h: there she is, a
wraith of a creature made up of thistledown and fountain-bubbles and
stars. He stares at her, stretches out his huge paw to grab a fairy,
feathery tress of her dark hair. Defensive, she puts up her little hand.
Its touch is an electric shock to the marauder. He blinks, and rubs his
arm. He has a mighty respect for her. He could take her up in his
fingers and eat her like a quail--the one satisfactory method of eating
a quail is unfortunately practised only by ogres--but he does not want
to eat her. He goes on his knees, and invites her to chew any portion of
him that may please her dainty taste. In short he makes the very
silliest ass of himself, and the elfin princess, who of course has come
into contact with the Real Beautiful Young Man of the Story Books, won't
have anything to do with the Ogre; and if he is more rumbustious than he
ought to be, generally finds a way to send him packing. And so the poor
Ogre remains, planted there. The Fairy Tales, I remark again, are very
true in demonstrating that the Ogre loves the elf and not the Ogress.
But all the same they are deucedly unsympathetic towards the poor Ogre.
The only sympathetic one I know is Beauty and the Beast; and even that
is a mere begging of the question, for the Beast was a handsome young
nincompoop of a Prince all the time!

Barbara says that this figurative, allusive adumbration of Jaffery's
love affair is pure nonsense. Anything less like an ogre than our
overgrown baby of a friend it would he impossible to imagine. But I hold
to my theory; all the more because when Adrian and I returned from our
stroll round the garden, we found Jaffery standing over her, legs apart,
like a Colossus of Rhodes, and roaring at her like a sucking dove. I
noticed a scared, please-don't-eat-me look in her eyes. It was the ogre
(trying to make himself agreeable) and the princess to the life.

Presently tea was brought out, and with it came Barbara, a quiet laugh
about her lips, and Liosha, stately and smiling. My wife to put her at
her ease (though she had displayed singularly little shyness), after
dealing with maid and taxi, had taken her over the house, exhibited
Susan at tea in the nursery, and as much of Doria's trousseau as was
visible in the sewing-room. The approaching marriage aroused her keen
interest. She said very little during the meal, but smiled
embarrassingly on the engaged pair. Jaffery stood glumly devouring
cucumber sandwiches, till Ba