For it was essentially protective; it served to emphasize in her own
mind a fear which until now had been a mere formless mist, a fear for
her frivolous little friend. Galloway's whole being was so expressive
of conscious power, Florrie's of vacillating impulsiveness, that it
required no considerable burden laid upon the imagination to picture
the girl coming if he called . . . if he called with the look in his
eyes now, with the tone he knew to put into his voice.
Social lines are none too clearly drawn in towns like San Juan; often
enough they have long ago failed to exist. A John Engle, though six
days of the seven he sat behind his desk in a bank, was only a man, his
daughter only the daughter of a mere man; a Jim Galloway, though he
owned the Casa Blanca and upon occasion stood behind his own bar, might
be a man and look with level eyes upon all other men, their wives, and
their daughters. Here, with conditions what they always had been,
there could stand but one barrier between Galloway and Florrie Engle,
the barrier of character. And already the girl had cried: "His eyes
are not bad eyes, are they?" A barrier is a silent command to pause;
what is the spontaneous answer of a spoiled child to any command?
Galloway spoke lightly of this and that, managing in a dozen little
ways to compliment Florrie who chattered with a gayety which partook of
excitement.
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