"I hate going—even for six months," he said.
Hamilton of the Houssas, with laughter in his blue eyes, and his fumed-oak face—lean and wholesome it was—all a-twitch, whistled with difficulty.
"Oh, yes, I shall come back again," said Sanders, answering the question in the tune. "I hope things will go well in my absence."
"How can they go well?" asked Hamilton, gently. "How can the Isisi live, or the Akasava sow his barbarous potatoes, or the sun shine, or the river run when Sandi Sitani is no longer in the land?"
"I wouldn't have worried," Sanders went on, ignoring the insult, "if they'd put a good man in charge; but to give a pudden-headed soldier——"
"We thank you!" bowed Hamilton.
"——with little or no experience——"
"An insolent lie—and scarcely removed from an unqualified lie!" murmured Hamilton.
"To put him in my place!" apostrophized Sanders, tilting back his helmet the better to appeal to the heavens.