"'Course it was a good many years ago," Mr. Crow was quick to explain.
"Love's young dream," chided Miss Becker coyly.
Mr. Crow twisted his sparse grey beard with unusual tenderness. "Beats all, don't it, Sue, what a poet'll do when he's tryin' to raise a moustache?"
"I am sure I don't know," said Miss Becker stiffly.
"Speakin' about sunsets," said he hastily, after a quick glance at her shaded upper lip, "how's your pa? I heard he had a sinkin' spell yestiday."
"He's better." A moment later, with fine scorn: "His sun hasn't set yet, Mr. Crow."
"Beats all how he hangs on, don't it? Eighty-seven last birthday, an' spry as a man o' fifty up to—" He broke off to devote his attention to a couple of strangers farther down the tree-lined street: two men who approached slowly on the plank sidewalk, pausing every now and then to peer inquiringly at the front doors of houses along the way.
Miss Sue Becker, whose back was toward the strangers, allowed her poetic mind to resume its interest in the sunset.
"Golden cloudlets float upon a coral—What did you say, Mr. Crow?"
"Ever see 'em before, Sue?"