“That isn’t filling and passes the time,” Jack admitted.

“Jim says if you had to Fletcherize on floating island you would starve to death and your teeth would get so used to missing a step on the stairs that they would never be able to deal with real victuals at all.”

“Mrs. Galway,” Jack observed sagely, dropping his head on the back of the chair, “I see that it has occurred to you and Jim that it is an excellent world and full of excellent nonsense.  I am ready to eat both fluffy isles and the yellow sea in which they float.  I am ready to keep on getting hungry with my efforts, even though you make it continents and oceans!”

From his window he had a view, over the dark, polished green of Jim’s orange trees, of the range, brown and gray and bare, holding steady shadows of its own and host to the shadows of journeying clouds, with the pass set in the centre as a cleft in a forbidding barrier.  In the yard Wrath of God, Jag Ear, and P.D. were tethered.  Deep content illumined the faces of P.D. and Jag Ear; but Wrath of God was as sorrowful as ever.  A cheerful Wrath of God would have excited fears for his health.

“Yet, maybe he is enjoying his rest more than the others,” Jack told Firio, who kept appearing at the window on some excuse or other.  “Perhaps he takes his happiness internally.  Perhaps the external signs are only the last stand of a lugubriousness driven out by overwhelming forces of internal joy.”

“Si, si!” said Firio.

“Firio, you are eminently a conversationalist,” said Jack.  “You agree with any foolishness as if it were a new theory of ethics.  You are an ideal companion.  I never have to listen to you in order that I may in turn have my say.”

“Si,” said Firio.  He leaned on the windowsill, his black eyes shining with ingenuous and flattering appeal:  “I will broil you a quail on a spit,” he whispered.  “It’s better than stove cooking.”

“Don’t talk of that!” Jack exclaimed, almost sharply.  The suggestion brought a swift change to sadness over his face and drew a veil of vagueness over his eyes.  “No, Firio, and I’ll tell you why:  the odor of a quail broiled on a spit belongs at the end of a day’s journey, when you camp in sight of no habitation.  You should sit on a dusty blanket-roll; you should eat by the light of the embers or a guttering candle.  No, Firio, we’ll wait till some other day.  And it’s not exactly courtesy to our hostess to bring in provender from the outside.”

The trail had apparently taught Firio all the moods of his master.  He knew when it was unwise to persist.

“Si!” he whispered, and withdrew.

Jack looked at Galeria and then back quickly, as if resisting its call.  He smiled half wryly and readjusted his position in the chair.  Over the hedge he could see the heads and shoulders of passers-by.  Jim Galway had come into the room, when Jasper Ewold’s broad back and great head hove in sight with something of the steady majesty of progress of a full-rigged ship.