The Fyne dog was supposed to lead a Spartan existence on a diet of repulsive biscuits with an occasional dry, hygienic, bone thrown in.

Fyne looked down gloomily at the appeased animal, I too looked at that fool-dog; and (you know how one's memory gets suddenly stimulated) I was reminded visually, with an almost painful distinctness, of the ghostly white face of the girl I saw last accompanied by that dog--deserted by that dog.

I almost heard her distressed voice as if on the verge of resentful tears calling to the dog, the unsympathetic dog.

Perhaps she had not the power of evoking sympathy, that personal gift of direct appeal to the feelings.
I said to Fyne, mistrusting the supine attitude of the dog: "Why don't you let him come inside ?" Oh dear no! He couldn't think of it! I might indeed have saved my breath, I knew it was one of the Fynes' rules of life, part of their solemnity and responsibility, one of those things that were part of their unassertive but ever present superiority, that their dog must not be allowed in.

It was most improper to intrude the dog into the houses of the people they were calling on--if it were only a careless bachelor in farmhouse lodgings and a personal friend of the dog.