where he
found them, and from that day Haig had never been able to rid himself
of this idolater.

"Tien-Tsin! Tien-Tsin!" Haig repeated, lingering covetously on the
words. "But that was a fight, eh!"

"No likee!" replied Jim.

"No likee!" cried Haig. "Why, you hypocritical young ruffian, you!
That was one of the happiest nights of your life. You're always trying
to make people think you're asleep, or timid. I can see, right now,
that long knife of yours slip under my arm, and catch the big fellow
in the stomach. He just coughed once, and crumpled up at my feet. In
the nick of time, too, Jim, and I let the next one have it. The rest
of them took to their heels, and you with your long pigsticker after
them. No likee! Jim, you're a moon-faced old liar, and a disgrace to
your ten thousand and seven ancestors."

Jim's smile was perfectly noncommittal. He was too wily to appear
eager. Besides, he did not really like fighting, which made all the
more trouble for somebody when he had to fight. But he was heartily
sick of this cold and uneventful life in the Park. Better a thousand
times the foolish adventures, the unnecessary battles, the restless
wanderings of other days!

"That was a night!" said Haig, flinging himself back in his chair to
gaze dreamily into the flames, while Jim, like a blue ghost, stole
noiselessly away. And there, in the glow of the dying fire, bright
and alluring visions successively took shape: A red-and-yellow temple
on a hill, to which a thousand steps led up from a lake the color of a
blue heron's breast; a junk with sails of purple creeping out of a
morning mist as yellow as saffron; an island with a still lagoon in
its center, and coconut palms alive with screaming parrots of every
gorgeous hue; a sandy beach where jabbering natives dragged the
flotsam of a wrecked steamer out of the breakers; a village on a high
plateau, where a drum throbbed incessantly, and naked Indian children
peered out from behind the huts; a skirmish line in khaki crawling up
to the brow of a shell-swept hill; a dog-team yelping under the long
lash of a half-breed Aleut, on a frozen river that sparkled in the
sun; a sweating jungle where two bright spots glowed balefully in the
gloom.

"God!" groaned Haig, as he sat erect at last, and reached for the
glass, now cold. He tasted it, and set it back with a wry face.

"Damn Thursby!" he muttered. "Does he think I'm going to stay here
forever, like a bear in a pit?"