When they were at a safe distance he turned to Dunn and said
"Is he serious, do you think, or is he playing with her? I'll make
him pay for it if he is."
"How should I know?" answered Dunn, quite certain it was no such
anxiety as this that had set Deede Dawson watching them so carefully.
Deede Dawson seemed to feel that the explanation he had offered was
a little crude, and he made no attempt to enlarge on it.
With a complete change of manner, with his old smile on his lips
and his eyes as dark and unsmiling as ever, he said
"Pretty girl, Ella--isn't she?"
"She is more than pretty, she is beautiful," Dunn answered with an
emphasis that made Deede Dawson look at him sharply.
"Think so?" he said, and gave his peculiar laugh that had so little
mirth in it. "Well, you're right, she is. He'll be a lucky man
that gets her--and she's to be had, you know. But I'll tell you
one thing, it won't be John Clive."
"I thought it rather looked," observed Dunn, "as if Miss Cayley
might mean--"
Deede Dawson interrupted with a quick jerk of his head.
"Never mind what she means, it'll be what I mean," he declared. "I
am boss; and what's more, she knows it. I believe in a man being
master in his own family. Don't you?"
"If he can be," retorted Dunn. "But still, a girl naturally--"
"Naturally nothing," Deede Dawson interrupted again.
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