Her tone carried it far too intelligibly.

It was quite as bad as swearing.

I tried twice before I succeeded in finding my voice.
"I've _told_ you," I said desperately; "can't you see--that queen isn't free ?" Swiftly--I regret to say, almost with a show of temper--she snatched the four of diamonds from its lawful place and laid it brazenly far outside the game.
"The creature _is_ free," she said crisply--but at once her arrogance was gone and she drooped visibly in weakness.
So quickly did I rise from the table that the cards of the game were hurled into a meaningless confusion.

I stood at her side.

I had lost myself.
"Little Miss,--oh, Little Miss! I've a thousand arms all crying for you." Slowly she made her eyes come to mine--not without effort, for we were close.
"I am glad we left you,"-- she had meant to say "that arm," I judge, but there was a break in her voice, a swift movement, and she suddenly said "_this_ arm," with a little shudder in which she could not meet my eyes; for, such as the arm was, she had finished her speech from within it.
Close I held her, like a witless moonling, forgetting all resolves, all lessons, all treaties--all but that she was not a dream woman.
"Oh, Little Miss!" was all I could say; and she--"Calvin Blake!" as if it were a phrase of endearment.
"Little Miss, that loss has put me out, but never has it been the hardship it is now--one arm!" I had not thought it possible for her to come nearer, but a successful nestling movement was her answer.
"I feel the need of a thousand arms, and yet their strength is--" "Is in this one." She completed my sentence with her own nestling emphasis for "this one." "Can you believe now, Little Miss ?" "Yes--you gave it to me again." "Can you believe that I--I--" "_That_ was never hard.