known her father in South Africa.
The days passed with a delightful monotony. The Aunt and her pet Tabbies all day, a sound sleep, an early waking, a heavenly meeting with Alcibiades at the back door, the restoring of him to his master. And every day the chain grew heavier, the walks longer, the talks more interesting and more intimate.
It was very wrong, of course, but what was the girl to do? You cannot be rude to a man who is saving your dog, your darling, from rat-poisons, rivers and ropes. And if dogs will break chains, why—so will girls.
It was on Christmas Day that the spell was shattered. Judy awoke at the accustomed time, but no welcome whine, no pathetic scrabble of eager paws broke the respectable stillness of the Aunt’s house. Judy listened. She even crept down to the side gate. A feeling of misery, of real physical faintness came over her. Alcibiades was not there! he had not come! He had, indeed, forgotten her.
The conviction that the master of Alcibiades would be the last to appreciate the new attachment of his dog comforted her a little; but for all that the day was grey, life seemed well-nigh worthless. Judy now had leisure to reconsider her position, and she was not pleased with herself. It was in the thick of the Christmas beef that the thought awoke.
“He is tired of meeting me; he has locked Alcibiades up. If he hadn’t, the darling must have come.” Since this solution left Alcibiades without a stain upon his faithful character, it ought to have been comforting, but it wasn’t.
She felt her cheeks flush.