This place is so beyond his experience that he nearly misbehaves when Rosie closes the heavy door between them. He wants to call to her, to bark, to let her know that she shouldn’t walk away from him. That man, the small one, keeps a careful hand on Shadow’s collar, but the dog figures that if he jumped up and tugged, the man would let go. It’s only that because he can smell Rosie behind that door, and hear her voice, that he remains fixed in place.
The words are indistinct, Rosie’s and another woman’s, but the pain is not.