Nor were the dogs
the only cognisant or expectant animals. Most of the creatures about
the place understood that something was happening, and probably
associated it with their mistress; for almost every live thing
knew her--from the rheumatic cart horse, forty years of age, and
every whit as respectable in Clementina's eyes as her father's old
butler, to the wild cats that haunted the lofts and garrets of the
old Elizabethan hunting lodge.
When they dismounted, the ladies could hardly get into the house
for dogs; those which could not reach their mistress, turned to
Florimel, and came swarming about her and leaping upon her, until,
much as she liked animal favour, she would gladly have used her
whip--but dared not, because of the presence of their mistress.
If the theories of that mistress allowed them anything of a moral
nature, she was certainly culpable in refusing them their right to
a few cuts of the whip.
Mingled with all the noises of dogs and horses, came a soft nestling
murmur that filled up the interspaces of sound which even their
tumult could not help leaving. Florimel was too tired to hear it,
but Malcolm heard it, and it filled all the interspaces of his soul
with a speechless delight. He knew it for the still small voice of
the awful sea.
Florimel scarcely cast a glance around the dark old fashioned room
into which she was shown, but went at once to bed, and when the old
housekeeper carried her something from the supper table at which
she had been expected, she found her already fast asleep.
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