Page:The Fate of Fenella (1892).djvu/308

door that communicated with the balcony at all hours of the day to ask him to decide this or that question for her. Might not Ronny be "let off" his tonic, which he hated, and have some roast chicken? Did Mr. Jacynth think it would hurt him to have his sofa wheeled on to the balcony—and oh! would he mind just tasting the tiniest drop of the new cough mixture, which was quite a different color from the last, and telling her whether he thought the apothecary might not have made some mistake? And all these questions Jacynth settled with a pseudo-marital authority it was delightful to exercise. He unhesitatingly prescribed roast chicken in the place of the tonic; he wheeled Ronny's sofa himself on to the balcony; and he swallowed a whole teaspoonful of magenta cough mixture without a murmur, inwardly flattered that Fenella should assign him the rôle of a slave of the worst of the Roman Emperors (for was he not her slave in all things). Her smile took away all the bitter flavor from the drug, and the subsequent hours, during which she sat by the side of Ronny's sofa, seemed to pass like a pleasant dream. What he most enjoyed was the atmosphere of domestic retirement and freedom that pervaded them. Fenella would insist upon his continuing to smoke his cigar, and so at home did he feel in her presence that it had actually happened to him to close his eyes behind The Times he was pretend-