Benee spat on the ground and stamped his foot.
"I watch he eye," the semi-savage replied. "He one very bad man. Some day you know plenty moochee foh true."
"Well," said Tom one evening as he and his wife sat alone in the verandah together, "I do long to get back to England. I am tired, dear wife--my heart is weak why should we remain here over two years more? We are wealthy enough, and I promise myself and you, dear, many long years of health and happiness yet in the old country."
He paused and smoked a little; then, after watching for a few moments the fireflies that flitted from bush to bush, he stretched his left arm out and rested his hand on his wife's lap.
Some impulse seized her. She took it and pressed it to her lips. But a tear trickled down her cheek as she did so.
Lovers still this couple were, though nearly twenty years had elapsed since he led her, a bonnie, buxom, blushing lassie, to the altar.
But now in a sweet, low, but somewhat sad voice he sang a verse of that dear old song--"We have lived and loved together":--
"We have lived and loved together
Through many changing years,
We have shared each other's gladness
And dried each other's tears.
I have never known a sorrow
That was long unsoothed by thee,
For thy smile can make a summer
Where darkness else would be.
Mrs. St. Clair would never forget that evening on the star-lit lawn, nor the flitting, little fire-insects, nor her husband's voice.
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