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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/2777-0.txt b/2777-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b45831d --- /dev/null +++ b/2777-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7365 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook of Cabbages and Kings, by O. Henry + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at +www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you +will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before +using this eBook. + +Title: Cabbages and Kings + +Author: O. Henry + +Release Date: July 23, 2000 [eBook #2777] +[Most recently updated: February 2, 2022] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +Produced by: Earle C. Beach and Joseph E. Loewenstein, M.D. + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CABBAGES AND KINGS *** + +[Illustration] + +[Illustration] +“A little saint with a color more lightful than orange” + + + + +CABBAGES AND KINGS + +by O. HENRY + + +_Author of “The Four Million,” “The Voice of the +City,” “The Trimmed Lamp,” “Strictly Business,” +“Whirligigs,” Etc._ + + + + + “The time has come,” the Walrus said, + “To talk of many things; + Of shoes and ships and sealing-wax, + And cabbages and kings.” + + THE WALRUS AND THE CARPENTER + + +Contents + + THE PROEM BY THE CARPENTER + I. “FOX-IN-THE-MORNING” + II. THE LOTUS AND THE BOTTLE + III. SMITH + IV. CAUGHT + V. CUPID’S EXILE NUMBER TWO + VI. THE PHONOGRAPH AND THE GRAFT + VII. MONEY MAZE + VIII. THE ADMIRAL + IX. THE FLAG PARAMOUNT + X. THE SHAMROCK AND THE PALM + XI. THE REMNANTS OF THE CODE + XII. SHOES + XIII. SHIPS + XIV. MASTERS OF ARTS + XV. DICKY + XVI. ROUGE ET NOIR + XVII. TWO RECALLS + XVIII. THE VITAGRAPHOSCOPE + + + + +THE PROEM +BY THE CARPENTER + + +They will tell you in Anchuria, that President Miraflores, of that +volatile republic, died by his own hand in the coast town of Coralio; +that he had reached thus far in flight from the inconveniences of an +imminent revolution; and that one hundred thousand dollars, government +funds, which he carried with him in an American leather valise as a +souvenir of his tempestuous administration, was never afterward +recovered. + +For a _real_, a boy will show you his grave. It is back of the town +near a little bridge that spans a mangrove swamp. A plain slab of wood +stands at its head. Some one has burned upon the headstone with a hot +iron this inscription: + +RAMON ANGEL DE LAS CRUZES +Y MIRAFLORES +PRESIDENTE DE LA REPUBLICA +DE ANCHURIA +QUE SEA SU JUEZ DIOS + + +It is characteristic of this buoyant people that they pursue no man +beyond the grave. “Let God be his judge!”—Even with the hundred +thousand unfound, though greatly coveted, the hue and cry went no +further than that. + +To the stranger or the guest the people of Coralio will relate the +story of the tragic end of their former president; how he strove to +escape from the country with the public funds and also with Doña Isabel +Guilbert, the young American opera singer; and how, being apprehended +by members of the opposing political party in Coralio, he shot himself +through the head rather than give up the funds, and, in consequence, +the Señorita Guilbert. They will relate further that Doña Isabel, her +adventurous bark of fortune shoaled by the simultaneous loss of her +distinguished admirer and the souvenir hundred thousand, dropped anchor +on this stagnant coast, awaiting a rising tide. + +They say, in Coralio, that she found a prompt and prosperous tide in +the form of Frank Goodwin, an American resident of the town, an +investor who had grown wealthy by dealing in the products of the +country—a banana king, a rubber prince, a sarsaparilla, indigo, and +mahogany baron. The Señorita Guilbert, you will be told, married Señor +Goodwin one month after the president’s death, thus, in the very moment +when Fortune had ceased to smile, wresting from her a gift greater than +the prize withdrawn. + +Of the American, Don Frank Goodwin, and of his wife the natives have +nothing but good to say. Don Frank has lived among them for years, and +has compelled their respect. His lady is easily queen of what social +life the sober coast affords. The wife of the governor of the district, +herself, who was of the proud Castilian family of Monteleon y Dolorosa +de los Santos y Mendez, feels honoured to unfold her napkin with +olive-hued, ringed hands at the table of Señora Goodwin. Were you to +refer (with your northern prejudices) to the vivacious past of Mrs. +Goodwin when her audacious and gleeful abandon in light opera captured +the mature president’s fancy, or to her share in that statesman’s +downfall and malfeasance, the Latin shrug of the shoulder would be your +only answer and rebuttal. What prejudices there were in Coralio +concerning Señora Goodwin seemed now to be in her favour, whatever they +had been in the past. + +It would seem that the story is ended, instead of begun; that the close +of tragedy and the climax of a romance have covered the ground of +interest; but, to the more curious reader it shall be some slight +instruction to trace the close threads that underlie the ingenuous web +of circumstances. + +The headpiece bearing the name of President Miraflores is daily +scrubbed with soap-bark and sand. An old half-breed Indian tends the +grave with fidelity and the dawdling minuteness of inherited sloth. He +chops down the weeds and ever-springing grass with his machete, he +plucks ants and scorpions and beetles from it with his horny fingers, +and sprinkles its turf with water from the plaza fountain. There is no +grave anywhere so well kept and ordered. + +Only by following out the underlying threads will it be made clear why +the old Indian, Galvez, is secretly paid to keep green the grave of +President Miraflores by one who never saw that unfortunate statesman in +life or in death, and why that one was wont to walk in the twilight, +casting from a distance looks of gentle sadness upon that unhonoured +mound. + +Elsewhere than at Coralio one learns of the impetuous career of Isabel +Guilbert. New Orleans gave her birth and the mingled French and Spanish +creole nature that tinctured her life with such turbulence and warmth. +She had little education, but a knowledge of men and motives that +seemed to have come by instinct. Far beyond the common woman was she +endowed with intrepid rashness, with a love for the pursuit of +adventure to the brink of danger, and with desire for the pleasures of +life. Her spirit was one to chafe under any curb; she was Eve after the +fall, but before the bitterness of it was felt. She wore life as a rose +in her bosom. + +Of the legion of men who had been at her feet it was said that but one +was so fortunate as to engage her fancy. To President Miraflores, the +brilliant but unstable ruler of Anchuria, she yielded the key to her +resolute heart. How, then, do we find her (as the Coralians would have +told you) the wife of Frank Goodwin, and happily living a life of dull +and dreamy inaction? + +The underlying threads reach far, stretching across the sea. Following +them out it will be made plain why “Shorty” O’Day, of the Columbia +Detective Agency, resigned his position. And, for a lighter pastime, it +shall be a duty and a pleasing sport to wander with Momus beneath the +tropic stars where Melpomene once stalked austere. Now to cause +laughter to echo from those lavish jungles and frowning crags where +formerly rang the cries of pirates’ victims; to lay aside pike and +cutlass and attack with quip and jollity; to draw one saving titter of +mirth from the rusty casque of Romance—this were pleasant to do in the +shade of the lemon-trees on that coast that is curved like lips set for +smiling. + +For there are yet tales of the Spanish Main. That segment of continent +washed by the tempestuous Caribbean, and presenting to the sea a +formidable border of tropical jungle topped by the overweening +Cordilleras, is still begirt by mystery and romance. In past times +buccaneers and revolutionists roused the echoes of its cliffs, and the +condor wheeled perpetually above where, in the green groves, they made +food for him with their matchlocks and toledos. Taken and retaken by +sea rovers, by adverse powers and by sudden uprising of rebellious +factions, the historic 300 miles of adventurous coast has scarcely +known for hundreds of years whom rightly to call its master. Pizarro, +Balboa, Sir Francis Drake, and Bolivar did what they could to make it a +part of Christendom. Sir John Morgan, Lafitte and other eminent +swash-bucklers bombarded and pounded it in the name of Abaddon. + +The game still goes on. The guns of the rovers are silenced; but the +tintype man, the enlarged photograph brigand, the kodaking tourist and +the scouts of the gentle brigade of fakirs have found it out, and carry +on the work. The hucksters of Germany, France, and Sicily now bag its +small change across their counters. Gentleman adventurers throng the +waiting-rooms of its rulers with proposals for railways and +concessions. The little _opéra-bouffe_ nations play at government and +intrigue until some day a big, silent gunboat glides into the offing +and warns them not to break their toys. And with these changes comes +also the small adventurer, with empty pockets to fill, light of heart, +busy-brained—the modern fairy prince, bearing an alarm clock with +which, more surely than by the sentimental kiss, to awaken the +beautiful tropics from their centuries’ sleep. Generally he wears a +shamrock, which he matches pridefully against the extravagant palms; +and it is he who has driven Melpomene to the wings, and set Comedy to +dancing before the footlights of the Southern Cross. + +So, there is a little tale to tell of many things. Perhaps to the +promiscuous ear of the Walrus it shall come with most avail; for in it +there are indeed shoes and ships and sealing-wax and cabbage-palms and +presidents instead of kings. + +Add to these a little love and counterplotting, and scatter everywhere +throughout the maze a trail of tropical dollars—dollars warmed no more +by the torrid sun than by the hot palms of the scouts of Fortune—and, +after all, here seems to be Life, itself, with talk enough to weary the +most garrulous of Walruses. + + + + +I +“FOX-IN-THE-MORNING” + + +Coralio reclined, in the mid-day heat, like some vacuous beauty +lounging in a guarded harem. The town lay at the sea’s edge on a strip +of alluvial coast. It was set like a little pearl in an emerald band. +Behind it, and seeming almost to topple, imminent, above it, rose the +sea-following range of the Cordilleras. In front the sea was spread, a +smiling jailer, but even more incorruptible than the frowning +mountains. The waves swished along the smooth beach; the parrots +screamed in the orange and ceiba-trees; the palms waved their limber +fronds foolishly like an awkward chorus at the prima donna’s cue to +enter. + +Suddenly the town was full of excitement. A native boy dashed down a +grass-grown street, shrieking: “_Busca el Señor Goodwin. Ha venido un +telégrafo por el!_” + +The word passed quickly. Telegrams do not often come to anyone in +Coralio. The cry for Señor Goodwin was taken up by a dozen officious +voices. The main street running parallel to the beach became populated +with those who desired to expedite the delivery of the despatch. Knots +of women with complexions varying from palest olive to deepest brown +gathered at street corners and plaintively carolled: “_Un telégrafo por +Señor Goodwin!_” The _comandante_, Don Señor el Coronel Encarnación +Rios, who was loyal to the Ins and suspected Goodwin’s devotion to the +Outs, hissed: “Aha!” and wrote in his secret memorandum book the +accusive fact that Señor Goodwin had on that momentous date received a +telegram. + +In the midst of the hullabaloo a man stepped to the door of a small +wooden building and looked out. Above the door was a sign that read +“Keogh and Clancy”—a nomenclature that seemed not to be indigenous to +that tropical soil. The man in the door was Billy Keogh, scout of +fortune and progress and latter-day rover of the Spanish Main. Tintypes +and photographs were the weapons with which Keogh and Clancy were at +that time assailing the hopeless shores. Outside the shop were set two +large frames filled with specimens of their art and skill. + +Keogh leaned in the doorway, his bold and humorous countenance wearing +a look of interest at the unusual influx of life and sound into the +street. When the meaning of the disturbance became clear to him he +placed a hand beside his mouth and shouted: “Hey! Frank!” in such a +robustious voice that the feeble clamour of the natives was drowned and +silenced. + +Fifty yards away, on the seaward side of the street, stood the abode of +the consul for the United States. Out from the door of this building +tumbled Goodwin at the call. He had been smoking with Willard Geddie, +the consul, on the back porch of the consulate, which was conceded to +be the coolest spot in Coralio. + +“Hurry up,” shouted Keogh. “There’s a riot in town on account of a +telegram that’s come for you. You want to be careful about these +things, my boy. It won’t do to trifle with the feelings of the public +this way. You’ll be getting a pink note some day with violet scent on +it; and then the country’ll be steeped in the throes of a revolution.” + +Goodwin had strolled up the street and met the boy with the message. +The ox-eyed women gazed at him with shy admiration, for his type drew +them. He was big, blonde, and jauntily dressed in white linen, with +buckskin _zapatos_. His manner was courtly, with a sort of kindly +truculence in it, tempered by a merciful eye. When the telegram had +been delivered, and the bearer of it dismissed with a gratuity, the +relieved populace returned to the contiguities of shade from which +curiosity had drawn it—the women to their baking in the mud ovens under +the orange-trees, or to the interminable combing of their long, +straight hair; the men to their cigarettes and gossip in the cantinas. + +Goodwin sat on Keogh’s doorstep, and read his telegram. It was from Bob +Englehart, an American, who lived in San Mateo, the capital city of +Anchuria, eighty miles in the interior. Englehart was a gold miner, an +ardent revolutionist and “good people.” That he was a man of resource +and imagination was proven by the telegram he had sent. It had been his +task to send a confidential message to his friend in Coralio. This +could not have been accomplished in either Spanish or English, for the +eye politic in Anchuria was an active one. The Ins and the Outs were +perpetually on their guard. But Englehart was a diplomatist. There +existed but one code upon which he might make requisition with promise +of safety—the great and potent code of Slang. So, here is the message +that slipped, unconstrued, through the fingers of curious officials, +and came to the eye of Goodwin: + +His Nibs skedaddled yesterday per jack-rabbit line with all the coin in +the kitty and the bundle of muslin he’s spoony about. The boodle is six +figures short. Our crowd in good shape, but we need the spondulicks. +You collar it. The main guy and the dry goods are headed for the briny. +You know what to do. + + +BOB. + + +This screed, remarkable as it was, had no mystery for Goodwin. He was +the most successful of the small advance-guard of speculative Americans +that had invaded Anchuria, and he had not reached that enviable +pinnacle without having well exercised the arts of foresight and +deduction. He had taken up political intrigue as a matter of business. +He was acute enough to wield a certain influence among the leading +schemers, and he was prosperous enough to be able to purchase the +respect of the petty office-holders. There was always a revolutionary +party; and to it he had always allied himself; for the adherents of a +new administration received the rewards of their labours. There was now +a Liberal party seeking to overturn President Miraflores. If the wheel +successfully revolved, Goodwin stood to win a concession to 30,000 +manzanas of the finest coffee lands in the interior. Certain incidents +in the recent career of President Miraflores had excited a shrewd +suspicion in Goodwin’s mind that the government was near a dissolution +from another cause than that of a revolution, and now Englehart’s +telegram had come as a corroboration of his wisdom. + +The telegram, which had remained unintelligible to the Anchurian +linguists who had applied to it in vain their knowledge of Spanish and +elemental English, conveyed a stimulating piece of news to Goodwin’s +understanding. It informed him that the president of the republic had +decamped from the capital city with the contents of the treasury. +Furthermore, that he was accompanied in his flight by that winning +adventuress Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer, whose troupe of +performers had been entertained by the president at San Mateo during +the past month on a scale less modest than that with which royal +visitors are often content. The reference to the “jack-rabbit line” +could mean nothing else than the mule-back system of transport that +prevailed between Coralio and the capital. The hint that the “boodle” +was “six figures short” made the condition of the national treasury +lamentably clear. Also it was convincingly true that the ingoing +party—its way now made a pacific one—would need the “spondulicks.” +Unless its pledges should be fulfilled, and the spoils held for the +delectation of the victors, precarious indeed, would be the position of +the new government. Therefore it was exceeding necessary to “collar the +main guy,” and recapture the sinews of war and government. + +Goodwin handed the message to Keogh. + +“Read that, Billy,” he said. “It’s from Bob Englehart. Can you manage +the cipher?” + +Keogh sat in the other half of the doorway, and carefully perused the +telegram. + +“’Tis not a cipher,” he said, finally. “’Tis what they call literature, +and that’s a system of language put in the mouths of people that +they’ve never been introduced to by writers of imagination. The +magazines invented it, but I never knew before that President Norvin +Green had stamped it with the seal of his approval. ’Tis now no longer +literature, but language. The dictionaries tried, but they couldn’t +make it go for anything but dialect. Sure, now that the Western Union +indorses it, it won’t be long till a race of people will spring up that +speaks it.” + +“You’re running too much to philology, Billy,” said Goodwin. “Do you +make out the meaning of it?” + +“Sure,” replied the philosopher of Fortune. “All languages come easy to +the man who must know ’em. I’ve even failed to misunderstand an order +to evacuate in classical Chinese when it was backed up by the muzzle of +a breech-loader. This little literary essay I hold in my hands means a +game of Fox-in-the-Morning. Ever play that, Frank, when you was a kid?” + +“I think so,” said Goodwin, laughing. “You join hands all ’round, and—” + +“You do not,” interrupted Keogh. “You’ve got a fine sporting game mixed +up in your head with ‘All Around the Rosebush.’ The spirit of +‘Fox-in-the-Morning’ is opposed to the holding of hands. I’ll tell you +how it’s played. This president man and his companion in play, they +stand up over in San Mateo, ready for the run, and shout: +‘Fox-in-the-Morning!’ Me and you, standing here, we say: ‘Goose and the +Gander!’ They say: ‘How many miles is it to London town?’ We say: ‘Only +a few, if your legs are long enough. How many comes out?’ They say: +‘More than you’re able to catch.’ And then the game commences.” + +“I catch the idea,” said Goodwin. “It won’t do to let the goose and +gander slip through our fingers, Billy; their feathers are too +valuable. Our crowd is prepared and able to step into the shoes of the +government at once; but with the treasury empty we’d stay in power +about as long as a tenderfoot would stick on an untamed bronco. We must +play the fox on every foot of the coast to prevent their getting out of +the country.” + +“By the mule-back schedule,” said Keogh, “it’s five days down from San +Mateo. We’ve got plenty of time to set our outposts. There’s only three +places on the coast where they can hope to sail from—here and Solitas +and Alazan. They’re the only points we’ll have to guard. It’s as easy +as a chess problem—fox to play, and mate in three moves. Oh, goosey, +goosey, gander, whither do you wander? By the blessing of the literary +telegraph the boodle of this benighted fatherland shall be preserved to +the honest political party that is seeking to overthrow it.” + +The situation had been justly outlined by Keogh. The down trail from +the capital was at all times a weary road to travel. A jiggety-joggety +journey it was; ice-cold and hot, wet and dry. The trail climbed +appalling mountains, wound like a rotten string about the brows of +breathless precipices, plunged through chilling snow-fed streams, and +wriggled like a snake through sunless forests teeming with menacing +insect and animal life. After descending to the foothills it turned to +a trident, the central prong ending at Alazan. Another branched off to +Coralio; the third penetrated to Solitas. Between the sea and the +foothills stretched the five miles breadth of alluvial coast. Here was +the flora of the tropics in its rankest and most prodigal growth. +Spaces here and there had been wrested from the jungle and planted with +bananas and cane and orange groves. The rest was a riot of wild +vegetation, the home of monkeys, tapirs, jaguars, alligators and +prodigious reptiles and insects. Where no road was cut a serpent could +scarcely make its way through the tangle of vines and creepers. Across +the treacherous mangrove swamps few things without wings could safely +pass. Therefore the fugitives could hope to reach the coast only by one +of the routes named. + +“Keep the matter quiet, Billy,” advised Goodwin. “We don’t want the Ins +to know that the president is in flight. I suppose Bob’s information is +something of a scoop in the capital as yet. Otherwise he would not have +tried to make his message a confidential one; and besides, everybody +would have heard the news. I’m going around now to see Dr. Zavalla, and +start a man up the trail to cut the telegraph wire.” + +As Goodwin rose, Keogh threw his hat upon the grass by the door and +expelled a tremendous sigh. + +“What’s the trouble, Billy?” asked Goodwin, pausing. “That’s the first +time I ever heard you sigh.” + +“’Tis the last,” said Keogh. “With that sorrowful puff of wind I resign +myself to a life of praiseworthy but harassing honesty. What are +tintypes, if you please, to the opportunities of the great and +hilarious class of ganders and geese? Not that I would be a president, +Frank—and the boodle he’s got is too big for me to handle—but in some +ways I feel my conscience hurting me for addicting myself to +photographing a nation instead of running away with it. Frank, did you +ever see the ‘bundle of muslin’ that His Excellency has wrapped up and +carried off?” + +“Isabel Guilbert?” said Goodwin, laughing. “No, I never did. From what +I’ve heard of her, though, I imagine that she wouldn’t stick at +anything to carry her point. Don’t get romantic, Billy. Sometimes I +begin to fear that there’s Irish blood in your ancestry.” + +“I never saw her either,” went on Keogh; “but they say she’s got all +the ladies of mythology, sculpture, and fiction reduced to chromos. +They say she can look at a man once, and he’ll turn monkey and climb +trees to pick cocoanuts for her. Think of that president man with Lord +knows how many hundreds of thousands of dollars in one hand, and this +muslin siren in the other, galloping down hill on a sympathetic mule +amid songbirds and flowers! And here is Billy Keogh, because he is +virtuous, condemned to the unprofitable swindle of slandering the faces +of missing links on tin for an honest living! ’Tis an injustice of +nature.” + +“Cheer up,” said Goodwin. “You are a pretty poor fox to be envying a +gander. Maybe the enchanting Guilbert will take a fancy to you and your +tintypes after we impoverish her royal escort.” + +“She could do worse,” reflected Keogh; “but she won’t. ’Tis not a +tintype gallery, but the gallery of the gods that she’s fitted to +adorn. She’s a very wicked lady, and the president man is in luck. But +I hear Clancy swearing in the back room for having to do all the work.” +And Keogh plunged for the rear of the “gallery,” whistling gaily in a +spontaneous way that belied his recent sigh over the questionable good +luck of the flying president. + +Goodwin turned from the main street into a much narrower one that +intersected it at a right angle. + +These side streets were covered by a growth of thick, rank grass, which +was kept to a navigable shortness by the machetes of the police. Stone +sidewalks, little more than a ledge in width, ran along the base of the +mean and monotonous adobe houses. At the outskirts of the village these +streets dwindled to nothing; and here were set the palm-thatched huts +of the Caribs and the poorer natives, and the shabby cabins of negroes +from Jamaica and the West India islands. A few structures raised their +heads above the red-tiled roofs of the one-story houses—the bell tower +of the _Calaboza_, the Hotel de los Estranjeros, the residence of the +Vesuvius Fruit Company’s agent, the store and residence of Bernard +Brannigan, a ruined cathedral in which Columbus had once set foot, and, +most imposing of all, the Casa Morena—the summer “White House” of the +President of Anchuria. On the principal street running along the +beach—the Broadway of Coralio—were the larger stores, the government +_bodega_ and post-office, the _cuartel_, the rum-shops and the market +place. + +On his way Goodwin passed the house of Bernard Brannigan. It was a +modern wooden building, two stories in height. The ground floor was +occupied by Brannigan’s store, the upper one contained the living +apartments. A wide cool porch ran around the house half way up its +outer walls. A handsome, vivacious girl neatly dressed in flowing white +leaned over the railing and smiled down upon Goodwin. She was no darker +than many an Andalusian of high descent; and she sparkled and glowed +like a tropical moonlight. + +“Good evening, Miss Paula,” said Goodwin, taking off his hat, with his +ready smile. There was little difference in his manner whether he +addressed women or men. Everybody in Coralio liked to receive the +salutation of the big American. + +“Is there any news, Mr. Goodwin? Please don’t say no. Isn’t it warm? I +feel just like Mariana in her moated grange—or was it a range?—it’s hot +enough.” + +“No, there’s no news to tell, I believe,” said Goodwin, with a +mischievous look in his eye, “except that old Geddie is getting +grumpier and crosser every day. If something doesn’t happen to relieve +his mind I’ll have to quit smoking on his back porch—and there’s no +other place available that is cool enough.” + +“He isn’t grumpy,” said Paula Brannigan, impulsively, “when he—” + +But she ceased suddenly, and drew back with a deepening colour; for her +mother had been a _mestizo_ lady, and the Spanish blood had brought to +Paula a certain shyness that was an adornment to the other half of her +demonstrative nature. + + + + +II +THE LOTUS AND THE BOTTLE + + +Willard Geddie, consul for the United States in Coralio, was working +leisurely on his yearly report. Goodwin, who had strolled in as he did +daily for a smoke on the much coveted porch, had found him so absorbed +in his work that he departed after roundly abusing the consul for his +lack of hospitality. + +“I shall complain to the civil service department,” said Goodwin;—“or +is it a department?—perhaps it’s only a theory. One gets neither +civility nor service from you. You won’t talk; and you won’t set out +anything to drink. What kind of a way is that of representing your +government?” + +Goodwin strolled out and across to the hotel to see if he could bully +the quarantine doctor into a game on Coralio’s solitary billiard table. +His plans were completed for the interception of the fugitives from the +capital; and now it was but a waiting game that he had to play. + +The consul was interested in his report. He was only twenty-four; and +he had not been in Coralio long enough for his enthusiasm to cool in +the heat of the tropics—a paradox that may be allowed between Cancer +and Capricorn. + +So many thousand bunches of bananas, so many thousand oranges and +cocoanuts, so many ounces of gold dust, pounds of rubber, coffee, +indigo and sarsaparilla—actually, exports were twenty per cent. greater +than for the previous year! + +A little thrill of satisfaction ran through the consul. Perhaps, he +thought, the State Department, upon reading his introduction, would +notice—and then he leaned back in his chair and laughed. He was getting +as bad as the others. For the moment he had forgotten that Coralio was +an insignificant town in an insignificant republic lying along the +by-ways of a second-rate sea. He thought of Gregg, the quarantine +doctor, who subscribed for the London _Lancet_, expecting to find it +quoting his reports to the home Board of Health concerning the yellow +fever germ. The consul knew that not one in fifty of his acquaintances +in the States had ever heard of Coralio. He knew that two men, at any +rate, would have to read his report—some underling in the State +Department and a compositor in the Public Printing Office. Perhaps the +typesticker would note the increase of commerce in Coralio, and speak +of it, over the cheese and beer, to a friend. + +He had just written: “Most unaccountable is the supineness of the large +exporters in the United States in permitting the French and German +houses to practically control the trade interests of this rich and +productive country”—when he heard the hoarse notes of a steamer’s +siren. + +Geddie laid down his pen and gathered his Panama hat and umbrella. By +the sound he knew it to be the _Valhalla_, one of the line of fruit +vessels plying for the Vesuvius Company. Down to _niños_ of five years, +everyone in Coralio could name you each incoming steamer by the note of +her siren. + +The consul sauntered by a roundabout, shaded way to the beach. By +reason of long practice he gauged his stroll so accurately that by the +time he arrived on the sandy shore the boat of the customs officials +was rowing back from the steamer, which had been boarded and inspected +according to the laws of Anchuria. + +There is no harbour at Coralio. Vessels of the draught of the +_Valhalla_ must ride at anchor a mile from shore. When they take on +fruit it is conveyed on lighters and freighter sloops. At Solitas, +where there was a fine harbour, ships of many kinds were to be seen, +but in the roadstead off Coralio scarcely any save the fruiters paused. +Now and then a tramp coaster, or a mysterious brig from Spain, or a +saucy French barque would hang innocently for a few days in the offing. +Then the custom-house crew would become doubly vigilant and wary. At +night a sloop or two would be making strange trips in and out along the +shore; and in the morning the stock of Three-Star Hennessey, wines and +drygoods in Coralio would be found vastly increased. It has also been +said that the customs officials jingled more silver in the pockets of +their red-striped trousers, and that the record books showed no +increase in import duties received. + +The customs boat and the _Valhalla_ gig reached the shore at the same +time. When they grounded in the shallow water there was still five +yards of rolling surf between them and dry sand. Then half-clothed +Caribs dashed into the water, and brought in on their backs the +_Valhalla’s_ purser and the little native officials in their cotton +undershirts, blue trousers with red stripes, and flapping straw hats. + +At college Geddie had been a treasure as a first-baseman. He now closed +his umbrella, stuck it upright in the sand, and stooped, with his hands +resting upon his knees. The purser, burlesquing the pitcher’s +contortions, hurled at the consul the heavy roll of newspapers, tied +with a string, that the steamer always brought for him. Geddie leaped +high and caught the roll with a sounding “thwack.” The loungers on the +beach—about a third of the population of the town—laughed and applauded +delightedly. Every week they expected to see that roll of papers +delivered and received in that same manner, and they were never +disappointed. Innovations did not flourish in Coralio. + +The consul re-hoisted his umbrella and walked back to the consulate. + +This home of a great nation’s representative was a wooden structure of +two rooms, with a native-built gallery of poles, bamboo and nipa palm +running on three sides of it. One room was the official apartment, +furnished chastely with a flat-top desk, a hammock, and three +uncomfortable cane-seated chairs. Engravings of the first and latest +president of the country represented hung against the wall. The other +room was the consul’s living apartment. + +It was eleven o’clock when he returned from the beach, and therefore +breakfast time. Chanca, the Carib woman who cooked for him, was just +serving the meal on the side of the gallery facing the sea—a spot +famous as the coolest in Coralio. The breakfast consisted of shark’s +fin soup, stew of land crabs, breadfruit, a boiled iguana steak, +aguacates, a freshly cut pineapple, claret and coffee. + +Geddie took his seat, and unrolled with luxurious laziness his bundle +of newspapers. Here in Coralio for two days or longer he would read of +goings-on in the world very much as we of the world read those +whimsical contributions to inexact science that assume to portray the +doings of the Martians. After he had finished with the papers they +would be sent on the rounds of the other English-speaking residents of +the town. + +The paper that came first to his hand was one of those bulky mattresses +of printed stuff upon which the readers of certain New York journals +are supposed to take their Sabbath literary nap. Opening this the +consul rested it upon the table, supporting its weight with the aid of +the back of a chair. Then he partook of his meal deliberately, turning +the leaves from time to time and glancing half idly at the contents. + +Presently he was struck by something familiar to him in a picture—a +half-page, badly printed reproduction of a photograph of a vessel. +Languidly interested, he leaned for a nearer scrutiny and a view of the +florid headlines of the column next to the picture. + +Yes; he was not mistaken. The engraving was of the eight-hundred-ton +yacht _Idalia_, belonging to “that prince of good fellows, Midas of the +money market, and society’s pink of perfection, J. Ward Tolliver.” + +Slowly sipping his black coffee, Geddie read the column of print. +Following a listed statement of Mr. Tolliver’s real estate and bonds, +came a description of the yacht’s furnishings, and then the grain of +news no bigger than a mustard seed. Mr. Tolliver, with a party of +favoured guests, would sail the next day on a six weeks’ cruise along +the Central American and South American coasts and among the Bahama +Islands. Among the guests were Mrs. Cumberland Payne and Miss Ida +Payne, of Norfolk. + +The writer, with the fatuous presumption that was demanded of him by +his readers, had concocted a romance suited to their palates. He +bracketed the names of Miss Payne and Mr. Tolliver until he had +well-nigh read the marriage ceremony over them. He played coyly and +insinuatingly upon the strings of “_on dit_” and “Madame Rumour” and “a +little bird” and “no one would be surprised,” and ended with +congratulations. + +Geddie, having finished his breakfast, took his papers to the edge of +the gallery, and sat there in his favourite steamer chair with his feet +on the bamboo railing. He lighted a cigar, and looked out upon the sea. +He felt a glow of satisfaction at finding he was so little disturbed by +what he had read. He told himself that he had conquered the distress +that had sent him, a voluntary exile, to this far land of the lotus. He +could never forget Ida, of course; but there was no longer any pain in +thinking about her. When they had had that misunderstanding and quarrel +he had impulsively sought this consulship, with the desire to retaliate +upon her by detaching himself from her world and presence. He had +succeeded thoroughly in that. During the twelve months of his life in +Coralio no word had passed between them, though he had sometimes heard +of her through the dilatory correspondence with the few friends to whom +he still wrote. Still he could not repress a little thrill of +satisfaction at knowing that she had not yet married Tolliver or anyone +else. But evidently Tolliver had not yet abandoned hope. + +Well, it made no difference to him now. He had eaten of the lotus. He +was happy and content in this land of perpetual afternoon. Those old +days of life in the States seemed like an irritating dream. He hoped +Ida would be as happy as he was. The climate as balmy as that of +distant Avalon; the fetterless, idyllic round of enchanted days; the +life among this indolent, romantic people—a life full of music, +flowers, and low laughter; the influence of the imminent sea and +mountains, and the many shapes of love and magic and beauty that +bloomed in the white tropic nights—with all he was more than content. +Also, there was Paula Brannigan. + +Geddie intended to marry Paula—if, of course, she would consent; but he +felt rather sure that she would do that. Somehow, he kept postponing +his proposal. Several times he had been quite near to it; but a +mysterious something always held him back. Perhaps it was only the +unconscious, instinctive conviction that the act would sever the last +tie that bound him to his old world. + +He could be very happy with Paula. Few of the native girls could be +compared with her. She had attended a convent school in New Orleans for +two years; and when she chose to display her accomplishments no one +could detect any difference between her and the girls of Norfolk and +Manhattan. But it was delicious to see her at home dressed, as she +sometimes was, in the native costume, with bare shoulders and flowing +sleeves. + +Bernard Brannigan was the great merchant of Coralio. Besides his store, +he maintained a train of pack mules, and carried on a lively trade with +the interior towns and villages. He had married a native lady of high +Castilian descent, but with a tinge of Indian brown showing through her +olive cheek. The union of the Irish and the Spanish had produced, as it +so often has, an offshoot of rare beauty and variety. They were very +excellent people indeed, and the upper story of their house was ready +to be placed at the service of Geddie and Paula as soon as he should +make up his mind to speak about it. + +By the time two hours were whiled away the consul tired of reading. The +papers lay scattered about him on the gallery. Reclining there, he +gazed dreamily out upon an Eden. A clump of banana plants interposed +their broad shields between him and the sun. The gentle slope from the +consulate to the sea was covered with the dark-green foliage of +lemon-trees and orange-trees just bursting into bloom. A lagoon pierced +the land like a dark, jagged crystal, and above it a pale ceiba-tree +rose almost to the clouds. The waving cocoanut palms on the beach +flared their decorative green leaves against the slate of an almost +quiescent sea. His senses were cognizant of brilliant scarlet and +ochres amid the vert of the coppice, of odours of fruit and bloom and +the smoke from Chanca’s clay oven under the calabash-tree; of the +treble laughter of the native women in their huts, the song of the +robin, the salt taste of the breeze, the diminuendo of the faint surf +running along the shore—and, gradually, of a white speck, growing to a +blur, that intruded itself upon the drab prospect of the sea. + +Lazily interested, he watched this blur increase until it became the +_Idalia_ steaming at full speed, coming down the coast. Without +changing his position he kept his eyes upon the beautiful white yacht +as she drew swiftly near, and came opposite to Coralio. Then, sitting +upright, he saw her float steadily past and on. Scarcely a mile of sea +had separated her from the shore. He had seen the frequent flash of her +polished brass work and the stripes of her deck-awnings—so much, and no +more. Like a ship on a magic lantern slide the _Idalia_ had crossed the +illuminated circle of the consul’s little world, and was gone. Save for +the tiny cloud of smoke that was left hanging over the brim of the sea, +she might have been an immaterial thing, a chimera of his idle brain. + +Geddie went into his office and sat down to dawdle over his report. If +the reading of the article in the paper had left him unshaken, this +silent passing of the _Idalia_ had done for him still more. It had +brought the calm and peace of a situation from which all uncertainty +had been erased. He knew that men sometimes hope without being aware of +it. Now, since she had come two thousand miles and had passed without a +sign, not even his unconscious self need cling to the past any longer. + +After dinner, when the sun was low behind the mountains, Geddie walked +on the little strip of beach under the cocoanuts. The wind was blowing +mildly landward, and the surface of the sea was rippled by tiny +wavelets. + +A miniature breaker, spreading with a soft “swish” upon the sand +brought with it something round and shiny that rolled back again as the +wave receded. The next influx beached it clear, and Geddie picked it +up. The thing was a long-necked wine bottle of colourless glass. The +cork had been driven in tightly to the level of the mouth, and the end +covered with dark-red sealing-wax. The bottle contained only what +seemed to be a sheet of paper, much curled from the manipulation it had +undergone while being inserted. In the sealing-wax was the impression +of a seal—probably of a signet-ring, bearing the initials of a +monogram; but the impression had been hastily made, and the letters +were past anything more certain than a shrewd conjecture. Ida Payne had +always worn a signet-ring in preference to any other finger decoration. +Geddie thought he could make out the familiar “I P”; and a queer +sensation of disquietude went over him. More personal and intimate was +this reminder of her than had been the sight of the vessel she was +doubtless on. He walked back to his house, and set the bottle on his +desk. + +Throwing off his hat and coat, and lighting a lamp—for the night had +crowded precipitately upon the brief twilight—he began to examine his +piece of sea salvage. + +By holding the bottle near the light and turning it judiciously, he +made out that it contained a double sheet of note-paper filled with +close writing; further, that the paper was of the same size and shade +as that always used by Ida; and that, to the best of his belief, the +handwriting was hers. The imperfect glass of the bottle so distorted +the rays of light that he could read no word of the writing; but +certain capital letters, of which he caught comprehensive glimpses, +were Ida’s, he felt sure. + +There was a little smile both of perplexity and amusement in Geddie’s +eyes as he set the bottle down, and laid three cigars side by side on +his desk. He fetched his steamer chair from the gallery, and stretched +himself comfortably. He would smoke those three cigars while +considering the problem. + +For it amounted to a problem. He almost wished that he had not found +the bottle; but the bottle was there. Why should it have drifted in +from the sea, whence come so many disquieting things, to disturb his +peace? + +In this dreamy land, where time seemed so redundant, he had fallen into +the habit of bestowing much thought upon even trifling matters. + +He began to speculate upon many fanciful theories concerning the story +of the bottle, rejecting each in turn. + +Ships in danger of wreck or disablement sometimes cast forth such +precarious messengers calling for aid. But he had seen the _Idalia_ not +three hours before, safe and speeding. Suppose the crew had mutinied +and imprisoned the passengers below, and the message was one begging +for succour! But, premising such an improbable outrage, would the +agitated captives have taken the pains to fill four pages of note-paper +with carefully penned arguments to their rescue. + +Thus by elimination he soon rid the matter of the more unlikely +theories, and was reduced—though aversely—to the less assailable one +that the bottle contained a message to himself. Ida knew he was in +Coralio; she must have launched the bottle while the yacht was passing +and the wind blowing fairly toward the shore. + +As soon as Geddie reached this conclusion a wrinkle came between his +brows and a stubborn look settled around his mouth. He sat looking out +through the doorway at the gigantic fire-flies traversing the quiet +streets. + +If this was a message to him from Ida, what could it mean save an +overture toward a reconciliation? And if that, why had she not used the +same methods of the post instead of this uncertain and even flippant +means of communication? A note in an empty bottle, cast into the sea! +There was something light and frivolous about it, if not actually +contemptuous. + +The thought stirred his pride and subdued whatever emotions had been +resurrected by the finding of the bottle. + +Geddie put on his coat and hat and walked out. He followed a street +that led him along the border of the little plaza where a band was +playing and people were rambling, care-free and indolent. Some timorous +_señoritas_ scurrying past with fire-flies tangled in the jetty braids +of their hair glanced at him with shy, flattering eyes. The air was +languorous with the scent of jasmin and orange-blossoms. + +The consul stayed his steps at the house of Bernard Brannigan. Paula +was swinging in a hammock on the gallery. She rose from it like a bird +from its nest. The colour came to her cheek at the sound of Geddie’s +voice. + +He was charmed at the sight of her costume—a flounced muslin dress, +with a little jacket of white flannel, all made with neatness and +style. He suggested a stroll, and they walked out to the old Indian +well on the hill road. They sat on the curb, and there Geddie made the +expected but long-deferred speech. Certain though he had been that she +would not say him nay, he was thrilled with joy at the completeness and +sweetness of her surrender. Here was surely a heart made for love and +steadfastness. Here was no caprice or questionings or captious +standards of convention. + +When Geddie kissed Paula at her door that night he was happier than he +had ever been before. “Here in this hollow lotus land, ever to live and +lie reclined” seemed to him, as it has seemed to many mariners, the +best as well as the easiest. His future would be an ideal one. He had +attained a Paradise without a serpent. His Eve would be indeed a part +of him, unbeguiled, and therefore more beguiling. He had made his +decision to-night, and his heart was full of serene, assured content. + +Geddie went back to his house whistling that finest and saddest love +song, “La Golondrina.” At the door his tame monkey leaped down from his +shelf, chattering briskly. The consul turned to his desk to get him +some nuts he usually kept there. Reaching in the half-darkness, his +hand struck against the bottle. He started as if he had touched the +cold rotundity of a serpent. + +He had forgotten that the bottle was there. + +He lighted the lamp and fed the monkey. Then, very deliberately, he +lighted a cigar, and took the bottle in his hand, and walked down the +path to the beach. + +There was a moon, and the sea was glorious. The breeze had shifted, as +it did each evening, and was now rushing steadily seaward. + +Stepping to the water’s edge, Geddie hurled the unopened bottle far out +into the sea. It disappeared for a moment, and then shot upward twice +its length. Geddie stood still, watching it. The moonlight was so +bright that he could see it bobbing up and down with the little waves. +Slowly it receded from the shore, flashing and turning as it went. The +wind was carrying it out to sea. Soon it became a mere speck, +doubtfully discerned at irregular intervals; and then the mystery of it +was swallowed up by the greater mystery of the ocean. Geddie stood +still upon the beach, smoking and looking out upon the water. + +“Simon!—Oh, Simon!—wake up there, Simon!” bawled a sonorous voice at +the edge of the water. + +Old Simon Cruz was a half-breed fisherman and smuggler who lived in a +hut on the beach. Out of his earliest nap Simon was thus awakened. + +He slipped on his shoes and went outside. Just landing from one of the +_Valhalla’s_ boats was the third mate of that vessel, who was an +acquaintance of Simon’s, and three sailors from the fruiter. + +“Go up, Simon,” called the mate, “and find Dr. Gregg or Mr. Goodwin or +anybody that’s a friend to Mr. Geddie, and bring ’em here at once.” + +“Saints of the skies!” said Simon, sleepily, “nothing has happened to +Mr. Geddie?” + +“He’s under that tarpauling,” said the mate, pointing to the boat, “and +he’s rather more than half drownded. We seen him from the steamer +nearly a mile out from shore, swimmin’ like mad after a bottle that was +floatin’ in the water, outward bound. We lowered the gig and started +for him. He nearly had his hand on the bottle, when he gave out and +went under. We pulled him out in time to save him, maybe; but the +doctor is the one to decide that.” + +“A bottle?” said the old man, rubbing his eyes. He was not yet fully +awake. “Where is the bottle?” + +“Driftin’ along out there some’eres,” said the mate, jerking his thumb +toward the sea. “Get on with you, Simon.” + + + + +III +SMITH + + +Goodwin and the ardent patriot, Zavalla, took all the precautions that +their foresight could contrive to prevent the escape of President +Miraflores and his companion. They sent trusted messengers up the coast +to Solitas and Alazan to warn the local leaders of the flight, and to +instruct them to patrol the water line and arrest the fugitives at all +hazards should they reveal themselves in that territory. After this was +done there remained only to cover the district about Coralio and await +the coming of the quarry. The nets were well spread. The roads were so +few, the opportunities for embarkation so limited, and the two or three +probable points of exit so well guarded that it would be strange indeed +if there should slip through the meshes so much of the country’s +dignity, romance, and collateral. The president would, without doubt, +move as secretly as possible, and endeavour to board a vessel by +stealth from some secluded point along the shore. + +On the fourth day after the receipt of Englehart’s telegram the +_Karlsefin_, a Norwegian steamer chartered by the New Orleans fruit +trade, anchored off Coralio with three hoarse toots of her siren. The +_Karlsefin_ was not one of the line operated by the Vesuvius Fruit +Company. She was something of a dilettante, doing odd jobs for a +company that was scarcely important enough to figure as a rival to the +Vesuvius. The movements of the _Karlsefin_ were dependent upon the +state of the market. Sometimes she would ply steadily between the +Spanish Main and New Orleans in the regular transport of fruit; next +she would be making erratic trips to Mobile or Charleston, or even as +far north as New York, according to the distribution of the fruit +supply. + +Goodwin lounged upon the beach with the usual crowd of idlers that had +gathered to view the steamer. Now that President Miraflores might be +expected to reach the borders of his abjured country at any time, the +orders were to keep a strict and unrelenting watch. Every vessel that +approached the shores might now be considered a possible means of +escape for the fugitives; and an eye was kept even on the sloops and +dories that belonged to the sea-going contingent of Coralio. Goodwin +and Zavalla moved everywhere, but without ostentation, watching the +loopholes of escape. + +The customs officials crowded importantly into their boat and rowed out +to the _Karlsefin_. A boat from the steamer landed her purser with his +papers, and took out the quarantine doctor with his green umbrella and +clinical thermometer. Next a swarm of Caribs began to load upon +lighters the thousands of bunches of bananas heaped upon the shore and +row them out to the steamer. The _Karlsefin_ had no passenger list, and +was soon done with the attention of the authorities. The purser +declared that the steamer would remain at anchor until morning, taking +on her fruit during the night. The _Karlsefin_ had come, he said, from +New York, to which port her latest load of oranges and cocoanuts had +been conveyed. Two or three of the freighter sloops were engaged to +assist in the work, for the captain was anxious to make a quick return +in order to reap the advantage offered by a certain dearth of fruit in +the States. + +About four o’clock in the afternoon another of those marine monsters, +not very familiar in those waters, hove in sight, following the fateful +_Idalia_—a graceful steam yacht, painted a light buff, clean-cut as a +steel engraving. The beautiful vessel hovered off shore, see-sawing the +waves as lightly as a duck in a rain barrel. A swift boat manned by a +crew in uniform came ashore, and a stocky-built man leaped to the +sands. + +The new-comer seemed to turn a disapproving eye upon the rather motley +congregation of native Anchurians, and made his way at once toward +Goodwin, who was the most conspicuously Anglo-Saxon figure present. +Goodwin greeted him with courtesy. + +Conversation developed that the newly landed one was named Smith, and +that he had come in a yacht. A meagre biography, truly; for the yacht +was most apparent; and the “Smith” not beyond a reasonable guess before +the revelation. Yet to the eye of Goodwin, who had seen several things, +there was a discrepancy between Smith and his yacht. A bullet-headed +man Smith was, with an oblique, dead eye and the moustache of a +cocktail-mixer. And unless he had shifted costumes before putting off +for shore he had affronted the deck of his correct vessel clad in a +pearl-gray derby, a gay plaid suit and vaudeville neckwear. Men owning +pleasure yachts generally harmonize better with them. + +Smith looked business, but he was no advertiser. He commented upon the +scenery, remarking upon its fidelity to the pictures in the geography; +and then inquired for the United States consul. Goodwin pointed out the +starred-and-striped bunting hanging above the little consulate, which +was concealed behind the orange-trees. + +“Mr. Geddie, the consul, will be sure to be there,” said Goodwin. “He +was very nearly drowned a few days ago while taking a swim in the sea, +and the doctor has ordered him to remain indoors for some time.” + +Smith plowed his way through the sand to the consulate, his +haberdashery creating violent discord against the smooth tropical blues +and greens. + +Geddie was lounging in his hammock, somewhat pale of face and languid +in pose. On that night when the _Valhalla’s_ boat had brought him +ashore apparently drenched to death by the sea, Doctor Gregg and his +other friends had toiled for hours to preserve the little spark of life +that remained to him. The bottle, with its impotent message, was gone +out to sea, and the problem that it had provoked was reduced to a +simple sum in addition—one and one make two, by the rule of arithmetic; +one by the rule of romance. + +There is a quaint old theory that man may have two souls—a peripheral +one which serves ordinarily, and a central one which is stirred only at +certain times, but then with activity and vigour. While under the +domination of the former a man will shave, vote, pay taxes, give money +to his family, buy subscription books and comport himself on the +average plan. But let the central soul suddenly become dominant, and he +may, in the twinkling of an eye, turn upon the partner of his joys with +furious execration; he may change his politics while you could snap +your fingers; he may deal out deadly insult to his dearest friend; he +may get him, instanter, to a monastery or a dance hall; he may elope, +or hang himself—or he may write a song or poem, or kiss his wife +unasked, or give his funds to the search of a microbe. Then the +peripheral soul will return; and we have our safe, sane citizen again. +It is but the revolt of the Ego against Order; and its effect is to +shake up the atoms only that they may settle where they belong. + +Geddie’s revulsion had been a mild one—no more than a swim in a summer +sea after so inglorious an object as a drifting bottle. And now he was +himself again. Upon his desk, ready for the post, was a letter to his +government tendering his resignation as consul, to be effective as soon +as another could be appointed in his place. For Bernard Brannigan, who +never did things in a half-way manner, was to take Geddie at once for a +partner in his very profitable and various enterprises; and Paula was +happily engaged in plans for refurnishing and decorating the upper +story of the Brannigan house. + +The consul rose from his hammock when he saw the conspicuous stranger +in his door. + +“Keep your seat, old man,” said the visitor, with an airy wave of his +large hand. “My name’s Smith; and I’ve come in a yacht. You are the +consul—is that right? A big, cool guy on the beach directed me here. +Thought I’d pay my respects to the flag.” + +“Sit down,” said Geddie. “I’ve been admiring your craft ever since it +came in sight. Looks like a fast sailer. What’s her tonnage?” + +“Search me!” said Smith. “I don’t know what she weighs in at. But she’s +got a tidy gait. The _Rambler_—that’s her name—don’t take the dust of +anything afloat. This is my first trip on her. I’m taking a squint +along this coast just to get an idea of the countries where the rubber +and red pepper and revolutions come from. I had no idea there was so +much scenery down here. Why, Central Park ain’t in it with this neck of +the woods. I’m from New York. They get monkeys, and cocoanuts, and +parrots down here—is that right?” + +“We have them all,” said Geddie. “I’m quite sure that our fauna and +flora would take a prize over Central Park.” + +“Maybe they would,” admitted Smith, cheerfully. “I haven’t seen them +yet. But I guess you’ve got us skinned on the animal and vegetation +question. You don’t have much travel here, do you?” + +“Travel?” queried the consul. “I suppose you mean passengers on the +steamers. No; very few people land in Coralio. An investor now and +then—tourists and sight-seers generally go further down the coast to +one of the larger towns where there is a harbour.” + +“I see a ship out there loading up with bananas,” said Smith. “Any +passengers come on her?” + +“That’s the _Karlsefin_,” said the consul. “She’s a tramp fruiter—made +her last trip to New York, I believe. No; she brought no passengers. I +saw her boat come ashore, and there was no one. About the only exciting +recreation we have here is watching steamers when they arrive; and a +passenger on one of them generally causes the whole town to turn out. +If you are going to remain in Coralio a while, Mr. Smith, I’ll be glad +to take you around to meet some people. There are four or five American +chaps that are good to know, besides the native high-fliers.” + +“Thanks,” said the yachtsman, “but I wouldn’t put you to the trouble. +I’d like to meet the guys you speak of, but I won’t be here long enough +to do much knocking around. That cool gent on the beach spoke of a +doctor; can you tell me where I could find him? The _Rambler_ ain’t +quite as steady on her feet as a Broadway hotel; and a fellow gets a +touch of seasickness now and then. Thought I’d strike the croaker for a +handful of the little sugar pills, in case I need ’em.” + +“You will be apt to find Dr. Gregg at the hotel,” said the consul. “You +can see it from the door—it’s that two-story building with the balcony, +where the orange-trees are.” + +The Hotel de los Estranjeros was a dreary hostelry, in great disuse +both by strangers and friends. It stood at a corner of the Street of +the Holy Sepulchre. A grove of small orange-trees crowded against one +side of it, enclosed by a low, rock wall over which a tall man might +easily step. The house was of plastered adobe, stained a hundred shades +of colour by the salt breeze and the sun. Upon its upper balcony opened +a central door and two windows containing broad jalousies instead of +sashes. + +The lower floor communicated by two doorways with the narrow, +rock-paved sidewalk. The _pulperia_—or drinking shop—of the +proprietress, Madama Timotea Ortiz, occupied the ground floor. On the +bottles of brandy, _anisada_, Scotch “smoke” and inexpensive wines +behind the little counter the dust lay thick save where the fingers of +infrequent customers had left irregular prints. The upper story +contained four or five guest-rooms which were rarely put to their +destined use. Sometimes a fruit-grower, riding in from his plantation +to confer with his agent, would pass a melancholy night in the dismal +upper story; sometimes a minor native official on some trifling +government quest would have his pomp and majesty awed by Madama’s +sepulchral hospitality. But Madama sat behind her bar content, not +desiring to quarrel with Fate. If anyone required meat, drink or +lodging at the Hotel de los Estranjeros they had but to come, and be +served. _Está bueno._ If they came not, why, then, they came not. _Está +bueno._ + +As the exceptional yachtsman was making his way down the precarious +sidewalk of the Street of the Holy Sepulchre, the solitary permanent +guest of that decaying hotel sat at its door, enjoying the breeze from +the sea. + +Dr. Gregg, the quarantine physician, was a man of fifty or sixty, with +a florid face and the longest beard between Topeka and Terra del Fuego. +He held his position by virtue of an appointment by the Board of Health +of a seaport city in one of the Southern states. That city feared the +ancient enemy of every Southern seaport—the yellow fever—and it was the +duty of Dr. Gregg to examine crew and passengers of every vessel +leaving Coralio for preliminary symptoms. The duties were light, and +the salary, for one who lived in Coralio, ample. Surplus time there was +in plenty; and the good doctor added to his gains by a large private +practice among the residents of the coast. The fact that he did not +know ten words of Spanish was no obstacle; a pulse could be felt and a +fee collected without one being a linguist. Add to the description the +facts that the doctor had a story to tell concerning the operation of +trepanning which no listener had ever allowed him to conclude, and that +he believed in brandy as a prophylactic; and the special points of +interest possessed by Dr. Gregg will have become exhausted. + +The doctor had dragged a chair to the sidewalk. He was coatless, and he +leaned back against the wall and smoked, while he stroked his beard. +Surprise came into his pale blue eyes when he caught sight of Smith in +his unusual and prismatic clothes. + +“You’re Dr. Gregg—is that right?” said Smith, feeling the dog’s head +pin in his tie. “The constable—I mean the consul, told me you hung out +at this caravansary. My name’s Smith; and I came in a yacht. Taking a +cruise around, looking at the monkeys and pineapple-trees. Come inside +and have a drink, Doc. This café looks on the blink, but I guess it can +set out something wet.” + +“I will join you, sir, in just a taste of brandy,” said Dr. Gregg, +rising quickly. “I find that as a prophylactic a little brandy is +almost a necessity in this climate.” + +As they turned to enter the _pulperia_ a native man, barefoot, glided +noiselessly up and addressed the doctor in Spanish. He was +yellowish-brown, like an over-ripe lemon; he wore a cotton shirt and +ragged linen trousers girded by a leather belt. His face was like an +animal’s, live and wary, but without promise of much intelligence. This +man jabbered with animation and so much seriousness that it seemed a +pity that his words were to be wasted. + +Dr. Gregg felt his pulse. + +“You sick?” he inquired. + +“_Mi mujer está enferma en la casa_,” said the man, thus endeavouring +to convey the news, in the only language open to him, that his wife lay +ill in her palm-thatched hut. + +The doctor drew a handful of capsules filled with a white powder from +his trousers pocket. He counted out ten of them into the native’s hand, +and held up his forefinger impressively. + +“Take one,” said the doctor, “every two hours.” He then held up two +fingers, shaking them emphatically before the native’s face. Next he +pulled out his watch and ran his finger round its dial twice. Again the +two fingers confronted the patient’s nose. “Two—two—two hours,” +repeated the doctor. + +“_Si, Señor_,” said the native, sadly. + +He pulled a cheap silver watch from his own pocket and laid it in the +doctor’s hand. “Me bring,” said he, struggling painfully with his scant +English, “other watchy to-morrow.” Then he departed downheartedly with +his capsules. + +“A very ignorant race of people, sir,” said the doctor, as he slipped +the watch into his pocket. “He seems to have mistaken my directions for +taking the physic for the fee. However, it is all right. He owes me an +account, anyway. The chances are that he won’t bring the other watch. +You can’t depend on anything they promise you. About that drink, now? +How did you come to Coralio, Mr. Smith? I was not aware that any boats +except the _Karlsefin_ had arrived for some days.” + +The two leaned against the deserted bar; and Madama set out a bottle +without waiting for the doctor’s order. There was no dust on it. + +After they had drank twice Smith said: + +“You say there were no passengers on the _Karlsefin_, Doc? Are you sure +about that? It seems to me I heard somebody down on the beach say that +there was one or two aboard.” + +“They were mistaken, sir. I myself went out and put all hands through a +medical examination, as usual. The _Karlsefin_ sails as soon as she +gets her bananas loaded, which will be about daylight in the morning, +and she got everything ready this afternoon. No, sir, there was no +passenger list. Like that Three-Star? A French schooner landed two +slooploads of it a month ago. If any customs duties on it went to the +distinguished republic of Anchuria you may have my hat. If you won’t +have another, come out and let’s sit in the cool a while. It isn’t +often we exiles get a chance to talk with somebody from the outside +world.” + +The doctor brought out another chair to the sidewalk for his new +acquaintance. The two seated themselves. + +“You are a man of the world,” said Dr. Gregg; “a man of travel and +experience. Your decision in a matter of ethics and, no doubt, on the +points of equity, ability and professional probity should be of value. +I would be glad if you will listen to the history of a case that I +think stands unique in medical annals. + +“About nine years ago, while I was engaged in the practice of medicine +in my native city, I was called to treat a case of contusion of the +skull. I made the diagnosis that a splinter of bone was pressing upon +the brain, and that the surgical operation known as trepanning was +required. However, as the patient was a gentleman of wealth and +position, I called in for consultation Dr.—” + +Smith rose from his chair, and laid a hand, soft with apology, upon the +doctor’s shirt sleeve. + +“Say, Doc,” he said, solemnly, “I want to hear that story. You’ve got +me interested; and I don’t want to miss the rest of it. I know it’s a +loola by the way it begins; and I want to tell it at the next meeting +of the Barney O’Flynn Association, if you don’t mind. But I’ve got one +or two matters to attend to first. If I get ’em attended to in time +I’ll come right back and hear you spiel the rest before bedtime—is that +right?” + +“By all means,” said the doctor, “get your business attended to, and +then return. I shall wait up for you. You see, one of the most +prominent physicians at the consultation diagnosed the trouble as a +blood clot; another said it was an abscess, but I—” + +“Don’t tell me now, Doc. Don’t spoil the story. Wait till I come back. +I want to hear it as it runs off the reel—is that right?” + +The mountains reached up their bulky shoulders to receive the level +gallop of Apollo’s homing steeds, the day died in the lagoons and in +the shadowed banana groves and in the mangrove swamps, where the great +blue crabs were beginning to crawl to land for their nightly ramble. +And it died, at last, upon the highest peaks. Then the brief twilight, +ephemeral as the flight of a moth, came and went; the Southern Cross +peeped with its topmost eye above a row of palms, and the fire-flies +heralded with their torches the approach of soft-footed night. + +In the offing the _Karlsefin_ swayed at anchor, her lights seeming to +penetrate the water to countless fathoms with their shimmering, +lanceolate reflections. The Caribs were busy loading her by means of +the great lighters heaped full from the piles of fruit ranged upon the +shore. + +On the sandy beach, with his back against a cocoanut-tree and the stubs +of many cigars lying around him, Smith sat waiting, never relaxing his +sharp gaze in the direction of the steamer. + +The incongruous yachtsman had concentrated his interest upon the +innocent fruiter. Twice had he been assured that no passengers had come +to Coralio on board of her. And yet, with a persistence not to be +attributed to an idling voyager, he had appealed the case to the higher +court of his own eyesight. Surprisingly like some gay-coated lizard, he +crouched at the foot of the cocoanut palm, and with the beady, shifting +eyes of the selfsame reptile, sustained his espionage on the +_Karlsefin_. + +On the white sands a whiter gig belonging to the yacht was drawn up, +guarded by one of the white-ducked crew. Not far away in a _pulperia_ +on the shore-following Calle Grande three other sailors swaggered with +their cues around Coralio’s solitary billiard-table. The boat lay there +as if under orders to be ready for use at any moment. There was in the +atmosphere a hint of expectation, of waiting for something to occur, +which was foreign to the air of Coralio. + +Like some passing bird of brilliant plumage, Smith alights on this +palmy shore but to preen his wings for an instant and then to fly away +upon silent pinions. When morning dawned there was no Smith, no waiting +gig, no yacht in the offing. Smith left no intimation of his mission +there, no footprints to show where he had followed the trail of his +mystery on the sands of Coralio that night. He came; he spake his +strange jargon of the asphalt and the cafés; he sat under the +cocoanut-tree, and vanished. The next morning Coralio, Smithless, ate +its fried plantain and said: “The man of pictured clothing went himself +away.” With the _siesta_ the incident passed, yawning, into history. + +So, for a time, must Smith pass behind the scenes of the play. He comes +no more to Coralio nor to Doctor Gregg, who sits in vain, wagging his +redundant beard, waiting to enrich his derelict audience with his +moving tale of trepanning and jealousy. + +But prosperously to the lucidity of these loose pages, Smith shall +flutter among them again. In the nick of time he shall come to tell us +why he strewed so many anxious cigar stumps around the cocoanut palm +that night. This he must do; for, when he sailed away before the dawn +in his yacht _Rambler_, he carried with him the answer to a riddle so +big and preposterous that few in Anchuria had ventured even to propound +it. + + + + +IV +CAUGHT + + +The plans for the detention of the flying President Miraflores and his +companion at the coast line seemed hardly likely to fail. Dr. Zavalla +himself had gone to the port of Alazan to establish a guard at that +point. At Solitas the Liberal patriot Varras could be depended upon to +keep close watch. Goodwin held himself responsible for the district +about Coralio. + +The news of the president’s flight had been disclosed to no one in the +coast towns save trusted members of the ambitious political party that +was desirous of succeeding to power. The telegraph wire running from +San Mateo to the coast had been cut far up on the mountain trail by an +emissary of Zavalla’s. Long before this could be repaired and word +received along it from the capital the fugitives would have reached the +coast and the question of escape or capture been solved. + +Goodwin had stationed armed sentinels at frequent intervals along the +shore for a mile in each direction from Coralio. They were instructed +to keep a vigilant lookout during the night to prevent Miraflores from +attempting to embark stealthily by means of some boat or sloop found by +chance at the water’s edge. A dozen patrols walked the streets of +Coralio unsuspected, ready to intercept the truant official should he +show himself there. + +Goodwin was very well convinced that no precautions had been +overlooked. He strolled about the streets that bore such high-sounding +names and were but narrow, grass-covered lanes, lending his own aid to +the vigil that had been intrusted to him by Bob Englehart. + +The town had begun the tepid round of its nightly diversions. A few +leisurely dandies, clad in white duck, with flowing neckties, and +swinging slim bamboo canes, threaded the grassy by-ways toward the +houses of their favoured señoritas. Those who wooed the art of music +dragged tirelessly at whining concertinas, or fingered lugubrious +guitars at doors and windows. An occasional soldier from the _cuartel_, +with flapping straw hat, without coat or shoes, hurried by, balancing +his long gun like a lance in one hand. From every density of the +foliage the giant tree frogs sounded their loud and irritating clatter. +Further out, where the by-ways perished at the brink of the jungle, the +guttural cries of marauding baboons and the coughing of the alligators +in the black estuaries fractured the vain silence of the wood. + +By ten o’clock the streets were deserted. The oil lamps that had +burned, a sickly yellow, at random corners, had been extinguished by +some economical civic agent. Coralio lay sleeping calmly between +toppling mountains and encroaching sea like a stolen babe in the arms +of its abductors. Somewhere over in that tropical darkness—perhaps +already threading the profundities of the alluvial lowlands—the high +adventurer and his mate were moving toward land’s end. The game of +Fox-in-the-Morning should be coming soon to its close. + +Goodwin, at his deliberate gait, passed the long, low _cuartel_ where +Coralio’s contingent of Anchuria’s military force slumbered, with its +bare toes pointed heavenward. There was a law that no civilian might +come so near the headquarters of that citadel of war after nine +o’clock, but Goodwin was always forgetting the minor statutes. + +“_Quién vive?_” shrieked the sentinel, wrestling prodigiously with his +lengthy musket. + +“_Americano_,” growled Goodwin, without turning his head, and passed +on, unhalted. + +To the right he turned, and to the left up the street that ultimately +reached the Plaza Nacional. When within the toss of a cigar stump from +the intersecting Street of the Holy Sepulchre, he stopped suddenly in +the pathway. + +He saw the form of a tall man, clothed in black and carrying a large +valise, hurry down the cross-street in the direction of the beach. And +Goodwin’s second glance made him aware of a woman at the man’s elbow on +the farther side, who seemed to urge forward, if not even to assist, +her companion in their swift but silent progress. They were no +Coralians, those two. + +Goodwin followed at increased speed, but without any of the artful +tactics that are so dear to the heart of the sleuth. The American was +too broad to feel the instinct of the detective. He stood as an agent +for the people of Anchuria, and but for political reasons he would have +demanded then and there the money. It was the design of his party to +secure the imperilled fund, to restore it to the treasury of the +country, and to declare itself in power without bloodshed or +resistance. + +The couple halted at the door of the Hotel de los Estranjeros, and the +man struck upon the wood with the impatience of one unused to his entry +being stayed. Madama was long in response; but after a time her light +showed, the door was opened, and the guests housed. + +Goodwin stood in the quiet street, lighting another cigar. In two +minutes a faint gleam began to show between the slats of the jalousies +in the upper story of the hotel. “They have engaged rooms,” said +Goodwin to himself. “So, then, their arrangements for sailing have yet +to be made.” + +At that moment there came along one Estebán Delgado, a barber, an enemy +to existing government, a jovial plotter against stagnation in any +form. This barber was one of Coralio’s saddest dogs, often remaining +out of doors as late as eleven, post meridian. He was a partisan +Liberal; and he greeted Goodwin with flatulent importance as a brother +in the cause. But he had something important to tell. + +“What think you, Don Frank!” he cried, in the universal tone of the +conspirator. “I have to-night shaved _la barba_—what you call the +‘weeskers’ of the _Presidente_ himself, of this countree! Consider! He +sent for me to come. In the poor _casita_ of an old woman he awaited +me—in a verree leetle house in a dark place. _Carramba!_—el Señor +Presidente to make himself thus secret and obscured! I think he desired +not to be known—but, _carajo!_ can you shave a man and not see his +face? This gold piece he gave me, and said it was to be all quite +still. I think, Don Frank, there is what you call a chip over the bug.” + +“Have you ever seen President Miraflores before?” asked Goodwin. + +“But once,” answered Estebán. “He is tall; and he had weeskers, verree +black and sufficient.” + +“Was anyone else present when you shaved him?” + +“An old Indian woman, Señor, that belonged with the _casa_, and one +señorita—a ladee of so much beautee!—_ah, Dios!_” + +“All right, Estebán,” said Goodwin. “It’s very lucky that you happened +along with your tonsorial information. The new administration will be +likely to remember you for this.” + +Then in a few words he made the barber acquainted with the crisis into +which the affairs of the nation had culminated, and instructed him to +remain outside, keeping watch upon the two sides of the hotel that +looked upon the street, and observing whether anyone should attempt to +leave the house by any door or window. Goodwin himself went to the door +through which the guests had entered, opened it and stepped inside. + +Madama had returned downstairs from her journey above to see after the +comfort of her lodgers. Her candle stood upon the bar. She was about to +take a thimbleful of rum as a solace for having her rest disturbed. She +looked up without surprise or alarm as her third caller entered. + +“Ah! it is the Señor Goodwin. Not often does he honour my poor house by +his presence.” + +“I must come oftener,” said Goodwin, with the Goodwin smile. “I hear +that your cognac is the best between Belize to the north and Rio to the +south. Set out the bottle, Madama, and let us have the proof in _un +vasito_ for each of us.” + +“My _aguardiente_,” said Madama, with pride, “is the best. It grows, in +beautiful bottles, in the dark places among the banana-trees. _Si, +Señor._ Only at midnight can they be picked by sailor-men who bring +them, before daylight comes, to your back door. Good _aguardiente_ is a +verree difficult fruit to handle, Señor Goodwin.” + +Smuggling, in Coralio, was much nearer than competition to being the +life of trade. One spoke of it slyly, yet with a certain conceit, when +it had been well accomplished. + +“You have guests in the house to-night,” said Goodwin, laying a silver +dollar upon the counter. + +“Why not?” said Madama, counting the change. “Two; but the smallest +while finished to arrive. One señor, not quite old, and one señorita of +sufficient handsomeness. To their rooms they have ascended, not +desiring the to-eat nor the to-drink. Two rooms—_Numero_ 9 and _Numero_ +10.” + +“I was expecting that gentleman and that lady,” said Goodwin. “I have +important _negocios_ that must be transacted. Will you allow me to see +them?” + +“Why not?” sighed Madama, placidly. “Why should not Señor Goodwin +ascend and speak to his friends? _Está bueno._ Room _Numero_ 9 and room +_Numero_ 10.” + +Goodwin loosened in his coat pocket the American revolver that he +carried, and ascended the steep, dark stairway. + +In the hallway above, the saffron light from a hanging lamp allowed him +to select the gaudy numbers on the doors. He turned the knob of Number +9, entered and closed the door behind him. + +If that was Isabel Guilbert seated by the table in that poorly +furnished room, report had failed to do her charms justice. She rested +her head upon one hand. Extreme fatigue was signified in every line of +her figure; and upon her countenance a deep perplexity was written. Her +eyes were gray-irised, and of that mould that seems to have belonged to +the orbs of all the famous queens of hearts. Their whites were +singularly clear and brilliant, concealed above the irises by heavy +horizontal lids, and showing a snowy line below them. Such eyes denote +great nobility, vigour, and, if you can conceive of it, a most generous +selfishness. She looked up when the American entered with an expression +of surprised inquiry, but without alarm. + +Goodwin took off his hat and seated himself, with his characteristic +deliberate ease, upon a corner of the table. He held a lighted cigar +between his fingers. He took this familiar course because he was sure +that preliminaries would be wasted upon Miss Guilbert. He knew her +history, and the small part that the conventions had played in it. + +“Good evening,” he said. “Now, madame, let us come to business at once. +You will observe that I mention no names, but I know who is in the next +room, and what he carries in that valise. That is the point which +brings me here. I have come to dictate terms of surrender.” + +The lady neither moved nor replied, but steadily regarded the cigar in +Goodwin’s hand. + +“We,” continued the dictator, thoughtfully regarding the neat buckskin +shoe on his gently swinging foot—“I speak for a considerable majority +of the people—demand the return of the stolen funds belonging to them. +Our terms go very little further than that. They are very simple. As an +accredited spokesman, I promise that our interference will cease if +they are accepted. Give up the money, and you and your companion will +be permitted to proceed wherever you will. In fact, assistance will be +given you in the matter of securing a passage by any outgoing vessel +you may choose. It is on my personal responsibility that I add +congratulations to the gentleman in Number 10 upon his taste in +feminine charms.” + +Returning his cigar to his mouth, Goodwin observed her, and saw that +her eyes followed it and rested upon it with icy and significant +concentration. Apparently she had not heard a word he had said. He +understood, tossed the cigar out the window, and, with an amused laugh, +slid from the table to his feet. + +“That is better,” said the lady. “It makes it possible for me to listen +to you. For a second lesson in good manners, you might now tell me by +whom I am being insulted.” + +“I am sorry,” said Goodwin, leaning one hand on the table, “that my +time is too brief for devoting much of it to a course of etiquette. +Come, now; I appeal to your good sense. You have shown yourself, in +more than one instance, to be well aware of what is to your advantage. +This is an occasion that demands the exercise of your undoubted +intelligence. There is no mystery here. I am Frank Goodwin; and I have +come for the money. I entered this room at a venture. Had I entered the +other I would have had it before now. Do you want it in words? The +gentleman in Number 10 has betrayed a great trust. He has robbed his +people of a large sum, and it is I who will prevent their losing it. I +do not say who that gentleman is; but if I should be forced to see him +and he should prove to be a certain high official of the republic, it +will be my duty to arrest him. The house is guarded. I am offering you +liberal terms. It is not absolutely necessary that I confer personally +with the gentleman in the next room. Bring me the valise containing the +money, and we will call the affair ended.” + +The lady arose from her chair and stood for a moment, thinking deeply. + +“Do you live here, Mr. Goodwin?” she asked, presently. + +“Yes.” + +“What is your authority for this intrusion?” + +“I am an instrument of the republic. I was advised by wire of the +movements of the—gentleman in Number 10.” + +“May I ask you two or three questions? I believe you to be a man more +apt to be truthful than—timid. What sort of a town is this—Coralio, I +think they call it?” + +“Not much of a town,” said Goodwin, smiling. “A banana town, as they +run. Grass huts, ’dobes, five or six two-story houses, accommodations +limited, population half-breed Spanish and Indian, Caribs and +blackamoors. No sidewalks to speak of, no amusements. Rather unmoral. +That’s an offhand sketch, of course.” + +“Are there any inducements, say in a social or in a business way, for +people to reside here?” + +“Oh, yes,” answered Goodwin, smiling broadly. “There are no afternoon +teas, no hand-organs, no department stores—and there is no extradition +treaty.” + +“He told me,” went on the lady, speaking as if to herself, and with a +slight frown, “that there were towns on this coast of beauty and +importance; that there was a pleasing social order—especially an +American colony of cultured residents.” + +“There is an American colony,” said Goodwin, gazing at her in some +wonder. “Some of the members are all right. Some are fugitives from +justice from the States. I recall two exiled bank presidents, one army +paymaster under a cloud, a couple of manslayers, and a widow—arsenic, I +believe, was the suspicion in her case. I myself complete the colony, +but, as yet, I have not distinguished myself by any particular crime.” + +“Do not lose hope,” said the lady, dryly; “I see nothing in your +actions to-night to guarantee you further obscurity. Some mistake has +been made; I do not know just where. But _him_ you shall not disturb +to-night. The journey has fatigued him so that he has fallen asleep, I +think, in his clothes. You talk of stolen money! I do not understand +you. Some mistake has been made. I will convince you. Remain where you +are and I will bring you the valise that you seem to covet so, and show +it to you.” + +She moved toward the closed door that connected the two rooms, but +stopped, and half turned and bestowed upon Goodwin a grave, searching +look that ended in a quizzical smile. + +“You force my door,” she said, “and you follow your ruffianly behaviour +with the basest accusations; and yet”—she hesitated, as if to +reconsider what she was about to say—“and yet—it is a puzzling thing—I +am sure there has been some mistake.” + +She took a step toward the door, but Goodwin stayed her by a light +touch upon her arm. I have said before that women turned to look at him +in the streets. He was the viking sort of man, big, good-looking, and +with an air of kindly truculence. She was dark and proud, glowing or +pale as her mood moved her. I do not know if Eve were light or dark, +but if such a woman had stood in the garden I know that the apple would +have been eaten. This woman was to be Goodwin’s fate, and he did not +know it; but he must have felt the first throes of destiny, for, as he +faced her, the knowledge of what report named her turned bitter in his +throat. + +“If there has been any mistake,” he said, hotly, “it was yours. I do +not blame the man who has lost his country, his honour, and is about to +lose the poor consolation of his stolen riches as much as I blame you, +for, by Heaven! I can very well see how he was brought to it. I can +understand, and pity him. It is such women as you that strew this +degraded coast with wretched exiles, that make men forget their trusts, +that drag—” + +The lady interrupted him with a weary gesture. + +“There is no need to continue your insults,” she said, coldly. “I do +not understand what you are saying, nor do I know what mad blunder you +are making; but if the inspection of the contents of a gentleman’s +portmanteau will rid me of you, let us delay it no longer.” + +She passed quickly and noiselessly into the other room, and returned +with the heavy leather valise, which she handed to the American with an +air of patient contempt. + +Goodwin set the valise quickly upon the table and began to unfasten the +straps. The lady stood by, with an expression of infinite scorn and +weariness upon her face. + +The valise opened wide to a powerful, sidelong wrench. Goodwin dragged +out two or three articles of clothing, exposing the bulk of its +contents—package after package of tightly packed United States bank and +treasury notes of large denomination. Reckoning from the high figures +written upon the paper bands that bound them, the total must have come +closely upon the hundred thousand mark. + +Goodwin glanced swiftly at the woman, and saw, with surprise and a +thrill of pleasure that he wondered at, that she had experienced an +unmistakable shock. Her eyes grew wide, she gasped, and leaned heavily +against the table. She had been ignorant, then, he inferred, that her +companion had looted the government treasury. But why, he angrily asked +himself, should he be so well pleased to think this wandering and +unscrupulous singer not so black as report had painted her? + +A noise in the other room startled them both. The door swung open, and +a tall, elderly, dark complexioned man, recently shaven, hurried into +the room. + +All the pictures of President Miraflores represent him as the possessor +of a luxuriant supply of dark and carefully tended whiskers; but the +story of the barber, Estebán, had prepared Goodwin for the change. + +The man stumbled in from the dark room, his eyes blinking at the +lamplight, and heavy from sleep. + +“What does this mean?” he demanded in excellent English, with a keen +and perturbed look at the American—“robbery?” + +“Very near it,” answered Goodwin. “But I rather think I’m in time to +prevent it. I represent the people to whom this money belongs, and I +have come to convey it back to them.” He thrust his hand into a pocket +of his loose, linen coat. + +The other man’s hand went quickly behind him. + +“Don’t draw,” called Goodwin, sharply; “I’ve got you covered from my +pocket.” + +The lady stepped forward, and laid one hand upon the shoulder of her +hesitating companion. She pointed to the table. “Tell me the truth—the +truth,” she said, in a low voice. “Whose money is that?” + +The man did not answer. He gave a deep, long-drawn sigh, leaned and +kissed her on the forehead, stepped back into the other room and closed +the door. + +Goodwin foresaw his purpose, and jumped for the door, but the report of +the pistol echoed as his hand touched the knob. A heavy fall followed, +and some one swept him aside and struggled into the room of the fallen +man. + +A desolation, thought Goodwin, greater than that derived from the loss +of cavalier and gold must have been in the heart of the enchantress to +have wrung from her, in that moment, the cry of one turning to the +all-forgiving, all-comforting earthly consoler—to have made her call +out from that bloody and dishonoured room—“Oh, mother, mother, mother!” + +But there was an alarm outside. The barber, Estebán, at the sound of +the shot, had raised his voice; and the shot itself had aroused half +the town. A pattering of feet came up the street, and official orders +rang out on the still air. Goodwin had a duty to perform. Circumstances +had made him the custodian of his adopted country’s treasure. Swiftly +cramming the money into the valise, he closed it, leaned far out of the +window and dropped it into a thick orange-tree in the little inclosure +below. + +They will tell you in Coralio, as they delight in telling the stranger, +of the conclusion of that tragic flight. They will tell you how the +upholders of the law came apace when the alarm was sounded—the +_Comandante_ in red slippers and a jacket like a head waiter’s and +girded sword, the soldiers with their interminable guns, followed by +outnumbering officers struggling into their gold lace and epaulettes; +the barefooted policemen (the only capables in the lot), and ruffled +citizens of every hue and description. + +They say that the countenance of the dead man was marred sadly by the +effects of the shot; but he was identified as the fallen president by +both Goodwin and the barber Estebán. On the next morning messages began +to come over the mended telegraph wire; and the story of the flight +from the capital was given out to the public. In San Mateo the +revolutionary party had seized the sceptre of government, without +opposition, and the _vivas_ of the mercurial populace quickly effaced +the interest belonging to the unfortunate Miraflores. + +They will relate to you how the new government sifted the towns and +raked the roads to find the valise containing Anchuria’s surplus +capital, which the president was known to have carried with him, but +all in vain. In Coralio Señor Goodwin himself led the searching party +which combed that town as carefully as a woman combs her hair; but the +money was not found. + +So they buried the dead man, without honours, back of the town near the +little bridge that spans the mangrove swamp; and for a _real_ a boy +will show you his grave. They say that the old woman in whose hut the +barber shaved the president placed the wooden slab at his head, and +burned the inscription upon it with a hot iron. + +You will hear also that Señor Goodwin, like a tower of strength, +shielded Doña Isabel Guilbert through those subsequent distressful +days; and that his scruples as to her past career (if he had any) +vanished; and her adventuresome waywardness (if she had any) left her, +and they were wedded and were happy. + +The American built a home on a little foothill near the town. It is a +conglomerate structure of native woods that, exported, would be worth a +fortune, and of brick, palm, glass, bamboo and adobe. There is a +paradise of nature about it; and something of the same sort within. The +natives speak of its interior with hands uplifted in admiration. There +are floors polished like mirrors and covered with hand-woven Indian +rugs of silk fibre, tall ornaments and pictures, musical instruments +and papered walls—“figure-it-to-yourself!” they exclaim. + +But they cannot tell you in Coralio (as you shall learn) what became of +the money that Frank Goodwin dropped into the orange-tree. But that +shall come later; for the palms are fluttering in the breeze, bidding +us to sport and gaiety. + + + + +V +CUPID’S EXILE NUMBER TWO + + +The United States of America, after looking over its stock of consular +timber, selected Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood, of Dalesburg, Alabama, +for a successor to Willard Geddie, resigned. + +Without prejudice to Mr. Atwood, it will have to be acknowledged that, +in this instance, it was the man who sought the office. As with the +self-banished Geddie, it was nothing less than the artful smiles of +lovely woman that had driven Johnny Atwood to the desperate expedient +of accepting office under a despised Federal Government so that he +might go far, far away and never see again the false, fair face that +had wrecked his young life. The consulship at Coralio seemed to offer a +retreat sufficiently removed and romantic enough to inject the +necessary drama into the pastoral scenes of Dalesburg life. + +It was while playing the part of Cupid’s exile that Johnny added his +handiwork to the long list of casualties along the Spanish Main by his +famous manipulation of the shoe market, and his unparalleled feat of +elevating the most despised and useless weed in his own country from +obscurity to be a valuable product in international commerce. + +The trouble began, as trouble often begins instead of ending, with a +romance. In Dalesburg there was a man named Elijah Hemstetter, who kept +a general store. His family consisted of one daughter called Rosine, a +name that atoned much for “Hemstetter.” This young woman was possessed +of plentiful attractions, so that the young men of the community were +agitated in their bosoms. Among the more agitated was Johnny, the son +of Judge Atwood, who lived in the big colonial mansion on the edge of +Dalesburg. + +It would seem that the desirable Rosine should have been pleased to +return the affection of an Atwood, a name honoured all over the state +long before and since the war. It does seem that she should have gladly +consented to have been led into that stately but rather empty colonial +mansion. But not so. There was a cloud on the horizon, a threatening, +cumulus cloud, in the shape of a lively and shrewd young farmer in the +neighbourhood who dared to enter the lists as a rival to the high-born +Atwood. + +One night Johnny propounded to Rosine a question that is considered of +much importance by the young of the human species. The accessories were +all there—moonlight, oleanders, magnolias, the mock-bird’s song. +Whether or no the shadow of Pinkney Dawson, the prosperous young +farmer, came between them on that occasion is not known; but Rosine’s +answer was unfavourable. Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood bowed till his +hat touched the lawn grass, and went away with his head high, but with +a sore wound in his pedigree and heart. A Hemstetter refuse an Atwood! +Zounds! + +Among other accidents of that year was a Democratic president. Judge +Atwood was a warhorse of Democracy. Johnny persuaded him to set the +wheels moving for some foreign appointment. He would go away—away. +Perhaps in years to come Rosine would think how true, how faithful his +love had been, and would drop a tear—maybe in the cream she would be +skimming for Pink Dawson’s breakfast. + +The wheels of politics revolved; and Johnny was appointed consul to +Coralio. Just before leaving he dropped in at Hemstetter’s to say +good-bye. There was a queer, pinkish look about Rosine’s eyes; and had +the two been alone, the United States might have had to cast about for +another consul. But Pink Dawson was there, of course, talking about his +400-acre orchard, and the three-mile alfalfa tract, and the 200-acre +pasture. So Johnny shook hands with Rosine as coolly as if he were only +going to run up to Montgomery for a couple of days. They had the royal +manner when they chose, those Atwoods. + +“If you happen to strike anything in the way of a good investment down +there, Johnny,” said Pink Dawson, “just let me know, will you? I reckon +I could lay my hands on a few extra thousands ’most any time for a +profitable deal.” + +“Certainly, Pink,” said Johnny, pleasantly. “If I strike anything of +the sort I’ll let you in with pleasure.” + +So Johnny went down to Mobile and took a fruit steamer for the coast of +Anchuria. + +When the new consul arrived in Coralio the strangeness of the scenes +diverted him much. He was only twenty-two; and the grief of youth is +not worn like a garment as it is by older men. It has its seasons when +it reigns; and then it is unseated for a time by the assertion of the +keen senses. + +Billy Keogh and Johnny seemed to conceive a mutual friendship at once. +Keogh took the new consul about town and presented him to the handful +of Americans and the smaller number of French and Germans who made up +the “foreign” contingent. And then, of course, he had to be more +formally introduced to the native officials, and have his credentials +transmitted through an interpreter. + +There was something about the young Southerner that the sophisticated +Keogh liked. His manner was simple almost to boyishness; but he +possessed the cool carelessness of a man of far greater age and +experience. Neither uniforms nor titles, red tape nor foreign +languages, mountains nor sea weighed upon his spirits. He was heir to +all the ages, an Atwood, of Dalesburg; and you might know every thought +conceived in his bosom. + +Geddie came down to the consulate to explain the duties and workings of +the office. He and Keogh tried to interest the new consul in their +description of the work that his government expected him to perform. + +“It’s all right,” said Johnny from the hammock that he had set up as +the official reclining place. “If anything turns up that has to be done +I’ll let you fellows do it. You can’t expect a Democrat to work during +his first term of holding office.” + +“You might look over these headings,” suggested Geddie, “of the +different lines of exports you will have to keep account of. The fruit +is classified; and there are the valuable woods, coffee, rubber—” + +“That last account sounds all right,” interrupted Mr. Atwood. “Sounds +as if it could be stretched. I want to buy a new flag, a monkey, a +guitar and a barrel of pineapples. Will that rubber account stretch +over ’em?” + +“That’s merely statistics,” said Geddie, smiling. “The expense account +is what you want. It is supposed to have a slight elasticity. The +‘stationery’ items are sometimes carelessly audited by the State +Department.” + +“We’re wasting our time,” said Keogh. “This man was born to hold +office. He penetrates to the root of the art at one step of his eagle +eye. The true genius of government shows its hand in every word of his +speech.” + +“I didn’t take this job with any intention of working,” explained +Johnny, lazily. “I wanted to go somewhere in the world where they +didn’t talk about farms. There are none here, are there?” + +“Not the kind you are acquainted with,” answered the ex-consul. “There +is no such art here as agriculture. There never was a plow or a reaper +within the boundaries of Anchuria.” + +“This is the country for me,” murmured the consul, and immediately he +fell asleep. + +The cheerful tintypist pursued his intimacy with Johnny in spite of +open charges that he did so to obtain a preëmption on a seat in that +coveted spot, the rear gallery of the consulate. But whether his +designs were selfish or purely friendly, Keogh achieved that desirable +privilege. Few were the nights on which the two could not be found +reposing there in the sea breeze, with their heels on the railing, and +the cigars and brandy conveniently near. + +One evening they sat thus, mainly silent, for their talk had dwindled +before the stilling influence of an unusual night. + +There was a great, full moon; and the sea was mother-of-pearl. Almost +every sound was hushed, for the air was but faintly stirring; and the +town lay panting, waiting for the night to cool. Offshore lay the fruit +steamer _Andador_, of the Vesuvius line, full-laden and scheduled to +sail at six in the morning. There were no loiterers on the beach. So +bright was the moonlight that the two men could see the small pebbles +shining on the beach where the gentle surf wetted them. + +Then down the coast, tacking close to shore, slowly swam a little +sloop, white-winged like some snowy sea fowl. Its course lay within +twenty points of the wind’s eye; so it veered in and out again in long, +slow strokes like the movements of a graceful skater. + +Again the tactics of its crew brought it close in shore, this time +nearly opposite the consulate; and then there blew from the sloop clear +and surprising notes as if from a horn of elfland. A fairy bugle it +might have been, sweet and silvery and unexpected, playing with spirit +the familiar air of “Home, Sweet Home.” + +It was a scene set for the land of the lotus. The authority of the sea +and the tropics, the mystery that attends unknown sails, and the +prestige of drifting music on moonlit waters gave it an anodynous +charm. Johnny Atwood felt it, and thought of Dalesburg; but as soon as +Keogh’s mind had arrived at a theory concerning the peripatetic solo he +sprang to the railing, and his ear-rending yawp fractured the silence +of Coralio like a cannon shot. + +“Mel-lin-ger a-hoy!” + +The sloop was now on its outward tack; but from it came a clear, +answering hail: + +“Good-bye, Billy … go-ing home—bye!” + +The _Andador_ was the sloop’s destination. No doubt some passenger with +a sailing permit from some up-the-coast point had come down in this +sloop to catch the regular fruit steamer on its return trip. Like a +coquettish pigeon the little boat tacked on its eccentric way until at +last its white sail was lost to sight against the larger bulk of the +fruiter’s side. + +“That’s old H. P. Mellinger,” explained Keogh, dropping back into his +chair. “He’s going back to New York. He was private secretary of the +late hot-foot president of this grocery and fruit stand that they call +a country. His job’s over now; and I guess old Mellinger is glad.” + +“Why does he disappear to music, like Zo-zo, the magic queen?” asked +Johnny. “Just to show ’em that he doesn’t care?” + +“That noise you heard is a phonograph,” said Keogh. “I sold him that. +Mellinger had a graft in this country that was the only thing of its +kind in the world. The tooting machine saved it for him once, and he +always carried it around with him afterward.” + +“Tell me about it,” demanded Johnny, betraying interest. + +“I’m no disseminator of narratives,” said Keogh. “I can use language +for purposes of speech; but when I attempt a discourse the words come +out as they will, and they may make sense when they strike the +atmosphere, or they may not.” + +“I want to hear about that graft,” persisted Johnny. “You’ve got no +right to refuse. I’ve told you all about every man, woman and hitching +post in Dalesburg.” + +“You shall hear it,” said Keogh. “I said my instincts of narrative were +perplexed. Don’t you believe it. It’s an art I’ve acquired along with +many other of the graces and sciences.” + + + + +VI +THE PHONOGRAPH AND THE GRAFT + + +“What was this graft?” asked Johnny, with the impatience of the great +public to whom tales are told. + +“’Tis contrary to art and philosophy to give you the information,” said +Keogh, calmly. “The art of narrative consists in concealing from your +audience everything it wants to know until after you expose your +favourite opinions on topics foreign to the subject. A good story is +like a bitter pill with the sugar coating inside of it. I will begin, +if you please, with a horoscope located in the Cherokee Nation; and end +with a moral tune on the phonograph. + +“Me and Henry Horsecollar brought the first phonograph to this country. +Henry was a quarter-breed, quarter-back Cherokee, educated East in the +idioms of football, and West in contraband whisky, and a gentleman, the +same as you and me. He was easy and romping in his ways; a man about +six foot, with a kind of rubber-tire movement. Yes, he was a little man +about five foot five, or five foot eleven. He was what you would call a +medium tall man of average smallness. Henry had quit college once, and +the Muscogee jail three times—the last-named institution on account of +introducing and selling whisky in the territories. Henry Horsecollar +never let any cigar stores come up and stand behind him. He didn’t +belong to that tribe of Indians. + +“Henry and me met at Texarkana, and figured out this phonograph scheme. +He had $360 which came to him out of a land allotment in the +reservation. I had run down from Little Rock on account of a +distressful scene I had witnessed on the street there. A man stood on a +box and passed around some gold watches, screw case, stem-winders, +Elgin movement, very elegant. Twenty bucks they cost you over the +counter. At three dollars the crowd fought for the tickers. The man +happened to find a valise full of them handy, and he passed them out +like putting hot biscuits on a plate. The backs were hard to unscrew, +but the crowd put its ear to the case, and they ticked mollifying and +agreeable. Three of these watches were genuine tickers; the rest were +only kickers. Hey? Why, empty cases with one of them horny black bugs +that fly around electric lights in ’em. Them bugs kick off minutes and +seconds industrious and beautiful. So, this man I was speaking of +cleaned up $288; and then he went away, because he knew that when it +came time to wind watches in Little Rock an entomologist would be +needed, and he wasn’t one. + +“So, as I say, Henry had $360, and I had $288. The idea of introducing +the phonograph to South America was Henry’s; but I took to it freely, +being fond of machinery of all kinds. + +“‘The Latin races,’ says Henry, explaining easy in the idioms he +learned at college, ‘are peculiarly adapted to be victims of the +phonograph. They have the artistic temperament. They yearn for music +and color and gaiety. They give wampum to the hand-organ man and the +four-legged chicken in the tent when they’re months behind with the +grocery and the bread-fruit tree.’ + +“‘Then,’ says I, ‘we’ll export canned music to the Latins; but I’m +mindful of Mr. Julius Cæsar’s account of ’em where he says: “_Omnia +Gallia in tres partes divisa est_;” which is the same as to say, “We +will need all of our gall in devising means to tree them parties.”’ + +“I hated to make a show of education; but I was disinclined to be +overdone in syntax by a mere Indian, a member of a race to which we owe +nothing except the land on which the United States is situated. + +“We bought a fine phonograph in Texarkana—one of the best make—and half +a trunkful of records. We packed up, and took the T. and P. for New +Orleans. From that celebrated centre of molasses and disfranchised coon +songs we took a steamer for South America. + +“We landed at Solitas, forty miles up the coast from here. ’Twas a +palatable enough place to look at. The houses were clean and white; and +to look at ’em stuck around among the scenery they reminded you of +hard-boiled eggs served with lettuce. There was a block of skyscraper +mountains in the suburbs; and they kept pretty quiet, like they had +crept up there and were watching the town. And the sea was remarking +‘Sh-sh-sh’ on the beach; and now and then a ripe cocoanut would drop +kerblip in the sand; and that was all there was doing. Yes, I judge +that town was considerably on the quiet. I judge that after Gabriel +quits blowing his horn, and the car starts, with Philadelphia swinging +to the last strap, and Pine Gully, Arkansas, hanging onto the rear +step, this town of Solitas will wake up and ask if anybody spoke. + +“The captain went ashore with us, and offered to conduct what he seemed +to like to call the obsequies. He introduced Henry and me to the United +States Consul, and a roan man, the head of the Department of Mercenary +and Licentious Dispositions, the way it read upon his sign. + +“‘I touch here again a week from to-day,’ says the captain. + +“‘By that time,’ we told him, ‘we’ll be amassing wealth in the interior +towns with our galvanized prima donna and correct imitations of Sousa’s +band excavating a march from a tin mine.’ + +“‘Ye’ll not,’ says the captain. ‘Ye’ll be hypnotized. Any gentleman in +the audience who kindly steps upon the stage and looks this country in +the eye will be converted to the hypothesis that he’s but a fly in the +Elgin creamery. Ye’ll be standing knee deep in the surf waiting for me, +and your machine for making Hamburger steak out of the hitherto +respected art of music will be playing “There’s no place like home.”’ + +“Henry skinned a twenty off his roll, and received from the Bureau of +Mercenary Dispositions a paper bearing a red seal and a dialect story, +and no change. + +“Then we got the consul full of red wine, and struck him for a +horoscope. He was a thin, youngish kind of man, I should say past +fifty, sort of French-Irish in his affections, and puffed up with +disconsolation. Yes, he was a flattened kind of a man, in whom drink +lay stagnant, inclined to corpulence and misery. Yes, I think he was a +kind of Dutchman, being very sad and genial in his ways. + +“‘The marvelous invention,’ he says, ‘entitled the phonograph, has +never invaded these shores. The people have never heard it. They would +not believe it if they should. Simple-hearted children of nature, +progress has never condemned them to accept the work of a can-opener as +an overture, and rag-time might incite them to a bloody revolution. But +you can try the experiment. The best chance you have is that the +populace may not wake up when you play. There’s two ways,’ says the +consul, ‘they may take it. They may become inebriated with attention, +like an Atlanta colonel listening to “Marching Through Georgia,” or +they will get excited and transpose the key of the music with an axe +and yourselves into a dungeon. In the latter case,’ says the consul, +‘I’ll do my duty by cabling to the State Department, and I’ll wrap the +Stars and Stripes around you when you come to be shot, and threaten +them with the vengeance of the greatest gold export and financial +reserve nation on earth. The flag is full of bullet holes now,’ says +the consul, ‘made in that way. Twice before,’ says the consul, ‘I have +cabled our government for a couple of gunboats to protect American +citizens. The first time the Department sent me a pair of gum boots. +The other time was when a man named Pease was going to be executed +here. They referred that appeal to the Secretary of Agriculture. Let us +now disturb the señor behind the bar for a subsequence of the red +wine.’ + +“Thus soliloquized the consul of Solitas to me and Henry Horsecollar. + +“But, notwithstanding, we hired a room that afternoon in the Calle de +los Angeles, the main street that runs along the shore, and put our +trunks there. ’Twas a good-sized room, dark and cheerful, but small. +’Twas on a various street, diversified by houses and conservatory +plants. The peasantry of the city passed to and fro on the fine +pasturage between the sidewalks. ’Twas, for the world, like an opera +chorus when the Royal Kafoozlum is about to enter. + +“We were rubbing the dust off the machine and getting fixed to start +business the next day, when a big, fine-looking white man in white +clothes stopped at the door and looked in. We extended the invitations, +and he walked inside and sized us up. He was chewing a long cigar, and +wrinkling his eyes, meditative, like a girl trying to decide which +dress to wear to the party. + +“‘New York?’ he says to me finally. + +“‘Originally, and from time to time,’ I says. ‘Hasn’t it rubbed off +yet?’ + +“‘It’s simple,’ says he, ‘when you know how. It’s the fit of the vest. +They don’t cut vests right anywhere else. Coats, maybe, but not vests.’ + +“The white man looks at Henry Horsecollar and hesitates. + +“‘Injun,’ says Henry; ‘tame Injun.’ + +“‘Mellinger,’ says the man—‘Homer P. Mellinger. Boys, you’re +confiscated. You’re babes in the wood without a chaperon or referee, +and it’s my duty to start you going. I’ll knock out the props and +launch you proper in the pellucid waters of this tropical mud puddle. +You’ll have to be christened, and if you’ll come with me I’ll break a +bottle of wine across your bows, according to Hoyle.’ + +“Well, for two days Homer P. Mellinger did the honors. That man cut ice +in Anchuria. He was It. He was the Royal Kafoozlum. If me and Henry was +babes in the wood, he was a Robin Redbreast from the topmost bough. Him +and me and Henry Horsecollar locked arms, and toted that phonograph +around, and had wassail and diversions. Everywhere we found doors open +we went inside and set the machine going, and Mellinger called upon the +people to observe the artful music and his two lifelong friends, the +Señors Americanos. The opera chorus was agitated with esteem, and +followed us from house to house. There was a different kind of drink to +be had with every tune. The natives had acquirements of a pleasant +thing in the way of a drink that gums itself to the recollection. They +chop off the end of a green cocoanut, and pour in on the juice of it +French brandy and other adjuvants. We had them and other things. + +“Mine and Henry’s money was counterfeit. Everything was on Homer P. +Mellinger. That man could find rolls of bills concealed in places on +his person where Hermann the Wizard couldn’t have conjured out a rabbit +or an omelette. He could have founded universities, and made orchid +collections, and then had enough left to purchase the colored vote of +his country. Henry and me wondered what his graft was. One evening he +told us. + +“‘Boys,’ said he, ‘I’ve deceived you. You think I’m a painted +butterfly; but in fact I’m the hardest worked man in this country. Ten +years ago I landed on its shores; and two years ago on the point of its +jaw. Yes, I guess I can get the decision over this ginger cake +commonwealth at the end of any round I choose. I’ll confide in you +because you are my countrymen and guests, even if you have assaulted my +adopted shores with the worst system of noises ever set to music. + +“‘My job is private secretary to the president of this republic; and my +duties are running it. I’m not headlined in the bills, but I’m the +mustard in the salad dressing just the same. There isn’t a law goes +before Congress, there isn’t a concession granted, there isn’t an +import duty levied but what H. P. Mellinger he cooks and seasons it. In +the front office I fill the president’s inkstand and search visiting +statesmen for dirks and dynamite; but in the back room I dictate the +policy of the government. You’d never guess in the world how I got my +pull. It’s the only graft of its kind on earth. I’ll put you wise. You +remember the old top-liner in the copy book—“Honesty is the Best +Policy”? That’s it. I’m working honesty for a graft. I’m the only +honest man in the republic. The government knows it; the people know +it; the boodlers know it; the foreign investors know it. I make the +government keep its faith. If a man is promised a job he gets it. If +outside capital buys a concession it gets the goods. I run a monopoly +of square dealing here. There’s no competition. If Colonel Diogenes +were to flash his lantern in this precinct he’d have my address inside +of two minutes. There isn’t big money in it, but it’s a sure thing, and +lets a man sleep of nights.’ + +“Thus Homer P. Mellinger made oration to me and Henry Horsecollar. And, +later, he divested himself of this remark: + +“‘Boys, I’m to hold a _soirée_ this evening with a gang of leading +citizens, and I want your assistance. You bring the musical corn +sheller and give the affair the outside appearance of a function. +There’s important business on hand, but it mustn’t show. I can talk to +you people. I’ve been pained for years on account of not having anybody +to blow off and brag to. I get homesick sometimes, and I’d swap the +entire perquisites of office for just one hour to have a stein and a +caviare sandwich somewhere on Thirty-fourth Street, and stand and watch +the street cars go by, and smell the peanut roaster at old Giuseppe’s +fruit stand.’ + +“‘Yes,’ said I, ‘there’s fine caviare at Billy Renfrew’s café, corner +of Thirty-fourth and—’ + +“‘God knows it,’ interrupts Mellinger, ‘and if you’d told me you knew +Billy Renfrew I’d have invented tons of ways of making you happy. Billy +was my side-kicker in New York. There is a man who never knew what +crooked was. Here I am working Honesty for a graft, but that man loses +money on it. Carrambos! I get sick at times of this country. +Everything’s rotten. From the executive down to the coffee pickers, +they’re plotting to down each other and skin their friends. If a mule +driver takes off his hat to an official, that man figures it out that +he’s a popular idol, and sets his pegs to stir up a revolution and +upset the administration. It’s one of my little chores as private +secretary to smell out these revolutions and affix the kibosh before +they break out and scratch the paint off the government property. +That’s why I’m down here now in this mildewed coast town. The governor +of the district and his crew are plotting to uprise. I’ve got every one +of their names, and they’re invited to listen to the phonograph +to-night, compliments of H. P. M. That’s the way I’ll get them in a +bunch, and things are on the programme to happen to them.’ + +“We three were sitting at table in the cantina of the Purified Saints. +Mellinger poured out wine, and was looking some worried; I was +thinking. + +“‘They’re a sharp crowd,’ he says, kind of fretful. ‘They’re +capitalized by a foreign syndicate after rubber, and they’re loaded to +the muzzle for bribing. I’m sick,’ goes on Mellinger, ‘of comic opera. +I want to smell East River and wear suspenders again. At times I feel +like throwing up my job, but I’m d——n fool enough to be sort of proud +of it. “There’s Mellinger,” they say here. “_Por Dios!_ you can’t touch +him with a million.” I’d like to take that record back and show it to +Billy Renfrew some day; and that tightens my grip whenever I see a fat +thing that I could corral just by winking one eye—and losing my graft. +By ——, they can’t monkey with me. They know it. What money I get I make +honest and spend it. Some day I’ll make a pile and go back and eat +caviare with Billy. To-night I’ll show you how to handle a bunch of +corruptionists. I’ll show them what Mellinger, private secretary, means +when you spell it with the cotton and tissue paper off.’ + +“Mellinger appears shaky, and breaks his glass against the neck of the +bottle. + +“I says to myself, ‘White man, if I’m not mistaken there’s been a bait +laid out where the tail of your eye could see it.’ + +“That night, according to arrangements, me and Henry took the +phonograph to a room in a ’dobe house in a dirty side street, where the +grass was knee high. ’Twas a long room, lit with smoky oil lamps. There +was plenty of chairs, and a table at the back end. We set the +phonograph on the table. Mellinger was there, walking up and down, +disturbed in his predicaments. He chewed cigars and spat ’em out, and +he bit the thumb nail of his left hand. + +“By and by the invitations to the musicale came sliding in by pairs and +threes and spade flushes. Their colour was of a diversity, running from +a three-days’ smoked meerschaum to a patent-leather polish. They were +as polite as wax, being devastated with enjoyments to give Señor +Mellinger the good evenings. I understood their Spanish talk—I ran a +pumping engine two years in a Mexican silver mine, and had it pat—but I +never let on. + +“Maybe fifty of ’em had come, and was seated, when in slid the king +bee, the governor of the district. Mellinger met him at the door, and +escorted him to the grand stand. When I saw that Latin man I knew that +Mellinger, private secretary, had all the dances on his card taken. +That was a big, squashy man, the colour of a rubber overshoe, and he +had an eye like a head waiter’s. + +“Mellinger explained, fluent, in the Castilian idioms, that his soul +was disconcerted with joy at introducing to his respected friends +America’s greatest invention, the wonder of the age. Henry got the cue +and run on an elegant brass-band record and the festivities became +initiated. The governor man had a bit of English under his hat, and +when the music was choked off he says: + +“‘Ver-r-ree fine. _Gr-r-r-r-racias_, the American gentleemen, the so +esplendeed moosic as to playee.’ + +“The table was a long one, and Henry and me sat at the end of it next +the wall. The governor sat at the other end. Homer P. Mellinger stood +at the side of it. I was just wondering how Mellinger was going to +handle his crowd, when the home talent suddenly opened the services. + +“That governor man was suitable for uprisings and policies. I judge he +was a ready kind of man, who took his own time. Yes, he was full of +attention and immediateness. He leaned his hands on the table and +imposed his face toward the secretary man. + +“‘Do the American señors understand Spanish?’ he asks in his native +accents. + +“‘They do not,’ says Mellinger. + +“‘Then listen,’ goes on the Latin man, prompt. ‘The musics are of +sufficient prettiness, but not of necessity. Let us speak of business. +I well know why we are here, since I observe my compatriots. You had a +whisper yesterday, Señor Mellinger, of our proposals. To-night we will +speak out. We know that you stand in the president’s favour, and we +know your influence. The government will be changed. We know the worth +of your services. We esteem your friendship and aid so much +that’—Mellinger raises his hand, but the governor man bottles him up. +‘Do not speak until I have done.’ + +“The governor man then draws a package wrapped in paper from his +pocket, and lays it on the table by Mellinger’s hand. + +“‘In that you will find fifty thousand dollars in money of your +country. You can do nothing against us, but you can be worth that for +us. Go back to the capital and obey our instructions. Take that money +now. We trust you. You will find with it a paper giving in detail the +work you will be expected to do for us. Do not have the unwiseness to +refuse.’ + +“The governor man paused, with his eyes fixed on Mellinger, full of +expressions and observances. I looked at Mellinger, and was glad Billy +Renfrew couldn’t see him then. The sweat was popping out on his +forehead, and he stood dumb, tapping the little package with the ends +of his fingers. The colorado-maduro gang was after his graft. He had +only to change his politics, and stuff five fingers in his inside +pocket. + +“Henry whispers to me and wants the pause in the programme interpreted. +I whisper back: ‘H. P. is up against a bribe, senator’s size, and the +coons have got him going.’ I saw Mellinger’s hand moving closer to the +package. ‘He’s weakening,’ I whispered to Henry. ‘We’ll remind him,’ +says Henry, ‘of the peanut-roaster on Thirty-fourth Street, New York.’ + +“Henry stooped down and got a record from the basketful we’d brought, +slid it in the phonograph, and started her off. It was a cornet solo, +very neat and beautiful, and the name of it was ‘Home, Sweet Home.’ Not +one of them fifty odd men in the room moved while it was playing, and +the governor man kept his eyes steady on Mellinger. I saw Mellinger’s +head go up little by little, and his hand came creeping away from the +package. Not until the last note sounded did anybody stir. And then +Homer P. Mellinger takes up the bundle of boodle and slams it in the +governor man’s face. + +“‘That’s my answer,’ says Mellinger, private secretary, ‘and there’ll +be another in the morning. I have proofs of conspiracy against every +man of you. The show is over, gentlemen.’ + +“‘There’s one more act,’ puts in the governor man. ‘You are a servant, +I believe, employed by the president to copy letters and answer raps at +the door. I am governor here. _Señores_, I call upon you in the name of +the cause to seize this man.’ + +“That brindled gang of conspirators shoved back their chairs and +advanced in force. I could see where Mellinger had made a mistake in +massing his enemy so as to make a grand-stand play. I think he made +another one, too; but we can pass that, Mellinger’s idea of a graft and +mine being different, according to estimations and points of view. + +“There was only one window and door in that room, and they were in the +front end. Here was fifty odd Latin men coming in a bunch to obstruct +the legislation of Mellinger. You may say there were three of us, for +me and Henry, simultaneous, declared New York City and the Cherokee +Nation in sympathy with the weaker party. + +“Then it was that Henry Horsecollar rose to a point of disorder and +intervened, showing, admirable, the advantages of education as applied +to the American Indian’s natural intellect and native refinement. He +stood up and smoothed back his hair on each side with his hands as you +have seen little girls do when they play. + +“‘Get behind me, both of you,’ says Henry. + +“‘What’s it to be, chief?’ I asked. + +“‘I’m going to buck centre,’ says Henry, in his football idioms. ‘There +isn’t a tackle in the lot of them. Follow me close, and rush the game.’ + +“Then that cultured Red Man exhaled an arrangement of sounds with his +mouth that made the Latin aggregation pause, with thoughtfulness and +hesitations. The matter of his proclamation seemed to be a co-operation +of the Carlisle war-whoop with the Cherokee college yell. He went at +the chocolate team like a bean out of a little boy’s nigger shooter. +His right elbow laid out the governor man on the gridiron, and he made +a lane the length of the crowd so wide that a woman could have carried +a step-ladder through it without striking against anything. All +Mellinger and me had to do was to follow. + +“It took us just three minutes to get out of that street around to +military headquarters, where Mellinger had things his own way. A +colonel and a battalion of bare-toed infantry turned out and went back +to the scene of the musicale with us, but the conspirator gang was +gone. But we recaptured the phonograph with honours of war, and marched +back to the _cuartel_ with it playing ‘All Coons Look Alike to Me.’ + +“The next day Mellinger takes me and Henry to one side, and begins to +shed tens and twenties. + +“‘I want to buy that phonograph,’ says he. ‘I liked that last tune it +played at the _soirée_.’ + +“‘This is more money than the machine is worth,’ says I. + +“‘’Tis government expense money,’ says Mellinger. ‘The government pays +for it, and it’s getting the tune-grinder cheap.’ + +“Me and Henry knew that pretty well. We knew that it had saved Homer P. +Mellinger’s graft when he was on the point of losing it; but we never +let him know we knew it. + +“‘Now you boys better slide off further down the coast for a while,’ +says Mellinger, ‘till I get the screws put on these fellows here. If +you don’t they’ll give you trouble. And if you ever happen to see Billy +Renfrew again before I do, tell him I’m coming back to New York as soon +as I can make a stake—honest.’ + +“Me and Henry laid low until the day the steamer came back. When we saw +the captain’s boat on the beach we went down and stood in the edge of +the water. The captain grinned when he saw us. + +“‘I told you you’d be waiting,’ he says. ‘Where’s the Hamburger +machine?’ + +“‘It stays behind,’ I says, ‘to play “Home, Sweet Home.”’ + +“‘I told you so,’ says the captain again. ‘Climb in the boat.’ + +“And that,” said Keogh, “is the way me and Henry Horsecollar introduced +the phonograph into this country. Henry went back to the States, but +I’ve been rummaging around in the tropics ever since. They say +Mellinger never travelled a mile after that without his phonograph. I +guess it kept him reminded about his graft whenever he saw the siren +voice of the boodler tip him the wink with a bribe in its hand.” + +“I suppose he’s taking it home with him as a souvenir,” remarked the +consul. + +“Not as a souvenir,” said Keogh. “He’ll need two of ’em in New York, +running day and night.” + + + + +VII +MONEY MAZE + + +The new administration of Anchuria entered upon its duties and +privileges with enthusiasm. Its first act was to send an agent to +Coralio with imperative orders to recover, if possible, the sum of +money ravished from the treasury by the ill-fated Miraflores. + +Colonel Emilio Falcon, the private secretary of Losada, the new +president, was despatched from the capital upon this important mission. + +The position of private secretary to a tropical president is a +responsible one. He must be a diplomat, a spy, a ruler of men, a +body-guard to his chief, and a smeller-out of plots and nascent +revolutions. Often he is the power behind the throne, the dictator of +policy; and a president chooses him with a dozen times the care with +which he selects a matrimonial mate. + +Colonel Falcon, a handsome and urbane gentleman of Castilian courtesy +and débonnaire manners, came to Coralio with the task before him of +striking upon the cold trail of the lost money. There he conferred with +the military authorities, who had received instructions to co-operate +with him in the search. + +Colonel Falcon established his headquarters in one of the rooms of the +Casa Morena. Here for a week he held informal sittings—much as if he +were a kind of unified grand jury—and summoned before him all those +whose testimony might illumine the financial tragedy that had +accompanied the less momentous one of the late president’s death. + +Two or three who were thus examined, among whom was the barber Estebán, +declared that they had identified the body of the president before its +burial. + +“Of a truth,” testified Estebán before the mighty secretary, “it was +he, the president. Consider!—how could I shave a man and not see his +face? He sent for me to shave him in a small house. He had a beard very +black and thick. Had I ever seen the president before? Why not? I saw +him once ride forth in a carriage from the _vapor_ in Solitas. When I +shaved him he gave me a gold piece, and said there was to be no talk. +But I am a Liberal—I am devoted to my country—and I spake of these +things to Señor Goodwin.” + +“It is known,” said Colonel Falcon, smoothly, “that the late President +took with him an American leather valise, containing a large amount of +money. Did you see that?” + +“_De veras_—no,” Estebán answered. “The light in the little house was +but a small lamp by which I could scarcely see to shave the President. +Such a thing there may have been, but I did not see it. No. Also in the +room was a young lady—a señorita of much beauty—that I could see even +in so small a light. But the money, señor, or the thing in which it was +carried—that I did not see.” + +The _comandante_ and other officers gave testimony that they had been +awakened and alarmed by the noise of a pistol-shot in the Hotel de los +Estranjeros. Hurrying thither to protect the peace and dignity of the +republic, they found a man lying dead, with a pistol clutched in his +hand. Beside him was a young woman, weeping sorely. Señor Goodwin was +also in the room when they entered it. But of the valise of money they +saw nothing. + +Madame Timotea Ortiz, the proprietress of the hotel in which the game +of Fox-in-the-Morning had been played out, told of the coming of the +two guests to her house. + +“To my house they came,” said she—“one _señor_, not quite old, and one +_señorita_ of sufficient handsomeness. They desired not to eat or to +drink—not even of my _aguardiente_, which is the best. To their rooms +they ascended—_Numero Nueve_ and _Numero Diez_. Later came Señor +Goodwin, who ascended to speak with them. Then I heard a great noise +like that of a _canon_, and they said that the _pobre Presidente_ had +shot himself. _Está bueno._ I saw nothing of money or of the thing you +call _veliz_ that you say he carried it in.” + +Colonel Falcon soon came to the reasonable conclusion that if anyone in +Coralio could furnish a clue to the vanished money, Frank Goodwin must +be the man. But the wise secretary pursued a different course in +seeking information from the American. Goodwin was a powerful friend to +the new administration, and one who was not to be carelessly dealt with +in respect to either his honesty or his courage. Even the private +secretary of His Excellency hesitated to have this rubber prince and +mahogany baron haled before him as a common citizen of Anchuria. So he +sent Goodwin a flowery epistle, each word-petal dripping with honey, +requesting the favour of an interview. Goodwin replied with an +invitation to dinner at his own house. + +Before the hour named the American walked over to the Casa Morena, and +greeted his guest frankly and friendly. Then the two strolled, in the +cool of the afternoon, to Goodwin’s home in the environs. + +The American left Colonel Falcon in a big, cool, shadowed room with a +floor of inlaid and polished woods that any millionaire in the States +would have envied, excusing himself for a few minutes. He crossed a +_patio_, shaded with deftly arranged awnings and plants, and entered a +long room looking upon the sea in the opposite wing of the house. The +broad jalousies were opened wide, and the ocean breeze flowed in +through the room, an invisible current of coolness and health. +Goodwin’s wife sat near one of the windows, making a water-color sketch +of the afternoon seascape. + +Here was a woman who looked to be happy. And more—she looked to be +content. Had a poet been inspired to pen just similes concerning her +favour, he would have likened her full, clear eyes, with their +white-encircled, gray irises, to moonflowers. With none of the +goddesses whose traditional charms have become coldly classic would the +discerning rhymester have compared her. She was purely Paradisaic, not +Olympian. If you can imagine Eve, after the eviction, beguiling the +flaming warriors and serenely re-entering the Garden, you will have +her. Just so human, and still so harmonious with Eden seemed Mrs. +Goodwin. + +When her husband entered she looked up, and her lips curved and parted; +her eyelids fluttered twice or thrice—a movement remindful (Poesy +forgive us!) of the tail-wagging of a faithful dog—and a little ripple +went through her like the commotion set up in a weeping willow by a +puff of wind. Thus she ever acknowledged his coming, were it twenty +times a day. If they who sometimes sat over their wine in Coralio, +reshaping old, diverting stories of the madcap career of Isabel +Guilbert, could have seen the wife of Frank Goodwin that afternoon in +the estimable aura of her happy wifehood, they might have disbelieved, +or have agreed to forget, those graphic annals of the life of the one +for whom their president gave up his country and his honour. + +“I have brought a guest to dinner,” said Goodwin. “One Colonel Falcon, +from San Mateo. He is come on government business. I do not think you +will care to see him, so I prescribe for you one of those convenient +and indisputable feminine headaches.” + +“He has come to inquire about the lost money, has he not?” asked Mrs. +Goodwin, going on with her sketch. + +“A good guess!” acknowledged Goodwin. “He has been holding an +inquisition among the natives for three days. I am next on his list of +witnesses, but as he feels shy about dragging one of Uncle Sam’s +subjects before him, he consents to give it the outward appearance of a +social function. He will apply the torture over my own wine and +provender.” + +“Has he found anyone who saw the valise of money?” + +“Not a soul. Even Madama Ortiz, whose eyes are so sharp for the sight +of a revenue official, does not remember that there was any baggage.” + +Mrs. Goodwin laid down her brush and sighed. + +“I am so sorry, Frank,” she said, “that they are giving you so much +trouble about the money. But we can’t let them know about it, can we?” + +“Not without doing our intelligence a great injustice,” said Goodwin, +with a smile and a shrug that he had picked up from the natives. +“_Americano_, though I am, they would have me in the _calaboza_ in half +an hour if they knew we had appropriated that valise. No; we must +appear as ignorant about the money as the other ignoramuses in +Coralio.” + +“Do you think that this man they have sent suspects you?” she asked, +with a little pucker of her brows. + +“He’d better not,” said the American, carelessly. “It’s lucky that no +one caught a sight of the valise except myself. As I was in the rooms +when the shot was fired, it is not surprising that they should want to +investigate my part in the affair rather closely. But there’s no cause +for alarm. This colonel is down on the list of events for a good +dinner, with a dessert of American ‘bluff’ that will end the matter, I +think.” + +Mrs. Goodwin rose and walked to the window. Goodwin followed and stood +by her side. She leaned to him, and rested in the protection of his +strength, as she had always rested since that dark night on which he +had first made himself her tower of refuge. Thus they stood for a +little while. + +Straight through the lavish growth of tropical branch and leaf and vine +that confronted them had been cunningly trimmed a vista, that ended at +the cleared environs of Coralio, on the banks of the mangrove swamp. At +the other end of the aerial tunnel they could see the grave and wooden +headpiece that bore the name of the unhappy President Miraflores. From +this window when the rains forbade the open, and from the green and +shady slopes of Goodwin’s fruitful lands when the skies were smiling, +his wife was wont to look upon that grave with a gentle sadness that +was now scarcely a mar to her happiness. + +“I loved him so, Frank!” she said, “even after that terrible flight and +its awful ending. And you have been so good to me, and have made me so +happy. It has all grown into such a strange puzzle. If they were to +find out that we got the money do you think they would force you to +make the amount good to the government?” + +“They would undoubtedly try,” answered Goodwin. “You are right about +its being a puzzle. And it must remain a puzzle to Falcon and all his +countrymen until it solves itself. You and I, who know more than anyone +else, only know half of the solution. We must not let even a hint about +this money get abroad. Let them come to the theory that the president +concealed it in the mountains during his journey, or that he found +means to ship it out of the country before he reached Coralio. I don’t +think that Falcon suspects me. He is making a close investigation, +according to his orders, but he will find out nothing.” + +Thus they spake together. Had anyone overheard or overseen them as they +discussed the lost funds of Anchuria there would have been a second +puzzle presented. For upon the faces and in the bearing of each of them +was visible (if countenances are to be believed) Saxon honesty and +pride and honourable thoughts. In Goodwin’s steady eye and firm +lineaments, moulded into material shape by the inward spirit of +kindness and generosity and courage, there was nothing reconcilable +with his words. + +As for his wife, physiognomy championed her even in the face of their +accusive talk. Nobility was in her guise; purity was in her glance. The +devotion that she manifested had not even the appearance of that +feeling that now and then inspires a woman to share the guilt of her +partner out of the pathetic greatness of her love. No, there was a +discrepancy here between what the eye would have seen and the ear have +heard. + +Dinner was served to Goodwin and his guest in the _patio_, under cool +foliage and flowers. The American begged the illustrious secretary to +excuse the absence of Mrs. Goodwin, who was suffering, he said, from a +headache brought on by a slight _calentura_. + +After the meal they lingered, according to the custom, over their +coffee and cigars. Colonel Falcon, with true Castilian delicacy, waited +for his host to open the question that they had met to discuss. He had +not long to wait. As soon as the cigars were lighted, the American +cleared the way by inquiring whether the secretary’s investigations in +the town had furnished him with any clue to the lost funds. + +“I have found no one yet,” admitted Colonel Falcon, “who even had sight +of the valise or the money. Yet I have persisted. It has been proven in +the capital that President Miraflores set out from San Mateo with one +hundred thousand dollars belonging to the government, accompanied by +_Señorita_ Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer. The Government, +officially and personally, is loath to believe,” concluded Colonel +Falcon, with a smile, “that our late President’s tastes would have +permitted him to abandon on the route, as excess baggage, either of the +desirable articles with which his flight was burdened.” + +“I suppose you would like to hear what I have to say about the affair,” +said Goodwin, coming directly to the point. “It will not require many +words. + +“On that night, with others of our friends here, I was keeping a +lookout for the president, having been notified of his flight by a +telegram in our national cipher from Englehart, one of our leaders in +the capital. About ten o’clock that night I saw a man and a woman +hurrying along the streets. They went to the Hotel de los Estranjeros, +and engaged rooms. I followed them upstairs, leaving Estebán, who had +come up, to watch outside. The barber had told me that he had shaved +the beard from the president’s face that night; therefore I was +prepared, when I entered the rooms, to find him with a smooth face. +When I apprehended him in the name of the people he drew a pistol and +shot himself instantly. In a few minutes many officers and citizens +were on the spot. I suppose you have been informed of the subsequent +facts.” + +Goodwin paused. Losada’s agent maintained an attitude of waiting, as if +he expected a continuance. + +“And now,” went on the American, looking steadily into the eyes of the +other man, and giving each word a deliberate emphasis, “you will oblige +me by attending carefully to what I have to add. I saw no valise or +receptacle of any kind, or any money belonging to the Republic of +Anchuria. If President Miraflores decamped with any funds belonging to +the treasury of this country, or to himself, or to anyone else, I saw +no trace of it in the house or elsewhere, at that time or at any other. +Does that statement cover the ground of the inquiry you wished to make +of me?” + +Colonel Falcon bowed, and described a fluent curve with his cigar. His +duty was performed. Goodwin was not to be disputed. He was a loyal +supporter of the government, and enjoyed the full confidence of the new +president. His rectitude had been the capital that had brought him +fortune in Anchuria, just as it had formed the lucrative “graft” of +Mellinger, the secretary of Miraflores. + +“I thank you, _Señor_ Goodwin,” said Falcon, “for speaking plainly. +Your word will be sufficient for the president. But, _Señor_ Goodwin, I +am instructed to pursue every clue that presents itself in this matter. +There is one that I have not yet touched upon. Our friends in France, +_señor_, have a saying, ‘_Cherchez la femme_,’ when there is a mystery +without a clue. But here we do not have to search. The woman who +accompanied the late President in his flight must surely—” + +“I must interrupt you there,” interposed Goodwin. “It is true that when +I entered the hotel for the purpose of intercepting President +Miraflores I found a lady there. I must beg of you to remember that +that lady is now my wife. I speak for her as I do for myself. She knows +nothing of the fate of the valise or of the money that you are seeking. +You will say to his excellency that I guarantee her innocence. I do not +need to add to you, Colonel Falcon, that I do not care to have her +questioned or disturbed.” + +Colonel Falcon bowed again. + +“_Por supuesto_, no!” he cried. And to indicate that the inquiry was +ended he added: “And now, _señor_, let me beg of you to show me that +sea view from your _galeria_ of which you spoke. I am a lover of the +sea.” + +In the early evening Goodwin walked back to the town with his guest, +leaving him at the corner of the Calle Grande. As he was returning +homeward one “Beelzebub” Blythe, with the air of a courtier and the +outward aspect of a scarecrow, pounced upon him hopefully from the door +of a _pulperia_. + +Blythe had been re-christened “Beelzebub” as an acknowledgment of the +greatness of his fall. Once in some distant Paradise Lost, he had +foregathered with the angels of the earth. But Fate had hurled him +headlong down to the tropics, where flamed in his bosom a fire that was +seldom quenched. In Coralio they called him a beachcomber; but he was, +in reality, a categorical idealist who strove to anamorphosize the dull +verities of life by the means of brandy and rum. As Beelzebub, himself, +might have held in his clutch with unwitting tenacity his harp or crown +during his tremendous fall, so his namesake had clung to his +gold-rimmed eyeglasses as the only souvenir of his lost estate. These +he wore with impressiveness and distinction while he combed beaches and +extracted toll from his friends. By some mysterious means he kept his +drink-reddened face always smoothly shaven. For the rest he sponged +gracefully upon whomsoever he could for enough to keep him pretty +drunk, and sheltered from the rains and night dews. + +“Hallo, Goodwin!” called the derelict, airily. “I was hoping I’d strike +you. I wanted to see you particularly. Suppose we go where we can talk. +Of course you know there’s a chap down here looking up the money old +Miraflores lost.” + +“Yes,” said Goodwin, “I’ve been talking with him. Let’s go into +Espada’s place. I can spare you ten minutes.” + +They went into the _pulperia_ and sat at a little table upon stools +with rawhide tops. + +“Have a drink?” said Goodwin. + +“They can’t bring it too quickly,” said Blythe. “I’ve been in a drought +ever since morning. Hi—_muchacho!—el aguardiente por acá_.” + +“Now, what do you want to see me about?” asked Goodwin, when the drinks +were before them. + +“Confound it, old man,” drawled Blythe, “why do you spoil a golden +moment like this with business? I wanted to see you—well, this has the +preference.” He gulped down his brandy, and gazed longingly into the +empty glass. + +“Have another?” suggested Goodwin. + +“Between gentlemen,” said the fallen angel, “I don’t quite like your +use of that word ‘another.’ It isn’t quite delicate. But the concrete +idea that the word represents is not displeasing.” + +The glasses were refilled. Blythe sipped blissfully from his, as he +began to enter the state of a true idealist. + +“I must trot along in a minute or two,” hinted Goodwin. “Was there +anything in particular?” + +Blythe did not reply at once. + +“Old Losada would make it a hot country,” he remarked at length, “for +the man who swiped that gripsack of treasury boodle, don’t you think?” + +“Undoubtedly, he would,” agreed Goodwin calmly, as he rose leisurely to +his feet. “I’ll be running over to the house now, old man. Mrs. Goodwin +is alone. There was nothing important you had to say, was there?” + +“That’s all,” said Blythe. “Unless you wouldn’t mind sending in another +drink from the bar as you go out. Old Espada has closed my account to +profit and loss. And pay for the lot, will you, like a good fellow?” + +“All right,” said Goodwin. “_Buenas noches._” + +“Beelzebub” Blythe lingered over his cups, polishing his eyeglasses +with a disreputable handkerchief. + +“I thought I could do it, but I couldn’t,” he muttered to himself after +a time. “A gentleman can’t blackmail the man that he drinks with.” + + + + +VIII +THE ADMIRAL + + +Spilled milk draws few tears from an Anchurian administration. Many are +its lacteal sources; and the clocks’ hands point forever to milking +time. Even the rich cream skimmed from the treasury by the bewitched +Miraflores did not cause the newly-installed patriots to waste time in +unprofitable regrets. The government philosophically set about +supplying the deficiency by increasing the import duties and by +“suggesting” to wealthy private citizens that contributions according +to their means would be considered patriotic and in order. Prosperity +was expected to attend the reign of Losada, the new president. The +ousted office-holders and military favourites organized a new “Liberal” +party, and began to lay their plans for a re-succession. Thus the game +of Anchurian politics began, like a Chinese comedy, to unwind slowly +its serial length. Here and there Mirth peeps for an instant from the +wings and illumines the florid lines. + +A dozen quarts of champagne in conjunction with an informal sitting of +the president and his cabinet led to the establishment of the navy and +the appointment of Felipe Carrera as its admiral. + +Next to the champagne the credit of the appointment belongs to Don +Sabas Placido, the newly confirmed Minister of War. + +The president had requested a convention of his cabinet for the +discussion of questions politic and for the transaction of certain +routine matters of state. The session had been signally tedious; the +business and the wine prodigiously dry. A sudden, prankish humour of +Don Sabas, impelling him to the deed, spiced the grave affairs of state +with a whiff of agreeable playfulness. + +In the dilatory order of business had come a bulletin from the coast +department of Orilla del Mar reporting the seizure by the custom-house +officers at the town of Coralio of the sloop _Estrella del Noche_ and +her cargo of drygoods, patent medicines, granulated sugar and +three-star brandy. Also six Martini rifles and a barrel of American +whisky. Caught in the act of smuggling, the sloop with its cargo was +now, according to law, the property of the republic. + +The Collector of Customs, in making his report, departed from the +conventional forms so far as to suggest that the confiscated vessel be +converted to the use of the government. The prize was the first capture +to the credit of the department in ten years. The collector took +opportunity to pat his department on the back. + +It often happened that government officers required transportation from +point to point along the coast, and means were usually lacking. +Furthermore, the sloop could be manned by a loyal crew and employed as +a coast guard to discourage the pernicious art of smuggling. The +collector also ventured to nominate one to whom the charge of the boat +could be safely intrusted—a young man of Coralio, Felipe Carrera—not, +be it understood, one of extreme wisdom, but loyal and the best sailor +along the coast. + +It was upon this hint that the Minister of War acted, executing a rare +piece of drollery that so enlivened the tedium of executive session. + +In the constitution of this small, maritime banana republic was a +forgotten section that provided for the maintenance of a navy. This +provision—with many other wiser ones—had lain inert since the +establishment of the republic. Anchuria had no navy and had no use for +one. It was characteristic of Don Sabas—a man at once merry, learned, +whimsical and audacious—that he should have disturbed the dust of this +musty and sleeping statute to increase the humour of the world by so +much as a smile from his indulgent colleagues. + +With delightful mock seriousness the Minister of War proposed the +creation of a navy. He argued its need and the glories it might achieve +with such gay and witty zeal that the travesty overcame with its humour +even the swart dignity of President Losada himself. + +The champagne was bubbling trickily in the veins of the mercurial +statesmen. It was not the custom of the grave governors of Anchuria to +enliven their sessions with a beverage so apt to cast a veil of +disparagement over sober affairs. The wine had been a thoughtful +compliment tendered by the agent of the Vesuvius Fruit Company as a +token of amicable relations—and certain consummated deals—between that +company and the republic of Anchuria. + +The jest was carried to its end. A formidable, official document was +prepared, encrusted with chromatic seals and jaunty with fluttering +ribbons, bearing the florid signatures of state. This commission +conferred upon el Señor Don Felipe Carrera the title of Flag Admiral of +the Republic of Anchuria. Thus within the space of a few minutes and +the dominion of a dozen “extra dry,” the country took its place among +the naval powers of the world, and Felipe Carrera became entitled to a +salute of nineteen guns whenever he might enter port. + +The southern races are lacking in that particular kind of humour that +finds entertainment in the defects and misfortunes bestowed by Nature. +Owing to this defect in their constitution they are not moved to +laughter (as are their northern brothers) by the spectacle of the +deformed, the feeble-minded or the insane. + +Felipe Carrera was sent upon earth with but half his wits. Therefore, +the people of Coralio called him “_El pobrecito loco_”—“the poor little +crazed one”—saying that God had sent but half of him to earth, +retaining the other half. + +A sombre youth, glowering, and speaking only at the rarest times, +Felipe was but negatively “loco.” On shore he generally refused all +conversation. He seemed to know that he was badly handicapped on land, +where so many kinds of understanding are needed; but on the water his +one talent set him equal with most men. Few sailors whom God had +carefully and completely made could handle a sailboat as well. Five +points nearer the wind than even the best of them he could sail his +sloop. When the elements raged and set other men to cowering, the +deficiencies of Felipe seemed of little importance. He was a perfect +sailor, if an imperfect man. He owned no boat, but worked among the +crews of the schooners and sloops that skimmed the coast, trading and +freighting fruit out to the steamers where there was no harbour. It was +through his famous skill and boldness on the sea, as well as for the +pity felt for his mental imperfections, that he was recommended by the +collector as a suitable custodian of the captured sloop. + +When the outcome of Don Sabas’ little pleasantry arrived in the form of +the imposing and preposterous commission, the collector smiled. He had +not expected such prompt and overwhelming response to his +recommendation. He despatched a _muchacho_ at once to fetch the future +admiral. + +The collector waited in his official quarters. His office was in the +Calle Grande, and the sea breezes hummed through its windows all day. +The collector, in white linen and canvas shoes, philandered with papers +on an antique desk. A parrot, perched on a pen rack, seasoned the +official tedium with a fire of choice Castilian imprecations. Two rooms +opened into the collector’s. In one the clerical force of young men of +variegated complexions transacted with glitter and parade their several +duties. Through the open door of the other room could be seen a bronze +babe, guiltless of clothing, that rollicked upon the floor. In a grass +hammock a thin woman, tinted a pale lemon, played a guitar and swung +contentedly in the breeze. Thus surrounded by the routine of his high +duties and the visible tokens of agreeable domesticity, the collector’s +heart was further made happy by the power placed in his hands to +brighten the fortunes of the “innocent” Felipe. + +Felipe came and stood before the collector. He was a lad of twenty, not +ill-favoured in looks, but with an expression of distant and pondering +vacuity. He wore white cotton trousers, down the seams of which he had +sewed red stripes with some vague aim at military decoration. A flimsy +blue shirt fell open at his throat; his feet were bare; he held in his +hand the cheapest of straw hats from the States. + +“Señor Carrera,” said the collector, gravely, producing the showy +commission, “I have sent for you at the president’s bidding. This +document that I present to you confers upon you the title of Admiral of +this great republic, and gives you absolute command of the naval forces +and fleet of our country. You may think, friend Felipe, that we have no +navy—but yes! The sloop the _Estrella del Noche_, that my brave men +captured from the coast smugglers, is to be placed under your command. +The boat is to be devoted to the services of your country. You will be +ready at all times to convey officials of the government to points +along the coast where they may be obliged to visit. You will also act +as a coast-guard to prevent, as far as you may be able, the crime of +smuggling. You will uphold the honour and prestige of your country at +sea, and endeavour to place Anchuria among the proudest naval powers of +the world. These are your instructions as the Minister of War desires +me to convey them to you. _Por Dios!_ I do not know how all this is to +be accomplished, for not one word did his letter contain in respect to +a crew or to the expenses of this navy. Perhaps you are to provide a +crew yourself, Señor Admiral—I do not know—but it is a very high honour +that has descended upon you. I now hand you your commission. When you +are ready for the boat I will give orders that she shall be made over +into your charge. That is as far as my instructions go.” + +Felipe took the commission that the collector handed to him. He gazed +through the open window at the sea for a moment, with his customary +expression of deep but vain pondering. Then he turned without having +spoken a word, and walked swiftly away through the hot sand of the +street. + +“_Pobrecito loco!_” sighed the collector; and the parrot on the pen +racks screeched “Loco!—loco!—loco!” + +The next morning a strange procession filed through the streets to the +collector’s office. At its head was the admiral of the navy. Somewhere +Felipe had raked together a pitiful semblance of a military uniform—a +pair of red trousers, a dingy blue short jacket heavily ornamented with +gold braid, and an old fatigue cap that must have been cast away by one +of the British soldiers in Belize and brought away by Felipe on one of +his coasting voyages. Buckled around his waist was an ancient ship’s +cutlass contributed to his equipment by Pedro Lafitte, the baker, who +proudly asserted its inheritance from his ancestor, the illustrious +buccaneer. At the admiral’s heels tagged his newly-shipped crew—three +grinning, glossy, black Caribs, bare to the waist, the sand spurting in +showers from the spring of their naked feet. + +Briefly and with dignity Felipe demanded his vessel of the collector. +And now a fresh honour awaited him. The collector’s wife, who played +the guitar and read novels in the hammock all day, had more than a +little romance in her placid, yellow bosom. She had found in an old +book an engraving of a flag that purported to be the naval flag of +Anchuria. Perhaps it had so been designed by the founders of the +nation; but, as no navy had ever been established, oblivion had claimed +the flag. Laboriously with her own hands she had made a flag after the +pattern—a red cross upon a blue-and-white ground. She presented it to +Felipe with these words: “Brave sailor, this flag is of your country. +Be true, and defend it with your life. Go you with God.” + +For the first time since his appointment the admiral showed a flicker +of emotion. He took the silken emblem, and passed his hand reverently +over its surface. “I am the admiral,” he said to the collector’s lady. +Being on land he could bring himself to no more exuberant expression of +sentiment. At sea with the flag at the masthead of his navy, some more +eloquent exposition of feelings might be forthcoming. + +Abruptly the admiral departed with his crew. For the next three days +they were busy giving the _Estrella del Noche_ a new coat of white +paint trimmed with blue. And then Felipe further adorned himself by +fastening a handful of brilliant parrot’s plumes in his cap. Again he +tramped with his faithful crew to the collector’s office and formally +notified him that the sloop’s name had been changed to _El Nacional_. + +During the next few months the navy had its troubles. Even an admiral +is perplexed to know what to do without any orders. But none came. +Neither did any salaries. _El Nacional_ swung idly at anchor. + +When Felipe’s little store of money was exhausted he went to the +collector and raised the question of finances. + +“Salaries!” exclaimed the collector, with hands raised; “_Valgame +Dios!_ not one _centavo_ of my own pay have I received for the last +seven months. The pay of an admiral, do you ask? _Quién sabe?_ Should +it be less than three thousand _pesos_? _Mira!_ you will see a +revolution in this country very soon. A good sign of it is when the +government calls all the time for _pesos_, _pesos_, _pesos_, and pays +none out.” + +Felipe left the collector’s office with a look almost of content on his +sombre face. A revolution would mean fighting, and then the government +would need his services. It was rather humiliating to be an admiral +without anything to do, and have a hungry crew at your heels begging +for _reales_ to buy plantains and tobacco with. + +When he returned to where his happy-go-lucky Caribs were waiting they +sprang up and saluted, as he had drilled them to do. + +“Come, _muchachos_,” said the admiral; “it seems that the government is +poor. It has no money to give us. We will earn what we need to live +upon. Thus will we serve our country. Soon”—his heavy eyes almost +lighted up—“it may gladly call upon us for help.” + +Thereafter _El Nacional_ turned out with the other coast craft and +became a wage-earner. She worked with the lighters freighting bananas +and oranges out to the fruit steamers that could not approach nearer +than a mile from the shore. Surely a self-supporting navy deserves red +letters in the budget of any nation. + +After earning enough at freighting to keep himself and his crew in +provisions for a week Felipe would anchor the navy and hang about the +little telegraph office, looking like one of the chorus of an insolvent +comic opera troupe besieging the manager’s den. A hope for orders from +the capital was always in his heart. That his services as admiral had +never been called into requirement hurt his pride and patriotism. At +every call he would inquire, gravely and expectantly, for despatches. +The operator would pretend to make a search, and then reply: + +“Not yet, it seems, _Señor el Almirante—poco tiempo!_” + +Outside in the shade of the lime-trees the crew chewed sugar cane or +slumbered, well content to serve a country that was contented with so +little service. + +One day in the early summer the revolution predicted by the collector +flamed out suddenly. It had long been smouldering. At the first note of +alarm the admiral of the navy force and fleet made all sail for a +larger port on the coast of a neighbouring republic, where he traded a +hastily collected cargo of fruit for its value in cartridges for the +five Martini rifles, the only guns that the navy could boast. Then to +the telegraph office sped the admiral. Sprawling in his favourite +corner, in his fast-decaying uniform, with his prodigious sabre +distributed between his red legs, he waited for the long-delayed, but +now soon expected, orders. + +“Not yet, _Señor el Almirante_,” the telegraph clerk would call to +him—“_poco tiempo!_” + +At the answer the admiral would plump himself down with a great +rattling of scabbard to await the infrequent tick of the little +instrument on the table. + +“They will come,” would be his unshaken reply; “I am the admiral.” + + + + +IX +THE FLAG PARAMOUNT + + +At the head of the insurgent party appeared that Hector and learned +Theban of the southern republics, Don Sabas Placido. A traveller, a +soldier, a poet, a scientist, a statesman and a connoisseur—the wonder +was that he could content himself with the petty, remote life of his +native country. + +“It is a whim of Placido’s,” said a friend who knew him well, “to take +up political intrigue. It is not otherwise than as if he had come upon +a new _tempo_ in music, a new bacillus in the air, a new scent, or +rhyme, or explosive. He will squeeze this revolution dry of sensations, +and a week afterward will forget it, skimming the seas of the world in +his brigantine to add to his already world-famous collections. +Collections of what? _Por Dios!_ of everything from postage stamps to +prehistoric stone idols.” + +But, for a mere dilettante, the æsthetic Placido seemed to be creating +a lively row. The people admired him; they were fascinated by his +brilliancy and flattered by his taking an interest in so small a thing +as his native country. They rallied to the call of his lieutenants in +the capital, where (somewhat contrary to arrangements) the army +remained faithful to the government. There was also lively skirmishing +in the coast towns. It was rumoured that the revolution was aided by +the Vesuvius Fruit Company, the power that forever stood with chiding +smile and uplifted finger to keep Anchuria in the class of good +children. Two of its steamers, the _Traveler_ and the _Salvador_, were +known to have conveyed insurgent troops from point to point along the +coast. + +As yet there had been no actual uprising in Coralio. Military law +prevailed, and the ferment was bottled for the time. And then came the +word that everywhere the revolutionists were encountering defeat. In +the capital the president’s forces triumphed; and there was a rumour +that the leaders of the revolt had been forced to fly, hotly pursued. + +In the little telegraph office at Coralio there was always a gathering +of officials and loyal citizens, awaiting news from the seat of +government. One morning the telegraph key began clicking, and presently +the operator called, loudly: “One telegram for _el Almirante_, Don +Señor Felipe Carrera!” + +There was a shuffling sound, a great rattling of tin scabbard, and the +admiral, prompt at his spot of waiting, leaped across the room to +receive it. + +The message was handed to him. Slowly spelling it out, he found it to +be his first official order—thus running: + +Proceed immediately with your vessel to mouth of Rio Ruiz; transport +beef and provisions to barracks at Alforan. + + +Martinez, General. + + +Small glory, to be sure, in this, his country’s first call. But it had +called, and joy surged in the admiral’s breast. He drew his cutlass +belt to another buckle hole, roused his dozing crew, and in a quarter +of an hour _El Nacional_ was tacking swiftly down coast in a stiff +landward breeze. + +The Rio Ruiz is a small river, emptying into the sea ten miles below +Coralio. That portion of the coast is wild and solitary. Through a +gorge in the Cordilleras rushes the Rio Ruiz, cold and bubbling, to +glide, at last, with breadth and leisure, through an alluvial morass +into the sea. + +In two hours _El Nacional_ entered the river’s mouth. The banks were +crowded with a disposition of formidable trees. The sumptuous +undergrowth of the tropics overflowed the land, and drowned itself in +the fallow waters. Silently the sloop entered there, and met a deeper +silence. Brilliant with greens and ochres and floral scarlets, the +umbrageous mouth of the Rio Ruiz furnished no sound or movement save of +the sea-going water as it purled against the prow of the vessel. Small +chance there seemed of wresting beef or provisions from that empty +solitude. + +The admiral decided to cast anchor, and, at the chain’s rattle, the +forest was stimulated to instant and resounding uproar. The mouth of +the Rio Ruiz had only been taking a morning nap. Parrots and baboons +screeched and barked in the trees; a whirring and a hissing and a +booming marked the awakening of animal life; a dark blue bulk was +visible for an instant, as a startled tapir fought his way through the +vines. + +The navy, under orders, hung in the mouth of the little river for +hours. The crew served the dinner of shark’s fin soup, plantains, crab +gumbo and sour wine. The admiral, with a three-foot telescope, closely +scanned the impervious foliage fifty yards away. + +It was nearly sunset when a reverberating “hal-lo-o-o!” came from the +forest to their left. It was answered; and three men, mounted upon +mules, crashed through the tropic tangle to within a dozen yards of the +river’s bank. There they dismounted; and one, unbuckling his belt, +struck each mule a violent blow with his sword scabbard, so that they, +with a fling of heels, dashed back again into the forest. + +Those were strange-looking men to be conveying beef and provisions. One +was a large and exceedingly active man, of striking presence. He was of +the purest Spanish type, with curling, gray-besprinkled, dark hair, +blue, sparkling eyes, and the pronounced air of a _caballero grande_. +The other two were small, brown-faced men, wearing white military +uniforms, high riding boots and swords. The clothes of all were +drenched, bespattered and rent by the thicket. Some stress of +circumstance must have driven them, _diable à quatre_, through flood, +mire and jungle. + +“_O-hé! Señor Almirante_,” called the large man. “Send to us your +boat.” + +The dory was lowered, and Felipe, with one of the Caribs, rowed toward +the left bank. + +The large man stood near the water’s brink, waist deep in the curling +vines. As he gazed upon the scarecrow figure in the stern of the dory a +sprightly interest beamed upon his mobile face. + +Months of wageless and thankless service had dimmed the admiral’s +splendour. His red trousers were patched and ragged. Most of the bright +buttons and yellow braid were gone from his jacket. The visor of his +cap was torn, and depended almost to his eyes. The admiral’s feet were +bare. + +“Dear admiral,” cried the large man, and his voice was like a blast +from a horn, “I kiss your hands. I knew we could build upon your +fidelity. You had our despatch—from General Martinez. A little nearer +with your boat, dear Admiral. Upon these devils of shifting vines we +stand with the smallest security.” + +Felipe regarded him with a stolid face. + +“Provisions and beef for the barracks at Alforan,” he quoted. + +“No fault of the butchers, _Almirante mio_, that the beef awaits you +not. But you are come in time to save the cattle. Get us aboard your +vessel, señor, at once. You first, _caballeros—á priesa!_ Come back for +me. The boat is too small.” + +The dory conveyed the two officers to the sloop, and returned for the +large man. + +“Have you so gross a thing as food, good admiral?” he cried, when +aboard. “And, perhaps, coffee? Beef and provisions! _Nombre de Dios!_ a +little longer and we could have eaten one of those mules that you, +Colonel Rafael, saluted so feelingly with your sword scabbard at +parting. Let us have food; and then we will sail—for the barracks at +Alforan—no?” + +The Caribs prepared a meal, to which the three passengers of _El +Nacional_ set themselves with famished delight. About sunset, as was +its custom, the breeze veered and swept back from the mountains, cool +and steady, bringing a taste of the stagnant lagoons and mangrove +swamps that guttered the lowlands. The mainsail of the sloop was +hoisted and swelled to it, and at that moment they heard shouts and a +waxing clamour from the bosky profundities of the shore. + +“The butchers, my dear admiral,” said the large man, smiling, “too late +for the slaughter.” + +Further than his orders to his crew, the admiral was saying nothing. +The topsail and jib were spread, and the sloop glided out of the +estuary. The large man and his companions had bestowed themselves with +what comfort they could about the bare deck. Belike, the thing big in +their minds had been their departure from that critical shore; and now +that the hazard was so far reduced their thoughts were loosed to the +consideration of further deliverance. But when they saw the sloop turn +and fly up coast again they relaxed, satisfied with the course the +admiral had taken. + +The large man sat at ease, his spirited blue eye engaged in the +contemplation of the navy’s commander. He was trying to estimate this +sombre and fantastic lad, whose impenetrable stolidity puzzled him. +Himself a fugitive, his life sought, and chafing under the smart of +defeat and failure, it was characteristic of him to transfer instantly +his interest to the study of a thing new to him. It was like him, too, +to have conceived and risked all upon this last desperate and madcap +scheme—this message to a poor, crazed _fanatico_ cruising about with +his grotesque uniform and his farcical title. But his companions had +been at their wits’ end; escape had seemed incredible; and now he was +pleased with the success of the plan they had called crack-brained and +precarious. + +The brief, tropic twilight seemed to slide swiftly into the pearly +splendour of a moonlit night. And now the lights of Coralio appeared, +distributed against the darkening shore to their right. The admiral +stood, silent, at the tiller; the Caribs, like black panthers, held the +sheets, leaping noiselessly at his short commands. The three passengers +were watching intently the sea before them, and when at length they +came in sight of the bulk of a steamer lying a mile out from the town, +with her lights radiating deep into the water, they held a sudden +voluble and close-headed converse. The sloop was speeding as if to +strike midway between ship and shore. + +The large man suddenly separated from his companions and approached the +scarecrow at the helm. + +“My dear admiral,” he said, “the government has been exceedingly +remiss. I feel all the shame for it that only its ignorance of your +devoted service has prevented it from sustaining. An inexcusable +oversight has been made. A vessel, a uniform and a crew worthy of your +fidelity shall be furnished you. But just now, dear admiral, there is +business of moment afoot. The steamer lying there is the _Salvador_. I +and my friends desire to be conveyed to her, where we are sent on the +government’s business. Do us the favour to shape your course +accordingly.” + +Without replying, the admiral gave a sharp command, and put the tiller +hard to port. _El Nacional_ swerved, and headed straight as an arrow’s +course for the shore. + +“Do me the favour,” said the large man, a trifle restively, “to +acknowledge, at least, that you catch the sound of my words.” It was +possible that the fellow might be lacking in senses as well as +intellect. + +The admiral emitted a croaking, harsh laugh, and spake. + +“They will stand you,” he said, “with your face to a wall and shoot you +dead. That is the way they kill traitors. I knew you when you stepped +into my boat. I have seen your picture in a book. You are Sabas +Placido, traitor to your country. With your face to a wall. So, you +will die. I am the admiral, and I will take you to them. With your face +to a wall. Yes.” + +Don Sabas half turned and waved his hand, with a ringing laugh, toward +his fellow fugitives. “To you, _caballeros_, I have related the history +of that session when we issued that O! so ridiculous commission. Of a +truth our jest has been turned against us. Behold the Frankenstein’s +monster we have created!” + +Don Sabas glanced toward the shore. The lights of Coralio were drawing +near. He could see the beach, the warehouse of the _Bodega Nacional_, +the long, low _cuartel_ occupied by the soldiers, and, behind that, +gleaming in the moonlight, a stretch of high adobe wall. He had seen +men stood with their faces to that wall and shot dead. + +Again he addressed the extravagant figure at the helm. + +“It is true,” he said, “that I am fleeing the country. But, receive the +assurance that I care very little for that. Courts and camps everywhere +are open to Sabas Placido. _Vaya!_ what is this molehill of a +republic—this pig’s head of a country—to a man like me? I am a +_paisano_ of everywhere. In Rome, in London, in Paris, in Vienna, you +will hear them say: ‘Welcome back, Don Sabas.’ Come!—_tonto_—baboon of +a boy—admiral, whatever you call yourself, turn your boat. Put us on +board the _Salvador_, and here is your pay—five hundred _pesos_ in +money of the _Estados Unidos_—more than your lying government will pay +you in twenty years.” + +Don Sabas pressed a plump purse against the youth’s hand. The admiral +gave no heed to the words or the movement. Braced against the helm, he +was holding the sloop dead on her shoreward course. His dull face was +lit almost to intelligence by some inward conceit that seemed to afford +him joy, and found utterance in another parrot-like cackle. + +“That is why they do it,” he said—“so that you will not see the guns. +They fire—oom!—and you fall dead. With your face to the wall. Yes.” + +The admiral called a sudden order to his crew. The lithe, silent Caribs +made fast the sheets they held, and slipped down the hatchway into the +hold of the sloop. When the last one had disappeared, Don Sabas, like a +big, brown leopard, leaped forward, closed and fastened the hatch and +stood, smiling. + +“No rifles, if you please, dear admiral,” he said. “It was a whimsey of +mine once to compile a dictionary of the Carib _lengua_. So, I +understood your order. Perhaps now you will—” + +He cut short his words, for he heard the dull “swish” of iron scraping +along tin. The admiral had drawn the cutlass of Pedro Lafitte, and was +darting upon him. The blade descended, and it was only by a display of +surprising agility that the large man escaped, with only a bruised +shoulder, the glancing weapon. He was drawing his pistol as he sprang, +and the next instant he shot the admiral down. + +Don Sabas stooped over him, and rose again. + +“In the heart,” he said briefly. “_Señores_, the navy is abolished.” + +Colonel Rafael sprang to the helm, and the other officer hastened to +loose the mainsail sheets. The boom swung round; _El Nacional_ veered +and began to tack industriously for the _Salvador_. + +“Strike that flag, señor,” called Colonel Rafael. “Our friends on the +steamer will wonder why we are sailing under it.” + +“Well said,” cried Don Sabas. Advancing to the mast he lowered the flag +to the deck, where lay its too loyal supporter. Thus ended the Minister +of War’s little piece of after-dinner drollery, and by the same hand +that began it. + +Suddenly Don Sabas gave a great cry of joy, and ran down the slanting +deck to the side of Colonel Rafael. Across his arm he carried the flag +of the extinguished navy. + +“_Mire! mire! señor._ Ah, _Dios!_ Already can I hear that great bear of +an _Oestreicher_ shout, _‘Du hast mein herz gebrochen!’ Mire!_ Of my +friend, Herr Grunitz, of Vienna, you have heard me relate. That man has +travelled to Ceylon for an orchid—to Patagonia for a headdress—to +Benares for a slipper—to Mozambique for a spearhead to add to his +famous collections. Thou knowest, also, _amigo_ Rafael, that I have +been a gatherer of curios. My collection of battle flags of the world’s +navies was the most complete in existence until last year. Then Herr +Grunitz secured two, O! such rare specimens. One of a Barbary state, +and one of the Makarooroos, a tribe on the west coast of Africa. I have +not those, but they can be procured. But this flag, señor—do you know +what it is? Name of God! do you know? See that red cross upon the blue +and white ground! You never saw it before? _Seguramente no._ It is the +naval flag of your country. _Mire!_ This rotten tub we stand upon is +its navy—that dead cockatoo lying there was its commander—that stroke +of cutlass and single pistol shot a sea battle. All a piece of absurd +foolery, I grant you—but authentic. There has never been another flag +like this, and there never will be another. No. It is unique in the +whole world. Yes. Think of what that means to a collector of flags! Do +you know, _Coronel mio_, how many golden crowns Herr Grunitz would give +for this flag? Ten thousand, likely. Well, a hundred thousand would not +buy it. Beautiful flag! Only flag! Little devil of a most heaven-born +flag! _O-hé!_ old grumbler beyond the ocean. Wait till Don Sabas comes +again to the Königin Strasse. He will let you kneel and touch the folds +of it with one finger. _O-hé!_ old spectacled ransacker of the world!” + +Forgotten was the impotent revolution, the danger, the loss, the gall +of defeat. Possessed solely by the inordinate and unparalleled passion +of the collector, he strode up and down the little deck, clasping to +his breast with one hand the paragon of a flag. He snapped his fingers +triumphantly toward the east. He shouted the paean to his prize in +trumpet tones, as though he would make old Grunitz hear in his musty +den beyond the sea. + +They were waiting, on the _Salvador_, to welcome them. The sloop came +close alongside the steamer where her sides were sliced almost to the +lower deck for the loading of fruit. The sailors of the _Salvador_ +grappled and held her there. + +Captain McLeod leaned over the side. + +“Well, señor, the jig is up, I’m told.” + +“The jig is up?” Don Sabas looked perplexed for a moment. “That +revolution—ah, yes!” With a shrug of his shoulders he dismissed the +matter. + +The captain learned of the escape and the imprisoned crew. + +“Caribs?” he said; “no harm in them.” He slipped down into the sloop +and kicked loose the hasp of the hatch. The black fellows came tumbling +up, sweating but grinning. + +“Hey! black boys!” said the captain, in a dialect of his own; “you +sabe, catchy boat and vamos back same place quick.” + +They saw him point to themselves, the sloop and Coralio. “Yas, yas!” +they cried, with broader grins and many nods. + +The four—Don Sabas, the two officers and the captain—moved to quit the +sloop. Don Sabas lagged a little behind, looking at the still form of +the late admiral, sprawled in his paltry trappings. + +“_Pobrecito loco_,” he said softly. + +He was a brilliant cosmopolite and a _cognoscente_ of high rank; but, +after all, he was of the same race and blood and instinct as this +people. Even as the simple _paisanos_ of Coralio had said it, so said +Don Sabas. Without a smile, he looked, and said, “The poor little +crazed one!” + +Stooping he raised the limp shoulders, drew the priceless and +induplicable flag under them and over the breast, pinning it there with +the diamond star of the Order of San Carlos that he took from the +collar of his own coat. + +He followed after the others, and stood with them upon the deck of the +_Salvador_. The sailors that steadied _El Nacional_ shoved her off. The +jabbering Caribs hauled away at the rigging; the sloop headed for the +shore. + +And Herr Grunitz’s collection of naval flags was still the finest in +the world. + + + + +X +THE SHAMROCK AND THE PALM + + +One night when there was no breeze, and Coralio seemed closer than ever +to the gratings of Avernus, five men were grouped about the door of the +photograph establishment of Keogh and Clancy. Thus, in all the scorched +and exotic places of the earth, Caucasians meet when the day’s work is +done to preserve the fulness of their heritage by the aspersion of +alien things. + +Johnny Atwood lay stretched upon the grass in the undress uniform of a +Carib, and prated feebly of cool water to be had in the cucumber-wood +pumps of Dalesburg. Dr. Gregg, through the prestige of his whiskers and +as a bribe against the relation of his imminent professional tales, was +conceded the hammock that was swung between the door jamb and a +calabash-tree. Keogh had moved out upon the grass a little table that +held the instrument for burnishing completed photographs. He was the +only busy one of the group. Industriously from between the cylinders of +the burnisher rolled the finished depictments of Coralio’s citizens. +Blanchard, the French mining engineer, in his cool linen viewed the +smoke of his cigarette through his calm glasses, impervious to the +heat. Clancy sat on the steps, smoking his short pipe. His mood was the +gossip’s; the others were reduced, by the humidity, to the state of +disability desirable in an audience. + +Clancy was an American with an Irish diathesis and cosmopolitan +proclivities. Many businesses had claimed him, but not for long. The +roadster’s blood was in his veins. The voice of the tintype was but one +of the many callings that had wooed him upon so many roads. Sometimes +he could be persuaded to oral construction of his voyages into the +informal and egregious. To-night there were symptoms of divulgement in +him. + +“’Tis elegant weather for filibusterin’,” he volunteered. “It reminds +me of the time I struggled to liberate a nation from the poisonous +breath of a tyrant’s clutch. ’Twas hard work. ’Tis strainin’ to the +back and makes corns on the hands.” + +“I didn’t know you had ever lent your sword to an oppressed people,” +murmured Atwood, from the grass. + +“I did,” said Clancy; “and they turned it into a ploughshare.” + +“What country was so fortunate as to secure your aid?” airily inquired +Blanchard. + +“Where’s Kamchatka?” asked Clancy, with seeming irrelevance. + +“Why, off Siberia somewhere in the Arctic regions,” somebody answered, +doubtfully. + +“I thought that was the cold one,” said Clancy, with a satisfied nod. +“I’m always gettin’ the two names mixed. ’Twas Guatemala, then—the hot +one—I’ve been filibusterin’ with. Ye’ll find that country on the map. +’Tis in the district known as the tropics. By the foresight of +Providence, it lies on the coast so the geography man could run the +names of the towns off into the water. They’re an inch long, small +type, composed of Spanish dialects, and, ’tis my opinion, of the same +system of syntax that blew up the _Maine_. Yes, ’twas that country I +sailed against, single-handed, and endeavoured to liberate it from a +tyrannical government with a single-barreled pickaxe, unloaded at that. +Ye don’t understand, of course. ’Tis a statement demandin’ elucidation +and apologies. + +“’Twas in New Orleans one morning about the first of June; I was +standin’ down on the wharf, lookin’ about at the ships in the river. +There was a little steamer moored right opposite me that seemed about +ready to sail. The funnels of it were throwin’ out smoke, and a gang of +roustabouts were carryin’ aboard a pile of boxes that was stacked up on +the wharf. The boxes were about two feet square, and somethin’ like +four feet long, and they seemed to be pretty heavy. + +“I walked over, careless, to the stack of boxes. I saw one of them had +been broken in handlin’. ’Twas curiosity made me pull up the loose top +and look inside. The box was packed full of Winchester rifles. ‘So, +so,’ says I to myself; ‘somebody’s gettin’ a twist on the neutrality +laws. Somebody’s aidin’ with munitions of war. I wonder where the +popguns are goin’?’ + +“I heard somebody cough, and I turned around. There stood a little, +round, fat man with a brown face and white clothes, a +first-class-looking little man, with a four-karat diamond on his finger +and his eye full of interrogations and respects. I judged he was a kind +of foreigner—may be from Russia or Japan or the archipelagoes. + +“‘Hist!’ says the round man, full of concealments and confidences. +‘Will the señor respect the discoveryments he has made, that the mans +on the ship shall not be acquaint? The señor will be a gentleman that +shall not expose one thing that by accident occur.’ + +“‘Monseer,’ says I—for I judged him to be a kind of Frenchman—‘receive +my most exasperated assurances that your secret is safe with James +Clancy. Furthermore, I will go so far as to remark, Veev la +Liberty—veev it good and strong. Whenever you hear of a Clancy +obstructin’ the abolishment of existin’ governments you may notify me +by return mail.’ + +“‘The señor is good,’ says the dark, fat man, smilin’ under his black +mustache. ‘Wish you to come aboard my ship and drink of wine a glass.’ + +“Bein’ a Clancy, in two minutes me and the foreigner man were seated at +a table in the cabin of the steamer, with a bottle between us. I could +hear the heavy boxes bein’ dumped into the hold. I judged that cargo +must consist of at least 2,000 Winchesters. Me and the brown man drank +the bottle of stuff, and he called the steward to bring another. When +you amalgamate a Clancy with the contents of a bottle you practically +instigate secession. I had heard a good deal about these revolutions in +them tropical localities, and I begun to want a hand in it. + +“‘You goin’ to stir things up in your country, ain’t you, monseer?’ +says I, with a wink to let him know I was on. + +“‘Yes, yes,’ said the little man, pounding his fist on the table. ‘A +change of the greatest will occur. Too long have the people been +oppressed with the promises and the never-to-happen things to become. +The great work it shall be carry on. Yes. Our forces shall in the +capital city strike of the soonest. _Carrambos!_’ + +“‘_Carrambos_ is the word,’ says I, beginning to invest myself with +enthusiasm and more wine, ‘likewise veeva, as I said before. May the +shamrock of old—I mean the banana-vine or the pie-plant, or whatever +the imperial emblem may be of your down-trodden country, wave forever.’ + +“‘A thousand thank-yous,’ says the round man, ‘for your emission of +amicable utterances. What our cause needs of the very most is mans who +will the work do, to lift it along. Oh, for one thousands strong, good +mans to aid the General De Vega that he shall to his country bring +those success and glory! It is hard—oh, so hard to find good mans to +help in the work.’ + +“‘Monseer,’ says I, leanin’ over the table and graspin’ his hand, ‘I +don’t know where your country is, but me heart bleeds for it. The heart +of a Clancy was never deaf to the sight of an oppressed people. The +family is filibusterers by birth, and foreigners by trade. If you can +use James Clancy’s arms and his blood in denudin’ your shores of the +tyrant’s yoke they’re yours to command.’ + +“General De Vega was overcome with joy to confiscate my condolence of +his conspiracies and predicaments. He tried to embrace me across the +table, but his fatness, and the wine that had been in the bottles, +prevented. Thus was I welcomed into the ranks of filibustery. Then the +general man told me his country had the name of Guatemala, and was the +greatest nation laved by any ocean whatever anywhere. He looked at me +with tears in his eyes, and from time to time he would emit the remark, +‘Ah! big, strong, brave mans! That is what my country need.’ + +“General De Vega, as was the name by which he denounced himself, +brought out a document for me to sign, which I did, makin’ a fine +flourish and curlycue with the tail of the ‘y.’ + +“‘Your passage-money,’ says the general, business-like, ‘shall from +your pay be deduct.’ + +“’Twill not,’ says I, haughty. ‘I’ll pay my own passage.’ A hundred and +eighty dollars I had in my inside pocket, and ’twas no common +filibuster I was goin’ to be, filibusterin’ for me board and clothes. + +“The steamer was to sail in two hours, and I went ashore to get some +things together I’d need. When I came aboard I showed the general with +pride the outfit. ’Twas a fine Chinchilla overcoat, Arctic overshoes, +fur cap and earmuffs, with elegant fleece-lined gloves and woolen +muffler. + +“‘_Carrambos!_’ says the little general. ‘What clothes are these that +shall go to the tropic?’ And then the little spalpeen laughs, and he +calls the captain, and the captain calls the purser, and they pipe up +the chief engineer, and the whole gang leans against the cabin and +laughs at Clancy’s wardrobe for Guatemala. + +“I reflects a bit, serious, and asks the general again to denominate +the terms by which his country is called. He tells me, and I see then +that ’twas the t’other one, Kamchatka, I had in mind. Since then I’ve +had difficulty in separatin’ the two nations in name, climate and +geographic disposition. + +“I paid my passage—twenty-four dollars, first cabin—and ate at table +with the officer crowd. Down on the lower deck was a gang of +second-class passengers, about forty of them, seemin’ to be Dagoes and +the like. I wondered what so many of them were goin’ along for. + +“Well, then, in three days we sailed alongside that Guatemala. ’Twas a +blue country, and not yellow as ’tis miscolored on the map. We landed +at a town on the coast, where a train of cars was waitin’ for us on a +dinky little railroad. The boxes on the steamer were brought ashore and +loaded on the cars. The gang of Dagoes got aboard, too, the general and +me in the front car. Yes, me and General De Vega headed the revolution, +as it pulled out of the seaport town. That train travelled about as +fast as a policeman goin’ to a riot. It penetrated the most conspicuous +lot of fuzzy scenery ever seen outside a geography. We run some forty +miles in seven hours, and the train stopped. There was no more +railroad. ’Twas a sort of camp in a damp gorge full of wildness and +melancholies. They was gradin’ and choppin’ out the forests ahead to +continue the road. ‘Here,’ says I to myself, ‘is the romantic haunt of +the revolutionists. Here will Clancy, by the virtue that is in a +superior race and the inculcation of Fenian tactics, strike a +tremendous blow for liberty.’ + +“They unloaded the boxes from the train and begun to knock the tops +off. From the first one that was open I saw General De Vega take the +Winchester rifles and pass them around to a squad of morbid soldiery. +The other boxes was opened next, and, believe me or not, divil another +gun was to be seen. Every other box in the load was full of pickaxes +and spades. + +“And then—sorrow be upon them tropics—the proud Clancy and the +dishonoured Dagoes, each one of them, had to shoulder a pick or a +spade, and march away to work on that dirty little railroad. Yes; ’twas +that the Dagoes shipped for, and ’twas that the filibusterin’ Clancy +signed for, though unbeknownst to himself at the time. In after days I +found out about it. It seems ’twas hard to get hands to work on that +road. The intelligent natives of the country was too lazy to work. +Indeed, the saints know, ’twas unnecessary. By stretchin’ out one hand, +they could seize the most delicate and costly fruits of the earth, and, +by stretchin’ out the other, they could sleep for days at a time +without hearin’ a seven-o’clock whistle or the footsteps of the rent +man upon the stairs. So, regular, the steamers travelled to the United +States to seduce labour. Usually the imported spade-slingers died in +two or three months from eatin’ the over-ripe water and breathin’ the +violent tropical scenery. Wherefore they made them sign contracts for a +year, when they hired them, and put an armed guard over the poor divils +to keep them from runnin’ away. + +“’Twas thus I was double-crossed by the tropics through a family +failin’ of goin’ out of the way to hunt disturbances. + +“They gave me a pick, and I took it, meditatin’ an insurrection on the +spot; but there was the guards handlin’ the Winchesters careless, and I +come to the conclusion that discretion was the best part of +filibusterin’. There was about a hundred of us in the gang startin’ out +to work, and the word was given to move. I steps out of the ranks and +goes up to that General De Vega man, who was smokin’ a cigar and gazin’ +upon the scene with satisfactions and glory. He smiles at me polite and +devilish. ‘Plenty work,’ says he, ‘for big, strong mans in Guatemala. +Yes. T’irty dollars in the month. Good pay. Ah, yes. You strong, brave +man. Bimeby we push those railroad in the capital very quick. They want +you go work now. _Adios_, strong mans.’ + +“‘Monseer,’ says I, lingerin’, ‘will you tell a poor little Irishman +this: When I set foot on your cockroachy steamer, and breathed liberal +and revolutionary sentiments into your sour wine, did you think I was +conspirin’ to sling a pick on your contemptuous little railroad? And +when you answered me with patriotic recitations, humping up the +star-spangled cause of liberty, did you have meditations of reducin’ me +to the ranks of the stump-grubbin’ Dagoes in the chain-gangs of your +vile and grovelin’ country?’ + +“The general man expanded his rotundity and laughed considerable. Yes, +he laughed very long and loud, and I, Clancy, stood and waited. + +“‘Comical mans!’ he shouts, at last. ‘So you will kill me from the +laughing. Yes; it is hard to find the brave, strong mans to aid my +country. Revolutions? Did I speak of r-r-revolutions? Not one word. I +say, big, strong mans is need in Guatemala. So. The mistake is of you. +You have looked in those one box containing those gun for the guard. +You think all boxes is contain gun? No. + +“‘There is not war in Guatemala. But work? Yes. Good. T’irty dollar in +the month. You shall shoulder one pickaxe, señor, and dig for the +liberty and prosperity of Guatemala. Off to your work. The guard waits +for you.’ + +“‘Little, fat, poodle dog of a brown man,’ says I, quiet, but full of +indignations and discomforts, ‘things shall happen to you. Maybe not +right away, but as soon as J. Clancy can formulate somethin’ in the way +of repartee.’ + +“The boss of the gang orders us to work. I tramps off with the Dagoes, +and I hears the distinguished patriot and kidnapper laughin’ hearty as +we go. + +“’Tis a sorrowful fact, for eight weeks I built railroads for that +misbehavin’ country. I filibustered twelve hours a day with a heavy +pick and a spade, choppin’ away the luxurious landscape that grew upon +the right of way. We worked in swamps that smelled like there was a +leak in the gas mains, trampin’ down a fine assortment of the most +expensive hothouse plants and vegetables. The scene was tropical beyond +the wildest imagination of the geography man. The trees was all +sky-scrapers; the underbrush was full of needles and pins; there was +monkeys jumpin’ around and crocodiles and pink-tailed mockin’-birds, +and ye stood knee-deep in the rotten water and grabbled roots for the +liberation of Guatemala. Of nights we would build smudges in camp to +discourage the mosquitoes, and sit in the smoke, with the guards pacin’ +all around us. There was two hundred men workin’ on the road—mostly +Dagoes, nigger-men, Spanish-men and Swedes. Three or four were Irish. + +“One old man named Halloran—a man of Hibernian entitlements and +discretions, explained it to me. He had been workin’ on the road a +year. Most of them died in less than six months. He was dried up to +gristle and bone, and shook with chills every third night. + +“‘When you first come,’ says he, ‘ye think ye’ll leave right away. But +they hold out your first month’s pay for your passage over, and by that +time the tropics has its grip on ye. Ye’re surrounded by a ragin’ +forest full of disreputable beasts—lions and baboons and +anacondas—waitin’ to devour ye. The sun strikes ye hard, and melts the +marrow in your bones. Ye get similar to the lettuce-eaters the +poetry-book speaks about. Ye forget the elevated sintiments of life, +such as patriotism, revenge, disturbances of the peace and the dacint +love of a clane shirt. Ye do your work, and ye swallow the kerosene ile +and rubber pipestems dished up to ye by the Dago cook for food. Ye +light your pipeful, and say to yoursilf, “Nixt week I’ll break away,” +and ye go to sleep and call yersilf a liar, for ye know ye’ll never do +it.’ + +“‘Who is this general man,’ asks I, ‘that calls himself De Vega?’ + +“‘’Tis the man,’ says Halloran, ‘who is tryin’ to complete the +finishin’ of the railroad. ’Twas the project of a private corporation, +but it busted, and then the government took it up. De Vegy is a big +politician, and wants to be prisident. The people want the railroad +completed, as they’re taxed mighty on account of it. The De Vegy man is +pushin’ it along as a campaign move.’ + +“‘’Tis not my way,’ says I, ‘to make threats against any man, but +there’s an account to be settled between the railroad man and James +O’Dowd Clancy.’ + +“‘’Twas that way I thought, mesilf, at first,’ Halloran says, with a +big sigh, ‘until I got to be a lettuce-eater. The fault’s wid these +tropics. They rejuices a man’s system. ’Tis a land, as the poet says, +“Where it always seems to be after dinner.” I does me work and smokes +me pipe and sleeps. There’s little else in life, anyway. Ye’ll get that +way yersilf, mighty soon. Don’t be harbourin’ any sintiments at all, +Clancy.’ + +“‘I can’t help it,’ says I; ‘I’m full of ’em. I enlisted in the +revolutionary army of this dark country in good faith to fight for its +liberty, honours and silver candlesticks; instead of which I am set to +amputatin’ its scenery and grubbin’ its roots. ’Tis the general man +will have to pay for it.’ + +“Two months I worked on that railroad before I found a chance to get +away. One day a gang of us was sent back to the end of the completed +line to fetch some picks that had been sent down to Port Barrios to be +sharpened. They were brought on a hand-car, and I noticed, when I +started away, that the car was left there on the track. + +“That night, about twelve, I woke up Halloran and told him my scheme. + +“‘Run away?’ says Halloran. ‘Good Lord, Clancy, do ye mean it? Why, I +ain’t got the nerve. It’s too chilly, and I ain’t slept enough. Run +away? I told you, Clancy, I’ve eat the lettuce. I’ve lost my grip. ’Tis +the tropics that’s done it. ’Tis like the poet says: “Forgotten are our +friends that we have left behind; in the hollow lettuce-land we will +live and lay reclined.” You better go on, Clancy. I’ll stay, I guess. +It’s too early and cold, and I’m sleepy.’ + +“So I had to leave Halloran. I dressed quiet, and slipped out of the +tent we were in. When the guard came along I knocked him over, like a +ninepin, with a green cocoanut I had, and made for the railroad. I got +on that hand-car and made it fly. ’Twas yet a while before daybreak +when I saw the lights of Port Barrios about a mile away. I stopped the +hand-car there and walked to the town. I stepped inside the +corporations of that town with care and hesitations. I was not afraid +of the army of Guatemala, but me soul quaked at the prospect of a +hand-to-hand struggle with its employment bureau. ’Tis a country that +hires its help easy and keeps ’em long. Sure I can fancy Missis America +and Missis Guatemala passin’ a bit of gossip some fine, still night +across the mountains. ‘Oh, dear,’ says Missis America, ‘and it’s a lot +of trouble I’m havin’ ag’in with the help, señora, ma’am.’ ‘Laws, now!’ +says Missis Guatemala, ‘you don’t say so, ma’am! Now, mine never think +of leavin’ me—te-he! ma’am,’ snickers Missis Guatemala. + +“I was wonderin’ how I was goin’ to move away from them tropics without +bein’ hired again. Dark as it was, I could see a steamer ridin’ in the +harbour, with smoke emergin’ from her stacks. I turned down a little +grass street that run down to the water. On the beach I found a little +brown nigger-man just about to shove off in a skiff. + +“‘Hold on, Sambo,’ says I, ‘savve English?’ + +“‘Heap plenty, yes,’ says he, with a pleasant grin. + +“‘What steamer is that?’ I asks him, ‘and where is it going? And what’s +the news, and the good word and the time of day?’ + +“‘That steamer the _Conchita_,’ said the brown man, affable and easy, +rollin’ a cigarette. ‘Him come from New Orleans for load banana. Him +got load last night. I think him sail in one, two hour. Verree nice day +we shall be goin’ have. You hear some talkee ’bout big battle, maybe +so? You think catchee General De Vega, señor? Yes? No?’ + +“‘How’s that, Sambo?’ says I. ‘Big battle? What battle? Who wants +catchee General De Vega? I’ve been up at my old gold mines in the +interior for a couple of months, and haven’t heard any news.’ + +“‘Oh,’ says the nigger-man, proud to speak the English, ‘verree great +revolution in Guatemala one week ago. General De Vega, him try be +president. Him raise armee—one—five—ten thousand mans for fight at the +government. Those one government send five—forty—hundred thousand +soldier to suppress revolution. They fight big battle yesterday at +Lomagrande—that about nineteen or fifty mile in the mountain. That +government soldier wheep General De Vega—oh, most bad. Five +hundred—nine hundred—two thousand of his mans is kill. That revolution +is smash suppress—bust—very quick. General De Vega, him r-r-run away +fast on one big mule. Yes, _carrambos!_ The general, him r-r-run away, +and his armee is kill. That government soldier, they try find General +De Vega verree much. They want catchee him for shoot. You think they +catchee that general, señor?’ + +“‘Saints grant it!’ says I. ‘’Twould be the judgment of Providence for +settin’ the warlike talent of a Clancy to gradin’ the tropics with a +pick and shovel. But ’tis not so much a question of insurrections now, +me little man, as ’tis of the hired-man problem. ’Tis anxious I am to +resign a situation of responsibility and trust with the white wings +department of your great and degraded country. Row me in your little +boat out to that steamer, and I’ll give ye five dollars—sinker +pacers—sinker pacers,’ says I, reducin’ the offer to the language and +denomination of the tropic dialects. + +“‘_Cinco pesos_,’ repeats the little man. ‘Five dollee, you give?’ + +“’Twas not such a bad little man. He had hesitations at first, sayin’ +that passengers leavin’ the country had to have papers and passports, +but at last he took me out alongside the steamer. + +“Day was just breakin’ as we struck her, and there wasn’t a soul to be +seen on board. The water was very still, and the nigger-man gave me a +lift from the boat, and I climbed onto the steamer where her side was +sliced to the deck for loadin’ fruit. The hatches was open, and I +looked down and saw the cargo of bananas that filled the hold to within +six feet of the top. I thinks to myself, ‘Clancy, you better go as a +stowaway. It’s safer. The steamer men might hand you back to the +employment bureau. The tropic’ll get you, Clancy, if you don’t watch +out.’ + +“So I jumps down easy among the bananas, and digs out a hole to hide in +among the bunches. In an hour or so I could hear the engines goin’, and +feel the steamer rockin’, and I knew we were off to sea. They left the +hatches open for ventilation, and pretty soon it was light enough in +the hold to see fairly well. I got to feelin’ a bit hungry, and thought +I’d have a light fruit lunch, by way of refreshment. I creeped out of +the hole I’d made and stood up straight. Just then I saw another man +crawl up about ten feet away and reach out and skin a banana and stuff +it into his mouth. ’Twas a dirty man, black-faced and ragged and +disgraceful of aspect. Yes, the man was a ringer for the pictures of +the fat Weary Willie in the funny papers. I looked again, and saw it +was my general man—De Vega, the great revolutionist, mule-rider and +pickaxe importer. When he saw me the general hesitated with his mouth +filled with banana and his eyes the size of cocoanuts. + +“‘Hist!’ I says. ‘Not a word, or they’ll put us off and make us walk. +“Veev la Liberty!”’ I adds, copperin’ the sentiment by shovin’ a banana +into the source of it. I was certain the general wouldn’t recognize me. +The nefarious work of the tropics had left me lookin’ different. There +was half an inch of roan whiskers coverin’ me face, and me costume was +a pair of blue overalls and a red shirt. + +“‘How you come in the ship, señor?’ asked the general as soon as he +could speak. + +“‘By the back door—whist!’ says I. ‘’Twas a glorious blow for liberty +we struck,’ I continues; ‘but we was overpowered by numbers. Let us +accept our defeat like brave men and eat another banana.’ + +“‘Were you in the cause of liberty fightin’, señor?’ says the general, +sheddin’ tears on the cargo. + +“‘To the last,’ says I. ‘’Twas I led the last desperate charge against +the minions of the tyrant. But it made them mad, and we was forced to +retreat. ’Twas I, general, procured the mule upon which you escaped. +Could you give that ripe bunch a little boost this way, general? It’s a +bit out of my reach. Thanks.’ + +“‘Say you so, brave patriot?’ said the general, again weepin’. ‘Ah, +_Dios!_ And I have not the means to reward your devotion. Barely did I +my life bring away. _Carrambos!_ what a devil’s animal was that mule, +señor! Like ships in one storm was I dashed about. The skin on myself +was ripped away with the thorns and vines. Upon the bark of a hundred +trees did that beast of the infernal bump, and cause outrage to the +legs of mine. In the night to Port Barrios I came. I dispossess myself +of that mountain of mule and hasten along the water shore. I find a +little boat to be tied. I launch myself and row to the steamer. I +cannot see any mans on board, so I climbed one rope which hang at the +side. I then myself hide in the bananas. Surely, I say, if the ship +captains view me, they shall throw me again to those Guatemala. Those +things are not good. Guatemala will shoot General De Vega. Therefore, I +am hide and remain silent. Life itself is glorious. Liberty, it is +pretty good; but so good as life I do not think.’ + +“Three days, as I said, was the trip to New Orleans. The general man +and me got to be cronies of the deepest dye. Bananas we ate until they +were distasteful to the sight and an eyesore to the palate, but to +bananas alone was the bill of fare reduced. At night I crawls out, +careful, on the lower deck, and gets a bucket of fresh water. + +“That General De Vega was a man inhabited by an engorgement of words +and sentences. He added to the monotony of the voyage by divestin’ +himself of conversation. He believed I was a revolutionist of his own +party, there bein’, as he told me, a good many Americans and other +foreigners in its ranks. ’Twas a braggart and a conceited little +gabbler it was, though he considered himself a hero. ’Twas on himself +he wasted all his regrets at the failin’ of his plot. Not a word did +the little balloon have to say about the other misbehavin’ idiots that +had been shot, or run themselves to death in his revolution. + +“The second day out he was feelin’ pretty braggy and uppish for a +stowed-away conspirator that owed his existence to a mule and stolen +bananas. He was tellin’ me about the great railroad he had been +buildin’, and he relates what he calls a comic incident about a fool +Irishman he inveigled from New Orleans to sling a pick on his little +morgue of a narrow-gauge line. ’Twas sorrowful to hear the little, +dirty general tell the opprobrious story of how he put salt upon the +tail of that reckless and silly bird, Clancy. Laugh, he did, hearty and +long. He shook with laughin’, the black-faced rebel and outcast, +standin’ neck-deep in bananas, without friends or country. + +“‘Ah, señor,’ he snickers, ‘to the death you would have laughed at that +drollest Irish. I say to him: “Strong, big mans is need very much in +Guatemala.” “I will blows strike for your down-pressed country,” he +say. “That shall you do,” I tell him. Ah! it was an Irish so comic. He +sees one box break upon the wharf that contain for the guard a few gun. +He think there is gun in all the box. But that is all pickaxe. Yes. Ah! +señor, could you the face of that Irish have seen when they set him to +the work!’ + +“’Twas thus the ex-boss of the employment bureau contributed to the +tedium of the trip with merry jests and anecdote. But now and then he +would weep upon the bananas and make oration about the lost cause of +liberty and the mule. + +“’Twas a pleasant sound when the steamer bumped against the pier in New +Orleans. Pretty soon we heard the pat-a-pat of hundreds of bare feet, +and the Dago gang that unloads the fruit jumped on the deck and down +into the hold. Me and the general worked a while at passin’ up the +bunches, and they thought we were part of the gang. After about an hour +we managed to slip off the steamer onto the wharf. + +“’Twas a great honour on the hands of an obscure Clancy, havin’ the +entertainment of the representative of a great foreign filibusterin’ +power. I first bought for the general and myself many long drinks and +things to eat that were not bananas. The general man trotted along at +my side, leavin’ all the arrangements to me. I led him up to Lafayette +Square and set him on a bench in the little park. Cigarettes I had +bought for him, and he humped himself down on the seat like a little, +fat, contented hobo. I look him over as he sets there, and what I see +pleases me. Brown by nature and instinct, he is now brindled with dirt +and dust. Praise to the mule, his clothes is mostly strings and flaps. +Yes, the looks of the general man is agreeable to Clancy. + +“I ask him, delicate, if, by any chance, he brought away anybody’s +money with him from Guatemala. He sighs and bumps his shoulders against +the bench. Not a cent. All right. Maybe, he tells me, some of his +friends in the tropic outfit will send him funds later. The general was +as clear a case of no visible means as I ever saw. + +“I told him not to move from the bench, and then I went up to the +corner of Poydras and Carondelet. Along there is O’Hara’s beat. In five +minutes along comes O’Hara, a big, fine man, red-faced, with shinin’ +buttons, swingin’ his club. ’Twould be a fine thing for Guatemala to +move into O’Hara’s precinct. ’Twould be a fine bit of recreation for +Danny to suppress revolutions and uprisin’s once or twice a week with +his club. + +“‘Is 5046 workin’ yet, Danny?’ says I, walkin’ up to him. + +“‘Overtime,’ says O’Hara, lookin’ over me suspicious. ‘Want some of +it?’ + +“Fifty-forty-six is the celebrated city ordinance authorizin’ arrest, +conviction and imprisonment of persons that succeed in concealin’ their +crimes from the police. + +“‘Don’t ye know Jimmy Clancy?’ says I. ‘Ye pink-gilled monster.’ So, +when O’Hara recognized me beneath the scandalous exterior bestowed upon +me by the tropics, I backed him into a doorway and told him what I +wanted, and why I wanted it. ‘All right, Jimmy,’ says O’Hara. ‘Go back +and hold the bench. I’ll be along in ten minutes.’ + +“In that time O’Hara strolled through Lafayette Square and spied two +Weary Willies disgracin’ one of the benches. In ten minutes more J. +Clancy and General De Vega, late candidate for the presidency of +Guatemala, was in the station house. The general is badly frightened, +and calls upon me to proclaim his distinguishments and rank. + +“‘The man,’ says I to the police, ‘used to be a railroad man. He’s on +the bum now. ’Tis a little bughouse he is, on account of losin’ his +job.’ + +“‘_Carrambos!_’ says the general, fizzin’ like a little soda-water +fountain, ‘you fought, señor, with my forces in my native country. Why +do you say the lies? You shall say I am the General De Vega, one +soldier, one _caballero_—’ + +“‘Railroader,’ says I again. ‘On the hog. No good. Been livin’ for +three days on stolen bananas. Look at him. Ain’t that enough?’ + +“Twenty-five dollars or sixty days, was what the recorder gave the +general. He didn’t have a cent, so he took the time. They let me go, as +I knew they would, for I had money to show, and O’Hara spoke for me. +Yes; sixty days he got. ’Twas just so long that I slung a pick for the +great country of Kam—Guatemala.” + +Clancy paused. The bright starlight showed a reminiscent look of happy +content on his seasoned features. Keogh leaned in his chair and gave +his partner a slap on his thinly-clad back that sounded like the crack +of the surf on the sands. + +“Tell ’em, ye divil,” he chuckled, “how you got even with the tropical +general in the way of agricultural manœuvrings.” + +“Havin’ no money,” concluded Clancy, with unction, “they set him to +work his fine out with a gang from the parish prison clearing Ursulines +Street. Around the corner was a saloon decorated genially with electric +fans and cool merchandise. I made that me headquarters, and every +fifteen minutes I’d walk around and take a look at the little man +filibusterin’ with a rake and shovel. ’Twas just such a hot broth of a +day as this has been. And I’d call at him ‘Hey, monseer!’ and he’d look +at me black, with the damp showin’ through his shirt in places. + +“‘Fat, strong mans,’ says I to General De Vega, ‘is needed in New +Orleans. Yes. To carry on the good work. Carrambos! Erin go bragh!’” + + + + +XI +THE REMNANTS OF THE CODE + + +Breakfast in Coralio was at eleven. Therefore the people did not go to +market early. The little wooden market-house stood on a patch of +short-trimmed grass, under the vivid green foliage of a bread-fruit +tree. + +Thither one morning the venders leisurely convened, bringing their +wares with them. A porch or platform six feet wide encircled the +building, shaded from the mid-morning sun by the projecting, +grass-thatched roof. Upon this platform the venders were wont to +display their goods—newly-killed beef, fish, crabs, fruit of the +country, cassava, eggs, _dulces_ and high, tottering stacks of native +tortillas as large around as the sombrero of a Spanish grandee. + +But on this morning they whose stations lay on the seaward side of the +market-house, instead of spreading their merchandise formed themselves +into a softly jabbering and gesticulating group. For there upon their +space of the platform was sprawled, asleep, the unbeautiful figure of +“Beelzebub” Blythe. He lay upon a ragged strip of cocoa matting, more +than ever a fallen angel in appearance. His suit of coarse flax, +soiled, bursting at the seams, crumpled into a thousand diversified +wrinkles and creases, inclosed him absurdly, like the garb of some +effigy that had been stuffed in sport and thrown there after indignity +had been wrought upon it. But firmly upon the high bridge of his nose +reposed his gold-rimmed glasses, the surviving badge of his ancient +glory. + +The sun’s rays, reflecting quiveringly from the rippling sea upon his +face, and the voices of the market-men woke “Beelzebub” Blythe. He sat +up, blinking, and leaned his back against the wall of the market. +Drawing a blighted silk handkerchief from his pocket, he assiduously +rubbed and burnished his glasses. And while doing this he became aware +that his bedroom had been invaded, and that polite brown and yellow men +were beseeching him to vacate in favour of their market stuff. + +If the señor would have the goodness—a thousand pardons for bringing to +him molestation—but soon would come the _compradores_ for the day’s +provisions—surely they had ten thousand regrets at disturbing him! + +In this manner they expanded to him the intimation that he must clear +out and cease to clog the wheels of trade. + +Blythe stepped from the platform with the air of a prince leaving his +canopied couch. He never quite lost that air, even at the lowest point +of his fall. It is clear that the college of good breeding does not +necessarily maintain a chair of morals within its walls. + +Blythe shook out his wry clothing, and moved slowly up the Calle Grande +through the hot sand. He moved without a destination in his mind. The +little town was languidly stirring to its daily life. Golden-skinned +babies tumbled over one another in the grass. The sea breeze brought +him appetite, but nothing to satisfy it. Throughout Coralio were its +morning odors—those from the heavily fragrant tropical flowers and from +the bread baking in the outdoor ovens of clay and the pervading smoke +of their fires. Where the smoke cleared, the crystal air, with some of +the efficacy of faith, seemed to remove the mountains almost to the +sea, bringing them so near that one might count the scarred glades on +their wooded sides. The light-footed Caribs were swiftly gliding to +their tasks at the waterside. Already along the bosky trails from the +banana groves files of horses were slowly moving, concealed, except for +their nodding heads and plodding legs, by the bunches of green-golden +fruit heaped upon their backs. On doorsills sat women combing their +long, black hair and calling, one to another, across the narrow +thoroughfares. Peace reigned in Coralio—arid and bald peace; but still +peace. + +On that bright morning when Nature seemed to be offering the lotus on +the Dawn’s golden platter “Beelzebub” Blythe had reached rock bottom. +Further descent seemed impossible. That last night’s slumber in a +public place had done for him. As long as he had had a roof to cover +him there had remained, unbridged, the space that separates a gentleman +from the beasts of the jungle and the fowls of the air. But now he was +little more than a whimpering oyster led to be devoured on the sands of +a Southern sea by the artful walrus, Circumstance, and the implacable +carpenter, Fate. + +To Blythe money was now but a memory. He had drained his friends of all +that their good-fellowship had to offer; then he had squeezed them to +the last drop of their generosity; and at the last, Aaron-like, he had +smitten the rock of their hardening bosoms for the scattering, ignoble +drops of Charity itself. + +He had exhausted his credit to the last _real_. With the minute +keenness of the shameless sponger he was aware of every source in +Coralio from which a glass of rum, a meal or a piece of silver could be +wheedled. Marshalling each such source in his mind, he considered it +with all the thoroughness and penetration that hunger and thirst lent +him for the task. All his optimism failed to thresh a grain of hope +from the chaff of his postulations. He had played out the game. That +one night in the open had shaken his nerves. Until then there had been +left to him at least a few grounds upon which he could base his +unblushing demands upon his neighbours’ stores. Now he must beg instead +of borrowing. The most brazen sophistry could not dignify by the name +of “loan” the coin contemptuously flung to a beachcomber who slept on +the bare boards of the public market. + +But on this morning no beggar would have more thankfully received a +charitable coin, for the demon thirst had him by the throat—the +drunkard’s matutinal thirst that requires to be slaked at each morning +station on the road to Tophet. + +Blythe walked slowly up the street, keeping a watchful eye for any +miracle that might drop manna upon him in his wilderness. As he passed +the popular eating house of Madama Vasquez, Madama’s boarders were just +sitting down to freshly-baked bread, _aguacates_, pines and delicious +coffee that sent forth odorous guarantee of its quality upon the +breeze. Madama was serving; she turned her shy, stolid, melancholy gaze +for a moment out the window; she saw Blythe, and her expression turned +more shy and embarrassed. “Beelzebub” owed her twenty _pesos_. He bowed +as he had once bowed to less embarrassed dames to whom he owed nothing, +and passed on. + +Merchants and their clerks were throwing open the solid wooden doors of +their shops. Polite but cool were the glances they cast upon Blythe as +he lounged tentatively by with the remains of his old jaunty air; for +they were his creditors almost without exception. + +At the little fountain in the _plaza_ he made an apology for a toilet +with his wetted handkerchief. Across the open square filed the dolorous +line of friends of the prisoners in the _calaboza_, bearing the morning +meal of the immured. The food in their hands aroused small longing in +Blythe. It was drink that his soul craved, or money to buy it. + +In the streets he met many with whom he had been friends and equals, +and whose patience and liberality he had gradually exhausted. Willard +Geddie and Paula cantered past him with the coolest of nods, returning +from their daily horseback ride along the old Indian road. Keogh passed +him at another corner, whistling cheerfully and bearing a prize of +newly-laid eggs for the breakfast of himself and Clancy. The jovial +scout of Fortune was one of Blythe’s victims who had plunged his hand +oftenest into his pocket to aid him. But now it seemed that Keogh, too, +had fortified himself against further invasions. His curt greeting and +the ominous light in his full, grey eye quickened the steps of +“Beelzebub,” whom desperation had almost incited to attempt an +additional “loan.” + +Three drinking shops the forlorn one next visited in succession. In all +of these his money, his credit and his welcome had long since been +spent; but Blythe felt that he would have fawned in the dust at the +feet of an enemy that morning for one draught of _aguardiente_. In two +of the _pulperias_ his courageous petition for drink was met with a +refusal so polite that it stung worse than abuse. The third +establishment had acquired something of American methods; and here he +was seized bodily and cast out upon his hands and knees. + +This physical indignity caused a singular change in the man. As he +picked himself up and walked away, an expression of absolute relief +came upon his features. The specious and conciliatory smile that had +been graven there was succeeded by a look of calm and sinister resolve. +“Beelzebub” had been floundering in the sea of improbity, holding by a +slender life-line to the respectable world that had cast him overboard. +He must have felt that with this ultimate shock the line had snapped, +and have experienced the welcome ease of the drowning swimmer who has +ceased to struggle. + +Blythe walked to the next corner and stood there while he brushed the +sand from his garments and re-polished his glasses. + +“I’ve got to do it—oh, I’ve got to do it,” he told himself, aloud. “If +I had a quart of rum I believe I could stave it off yet—for a little +while. But there’s no more rum for—‘Beelzebub,’ as they call me. By the +flames of Tartarus! if I’m to sit at the right hand of Satan somebody +has got to pay the court expenses. You’ll have to pony up, Mr. Frank +Goodwin. You’re a good fellow; but a gentleman must draw the line at +being kicked into the gutter. Blackmail isn’t a pretty word, but it’s +the next station on the road I’m travelling.” + +With purpose in his steps Blythe now moved rapidly through the town by +way of its landward environs. He passed through the squalid quarters of +the improvident negroes and on beyond the picturesque shacks of the +poorer _mestizos_. From many points along his course he could see, +through the umbrageous glades, the house of Frank Goodwin on its wooded +hill. And as he crossed the little bridge over the lagoon he saw the +old Indian, Galvez, scrubbing at the wooden slab that bore the name of +Miraflores. Beyond the lagoon the lands of Goodwin began to slope +gently upward. A grassy road, shaded by a munificent and diverse array +of tropical flora wound from the edge of an outlying banana grove to +the dwelling. Blythe took this road with long and purposeful strides. + +Goodwin was seated on his coolest gallery, dictating letters to his +secretary, a sallow and capable native youth. The household adhered to +the American plan of breakfast; and that meal had been a thing of the +past for the better part of an hour. + +The castaway walked to the steps, and flourished a hand. + +“Good morning, Blythe,” said Goodwin, looking up. “Come in and have a +chair. Anything I can do for you?” + +“I want to speak to you in private.” + +Goodwin nodded at his secretary, who strolled out under a mango tree +and lit a cigarette. Blythe took the chair that he had left vacant. + +“I want some money,” he began, doggedly. + +“I’m sorry,” said Goodwin, with equal directness, “but you can’t have +any. You’re drinking yourself to death, Blythe. Your friends have done +all they could to help you to brace up. You won’t help yourself. +There’s no use furnishing you with money to ruin yourself with any +longer.” + +“Dear man,” said Blythe, tilting back his chair, “it isn’t a question +of social economy now. It’s past that. I like you, Goodwin; and I’ve +come to stick a knife between your ribs. I was kicked out of Espada’s +saloon this morning; and Society owes me reparation for my wounded +feelings.” + +“I didn’t kick you out.” + +“No; but in a general way you represent Society; and in a particular +way you represent my last chance. I’ve had to come down to it, old +man—I tried to do it a month ago when Losada’s man was here turning +things over; but I couldn’t do it then. Now it’s different. I want a +thousand dollars, Goodwin; and you’ll have to give it to me.” + +“Only last week,” said Goodwin, with a smile, “a silver dollar was all +you were asking for.” + +“An evidence,” said Blythe, flippantly, “that I was still +virtuous—though under heavy pressure. The wages of sin should be +something higher than a _peso_ worth forty-eight cents. Let’s talk +business. I am the villain in the third act; and I must have my +merited, if only temporary, triumph. I saw you collar the late +president’s valiseful of boodle. Oh, I know it’s blackmail; but I’m +liberal about the price. I know I’m a cheap villain—one of the regular +sawmill-drama kind—but you’re one of my particular friends, and I don’t +want to stick you hard.” + +“Suppose you go into the details,” suggested Goodwin, calmly arranging +his letters on the table. + +“All right,” said “Beelzebub.” “I like the way you take it. I despise +histrionics; so you will please prepare yourself for the facts without +any red fire, calcium or grace notes on the saxophone. + +“On the night that His Fly-by-night Excellency arrived in town I was +very drunk. You will excuse the pride with which I state that fact; but +it was quite a feat for me to attain that desirable state. Somebody had +left a cot out under the orange trees in the yard of Madama Ortiz’s +hotel. I stepped over the wall, laid down upon it, and fell asleep. I +was awakened by an orange that dropped from the tree upon my nose; and +I laid there for awhile cursing Sir Isaac Newton, or whoever it was +that invented gravitation, for not confining his theory to apples. + +“And then along came Mr. Miraflores and his true-love with the treasury +in a valise, and went into the hotel. Next you hove in sight, and held +a pow-wow with the tonsorial artist who insisted upon talking shop +after hours. I tried to slumber again; but once more my rest was +disturbed—this time by the noise of the popgun that went off upstairs. +Then that valise came crashing down into an orange tree just above my +head; and I arose from my couch, not knowing when it might begin to +rain Saratoga trunks. When the army and the constabulary began to +arrive, with their medals and decorations hastily pinned to their +pajamas, and their snickersnees drawn, I crawled into the welcome +shadow of a banana plant. I remained there for an hour, by which time +the excitement and the people had cleared away. And then, my dear +Goodwin—excuse me—I saw you sneak back and pluck that ripe and juicy +valise from the orange tree. I followed you, and saw you take it to +your own house. A hundred-thousand-dollar crop from one orange tree in +a season about breaks the record of the fruit-growing industry. + +“Being a gentleman at that time, of course, I never mentioned the +incident to anyone. But this morning I was kicked out of a saloon, my +code of honour is all out at the elbows, and I’d sell my mother’s +prayer-book for three fingers of _aguardiente_. I’m not putting on the +screws hard. It ought to be worth a thousand to you for me to have +slept on that cot through the whole business without waking up and +seeing anything.” + +Goodwin opened two more letters, and made memoranda in pencil on them. +Then he called “Manuel!” to his secretary, who came, spryly. + +“The _Ariel_—when does she sail?” asked Goodwin. + +“Señor,” answered the youth, “at three this afternoon. She drops +down-coast to Punta Soledad to complete her cargo of fruit. From there +she sails for New Orleans without delay.” + +“_Bueno!_” said Goodwin. “These letters may wait yet awhile.” + +The secretary returned to his cigarette under the mango tree. + +“In round numbers,” said Goodwin, facing Blythe squarely, “how much +money do you owe in this town, not including the sums you have +‘borrowed’ from me?” + +“Five hundred—at a rough guess,” answered Blythe, lightly. + +“Go somewhere in the town and draw up a schedule of your debts,” said +Goodwin. “Come back here in two hours, and I will send Manuel with the +money to pay them. I will also have a decent outfit of clothing ready +for you. You will sail on the _Ariel_ at three. Manuel will accompany +you as far as the deck of the steamer. There he will hand you one +thousand dollars in cash. I suppose that we needn’t discuss what you +will be expected to do in return.” + +“Oh, I understand,” piped Blythe, cheerily. “I was asleep all the time +on the cot under Madama Ortiz’s orange trees; and I shake off the dust +of Coralio forever. I’ll play fair. No more of the lotus for me. Your +proposition is O. K. You’re a good fellow, Goodwin; and I let you off +light. I’ll agree to everything. But in the meantime—I’ve a devil of a +thirst on, old man—” + +“Not a _centavo_,” said Goodwin, firmly, “until you are on board the +_Ariel_. You would be drunk in thirty minutes if you had money now.” + +But he noticed the blood-streaked eyeballs, the relaxed form and the +shaking hands of “Beelzebub;” and he stepped into the dining room +through the low window, and brought out a glass and a decanter of +brandy. + +“Take a bracer, anyway, before you go,” he proposed, even as a man to +the friend whom he entertains. + +“Beelzebub” Blythe’s eyes glistened at the sight of the solace for +which his soul burned. To-day for the first time his poisoned nerves +had been denied their steadying dose; and their retort was a mounting +torment. He grasped the decanter and rattled its crystal mouth against +the glass in his trembling hand. He flushed the glass, and then stood +erect, holding it aloft for an instant. For one fleeting moment he held +his head above the drowning waves of his abyss. He nodded easily at +Goodwin, raised his brimming glass and murmured a “health” that men had +used in his ancient Paradise Lost. And then so suddenly that he spilled +the brandy over his hand, he set down his glass, untasted. + +“In two hours,” his dry lips muttered to Goodwin, as he marched down +the steps and turned his face toward the town. + +In the edge of the cool banana grove “Beelzebub” halted, and snapped +the tongue of his belt buckle into another hole. + +“I couldn’t do it,” he explained, feverishly, to the waving banana +fronds. “I wanted to, but I couldn’t. A gentleman can’t drink with the +man that he blackmails.” + + + + +XII +SHOES + + +John De Graffenreid Atwood ate of the lotus, root, stem, and flower. +The tropics gobbled him up. He plunged enthusiastically into his work, +which was to try to forget Rosine. + +Now, they who dine on the lotus rarely consume it plain. There is a +sauce _au diable_ that goes with it; and the distillers are the chefs +who prepare it. And on Johnny’s menu card it read “brandy.” With a +bottle between them, he and Billy Keogh would sit on the porch of the +little consulate at night and roar out great, indecorous songs, until +the natives, slipping hastily past, would shrug a shoulder and mutter +things to themselves about the “_Americanos diablos_.” + +One day Johnny’s _mozo_ brought the mail and dumped it on the table. +Johnny leaned from his hammock, and fingered the four or five letters +dejectedly. Keogh was sitting on the edge of the table chopping lazily +with a paper knife at the legs of a centipede that was crawling among +the stationery. Johnny was in that phase of lotus-eating when all the +world tastes bitter in one’s mouth. + +“Same old thing!” he complained. “Fool people writing for information +about the country. They want to know all about raising fruit, and how +to make a fortune without work. Half of ’em don’t even send stamps for +a reply. They think a consul hasn’t anything to do but write letters. +Slit those envelopes for me, old man, and see what they want. I’m +feeling too rocky to move.” + +Keogh, acclimated beyond all possibility of ill-humour, drew his chair +to the table with smiling compliance on his rose-pink countenance, and +began to slit open the letters. Four of them were from citizens in +various parts of the United States who seemed to regard the consul at +Coralio as a cyclopædia of information. They asked long lists of +questions, numerically arranged, about the climate, products, +possibilities, laws, business chances, and statistics of the country in +which the consul had the honour of representing his own government. + +“Write ’em, please, Billy,” said that inert official, “just a line, +referring them to the latest consular report. Tell ’em the State +Department will be delighted to furnish the literary gems. Sign my +name. Don’t let your pen scratch, Billy; it’ll keep me awake.” + +“Don’t snore,” said Keogh, amiably, “and I’ll do your work for you. You +need a corps of assistants, anyhow. Don’t see how you ever get out a +report. Wake up a minute!—here’s one more letter—it’s from your own +town, too—Dalesburg.” + +“That so?” murmured Johnny showing a mild and obligatory interest. +“What’s it about?” + +“Postmaster writes,” explained Keogh. “Says a citizen of the town wants +some facts and advice from you. Says the citizen has an idea in his +head of coming down where you are and opening a shoe store. Wants to +know if you think the business would pay. Says he’s heard of the boom +along this coast, and wants to get in on the ground floor.” + +In spite of the heat and his bad temper, Johnny’s hammock swayed with +his laughter. Keogh laughed too; and the pet monkey on the top shelf of +the bookcase chattered in shrill sympathy with the ironical reception +of the letter from Dalesburg. + +“Great bunions!” exclaimed the consul. “Shoe store! What’ll they ask +about next, I wonder? Overcoat factory, I reckon. Say, Billy—of our +3,000 citizens, how many do you suppose ever had on a pair of shoes?” + +Keogh reflected judicially. + +“Let’s see—there’s you and me and—” + +“Not me,” said Johnny, promptly and incorrectly, holding up a foot +encased in a disreputable deerskin _zapato_. “I haven’t been a victim +to shoes in months.” + +“But you’ve got ’em, though,” went on Keogh. “And there’s Goodwin and +Blanchard and Geddie and old Lutz and Doc Gregg and that Italian that’s +agent for the banana company, and there’s old Delgado—no; he wears +sandals. And, oh, yes; there’s Madama Ortiz, ‘what kapes the hotel’—she +had on a pair of red slippers at the _baile_ the other night. And Miss +Pasa, her daughter, that went to school in the States—she brought back +some civilized notions in the way of footgear. And there’s the +_comandante’s_ sister that dresses up her feet on feast-days—and Mrs. +Geddie, who wears a two with a Castilian instep—and that’s about all +the ladies. Let’s see—don’t some of the soldiers at the _cuartel_—no: +that’s so; they’re allowed shoes only when on the march. In barracks +they turn their little toeses out to grass.” + +“’Bout right,” agreed the consul. “Not over twenty out of the three +thousand ever felt leather on their walking arrangements. Oh, yes; +Coralio is just the town for an enterprising shoe store—that doesn’t +want to part with its goods. Wonder if old Patterson is trying to jolly +me! He always was full of things he called jokes. Write him a letter, +Billy. I’ll dictate it. We’ll jolly him back a few.” + +Keogh dipped his pen, and wrote at Johnny’s dictation. With many +pauses, filled in with smoke and sundry travellings of the bottle and +glasses, the following reply to the Dalesburg communication was +perpetrated: + +Mr. Obadiah Patterson, + Dalesburg, Ala. + _Dear Sir:_ In reply to your favour of July 2d, I have the honour + to inform you that, according to my opinion, there is no place on + the habitable globe that presents to the eye stronger evidence of + the need of a first-class shoe store than does the town of Coralio. + There are 3,000 inhabitants in the place, and not a single shoe + store! The situation speaks for itself. This coast is rapidly + becoming the goal of enterprising business men, but the shoe + business is one that has been sadly overlooked or neglected. In + fact, there are a considerable number of our citizens actually + without shoes at present. + Besides the want above mentioned, there is also a crying need for a + brewery, a college of higher mathematics, a coal yard, and a clean + and intellectual Punch and Judy show. I have the honour to be, sir, + + +Your Obt. Servant, +JOHN DE GRAFFENREID ATWOOD, +U. S. Consul at Coralio. + + +P.S.—Hello! Uncle Obadiah. How’s the old burg racking along? What would +the government do without you and me? Look out for a green-headed +parrot and a bunch of bananas soon, from your old friend + + +JOHNNY. + + +“I throw in that postscript,” explained the consul, “so Uncle Obadiah +won’t take offence at the official tone of the letter! Now, Billy, you +get that correspondence fixed up, and send Pancho to the post-office +with it. The _Ariadne_ takes the mail out to-morrow if they make up +that load of fruit to-day.” + +The night programme in Coralio never varied. The recreations of the +people were soporific and flat. They wandered about, barefoot and +aimless, speaking lowly and smoking cigar or cigarette. Looking down on +the dimly lighted ways one seemed to see a threading maze of brunette +ghosts tangled with a procession of insane fireflies. In some houses +the thrumming of lugubrious guitars added to the depression of the +_triste_ night. Giant tree-frogs rattled in the foliage as loudly as +the end man’s “bones” in a minstrel troupe. By nine o’clock the streets +were almost deserted. + +Nor at the consulate was there often a change of bill. Keogh would come +there nightly, for Coralio’s one cool place was the little seaward +porch of that official residence. + +The brandy would be kept moving; and before midnight sentiment would +begin to stir in the heart of the self-exiled consul. Then he would +relate to Keogh the story of his ended romance. Each night Keogh would +listen patiently to the tale, and be ready with untiring sympathy. + +“But don’t you think for a minute”—thus Johnny would always conclude +his woeful narrative—“that I’m grieving about that girl, Billy. I’ve +forgotten her. She never enters my mind. If she were to enter that door +right now, my pulse wouldn’t gain a beat. That’s all over long ago.” + +“Don’t I know it?” Keogh would answer. “Of course you’ve forgotten her. +Proper thing to do. Wasn’t quite O. K. of her to listen to the knocks +that—er—Dink Pawson kept giving you.” + +“Pink Dawson!”—a world of contempt would be in Johnny’s tones—“Poor +white trash! That’s what he was. Had five hundred acres of farming +land, though; and that counted. Maybe I’ll have a chance to get back at +him some day. The Dawsons weren’t anybody. Everybody in Alabama knows +the Atwoods. Say, Billy—did you know my mother was a De Graffenreid?” + +“Why, no,” Keogh would say; “is that so?” He had heard it some three +hundred times. + +“Fact. The De Graffenreids of Hancock County. But I never think of that +girl any more, do I, Billy?” + +“Not for a minute, my boy,” would be the last sounds heard by the +conqueror of Cupid. + +At this point Johnny would fall into a gentle slumber, and Keogh would +saunter out to his own shack under the calabash tree at the edge of the +plaza. + +In a day or two the letter from the Dalesburg postmaster and its answer +had been forgotten by the Coralio exiles. But on the 26th day of July +the fruit of the reply appeared upon the tree of events. + +The _Andador_, a fruit steamer that visited Coralio regularly, drew +into the offing and anchored. The beach was lined with spectators while +the quarantine doctor and the custom-house crew rowed out to attend to +their duties. + +An hour later Billy Keogh lounged into the consulate, clean and cool in +his linen clothes, and grinning like a pleased shark. + +“Guess what?” he said to Johnny, lounging in his hammock. + +“Too hot to guess,” said Johnny, lazily. + +“Your shoe-store man’s come,” said Keogh, rolling the sweet morsel on +his tongue, “with a stock of goods big enough to supply the continent +as far down as Terra del Fuego. They’re carting his cases over to the +custom-house now. Six barges full they brought ashore and have paddled +back for the rest. Oh, ye saints in glory! won’t there be regalements +in the air when he gets onto the joke and has an interview with Mr. +Consul? It’ll be worth nine years in the tropics just to witness that +one joyful moment.” + +Keogh loved to take his mirth easily. He selected a clean place on the +matting and lay upon the floor. The walls shook with his enjoyment. +Johnny turned half over and blinked. + +“Don’t tell me,” he said, “that anybody was fool enough to take that +letter seriously.” + +“Four-thousand-dollar stock of goods!” gasped Keogh, in ecstasy. “Talk +about coals to Newcastle! Why didn’t he take a ship-load of palm-leaf +fans to Spitzbergen while he was about it? Saw the old codger on the +beach. You ought to have been there when he put on his specs and +squinted at the five hundred or so barefooted citizens standing +around.” + +“Are you telling the truth, Billy?” asked the consul, weakly. + +“Am I? You ought to see the buncoed gentleman’s daughter he brought +along. Looks! She makes the brick-dust señoritas here look like +tar-babies.” + +“Go on,” said Johnny, “if you can stop that asinine giggling. I hate to +see a grown man make a laughing hyena of himself.” + +“Name is Hemstetter,” went on Keogh. “He’s a— Hello! what’s the matter +now?” + +Johnny’s moccasined feet struck the floor with a thud as he wriggled +out of his hammock. + +“Get up, you idiot,” he said, sternly, “or I’ll brain you with this +inkstand. That’s Rosine and her father. Gad! what a drivelling idiot +old Patterson is! Get up, here, Billy Keogh, and help me. What the +devil are we going to do? Has all the world gone crazy?” + +Keogh rose and dusted himself. He managed to regain a decorous +demeanour. + +“Situation has got to be met, Johnny,” he said, with some success at +seriousness. “I didn’t think about its being your girl until you spoke. +First thing to do is to get them comfortable quarters. You go down and +face the music, and I’ll trot out to Goodwin’s and see if Mrs. Goodwin +won’t take them in. They’ve got the decentest house in town.” + +“Bless you, Billy!” said the consul. “I knew you wouldn’t desert me. +The world’s bound to come to an end, but maybe we can stave it off for +a day or two.” + +Keogh hoisted his umbrella and set out for Goodwin’s house. Johnny put +on his coat and hat. He picked up the brandy bottle, but set it down +again without drinking, and marched bravely down to the beach. + +In the shade of the custom-house walls he found Mr. Hemstetter and +Rosine surrounded by a mass of gaping citizens. The customs officers +were ducking and scraping, while the captain of the _Andador_ +interpreted the business of the new arrivals. Rosine looked healthy and +very much alive. She was gazing at the strange scenes around her with +amused interest. There was a faint blush upon her round cheek as she +greeted her old admirer. Mr. Hemstetter shook hands with Johnny in a +very friendly way. He was an oldish, impractical man—one of that +numerous class of erratic business men who are forever dissatisfied, +and seeking a change. + +“I am very glad to see you, John—may I call you John?” he said. “Let me +thank you for your prompt answer to our postmaster’s letter of inquiry. +He volunteered to write to you on my behalf. I was looking about for +something different in the way of a business in which the profits would +be greater. I had noticed in the papers that this coast was receiving +much attention from investors. I am extremely grateful for your advice +to come. I sold out everything that I possess, and invested the +proceeds in as fine a stock of shoes as could be bought in the North. +You have a picturesque town here, John. I hope business will be as good +as your letter justifies me in expecting.” + +Johnny’s agony was abbreviated by the arrival of Keogh, who hurried up +with the news that Mrs. Goodwin would be much pleased to place rooms at +the disposal of Mr. Hemstetter and his daughter. So there Mr. +Hemstetter and Rosine were at once conducted and left to recuperate +from the fatigue of the voyage, while Johnny went down to see that the +cases of shoes were safely stored in the customs warehouse pending +their examination by the officials. Keogh, grinning like a shark, +skirmished about to find Goodwin, to instruct him not to expose to Mr. +Hemstetter the true state of Coralio as a shoe market until Johnny had +been given a chance to redeem the situation, if such a thing were +possible. + +That night the consul and Keogh held a desperate consultation on the +breezy porch of the consulate. + +“Send ’em back home,” began Keogh, reading Johnny’s thoughts. + +“I would,” said Johnny, after a little silence; “but I’ve been lying to +you, Billy.” + +“All right about that,” said Keogh, affably. + +“I’ve told you hundreds of times,” said Johnny, slowly, “that I had +forgotten that girl, haven’t I?” + +“About three hundred and seventy-five,” admitted the monument of +patience. + +“I lied,” repeated the consul, “every time. I never forgot her for one +minute. I was an obstinate ass for running away just because she said +‘No’ once. And I was too proud a fool to go back. I talked with Rosine +a few minutes this evening up at Goodwin’s. I found out one thing. You +remember that farmer fellow who was always after her?” + +“Dink Pawson?” asked Keogh. + +“Pink Dawson. Well, he wasn’t a hill of beans to her. She says she +didn’t believe a word of the things he told her about me. But I’m sewed +up now, Billy. That tomfool letter we sent ruined whatever chance I had +left. She’ll despise me when she finds out that her old father has been +made the victim of a joke that a decent school boy wouldn’t have been +guilty of. Shoes! Why he couldn’t sell twenty pairs of shoes in Coralio +if he kept store here for twenty years. You put a pair of shoes on one +of these Caribs or Spanish brown boys and what’d he do? Stand on his +head and squeal until he’d kicked ’em off. None of ’em ever wore shoes +and they never will. If I send ’em back home I’ll have to tell the +whole story, and what’ll she think of me? I want that girl worse than +ever, Billy, and now when she’s in reach I’ve lost her forever because +I tried to be funny when the thermometer was at 102.” + +“Keep cheerful,” said the optimistic Keogh. “And let ’em open the +store. I’ve been busy myself this afternoon. We can stir up a temporary +boom in foot-gear anyhow. I’ll buy six pairs when the doors open. I’ve +been around and seen all the fellows and explained the catastrophe. +They’ll all buy shoes like they was centipedes. Frank Goodwin will take +cases of ’em. The Geddies want about eleven pairs between ’em. Clancy +is going to invest the savings of weeks, and even old Doc Gregg wants +three pairs of alligator-hide slippers if they’ve got any tens. +Blanchard got a look at Miss Hemstetter; and as he’s a Frenchman, no +less than a dozen pairs will do for him.” + +“A dozen customers,” said Johnny, “for a $4,000 stock of shoes! It +won’t work. There’s a big problem here to figure out. You go home, +Billy, and leave me alone. I’ve got to work at it all by myself. Take +that bottle of Three-star along with you—no, sir; not another ounce of +booze for the United States consul. I’ll sit here to-night and pull out +the think stop. If there’s a soft place on this proposition anywhere +I’ll land on it. If there isn’t there’ll be another wreck to the credit +of the gorgeous tropics.” + +Keogh left, feeling that he could be of no use. Johnny laid a handful +of cigars on a table and stretched himself in a steamer chair. When the +sudden daylight broke, silvering the harbour ripples, he was still +sitting there. Then he got up, whistling a little tune, and took his +bath. + +At nine o’clock he walked down to the dingy little cable office and +hung for half an hour over a blank. The result of his application was +the following message, which he signed and had transmitted at a cost of +$33: + +TO PINKNEY DAWSON, + Dalesburg, Ala. + Draft for $100 comes to you next mail. Ship me immediately 500 + pounds stiff, dry cockleburrs. New use here in arts. Market price + twenty cents pound. Further orders likely. Rush. + + + + +XIII +SHIPS + + +Within a week a suitable building had been secured in the Calle Grande, +and Mr. Hemstetter’s stock of shoes arranged upon their shelves. The +rent of the store was moderate; and the stock made a fine showing of +neat white boxes, attractively displayed. + +Johnny’s friends stood by him loyally. On the first day Keogh strolled +into the store in a casual kind of way about once every hour, and +bought shoes. After he had purchased a pair each of extension soles, +congress gaiters, button kids, low-quartered calfs, dancing pumps, +rubber boots, tans of various hues, tennis shoes and flowered slippers, +he sought out Johnny to be prompted as to names of other kinds that he +might inquire for. The other English-speaking residents also played +their parts nobly by buying often and liberally. Keogh was grand +marshal, and made them distribute their patronage, thus keeping up a +fair run of custom for several days. + +Mr. Hemstetter was gratified by the amount of business done thus far; +but expressed surprise that the natives were so backward with their +custom. + +“Oh, they’re awfully shy,” explained Johnny, as he wiped his forehead +nervously. “They’ll get the habit pretty soon. They’ll come with a rush +when they do come.” + +One afternoon Keogh dropped into the consul’s office, chewing an +unlighted cigar thoughtfully. + +“Got anything up your sleeve?” he inquired of Johnny. “If you have it’s +about time to show it. If you can borrow some gent’s hat in the +audience, and make a lot of customers for an idle stock of shoes come +out of it, you’d better spiel. The boys have all laid in enough +footwear to last ’em ten years; and there’s nothing doing in the shoe +store but dolcy far nienty. I just came by there. Your venerable victim +was standing in the door, gazing through his specs at the bare toes +passing by his emporium. The natives here have got the true artistic +temperament. Me and Clancy took eighteen tintypes this morning in two +hours. There’s been but one pair of shoes sold all day. Blanchard went +in and bought a pair of fur-lined house-slippers because he thought he +saw Miss Hemstetter go into the store. I saw him throw the slippers +into the lagoon afterwards.” + +“There’s a Mobile fruit steamer coming in to-morrow or next day,” said +Johnny. “We can’t do anything until then.” + +“What are you going to do—try to create a demand?” + +“Political economy isn’t your strong point,” said the consul, +impudently. “You can’t create a demand. But you can create a necessity +for a demand. That’s what I am going to do.” + +Two weeks after the consul sent his cable, a fruit steamer brought him +a huge, mysterious brown bale of some unknown commodity. Johnny’s +influence with the custom-house people was sufficiently strong for him +to get the goods turned over to him without the usual inspection. He +had the bale taken to the consulate and snugly stowed in the back room. + +That night he ripped open a corner of it and took out a handful of the +cockleburrs. He examined them with the care with which a warrior +examines his arms before he goes forth to battle for his lady-love and +life. The burrs were the ripe August product, as hard as filberts, and +bristling with spines as tough and sharp as needles. Johnny whistled +softly a little tune, and went out to find Billy Keogh. + +Later in the night, when Coralio was steeped in slumber, he and Billy +went forth into the deserted streets with their coats bulging like +balloons. All up and down the Calle Grande they went, sowing the sharp +burrs carefully in the sand, along the narrow sidewalks, in every foot +of grass between the silent houses. And then they took the side streets +and by-ways, missing none. No place where the foot of man, woman or +child might fall was slighted. Many trips they made to and from the +prickly hoard. And then, nearly at the dawn, they laid themselves down +to rest calmly, as great generals do after planning a victory according +to the revised tactics, and slept, knowing that they had sowed with the +accuracy of Satan sowing tares and the perseverance of Paul planting. + +With the rising sun came the purveyors of fruits and meats, and +arranged their wares in and around the little market-house. At one end +of the town near the seashore the market-house stood; and the sowing of +the burrs had not been carried that far. The dealers waited long past +the hour when their sales usually began. None came to buy. “_Qué hay?_” +they began to exclaim, one to another. + +At their accustomed time, from every ’dobe and palm hut and +grass-thatched shack and dim _patio_ glided women—black women, brown +women, lemon-colored women, women dun and yellow and tawny. They were +the marketers starting to purchase the family supply of cassava, +plantains, meat, fowls, and tortillas. Décolleté they were and +bare-armed and bare-footed, with a single skirt reaching below the +knee. Stolid and ox-eyed, they stepped from their doorways into the +narrow paths or upon the soft grass of the streets. + +The first to emerge uttered ambiguous squeals, and raised one foot +quickly. Another step and they sat down, with shrill cries of alarm, to +pick at the new and painful insects that had stung them upon the feet. +“_Qué picadores diablos!_” they screeched to one another across the +narrow ways. Some tried the grass instead of the paths, but there they +were also stung and bitten by the strange little prickly balls. They +plumped down in the grass, and added their lamentations to those of +their sisters in the sandy paths. All through the town was heard the +plaint of the feminine jabber. The venders in the market still wondered +why no customers came. + +Then men, lords of the earth, came forth. They, too, began to hop, to +dance, to limp, and to curse. They stood stranded and foolish, or +stooped to pluck at the scourge that attacked their feet and ankles. +Some loudly proclaimed the pest to be poisonous spiders of an unknown +species. + +And then the children ran out for their morning romp. And now to the +uproar was added the howls of limping infants and cockleburred +childhood. Every minute the advancing day brought forth fresh victims. + +Doña Maria Castillas y Buenventura de las Casas stepped from her +honoured doorway, as was her daily custom, to procure fresh bread from +the _panaderia_ across the street. She was clad in a skirt of flowered +yellow satin, a chemise of ruffled linen, and wore a purple mantilla +from the looms of Spain. Her lemon-tinted feet, alas! were bare. Her +progress was majestic, for were not her ancestors hidalgos of Aragon? +Three steps she made across the velvety grass, and set her aristocratic +sole upon a bunch of Johnny’s burrs. Doña Maria Castillas y Buenventura +de las Casas emitted a yowl even as a wild-cat. Turning about, she fell +upon hands and knees, and crawled—ay, like a beast of the field she +crawled back to her honourable door-sill. + +Don Señor Ildefonso Federico Valdazar, _Juez de la Paz_, weighing +twenty stone, attempted to convey his bulk to the _pulperia_ at the +corner of the plaza in order to assuage his matutinal thirst. The first +plunge of his unshod foot into the cool grass struck a concealed mine. +Don Ildefonso fell like a crumpled cathedral, crying out that he had +been fatally bitten by a deadly scorpion. Everywhere were the shoeless +citizens hopping, stumbling, limping, and picking from their feet the +venomous insects that had come in a single night to harass them. + +The first to perceive the remedy was Estebán Delgado, the barber, a man +of travel and education. Sitting upon a stone, he plucked burrs from +his toes, and made oration: + +“Behold, my friends, these bugs of the devil! I know them well. They +soar through the skies in swarms like pigeons. These are the dead ones +that fell during the night. In Yucatan I have seen them as large as +oranges. Yes! There they hiss like serpents, and have wings like bats. +It is the shoes—the shoes that one needs! _Zapatos—zapatos para mi!_” + +Estebán hobbled to Mr. Hemstetter’s store, and bought shoes. Coming +out, he swaggered down the street with impunity, reviling loudly the +bugs of the devil. The suffering ones sat up or stood upon one foot and +beheld the immune barber. Men, women and children took up the cry: +“_Zapatos! zapatos!_” + +The necessity for the demand had been created. The demand followed. +That day Mr. Hemstetter sold three hundred pairs of shoes. + +“It is really surprising,” he said to Johnny, who came up in the +evening to help him straighten out the stock, “how trade is picking up. +Yesterday I made but three sales.” + +“I told you they’d whoop things up when they got started,” said the +consul. + +“I think I shall order a dozen more cases of goods, to keep the stock +up,” said Mr. Hemstetter, beaming through his spectacles. + +“I wouldn’t send in any orders yet,” advised Johnny. “Wait till you see +how the trade holds up.” + +Each night Johnny and Keogh sowed the crop that grew dollars by day. At +the end of ten days two-thirds of the stock of shoes had been sold; and +the stock of cockleburrs was exhausted. Johnny cabled to Pink Dawson +for another 500 pounds, paying twenty cents per pound as before. Mr. +Hemstetter carefully made up an order for $1500 worth of shoes from +Northern firms. Johnny hung about the store until this order was ready +for the mail, and succeeded in destroying it before it reached the +postoffice. + +That night he took Rosine under the mango tree by Goodwin’s porch, and +confessed everything. She looked him in the eye, and said: “You are a +very wicked man. Father and I will go back home. You say it was a joke? +I think it is a very serious matter.” + +But at the end of half an hour’s argument the conversation had been +turned upon a different subject. The two were considering the +respective merits of pale blue and pink wall paper with which the old +colonial mansion of the Atwoods in Dalesburg was to be decorated after +the wedding. + +On the next morning Johnny confessed to Mr. Hemstetter. The shoe +merchant put on his spectacles, and said through them: “You strike me +as being a most extraordinary young scamp. If I had not managed this +enterprise with good business judgment my entire stock of goods might +have been a complete loss. Now, how do you propose to dispose of the +rest of it?” + +When the second invoice of cockleburrs arrived Johnny loaded them and +the remainder of the shoes into a schooner, and sailed down the coast +to Alazan. + +There, in the same dark and diabolical manner, he repeated his success; +and came back with a bag of money and not so much as a shoestring. + +And then he besought his great Uncle of the waving goatee and starred +vest to accept his resignation, for the lotus no longer lured him. He +hankered for the spinach and cress of Dalesburg. + +The services of Mr. William Terence Keogh as acting consul, _pro tem._, +were suggested and accepted, and Johnny sailed with the Hemstetters +back to his native shores. + +Keogh slipped into the sinecure of the American consulship with the +ease that never left him even in such high places. The tintype +establishment was soon to become a thing of the past, although its +deadly work along the peaceful and helpless Spanish Main was never +effaced. The restless partners were about to be off again, scouting +ahead of the slow ranks of Fortune. But now they would take different +ways. There were rumours of a promising uprising in Peru; and thither +the martial Clancy would turn his adventurous steps. As for Keogh, he +was figuring in his mind and on quires of Government letter-heads a +scheme that dwarfed the art of misrepresenting the human countenance +upon tin. + +“What suits me,” Keogh used to say, “in the way of a business +proposition is something diversified that looks like a longer shot than +it is—something in the way of a genteel graft that isn’t worked enough +for the correspondence schools to be teaching it by mail. I take the +long end; but I like to have at least as good a chance to win as a man +learning to play poker on an ocean steamer, or running for governor of +Texas on the Republican ticket. And when I cash in my winnings, I don’t +want to find any widows’ and orphans’ chips in my stack.” + +The grass-grown globe was the green table on which Keogh gambled. The +games he played were of his own invention. He was no grubber after the +diffident dollar. Nor did he care to follow it with horn and hounds. +Rather he loved to coax it with egregious and brilliant flies from its +habitat in the waters of strange streams. Yet Keogh was a business man; +and his schemes, in spite of their singularity, were as solidly set as +the plans of a building contractor. In Arthur’s time Sir William Keogh +would have been a Knight of the Round Table. In these modern days he +rides abroad, seeking the Graft instead of the Grail. + +Three days after Johnny’s departure, two small schooners appeared off +Coralio. After some delay a boat put off from one of them, and brought +a sunburned young man ashore. This young man had a shrewd and +calculating eye; and he gazed with amazement at the strange things that +he saw. He found on the beach some one who directed him to the consul’s +office; and thither he made his way at a nervous gait. + +Keogh was sprawled in the official chair, drawing caricatures of his +Uncle’s head on an official pad of paper. He looked up at his visitor. + +“Where’s Johnny Atwood?” inquired the sunburned young man, in a +business tone. + +“Gone,” said Keogh, working carefully at Uncle Sam’s necktie. + +“That’s just like him,” remarked the nut-brown one, leaning against the +table. “He always was a fellow to gallivant around instead of ’tending +to business. Will he be in soon?” + +“Don’t think so,” said Keogh, after a fair amount of deliberation. + +“I s’pose he’s out at some of his tomfoolery,” conjectured the visitor, +in a tone of virtuous conviction. “Johnny never would stick to anything +long enough to succeed. I wonder how he manages to run his business +here, and never be ’round to look after it.” + +“I’m looking after the business just now,” admitted the _pro tem._ +consul. + +“Are you—then, say!—where’s the factory?” + +“What factory?” asked Keogh, with a mildly polite interest. + +“Why, the factory where they use them cockleburrs. Lord knows what they +use ’em for, anyway! I’ve got the basements of both them ships out +there loaded with ’em. I’ll give you a bargain in this lot. I’ve had +every man, woman and child around Dalesburg that wasn’t busy pickin’ +’em for a month. I hired these ships to bring ’em over. Everybody +thought I was crazy. Now, you can have this lot for fifteen cents a +pound, delivered on land. And if you want more I guess old Alabam’ can +come up to the demand. Johnny told me when he left home that if he +struck anything down here that there was any money in he’d let me in on +it. Shall I drive the ships in and hitch?” + +A look of supreme, almost incredulous, delight dawned in Keogh’s ruddy +countenance. He dropped his pencil. His eyes turned upon the sunburned +young man with joy in them mingled with fear lest his ecstasy should +prove a dream. + +“For God’s sake, tell me,” said Keogh, earnestly, “are you Dink +Pawson?” + +“My name is Pinkney Dawson,” said the cornerer of the cockleburr +market. + +Billy Keogh slid rapturously and gently from his chair to his favourite +strip of matting on the floor. + +There were not many sounds in Coralio on that sultry afternoon. Among +those that were may be mentioned a noise of enraptured and unrighteous +laughter from a prostrate Irish-American, while a sunburned young man, +with a shrewd eye, looked on him with wonder and amazement. Also the +“tramp, tramp, tramp” of many well-shod feet in the streets outside. +Also the lonesome wash of the waves that beat along the historic shores +of the Spanish Main. + + + + +XIV +MASTERS OF ARTS + + +A two-inch stub of a blue pencil was the wand with which Keogh +performed the preliminary acts of his magic. So, with this he covered +paper with diagrams and figures while he waited for the United States +of America to send down to Coralio a successor to Atwood, resigned. + +The new scheme that his mind had conceived, his stout heart indorsed, +and his blue pencil corroborated, was laid around the characteristics +and human frailties of the new president of Anchuria. These +characteristics, and the situation out of which Keogh hoped to wrest a +golden tribute, deserve chronicling contributive to the clear order of +events. + +President Losada—many called him Dictator—was a man whose genius would +have made him conspicuous even among Anglo-Saxons, had not that genius +been intermixed with other traits that were petty and subversive. He +had some of the lofty patriotism of Washington (the man he most +admired), the force of Napoleon, and much of the wisdom of the sages. +These characteristics might have justified him in the assumption of the +title of “The Illustrious Liberator,” had they not been accompanied by +a stupendous and amazing vanity that kept him in the less worthy ranks +of the dictators. + +Yet he did his country great service. With a mighty grasp he shook it +nearly free from the shackles of ignorance and sloth and the vermin +that fed upon it, and all but made it a power in the council of +nations. He established schools and hospitals, built roads, bridges, +railroads and palaces, and bestowed generous subsidies upon the arts +and sciences. He was the absolute despot and the idol of his people. +The wealth of the country poured into his hands. Other presidents had +been rapacious without reason. Losada amassed enormous wealth, but his +people had their share of the benefits. + +The joint in his armour was his insatiate passion for monuments and +tokens commemorating his glory. In every town he caused to be erected +statues of himself bearing legends in praise of his greatness. In the +walls of every public edifice, tablets were fixed reciting his +splendour and the gratitude of his subjects. His statuettes and +portraits were scattered throughout the land in every house and hut. +One of the sycophants in his court painted him as St. John, with a halo +and a train of attendants in full uniform. Losada saw nothing +incongruous in this picture, and had it hung in a church in the +capital. He ordered from a French sculptor a marble group including +himself with Napoleon, Alexander the Great, and one or two others whom +he deemed worthy of the honour. + +He ransacked Europe for decorations, employing policy, money and +intrigue to cajole the orders he coveted from kings and rulers. On +state occasions his breast was covered from shoulder to shoulder with +crosses, stars, golden roses, medals and ribbons. It was said that the +man who could contrive for him a new decoration, or invent some new +method of extolling his greatness, might plunge a hand deep into the +treasury. + +This was the man upon whom Billy Keogh had his eye. The gentle +buccaneer had observed the rain of favors that fell upon those who +ministered to the president’s vanities, and he did not deem it his duty +to hoist his umbrella against the scattering drops of liquid fortune. + +In a few weeks the new consul arrived, releasing Keogh from his +temporary duties. He was a young man fresh from college, who lived for +botany alone. The consulate at Coralio gave him the opportunity to +study tropical flora. He wore smoked glasses, and carried a green +umbrella. He filled the cool, back porch of the consulate with plants +and specimens so that space for a bottle and chair was not to be found. +Keogh gazed on him sadly, but without rancour, and began to pack his +gripsack. For his new plot against stagnation along the Spanish Main +required of him a voyage overseas. + +Soon came the _Karlsefin_ again—she of the trampish habits—gleaning a +cargo of cocoanuts for a speculative descent upon the New York market. +Keogh was booked for a passage on the return trip. + +“Yes, I’m going to New York,” he explained to the group of his +countrymen that had gathered on the beach to see him off. “But I’ll be +back before you miss me. I’ve undertaken the art education of this +piebald country, and I’m not the man to desert it while it’s in the +early throes of tintypes.” + +With this mysterious declaration of his intentions Keogh boarded the +_Karlsefin_. + +Ten days later, shivering, with the collar of his thin coat turned +high, he burst into the studio of Carolus White at the top of a tall +building in Tenth Street, New York City. + +Carolus White was smoking a cigarette and frying sausages over an oil +stove. He was only twenty-three, and had noble theories about art. + +“Billy Keogh!” exclaimed White, extending the hand that was not busy +with the frying pan. “From what part of the uncivilized world, I +wonder!” + +“Hello, Carry,” said Keogh, dragging forward a stool, and holding his +fingers close to the stove. “I’m glad I found you so soon. I’ve been +looking for you all day in the directories and art galleries. The +free-lunch man on the corner told me where you were, quick. I was sure +you’d be painting pictures yet.” + +Keogh glanced about the studio with the shrewd eye of a connoisseur in +business. + +“Yes, you can do it,” he declared, with many gentle nods of his head. +“That big one in the corner with the angels and green clouds and +band-wagon is just the sort of thing we want. What would you call that, +Carry—scene from Coney Island, ain’t it?” + +“That,” said White, “I had intended to call ‘The Translation of +Elijah,’ but you may be nearer right than I am.” + +“Name doesn’t matter,” said Keogh, largely; “it’s the frame and the +varieties of paint that does the trick. Now, I can tell you in a minute +what I want. I’ve come on a little voyage of two thousand miles to take +you in with me on a scheme. I thought of you as soon as the scheme +showed itself to me. How would you like to go back with me and paint a +picture? Ninety days for the trip, and five thousand dollars for the +job.” + +“Cereal food or hair-tonic posters?” asked White. + +“It isn’t an ad.” + +“What kind of a picture is it to be?” + +“It’s a long story,” said Keogh. + +“Go ahead with it. If you don’t mind, while you talk I’ll just keep my +eye on these sausages. Let ’em get one shade deeper than a Vandyke +brown and you spoil ’em.” + +Keogh explained his project. They were to return to Coralio, where +White was to pose as a distinguished American portrait painter who was +touring in the tropics as a relaxation from his arduous and +remunerative professional labours. It was not an unreasonable hope, +even to those who had trod in the beaten paths of business, that an +artist with so much prestige might secure a commission to perpetuate +upon canvas the lineaments of the president, and secure a share of the +_pesos_ that were raining upon the caterers to his weaknesses. + +Keogh had set his price at ten thousand dollars. Artists had been paid +more for portraits. He and White were to share the expenses of the +trip, and divide the possible profits. Thus he laid the scheme before +White, whom he had known in the West before one declared for Art and +the other became a Bedouin. + +Before long the two machinators abandoned the rigour of the bare studio +for a snug corner of a café. There they sat far into the night, with +old envelopes and Keogh’s stub of blue pencil between them. + +At twelve o’clock White doubled up in his chair, with his chin on his +fist, and shut his eyes at the unbeautiful wall-paper. + +“I’ll go you, Billy,” he said, in the quiet tones of decision. “I’ve +got two or three hundred saved up for sausages and rent; and I’ll take +the chance with you. Five thousand! It will give me two years in Paris +and one in Italy. I’ll begin to pack to-morrow.” + +“You’ll begin in ten minutes,” said Keogh. “It’s to-morrow now. The +_Karlsefin_ starts back at four P.M. Come on to your painting shop, and +I’ll help you.” + +For five months in the year Coralio is the Newport of Anchuria. Then +only does the town possess life. From November to March it is +practically the seat of government. The president with his official +family sojourns there; and society follows him. The pleasure-loving +people make the season one long holiday of amusement and rejoicing. +_Fiestas_, balls, games, sea bathing, processions and small theatres +contribute to their enjoyment. The famous Swiss band from the capital +plays in the little plaza every evening, while the fourteen carriages +and vehicles in the town circle in funereal but complacent procession. +Indians from the interior mountains, looking like prehistoric stone +idols, come down to peddle their handiwork in the streets. The people +throng the narrow ways, a chattering, happy, careless stream of buoyant +humanity. Preposterous children rigged out with the shortest of ballet +skirts and gilt wings, howl, underfoot, among the effervescent crowds. +Especially is the arrival of the presidential party, at the opening of +the season, attended with pomp, show and patriotic demonstrations of +enthusiasm and delight. + +When Keogh and White reached their destination, on the return trip of +the _Karlsefin_, the gay winter season was well begun. As they stepped +upon the beach they could hear the band playing in the plaza. The +village maidens, with fireflies already fixed in their dark locks, were +gliding, barefoot and coy-eyed, along the paths. Dandies in white +linen, swinging their canes, were beginning their seductive strolls. +The air was full of human essence, of artificial enticement, of +coquetry, indolence, pleasure—the man-made sense of existence. + +The first two or three days after their arrival were spent in +preliminaries. Keogh escorted the artist about town, introducing him to +the little circle of English-speaking residents and pulling whatever +wires he could to effect the spreading of White’s fame as a painter. +And then Keogh planned a more spectacular demonstration of the idea he +wished to keep before the public. + +He and White engaged rooms in the Hotel de los Estranjeros. The two +were clad in new suits of immaculate duck, with American straw hats, +and carried canes of remarkable uniqueness and inutility. Few +caballeros in Coralio—even the gorgeously uniformed officers of the +Anchurian army—were as conspicuous for ease and elegance of demeanour +as Keogh and his friend, the great American painter, Señor White. + +White set up his easel on the beach and made striking sketches of the +mountain and sea views. The native population formed at his rear in a +vast, chattering semicircle to watch his work. Keogh, with his care for +details, had arranged for himself a pose which he carried out with +fidelity. His rôle was that of friend to the great artist, a man of +affairs and leisure. The visible emblem of his position was a pocket +camera. + +“For branding the man who owns it,” said he, “a genteel dilettante with +a bank account and an easy conscience, a steam-yacht ain’t in it with a +camera. You see a man doing nothing but loafing around making +snap-shots, and you know right away he reads up well in ‘Bradstreet.’ +You notice these old millionaire boys—soon as they get through taking +everything else in sight they go to taking photographs. People are more +impressed by a kodak than they are by a title or a four-carat +scarf-pin.” So Keogh strolled blandly about Coralio, snapping the +scenery and the shrinking señoritas, while White posed conspicuously in +the higher regions of art. + +Two weeks after their arrival, the scheme began to bear fruit. An +aide-de-camp of the president drove to the hotel in a dashing victoria. +The president desired that Señor White come to the Casa Morena for an +informal interview. + +Keogh gripped his pipe tightly between his teeth. “Not a cent less than +ten thousand,” he said to the artist—“remember the price. And in gold +or its equivalent—don’t let him stick you with this bargain-counter +stuff they call money here.” + +“Perhaps it isn’t that he wants,” said White. + +“Get out!” said Keogh, with splendid confidence. “I know what he wants. +He wants his picture painted by the celebrated young American painter +and filibuster now sojourning in his down-trodden country. Off you go.” + +The victoria sped away with the artist. Keogh walked up and down, +puffing great clouds of smoke from his pipe, and waited. In an hour the +victoria swept again to the door of the hotel, deposited White, and +vanished. The artist dashed up the stairs, three at a step. Keogh +stopped smoking, and became a silent interrogation point. + +“Landed,” exclaimed White, with his boyish face flushed with elation. +“Billy, you are a wonder. He wants a picture. I’ll tell you all about +it. By Heavens! that dictator chap is a corker! He’s a dictator clear +down to his finger-ends. He’s a kind of combination of Julius Cæsar, +Lucifer and Chauncey Depew done in sepia. Polite and grim—that’s his +way. The room I saw him in was about ten acres big, and looked like a +Mississippi steamboat with its gilding and mirrors and white paint. He +talks English better than I can ever hope to. The matter of the price +came up. I mentioned ten thousand. I expected him to call the guard and +have me taken out and shot. He didn’t move an eyelash. He just waved +one of his chestnut hands in a careless way, and said, ‘Whatever you +say.’ I am to go back to-morrow and discuss with him the details of the +picture.” + +Keogh hung his head. Self-abasement was easy to read in his downcast +countenance. + +“I’m failing, Carry,” he said, sorrowfully. “I’m not fit to handle +these man’s-size schemes any longer. Peddling oranges in a push-cart is +about the suitable graft for me. When I said ten thousand, I swear I +thought I had sized up that brown man’s limit to within two cents. He’d +have melted down for fifteen thousand just as easy. Say—Carry—you’ll +see old man Keogh safe in some nice, quiet idiot asylum, won’t you, if +he makes a break like that again?” + +The Casa Morena, although only one story in height, was a building of +brown stone, luxurious as a palace in its interior. It stood on a low +hill in a walled garden of splendid tropical flora at the upper edge of +Coralio. The next day the president’s carriage came again for the +artist. Keogh went out for a walk along the beach, where he and his +“picture box” were now familiar sights. When he returned to the hotel +White was sitting in a steamer-chair on the balcony. + +“Well,” said Keogh, “did you and His Nibs decide on the kind of a +chromo he wants?” + +White got up and walked back and forth on the balcony a few times. Then +he stopped, and laughed strangely. His face was flushed, and his eyes +were bright with a kind of angry amusement. + +“Look here, Billy,” he said, somewhat roughly, “when you first came to +me in my studio and mentioned a picture, I thought you wanted a Smashed +Oats or a Hair Tonic poster painted on a range of mountains or the side +of a continent. Well, either of those jobs would have been Art in its +highest form compared to the one you’ve steered me against. I can’t +paint that picture, Billy. You’ve got to let me out. Let me try to tell +you what that barbarian wants. He had it all planned out and even a +sketch made of his idea. The old boy doesn’t draw badly at all. But, ye +goddesses of Art! listen to the monstrosity he expects me to paint. He +wants himself in the centre of the canvas, of course. He is to be +painted as Jupiter sitting on Olympus, with the clouds at his feet. At +one side of him stands George Washington, in full regimentals, with his +hand on the president’s shoulder. An angel with outstretched wings +hovers overhead, and is placing a laurel wreath on the president’s +head, crowning him—Queen of the May, I suppose. In the background is to +be cannon, more angels and soldiers. The man who would paint that +picture would have to have the soul of a dog, and would deserve to go +down into oblivion without even a tin can tied to his tail to sound his +memory.” + +Little beads of moisture crept out all over Billy Keogh’s brow. The +stub of his blue pencil had not figured out a contingency like this. +The machinery of his plan had run with flattering smoothness until now. +He dragged another chair upon the balcony, and got White back to his +seat. He lit his pipe with apparent calm. + +“Now, sonny,” he said, with gentle grimness, “you and me will have an +Art to Art talk. You’ve got your art and I’ve got mine. Yours is the +real Pierian stuff that turns up its nose at bock-beer signs and +oleographs of the Old Mill. Mine’s the art of Business. This was my +scheme, and it worked out like two-and-two. Paint that president man as +Old King Cole, or Venus, or a landscape, or a fresco, or a bunch of +lilies, or anything he thinks he looks like. But get the paint on the +canvas and collect the spoils. You wouldn’t throw me down, Carry, at +this stage of the game. Think of that ten thousand.” + +“I can’t help thinking of it,” said White, “and that’s what hurts. I’m +tempted to throw every ideal I ever had down in the mire, and steep my +soul in infamy by painting that picture. That five thousand meant three +years of foreign study to me, and I’d almost sell my soul for that.” + +“Now it ain’t as bad as that,” said Keogh, soothingly. “It’s a business +proposition. It’s so much paint and time against money. I don’t fall in +with your idea that that picture would so everlastingly jolt the art +side of the question. George Washington was all right, you know, and +nobody could say a word against the angel. I don’t think so bad of that +group. If you was to give Jupiter a pair of epaulets and a sword, and +kind of work the clouds around to look like a blackberry patch, it +wouldn’t make such a bad battle scene. Why, if we hadn’t already +settled on the price, he ought to pay an extra thousand for Washington, +and the angel ought to raise it five hundred.” + +“You don’t understand, Billy,” said White, with an uneasy laugh. “Some +of us fellows who try to paint have big notions about Art. I wanted to +paint a picture some day that people would stand before and forget that +it was made of paint. I wanted it to creep into them like a bar of +music and mushroom there like a soft bullet. And I wanted ’em to go +away and ask, ‘What else has he done?’ And I didn’t want ’em to find a +thing; not a portrait nor a magazine cover nor an illustration nor a +drawing of a girl—nothing but _the_ picture. That’s why I’ve lived on +fried sausages, and tried to keep true to myself. I persuaded myself to +do this portrait for the chance it might give me to study abroad. But +this howling, screaming caricature! Good Lord! can’t you see how it +is?” + +“Sure,” said Keogh, as tenderly as he would have spoken to a child, and +he laid a long forefinger on White’s knee. “I see. It’s bad to have +your art all slugged up like that. I know. You wanted to paint a big +thing like the panorama of the battle of Gettysburg. But let me +kalsomine you a little mental sketch to consider. Up to date we’re out +$385.50 on this scheme. Our capital took every cent both of us could +raise. We’ve got about enough left to get back to New York on. I need +my share of that ten thousand. I want to work a copper deal in Idaho, +and make a hundred thousand. That’s the business end of the thing. Come +down off your art perch, Carry, and let’s land that hatful of dollars.” + +“Billy,” said White, with an effort, “I’ll try. I won’t say I’ll do it, +but I’ll try. I’ll go at it, and put it through if I can.” + +“That’s business,” said Keogh heartily. “Good boy! Now, here’s another +thing—rush that picture—crowd it through as quick as you can. Get a +couple of boys to help you mix the paint if necessary. I’ve picked up +some pointers around town. The people here are beginning to get sick of +Mr. President. They say he’s been too free with concessions; and they +accuse him of trying to make a dicker with England to sell out the +country. We want that picture done and paid for before there’s any +row.” + +In the great _patio_ of Casa Morena, the president caused to be +stretched a huge canvas. Under this White set up his temporary studio. +For two hours each day the great man sat to him. + +White worked faithfully. But, as the work progressed, he had seasons of +bitter scorn, of infinite self-contempt, of sullen gloom and sardonic +gaiety. Keogh, with the patience of a great general, soothed, coaxed, +argued—kept him at the picture. + +At the end of a month White announced that the picture was +completed—Jupiter, Washington, angels, clouds, cannon and all. His face +was pale and his mouth drawn straight when he told Keogh. He said the +president was much pleased with it. It was to be hung in the National +Gallery of Statesmen and Heroes. The artist had been requested to +return to Casa Morena on the following day to receive payment. At the +appointed time he left the hotel, silent under his friend’s joyful talk +of their success. + +An hour later he walked into the room where Keogh was waiting, threw +his hat on the floor, and sat upon the table. + +“Billy,” he said, in strained and labouring tones, “I’ve a little money +out West in a small business that my brother is running. It’s what I’ve +been living on while I’ve been studying art. I’ll draw out my share and +pay you back what you’ve lost on this scheme.” + +“Lost!” exclaimed Keogh, jumping up. “Didn’t you get paid for the +picture?” + +“Yes, I got paid,” said White. “But just now there isn’t any picture, +and there isn’t any pay. If you care to hear about it, here are the +edifying details. The president and I were looking at the painting. His +secretary brought a bank draft on New York for ten thousand dollars and +handed it to me. The moment I touched it I went wild. I tore it into +little pieces and threw them on the floor. A workman was repainting the +pillars inside the _patio_. A bucket of his paint happened to be +convenient. I picked up his brush and slapped a quart of blue paint all +over that ten-thousand-dollar nightmare. I bowed, and walked out. The +president didn’t move or speak. That was one time he was taken by +surprise. It’s tough on you, Billy, but I couldn’t help it.” + +There seemed to be excitement in Coralio. Outside there was a confused, +rising murmur pierced by high-pitched cries. “_Bajo el traidor—Muerte +el traidor!_” were the words they seemed to form. + +“Listen to that!” exclaimed White, bitterly: “I know that much Spanish. +They’re shouting, ‘Down with the traitor!’ I heard them before. I felt +that they meant me. I was a traitor to Art. The picture had to go.” + +“‘Down with the blank fool’ would have suited your case better,” said +Keogh, with fiery emphasis. “You tear up ten thousand dollars like an +old rag because the way you’ve spread on five dollars’ worth of paint +hurts your conscience. Next time I pick a side-partner in a scheme the +man has got to go before a notary and swear he never even heard the +word ‘ideal’ mentioned.” + +Keogh strode from the room, white-hot. White paid little attention to +his resentment. The scorn of Billy Keogh seemed a trifling thing beside +the greater self-scorn he had escaped. + +In Coralio the excitement waxed. An outburst was imminent. The cause of +this demonstration of displeasure was the presence in the town of a +big, pink-cheeked Englishman, who, it was said, was an agent of his +government come to clinch the bargain by which the president placed his +people in the hands of a foreign power. It was charged that not only +had he given away priceless concessions, but that the public debt was +to be transferred into the hands of the English, and the custom-houses +turned over to them as a guarantee. The long-enduring people had +determined to make their protest felt. + +On that night, in Coralio and in other towns, their ire found vent. +Yelling mobs, mercurial but dangerous, roamed the streets. They +overthrew the great bronze statue of the president that stood in the +centre of the plaza, and hacked it to shapeless pieces. They tore from +public buildings the tablets set there proclaiming the glory of the +“Illustrious Liberator.” His pictures in the government offices were +demolished. The mobs even attacked the Casa Morena, but were driven +away by the military, which remained faithful to the executive. All the +night terror reigned. + +The greatness of Losada was shown by the fact that by noon the next day +order was restored, and he was still absolute. He issued proclamations +denying positively that any negotiations of any kind had been entered +into with England. Sir Stafford Vaughn, the pink-cheeked Englishman, +also declared in placards and in public print that his presence there +had no international significance. He was a traveller without guile. In +fact (so he stated), he had not even spoken with the president or been +in his presence since his arrival. + +During this disturbance, White was preparing for his homeward voyage in +the steamship that was to sail within two or three days. About noon, +Keogh, the restless, took his camera out with the hope of speeding the +lagging hours. The town was now as quiet as if peace had never departed +from her perch on the red-tiled roofs. + +About the middle of the afternoon, Keogh hurried back to the hotel with +something decidedly special in his air. He retired to the little room +where he developed his pictures. + +Later on he came out to White on the balcony, with a luminous, grim, +predatory smile on his face. + +“Do you know what that is?” he asked, holding up a 4 × 5 photograph +mounted on cardboard. + +“Snap-shot of a señorita sitting in the sand—alliteration +unintentional,” guessed White, lazily. + +“Wrong,” said Keogh with shining eyes. “It’s a slung-shot. It’s a can +of dynamite. It’s a gold mine. It’s a sight-draft on your president man +for twenty thousand dollars—yes, sir—twenty thousand this time, and no +spoiling the picture. No ethics of art in the way. Art! You with your +smelly little tubes! I’ve got you skinned to death with a kodak. Take a +look at that.” + +White took the picture in his hand, and gave a long whistle. + +“Jove!” he exclaimed, “but wouldn’t that stir up a row in town if you +let it be seen. How in the world did you get it, Billy?” + +“You know that high wall around the president man’s back garden? I was +up there trying to get a bird’s-eye of the town. I happened to notice a +chink in the wall where a stone and a lot of plaster had slid out. +Thinks I, I’ll take a peep through to see how Mr. President’s cabbages +are growing. The first thing I saw was him and this Sir Englishman +sitting at a little table about twenty feet away. They had the table +all spread over with documents, and they were hobnobbing over them as +thick as two pirates. ’Twas a nice corner of the garden, all private +and shady with palms and orange trees, and they had a pail of champagne +set by handy in the grass. I knew then was the time for me to make my +big hit in Art. So I raised the machine up to the crack, and pressed +the button. Just as I did so them old boys shook hands on the deal—you +see they took that way in the picture.” + +Keogh put on his coat and hat. + +“What are you going to do with it?” asked White. + +“Me,” said Keogh in a hurt tone, “why, I’m going to tie a pink ribbon +to it and hang it on the what-not, of course. I’m surprised at you. But +while I’m out you just try to figure out what ginger-cake potentate +would be most likely to want to buy this work of art for his private +collection—just to keep it out of circulation.” + +The sunset was reddening the tops of the cocoanut palms when Billy +Keogh came back from Casa Morena. He nodded to the artist’s questioning +gaze; and lay down on a cot with his hands under the back of his head. + +“I saw him. He paid the money like a little man. They didn’t want to +let me in at first. I told ’em it was important. Yes, that president +man is on the plenty-able list. He’s got a beautiful business system +about the way he uses his brains. All I had to do was to hold up the +photograph so he could see it, and name the price. He just smiled, and +walked over to a safe and got the cash. Twenty one-thousand-dollar +brand-new United States Treasury notes he laid on the table, like I’d +pay out a dollar and a quarter. Fine notes, too—they crackled with a +sound like burning the brush off a ten-acre lot.” + +“Let’s try the feel of one,” said White, curiously. “I never saw a +thousand-dollar bill.” Keogh did not immediately respond. + +“Carry,” he said, in an absent-minded way, “you think a heap of your +art, don’t you?” + +“More,” said White, frankly, “than has been for the financial good of +myself and my friends.” + +“I thought you were a fool the other day,” went on Keogh, quietly, “and +I’m not sure now that you wasn’t. But if you was, so am I. I’ve been in +some funny deals, Carry, but I’ve always managed to scramble fair, and +match my brains and capital against the other fellow’s. But when it +comes to—well, when you’ve got the other fellow cinched, and the screws +on him, and he’s got to put up—why, it don’t strike me as being a man’s +game. They’ve got a name for it, you know; it’s—confound you, don’t you +understand? A fellow feels—it’s something like that blamed art of +yours—he—well, I tore that photograph up and laid the pieces on that +stack of money and shoved the whole business back across the table. +‘Excuse me, Mr. Losada,’ I said, ‘but I guess I’ve made a mistake in +the price. You get the photo for nothing.’ Now, Carry, you get out the +pencil, and we’ll do some more figuring. I’d like to save enough out of +our capital for you to have some fried sausages in your joint when you +get back to New York.” + + + + +XV +DICKY + + +There is little consecutiveness along the Spanish Main. Things happen +there intermittently. Even Time seems to hang his scythe daily on the +branch of an orange tree while he takes a siesta and a cigarette. + +After the ineffectual revolt against the administration of President +Losada, the country settled again into quiet toleration of the abuses +with which he had been charged. In Coralio old political enemies went +arm-in-arm, lightly eschewing for the time all differences of opinion. + +The failure of the art expedition did not stretch the cat-footed Keogh +upon his back. The ups and downs of Fortune made smooth travelling for +his nimble steps. His blue pencil stub was at work again before the +smoke of the steamer on which White sailed had cleared away from the +horizon. He had but to speak a word to Geddie to find his credit +negotiable for whatever goods he wanted from the store of Brannigan & +Company. On the same day on which White arrived in New York Keogh, at +the rear of a train of five pack mules loaded with hardware and +cutlery, set his face toward the grim, interior mountains. There the +Indian tribes wash gold dust from the auriferous streams; and when a +market is brought to them trading is brisk and _muy bueno_ in the +Cordilleras. + +In Coralio Time folded his wings and paced wearily along his drowsy +path. They who had most cheered the torpid hours were gone. Clancy had +sailed on a Spanish barque for Colon, contemplating a cut across the +isthmus and then a further voyage to end at Calao, where the fighting +was said to be on. Geddie, whose quiet and genial nature had once +served to mitigate the frequent dull reaction of lotus eating, was now +a home-man, happy with his bright orchid, Paula, and never even +dreaming of or regretting the unsolved, sealed and monogramed Bottle +whose contents, now inconsiderable, were held safely in the keeping of +the sea. + +Well may the Walrus, most discerning and eclectic of beasts, place +sealing-wax midway on his programme of topics that fall pertinent and +diverting upon the ear. + +Atwood was gone—he of the hospitable back porch and ingenuous cunning. +Dr. Gregg, with his trepanning story smouldering within him, was a +whiskered volcano, always showing signs of imminent eruption, and was +not to be considered in the ranks of those who might contribute to the +amelioration of ennui. The new consul’s note chimed with the sad sea +waves and the violent tropical greens—he had not a bar of Scheherezade +or of the Round Table in his lute. Goodwin was employed with large +projects: what time he was loosed from them found him at his home, +where he loved to be. Therefore it will be seen that there was a dearth +of fellowship and entertainment among the foreign contingent of +Coralio. + +And then Dicky Maloney dropped down from the clouds upon the town, and +amused it. + +Nobody knew where Dicky Maloney hailed from or how he reached Coralio. +He appeared there one day; and that was all. He afterward said that he +came on the fruit steamer _Thor_; but an inspection of the _Thor’s_ +passenger list of that date was found to be Maloneyless. Curiosity, +however, soon perished; and Dicky took his place among the odd fish +cast up by the Caribbean. + +He was an active, devil-may-care, rollicking fellow with an engaging +gray eye, the most irresistible grin, a rather dark or much sunburned +complexion, and a head of the fieriest red hair ever seen in that +country. Speaking the Spanish language as well as he spoke English, and +seeming always to have plenty of silver in his pockets, it was not long +before he was a welcome companion whithersoever he went. He had an +extreme fondness for _vino blanco_, and gained the reputation of being +able to drink more of it than any three men in town. Everybody called +him “Dicky”; everybody cheered up at the sight of him—especially the +natives, to whom his marvellous red hair and his free-and-easy style +were a constant delight and envy. Wherever you went in the town you +would soon see Dicky or hear his genial laugh, and find around him a +group of admirers who appreciated him both for his good nature and the +white wine he was always so ready to buy. + +A considerable amount of speculation was had concerning the object of +his sojourn there, until one day he silenced this by opening a small +shop for the sale of tobacco, _dulces_ and the handiwork of the +interior Indians—fibre-and-silk-woven goods, deerskin _zapatos_ and +basketwork of _tule_ reeds. Even then he did not change his habits; for +he was drinking and playing cards half the day and night with the +_comandante_, the collector of customs, the _Jefe Politico_ and other +gay dogs among the native officials. + +One day Dicky saw Pasa, the daughter of Madama Ortiz, sitting in the +side-door of the Hotel de los Estranjeros. He stopped in his tracks, +still, for the first time in Coralio; and then he sped, swift as a +deer, to find Vasquez, a gilded native youth, to present him. + +The young men had named Pasa “_La Santita Naranjadita_.” _Naranjadita_ +is a Spanish word for a certain colour that you must go to more trouble +to describe in English. By saying “The little saint, tinted the most +beautiful-delicate-slightly-orange-golden,” you will approximate the +description of Madama Ortiz’s daughter. + +La Madama Ortiz sold rum in addition to other liquors. Now, you must +know that the rum expiates whatever opprobrium attends upon the other +commodities. For rum-making, mind you, is a government monopoly; and to +keep a government dispensary assures respectability if not preëminence. +Moreover, the saddest of precisians could find no fault with the +conduct of the shop. Customers drank there in the lowest of spirits and +fearsomely, as in the shadow of the dead; for Madama’s ancient and +vaunted lineage counteracted even the rum’s behest to be merry. For, +was she not of the Iglesias, who landed with Pizarro? And had not her +deceased husband been _comisionado de caminos y puentes_ for the +district? + +In the evenings Pasa sat by the window in the room next to the one +where they drank, and strummed dreamily upon her guitar. And then, by +twos and threes, would come visiting young caballeros and occupy the +prim line of chairs set against the wall of this room. They were there +to besiege the heart of “_La Santita_.” Their method (which is not +proof against intelligent competition) consisted of expanding the +chest, looking valorous, and consuming a gross or two of cigarettes. +Even saints delicately oranged prefer to be wooed differently. + +Doña Pasa would tide over the vast chasms of nicotinized silence with +music from her guitar, while she wondered if the romances she had read +about gallant and more—more contiguous cavaliers were all lies. At +somewhat regular intervals Madama would glide in from the dispensary +with a sort of drought-suggesting gleam in her eye, and there would be +a rustling of stiffly-starched white trousers as one of the caballeros +would propose an adjournment to the bar. + +That Dicky Maloney would, sooner or later, explore this field was a +thing to be foreseen. There were few doors in Coralio into which his +red head had not been poked. + +In an incredibly short space of time after his first sight of her he +was there, seated close beside her rocking chair. There were no +back-against-the-wall poses in Dicky’s theory of wooing. His plan of +subjection was an attack at close range. To carry the fortress with one +concentrated, ardent, eloquent, irresistible _escalade_—that was +Dicky’s way. + +Pasa was descended from the proudest Spanish families in the country. +Moreover, she had had unusual advantages. Two years in a New Orleans +school had elevated her ambitions and fitted her for a fate above the +ordinary maidens of her native land. And yet here she succumbed to the +first red-haired scamp with a glib tongue and a charming smile that +came along and courted her properly. + +Very soon Dicky took her to the little church on the corner of the +plaza, and “Mrs. Maloney” was added to her string of distinguished +names. + +And it was her fate to sit, with her patient, saintly eyes and figure +like a bisque Psyche, behind the sequestered counter of the little +shop, while Dicky drank and philandered with his frivolous +acquaintances. + +The women, with their naturally fine instinct, saw a chance for +vivisection, and delicately taunted her with his habits. She turned +upon them in a beautiful, steady blaze of sorrowful contempt. + +“You meat-cows,” she said, in her level, crystal-clear tones; “you know +nothing of a man. Your men are _maromeros_. They are fit only to roll +cigarettes in the shade until the sun strikes and shrivels them up. +They drone in your hammocks and you comb their hair and feed them with +fresh fruit. My man is of no such blood. Let him drink of the wine. +When he has taken sufficient of it to drown one of your _flaccitos_ he +will come home to me more of a man than one thousand of your +_pobrecitos_. _My_ hair he smooths and braids; to me he sings; he +himself removes my _zapatos_, and there, there, upon each instep leaves +a kiss. He holds— Oh, you will never understand! Blind ones who have +never known a _man_.” + +Sometimes mysterious things happened at night about Dicky’s shop. While +the front of it was dark, in the little room back of it Dicky and a few +of his friends would sit about a table carrying on some kind of very +quiet _negocios_ until quite late. Finally he would let them out the +front door very carefully, and go upstairs to his little saint. These +visitors were generally conspirator-like men with dark clothes and +hats. Of course, these dark doings were noticed after a while, and +talked about. + +Dicky seemed to care nothing at all for the society of the alien +residents of the town. He avoided Goodwin, and his skilful escape from +the trepanning story of Dr. Gregg is still referred to, in Coralio, as +a masterpiece of lightning diplomacy. + +Many letters arrived, addressed to “Mr. Dicky Maloney,” or “Señor +Dickee Maloney,” to the considerable pride of Pasa. That so many people +should desire to write to him only confirmed her own suspicion that the +light from his red head shone around the world. As to their contents +she never felt curiosity. There was a wife for you! + +The one mistake Dicky made in Coralio was to run out of money at the +wrong time. Where his money came from was a puzzle, for the sales of +his shop were next to nothing, but that source failed, and at a +peculiarly unfortunate time. It was when the _comandante_, Don Señor el +Coronel Encarnación Rios, looked upon the little saint seated in the +shop and felt his heart go pitapat. + +The _comandante_, who was versed in all the intricate arts of +gallantry, first delicately hinted at his sentiments by donning his +dress uniform and strutting up and down fiercely before her window. +Pasa, glancing demurely with her saintly eyes, instantly perceived his +resemblance to her parrot, Chichi, and was diverted to the extent of a +smile. The _comandante_ saw the smile, which was not intended for him. +Convinced of an impression made, he entered the shop, confidently, and +advanced to open compliment. Pasa froze; he pranced; she flamed +royally; he was charmed to injudicious persistence; she commanded him +to leave the shop; he tried to capture her hand,—and Dicky entered, +smiling broadly, full of white wine and the devil. + +He spent five minutes in punishing the _comandante_ scientifically and +carefully, so that the pain might be prolonged as far as possible. At +the end of that time he pitched the rash wooer out the door upon the +stones of the street, senseless. + +A barefooted policeman who had been watching the affair from across the +street blew a whistle. A squad of four soldiers came running from the +_cuartel_ around the corner. When they saw that the offender was Dicky, +they stopped, and blew more whistles, which brought out reënforcements +of eight. Deeming the odds against them sufficiently reduced, the +military advanced upon the disturber. + +Dicky, being thoroughly imbued with the martial spirit, stooped and +drew the _comandante’s_ sword, which was girded about him, and charged +his foe. He chased the standing army four squares, playfully prodding +its squealing rear and hacking at its ginger-coloured heels. + +But he was not so successful with the civic authorities. Six muscular, +nimble policemen overpowered him and conveyed him, triumphantly but +warily, to jail. “_El Diablo Colorado_” they dubbed him, and derided +the military for its defeat. + +Dicky, with the rest of the prisoners, could look out through the +barred door at the grass of the little plaza, at a row of orange trees +and the red tile roofs and ’dobe walls of a line of insignificant +stores. + +At sunset along a path across this plaza came a melancholy procession +of sad-faced women bearing plantains, cassaba, bread and fruit—each +coming with food to some wretch behind those bars to whom she still +clung and furnished the means of life. Twice a day—morning and +evening—they were permitted to come. Water was furnished to her +compulsory guests by the republic, but no food. + +That evening Dicky’s name was called by the sentry, and he stepped +before the bars of the door. There stood his little saint, a black +mantilla draped about her head and shoulders, her face like glorified +melancholy, her clear eyes gazing longingly at him as if they might +draw him between the bars to her. She brought a chicken, some oranges, +_dulces_ and a loaf of white bread. A soldier inspected the food, and +passed it in to Dicky. Pasa spoke calmly, as she always did, briefly, +in her thrilling, flute-like tones. “Angel of my life,” she said, “let +it not be long that thou art away from me. Thou knowest that life is +not a thing to be endured with thou not at my side. Tell me if I can do +aught in this matter. If not, I will wait—a little while. I come again +in the morning.” + +Dicky, with his shoes removed so as not to disturb his fellow +prisoners, tramped the floor of the jail half the night condemning his +lack of money and the cause of it—whatever that might have been. He +knew very well that money would have bought his release at once. + +For two days succeeding Pasa came at the appointed times and brought +him food. He eagerly inquired each time if a letter or package had come +for him, and she mournfully shook her head. + +On the morning of the third day she brought only a small loaf of bread. +There were dark circles under her eyes. She seemed as calm as ever. + +“By jingo,” said Dicky, who seemed to speak in English or Spanish as +the whim seized him, “this is dry provender, _muchachita_. Is this the +best you can dig up for a fellow?” + +Pasa looked at him as a mother looks at a beloved but capricious babe. + +“Think better of it,” she said, in a low voice; “since for the next +meal there will be nothing. The last _centavo_ is spent.” She pressed +closer against the grating. + +“Sell the goods in the shop—take anything for them.” + +“Have I not tried? Did I not offer them for one-tenth their cost? Not +even one _peso_ would any one give. There is not one _real_ in this +town to assist Dickee Malonee.” + +Dick clenched his teeth grimly. “That’s the _comandante_,” he growled. +“He’s responsible for that sentiment. Wait, oh, wait till the cards are +all out.” + +Pasa lowered her voice to almost a whisper. “And, listen, heart of my +heart,” she said, “I have endeavoured to be brave, but I cannot live +without thee. Three days now—” + +Dicky caught a faint gleam of steel from the folds of her mantilla. For +once she looked in his face and saw it without a smile, stern, menacing +and purposeful. Then he suddenly raised his hand and his smile came +back like a gleam of sunshine. The hoarse signal of an incoming +steamer’s siren sounded in the harbour. Dicky called to the sentry who +was pacing before the door: “What steamer comes?” + +“The _Catarina_.” + +“Of the Vesuvius line?” + +“Without doubt, of that line.” + +“Go you, _picarilla_,” said Dicky joyously to Pasa, “to the American +consul. Tell him I wish to speak with him. See that he comes at once. +And look you! let me see a different look in those eyes, for I promise +your head shall rest upon this arm to-night.” + +It was an hour before the consul came. He held his green umbrella under +his arm, and mopped his forehead impatiently. + +“Now, see here, Maloney,” he began, captiously, “you fellows seem to +think you can cut up any kind of row, and expect me to pull you out of +it. I’m neither the War Department nor a gold mine. This country has +its laws, you know, and there’s one against pounding the senses out of +the regular army. You Irish are forever getting into trouble. I don’t +see what I can do. Anything like tobacco, now, to make you +comfortable—or newspapers—” + +“Son of Eli,” interrupted Dicky, gravely, “you haven’t changed an iota. +That is almost a duplicate of the speech you made when old Koen’s +donkeys and geese got into the chapel loft, and the culprits wanted to +hide in your room.” + +“Oh, heavens!” exclaimed the consul, hurriedly adjusting his +spectacles. “Are you a Yale man, too? Were you in that crowd? I don’t +seem to remember any one with red—any one named Maloney. Such a lot of +college men seem to have misused their advantages. One of the best +mathematicians of the class of ’91 is selling lottery tickets in +Belize. A Cornell man dropped off here last month. He was second +steward on a guano boat. I’ll write to the department if you like, +Maloney. Or if there’s any tobacco, or newspa—” + +“There’s nothing,” interrupted Dicky, shortly, “but this. You go tell +the captain of the _Catarina_ that Dicky Maloney wants to see him as +soon as he can conveniently come. Tell him where I am. Hurry. That’s +all.” + +The consul, glad to be let off so easily, hurried away. The captain of +the _Catarina_, a stout man, Sicilian born, soon appeared, shoving, +with little ceremony, through the guards to the jail door. The Vesuvius +Fruit Company had a habit of doing things that way in Anchuria. + +“I am exceedingly sorry—exceedingly sorry,” said the captain, “to see +this occur. I place myself at your service, Mr. Maloney. What you need +shall be furnished. Whatever you say shall be done.” + +Dicky looked at him unsmilingly. His red hair could not detract from +his attitude of severe dignity as he stood, tall and calm, with his now +grim mouth forming a horizontal line. + +“Captain De Lucco, I believe I still have funds in the hands of your +company—ample and personal funds. I ordered a remittance last week. The +money has not arrived. You know what is needed in this game. Money and +money and more money. Why has it not been sent?” + +“By the _Cristobal_,” replied De Lucco, gesticulating, “it was +despatched. Where is the _Cristobal_? Off Cape Antonio I spoke her with +a broken shaft. A tramp coaster was towing her back to New Orleans. I +brought money ashore thinking your need for it might not withstand +delay. In this envelope is one thousand dollars. There is more if you +need it, Mr. Maloney.” + +“For the present it will suffice,” said Dicky, softening as he crinkled +the envelope and looked down at the half-inch thickness of smooth, +dingy bills. + +“The long green!” he said, gently, with a new reverence in his gaze. +“Is there anything it will not buy, Captain?” + +“I had three friends,” replied De Lucco, who was a bit of a +philosopher, “who had money. One of them speculated in stocks and made +ten million; another is in heaven, and the third married a poor girl +whom he loved.” + +“The answer, then,” said Dicky, “is held by the Almighty, Wall Street +and Cupid. So, the question remains.” + +“This,” queried the captain, including Dicky’s surroundings in a +significant gesture of his hand, “is it—it is not—it is not connected +with the business of your little shop? There is no failure in your +plans?” + +“No, no,” said Dicky. “This is merely the result of a little private +affair of mine, a digression from the regular line of business. They +say for a complete life a man must know poverty, love and war. But they +don’t go well together, _capitán mio_. No; there is no failure in my +business. The little shop is doing very well.” + +When the captain had departed Dicky called the sergeant of the jail +squad and asked: + +“Am I _preso_ by the military or by the civil authority?” + +“Surely there is no martial law in effect now, señor.” + +“_Bueno_. Now go or send to the alcalde, the _Jues de la Paz_ and the +_Jefe de los Policios_. Tell them I am prepared at once to satisfy the +demands of justice.” A folded bill of the “long green” slid into the +sergeant’s hand. + +Then Dicky’s smile came back again, for he knew that the hours of his +captivity were numbered; and he hummed, in time with the sentry’s +tread: + +“They’re hanging men and women now, + For lacking of the green.” + + +So, that night Dicky sat by the window of the room over his shop and +his little saint sat close by, working at something silken and dainty. +Dicky was thoughtful and grave. His red hair was in an unusual state of +disorder. Pasa’s fingers often ached to smooth and arrange it, but +Dicky would never allow it. He was poring, to-night, over a great +litter of maps and books and papers on his table until that +perpendicular line came between his brows that always distressed Pasa. +Presently she went and brought his hat, and stood with it until he +looked up, inquiringly. + +“It is sad for you here,” she explained. “Go out and drink _vino +blanco_. Come back when you get that smile you used to wear. That is +what I wish to see.” + +Dicky laughed and threw down his papers. “The _vino blanco_ stage is +past. It has served its turn. Perhaps, after all, there was less +entered my mouth and more my ears than people thought. But, there will +be no more maps or frowns to-night. I promise you that. Come.” + +They sat upon a reed _silleta_ at the window and watched the quivering +gleams from the lights of the _Catarina_ reflected in the harbour. + +Presently Pasa rippled out one of her infrequent chirrups of audible +laughter. + +“I was thinking,” she began, anticipating Dicky’s question, “of the +foolish things girls have in their minds. Because I went to school in +the States I used to have ambitions. Nothing less than to be the +president’s wife would satisfy me. And, look, thou red picaroon, to +what obscure fate thou hast stolen me!” + +“Don’t give up hope,” said Dicky, smiling. “More than one Irishman has +been the ruler of a South American country. There was a dictator of +Chili named O’Higgins. Why not a President Maloney, of Anchuria? Say +the word, _santita mia_, and we’ll make the race.” + +“No, no, no, thou red-haired, reckless one!” sighed Pasa; “I am +content”—she laid her head against his arm—“here.” + + + + +XVI +ROUGE ET NOIR + + +It has been indicated that disaffection followed the elevation of +Losada to the presidency. This feeling continued to grow. Throughout +the entire republic there seemed to be a spirit of silent, sullen +discontent. Even the old Liberal party to which Goodwin, Zavalla and +other patriots had lent their aid was disappointed. Losada had failed +to become a popular idol. Fresh taxes, fresh import duties and, more +than all, his tolerance of the outrageous oppression of citizens by the +military had rendered him the most obnoxious president since the +despicable Alforan. The majority of his own cabinet were out of +sympathy with him. The army, which he had courted by giving it license +to tyrannize, had been his main, and thus far adequate support. + +But the most impolitic of the administration’s moves had been when it +antagonized the Vesuvius Fruit Company, an organization plying twelve +steamers and with a cash capital somewhat larger than Anchuria’s +surplus and debt combined. + +Reasonably an established concern like the Vesuvius would become +irritated at having a small, retail republic with no rating at all +attempt to squeeze it. So when the government proxies applied for a +subsidy they encountered a polite refusal. The president at once +retaliated by clapping an export duty of one _real_ per bunch on +bananas—a thing unprecedented in fruit-growing countries. The Vesuvius +Company had invested large sums in wharves and plantations along the +Anchurian coast, their agents had erected fine homes in the towns where +they had their headquarters, and heretofore had worked with the +republic in good-will and with advantage to both. It would lose an +immense sum if compelled to move out. The selling price of bananas from +Vera Cruz to Trinidad was three _reals_ per bunch. This new duty of one +_real_ would have ruined the fruit growers in Anchuria and have +seriously discommoded the Vesuvius Company had it declined to pay it. +But for some reason, the Vesuvius continued to buy Anchurian fruit, +paying four _reals_ for it; and not suffering the growers to bear the +loss. + +This apparent victory deceived His Excellency; and he began to hunger +for more of it. He sent an emissary to request a conference with a +representative of the fruit company. The Vesuvius sent Mr. Franzoni, a +little, stout, cheerful man, always cool, and whistling airs from +Verdi’s operas. Señor Espirition, of the office of the Minister of +Finance, attempted the sandbagging in behalf of Anchuria. The meeting +took place in the cabin of the _Salvador_, of the Vesuvius line. + +Señor Espirition opened negotiations by announcing that the government +contemplated the building of a railroad to skirt the alluvial coast +lands. After touching upon the benefits such a road would confer upon +the interests of the Vesuvius, he reached the definite suggestion that +a contribution to the road’s expenses of, say, fifty thousand _pesos_ +would not be more than an equivalent to benefits received. + +Mr. Franzoni denied that his company would receive any benefits from a +contemplated road. As its representative he must decline to contribute +fifty thousand _pesos_. But he would assume the responsibility of +offering twenty-five. + +Did Señor Espirition understand Señor Franzoni to mean twenty-five +thousand _pesos_? + +By no means. Twenty-five _pesos_. And in silver; not in gold. + +“Your offer insults my government,” cried Señor Espirition, rising with +indignation. + +“Then,” said Mr. Franzoni, in warning tone, “_we will change it_.” + +The offer was never changed. Could Mr. Franzoni have meant the +government? + +This was the state of affairs in Anchuria when the winter season opened +at Coralio at the end of the second year of Losada’s administration. +So, when the government and society made its annual exodus to the +seashore it was evident that the presidential advent would not be +celebrated by unlimited rejoicing. The tenth of November was the day +set for the entrance into Coralio of the gay company from the capital. +A narrow-gauge railroad runs twenty miles into the interior from +Solitas. The government party travels by carriage from San Mateo to +this road’s terminal point, and proceeds by train to Solitas. From here +they march in grand procession to Coralio where, on the day of their +coming, festivities and ceremonies abound. But this season saw an +ominous dawning of the tenth of November. + +Although the rainy season was over, the day seemed to hark back to +reeking June. A fine drizzle of rain fell all during the forenoon. The +procession entered Coralio amid a strange silence. + +President Losada was an elderly man, grizzly bearded, with a +considerable ratio of Indian blood revealed in his cinnamon complexion. +His carriage headed the procession, surrounded and guarded by Captain +Cruz and his famous troop of one hundred light horse “_El Ciento +Huilando_.” Colonel Rocas followed, with a regiment of the regular +army. + +The president’s sharp, beady eyes glanced about him for the expected +demonstration of welcome; but he faced a stolid, indifferent array of +citizens. Sight-seers the Anchurians are by birth and habit, and they +turned out to their last able-bodied unit to witness the scene; but +they maintained an accusive silence. They crowded the streets to the +very wheel ruts; they covered the red tile roofs to the eaves, but +there was never a “_viva_” from them. No wreaths of palm and lemon +branches or gorgeous strings of paper roses hung from the windows and +balconies as was the custom. There was an apathy, a dull, dissenting +disapprobation, that was the more ominous because it puzzled. No one +feared an outburst, a revolt of the discontents, for they had no +leader. The president and those loyal to him had never even heard +whispered a name among them capable of crystallizing the +dissatisfaction into opposition. No, there could be no danger. The +people always procured a new idol before they destroyed an old one. + +At length, after a prodigious galloping and curvetting of red-sashed +majors, gold-laced colonels and epauletted generals, the procession +formed for its annual progress down the Calle Grande to the Casa +Morena, where the ceremony of welcome to the visiting president always +took place. + +The Swiss band led the line of march. After it pranced the local +_comandante_, mounted, and a detachment of his troops. Next came a +carriage with four members of the cabinet, conspicuous among them the +Minister of War, old General Pilar, with his white moustache and his +soldierly bearing. Then the president’s vehicle, containing also the +Ministers of Finance and State; and surrounded by Captain Cruz’s light +horse formed in a close double file of fours. Following them, the rest +of the officials of state, the judges and distinguished military and +social ornaments of public and private life. + +As the band struck up, and the movement began, like a bird of ill-omen +the _Valhalla_, the swiftest steamship of the Vesuvius line, glided +into the harbour in plain view of the president and his train. Of +course, there was nothing menacing about its arrival—a business firm +does not go to war with a nation—but it reminded Señor Espirition and +others in those carriages that the Vesuvius Fruit Company was +undoubtedly carrying something up its sleeve for them. + +By the time the van of the procession had reached the government +building, Captain Cronin, of the _Valhalla_, and Mr. Vincenti, member +of the Vesuvius Company, had landed and were pushing their way, bluff, +hearty and nonchalant, through the crowd on the narrow sidewalk. Clad +in white linen, big, debonair, with an air of good-humoured authority, +they made conspicuous figures among the dark mass of unimposing +Anchurians, as they penetrated to within a few yards of the steps of +the Casa Morena. Looking easily above the heads of the crowd, they +perceived another that towered above the undersized natives. It was the +fiery poll of Dicky Maloney against the wall close by the lower step; +and his broad, seductive grin showed that he recognized their presence. + +Dicky had attired himself becomingly for the festive occasion in a +well-fitting black suit. Pasa was close by his side, her head covered +with the ubiquitous black mantilla. + +Mr. Vincenti looked at her attentively. + +“Botticelli’s Madonna,” he remarked, gravely. “I wonder when she got +into the game. I don’t like his getting tangled with the women. I hoped +he would keep away from them.” + +Captain Cronin’s laugh almost drew attention from the parade. + +“With that head of hair! Keep away from the women! And a Maloney! +Hasn’t he got a license? But, nonsense aside, what do you think of the +prospects? It’s a species of filibustering out of my line.” + +Vincenti glanced again at Dicky’s head and smiled. + +“_Rouge et noir_,” he said. “There you have it. Make your play, +gentlemen. Our money is on the red.” + +“The lad’s game,” said Cronin, with a commending look at the tall, easy +figure by the steps. “But ’tis all like fly-by-night theatricals to me. +The talk’s bigger than the stage; there’s a smell of gasoline in the +air, and they’re their own audience and scene-shifters.” + +They ceased talking, for General Pilar had descended from the first +carriage and had taken his stand upon the top step of Casa Morena. As +the oldest member of the cabinet, custom had decreed that he should +make the address of welcome, presenting the keys of the official +residence to the president at its close. + +General Pilar was one of the most distinguished citizens of the +republic. Hero of three wars and innumerable revolutions, he was an +honoured guest at European courts and camps. An eloquent speaker and a +friend to the people, he represented the highest type of the +Anchurians. + +Holding in his hand the gilt keys of Casa Morena, he began his address +in a historical form, touching upon each administration and the advance +of civilization and prosperity from the first dim striving after +liberty down to present times. Arriving at the régime of President +Losada, at which point, according to precedent, he should have +delivered a eulogy upon its wise conduct and the happiness of the +people, General Pilar paused. Then he silently held up the bunch of +keys high above his head, with his eyes closely regarding it. The +ribbon with which they were bound fluttered in the breeze. + +“It still blows,” cried the speaker, exultantly. “Citizens of Anchuria, +give thanks to the saints this night that our air is still free.” + +Thus disposing of Losada’s administration, he abruptly reverted to that +of Olivarra, Anchuria’s most popular ruler. Olivarra had been +assassinated nine years before while in the prime of life and +usefulness. A faction of the Liberal party led by Losada himself had +been accused of the deed. Whether guilty or not, it was eight years +before the ambitious and scheming Losada had gained his goal. + +Upon this theme General Pilar’s eloquence was loosed. He drew the +picture of the beneficent Olivarra with a loving hand. He reminded the +people of the peace, the security and the happiness they had enjoyed +during that period. He recalled in vivid detail and with significant +contrast the last winter sojourn of President Olivarra in Coralio, when +his appearance at their fiestas was the signal for thundering _vivas_ +of love and approbation. + +The first public expression of sentiment from the people that day +followed. A low, sustained murmur went among them like the surf rolling +along the shore. + +“Ten dollars to a dinner at the Saint Charles,” remarked Mr. Vincenti, +“that _rouge_ wins.” + +“I never bet against my own interests,” said Captain Cronin, lighting a +cigar. “Long-winded old boy, for his age. What’s he talking about?” + +“My Spanish,” replied Vincenti, “runs about ten words to the minute; +his is something around two hundred. Whatever he’s saying, he’s getting +them warmed up.” + +“Friends and brothers,” General Pilar was saying, “could I reach out my +hand this day across the lamentable silence of the grave to Olivarra +‘the Good,’ to the ruler who was one of you, whose tears fell when you +sorrowed, and whose smile followed your joy—I would bring him back to +you, but—Olivarra is dead—dead at the hands of a craven assassin!” + +The speaker turned and gazed boldly into the carriage of the president. +His arm remained extended aloft as if to sustain his peroration. The +president was listening, aghast, at this remarkable address of welcome. +He was sunk back upon his seat, trembling with rage and dumb surprise, +his dark hands tightly gripping the carriage cushions. + +Half rising, he extended one arm toward the speaker, and shouted a +harsh command at Captain Cruz. The leader of the “Flying Hundred” sat +his horse, immovable, with folded arms, giving no sign of having heard. +Losada sank back again, his dark features distinctly paling. + +“Who says that Olivarra is dead?” suddenly cried the speaker, his +voice, old as he was, sounding like a battle trumpet. “His body lies in +the grave, but to the people he loved he has bequeathed his spirit—yes, +more—his learning, his courage, his kindness—yes, more—his youth, his +image—people of Anchuria, have you forgotten Ramon, the son of +Olivarra?” + +Cronin and Vincenti, watching closely, saw Dicky Maloney suddenly raise +his hat, tear off his shock of red hair, leap up the steps and stand at +the side of General Pilar. The Minister of War laid his arm across the +young man’s shoulders. All who had known President Olivarra saw again +his same lion-like pose, the same frank, undaunted expression, the same +high forehead with the peculiar line of the clustering, crisp black +hair. + +General Pilar was an experienced orator. He seized the moment of +breathless silence that preceded the storm. + +“Citizens of Anchuria,” he trumpeted, holding aloft the keys to Casa +Morena, “I am here to deliver these keys—the keys to your homes and +liberty—to your chosen president. Shall I deliver them to Enrico +Olivarra’s assassin, or to his son?” + +“Olivarra! Olivarra!” the crowd shrieked and howled. All vociferated +the magic name—men, women, children and the parrots. + +And the enthusiasm was not confined to the blood of the plebs. Colonel +Rocas ascended the steps and laid his sword theatrically at young Ramon +Olivarra’s feet. Four members of the cabinet embraced him. Captain Cruz +gave a command, and twenty of _El Ciento Huilando_ dismounted and +arranged themselves in a cordon about the steps of Casa Morena. + +But Ramon Olivarra seized that moment to prove himself a born genius +and politician. He waved those soldiers aside, and descended the steps +to the street. There, without losing his dignity or the distinguished +elegance that the loss of his red hair brought him, he took the +proletariat to his bosom—the barefooted, the dirty, Indians, Caribs, +babies, beggars, old, young, saints, soldiers and sinners—he missed +none of them. + +While this act of the drama was being presented, the scene shifters had +been busy at the duties that had been assigned to them. Two of Cruz’s +dragoons had seized the bridle reins of Losada’s horses; others formed +a close guard around the carriage; and they galloped off with the +tyrant and his two unpopular Ministers. No doubt a place had been +prepared for them. There are a number of well-barred stone apartments +in Coralio. + +“_Rouge_ wins,” said Mr. Vincenti, calmly lighting another cigar. + +Captain Cronin had been intently watching the vicinity of the stone +steps for some time. + +“Good boy!” he exclaimed suddenly, as if relieved. “I wondered if he +was going to forget his Kathleen Mavourneen.” + +Young Olivarra had reascended the steps and spoken a few words to +General Pilar. Then that distinguished veteran descended to the ground +and approached Pasa, who still stood, wonder-eyed, where Dicky had left +her. With his plumed hat in his hand, and his medals and decorations +shining on his breast, the general spoke to her and gave her his arm, +and they went up the stone steps of the Casa Morena together. And then +Ramon Olivarra stepped forward and took both her hands before all the +people. + +And while the cheering was breaking out afresh everywhere, Captain +Cronin and Mr. Vincenti turned and walked back toward the shore where +the gig was waiting for them. + +“There’ll be another ‘_presidente proclamada_’ in the morning,” said +Mr. Vincenti, musingly. “As a rule they are not as reliable as the +elected ones, but this youngster seems to have some good stuff in him. +He planned and manœuvred the entire campaign. Olivarra’s widow, you +know, was wealthy. After her husband was assassinated she went to the +States, and educated her son at Yale. The Vesuvius Company hunted him +up, and backed him in the little game.” + +“It’s a glorious thing,” said Cronin, half jestingly, “to be able to +discharge a government, and insert one of your own choosing, in these +days.” + +“Oh, it is only a matter of business,” said Vincenti, stopping and +offering the stump of his cigar to a monkey that swung down from a lime +tree; “and that is what moves the world of to-day. That extra _real_ on +the price of bananas had to go. We took the shortest way of removing +it.” + + + + +XVII +TWO RECALLS + + +There remains three duties to be performed before the curtain falls +upon the patched comedy. Two have been promised: the third is no less +obligatory. + +It was set forth in the programme of this tropic vaudeville that it +would be made known why Shorty O’Day, of the Columbia Detective Agency, +lost his position. Also that Smith should come again to tell us what +mystery he followed that night on the shores of Anchuria when he +strewed so many cigar stumps around the cocoanut palm during his lonely +night vigil on the beach. These things were promised; but a bigger +thing yet remains to be accomplished—the clearing up of a seeming wrong +that has been done according to the array of chronicled facts +(truthfully set forth) that have been presented. And one voice, +speaking, shall do these three things. + +Two men sat on a stringer of a North River pier in the City of New +York. A steamer from the tropics had begun to unload bananas and +oranges on the pier. Now and then a banana or two would fall from an +overripe bunch, and one of the two men would shamble forward, seize the +fruit and return to share it with his companion. + +One of the men was in the ultimate stage of deterioration. As far as +rain and wind and sun could wreck the garments he wore, it had been +done. In his person the ravages of drink were as plainly visible. And +yet, upon his high-bridged, rubicund nose was jauntily perched a pair +of shining and flawless gold-rimmed glasses. + +The other man was not so far gone upon the descending Highway of the +Incompetents. Truly, the flower of his manhood had gone to seed—seed +that, perhaps, no soil might sprout. But there were still cross-cuts +along where he travelled through which he might yet regain the pathway +of usefulness without disturbing the slumbering Miracles. This man was +short and compactly built. He had an oblique, dead eye, like that of a +sting-ray, and the moustache of a cocktail mixer. We know the eye and +the moustache; we know that Smith of the luxurious yacht, the gorgeous +raiment, the mysterious mission, the magic disappearance, has come +again, though shorn of the accessories of his former state. + +At his third banana, the man with the nose glasses spat it from him +with a shudder. + +“Deuce take all fruit!” he remarked, in a patrician tone of disgust. “I +lived for two years where these things grow. The memory of their taste +lingers with you. The oranges are not so bad. Just see if you can +gather a couple of them, O’Day, when the next broken crate comes up.” + +“Did you live down with the monkeys?” asked the other, made tepidly +garrulous by the sunshine and the alleviating meal of juicy fruit. “I +was down there, once myself. But only for a few hours. That was when I +was with the Columbia Detective Agency. The monkey people did me up. +I’d have my job yet if it hadn’t been for them. I’ll tell you about it. + +“One day the chief sent a note around to the office that read: ‘Send +O’Day here at once for a big piece of business.’ I was the crack +detective of the agency at that time. They always handed me the big +jobs. The address the chief wrote from was down in the Wall Street +district. + +“When I got there I found him in a private office with a lot of +directors who were looking pretty fuzzy. They stated the case. The +president of the Republic Insurance Company had skipped with about a +tenth of a million dollars in cash. The directors wanted him back +pretty bad, but they wanted the money worse. They said they needed it. +They had traced the old gent’s movements to where he boarded a tramp +fruit steamer bound for South America that same morning with his +daughter and a big gripsack—all the family he had. + +“One of the directors had his steam yacht coaled and with steam up, +ready for the trip; and he turned her over to me, cart blongsh. In four +hours I was on board of her, and hot on the trail of the fruit tub. I +had a pretty good idea where old Wahrfield—that was his name, J. +Churchill Wahrfield—would head for. At that time we had a treaty with +about every foreign country except Belgium and that banana republic, +Anchuria. There wasn’t a photo of old Wahrfield to be had in New +York—he had been foxy there—but I had his description. And besides, the +lady with him would be a dead-give-away anywhere. She was one of the +high-flyers in Society—not the kind that have their pictures in the +Sunday papers—but the real sort that open chrysanthemum shows and +christen battleships. + +“Well, sir, we never got a sight of that fruit tub on the road. The +ocean is a pretty big place; and I guess we took different paths across +it. But we kept going toward this Anchuria, where the fruiter was bound +for. + +“We struck the monkey coast one afternoon about four. There was a +ratty-looking steamer off shore taking on bananas. The monkeys were +loading her up with big barges. It might be the one the old man had +taken, and it might not. I went ashore to look around. The scenery was +pretty good. I never saw any finer on the New York stage. I struck an +American on shore, a big, cool chap, standing around with the monkeys. +He showed me the consul’s office. The consul was a nice young fellow. +He said the fruiter was the _Karlsefin_, running generally to New +Orleans, but took her last cargo to New York. Then I was sure my people +were on board, although everybody told me that no passengers had +landed. I didn’t think they would land until after dark, for they might +have been shy about it on account of seeing that yacht of mine hanging +around. So, all I had to do was to wait and nab ’em when they came +ashore. I couldn’t arrest old Wahrfield without extradition papers, but +my play was to get the cash. They generally give up if you strike ’em +when they’re tired and rattled and short on nerve. + +“After dark I sat under a cocoanut tree on the beach for a while, and +then I walked around and investigated that town some, and it was enough +to give you the lions. If a man could stay in New York and be honest, +he’d better do it than to hit that monkey town with a million. + +“Dinky little mud houses; grass over your shoe tops in the streets; +ladies in low-neck-and-short-sleeves walking around smoking cigars; +tree frogs rattling like a hose cart going to a ten blow; big mountains +dropping gravel in the back yards, and the sea licking the paint off in +front—no, sir—a man had better be in God’s country living on free lunch +than there. + +“The main street ran along the beach, and I walked down it, and then +turned up a kind of lane where the houses were made of poles and straw. +I wanted to see what the monkeys did when they weren’t climbing +cocoanut trees. The very first shack I looked in I saw my people. They +must have come ashore while I was promenading. A man about fifty, +smooth face, heavy eyebrows, dressed in black broadcloth, looking like +he was just about to say, ‘Can any little boy in the Sunday school +answer that?’ He was freezing on to a grip that weighed like a dozen +gold bricks, and a swell girl—a regular peach, with a Fifth Avenue +cut—was sitting on a wooden chair. An old black woman was fixing some +coffee and beans on a table. The light they had come from a lantern +hung on a nail. I went and stood in the door, and they looked at me, +and I said: + +“‘Mr. Wahrfield, you are my prisoner. I hope, for the lady’s sake, you +will take the matter sensibly. You know why I want you.’ + +“‘Who are you?’ says the old gent. + +“‘O’Day,’ says I, ‘of the Columbia Detective Agency. And now, sir, let +me give you a piece of good advice. You go back and take your medicine +like a man. Hand ’em back the boodle; and maybe they’ll let you off +light. Go back easy, and I’ll put in a word for you. I’ll give you five +minutes to decide.’ I pulled out my watch and waited. + +“Then the young lady chipped in. She was one of the genuine +high-steppers. You could tell by the way her clothes fit and the style +she had that Fifth Avenue was made for her. + +“‘Come inside,’ she says. ‘Don’t stand in the door and disturb the +whole street with that suit of clothes. Now, what is it you want?’ + +“‘Three minutes gone,’ I said. ‘I’ll tell you again while the other two +tick off. + +“‘You’ll admit being the president of the Republic, won’t you?’ + +“‘I am,’ says he. + +“‘Well, then,’ says I, ‘it ought to be plain to you. Wanted, in New +York, J. Churchill Wahrfield, president of the Republic Insurance +Company. + +“‘Also the funds belonging to said company, now in that grip, in the +unlawful possession of said J. Churchill Wahrfield.’ + +“‘Oh-h-h-h!’ says the young lady, as if she was thinking, ‘you want to +take us back to New York?’ + +“‘To take Mr. Wahrfield. There’s no charge against you, miss. There’ll +be no objection, of course, to your returning with your father.’ + +“Of a sudden the girl gave a tiny scream and grabbed the old boy around +the neck. ‘Oh, father, father!’ she says, kind of contralto, ‘can this +be true? Have you taken money that is not yours? Speak, father!’ It +made you shiver to hear the tremolo stop she put on her voice. + +“The old boy looked pretty bughouse when she first grappled him, but +she went on, whispering in his ear and patting his off shoulder till he +stood still, but sweating a little. + +“She got him to one side and they talked together a minute, and then he +put on some gold eyeglasses and walked up and handed me the grip. + +“‘Mr. Detective,’ he says, talking a little broken, ‘I conclude to +return with you. I have finished to discover that life on this desolate +and displeased coast would be worse than to die, itself. I will go back +and hurl myself upon the mercy of the Republic Company. Have you +brought a sheep?’ + +“‘Sheep!’ says I; ‘I haven’t a single—’ + +“‘Ship,’ cut in the young lady. ‘Don’t get funny. Father is of German +birth, and doesn’t speak perfect English. How did you come?’ + +“The girl was all broke up. She had a handkerchief to her face, and +kept saying every little bit, ‘Oh, father, father!’ She walked up to me +and laid her lily-white hand on the clothes that had pained her at +first. I smelt a million violets. She was a lulu. I told her I came in +a private yacht. + +“‘Mr. O’Day,’ she says. ‘Oh, take us away from this horrid country at +once. Can you! Will you! Say you will.’ + +“‘I’ll try,’ I said, concealing the fact that I was dying to get them +on salt water before they could change their mind. + +“One thing they both kicked against was going through the town to the +boat landing. Said they dreaded publicity, and now that they were going +to return, they had a hope that the thing might yet be kept out of the +papers. They swore they wouldn’t go unless I got them out to the yacht +without any one knowing it, so I agreed to humour them. + +“The sailors who rowed me ashore were playing billiards in a bar-room +near the water, waiting for orders, and I proposed to have them take +the boat down the beach half a mile or so, and take us up there. How to +get them word was the question, for I couldn’t leave the grip with the +prisoner, and I couldn’t take it with me, not knowing but what the +monkeys might stick me up. + +“The young lady says the old coloured woman would take them a note. I +sat down and wrote it, and gave it to the dame with plain directions +what to do, and she grins like a baboon and shakes her head. + +“Then Mr. Wahrfield handed her a string of foreign dialect, and she +nods her head and says, ‘See, señor,’ maybe fifty times, and lights out +with the note. + +“‘Old Augusta only understands German,’ said Miss Wahrfield, smiling at +me. ‘We stopped in her house to ask where we could find lodging, and +she insisted upon our having coffee. She tells us she was raised in a +German family in San Domingo.’ + +“‘Very likely,’ I said. ‘But you can search me for German words, except +_nix verstay_ and _noch einst_. I would have called that “See, señor” +French, though, on a gamble.’ + +“Well, we three made a sneak around the edge of town so as not to be +seen. We got tangled in vines and ferns and the banana bushes and +tropical scenery a good deal. The monkey suburbs was as wild as places +in Central Park. We came out on the beach a good half mile below. A +brown chap was lying asleep under a cocoanut tree, with a ten-foot +musket beside him. Mr. Wahrfield takes up the gun and pitches it into +the sea. ‘The coast is guarded,’ he says. ‘Rebellion and plots ripen +like fruit.’ He pointed to the sleeping man, who never stirred. ‘Thus,’ +he says, ‘they perform trusts. Children!’ + +“I saw our boat coming, and I struck a match and lit a piece of +newspaper to show them where we were. In thirty minutes we were on +board the yacht. + +“The first thing, Mr. Wahrfield and his daughter and I took the grip +into the owner’s cabin, opened it up, and took an inventory. There was +one hundred and five thousand dollars, United States treasury notes, in +it, besides a lot of diamond jewelry and a couple of hundred Havana +cigars. I gave the old man the cigars and a receipt for the rest of the +lot, as agent for the company, and locked the stuff up in my private +quarters. + +“I never had a pleasanter trip than that one. After we got to sea the +young lady turned out to be the jolliest ever. The very first time we +sat down to dinner, and the steward filled her glass with +champagne—that director’s yacht was a regular floating +Waldorf-Astoria—she winks at me and says, ‘What’s the use to borrow +trouble, Mr. Fly Cop? Here’s hoping you may live to eat the hen that +scratches on your grave.’ There was a piano on board, and she sat down +to it and sung better than you give up two cases to hear plenty times. +She knew about nine operas clear through. She was sure enough _bon ton_ +and swell. She wasn’t one of the ‘among others present’ kind; she +belonged on the special mention list! + +“The old man, too, perked up amazingly on the way. He passed the +cigars, and says to me once, quite chipper, out of a cloud of smoke, +‘Mr. O’Day, somehow I think the Republic Company will not give me the +much trouble. Guard well the gripvalise of the money, Mr. O’Day, for +that it must be returned to them that it belongs when we finish to +arrive.’ + +“When we landed in New York I ’phoned to the chief to meet us in that +director’s office. We got in a cab and went there. I carried the grip, +and we walked in, and I was pleased to see that the chief had got +together that same old crowd of moneybugs with pink faces and white +vests to see us march in. I set the grip on the table. ‘There’s the +money,’ I said. + +“‘And your prisoner?’ said the chief. + +“I pointed to Mr. Wahrfield, and he stepped forward and says: + +“‘The honour of a word with you, sir, to explain.’ + +“He and the chief went into another room and stayed ten minutes. When +they came back the chief looked as black as a ton of coal. + +“‘Did this gentleman,’ he says to me, ‘have this valise in his +possession when you first saw him?’ + +“‘He did,’ said I. + +“The chief took up the grip and handed it to the prisoner with a bow, +and says to the director crowd: ‘Do any of you recognize this +gentleman?’ + +“They all shook their pink faces. + +“‘Allow me to present,’ he goes on, Señor Miraflores, president of the +republic of Anchuria. The señor has generously consented to overlook +this outrageous blunder, on condition that we undertake to secure him +against the annoyance of public comment. It is a concession on his part +to overlook an insult for which he might claim international redress. I +think we can gratefully promise him secrecy in the matter.’ + +“They gave him a pink nod all round. + +“‘O’Day,’ he says to me. ‘As a private detective you’re wasted. In a +war, where kidnapping governments is in the rules, you’d be invaluable. +Come down to the office at eleven.’ + +“I knew what that meant. + +“‘So that’s the president of the monkeys,’ says I. ‘Well, why couldn’t +he have said so?’ + +“Wouldn’t it jar you?” + + + + +XVIII +THE VITAGRAPHOSCOPE + + +Vaudeville is intrinsically episodic and discontinuous. Its audiences +do not demand dénouements. Sufficient unto each “turn” is the evil +thereof. No one cares how many romances the singing comédienne may have +had if she can capably sustain the limelight and a high note or two. +The audiences reck not if the performing dogs get to the pound the +moment they have jumped through their last hoop. They do not desire +bulletins about the possible injuries received by the comic bicyclist +who retires head-first from the stage in a crash of (property) +china-ware. Neither do they consider that their seat coupons entitle +them to be instructed whether or no there is a sentiment between the +lady solo banjoist and the Irish monologist. + +Therefore let us have no lifting of the curtain upon a tableau of the +united lovers, backgrounded by defeated villainy and derogated by the +comic, osculating maid and butler, thrown in as a sop to the Cerberi of +the fifty-cent seats. + +But our programme ends with a brief “turn” or two; and then to the +exits. Whoever sits the show out may find, if he will, the slender +thread that binds together, though ever so slightly, the story that, +perhaps, only the Walrus will understand. + +_Extracts from a letter from the first vice-president of the Republic +Insurance Company, of New York City, to Frank Goodwin, of Coralio, +Republic of Anchuria._ + +My Dear Mr. Goodwin:—Your communication per Messrs. Howland and +Fourchet, of New Orleans, has reached us. Also their draft on N. Y. for +$100,000, the amount abstracted from the funds of this company by the +late J. Churchill Wahrfield, its former president. … The officers and +directors unite in requesting me to express to you their sincere esteem +and thanks for your prompt and much appreciated return of the entire +missing sum within two weeks from the time of its disappearance. … Can +assure you that the matter will not be allowed to receive the least +publicity. … Regret exceedingly the distressing death of Mr. Wahrfield +by his own hand, but… Congratulations on your marriage to Miss +Wahrfield … many charms, winning manners, noble and womanly nature and +envied position in the best metropolitan society… + + +Cordially yours, +Lucius E. Applegate, +First Vice-President the Republic Insurance Company. + +_The Vitagraphoscope_ +(Moving Pictures) + +_The Last Sausage_ + +SCENE—_An Artist’s Studio._ The artist, a young man of prepossessing +appearance, sits in a dejected attitude, amid a litter of sketches, +with his head resting upon his hand. An oil stove stands on a pine box +in the centre of the studio. The artist rises, tightens his waist belt +to another hole, and lights the stove. He goes to a tin bread box, +half-hidden by a screen, takes out a solitary link of sausage, turns +the box upside-down to show that there is no more, and chucks the +sausage into a frying-pan, which he sets upon the stove. The flame of +the stove goes out, showing that there is no more oil. The artist, in +evident despair, seizes the sausage, in a sudden access of rage, and +hurls it violently from him. At the same time a door opens, and a man +who enters receives the sausage forcibly against his nose. He seems to +cry out; and is observed to make a dance step or two, vigorously. The +newcomer is a ruddy-faced, active, keen-looking man, apparently of +Irish ancestry. Next he is observed to laugh immoderately; he kicks +over the stove; he claps the artist (who is vainly striving to grasp +his hand) vehemently upon the back. Then he goes through a pantomime +which to the sufficiently intelligent spectator reveals that he has +acquired large sums of money by trading pot-metal hatchets and razors +to the Indians of the Cordillera Mountains for gold dust. He draws a +roll of money as large as a small loaf of bread from his pocket, and +waves it above his head, while at the same time he makes pantomime of +drinking from a glass. The artist hurriedly secures his hat, and the +two leave the studio together. + +_The Writing on the Sands_ + +SCENE—_The Beach at Nice._ A woman, beautiful, still young, exquisitely +clothed, complacent, poised, reclines near the water, idly scrawling +letters in the sand with the staff of her silken parasol. The beauty of +her face is audacious; her languid pose is one that you feel to be +impermanent—you wait, expectant, for her to spring or glide or crawl, +like a panther that has unaccountably become stock-still. She idly +scrawls in the sand; and the word that she always writes is “Isabel.” A +man sits a few yards away. You can see that they are companions, even +if no longer comrades. His face is dark and smooth, and almost +inscrutable—but not quite. The two speak little together. The man also +scratches on the sand with his cane. And the word that he writes is +“Anchuria.” And then he looks out where the Mediterranean and the sky +intermingle, with death in his gaze. + +_The Wilderness and Thou_ + +SCENE—_The Borders of a Gentleman’s Estate in a Tropical Land._ An old +Indian, with a mahogany-coloured face, is trimming the grass on a grave +by a mangrove swamp. Presently he rises to his feet and walks slowly +toward a grove that is shaded by the gathering, brief twilight. In the +edge of the grove stand a man who is stalwart, with a kind and +courteous air, and a woman of a serene and clear-cut loveliness. When +the old Indian comes up to them the man drops money in his hand. The +grave-tender, with the stolid pride of his race, takes it as his due, +and goes his way. The two in the edge of the grove turn back along the +dim pathway, and walk close, close—for, after all, what is the world at +its best but a little round field of the moving pictures with two +walking together in it? + +CURTAIN + + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CABBAGES AND KINGS *** + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will +be renamed. + +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the +United States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part +of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm +concept and trademark. 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Henry</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and +most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions +whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms +of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online +at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you +are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the +country where you are located before using this eBook. +</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Cabbages and Kings</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: O. Henry</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: July 23, 2000 [eBook #2777]<br /> +[Most recently updated: February 2, 2022]</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</div> +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'>Character set encoding: UTF-8</div> +<div style='display:block; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Produced by: Earle C. Beach and Joseph E. Loewenstein, M.D.</div> +<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CABBAGES AND KINGS ***</div> + +<div class="fig" style="width:55%;"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" style="width:100%;" alt="[Illustration]" /> +</div> + +<div class="fig" style="width:100%;"> +<img src="images/frontis.jpg" width="406" height="600" alt="[Illustration]" /> +<p class="caption">“A little saint with a color more lightful than orange”</p> +</div> + +<h1>CABBAGES AND KINGS</h1> + +<h2 class="no-break">by O. HENRY</h2> + +<h4><i>Author of “The Four Million,” “The Voice of the +City,”<br/> +“The Trimmed Lamp,” “Strictly Business,” +“Whirligigs,” Etc.</i></h4> + +<hr /> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<p class="letter"> +“The time has come,” the Walrus said,<br/> + “To talk of many things;<br/> +Of shoes and ships and sealing-wax,<br/> + And cabbages and kings.” +</p> + +<p class="right"> +<small>THE WALRUS AND THE CARPENTER</small> +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2>Contents</h2> + +<table summary="" style=""> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap00">THE PROEM BY THE CARPENTER</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap01">I. “FOX-IN-THE-MORNING”</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap02">II. THE LOTUS AND THE BOTTLE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap03">III. SMITH</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap04">IV. CAUGHT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap05">V. CUPID’S EXILE NUMBER TWO</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap06">VI. THE PHONOGRAPH AND THE GRAFT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap07">VII. MONEY MAZE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap08">VIII. THE ADMIRAL</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap09">IX. THE FLAG PARAMOUNT</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap10">X. THE SHAMROCK AND THE PALM</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap11">XI. THE REMNANTS OF THE CODE</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap12">XII. SHOES</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap13">XIII. SHIPS</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap14">XIV. MASTERS OF ARTS</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap15">XV. DICKY</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap16">XVI. ROUGE ET NOIR</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap17">XVII. TWO RECALLS</a></td> +</tr> + +<tr> +<td> <a href="#chap18">XVIII. THE VITAGRAPHOSCOPE</a></td> +</tr> + +</table> + +<hr /> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap00"></a>THE PROEM<br/> +BY THE CARPENTER</h2> + +<p> +They will tell you in Anchuria, that President Miraflores, of that volatile +republic, died by his own hand in the coast town of Coralio; that he had +reached thus far in flight from the inconveniences of an imminent revolution; +and that one hundred thousand dollars, government funds, which he carried with +him in an American leather valise as a souvenir of his tempestuous +administration, was never afterward recovered. +</p> + +<p> +For a <i>real</i>, a boy will show you his grave. It is back of the town near a +little bridge that spans a mangrove swamp. A plain slab of wood stands at its +head. Some one has burned upon the headstone with a hot iron this inscription: +</p> + +<p class="center"> +RAMON ANGEL DE LAS CRUZES<br/> +Y MIRAFLORES<br/> +PRESIDENTE DE LA REPUBLICA<br/> +DE ANCHURIA<br/> +QUE SEA SU JUEZ DIOS +</p> + +<p> +It is characteristic of this buoyant people that they pursue no man beyond the +grave. “Let God be his judge!”—Even with the hundred thousand +unfound, though greatly coveted, the hue and cry went no further than that. +</p> + +<p> +To the stranger or the guest the people of Coralio will relate the story of the +tragic end of their former president; how he strove to escape from the country +with the public funds and also with Doña Isabel Guilbert, the young American +opera singer; and how, being apprehended by members of the opposing political +party in Coralio, he shot himself through the head rather than give up the +funds, and, in consequence, the Señorita Guilbert. They will relate further +that Doña Isabel, her adventurous bark of fortune shoaled by the simultaneous +loss of her distinguished admirer and the souvenir hundred thousand, dropped +anchor on this stagnant coast, awaiting a rising tide. +</p> + +<p> +They say, in Coralio, that she found a prompt and prosperous tide in the form +of Frank Goodwin, an American resident of the town, an investor who had grown +wealthy by dealing in the products of the country—a banana king, a rubber +prince, a sarsaparilla, indigo, and mahogany baron. The Señorita Guilbert, you +will be told, married Señor Goodwin one month after the president’s +death, thus, in the very moment when Fortune had ceased to smile, wresting from +her a gift greater than the prize withdrawn. +</p> + +<p> +Of the American, Don Frank Goodwin, and of his wife the natives have nothing +but good to say. Don Frank has lived among them for years, and has compelled +their respect. His lady is easily queen of what social life the sober coast +affords. The wife of the governor of the district, herself, who was of the +proud Castilian family of Monteleon y Dolorosa de los Santos y Mendez, feels +honoured to unfold her napkin with olive-hued, ringed hands at the table of +Señora Goodwin. Were you to refer (with your northern prejudices) to the +vivacious past of Mrs. Goodwin when her audacious and gleeful abandon in light +opera captured the mature president’s fancy, or to her share in that +statesman’s downfall and malfeasance, the Latin shrug of the shoulder +would be your only answer and rebuttal. What prejudices there were in Coralio +concerning Señora Goodwin seemed now to be in her favour, whatever they had +been in the past. +</p> + +<p> +It would seem that the story is ended, instead of begun; that the close of +tragedy and the climax of a romance have covered the ground of interest; but, +to the more curious reader it shall be some slight instruction to trace the +close threads that underlie the ingenuous web of circumstances. +</p> + +<p> +The headpiece bearing the name of President Miraflores is daily scrubbed with +soap-bark and sand. An old half-breed Indian tends the grave with fidelity and +the dawdling minuteness of inherited sloth. He chops down the weeds and +ever-springing grass with his machete, he plucks ants and scorpions and beetles +from it with his horny fingers, and sprinkles its turf with water from the +plaza fountain. There is no grave anywhere so well kept and ordered. +</p> + +<p> +Only by following out the underlying threads will it be made clear why the old +Indian, Galvez, is secretly paid to keep green the grave of President +Miraflores by one who never saw that unfortunate statesman in life or in death, +and why that one was wont to walk in the twilight, casting from a distance +looks of gentle sadness upon that unhonoured mound. +</p> + +<p> +Elsewhere than at Coralio one learns of the impetuous career of Isabel +Guilbert. New Orleans gave her birth and the mingled French and Spanish creole +nature that tinctured her life with such turbulence and warmth. She had little +education, but a knowledge of men and motives that seemed to have come by +instinct. Far beyond the common woman was she endowed with intrepid rashness, +with a love for the pursuit of adventure to the brink of danger, and with +desire for the pleasures of life. Her spirit was one to chafe under any curb; +she was Eve after the fall, but before the bitterness of it was felt. She wore +life as a rose in her bosom. +</p> + +<p> +Of the legion of men who had been at her feet it was said that but one was so +fortunate as to engage her fancy. To President Miraflores, the brilliant but +unstable ruler of Anchuria, she yielded the key to her resolute heart. How, +then, do we find her (as the Coralians would have told you) the wife of Frank +Goodwin, and happily living a life of dull and dreamy inaction? +</p> + +<p> +The underlying threads reach far, stretching across the sea. Following them out +it will be made plain why “Shorty” O’Day, of the Columbia +Detective Agency, resigned his position. And, for a lighter pastime, it shall +be a duty and a pleasing sport to wander with Momus beneath the tropic stars +where Melpomene once stalked austere. Now to cause laughter to echo from those +lavish jungles and frowning crags where formerly rang the cries of +pirates’ victims; to lay aside pike and cutlass and attack with quip and +jollity; to draw one saving titter of mirth from the rusty casque of +Romance—this were pleasant to do in the shade of the lemon-trees on that +coast that is curved like lips set for smiling. +</p> + +<p> +For there are yet tales of the Spanish Main. That segment of continent washed +by the tempestuous Caribbean, and presenting to the sea a formidable border of +tropical jungle topped by the overweening Cordilleras, is still begirt by +mystery and romance. In past times buccaneers and revolutionists roused the +echoes of its cliffs, and the condor wheeled perpetually above where, in the +green groves, they made food for him with their matchlocks and toledos. Taken +and retaken by sea rovers, by adverse powers and by sudden uprising of +rebellious factions, the historic 300 miles of adventurous coast has scarcely +known for hundreds of years whom rightly to call its master. Pizarro, Balboa, +Sir Francis Drake, and Bolivar did what they could to make it a part of +Christendom. Sir John Morgan, Lafitte and other eminent swash-bucklers +bombarded and pounded it in the name of Abaddon. +</p> + +<p> +The game still goes on. The guns of the rovers are silenced; but the tintype +man, the enlarged photograph brigand, the kodaking tourist and the scouts of +the gentle brigade of fakirs have found it out, and carry on the work. The +hucksters of Germany, France, and Sicily now bag its small change across their +counters. Gentleman adventurers throng the waiting-rooms of its rulers with +proposals for railways and concessions. The little <i>opéra-bouffe</i> nations +play at government and intrigue until some day a big, silent gunboat glides +into the offing and warns them not to break their toys. And with these changes +comes also the small adventurer, with empty pockets to fill, light of heart, +busy-brained—the modern fairy prince, bearing an alarm clock with which, +more surely than by the sentimental kiss, to awaken the beautiful tropics from +their centuries’ sleep. Generally he wears a shamrock, which he matches +pridefully against the extravagant palms; and it is he who has driven Melpomene +to the wings, and set Comedy to dancing before the footlights of the Southern +Cross. +</p> + +<p> +So, there is a little tale to tell of many things. Perhaps to the promiscuous +ear of the Walrus it shall come with most avail; for in it there are indeed +shoes and ships and sealing-wax and cabbage-palms and presidents instead of +kings. +</p> + +<p> +Add to these a little love and counterplotting, and scatter everywhere +throughout the maze a trail of tropical dollars—dollars warmed no more by +the torrid sun than by the hot palms of the scouts of Fortune—and, after +all, here seems to be Life, itself, with talk enough to weary the most +garrulous of Walruses. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap01"></a>I<br/> +“FOX-IN-THE-MORNING”</h2> + +<p> +Coralio reclined, in the mid-day heat, like some vacuous beauty lounging in a +guarded harem. The town lay at the sea’s edge on a strip of alluvial +coast. It was set like a little pearl in an emerald band. Behind it, and +seeming almost to topple, imminent, above it, rose the sea-following range of +the Cordilleras. In front the sea was spread, a smiling jailer, but even more +incorruptible than the frowning mountains. The waves swished along the smooth +beach; the parrots screamed in the orange and ceiba-trees; the palms waved +their limber fronds foolishly like an awkward chorus at the prima donna’s +cue to enter. +</p> + +<p> +Suddenly the town was full of excitement. A native boy dashed down a +grass-grown street, shrieking: “<i>Busca el Señor Goodwin. Ha venido un +telégrafo por el!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +The word passed quickly. Telegrams do not often come to anyone in Coralio. The +cry for Señor Goodwin was taken up by a dozen officious voices. The main street +running parallel to the beach became populated with those who desired to +expedite the delivery of the despatch. Knots of women with complexions varying +from palest olive to deepest brown gathered at street corners and plaintively +carolled: “<i>Un telégrafo por Señor Goodwin!</i>” The +<i>comandante</i>, Don Señor el Coronel Encarnación Rios, who was loyal to the +Ins and suspected Goodwin’s devotion to the Outs, hissed: +“Aha!” and wrote in his secret memorandum book the accusive fact +that Señor Goodwin had on that momentous date received a telegram. +</p> + +<p> +In the midst of the hullabaloo a man stepped to the door of a small wooden +building and looked out. Above the door was a sign that read “Keogh and +Clancy”—a nomenclature that seemed not to be indigenous to that +tropical soil. The man in the door was Billy Keogh, scout of fortune and +progress and latter-day rover of the Spanish Main. Tintypes and photographs +were the weapons with which Keogh and Clancy were at that time assailing the +hopeless shores. Outside the shop were set two large frames filled with +specimens of their art and skill. +</p> + +<p> +Keogh leaned in the doorway, his bold and humorous countenance wearing a look +of interest at the unusual influx of life and sound into the street. When the +meaning of the disturbance became clear to him he placed a hand beside his +mouth and shouted: “Hey! Frank!” in such a robustious voice that +the feeble clamour of the natives was drowned and silenced. +</p> + +<p> +Fifty yards away, on the seaward side of the street, stood the abode of the +consul for the United States. Out from the door of this building tumbled +Goodwin at the call. He had been smoking with Willard Geddie, the consul, on +the back porch of the consulate, which was conceded to be the coolest spot in +Coralio. +</p> + +<p> +“Hurry up,” shouted Keogh. “There’s a riot in town on +account of a telegram that’s come for you. You want to be careful about +these things, my boy. It won’t do to trifle with the feelings of the +public this way. You’ll be getting a pink note some day with violet scent +on it; and then the country’ll be steeped in the throes of a +revolution.” +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin had strolled up the street and met the boy with the message. The +ox-eyed women gazed at him with shy admiration, for his type drew them. He was +big, blonde, and jauntily dressed in white linen, with buckskin <i>zapatos</i>. +His manner was courtly, with a sort of kindly truculence in it, tempered by a +merciful eye. When the telegram had been delivered, and the bearer of it +dismissed with a gratuity, the relieved populace returned to the contiguities +of shade from which curiosity had drawn it—the women to their baking in +the mud ovens under the orange-trees, or to the interminable combing of their +long, straight hair; the men to their cigarettes and gossip in the cantinas. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin sat on Keogh’s doorstep, and read his telegram. It was from Bob +Englehart, an American, who lived in San Mateo, the capital city of Anchuria, +eighty miles in the interior. Englehart was a gold miner, an ardent +revolutionist and “good people.” That he was a man of resource and +imagination was proven by the telegram he had sent. It had been his task to +send a confidential message to his friend in Coralio. This could not have been +accomplished in either Spanish or English, for the eye politic in Anchuria was +an active one. The Ins and the Outs were perpetually on their guard. But +Englehart was a diplomatist. There existed but one code upon which he might +make requisition with promise of safety—the great and potent code of +Slang. So, here is the message that slipped, unconstrued, through the fingers +of curious officials, and came to the eye of Goodwin: +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +His Nibs skedaddled yesterday per jack-rabbit line with all the coin in the +kitty and the bundle of muslin he’s spoony about. The boodle is six +figures short. Our crowd in good shape, but we need the spondulicks. You collar +it. The main guy and the dry goods are headed for the briny. You know what to +do. +</p> + +<p class="right"> +B<small>OB</small>. +</p> + +<p> +This screed, remarkable as it was, had no mystery for Goodwin. He was the most +successful of the small advance-guard of speculative Americans that had invaded +Anchuria, and he had not reached that enviable pinnacle without having well +exercised the arts of foresight and deduction. He had taken up political +intrigue as a matter of business. He was acute enough to wield a certain +influence among the leading schemers, and he was prosperous enough to be able +to purchase the respect of the petty office-holders. There was always a +revolutionary party; and to it he had always allied himself; for the adherents +of a new administration received the rewards of their labours. There was now a +Liberal party seeking to overturn President Miraflores. If the wheel +successfully revolved, Goodwin stood to win a concession to 30,000 manzanas of +the finest coffee lands in the interior. Certain incidents in the recent career +of President Miraflores had excited a shrewd suspicion in Goodwin’s mind +that the government was near a dissolution from another cause than that of a +revolution, and now Englehart’s telegram had come as a corroboration of +his wisdom. +</p> + +<p> +The telegram, which had remained unintelligible to the Anchurian linguists who +had applied to it in vain their knowledge of Spanish and elemental English, +conveyed a stimulating piece of news to Goodwin’s understanding. It +informed him that the president of the republic had decamped from the capital +city with the contents of the treasury. Furthermore, that he was accompanied in +his flight by that winning adventuress Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer, whose +troupe of performers had been entertained by the president at San Mateo during +the past month on a scale less modest than that with which royal visitors are +often content. The reference to the “jack-rabbit line” could mean +nothing else than the mule-back system of transport that prevailed between +Coralio and the capital. The hint that the “boodle” was “six +figures short” made the condition of the national treasury lamentably +clear. Also it was convincingly true that the ingoing party—its way now +made a pacific one—would need the “spondulicks.” Unless its +pledges should be fulfilled, and the spoils held for the delectation of the +victors, precarious indeed, would be the position of the new government. +Therefore it was exceeding necessary to “collar the main guy,” and +recapture the sinews of war and government. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin handed the message to Keogh. +</p> + +<p> +“Read that, Billy,” he said. “It’s from Bob Englehart. +Can you manage the cipher?” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh sat in the other half of the doorway, and carefully perused the telegram. +</p> + +<p> +“’Tis not a cipher,” he said, finally. “’Tis what +they call literature, and that’s a system of language put in the mouths +of people that they’ve never been introduced to by writers of +imagination. The magazines invented it, but I never knew before that President +Norvin Green had stamped it with the seal of his approval. ’Tis now no +longer literature, but language. The dictionaries tried, but they +couldn’t make it go for anything but dialect. Sure, now that the Western +Union indorses it, it won’t be long till a race of people will spring up +that speaks it.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’re running too much to philology, Billy,” said Goodwin. +“Do you make out the meaning of it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Sure,” replied the philosopher of Fortune. “All languages +come easy to the man who must know ’em. I’ve even failed to +misunderstand an order to evacuate in classical Chinese when it was backed up +by the muzzle of a breech-loader. This little literary essay I hold in my hands +means a game of Fox-in-the-Morning. Ever play that, Frank, when you was a +kid?” +</p> + +<p> +“I think so,” said Goodwin, laughing. “You join hands all +’round, and—” +</p> + +<p> +“You do not,” interrupted Keogh. “You’ve got a fine +sporting game mixed up in your head with ‘All Around the Rosebush.’ +The spirit of ‘Fox-in-the-Morning’ is opposed to the holding of +hands. I’ll tell you how it’s played. This president man and his +companion in play, they stand up over in San Mateo, ready for the run, and +shout: ‘Fox-in-the-Morning!’ Me and you, standing here, we say: +‘Goose and the Gander!’ They say: ‘How many miles is it to +London town?’ We say: ‘Only a few, if your legs are long enough. +How many comes out?’ They say: ‘More than you’re able to +catch.’ And then the game commences.” +</p> + +<p> +“I catch the idea,” said Goodwin. “It won’t do to let +the goose and gander slip through our fingers, Billy; their feathers are too +valuable. Our crowd is prepared and able to step into the shoes of the +government at once; but with the treasury empty we’d stay in power about +as long as a tenderfoot would stick on an untamed bronco. We must play the fox +on every foot of the coast to prevent their getting out of the country.” +</p> + +<p> +“By the mule-back schedule,” said Keogh, “it’s five +days down from San Mateo. We’ve got plenty of time to set our outposts. +There’s only three places on the coast where they can hope to sail +from—here and Solitas and Alazan. They’re the only points +we’ll have to guard. It’s as easy as a chess problem—fox to +play, and mate in three moves. Oh, goosey, goosey, gander, whither do you +wander? By the blessing of the literary telegraph the boodle of this benighted +fatherland shall be preserved to the honest political party that is seeking to +overthrow it.” +</p> + +<p> +The situation had been justly outlined by Keogh. The down trail from the +capital was at all times a weary road to travel. A jiggety-joggety journey it +was; ice-cold and hot, wet and dry. The trail climbed appalling mountains, +wound like a rotten string about the brows of breathless precipices, plunged +through chilling snow-fed streams, and wriggled like a snake through sunless +forests teeming with menacing insect and animal life. After descending to the +foothills it turned to a trident, the central prong ending at Alazan. Another +branched off to Coralio; the third penetrated to Solitas. Between the sea and +the foothills stretched the five miles breadth of alluvial coast. Here was the +flora of the tropics in its rankest and most prodigal growth. Spaces here and +there had been wrested from the jungle and planted with bananas and cane and +orange groves. The rest was a riot of wild vegetation, the home of monkeys, +tapirs, jaguars, alligators and prodigious reptiles and insects. Where no road +was cut a serpent could scarcely make its way through the tangle of vines and +creepers. Across the treacherous mangrove swamps few things without wings could +safely pass. Therefore the fugitives could hope to reach the coast only by one +of the routes named. +</p> + +<p> +“Keep the matter quiet, Billy,” advised Goodwin. “We +don’t want the Ins to know that the president is in flight. I suppose +Bob’s information is something of a scoop in the capital as yet. +Otherwise he would not have tried to make his message a confidential one; and +besides, everybody would have heard the news. I’m going around now to see +Dr. Zavalla, and start a man up the trail to cut the telegraph wire.” +</p> + +<p> +As Goodwin rose, Keogh threw his hat upon the grass by the door and expelled a +tremendous sigh. +</p> + +<p> +“What’s the trouble, Billy?” asked Goodwin, pausing. +“That’s the first time I ever heard you sigh.” +</p> + +<p> +“’Tis the last,” said Keogh. “With that sorrowful puff +of wind I resign myself to a life of praiseworthy but harassing honesty. What +are tintypes, if you please, to the opportunities of the great and hilarious +class of ganders and geese? Not that I would be a president, Frank—and +the boodle he’s got is too big for me to handle—but in some ways I +feel my conscience hurting me for addicting myself to photographing a nation +instead of running away with it. Frank, did you ever see the ‘bundle of +muslin’ that His Excellency has wrapped up and carried off?” +</p> + +<p> +“Isabel Guilbert?” said Goodwin, laughing. “No, I never did. +From what I’ve heard of her, though, I imagine that she wouldn’t +stick at anything to carry her point. Don’t get romantic, Billy. +Sometimes I begin to fear that there’s Irish blood in your +ancestry.” +</p> + +<p> +“I never saw her either,” went on Keogh; “but they say +she’s got all the ladies of mythology, sculpture, and fiction reduced to +chromos. They say she can look at a man once, and he’ll turn monkey and +climb trees to pick cocoanuts for her. Think of that president man with Lord +knows how many hundreds of thousands of dollars in one hand, and this muslin +siren in the other, galloping down hill on a sympathetic mule amid songbirds +and flowers! And here is Billy Keogh, because he is virtuous, condemned to the +unprofitable swindle of slandering the faces of missing links on tin for an +honest living! ’Tis an injustice of nature.” +</p> + +<p> +“Cheer up,” said Goodwin. “You are a pretty poor fox to be +envying a gander. Maybe the enchanting Guilbert will take a fancy to you and +your tintypes after we impoverish her royal escort.” +</p> + +<p> +“She could do worse,” reflected Keogh; “but she won’t. +’Tis not a tintype gallery, but the gallery of the gods that she’s +fitted to adorn. She’s a very wicked lady, and the president man is in +luck. But I hear Clancy swearing in the back room for having to do all the +work.” And Keogh plunged for the rear of the “gallery,” +whistling gaily in a spontaneous way that belied his recent sigh over the +questionable good luck of the flying president. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin turned from the main street into a much narrower one that intersected +it at a right angle. +</p> + +<p> +These side streets were covered by a growth of thick, rank grass, which was +kept to a navigable shortness by the machetes of the police. Stone sidewalks, +little more than a ledge in width, ran along the base of the mean and +monotonous adobe houses. At the outskirts of the village these streets dwindled +to nothing; and here were set the palm-thatched huts of the Caribs and the +poorer natives, and the shabby cabins of negroes from Jamaica and the West +India islands. A few structures raised their heads above the red-tiled roofs of +the one-story houses—the bell tower of the <i>Calaboza</i>, the Hotel de +los Estranjeros, the residence of the Vesuvius Fruit Company’s agent, the +store and residence of Bernard Brannigan, a ruined cathedral in which Columbus +had once set foot, and, most imposing of all, the Casa Morena—the summer +“White House” of the President of Anchuria. On the principal street +running along the beach—the Broadway of Coralio—were the larger +stores, the government <i>bodega</i> and post-office, the <i>cuartel</i>, the +rum-shops and the market place. +</p> + +<p> +On his way Goodwin passed the house of Bernard Brannigan. It was a modern +wooden building, two stories in height. The ground floor was occupied by +Brannigan’s store, the upper one contained the living apartments. A wide +cool porch ran around the house half way up its outer walls. A handsome, +vivacious girl neatly dressed in flowing white leaned over the railing and +smiled down upon Goodwin. She was no darker than many an Andalusian of high +descent; and she sparkled and glowed like a tropical moonlight. +</p> + +<p> +“Good evening, Miss Paula,” said Goodwin, taking off his hat, with +his ready smile. There was little difference in his manner whether he addressed +women or men. Everybody in Coralio liked to receive the salutation of the big +American. +</p> + +<p> +“Is there any news, Mr. Goodwin? Please don’t say no. Isn’t +it warm? I feel just like Mariana in her moated grange—or was it a +range?—it’s hot enough.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, there’s no news to tell, I believe,” said Goodwin, with +a mischievous look in his eye, “except that old Geddie is getting +grumpier and crosser every day. If something doesn’t happen to relieve +his mind I’ll have to quit smoking on his back porch—and +there’s no other place available that is cool enough.” +</p> + +<p> +“He isn’t grumpy,” said Paula Brannigan, impulsively, +“when he—” +</p> + +<p> +But she ceased suddenly, and drew back with a deepening colour; for her mother +had been a <i>mestizo</i> lady, and the Spanish blood had brought to Paula a +certain shyness that was an adornment to the other half of her demonstrative +nature. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap02"></a>II<br/> +THE LOTUS AND THE BOTTLE</h2> + +<p> +Willard Geddie, consul for the United States in Coralio, was working leisurely +on his yearly report. Goodwin, who had strolled in as he did daily for a smoke +on the much coveted porch, had found him so absorbed in his work that he +departed after roundly abusing the consul for his lack of hospitality. +</p> + +<p> +“I shall complain to the civil service department,” said +Goodwin;—“or is it a department?—perhaps it’s only a +theory. One gets neither civility nor service from you. You won’t talk; +and you won’t set out anything to drink. What kind of a way is that of +representing your government?” +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin strolled out and across to the hotel to see if he could bully the +quarantine doctor into a game on Coralio’s solitary billiard table. His +plans were completed for the interception of the fugitives from the capital; +and now it was but a waiting game that he had to play. +</p> + +<p> +The consul was interested in his report. He was only twenty-four; and he had +not been in Coralio long enough for his enthusiasm to cool in the heat of the +tropics—a paradox that may be allowed between Cancer and Capricorn. +</p> + +<p> +So many thousand bunches of bananas, so many thousand oranges and cocoanuts, so +many ounces of gold dust, pounds of rubber, coffee, indigo and +sarsaparilla—actually, exports were twenty per cent. greater than for the +previous year! +</p> + +<p> +A little thrill of satisfaction ran through the consul. Perhaps, he thought, +the State Department, upon reading his introduction, would notice—and +then he leaned back in his chair and laughed. He was getting as bad as the +others. For the moment he had forgotten that Coralio was an insignificant town +in an insignificant republic lying along the by-ways of a second-rate sea. He +thought of Gregg, the quarantine doctor, who subscribed for the London +<i>Lancet</i>, expecting to find it quoting his reports to the home Board of +Health concerning the yellow fever germ. The consul knew that not one in fifty +of his acquaintances in the States had ever heard of Coralio. He knew that two +men, at any rate, would have to read his report—some underling in the +State Department and a compositor in the Public Printing Office. Perhaps the +typesticker would note the increase of commerce in Coralio, and speak of it, +over the cheese and beer, to a friend. +</p> + +<p> +He had just written: “Most unaccountable is the supineness of the large +exporters in the United States in permitting the French and German houses to +practically control the trade interests of this rich and productive +country”—when he heard the hoarse notes of a steamer’s siren. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie laid down his pen and gathered his Panama hat and umbrella. By the sound +he knew it to be the <i>Valhalla</i>, one of the line of fruit vessels plying +for the Vesuvius Company. Down to <i>niños</i> of five years, everyone in +Coralio could name you each incoming steamer by the note of her siren. +</p> + +<p> +The consul sauntered by a roundabout, shaded way to the beach. By reason of +long practice he gauged his stroll so accurately that by the time he arrived on +the sandy shore the boat of the customs officials was rowing back from the +steamer, which had been boarded and inspected according to the laws of +Anchuria. +</p> + +<p> +There is no harbour at Coralio. Vessels of the draught of the <i>Valhalla</i> +must ride at anchor a mile from shore. When they take on fruit it is conveyed +on lighters and freighter sloops. At Solitas, where there was a fine harbour, +ships of many kinds were to be seen, but in the roadstead off Coralio scarcely +any save the fruiters paused. Now and then a tramp coaster, or a mysterious +brig from Spain, or a saucy French barque would hang innocently for a few days +in the offing. Then the custom-house crew would become doubly vigilant and +wary. At night a sloop or two would be making strange trips in and out along +the shore; and in the morning the stock of Three-Star Hennessey, wines and +drygoods in Coralio would be found vastly increased. It has also been said that +the customs officials jingled more silver in the pockets of their red-striped +trousers, and that the record books showed no increase in import duties +received. +</p> + +<p> +The customs boat and the <i>Valhalla</i> gig reached the shore at the same +time. When they grounded in the shallow water there was still five yards of +rolling surf between them and dry sand. Then half-clothed Caribs dashed into +the water, and brought in on their backs the <i>Valhalla’s</i> purser and +the little native officials in their cotton undershirts, blue trousers with red +stripes, and flapping straw hats. +</p> + +<p> +At college Geddie had been a treasure as a first-baseman. He now closed his +umbrella, stuck it upright in the sand, and stooped, with his hands resting +upon his knees. The purser, burlesquing the pitcher’s contortions, hurled +at the consul the heavy roll of newspapers, tied with a string, that the +steamer always brought for him. Geddie leaped high and caught the roll with a +sounding “thwack.” The loungers on the beach—about a third of +the population of the town—laughed and applauded delightedly. Every week +they expected to see that roll of papers delivered and received in that same +manner, and they were never disappointed. Innovations did not flourish in +Coralio. +</p> + +<p> +The consul re-hoisted his umbrella and walked back to the consulate. +</p> + +<p> +This home of a great nation’s representative was a wooden structure of +two rooms, with a native-built gallery of poles, bamboo and nipa palm running +on three sides of it. One room was the official apartment, furnished chastely +with a flat-top desk, a hammock, and three uncomfortable cane-seated chairs. +Engravings of the first and latest president of the country represented hung +against the wall. The other room was the consul’s living apartment. +</p> + +<p> +It was eleven o’clock when he returned from the beach, and therefore +breakfast time. Chanca, the Carib woman who cooked for him, was just serving +the meal on the side of the gallery facing the sea—a spot famous as the +coolest in Coralio. The breakfast consisted of shark’s fin soup, stew of +land crabs, breadfruit, a boiled iguana steak, aguacates, a freshly cut +pineapple, claret and coffee. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie took his seat, and unrolled with luxurious laziness his bundle of +newspapers. Here in Coralio for two days or longer he would read of goings-on +in the world very much as we of the world read those whimsical contributions to +inexact science that assume to portray the doings of the Martians. After he had +finished with the papers they would be sent on the rounds of the other +English-speaking residents of the town. +</p> + +<p> +The paper that came first to his hand was one of those bulky mattresses of +printed stuff upon which the readers of certain New York journals are supposed +to take their Sabbath literary nap. Opening this the consul rested it upon the +table, supporting its weight with the aid of the back of a chair. Then he +partook of his meal deliberately, turning the leaves from time to time and +glancing half idly at the contents. +</p> + +<p> +Presently he was struck by something familiar to him in a picture—a +half-page, badly printed reproduction of a photograph of a vessel. Languidly +interested, he leaned for a nearer scrutiny and a view of the florid headlines +of the column next to the picture. +</p> + +<p> +Yes; he was not mistaken. The engraving was of the eight-hundred-ton yacht +<i>Idalia</i>, belonging to “that prince of good fellows, Midas of the +money market, and society’s pink of perfection, J. Ward Tolliver.” +</p> + +<p> +Slowly sipping his black coffee, Geddie read the column of print. Following a +listed statement of Mr. Tolliver’s real estate and bonds, came a +description of the yacht’s furnishings, and then the grain of news no +bigger than a mustard seed. Mr. Tolliver, with a party of favoured guests, +would sail the next day on a six weeks’ cruise along the Central American +and South American coasts and among the Bahama Islands. Among the guests were +Mrs. Cumberland Payne and Miss Ida Payne, of Norfolk. +</p> + +<p> +The writer, with the fatuous presumption that was demanded of him by his +readers, had concocted a romance suited to their palates. He bracketed the +names of Miss Payne and Mr. Tolliver until he had well-nigh read the marriage +ceremony over them. He played coyly and insinuatingly upon the strings of +“<i>on dit</i>” and “Madame Rumour” and “a little +bird” and “no one would be surprised,” and ended with +congratulations. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie, having finished his breakfast, took his papers to the edge of the +gallery, and sat there in his favourite steamer chair with his feet on the +bamboo railing. He lighted a cigar, and looked out upon the sea. He felt a glow +of satisfaction at finding he was so little disturbed by what he had read. He +told himself that he had conquered the distress that had sent him, a voluntary +exile, to this far land of the lotus. He could never forget Ida, of course; but +there was no longer any pain in thinking about her. When they had had that +misunderstanding and quarrel he had impulsively sought this consulship, with +the desire to retaliate upon her by detaching himself from her world and +presence. He had succeeded thoroughly in that. During the twelve months of his +life in Coralio no word had passed between them, though he had sometimes heard +of her through the dilatory correspondence with the few friends to whom he +still wrote. Still he could not repress a little thrill of satisfaction at +knowing that she had not yet married Tolliver or anyone else. But evidently +Tolliver had not yet abandoned hope. +</p> + +<p> +Well, it made no difference to him now. He had eaten of the lotus. He was happy +and content in this land of perpetual afternoon. Those old days of life in the +States seemed like an irritating dream. He hoped Ida would be as happy as he +was. The climate as balmy as that of distant Avalon; the fetterless, idyllic +round of enchanted days; the life among this indolent, romantic people—a +life full of music, flowers, and low laughter; the influence of the imminent +sea and mountains, and the many shapes of love and magic and beauty that +bloomed in the white tropic nights—with all he was more than content. +Also, there was Paula Brannigan. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie intended to marry Paula—if, of course, she would consent; but he +felt rather sure that she would do that. Somehow, he kept postponing his +proposal. Several times he had been quite near to it; but a mysterious +something always held him back. Perhaps it was only the unconscious, +instinctive conviction that the act would sever the last tie that bound him to +his old world. +</p> + +<p> +He could be very happy with Paula. Few of the native girls could be compared +with her. She had attended a convent school in New Orleans for two years; and +when she chose to display her accomplishments no one could detect any +difference between her and the girls of Norfolk and Manhattan. But it was +delicious to see her at home dressed, as she sometimes was, in the native +costume, with bare shoulders and flowing sleeves. +</p> + +<p> +Bernard Brannigan was the great merchant of Coralio. Besides his store, he +maintained a train of pack mules, and carried on a lively trade with the +interior towns and villages. He had married a native lady of high Castilian +descent, but with a tinge of Indian brown showing through her olive cheek. The +union of the Irish and the Spanish had produced, as it so often has, an +offshoot of rare beauty and variety. They were very excellent people indeed, +and the upper story of their house was ready to be placed at the service of +Geddie and Paula as soon as he should make up his mind to speak about it. +</p> + +<p> +By the time two hours were whiled away the consul tired of reading. The papers +lay scattered about him on the gallery. Reclining there, he gazed dreamily out +upon an Eden. A clump of banana plants interposed their broad shields between +him and the sun. The gentle slope from the consulate to the sea was covered +with the dark-green foliage of lemon-trees and orange-trees just bursting into +bloom. A lagoon pierced the land like a dark, jagged crystal, and above it a +pale ceiba-tree rose almost to the clouds. The waving cocoanut palms on the +beach flared their decorative green leaves against the slate of an almost +quiescent sea. His senses were cognizant of brilliant scarlet and ochres amid +the vert of the coppice, of odours of fruit and bloom and the smoke from +Chanca’s clay oven under the calabash-tree; of the treble laughter of the +native women in their huts, the song of the robin, the salt taste of the +breeze, the diminuendo of the faint surf running along the shore—and, +gradually, of a white speck, growing to a blur, that intruded itself upon the +drab prospect of the sea. +</p> + +<p> +Lazily interested, he watched this blur increase until it became the +<i>Idalia</i> steaming at full speed, coming down the coast. Without changing +his position he kept his eyes upon the beautiful white yacht as she drew +swiftly near, and came opposite to Coralio. Then, sitting upright, he saw her +float steadily past and on. Scarcely a mile of sea had separated her from the +shore. He had seen the frequent flash of her polished brass work and the +stripes of her deck-awnings—so much, and no more. Like a ship on a magic +lantern slide the <i>Idalia</i> had crossed the illuminated circle of the +consul’s little world, and was gone. Save for the tiny cloud of smoke +that was left hanging over the brim of the sea, she might have been an +immaterial thing, a chimera of his idle brain. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie went into his office and sat down to dawdle over his report. If the +reading of the article in the paper had left him unshaken, this silent passing +of the <i>Idalia</i> had done for him still more. It had brought the calm and +peace of a situation from which all uncertainty had been erased. He knew that +men sometimes hope without being aware of it. Now, since she had come two +thousand miles and had passed without a sign, not even his unconscious self +need cling to the past any longer. +</p> + +<p> +After dinner, when the sun was low behind the mountains, Geddie walked on the +little strip of beach under the cocoanuts. The wind was blowing mildly +landward, and the surface of the sea was rippled by tiny wavelets. +</p> + +<p> +A miniature breaker, spreading with a soft “swish” upon the sand +brought with it something round and shiny that rolled back again as the wave +receded. The next influx beached it clear, and Geddie picked it up. The thing +was a long-necked wine bottle of colourless glass. The cork had been driven in +tightly to the level of the mouth, and the end covered with dark-red +sealing-wax. The bottle contained only what seemed to be a sheet of paper, much +curled from the manipulation it had undergone while being inserted. In the +sealing-wax was the impression of a seal—probably of a signet-ring, +bearing the initials of a monogram; but the impression had been hastily made, +and the letters were past anything more certain than a shrewd conjecture. Ida +Payne had always worn a signet-ring in preference to any other finger +decoration. Geddie thought he could make out the familiar “I P”; +and a queer sensation of disquietude went over him. More personal and intimate +was this reminder of her than had been the sight of the vessel she was +doubtless on. He walked back to his house, and set the bottle on his desk. +</p> + +<p> +Throwing off his hat and coat, and lighting a lamp—for the night had +crowded precipitately upon the brief twilight—he began to examine his +piece of sea salvage. +</p> + +<p> +By holding the bottle near the light and turning it judiciously, he made out +that it contained a double sheet of note-paper filled with close writing; +further, that the paper was of the same size and shade as that always used by +Ida; and that, to the best of his belief, the handwriting was hers. The +imperfect glass of the bottle so distorted the rays of light that he could read +no word of the writing; but certain capital letters, of which he caught +comprehensive glimpses, were Ida’s, he felt sure. +</p> + +<p> +There was a little smile both of perplexity and amusement in Geddie’s +eyes as he set the bottle down, and laid three cigars side by side on his desk. +He fetched his steamer chair from the gallery, and stretched himself +comfortably. He would smoke those three cigars while considering the problem. +</p> + +<p> +For it amounted to a problem. He almost wished that he had not found the +bottle; but the bottle was there. Why should it have drifted in from the sea, +whence come so many disquieting things, to disturb his peace? +</p> + +<p> +In this dreamy land, where time seemed so redundant, he had fallen into the +habit of bestowing much thought upon even trifling matters. +</p> + +<p> +He began to speculate upon many fanciful theories concerning the story of the +bottle, rejecting each in turn. +</p> + +<p> +Ships in danger of wreck or disablement sometimes cast forth such precarious +messengers calling for aid. But he had seen the <i>Idalia</i> not three hours +before, safe and speeding. Suppose the crew had mutinied and imprisoned the +passengers below, and the message was one begging for succour! But, premising +such an improbable outrage, would the agitated captives have taken the pains to +fill four pages of note-paper with carefully penned arguments to their rescue. +</p> + +<p> +Thus by elimination he soon rid the matter of the more unlikely theories, and +was reduced—though aversely—to the less assailable one that the +bottle contained a message to himself. Ida knew he was in Coralio; she must +have launched the bottle while the yacht was passing and the wind blowing +fairly toward the shore. +</p> + +<p> +As soon as Geddie reached this conclusion a wrinkle came between his brows and +a stubborn look settled around his mouth. He sat looking out through the +doorway at the gigantic fire-flies traversing the quiet streets. +</p> + +<p> +If this was a message to him from Ida, what could it mean save an overture +toward a reconciliation? And if that, why had she not used the same methods of +the post instead of this uncertain and even flippant means of communication? A +note in an empty bottle, cast into the sea! There was something light and +frivolous about it, if not actually contemptuous. +</p> + +<p> +The thought stirred his pride and subdued whatever emotions had been +resurrected by the finding of the bottle. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie put on his coat and hat and walked out. He followed a street that led +him along the border of the little plaza where a band was playing and people +were rambling, care-free and indolent. Some timorous <i>señoritas</i> scurrying +past with fire-flies tangled in the jetty braids of their hair glanced at him +with shy, flattering eyes. The air was languorous with the scent of jasmin and +orange-blossoms. +</p> + +<p> +The consul stayed his steps at the house of Bernard Brannigan. Paula was +swinging in a hammock on the gallery. She rose from it like a bird from its +nest. The colour came to her cheek at the sound of Geddie’s voice. +</p> + +<p> +He was charmed at the sight of her costume—a flounced muslin dress, with +a little jacket of white flannel, all made with neatness and style. He +suggested a stroll, and they walked out to the old Indian well on the hill +road. They sat on the curb, and there Geddie made the expected but +long-deferred speech. Certain though he had been that she would not say him +nay, he was thrilled with joy at the completeness and sweetness of her +surrender. Here was surely a heart made for love and steadfastness. Here was no +caprice or questionings or captious standards of convention. +</p> + +<p> +When Geddie kissed Paula at her door that night he was happier than he had ever +been before. “Here in this hollow lotus land, ever to live and lie +reclined” seemed to him, as it has seemed to many mariners, the best as +well as the easiest. His future would be an ideal one. He had attained a +Paradise without a serpent. His Eve would be indeed a part of him, unbeguiled, +and therefore more beguiling. He had made his decision to-night, and his heart +was full of serene, assured content. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie went back to his house whistling that finest and saddest love song, +“La Golondrina.” At the door his tame monkey leaped down from his +shelf, chattering briskly. The consul turned to his desk to get him some nuts +he usually kept there. Reaching in the half-darkness, his hand struck against +the bottle. He started as if he had touched the cold rotundity of a serpent. +</p> + +<p> +He had forgotten that the bottle was there. +</p> + +<p> +He lighted the lamp and fed the monkey. Then, very deliberately, he lighted a +cigar, and took the bottle in his hand, and walked down the path to the beach. +</p> + +<p> +There was a moon, and the sea was glorious. The breeze had shifted, as it did +each evening, and was now rushing steadily seaward. +</p> + +<p> +Stepping to the water’s edge, Geddie hurled the unopened bottle far out +into the sea. It disappeared for a moment, and then shot upward twice its +length. Geddie stood still, watching it. The moonlight was so bright that he +could see it bobbing up and down with the little waves. Slowly it receded from +the shore, flashing and turning as it went. The wind was carrying it out to +sea. Soon it became a mere speck, doubtfully discerned at irregular intervals; +and then the mystery of it was swallowed up by the greater mystery of the +ocean. Geddie stood still upon the beach, smoking and looking out upon the +water. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +“Simon!—Oh, Simon!—wake up there, Simon!” bawled a +sonorous voice at the edge of the water. +</p> + +<p> +Old Simon Cruz was a half-breed fisherman and smuggler who lived in a hut on +the beach. Out of his earliest nap Simon was thus awakened. +</p> + +<p> +He slipped on his shoes and went outside. Just landing from one of the +<i>Valhalla’s</i> boats was the third mate of that vessel, who was an +acquaintance of Simon’s, and three sailors from the fruiter. +</p> + +<p> +“Go up, Simon,” called the mate, “and find Dr. Gregg or Mr. +Goodwin or anybody that’s a friend to Mr. Geddie, and bring ’em +here at once.” +</p> + +<p> +“Saints of the skies!” said Simon, sleepily, “nothing has +happened to Mr. Geddie?” +</p> + +<p> +“He’s under that tarpauling,” said the mate, pointing to the +boat, “and he’s rather more than half drownded. We seen him from +the steamer nearly a mile out from shore, swimmin’ like mad after a +bottle that was floatin’ in the water, outward bound. We lowered the gig +and started for him. He nearly had his hand on the bottle, when he gave out and +went under. We pulled him out in time to save him, maybe; but the doctor is the +one to decide that.” +</p> + +<p> +“A bottle?” said the old man, rubbing his eyes. He was not yet +fully awake. “Where is the bottle?” +</p> + +<p> +“Driftin’ along out there some’eres,” said the mate, +jerking his thumb toward the sea. “Get on with you, Simon.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap03"></a>III<br/> +SMITH</h2> + +<p> +Goodwin and the ardent patriot, Zavalla, took all the precautions that their +foresight could contrive to prevent the escape of President Miraflores and his +companion. They sent trusted messengers up the coast to Solitas and Alazan to +warn the local leaders of the flight, and to instruct them to patrol the water +line and arrest the fugitives at all hazards should they reveal themselves in +that territory. After this was done there remained only to cover the district +about Coralio and await the coming of the quarry. The nets were well spread. +The roads were so few, the opportunities for embarkation so limited, and the +two or three probable points of exit so well guarded that it would be strange +indeed if there should slip through the meshes so much of the country’s +dignity, romance, and collateral. The president would, without doubt, move as +secretly as possible, and endeavour to board a vessel by stealth from some +secluded point along the shore. +</p> + +<p> +On the fourth day after the receipt of Englehart’s telegram the +<i>Karlsefin</i>, a Norwegian steamer chartered by the New Orleans fruit trade, +anchored off Coralio with three hoarse toots of her siren. The <i>Karlsefin</i> +was not one of the line operated by the Vesuvius Fruit Company. She was +something of a dilettante, doing odd jobs for a company that was scarcely +important enough to figure as a rival to the Vesuvius. The movements of the +<i>Karlsefin</i> were dependent upon the state of the market. Sometimes she +would ply steadily between the Spanish Main and New Orleans in the regular +transport of fruit; next she would be making erratic trips to Mobile or +Charleston, or even as far north as New York, according to the distribution of +the fruit supply. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin lounged upon the beach with the usual crowd of idlers that had gathered +to view the steamer. Now that President Miraflores might be expected to reach +the borders of his abjured country at any time, the orders were to keep a +strict and unrelenting watch. Every vessel that approached the shores might now +be considered a possible means of escape for the fugitives; and an eye was kept +even on the sloops and dories that belonged to the sea-going contingent of +Coralio. Goodwin and Zavalla moved everywhere, but without ostentation, +watching the loopholes of escape. +</p> + +<p> +The customs officials crowded importantly into their boat and rowed out to the +<i>Karlsefin</i>. A boat from the steamer landed her purser with his papers, +and took out the quarantine doctor with his green umbrella and clinical +thermometer. Next a swarm of Caribs began to load upon lighters the thousands +of bunches of bananas heaped upon the shore and row them out to the steamer. +The <i>Karlsefin</i> had no passenger list, and was soon done with the +attention of the authorities. The purser declared that the steamer would remain +at anchor until morning, taking on her fruit during the night. The +<i>Karlsefin</i> had come, he said, from New York, to which port her latest +load of oranges and cocoanuts had been conveyed. Two or three of the freighter +sloops were engaged to assist in the work, for the captain was anxious to make +a quick return in order to reap the advantage offered by a certain dearth of +fruit in the States. +</p> + +<p> +About four o’clock in the afternoon another of those marine monsters, not +very familiar in those waters, hove in sight, following the fateful +<i>Idalia</i>—a graceful steam yacht, painted a light buff, clean-cut as +a steel engraving. The beautiful vessel hovered off shore, see-sawing the waves +as lightly as a duck in a rain barrel. A swift boat manned by a crew in uniform +came ashore, and a stocky-built man leaped to the sands. +</p> + +<p> +The new-comer seemed to turn a disapproving eye upon the rather motley +congregation of native Anchurians, and made his way at once toward Goodwin, who +was the most conspicuously Anglo-Saxon figure present. Goodwin greeted him with +courtesy. +</p> + +<p> +Conversation developed that the newly landed one was named Smith, and that he +had come in a yacht. A meagre biography, truly; for the yacht was most +apparent; and the “Smith” not beyond a reasonable guess before the +revelation. Yet to the eye of Goodwin, who had seen several things, there was a +discrepancy between Smith and his yacht. A bullet-headed man Smith was, with an +oblique, dead eye and the moustache of a cocktail-mixer. And unless he had +shifted costumes before putting off for shore he had affronted the deck of his +correct vessel clad in a pearl-gray derby, a gay plaid suit and vaudeville +neckwear. Men owning pleasure yachts generally harmonize better with them. +</p> + +<p> +Smith looked business, but he was no advertiser. He commented upon the scenery, +remarking upon its fidelity to the pictures in the geography; and then inquired +for the United States consul. Goodwin pointed out the starred-and-striped +bunting hanging above the little consulate, which was concealed behind the +orange-trees. +</p> + +<p> +“Mr. Geddie, the consul, will be sure to be there,” said Goodwin. +“He was very nearly drowned a few days ago while taking a swim in the +sea, and the doctor has ordered him to remain indoors for some time.” +</p> + +<p> +Smith plowed his way through the sand to the consulate, his haberdashery +creating violent discord against the smooth tropical blues and greens. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie was lounging in his hammock, somewhat pale of face and languid in pose. +On that night when the <i>Valhalla’s</i> boat had brought him ashore +apparently drenched to death by the sea, Doctor Gregg and his other friends had +toiled for hours to preserve the little spark of life that remained to him. The +bottle, with its impotent message, was gone out to sea, and the problem that it +had provoked was reduced to a simple sum in addition—one and one make +two, by the rule of arithmetic; one by the rule of romance. +</p> + +<p> +There is a quaint old theory that man may have two souls—a peripheral one +which serves ordinarily, and a central one which is stirred only at certain +times, but then with activity and vigour. While under the domination of the +former a man will shave, vote, pay taxes, give money to his family, buy +subscription books and comport himself on the average plan. But let the central +soul suddenly become dominant, and he may, in the twinkling of an eye, turn +upon the partner of his joys with furious execration; he may change his +politics while you could snap your fingers; he may deal out deadly insult to +his dearest friend; he may get him, instanter, to a monastery or a dance hall; +he may elope, or hang himself—or he may write a song or poem, or kiss his +wife unasked, or give his funds to the search of a microbe. Then the peripheral +soul will return; and we have our safe, sane citizen again. It is but the +revolt of the Ego against Order; and its effect is to shake up the atoms only +that they may settle where they belong. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie’s revulsion had been a mild one—no more than a swim in a +summer sea after so inglorious an object as a drifting bottle. And now he was +himself again. Upon his desk, ready for the post, was a letter to his +government tendering his resignation as consul, to be effective as soon as +another could be appointed in his place. For Bernard Brannigan, who never did +things in a half-way manner, was to take Geddie at once for a partner in his +very profitable and various enterprises; and Paula was happily engaged in plans +for refurnishing and decorating the upper story of the Brannigan house. +</p> + +<p> +The consul rose from his hammock when he saw the conspicuous stranger in his +door. +</p> + +<p> +“Keep your seat, old man,” said the visitor, with an airy wave of +his large hand. “My name’s Smith; and I’ve come in a yacht. +You are the consul—is that right? A big, cool guy on the beach directed +me here. Thought I’d pay my respects to the flag.” +</p> + +<p> +“Sit down,” said Geddie. “I’ve been admiring your craft +ever since it came in sight. Looks like a fast sailer. What’s her +tonnage?” +</p> + +<p> +“Search me!” said Smith. “I don’t know what she weighs +in at. But she’s got a tidy gait. The <i>Rambler</i>—that’s +her name—don’t take the dust of anything afloat. This is my first +trip on her. I’m taking a squint along this coast just to get an idea of +the countries where the rubber and red pepper and revolutions come from. I had +no idea there was so much scenery down here. Why, Central Park ain’t in +it with this neck of the woods. I’m from New York. They get monkeys, and +cocoanuts, and parrots down here—is that right?” +</p> + +<p> +“We have them all,” said Geddie. “I’m quite sure that +our fauna and flora would take a prize over Central Park.” +</p> + +<p> +“Maybe they would,” admitted Smith, cheerfully. “I +haven’t seen them yet. But I guess you’ve got us skinned on the +animal and vegetation question. You don’t have much travel here, do +you?” +</p> + +<p> +“Travel?” queried the consul. “I suppose you mean passengers +on the steamers. No; very few people land in Coralio. An investor now and +then—tourists and sight-seers generally go further down the coast to one +of the larger towns where there is a harbour.” +</p> + +<p> +“I see a ship out there loading up with bananas,” said Smith. +“Any passengers come on her?” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s the <i>Karlsefin</i>,” said the consul. +“She’s a tramp fruiter—made her last trip to New York, I +believe. No; she brought no passengers. I saw her boat come ashore, and there +was no one. About the only exciting recreation we have here is watching +steamers when they arrive; and a passenger on one of them generally causes the +whole town to turn out. If you are going to remain in Coralio a while, Mr. +Smith, I’ll be glad to take you around to meet some people. There are +four or five American chaps that are good to know, besides the native +high-fliers.” +</p> + +<p> +“Thanks,” said the yachtsman, “but I wouldn’t put you +to the trouble. I’d like to meet the guys you speak of, but I won’t +be here long enough to do much knocking around. That cool gent on the beach +spoke of a doctor; can you tell me where I could find him? The <i>Rambler</i> +ain’t quite as steady on her feet as a Broadway hotel; and a fellow gets +a touch of seasickness now and then. Thought I’d strike the croaker for a +handful of the little sugar pills, in case I need ’em.” +</p> + +<p> +“You will be apt to find Dr. Gregg at the hotel,” said the consul. +“You can see it from the door—it’s that two-story building +with the balcony, where the orange-trees are.” +</p> + +<p> +The Hotel de los Estranjeros was a dreary hostelry, in great disuse both by +strangers and friends. It stood at a corner of the Street of the Holy +Sepulchre. A grove of small orange-trees crowded against one side of it, +enclosed by a low, rock wall over which a tall man might easily step. The house +was of plastered adobe, stained a hundred shades of colour by the salt breeze +and the sun. Upon its upper balcony opened a central door and two windows +containing broad jalousies instead of sashes. +</p> + +<p> +The lower floor communicated by two doorways with the narrow, rock-paved +sidewalk. The <i>pulperia</i>—or drinking shop—of the proprietress, +Madama Timotea Ortiz, occupied the ground floor. On the bottles of brandy, +<i>anisada</i>, Scotch “smoke” and inexpensive wines behind the +little counter the dust lay thick save where the fingers of infrequent +customers had left irregular prints. The upper story contained four or five +guest-rooms which were rarely put to their destined use. Sometimes a +fruit-grower, riding in from his plantation to confer with his agent, would +pass a melancholy night in the dismal upper story; sometimes a minor native +official on some trifling government quest would have his pomp and majesty awed +by Madama’s sepulchral hospitality. But Madama sat behind her bar +content, not desiring to quarrel with Fate. If anyone required meat, drink or +lodging at the Hotel de los Estranjeros they had but to come, and be served. +<i>Está bueno.</i> If they came not, why, then, they came not. <i>Está +bueno.</i> +</p> + +<p> +As the exceptional yachtsman was making his way down the precarious sidewalk of +the Street of the Holy Sepulchre, the solitary permanent guest of that decaying +hotel sat at its door, enjoying the breeze from the sea. +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Gregg, the quarantine physician, was a man of fifty or sixty, with a florid +face and the longest beard between Topeka and Terra del Fuego. He held his +position by virtue of an appointment by the Board of Health of a seaport city +in one of the Southern states. That city feared the ancient enemy of every +Southern seaport—the yellow fever—and it was the duty of Dr. Gregg +to examine crew and passengers of every vessel leaving Coralio for preliminary +symptoms. The duties were light, and the salary, for one who lived in Coralio, +ample. Surplus time there was in plenty; and the good doctor added to his gains +by a large private practice among the residents of the coast. The fact that he +did not know ten words of Spanish was no obstacle; a pulse could be felt and a +fee collected without one being a linguist. Add to the description the facts +that the doctor had a story to tell concerning the operation of trepanning +which no listener had ever allowed him to conclude, and that he believed in +brandy as a prophylactic; and the special points of interest possessed by Dr. +Gregg will have become exhausted. +</p> + +<p> +The doctor had dragged a chair to the sidewalk. He was coatless, and he leaned +back against the wall and smoked, while he stroked his beard. Surprise came +into his pale blue eyes when he caught sight of Smith in his unusual and +prismatic clothes. +</p> + +<p> +“You’re Dr. Gregg—is that right?” said Smith, feeling +the dog’s head pin in his tie. “The constable—I mean the +consul, told me you hung out at this caravansary. My name’s Smith; and I +came in a yacht. Taking a cruise around, looking at the monkeys and +pineapple-trees. Come inside and have a drink, Doc. This café looks on the +blink, but I guess it can set out something wet.” +</p> + +<p> +“I will join you, sir, in just a taste of brandy,” said Dr. Gregg, +rising quickly. “I find that as a prophylactic a little brandy is almost +a necessity in this climate.” +</p> + +<p> +As they turned to enter the <i>pulperia</i> a native man, barefoot, glided +noiselessly up and addressed the doctor in Spanish. He was yellowish-brown, +like an over-ripe lemon; he wore a cotton shirt and ragged linen trousers +girded by a leather belt. His face was like an animal’s, live and wary, +but without promise of much intelligence. This man jabbered with animation and +so much seriousness that it seemed a pity that his words were to be wasted. +</p> + +<p> +Dr. Gregg felt his pulse. +</p> + +<p> +“You sick?” he inquired. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Mi mujer está enferma en la casa</i>,” said the man, thus +endeavouring to convey the news, in the only language open to him, that his +wife lay ill in her palm-thatched hut. +</p> + +<p> +The doctor drew a handful of capsules filled with a white powder from his +trousers pocket. He counted out ten of them into the native’s hand, and +held up his forefinger impressively. +</p> + +<p> +“Take one,” said the doctor, “every two hours.” He then +held up two fingers, shaking them emphatically before the native’s face. +Next he pulled out his watch and ran his finger round its dial twice. Again the +two fingers confronted the patient’s nose. “Two—two—two +hours,” repeated the doctor. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Si, Señor</i>,” said the native, sadly. +</p> + +<p> +He pulled a cheap silver watch from his own pocket and laid it in the +doctor’s hand. “Me bring,” said he, struggling painfully with +his scant English, “other watchy to-morrow.” Then he departed +downheartedly with his capsules. +</p> + +<p> +“A very ignorant race of people, sir,” said the doctor, as he +slipped the watch into his pocket. “He seems to have mistaken my +directions for taking the physic for the fee. However, it is all right. He owes +me an account, anyway. The chances are that he won’t bring the other +watch. You can’t depend on anything they promise you. About that drink, +now? How did you come to Coralio, Mr. Smith? I was not aware that any boats +except the <i>Karlsefin</i> had arrived for some days.” +</p> + +<p> +The two leaned against the deserted bar; and Madama set out a bottle without +waiting for the doctor’s order. There was no dust on it. +</p> + +<p> +After they had drank twice Smith said: +</p> + +<p> +“You say there were no passengers on the <i>Karlsefin</i>, Doc? Are you +sure about that? It seems to me I heard somebody down on the beach say that +there was one or two aboard.” +</p> + +<p> +“They were mistaken, sir. I myself went out and put all hands through a +medical examination, as usual. The <i>Karlsefin</i> sails as soon as she gets +her bananas loaded, which will be about daylight in the morning, and she got +everything ready this afternoon. No, sir, there was no passenger list. Like +that Three-Star? A French schooner landed two slooploads of it a month ago. If +any customs duties on it went to the distinguished republic of Anchuria you may +have my hat. If you won’t have another, come out and let’s sit in +the cool a while. It isn’t often we exiles get a chance to talk with +somebody from the outside world.” +</p> + +<p> +The doctor brought out another chair to the sidewalk for his new acquaintance. +The two seated themselves. +</p> + +<p> +“You are a man of the world,” said Dr. Gregg; “a man of +travel and experience. Your decision in a matter of ethics and, no doubt, on +the points of equity, ability and professional probity should be of value. I +would be glad if you will listen to the history of a case that I think stands +unique in medical annals. +</p> + +<p> +“About nine years ago, while I was engaged in the practice of medicine in +my native city, I was called to treat a case of contusion of the skull. I made +the diagnosis that a splinter of bone was pressing upon the brain, and that the +surgical operation known as trepanning was required. However, as the patient +was a gentleman of wealth and position, I called in for consultation +Dr.—” +</p> + +<p> +Smith rose from his chair, and laid a hand, soft with apology, upon the +doctor’s shirt sleeve. +</p> + +<p> +“Say, Doc,” he said, solemnly, “I want to hear that story. +You’ve got me interested; and I don’t want to miss the rest of it. +I know it’s a loola by the way it begins; and I want to tell it at the +next meeting of the Barney O’Flynn Association, if you don’t mind. +But I’ve got one or two matters to attend to first. If I get ’em +attended to in time I’ll come right back and hear you spiel the rest +before bedtime—is that right?” +</p> + +<p> +“By all means,” said the doctor, “get your business attended +to, and then return. I shall wait up for you. You see, one of the most +prominent physicians at the consultation diagnosed the trouble as a blood clot; +another said it was an abscess, but I—” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t tell me now, Doc. Don’t spoil the story. Wait till I +come back. I want to hear it as it runs off the reel—is that +right?” +</p> + +<p> +The mountains reached up their bulky shoulders to receive the level gallop of +Apollo’s homing steeds, the day died in the lagoons and in the shadowed +banana groves and in the mangrove swamps, where the great blue crabs were +beginning to crawl to land for their nightly ramble. And it died, at last, upon +the highest peaks. Then the brief twilight, ephemeral as the flight of a moth, +came and went; the Southern Cross peeped with its topmost eye above a row of +palms, and the fire-flies heralded with their torches the approach of +soft-footed night. +</p> + +<p> +In the offing the <i>Karlsefin</i> swayed at anchor, her lights seeming to +penetrate the water to countless fathoms with their shimmering, lanceolate +reflections. The Caribs were busy loading her by means of the great lighters +heaped full from the piles of fruit ranged upon the shore. +</p> + +<p> +On the sandy beach, with his back against a cocoanut-tree and the stubs of many +cigars lying around him, Smith sat waiting, never relaxing his sharp gaze in +the direction of the steamer. +</p> + +<p> +The incongruous yachtsman had concentrated his interest upon the innocent +fruiter. Twice had he been assured that no passengers had come to Coralio on +board of her. And yet, with a persistence not to be attributed to an idling +voyager, he had appealed the case to the higher court of his own eyesight. +Surprisingly like some gay-coated lizard, he crouched at the foot of the +cocoanut palm, and with the beady, shifting eyes of the selfsame reptile, +sustained his espionage on the <i>Karlsefin</i>. +</p> + +<p> +On the white sands a whiter gig belonging to the yacht was drawn up, guarded by +one of the white-ducked crew. Not far away in a <i>pulperia</i> on the +shore-following Calle Grande three other sailors swaggered with their cues +around Coralio’s solitary billiard-table. The boat lay there as if under +orders to be ready for use at any moment. There was in the atmosphere a hint of +expectation, of waiting for something to occur, which was foreign to the air of +Coralio. +</p> + +<p> +Like some passing bird of brilliant plumage, Smith alights on this palmy shore +but to preen his wings for an instant and then to fly away upon silent pinions. +When morning dawned there was no Smith, no waiting gig, no yacht in the offing. +Smith left no intimation of his mission there, no footprints to show where he +had followed the trail of his mystery on the sands of Coralio that night. He +came; he spake his strange jargon of the asphalt and the cafés; he sat under +the cocoanut-tree, and vanished. The next morning Coralio, Smithless, ate its +fried plantain and said: “The man of pictured clothing went himself +away.” With the <i>siesta</i> the incident passed, yawning, into history. +</p> + +<p> +So, for a time, must Smith pass behind the scenes of the play. He comes no more +to Coralio nor to Doctor Gregg, who sits in vain, wagging his redundant beard, +waiting to enrich his derelict audience with his moving tale of trepanning and +jealousy. +</p> + +<p> +But prosperously to the lucidity of these loose pages, Smith shall flutter +among them again. In the nick of time he shall come to tell us why he strewed +so many anxious cigar stumps around the cocoanut palm that night. This he must +do; for, when he sailed away before the dawn in his yacht <i>Rambler</i>, he +carried with him the answer to a riddle so big and preposterous that few in +Anchuria had ventured even to propound it. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap04"></a>IV<br/> +CAUGHT</h2> + +<p> +The plans for the detention of the flying President Miraflores and his +companion at the coast line seemed hardly likely to fail. Dr. Zavalla himself +had gone to the port of Alazan to establish a guard at that point. At Solitas +the Liberal patriot Varras could be depended upon to keep close watch. Goodwin +held himself responsible for the district about Coralio. +</p> + +<p> +The news of the president’s flight had been disclosed to no one in the +coast towns save trusted members of the ambitious political party that was +desirous of succeeding to power. The telegraph wire running from San Mateo to +the coast had been cut far up on the mountain trail by an emissary of +Zavalla’s. Long before this could be repaired and word received along it +from the capital the fugitives would have reached the coast and the question of +escape or capture been solved. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin had stationed armed sentinels at frequent intervals along the shore for +a mile in each direction from Coralio. They were instructed to keep a vigilant +lookout during the night to prevent Miraflores from attempting to embark +stealthily by means of some boat or sloop found by chance at the water’s +edge. A dozen patrols walked the streets of Coralio unsuspected, ready to +intercept the truant official should he show himself there. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin was very well convinced that no precautions had been overlooked. He +strolled about the streets that bore such high-sounding names and were but +narrow, grass-covered lanes, lending his own aid to the vigil that had been +intrusted to him by Bob Englehart. +</p> + +<p> +The town had begun the tepid round of its nightly diversions. A few leisurely +dandies, clad in white duck, with flowing neckties, and swinging slim bamboo +canes, threaded the grassy by-ways toward the houses of their favoured +señoritas. Those who wooed the art of music dragged tirelessly at whining +concertinas, or fingered lugubrious guitars at doors and windows. An occasional +soldier from the <i>cuartel</i>, with flapping straw hat, without coat or +shoes, hurried by, balancing his long gun like a lance in one hand. From every +density of the foliage the giant tree frogs sounded their loud and irritating +clatter. Further out, where the by-ways perished at the brink of the jungle, +the guttural cries of marauding baboons and the coughing of the alligators in +the black estuaries fractured the vain silence of the wood. +</p> + +<p> +By ten o’clock the streets were deserted. The oil lamps that had burned, +a sickly yellow, at random corners, had been extinguished by some economical +civic agent. Coralio lay sleeping calmly between toppling mountains and +encroaching sea like a stolen babe in the arms of its abductors. Somewhere over +in that tropical darkness—perhaps already threading the profundities of +the alluvial lowlands—the high adventurer and his mate were moving toward +land’s end. The game of Fox-in-the-Morning should be coming soon to its +close. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin, at his deliberate gait, passed the long, low <i>cuartel</i> where +Coralio’s contingent of Anchuria’s military force slumbered, with +its bare toes pointed heavenward. There was a law that no civilian might come +so near the headquarters of that citadel of war after nine o’clock, but +Goodwin was always forgetting the minor statutes. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Quién vive?</i>” shrieked the sentinel, wrestling prodigiously +with his lengthy musket. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Americano</i>,” growled Goodwin, without turning his head, and +passed on, unhalted. +</p> + +<p> +To the right he turned, and to the left up the street that ultimately reached +the Plaza Nacional. When within the toss of a cigar stump from the intersecting +Street of the Holy Sepulchre, he stopped suddenly in the pathway. +</p> + +<p> +He saw the form of a tall man, clothed in black and carrying a large valise, +hurry down the cross-street in the direction of the beach. And Goodwin’s +second glance made him aware of a woman at the man’s elbow on the farther +side, who seemed to urge forward, if not even to assist, her companion in their +swift but silent progress. They were no Coralians, those two. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin followed at increased speed, but without any of the artful tactics that +are so dear to the heart of the sleuth. The American was too broad to feel the +instinct of the detective. He stood as an agent for the people of Anchuria, and +but for political reasons he would have demanded then and there the money. It +was the design of his party to secure the imperilled fund, to restore it to the +treasury of the country, and to declare itself in power without bloodshed or +resistance. +</p> + +<p> +The couple halted at the door of the Hotel de los Estranjeros, and the man +struck upon the wood with the impatience of one unused to his entry being +stayed. Madama was long in response; but after a time her light showed, the +door was opened, and the guests housed. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin stood in the quiet street, lighting another cigar. In two minutes a +faint gleam began to show between the slats of the jalousies in the upper story +of the hotel. “They have engaged rooms,” said Goodwin to himself. +“So, then, their arrangements for sailing have yet to be made.” +</p> + +<p> +At that moment there came along one Estebán Delgado, a barber, an enemy to +existing government, a jovial plotter against stagnation in any form. This +barber was one of Coralio’s saddest dogs, often remaining out of doors as +late as eleven, post meridian. He was a partisan Liberal; and he greeted +Goodwin with flatulent importance as a brother in the cause. But he had +something important to tell. +</p> + +<p> +“What think you, Don Frank!” he cried, in the universal tone of the +conspirator. “I have to-night shaved <i>la barba</i>—what you call +the ‘weeskers’ of the <i>Presidente</i> himself, of this countree! +Consider! He sent for me to come. In the poor <i>casita</i> of an old woman he +awaited me—in a verree leetle house in a dark place. +<i>Carramba!</i>—el Señor Presidente to make himself thus secret and +obscured! I think he desired not to be known—but, <i>carajo!</i> can you +shave a man and not see his face? This gold piece he gave me, and said it was +to be all quite still. I think, Don Frank, there is what you call a chip over +the bug.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have you ever seen President Miraflores before?” asked Goodwin. +</p> + +<p> +“But once,” answered Estebán. “He is tall; and he had +weeskers, verree black and sufficient.” +</p> + +<p> +“Was anyone else present when you shaved him?” +</p> + +<p> +“An old Indian woman, Señor, that belonged with the <i>casa</i>, and one +señorita—a ladee of so much beautee!—<i>ah, Dios!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“All right, Estebán,” said Goodwin. “It’s very lucky +that you happened along with your tonsorial information. The new administration +will be likely to remember you for this.” +</p> + +<p> +Then in a few words he made the barber acquainted with the crisis into which +the affairs of the nation had culminated, and instructed him to remain outside, +keeping watch upon the two sides of the hotel that looked upon the street, and +observing whether anyone should attempt to leave the house by any door or +window. Goodwin himself went to the door through which the guests had entered, +opened it and stepped inside. +</p> + +<p> +Madama had returned downstairs from her journey above to see after the comfort +of her lodgers. Her candle stood upon the bar. She was about to take a +thimbleful of rum as a solace for having her rest disturbed. She looked up +without surprise or alarm as her third caller entered. +</p> + +<p> +“Ah! it is the Señor Goodwin. Not often does he honour my poor house by +his presence.” +</p> + +<p> +“I must come oftener,” said Goodwin, with the Goodwin smile. +“I hear that your cognac is the best between Belize to the north and Rio +to the south. Set out the bottle, Madama, and let us have the proof in <i>un +vasito</i> for each of us.” +</p> + +<p> +“My <i>aguardiente</i>,” said Madama, with pride, “is the +best. It grows, in beautiful bottles, in the dark places among the +banana-trees. <i>Si, Señor.</i> Only at midnight can they be picked by +sailor-men who bring them, before daylight comes, to your back door. Good +<i>aguardiente</i> is a verree difficult fruit to handle, Señor Goodwin.” +</p> + +<p> +Smuggling, in Coralio, was much nearer than competition to being the life of +trade. One spoke of it slyly, yet with a certain conceit, when it had been well +accomplished. +</p> + +<p> +“You have guests in the house to-night,” said Goodwin, laying a +silver dollar upon the counter. +</p> + +<p> +“Why not?” said Madama, counting the change. “Two; but the +smallest while finished to arrive. One señor, not quite old, and one señorita +of sufficient handsomeness. To their rooms they have ascended, not desiring the +to-eat nor the to-drink. Two rooms—<i>Numero</i> 9 and <i>Numero</i> +10.” +</p> + +<p> +“I was expecting that gentleman and that lady,” said Goodwin. +“I have important <i>negocios</i> that must be transacted. Will you allow +me to see them?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why not?” sighed Madama, placidly. “Why should not Señor +Goodwin ascend and speak to his friends? <i>Está bueno.</i> Room <i>Numero</i> +9 and room <i>Numero</i> 10.” +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin loosened in his coat pocket the American revolver that he carried, and +ascended the steep, dark stairway. +</p> + +<p> +In the hallway above, the saffron light from a hanging lamp allowed him to +select the gaudy numbers on the doors. He turned the knob of Number 9, entered +and closed the door behind him. +</p> + +<p> +If that was Isabel Guilbert seated by the table in that poorly furnished room, +report had failed to do her charms justice. She rested her head upon one hand. +Extreme fatigue was signified in every line of her figure; and upon her +countenance a deep perplexity was written. Her eyes were gray-irised, and of +that mould that seems to have belonged to the orbs of all the famous queens of +hearts. Their whites were singularly clear and brilliant, concealed above the +irises by heavy horizontal lids, and showing a snowy line below them. Such eyes +denote great nobility, vigour, and, if you can conceive of it, a most generous +selfishness. She looked up when the American entered with an expression of +surprised inquiry, but without alarm. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin took off his hat and seated himself, with his characteristic deliberate +ease, upon a corner of the table. He held a lighted cigar between his fingers. +He took this familiar course because he was sure that preliminaries would be +wasted upon Miss Guilbert. He knew her history, and the small part that the +conventions had played in it. +</p> + +<p> +“Good evening,” he said. “Now, madame, let us come to +business at once. You will observe that I mention no names, but I know who is +in the next room, and what he carries in that valise. That is the point which +brings me here. I have come to dictate terms of surrender.” +</p> + +<p> +The lady neither moved nor replied, but steadily regarded the cigar in +Goodwin’s hand. +</p> + +<p> +“We,” continued the dictator, thoughtfully regarding the neat +buckskin shoe on his gently swinging foot—“I speak for a +considerable majority of the people—demand the return of the stolen funds +belonging to them. Our terms go very little further than that. They are very +simple. As an accredited spokesman, I promise that our interference will cease +if they are accepted. Give up the money, and you and your companion will be +permitted to proceed wherever you will. In fact, assistance will be given you +in the matter of securing a passage by any outgoing vessel you may choose. It +is on my personal responsibility that I add congratulations to the gentleman in +Number 10 upon his taste in feminine charms.” +</p> + +<p> +Returning his cigar to his mouth, Goodwin observed her, and saw that her eyes +followed it and rested upon it with icy and significant concentration. +Apparently she had not heard a word he had said. He understood, tossed the +cigar out the window, and, with an amused laugh, slid from the table to his +feet. +</p> + +<p> +“That is better,” said the lady. “It makes it possible for me +to listen to you. For a second lesson in good manners, you might now tell me by +whom I am being insulted.” +</p> + +<p> +“I am sorry,” said Goodwin, leaning one hand on the table, +“that my time is too brief for devoting much of it to a course of +etiquette. Come, now; I appeal to your good sense. You have shown yourself, in +more than one instance, to be well aware of what is to your advantage. This is +an occasion that demands the exercise of your undoubted intelligence. There is +no mystery here. I am Frank Goodwin; and I have come for the money. I entered +this room at a venture. Had I entered the other I would have had it before now. +Do you want it in words? The gentleman in Number 10 has betrayed a great trust. +He has robbed his people of a large sum, and it is I who will prevent their +losing it. I do not say who that gentleman is; but if I should be forced to see +him and he should prove to be a certain high official of the republic, it will +be my duty to arrest him. The house is guarded. I am offering you liberal +terms. It is not absolutely necessary that I confer personally with the +gentleman in the next room. Bring me the valise containing the money, and we +will call the affair ended.” +</p> + +<p> +The lady arose from her chair and stood for a moment, thinking deeply. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you live here, Mr. Goodwin?” she asked, presently. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +“What is your authority for this intrusion?” +</p> + +<p> +“I am an instrument of the republic. I was advised by wire of the +movements of the—gentleman in Number 10.” +</p> + +<p> +“May I ask you two or three questions? I believe you to be a man more apt +to be truthful than—timid. What sort of a town is this—Coralio, I +think they call it?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not much of a town,” said Goodwin, smiling. “A banana town, +as they run. Grass huts, ’dobes, five or six two-story houses, +accommodations limited, population half-breed Spanish and Indian, Caribs and +blackamoors. No sidewalks to speak of, no amusements. Rather unmoral. +That’s an offhand sketch, of course.” +</p> + +<p> +“Are there any inducements, say in a social or in a business way, for +people to reside here?” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, yes,” answered Goodwin, smiling broadly. “There are no +afternoon teas, no hand-organs, no department stores—and there is no +extradition treaty.” +</p> + +<p> +“He told me,” went on the lady, speaking as if to herself, and with +a slight frown, “that there were towns on this coast of beauty and +importance; that there was a pleasing social order—especially an American +colony of cultured residents.” +</p> + +<p> +“There is an American colony,” said Goodwin, gazing at her in some +wonder. “Some of the members are all right. Some are fugitives from +justice from the States. I recall two exiled bank presidents, one army +paymaster under a cloud, a couple of manslayers, and a widow—arsenic, I +believe, was the suspicion in her case. I myself complete the colony, but, as +yet, I have not distinguished myself by any particular crime.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do not lose hope,” said the lady, dryly; “I see nothing in +your actions to-night to guarantee you further obscurity. Some mistake has been +made; I do not know just where. But <i>him</i> you shall not disturb to-night. +The journey has fatigued him so that he has fallen asleep, I think, in his +clothes. You talk of stolen money! I do not understand you. Some mistake has +been made. I will convince you. Remain where you are and I will bring you the +valise that you seem to covet so, and show it to you.” +</p> + +<p> +She moved toward the closed door that connected the two rooms, but stopped, and +half turned and bestowed upon Goodwin a grave, searching look that ended in a +quizzical smile. +</p> + +<p> +“You force my door,” she said, “and you follow your ruffianly +behaviour with the basest accusations; and yet”—she hesitated, as +if to reconsider what she was about to say—“and yet—it is a +puzzling thing—I am sure there has been some mistake.” +</p> + +<p> +She took a step toward the door, but Goodwin stayed her by a light touch upon +her arm. I have said before that women turned to look at him in the streets. He +was the viking sort of man, big, good-looking, and with an air of kindly +truculence. She was dark and proud, glowing or pale as her mood moved her. I do +not know if Eve were light or dark, but if such a woman had stood in the garden +I know that the apple would have been eaten. This woman was to be +Goodwin’s fate, and he did not know it; but he must have felt the first +throes of destiny, for, as he faced her, the knowledge of what report named her +turned bitter in his throat. +</p> + +<p> +“If there has been any mistake,” he said, hotly, “it was +yours. I do not blame the man who has lost his country, his honour, and is +about to lose the poor consolation of his stolen riches as much as I blame you, +for, by Heaven! I can very well see how he was brought to it. I can understand, +and pity him. It is such women as you that strew this degraded coast with +wretched exiles, that make men forget their trusts, that drag—” +</p> + +<p> +The lady interrupted him with a weary gesture. +</p> + +<p> +“There is no need to continue your insults,” she said, coldly. +“I do not understand what you are saying, nor do I know what mad blunder +you are making; but if the inspection of the contents of a gentleman’s +portmanteau will rid me of you, let us delay it no longer.” +</p> + +<p> +She passed quickly and noiselessly into the other room, and returned with the +heavy leather valise, which she handed to the American with an air of patient +contempt. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin set the valise quickly upon the table and began to unfasten the straps. +The lady stood by, with an expression of infinite scorn and weariness upon her +face. +</p> + +<p> +The valise opened wide to a powerful, sidelong wrench. Goodwin dragged out two +or three articles of clothing, exposing the bulk of its contents—package +after package of tightly packed United States bank and treasury notes of large +denomination. Reckoning from the high figures written upon the paper bands that +bound them, the total must have come closely upon the hundred thousand mark. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin glanced swiftly at the woman, and saw, with surprise and a thrill of +pleasure that he wondered at, that she had experienced an unmistakable shock. +Her eyes grew wide, she gasped, and leaned heavily against the table. She had +been ignorant, then, he inferred, that her companion had looted the government +treasury. But why, he angrily asked himself, should he be so well pleased to +think this wandering and unscrupulous singer not so black as report had painted +her? +</p> + +<p> +A noise in the other room startled them both. The door swung open, and a tall, +elderly, dark complexioned man, recently shaven, hurried into the room. +</p> + +<p> +All the pictures of President Miraflores represent him as the possessor of a +luxuriant supply of dark and carefully tended whiskers; but the story of the +barber, Estebán, had prepared Goodwin for the change. +</p> + +<p> +The man stumbled in from the dark room, his eyes blinking at the lamplight, and +heavy from sleep. +</p> + +<p> +“What does this mean?” he demanded in excellent English, with a +keen and perturbed look at the American—“robbery?” +</p> + +<p> +“Very near it,” answered Goodwin. “But I rather think +I’m in time to prevent it. I represent the people to whom this money +belongs, and I have come to convey it back to them.” He thrust his hand +into a pocket of his loose, linen coat. +</p> + +<p> +The other man’s hand went quickly behind him. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t draw,” called Goodwin, sharply; “I’ve got +you covered from my pocket.” +</p> + +<p> +The lady stepped forward, and laid one hand upon the shoulder of her hesitating +companion. She pointed to the table. “Tell me the truth—the +truth,” she said, in a low voice. “Whose money is that?” +</p> + +<p> +The man did not answer. He gave a deep, long-drawn sigh, leaned and kissed her +on the forehead, stepped back into the other room and closed the door. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin foresaw his purpose, and jumped for the door, but the report of the +pistol echoed as his hand touched the knob. A heavy fall followed, and some one +swept him aside and struggled into the room of the fallen man. +</p> + +<p> +A desolation, thought Goodwin, greater than that derived from the loss of +cavalier and gold must have been in the heart of the enchantress to have wrung +from her, in that moment, the cry of one turning to the all-forgiving, +all-comforting earthly consoler—to have made her call out from that +bloody and dishonoured room—“Oh, mother, mother, mother!” +</p> + +<p> +But there was an alarm outside. The barber, Estebán, at the sound of the shot, +had raised his voice; and the shot itself had aroused half the town. A +pattering of feet came up the street, and official orders rang out on the still +air. Goodwin had a duty to perform. Circumstances had made him the custodian of +his adopted country’s treasure. Swiftly cramming the money into the +valise, he closed it, leaned far out of the window and dropped it into a thick +orange-tree in the little inclosure below. +</p> + +<p class="p2"> +They will tell you in Coralio, as they delight in telling the stranger, of the +conclusion of that tragic flight. They will tell you how the upholders of the +law came apace when the alarm was sounded—the <i>Comandante</i> in red +slippers and a jacket like a head waiter’s and girded sword, the soldiers +with their interminable guns, followed by outnumbering officers struggling into +their gold lace and epaulettes; the barefooted policemen (the only capables in +the lot), and ruffled citizens of every hue and description. +</p> + +<p> +They say that the countenance of the dead man was marred sadly by the effects +of the shot; but he was identified as the fallen president by both Goodwin and +the barber Estebán. On the next morning messages began to come over the mended +telegraph wire; and the story of the flight from the capital was given out to +the public. In San Mateo the revolutionary party had seized the sceptre of +government, without opposition, and the <i>vivas</i> of the mercurial populace +quickly effaced the interest belonging to the unfortunate Miraflores. +</p> + +<p> +They will relate to you how the new government sifted the towns and raked the +roads to find the valise containing Anchuria’s surplus capital, which the +president was known to have carried with him, but all in vain. In Coralio Señor +Goodwin himself led the searching party which combed that town as carefully as +a woman combs her hair; but the money was not found. +</p> + +<p> +So they buried the dead man, without honours, back of the town near the little +bridge that spans the mangrove swamp; and for a <i>real</i> a boy will show you +his grave. They say that the old woman in whose hut the barber shaved the +president placed the wooden slab at his head, and burned the inscription upon +it with a hot iron. +</p> + +<p> +You will hear also that Señor Goodwin, like a tower of strength, shielded Doña +Isabel Guilbert through those subsequent distressful days; and that his +scruples as to her past career (if he had any) vanished; and her adventuresome +waywardness (if she had any) left her, and they were wedded and were happy. +</p> + +<p> +The American built a home on a little foothill near the town. It is a +conglomerate structure of native woods that, exported, would be worth a +fortune, and of brick, palm, glass, bamboo and adobe. There is a paradise of +nature about it; and something of the same sort within. The natives speak of +its interior with hands uplifted in admiration. There are floors polished like +mirrors and covered with hand-woven Indian rugs of silk fibre, tall ornaments +and pictures, musical instruments and papered +walls—“figure-it-to-yourself!” they exclaim. +</p> + +<p> +But they cannot tell you in Coralio (as you shall learn) what became of the +money that Frank Goodwin dropped into the orange-tree. But that shall come +later; for the palms are fluttering in the breeze, bidding us to sport and +gaiety. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap05"></a>V<br/> +CUPID’S EXILE NUMBER TWO</h2> + +<p> +The United States of America, after looking over its stock of consular timber, +selected Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood, of Dalesburg, Alabama, for a successor +to Willard Geddie, resigned. +</p> + +<p> +Without prejudice to Mr. Atwood, it will have to be acknowledged that, in this +instance, it was the man who sought the office. As with the self-banished +Geddie, it was nothing less than the artful smiles of lovely woman that had +driven Johnny Atwood to the desperate expedient of accepting office under a +despised Federal Government so that he might go far, far away and never see +again the false, fair face that had wrecked his young life. The consulship at +Coralio seemed to offer a retreat sufficiently removed and romantic enough to +inject the necessary drama into the pastoral scenes of Dalesburg life. +</p> + +<p> +It was while playing the part of Cupid’s exile that Johnny added his +handiwork to the long list of casualties along the Spanish Main by his famous +manipulation of the shoe market, and his unparalleled feat of elevating the +most despised and useless weed in his own country from obscurity to be a +valuable product in international commerce. +</p> + +<p> +The trouble began, as trouble often begins instead of ending, with a romance. +In Dalesburg there was a man named Elijah Hemstetter, who kept a general store. +His family consisted of one daughter called Rosine, a name that atoned much for +“Hemstetter.” This young woman was possessed of plentiful +attractions, so that the young men of the community were agitated in their +bosoms. Among the more agitated was Johnny, the son of Judge Atwood, who lived +in the big colonial mansion on the edge of Dalesburg. +</p> + +<p> +It would seem that the desirable Rosine should have been pleased to return the +affection of an Atwood, a name honoured all over the state long before and +since the war. It does seem that she should have gladly consented to have been +led into that stately but rather empty colonial mansion. But not so. There was +a cloud on the horizon, a threatening, cumulus cloud, in the shape of a lively +and shrewd young farmer in the neighbourhood who dared to enter the lists as a +rival to the high-born Atwood. +</p> + +<p> +One night Johnny propounded to Rosine a question that is considered of much +importance by the young of the human species. The accessories were all +there—moonlight, oleanders, magnolias, the mock-bird’s song. +Whether or no the shadow of Pinkney Dawson, the prosperous young farmer, came +between them on that occasion is not known; but Rosine’s answer was +unfavourable. Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood bowed till his hat touched the +lawn grass, and went away with his head high, but with a sore wound in his +pedigree and heart. A Hemstetter refuse an Atwood! Zounds! +</p> + +<p> +Among other accidents of that year was a Democratic president. Judge Atwood was +a warhorse of Democracy. Johnny persuaded him to set the wheels moving for some +foreign appointment. He would go away—away. Perhaps in years to come +Rosine would think how true, how faithful his love had been, and would drop a +tear—maybe in the cream she would be skimming for Pink Dawson’s +breakfast. +</p> + +<p> +The wheels of politics revolved; and Johnny was appointed consul to Coralio. +Just before leaving he dropped in at Hemstetter’s to say good-bye. There +was a queer, pinkish look about Rosine’s eyes; and had the two been +alone, the United States might have had to cast about for another consul. But +Pink Dawson was there, of course, talking about his 400-acre orchard, and the +three-mile alfalfa tract, and the 200-acre pasture. So Johnny shook hands with +Rosine as coolly as if he were only going to run up to Montgomery for a couple +of days. They had the royal manner when they chose, those Atwoods. +</p> + +<p> +“If you happen to strike anything in the way of a good investment down +there, Johnny,” said Pink Dawson, “just let me know, will you? I +reckon I could lay my hands on a few extra thousands ’most any time for a +profitable deal.” +</p> + +<p> +“Certainly, Pink,” said Johnny, pleasantly. “If I strike +anything of the sort I’ll let you in with pleasure.” +</p> + +<p> +So Johnny went down to Mobile and took a fruit steamer for the coast of +Anchuria. +</p> + +<p> +When the new consul arrived in Coralio the strangeness of the scenes diverted +him much. He was only twenty-two; and the grief of youth is not worn like a +garment as it is by older men. It has its seasons when it reigns; and then it +is unseated for a time by the assertion of the keen senses. +</p> + +<p> +Billy Keogh and Johnny seemed to conceive a mutual friendship at once. Keogh +took the new consul about town and presented him to the handful of Americans +and the smaller number of French and Germans who made up the +“foreign” contingent. And then, of course, he had to be more +formally introduced to the native officials, and have his credentials +transmitted through an interpreter. +</p> + +<p> +There was something about the young Southerner that the sophisticated Keogh +liked. His manner was simple almost to boyishness; but he possessed the cool +carelessness of a man of far greater age and experience. Neither uniforms nor +titles, red tape nor foreign languages, mountains nor sea weighed upon his +spirits. He was heir to all the ages, an Atwood, of Dalesburg; and you might +know every thought conceived in his bosom. +</p> + +<p> +Geddie came down to the consulate to explain the duties and workings of the +office. He and Keogh tried to interest the new consul in their description of +the work that his government expected him to perform. +</p> + +<p> +“It’s all right,” said Johnny from the hammock that he had +set up as the official reclining place. “If anything turns up that has to +be done I’ll let you fellows do it. You can’t expect a Democrat to +work during his first term of holding office.” +</p> + +<p> +“You might look over these headings,” suggested Geddie, “of +the different lines of exports you will have to keep account of. The fruit is +classified; and there are the valuable woods, coffee, rubber—” +</p> + +<p> +“That last account sounds all right,” interrupted Mr. Atwood. +“Sounds as if it could be stretched. I want to buy a new flag, a monkey, +a guitar and a barrel of pineapples. Will that rubber account stretch over +’em?” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s merely statistics,” said Geddie, smiling. “The +expense account is what you want. It is supposed to have a slight elasticity. +The ‘stationery’ items are sometimes carelessly audited by the +State Department.” +</p> + +<p> +“We’re wasting our time,” said Keogh. “This man was +born to hold office. He penetrates to the root of the art at one step of his +eagle eye. The true genius of government shows its hand in every word of his +speech.” +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t take this job with any intention of working,” +explained Johnny, lazily. “I wanted to go somewhere in the world where +they didn’t talk about farms. There are none here, are there?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not the kind you are acquainted with,” answered the ex-consul. +“There is no such art here as agriculture. There never was a plow or a +reaper within the boundaries of Anchuria.” +</p> + +<p> +“This is the country for me,” murmured the consul, and immediately +he fell asleep. +</p> + +<p> +The cheerful tintypist pursued his intimacy with Johnny in spite of open +charges that he did so to obtain a preëmption on a seat in that coveted spot, +the rear gallery of the consulate. But whether his designs were selfish or +purely friendly, Keogh achieved that desirable privilege. Few were the nights +on which the two could not be found reposing there in the sea breeze, with +their heels on the railing, and the cigars and brandy conveniently near. +</p> + +<p> +One evening they sat thus, mainly silent, for their talk had dwindled before +the stilling influence of an unusual night. +</p> + +<p> +There was a great, full moon; and the sea was mother-of-pearl. Almost every +sound was hushed, for the air was but faintly stirring; and the town lay +panting, waiting for the night to cool. Offshore lay the fruit steamer +<i>Andador</i>, of the Vesuvius line, full-laden and scheduled to sail at six +in the morning. There were no loiterers on the beach. So bright was the +moonlight that the two men could see the small pebbles shining on the beach +where the gentle surf wetted them. +</p> + +<p> +Then down the coast, tacking close to shore, slowly swam a little sloop, +white-winged like some snowy sea fowl. Its course lay within twenty points of +the wind’s eye; so it veered in and out again in long, slow strokes like +the movements of a graceful skater. +</p> + +<p> +Again the tactics of its crew brought it close in shore, this time nearly +opposite the consulate; and then there blew from the sloop clear and surprising +notes as if from a horn of elfland. A fairy bugle it might have been, sweet and +silvery and unexpected, playing with spirit the familiar air of “Home, +Sweet Home.” +</p> + +<p> +It was a scene set for the land of the lotus. The authority of the sea and the +tropics, the mystery that attends unknown sails, and the prestige of drifting +music on moonlit waters gave it an anodynous charm. Johnny Atwood felt it, and +thought of Dalesburg; but as soon as Keogh’s mind had arrived at a theory +concerning the peripatetic solo he sprang to the railing, and his ear-rending +yawp fractured the silence of Coralio like a cannon shot. +</p> + +<p> +“Mel-lin-ger a-hoy!” +</p> + +<p> +The sloop was now on its outward tack; but from it came a clear, answering +hail: +</p> + +<p> +“Good-bye, Billy … go-ing home—bye!” +</p> + +<p> +The <i>Andador</i> was the sloop’s destination. No doubt some passenger +with a sailing permit from some up-the-coast point had come down in this sloop +to catch the regular fruit steamer on its return trip. Like a coquettish pigeon +the little boat tacked on its eccentric way until at last its white sail was +lost to sight against the larger bulk of the fruiter’s side. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s old H. P. Mellinger,” explained Keogh, dropping back +into his chair. “He’s going back to New York. He was private +secretary of the late hot-foot president of this grocery and fruit stand that +they call a country. His job’s over now; and I guess old Mellinger is +glad.” +</p> + +<p> +“Why does he disappear to music, like Zo-zo, the magic queen?” +asked Johnny. “Just to show ’em that he doesn’t care?” +</p> + +<p> +“That noise you heard is a phonograph,” said Keogh. “I sold +him that. Mellinger had a graft in this country that was the only thing of its +kind in the world. The tooting machine saved it for him once, and he always +carried it around with him afterward.” +</p> + +<p> +“Tell me about it,” demanded Johnny, betraying interest. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m no disseminator of narratives,” said Keogh. “I can +use language for purposes of speech; but when I attempt a discourse the words +come out as they will, and they may make sense when they strike the atmosphere, +or they may not.” +</p> + +<p> +“I want to hear about that graft,” persisted Johnny. +“You’ve got no right to refuse. I’ve told you all about every +man, woman and hitching post in Dalesburg.” +</p> + +<p> +“You shall hear it,” said Keogh. “I said my instincts of +narrative were perplexed. Don’t you believe it. It’s an art +I’ve acquired along with many other of the graces and sciences.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap06"></a>VI<br/> +THE PHONOGRAPH AND THE GRAFT</h2> + +<p> +“What was this graft?” asked Johnny, with the impatience of the +great public to whom tales are told. +</p> + +<p> +“’Tis contrary to art and philosophy to give you the +information,” said Keogh, calmly. “The art of narrative consists in +concealing from your audience everything it wants to know until after you +expose your favourite opinions on topics foreign to the subject. A good story +is like a bitter pill with the sugar coating inside of it. I will begin, if you +please, with a horoscope located in the Cherokee Nation; and end with a moral +tune on the phonograph. +</p> + +<p> +“Me and Henry Horsecollar brought the first phonograph to this country. +Henry was a quarter-breed, quarter-back Cherokee, educated East in the idioms +of football, and West in contraband whisky, and a gentleman, the same as you +and me. He was easy and romping in his ways; a man about six foot, with a kind +of rubber-tire movement. Yes, he was a little man about five foot five, or five +foot eleven. He was what you would call a medium tall man of average smallness. +Henry had quit college once, and the Muscogee jail three times—the +last-named institution on account of introducing and selling whisky in the +territories. Henry Horsecollar never let any cigar stores come up and stand +behind him. He didn’t belong to that tribe of Indians. +</p> + +<p> +“Henry and me met at Texarkana, and figured out this phonograph scheme. +He had $360 which came to him out of a land allotment in the reservation. I had +run down from Little Rock on account of a distressful scene I had witnessed on +the street there. A man stood on a box and passed around some gold watches, +screw case, stem-winders, Elgin movement, very elegant. Twenty bucks they cost +you over the counter. At three dollars the crowd fought for the tickers. The +man happened to find a valise full of them handy, and he passed them out like +putting hot biscuits on a plate. The backs were hard to unscrew, but the crowd +put its ear to the case, and they ticked mollifying and agreeable. Three of +these watches were genuine tickers; the rest were only kickers. Hey? Why, empty +cases with one of them horny black bugs that fly around electric lights in +’em. Them bugs kick off minutes and seconds industrious and beautiful. +So, this man I was speaking of cleaned up $288; and then he went away, because +he knew that when it came time to wind watches in Little Rock an entomologist +would be needed, and he wasn’t one. +</p> + +<p> +“So, as I say, Henry had $360, and I had $288. The idea of introducing +the phonograph to South America was Henry’s; but I took to it freely, +being fond of machinery of all kinds. +</p> + +<p> +“‘The Latin races,’ says Henry, explaining easy in the idioms +he learned at college, ‘are peculiarly adapted to be victims of the +phonograph. They have the artistic temperament. They yearn for music and color +and gaiety. They give wampum to the hand-organ man and the four-legged chicken +in the tent when they’re months behind with the grocery and the +bread-fruit tree.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Then,’ says I, ‘we’ll export canned music to +the Latins; but I’m mindful of Mr. Julius Cæsar’s account of +’em where he says: “<i>Omnia Gallia in tres partes divisa +est</i>;” which is the same as to say, “We will need all of our +gall in devising means to tree them parties.”’ +</p> + +<p> +“I hated to make a show of education; but I was disinclined to be +overdone in syntax by a mere Indian, a member of a race to which we owe nothing +except the land on which the United States is situated. +</p> + +<p> +“We bought a fine phonograph in Texarkana—one of the best +make—and half a trunkful of records. We packed up, and took the T. and P. +for New Orleans. From that celebrated centre of molasses and disfranchised coon +songs we took a steamer for South America. +</p> + +<p> +“We landed at Solitas, forty miles up the coast from here. ’Twas a +palatable enough place to look at. The houses were clean and white; and to look +at ’em stuck around among the scenery they reminded you of hard-boiled +eggs served with lettuce. There was a block of skyscraper mountains in the +suburbs; and they kept pretty quiet, like they had crept up there and were +watching the town. And the sea was remarking ‘Sh-sh-sh’ on the +beach; and now and then a ripe cocoanut would drop kerblip in the sand; and +that was all there was doing. Yes, I judge that town was considerably on the +quiet. I judge that after Gabriel quits blowing his horn, and the car starts, +with Philadelphia swinging to the last strap, and Pine Gully, Arkansas, hanging +onto the rear step, this town of Solitas will wake up and ask if anybody spoke. +</p> + +<p> +“The captain went ashore with us, and offered to conduct what he seemed +to like to call the obsequies. He introduced Henry and me to the United States +Consul, and a roan man, the head of the Department of Mercenary and Licentious +Dispositions, the way it read upon his sign. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I touch here again a week from to-day,’ says the captain. +</p> + +<p> +“‘By that time,’ we told him, ‘we’ll be amassing +wealth in the interior towns with our galvanized prima donna and correct +imitations of Sousa’s band excavating a march from a tin mine.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Ye’ll not,’ says the captain. ‘Ye’ll be +hypnotized. Any gentleman in the audience who kindly steps upon the stage and +looks this country in the eye will be converted to the hypothesis that +he’s but a fly in the Elgin creamery. Ye’ll be standing knee deep +in the surf waiting for me, and your machine for making Hamburger steak out of +the hitherto respected art of music will be playing “There’s no +place like home.”’ +</p> + +<p> +“Henry skinned a twenty off his roll, and received from the Bureau of +Mercenary Dispositions a paper bearing a red seal and a dialect story, and no +change. +</p> + +<p> +“Then we got the consul full of red wine, and struck him for a horoscope. +He was a thin, youngish kind of man, I should say past fifty, sort of +French-Irish in his affections, and puffed up with disconsolation. Yes, he was +a flattened kind of a man, in whom drink lay stagnant, inclined to corpulence +and misery. Yes, I think he was a kind of Dutchman, being very sad and genial +in his ways. +</p> + +<p> +“‘The marvelous invention,’ he says, ‘entitled the +phonograph, has never invaded these shores. The people have never heard it. +They would not believe it if they should. Simple-hearted children of nature, +progress has never condemned them to accept the work of a can-opener as an +overture, and rag-time might incite them to a bloody revolution. But you can +try the experiment. The best chance you have is that the populace may not wake +up when you play. There’s two ways,’ says the consul, ‘they +may take it. They may become inebriated with attention, like an Atlanta colonel +listening to “Marching Through Georgia,” or they will get excited +and transpose the key of the music with an axe and yourselves into a dungeon. +In the latter case,’ says the consul, ‘I’ll do my duty by +cabling to the State Department, and I’ll wrap the Stars and Stripes +around you when you come to be shot, and threaten them with the vengeance of +the greatest gold export and financial reserve nation on earth. The flag is +full of bullet holes now,’ says the consul, ‘made in that way. +Twice before,’ says the consul, ‘I have cabled our government for a +couple of gunboats to protect American citizens. The first time the Department +sent me a pair of gum boots. The other time was when a man named Pease was +going to be executed here. They referred that appeal to the Secretary of +Agriculture. Let us now disturb the señor behind the bar for a subsequence of +the red wine.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Thus soliloquized the consul of Solitas to me and Henry Horsecollar. +</p> + +<p> +“But, notwithstanding, we hired a room that afternoon in the Calle de los +Angeles, the main street that runs along the shore, and put our trunks there. +’Twas a good-sized room, dark and cheerful, but small. ’Twas on a +various street, diversified by houses and conservatory plants. The peasantry of +the city passed to and fro on the fine pasturage between the sidewalks. +’Twas, for the world, like an opera chorus when the Royal Kafoozlum is +about to enter. +</p> + +<p> +“We were rubbing the dust off the machine and getting fixed to start +business the next day, when a big, fine-looking white man in white clothes +stopped at the door and looked in. We extended the invitations, and he walked +inside and sized us up. He was chewing a long cigar, and wrinkling his eyes, +meditative, like a girl trying to decide which dress to wear to the party. +</p> + +<p> +“‘New York?’ he says to me finally. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Originally, and from time to time,’ I says. +‘Hasn’t it rubbed off yet?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘It’s simple,’ says he, ‘when you know how. +It’s the fit of the vest. They don’t cut vests right anywhere else. +Coats, maybe, but not vests.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The white man looks at Henry Horsecollar and hesitates. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Injun,’ says Henry; ‘tame Injun.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mellinger,’ says the man—‘Homer P. Mellinger. +Boys, you’re confiscated. You’re babes in the wood without a +chaperon or referee, and it’s my duty to start you going. I’ll +knock out the props and launch you proper in the pellucid waters of this +tropical mud puddle. You’ll have to be christened, and if you’ll +come with me I’ll break a bottle of wine across your bows, according to +Hoyle.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Well, for two days Homer P. Mellinger did the honors. That man cut ice +in Anchuria. He was It. He was the Royal Kafoozlum. If me and Henry was babes +in the wood, he was a Robin Redbreast from the topmost bough. Him and me and +Henry Horsecollar locked arms, and toted that phonograph around, and had +wassail and diversions. Everywhere we found doors open we went inside and set +the machine going, and Mellinger called upon the people to observe the artful +music and his two lifelong friends, the Señors Americanos. The opera chorus was +agitated with esteem, and followed us from house to house. There was a +different kind of drink to be had with every tune. The natives had acquirements +of a pleasant thing in the way of a drink that gums itself to the recollection. +They chop off the end of a green cocoanut, and pour in on the juice of it +French brandy and other adjuvants. We had them and other things. +</p> + +<p> +“Mine and Henry’s money was counterfeit. Everything was on Homer P. +Mellinger. That man could find rolls of bills concealed in places on his person +where Hermann the Wizard couldn’t have conjured out a rabbit or an +omelette. He could have founded universities, and made orchid collections, and +then had enough left to purchase the colored vote of his country. Henry and me +wondered what his graft was. One evening he told us. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Boys,’ said he, ‘I’ve deceived you. You think +I’m a painted butterfly; but in fact I’m the hardest worked man in +this country. Ten years ago I landed on its shores; and two years ago on the +point of its jaw. Yes, I guess I can get the decision over this ginger cake +commonwealth at the end of any round I choose. I’ll confide in you +because you are my countrymen and guests, even if you have assaulted my adopted +shores with the worst system of noises ever set to music. +</p> + +<p> +“‘My job is private secretary to the president of this republic; +and my duties are running it. I’m not headlined in the bills, but +I’m the mustard in the salad dressing just the same. There isn’t a +law goes before Congress, there isn’t a concession granted, there +isn’t an import duty levied but what H. P. Mellinger he cooks and seasons +it. In the front office I fill the president’s inkstand and search +visiting statesmen for dirks and dynamite; but in the back room I dictate the +policy of the government. You’d never guess in the world how I got my +pull. It’s the only graft of its kind on earth. I’ll put you wise. +You remember the old top-liner in the copy book—“Honesty is the +Best Policy”? That’s it. I’m working honesty for a graft. +I’m the only honest man in the republic. The government knows it; the +people know it; the boodlers know it; the foreign investors know it. I make the +government keep its faith. If a man is promised a job he gets it. If outside +capital buys a concession it gets the goods. I run a monopoly of square dealing +here. There’s no competition. If Colonel Diogenes were to flash his +lantern in this precinct he’d have my address inside of two minutes. +There isn’t big money in it, but it’s a sure thing, and lets a man +sleep of nights.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Thus Homer P. Mellinger made oration to me and Henry Horsecollar. And, +later, he divested himself of this remark: +</p> + +<p> +“‘Boys, I’m to hold a <i>soirée</i> this evening with a gang +of leading citizens, and I want your assistance. You bring the musical corn +sheller and give the affair the outside appearance of a function. There’s +important business on hand, but it mustn’t show. I can talk to you +people. I’ve been pained for years on account of not having anybody to +blow off and brag to. I get homesick sometimes, and I’d swap the entire +perquisites of office for just one hour to have a stein and a caviare sandwich +somewhere on Thirty-fourth Street, and stand and watch the street cars go by, +and smell the peanut roaster at old Giuseppe’s fruit stand.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Yes,’ said I, ‘there’s fine caviare at Billy +Renfrew’s café, corner of Thirty-fourth and—’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘God knows it,’ interrupts Mellinger, ‘and if +you’d told me you knew Billy Renfrew I’d have invented tons of ways +of making you happy. Billy was my side-kicker in New York. There is a man who +never knew what crooked was. Here I am working Honesty for a graft, but that +man loses money on it. Carrambos! I get sick at times of this country. +Everything’s rotten. From the executive down to the coffee pickers, +they’re plotting to down each other and skin their friends. If a mule +driver takes off his hat to an official, that man figures it out that +he’s a popular idol, and sets his pegs to stir up a revolution and upset +the administration. It’s one of my little chores as private secretary to +smell out these revolutions and affix the kibosh before they break out and +scratch the paint off the government property. That’s why I’m down +here now in this mildewed coast town. The governor of the district and his crew +are plotting to uprise. I’ve got every one of their names, and +they’re invited to listen to the phonograph to-night, compliments of H. +P. M. That’s the way I’ll get them in a bunch, and things are on +the programme to happen to them.’ +</p> + +<p> +“We three were sitting at table in the cantina of the Purified Saints. +Mellinger poured out wine, and was looking some worried; I was thinking. +</p> + +<p> +“‘They’re a sharp crowd,’ he says, kind of fretful. +‘They’re capitalized by a foreign syndicate after rubber, and +they’re loaded to the muzzle for bribing. I’m sick,’ goes on +Mellinger, ‘of comic opera. I want to smell East River and wear +suspenders again. At times I feel like throwing up my job, but I’m +d——n fool enough to be sort of proud of it. “There’s +Mellinger,” they say here. “<i>Por Dios!</i> you can’t touch +him with a million.” I’d like to take that record back and show it +to Billy Renfrew some day; and that tightens my grip whenever I see a fat thing +that I could corral just by winking one eye—and losing my graft. By +——, they can’t monkey with me. They know it. What money I get +I make honest and spend it. Some day I’ll make a pile and go back and eat +caviare with Billy. To-night I’ll show you how to handle a bunch of +corruptionists. I’ll show them what Mellinger, private secretary, means +when you spell it with the cotton and tissue paper off.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Mellinger appears shaky, and breaks his glass against the neck of the +bottle. +</p> + +<p> +“I says to myself, ‘White man, if I’m not mistaken +there’s been a bait laid out where the tail of your eye could see +it.’ +</p> + +<p> +“That night, according to arrangements, me and Henry took the phonograph +to a room in a ’dobe house in a dirty side street, where the grass was +knee high. ’Twas a long room, lit with smoky oil lamps. There was plenty +of chairs, and a table at the back end. We set the phonograph on the table. +Mellinger was there, walking up and down, disturbed in his predicaments. He +chewed cigars and spat ’em out, and he bit the thumb nail of his left +hand. +</p> + +<p> +“By and by the invitations to the musicale came sliding in by pairs and +threes and spade flushes. Their colour was of a diversity, running from a +three-days’ smoked meerschaum to a patent-leather polish. They were as +polite as wax, being devastated with enjoyments to give Señor Mellinger the +good evenings. I understood their Spanish talk—I ran a pumping engine two +years in a Mexican silver mine, and had it pat—but I never let on. +</p> + +<p> +“Maybe fifty of ’em had come, and was seated, when in slid the king +bee, the governor of the district. Mellinger met him at the door, and escorted +him to the grand stand. When I saw that Latin man I knew that Mellinger, +private secretary, had all the dances on his card taken. That was a big, +squashy man, the colour of a rubber overshoe, and he had an eye like a head +waiter’s. +</p> + +<p> +“Mellinger explained, fluent, in the Castilian idioms, that his soul was +disconcerted with joy at introducing to his respected friends America’s +greatest invention, the wonder of the age. Henry got the cue and run on an +elegant brass-band record and the festivities became initiated. The governor +man had a bit of English under his hat, and when the music was choked off he +says: +</p> + +<p> +“‘Ver-r-ree fine. <i>Gr-r-r-r-racias</i>, the American gentleemen, +the so esplendeed moosic as to playee.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The table was a long one, and Henry and me sat at the end of it next the +wall. The governor sat at the other end. Homer P. Mellinger stood at the side +of it. I was just wondering how Mellinger was going to handle his crowd, when +the home talent suddenly opened the services. +</p> + +<p> +“That governor man was suitable for uprisings and policies. I judge he +was a ready kind of man, who took his own time. Yes, he was full of attention +and immediateness. He leaned his hands on the table and imposed his face toward +the secretary man. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Do the American señors understand Spanish?’ he asks in his +native accents. +</p> + +<p> +“‘They do not,’ says Mellinger. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Then listen,’ goes on the Latin man, prompt. ‘The +musics are of sufficient prettiness, but not of necessity. Let us speak of +business. I well know why we are here, since I observe my compatriots. You had +a whisper yesterday, Señor Mellinger, of our proposals. To-night we will speak +out. We know that you stand in the president’s favour, and we know your +influence. The government will be changed. We know the worth of your services. +We esteem your friendship and aid so much that’—Mellinger raises +his hand, but the governor man bottles him up. ‘Do not speak until I have +done.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The governor man then draws a package wrapped in paper from his pocket, +and lays it on the table by Mellinger’s hand. +</p> + +<p> +“‘In that you will find fifty thousand dollars in money of your +country. You can do nothing against us, but you can be worth that for us. Go +back to the capital and obey our instructions. Take that money now. We trust +you. You will find with it a paper giving in detail the work you will be +expected to do for us. Do not have the unwiseness to refuse.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The governor man paused, with his eyes fixed on Mellinger, full of +expressions and observances. I looked at Mellinger, and was glad Billy Renfrew +couldn’t see him then. The sweat was popping out on his forehead, and he +stood dumb, tapping the little package with the ends of his fingers. The +colorado-maduro gang was after his graft. He had only to change his politics, +and stuff five fingers in his inside pocket. +</p> + +<p> +“Henry whispers to me and wants the pause in the programme interpreted. I +whisper back: ‘H. P. is up against a bribe, senator’s size, and the +coons have got him going.’ I saw Mellinger’s hand moving closer to +the package. ‘He’s weakening,’ I whispered to Henry. +‘We’ll remind him,’ says Henry, ‘of the peanut-roaster +on Thirty-fourth Street, New York.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Henry stooped down and got a record from the basketful we’d +brought, slid it in the phonograph, and started her off. It was a cornet solo, +very neat and beautiful, and the name of it was ‘Home, Sweet Home.’ +Not one of them fifty odd men in the room moved while it was playing, and the +governor man kept his eyes steady on Mellinger. I saw Mellinger’s head go +up little by little, and his hand came creeping away from the package. Not +until the last note sounded did anybody stir. And then Homer P. Mellinger takes +up the bundle of boodle and slams it in the governor man’s face. +</p> + +<p> +“‘That’s my answer,’ says Mellinger, private secretary, +‘and there’ll be another in the morning. I have proofs of +conspiracy against every man of you. The show is over, gentlemen.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘There’s one more act,’ puts in the governor man. +‘You are a servant, I believe, employed by the president to copy letters +and answer raps at the door. I am governor here. <i>Señores</i>, I call upon +you in the name of the cause to seize this man.’ +</p> + +<p> +“That brindled gang of conspirators shoved back their chairs and advanced +in force. I could see where Mellinger had made a mistake in massing his enemy +so as to make a grand-stand play. I think he made another one, too; but we can +pass that, Mellinger’s idea of a graft and mine being different, +according to estimations and points of view. +</p> + +<p> +“There was only one window and door in that room, and they were in the +front end. Here was fifty odd Latin men coming in a bunch to obstruct the +legislation of Mellinger. You may say there were three of us, for me and Henry, +simultaneous, declared New York City and the Cherokee Nation in sympathy with +the weaker party. +</p> + +<p> +“Then it was that Henry Horsecollar rose to a point of disorder and +intervened, showing, admirable, the advantages of education as applied to the +American Indian’s natural intellect and native refinement. He stood up +and smoothed back his hair on each side with his hands as you have seen little +girls do when they play. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Get behind me, both of you,’ says Henry. +</p> + +<p> +“‘What’s it to be, chief?’ I asked. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I’m going to buck centre,’ says Henry, in his +football idioms. ‘There isn’t a tackle in the lot of them. Follow +me close, and rush the game.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Then that cultured Red Man exhaled an arrangement of sounds with his +mouth that made the Latin aggregation pause, with thoughtfulness and +hesitations. The matter of his proclamation seemed to be a co-operation of the +Carlisle war-whoop with the Cherokee college yell. He went at the chocolate +team like a bean out of a little boy’s nigger shooter. His right elbow +laid out the governor man on the gridiron, and he made a lane the length of the +crowd so wide that a woman could have carried a step-ladder through it without +striking against anything. All Mellinger and me had to do was to follow. +</p> + +<p> +“It took us just three minutes to get out of that street around to +military headquarters, where Mellinger had things his own way. A colonel and a +battalion of bare-toed infantry turned out and went back to the scene of the +musicale with us, but the conspirator gang was gone. But we recaptured the +phonograph with honours of war, and marched back to the <i>cuartel</i> with it +playing ‘All Coons Look Alike to Me.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The next day Mellinger takes me and Henry to one side, and begins to +shed tens and twenties. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I want to buy that phonograph,’ says he. ‘I liked +that last tune it played at the <i>soirée</i>.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘This is more money than the machine is worth,’ says I. +</p> + +<p> +“‘’Tis government expense money,’ says Mellinger. +‘The government pays for it, and it’s getting the tune-grinder +cheap.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Me and Henry knew that pretty well. We knew that it had saved Homer P. +Mellinger’s graft when he was on the point of losing it; but we never let +him know we knew it. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Now you boys better slide off further down the coast for a +while,’ says Mellinger, ‘till I get the screws put on these fellows +here. If you don’t they’ll give you trouble. And if you ever happen +to see Billy Renfrew again before I do, tell him I’m coming back to New +York as soon as I can make a stake—honest.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Me and Henry laid low until the day the steamer came back. When we saw +the captain’s boat on the beach we went down and stood in the edge of the +water. The captain grinned when he saw us. +</p> + +<p> +“‘I told you you’d be waiting,’ he says. +‘Where’s the Hamburger machine?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘It stays behind,’ I says, ‘to play “Home, Sweet +Home.”’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I told you so,’ says the captain again. ‘Climb in the +boat.’ +</p> + +<p> +“And that,” said Keogh, “is the way me and Henry Horsecollar +introduced the phonograph into this country. Henry went back to the States, but +I’ve been rummaging around in the tropics ever since. They say Mellinger +never travelled a mile after that without his phonograph. I guess it kept him +reminded about his graft whenever he saw the siren voice of the boodler tip him +the wink with a bribe in its hand.” +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose he’s taking it home with him as a souvenir,” +remarked the consul. +</p> + +<p> +“Not as a souvenir,” said Keogh. “He’ll need two of +’em in New York, running day and night.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap07"></a>VII<br/> +MONEY MAZE</h2> + +<p> +The new administration of Anchuria entered upon its duties and privileges with +enthusiasm. Its first act was to send an agent to Coralio with imperative +orders to recover, if possible, the sum of money ravished from the treasury by +the ill-fated Miraflores. +</p> + +<p> +Colonel Emilio Falcon, the private secretary of Losada, the new president, was +despatched from the capital upon this important mission. +</p> + +<p> +The position of private secretary to a tropical president is a responsible one. +He must be a diplomat, a spy, a ruler of men, a body-guard to his chief, and a +smeller-out of plots and nascent revolutions. Often he is the power behind the +throne, the dictator of policy; and a president chooses him with a dozen times +the care with which he selects a matrimonial mate. +</p> + +<p> +Colonel Falcon, a handsome and urbane gentleman of Castilian courtesy and +débonnaire manners, came to Coralio with the task before him of striking upon +the cold trail of the lost money. There he conferred with the military +authorities, who had received instructions to co-operate with him in the +search. +</p> + +<p> +Colonel Falcon established his headquarters in one of the rooms of the Casa +Morena. Here for a week he held informal sittings—much as if he were a +kind of unified grand jury—and summoned before him all those whose +testimony might illumine the financial tragedy that had accompanied the less +momentous one of the late president’s death. +</p> + +<p> +Two or three who were thus examined, among whom was the barber Estebán, +declared that they had identified the body of the president before its burial. +</p> + +<p> +“Of a truth,” testified Estebán before the mighty secretary, +“it was he, the president. Consider!—how could I shave a man and +not see his face? He sent for me to shave him in a small house. He had a beard +very black and thick. Had I ever seen the president before? Why not? I saw him +once ride forth in a carriage from the <i>vapor</i> in Solitas. When I shaved +him he gave me a gold piece, and said there was to be no talk. But I am a +Liberal—I am devoted to my country—and I spake of these things to +Señor Goodwin.” +</p> + +<p> +“It is known,” said Colonel Falcon, smoothly, “that the late +President took with him an American leather valise, containing a large amount +of money. Did you see that?” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>De veras</i>—no,” Estebán answered. “The light in +the little house was but a small lamp by which I could scarcely see to shave +the President. Such a thing there may have been, but I did not see it. No. Also +in the room was a young lady—a señorita of much beauty—that I could +see even in so small a light. But the money, señor, or the thing in which it +was carried—that I did not see.” +</p> + +<p> +The <i>comandante</i> and other officers gave testimony that they had been +awakened and alarmed by the noise of a pistol-shot in the Hotel de los +Estranjeros. Hurrying thither to protect the peace and dignity of the republic, +they found a man lying dead, with a pistol clutched in his hand. Beside him was +a young woman, weeping sorely. Señor Goodwin was also in the room when they +entered it. But of the valise of money they saw nothing. +</p> + +<p> +Madame Timotea Ortiz, the proprietress of the hotel in which the game of +Fox-in-the-Morning had been played out, told of the coming of the two guests to +her house. +</p> + +<p> +“To my house they came,” said she—“one <i>señor</i>, +not quite old, and one <i>señorita</i> of sufficient handsomeness. They desired +not to eat or to drink—not even of my <i>aguardiente</i>, which is the +best. To their rooms they ascended—<i>Numero Nueve</i> and <i>Numero +Diez</i>. Later came Señor Goodwin, who ascended to speak with them. Then I +heard a great noise like that of a <i>canon</i>, and they said that the +<i>pobre Presidente</i> had shot himself. <i>Está bueno.</i> I saw nothing of +money or of the thing you call <i>veliz</i> that you say he carried it +in.” +</p> + +<p> +Colonel Falcon soon came to the reasonable conclusion that if anyone in Coralio +could furnish a clue to the vanished money, Frank Goodwin must be the man. But +the wise secretary pursued a different course in seeking information from the +American. Goodwin was a powerful friend to the new administration, and one who +was not to be carelessly dealt with in respect to either his honesty or his +courage. Even the private secretary of His Excellency hesitated to have this +rubber prince and mahogany baron haled before him as a common citizen of +Anchuria. So he sent Goodwin a flowery epistle, each word-petal dripping with +honey, requesting the favour of an interview. Goodwin replied with an +invitation to dinner at his own house. +</p> + +<p> +Before the hour named the American walked over to the Casa Morena, and greeted +his guest frankly and friendly. Then the two strolled, in the cool of the +afternoon, to Goodwin’s home in the environs. +</p> + +<p> +The American left Colonel Falcon in a big, cool, shadowed room with a floor of +inlaid and polished woods that any millionaire in the States would have envied, +excusing himself for a few minutes. He crossed a <i>patio</i>, shaded with +deftly arranged awnings and plants, and entered a long room looking upon the +sea in the opposite wing of the house. The broad jalousies were opened wide, +and the ocean breeze flowed in through the room, an invisible current of +coolness and health. Goodwin’s wife sat near one of the windows, making a +water-color sketch of the afternoon seascape. +</p> + +<p> +Here was a woman who looked to be happy. And more—she looked to be +content. Had a poet been inspired to pen just similes concerning her favour, he +would have likened her full, clear eyes, with their white-encircled, gray +irises, to moonflowers. With none of the goddesses whose traditional charms +have become coldly classic would the discerning rhymester have compared her. +She was purely Paradisaic, not Olympian. If you can imagine Eve, after the +eviction, beguiling the flaming warriors and serenely re-entering the Garden, +you will have her. Just so human, and still so harmonious with Eden seemed Mrs. +Goodwin. +</p> + +<p> +When her husband entered she looked up, and her lips curved and parted; her +eyelids fluttered twice or thrice—a movement remindful (Poesy forgive +us!) of the tail-wagging of a faithful dog—and a little ripple went +through her like the commotion set up in a weeping willow by a puff of wind. +Thus she ever acknowledged his coming, were it twenty times a day. If they who +sometimes sat over their wine in Coralio, reshaping old, diverting stories of +the madcap career of Isabel Guilbert, could have seen the wife of Frank Goodwin +that afternoon in the estimable aura of her happy wifehood, they might have +disbelieved, or have agreed to forget, those graphic annals of the life of the +one for whom their president gave up his country and his honour. +</p> + +<p> +“I have brought a guest to dinner,” said Goodwin. “One +Colonel Falcon, from San Mateo. He is come on government business. I do not +think you will care to see him, so I prescribe for you one of those convenient +and indisputable feminine headaches.” +</p> + +<p> +“He has come to inquire about the lost money, has he not?” asked +Mrs. Goodwin, going on with her sketch. +</p> + +<p> +“A good guess!” acknowledged Goodwin. “He has been holding an +inquisition among the natives for three days. I am next on his list of +witnesses, but as he feels shy about dragging one of Uncle Sam’s subjects +before him, he consents to give it the outward appearance of a social function. +He will apply the torture over my own wine and provender.” +</p> + +<p> +“Has he found anyone who saw the valise of money?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not a soul. Even Madama Ortiz, whose eyes are so sharp for the sight of +a revenue official, does not remember that there was any baggage.” +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Goodwin laid down her brush and sighed. +</p> + +<p> +“I am so sorry, Frank,” she said, “that they are giving you +so much trouble about the money. But we can’t let them know about it, can +we?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not without doing our intelligence a great injustice,” said +Goodwin, with a smile and a shrug that he had picked up from the natives. +“<i>Americano</i>, though I am, they would have me in the <i>calaboza</i> +in half an hour if they knew we had appropriated that valise. No; we must +appear as ignorant about the money as the other ignoramuses in Coralio.” +</p> + +<p> +“Do you think that this man they have sent suspects you?” she +asked, with a little pucker of her brows. +</p> + +<p> +“He’d better not,” said the American, carelessly. +“It’s lucky that no one caught a sight of the valise except myself. +As I was in the rooms when the shot was fired, it is not surprising that they +should want to investigate my part in the affair rather closely. But +there’s no cause for alarm. This colonel is down on the list of events +for a good dinner, with a dessert of American ‘bluff’ that will end +the matter, I think.” +</p> + +<p> +Mrs. Goodwin rose and walked to the window. Goodwin followed and stood by her +side. She leaned to him, and rested in the protection of his strength, as she +had always rested since that dark night on which he had first made himself her +tower of refuge. Thus they stood for a little while. +</p> + +<p> +Straight through the lavish growth of tropical branch and leaf and vine that +confronted them had been cunningly trimmed a vista, that ended at the cleared +environs of Coralio, on the banks of the mangrove swamp. At the other end of +the aerial tunnel they could see the grave and wooden headpiece that bore the +name of the unhappy President Miraflores. From this window when the rains +forbade the open, and from the green and shady slopes of Goodwin’s +fruitful lands when the skies were smiling, his wife was wont to look upon that +grave with a gentle sadness that was now scarcely a mar to her happiness. +</p> + +<p> +“I loved him so, Frank!” she said, “even after that terrible +flight and its awful ending. And you have been so good to me, and have made me +so happy. It has all grown into such a strange puzzle. If they were to find out +that we got the money do you think they would force you to make the amount good +to the government?” +</p> + +<p> +“They would undoubtedly try,” answered Goodwin. “You are +right about its being a puzzle. And it must remain a puzzle to Falcon and all +his countrymen until it solves itself. You and I, who know more than anyone +else, only know half of the solution. We must not let even a hint about this +money get abroad. Let them come to the theory that the president concealed it +in the mountains during his journey, or that he found means to ship it out of +the country before he reached Coralio. I don’t think that Falcon suspects +me. He is making a close investigation, according to his orders, but he will +find out nothing.” +</p> + +<p> +Thus they spake together. Had anyone overheard or overseen them as they +discussed the lost funds of Anchuria there would have been a second puzzle +presented. For upon the faces and in the bearing of each of them was visible +(if countenances are to be believed) Saxon honesty and pride and honourable +thoughts. In Goodwin’s steady eye and firm lineaments, moulded into +material shape by the inward spirit of kindness and generosity and courage, +there was nothing reconcilable with his words. +</p> + +<p> +As for his wife, physiognomy championed her even in the face of their accusive +talk. Nobility was in her guise; purity was in her glance. The devotion that +she manifested had not even the appearance of that feeling that now and then +inspires a woman to share the guilt of her partner out of the pathetic +greatness of her love. No, there was a discrepancy here between what the eye +would have seen and the ear have heard. +</p> + +<p> +Dinner was served to Goodwin and his guest in the <i>patio</i>, under cool +foliage and flowers. The American begged the illustrious secretary to excuse +the absence of Mrs. Goodwin, who was suffering, he said, from a headache +brought on by a slight <i>calentura</i>. +</p> + +<p> +After the meal they lingered, according to the custom, over their coffee and +cigars. Colonel Falcon, with true Castilian delicacy, waited for his host to +open the question that they had met to discuss. He had not long to wait. As +soon as the cigars were lighted, the American cleared the way by inquiring +whether the secretary’s investigations in the town had furnished him with +any clue to the lost funds. +</p> + +<p> +“I have found no one yet,” admitted Colonel Falcon, “who even +had sight of the valise or the money. Yet I have persisted. It has been proven +in the capital that President Miraflores set out from San Mateo with one +hundred thousand dollars belonging to the government, accompanied by +<i>Señorita</i> Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer. The Government, officially +and personally, is loath to believe,” concluded Colonel Falcon, with a +smile, “that our late President’s tastes would have permitted him +to abandon on the route, as excess baggage, either of the desirable articles +with which his flight was burdened.” +</p> + +<p> +“I suppose you would like to hear what I have to say about the +affair,” said Goodwin, coming directly to the point. “It will not +require many words. +</p> + +<p> +“On that night, with others of our friends here, I was keeping a lookout +for the president, having been notified of his flight by a telegram in our +national cipher from Englehart, one of our leaders in the capital. About ten +o’clock that night I saw a man and a woman hurrying along the streets. +They went to the Hotel de los Estranjeros, and engaged rooms. I followed them +upstairs, leaving Estebán, who had come up, to watch outside. The barber had +told me that he had shaved the beard from the president’s face that +night; therefore I was prepared, when I entered the rooms, to find him with a +smooth face. When I apprehended him in the name of the people he drew a pistol +and shot himself instantly. In a few minutes many officers and citizens were on +the spot. I suppose you have been informed of the subsequent facts.” +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin paused. Losada’s agent maintained an attitude of waiting, as if +he expected a continuance. +</p> + +<p> +“And now,” went on the American, looking steadily into the eyes of +the other man, and giving each word a deliberate emphasis, “you will +oblige me by attending carefully to what I have to add. I saw no valise or +receptacle of any kind, or any money belonging to the Republic of Anchuria. If +President Miraflores decamped with any funds belonging to the treasury of this +country, or to himself, or to anyone else, I saw no trace of it in the house or +elsewhere, at that time or at any other. Does that statement cover the ground +of the inquiry you wished to make of me?” +</p> + +<p> +Colonel Falcon bowed, and described a fluent curve with his cigar. His duty was +performed. Goodwin was not to be disputed. He was a loyal supporter of the +government, and enjoyed the full confidence of the new president. His rectitude +had been the capital that had brought him fortune in Anchuria, just as it had +formed the lucrative “graft” of Mellinger, the secretary of +Miraflores. +</p> + +<p> +“I thank you, <i>Señor</i> Goodwin,” said Falcon, “for +speaking plainly. Your word will be sufficient for the president. But, +<i>Señor</i> Goodwin, I am instructed to pursue every clue that presents itself +in this matter. There is one that I have not yet touched upon. Our friends in +France, <i>señor</i>, have a saying, ‘<i>Cherchez la femme</i>,’ +when there is a mystery without a clue. But here we do not have to search. The +woman who accompanied the late President in his flight must +surely—” +</p> + +<p> +“I must interrupt you there,” interposed Goodwin. “It is true +that when I entered the hotel for the purpose of intercepting President +Miraflores I found a lady there. I must beg of you to remember that that lady +is now my wife. I speak for her as I do for myself. She knows nothing of the +fate of the valise or of the money that you are seeking. You will say to his +excellency that I guarantee her innocence. I do not need to add to you, Colonel +Falcon, that I do not care to have her questioned or disturbed.” +</p> + +<p> +Colonel Falcon bowed again. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Por supuesto</i>, no!” he cried. And to indicate that the +inquiry was ended he added: “And now, <i>señor</i>, let me beg of you to +show me that sea view from your <i>galeria</i> of which you spoke. I am a lover +of the sea.” +</p> + +<p> +In the early evening Goodwin walked back to the town with his guest, leaving +him at the corner of the Calle Grande. As he was returning homeward one +“Beelzebub” Blythe, with the air of a courtier and the outward +aspect of a scarecrow, pounced upon him hopefully from the door of a +<i>pulperia</i>. +</p> + +<p> +Blythe had been re-christened “Beelzebub” as an acknowledgment of +the greatness of his fall. Once in some distant Paradise Lost, he had +foregathered with the angels of the earth. But Fate had hurled him headlong +down to the tropics, where flamed in his bosom a fire that was seldom quenched. +In Coralio they called him a beachcomber; but he was, in reality, a categorical +idealist who strove to anamorphosize the dull verities of life by the means of +brandy and rum. As Beelzebub, himself, might have held in his clutch with +unwitting tenacity his harp or crown during his tremendous fall, so his +namesake had clung to his gold-rimmed eyeglasses as the only souvenir of his +lost estate. These he wore with impressiveness and distinction while he combed +beaches and extracted toll from his friends. By some mysterious means he kept +his drink-reddened face always smoothly shaven. For the rest he sponged +gracefully upon whomsoever he could for enough to keep him pretty drunk, and +sheltered from the rains and night dews. +</p> + +<p> +“Hallo, Goodwin!” called the derelict, airily. “I was hoping +I’d strike you. I wanted to see you particularly. Suppose we go where we +can talk. Of course you know there’s a chap down here looking up the +money old Miraflores lost.” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes,” said Goodwin, “I’ve been talking with him. +Let’s go into Espada’s place. I can spare you ten minutes.” +</p> + +<p> +They went into the <i>pulperia</i> and sat at a little table upon stools with +rawhide tops. +</p> + +<p> +“Have a drink?” said Goodwin. +</p> + +<p> +“They can’t bring it too quickly,” said Blythe. +“I’ve been in a drought ever since morning. +Hi—<i>muchacho!—el aguardiente por acá</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +“Now, what do you want to see me about?” asked Goodwin, when the +drinks were before them. +</p> + +<p> +“Confound it, old man,” drawled Blythe, “why do you spoil a +golden moment like this with business? I wanted to see you—well, this has +the preference.” He gulped down his brandy, and gazed longingly into the +empty glass. +</p> + +<p> +“Have another?” suggested Goodwin. +</p> + +<p> +“Between gentlemen,” said the fallen angel, “I don’t +quite like your use of that word ‘another.’ It isn’t quite +delicate. But the concrete idea that the word represents is not +displeasing.” +</p> + +<p> +The glasses were refilled. Blythe sipped blissfully from his, as he began to +enter the state of a true idealist. +</p> + +<p> +“I must trot along in a minute or two,” hinted Goodwin. “Was +there anything in particular?” +</p> + +<p> +Blythe did not reply at once. +</p> + +<p> +“Old Losada would make it a hot country,” he remarked at length, +“for the man who swiped that gripsack of treasury boodle, don’t you +think?” +</p> + +<p> +“Undoubtedly, he would,” agreed Goodwin calmly, as he rose +leisurely to his feet. “I’ll be running over to the house now, old +man. Mrs. Goodwin is alone. There was nothing important you had to say, was +there?” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s all,” said Blythe. “Unless you wouldn’t +mind sending in another drink from the bar as you go out. Old Espada has closed +my account to profit and loss. And pay for the lot, will you, like a good +fellow?” +</p> + +<p> +“All right,” said Goodwin. “<i>Buenas noches.</i>” +</p> + +<p> +“Beelzebub” Blythe lingered over his cups, polishing his eyeglasses +with a disreputable handkerchief. +</p> + +<p> +“I thought I could do it, but I couldn’t,” he muttered to +himself after a time. “A gentleman can’t blackmail the man that he +drinks with.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap08"></a>VIII<br/> +THE ADMIRAL</h2> + +<p> +Spilled milk draws few tears from an Anchurian administration. Many are its +lacteal sources; and the clocks’ hands point forever to milking time. +Even the rich cream skimmed from the treasury by the bewitched Miraflores did +not cause the newly-installed patriots to waste time in unprofitable regrets. +The government philosophically set about supplying the deficiency by increasing +the import duties and by “suggesting” to wealthy private citizens +that contributions according to their means would be considered patriotic and +in order. Prosperity was expected to attend the reign of Losada, the new +president. The ousted office-holders and military favourites organized a new +“Liberal” party, and began to lay their plans for a re-succession. +Thus the game of Anchurian politics began, like a Chinese comedy, to unwind +slowly its serial length. Here and there Mirth peeps for an instant from the +wings and illumines the florid lines. +</p> + +<p> +A dozen quarts of champagne in conjunction with an informal sitting of the +president and his cabinet led to the establishment of the navy and the +appointment of Felipe Carrera as its admiral. +</p> + +<p> +Next to the champagne the credit of the appointment belongs to Don Sabas +Placido, the newly confirmed Minister of War. +</p> + +<p> +The president had requested a convention of his cabinet for the discussion of +questions politic and for the transaction of certain routine matters of state. +The session had been signally tedious; the business and the wine prodigiously +dry. A sudden, prankish humour of Don Sabas, impelling him to the deed, spiced +the grave affairs of state with a whiff of agreeable playfulness. +</p> + +<p> +In the dilatory order of business had come a bulletin from the coast department +of Orilla del Mar reporting the seizure by the custom-house officers at the +town of Coralio of the sloop <i>Estrella del Noche</i> and her cargo of +drygoods, patent medicines, granulated sugar and three-star brandy. Also six +Martini rifles and a barrel of American whisky. Caught in the act of smuggling, +the sloop with its cargo was now, according to law, the property of the +republic. +</p> + +<p> +The Collector of Customs, in making his report, departed from the conventional +forms so far as to suggest that the confiscated vessel be converted to the use +of the government. The prize was the first capture to the credit of the +department in ten years. The collector took opportunity to pat his department +on the back. +</p> + +<p> +It often happened that government officers required transportation from point +to point along the coast, and means were usually lacking. Furthermore, the +sloop could be manned by a loyal crew and employed as a coast guard to +discourage the pernicious art of smuggling. The collector also ventured to +nominate one to whom the charge of the boat could be safely intrusted—a +young man of Coralio, Felipe Carrera—not, be it understood, one of +extreme wisdom, but loyal and the best sailor along the coast. +</p> + +<p> +It was upon this hint that the Minister of War acted, executing a rare piece of +drollery that so enlivened the tedium of executive session. +</p> + +<p> +In the constitution of this small, maritime banana republic was a forgotten +section that provided for the maintenance of a navy. This provision—with +many other wiser ones—had lain inert since the establishment of the +republic. Anchuria had no navy and had no use for one. It was characteristic of +Don Sabas—a man at once merry, learned, whimsical and +audacious—that he should have disturbed the dust of this musty and +sleeping statute to increase the humour of the world by so much as a smile from +his indulgent colleagues. +</p> + +<p> +With delightful mock seriousness the Minister of War proposed the creation of a +navy. He argued its need and the glories it might achieve with such gay and +witty zeal that the travesty overcame with its humour even the swart dignity of +President Losada himself. +</p> + +<p> +The champagne was bubbling trickily in the veins of the mercurial statesmen. It +was not the custom of the grave governors of Anchuria to enliven their sessions +with a beverage so apt to cast a veil of disparagement over sober affairs. The +wine had been a thoughtful compliment tendered by the agent of the Vesuvius +Fruit Company as a token of amicable relations—and certain consummated +deals—between that company and the republic of Anchuria. +</p> + +<p> +The jest was carried to its end. A formidable, official document was prepared, +encrusted with chromatic seals and jaunty with fluttering ribbons, bearing the +florid signatures of state. This commission conferred upon el Señor Don Felipe +Carrera the title of Flag Admiral of the Republic of Anchuria. Thus within the +space of a few minutes and the dominion of a dozen “extra dry,” the +country took its place among the naval powers of the world, and Felipe Carrera +became entitled to a salute of nineteen guns whenever he might enter port. +</p> + +<p> +The southern races are lacking in that particular kind of humour that finds +entertainment in the defects and misfortunes bestowed by Nature. Owing to this +defect in their constitution they are not moved to laughter (as are their +northern brothers) by the spectacle of the deformed, the feeble-minded or the +insane. +</p> + +<p> +Felipe Carrera was sent upon earth with but half his wits. Therefore, the +people of Coralio called him “<i>El pobrecito +loco</i>”—“the poor little crazed one”—saying +that God had sent but half of him to earth, retaining the other half. +</p> + +<p> +A sombre youth, glowering, and speaking only at the rarest times, Felipe was +but negatively “loco.” On shore he generally refused all +conversation. He seemed to know that he was badly handicapped on land, where so +many kinds of understanding are needed; but on the water his one talent set him +equal with most men. Few sailors whom God had carefully and completely made +could handle a sailboat as well. Five points nearer the wind than even the best +of them he could sail his sloop. When the elements raged and set other men to +cowering, the deficiencies of Felipe seemed of little importance. He was a +perfect sailor, if an imperfect man. He owned no boat, but worked among the +crews of the schooners and sloops that skimmed the coast, trading and +freighting fruit out to the steamers where there was no harbour. It was through +his famous skill and boldness on the sea, as well as for the pity felt for his +mental imperfections, that he was recommended by the collector as a suitable +custodian of the captured sloop. +</p> + +<p> +When the outcome of Don Sabas’ little pleasantry arrived in the form of +the imposing and preposterous commission, the collector smiled. He had not +expected such prompt and overwhelming response to his recommendation. He +despatched a <i>muchacho</i> at once to fetch the future admiral. +</p> + +<p> +The collector waited in his official quarters. His office was in the Calle +Grande, and the sea breezes hummed through its windows all day. The collector, +in white linen and canvas shoes, philandered with papers on an antique desk. A +parrot, perched on a pen rack, seasoned the official tedium with a fire of +choice Castilian imprecations. Two rooms opened into the collector’s. In +one the clerical force of young men of variegated complexions transacted with +glitter and parade their several duties. Through the open door of the other +room could be seen a bronze babe, guiltless of clothing, that rollicked upon +the floor. In a grass hammock a thin woman, tinted a pale lemon, played a +guitar and swung contentedly in the breeze. Thus surrounded by the routine of +his high duties and the visible tokens of agreeable domesticity, the +collector’s heart was further made happy by the power placed in his hands +to brighten the fortunes of the “innocent” Felipe. +</p> + +<p> +Felipe came and stood before the collector. He was a lad of twenty, not +ill-favoured in looks, but with an expression of distant and pondering vacuity. +He wore white cotton trousers, down the seams of which he had sewed red stripes +with some vague aim at military decoration. A flimsy blue shirt fell open at +his throat; his feet were bare; he held in his hand the cheapest of straw hats +from the States. +</p> + +<p> +“Señor Carrera,” said the collector, gravely, producing the showy +commission, “I have sent for you at the president’s bidding. This +document that I present to you confers upon you the title of Admiral of this +great republic, and gives you absolute command of the naval forces and fleet of +our country. You may think, friend Felipe, that we have no navy—but yes! +The sloop the <i>Estrella del Noche</i>, that my brave men captured from the +coast smugglers, is to be placed under your command. The boat is to be devoted +to the services of your country. You will be ready at all times to convey +officials of the government to points along the coast where they may be obliged +to visit. You will also act as a coast-guard to prevent, as far as you may be +able, the crime of smuggling. You will uphold the honour and prestige of your +country at sea, and endeavour to place Anchuria among the proudest naval powers +of the world. These are your instructions as the Minister of War desires me to +convey them to you. <i>Por Dios!</i> I do not know how all this is to be +accomplished, for not one word did his letter contain in respect to a crew or +to the expenses of this navy. Perhaps you are to provide a crew yourself, Señor +Admiral—I do not know—but it is a very high honour that has +descended upon you. I now hand you your commission. When you are ready for the +boat I will give orders that she shall be made over into your charge. That is +as far as my instructions go.” +</p> + +<p> +Felipe took the commission that the collector handed to him. He gazed through +the open window at the sea for a moment, with his customary expression of deep +but vain pondering. Then he turned without having spoken a word, and walked +swiftly away through the hot sand of the street. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Pobrecito loco!</i>” sighed the collector; and the parrot on +the pen racks screeched “Loco!—loco!—loco!” +</p> + +<p> +The next morning a strange procession filed through the streets to the +collector’s office. At its head was the admiral of the navy. Somewhere +Felipe had raked together a pitiful semblance of a military uniform—a +pair of red trousers, a dingy blue short jacket heavily ornamented with gold +braid, and an old fatigue cap that must have been cast away by one of the +British soldiers in Belize and brought away by Felipe on one of his coasting +voyages. Buckled around his waist was an ancient ship’s cutlass +contributed to his equipment by Pedro Lafitte, the baker, who proudly asserted +its inheritance from his ancestor, the illustrious buccaneer. At the +admiral’s heels tagged his newly-shipped crew—three grinning, +glossy, black Caribs, bare to the waist, the sand spurting in showers from the +spring of their naked feet. +</p> + +<p> +Briefly and with dignity Felipe demanded his vessel of the collector. And now a +fresh honour awaited him. The collector’s wife, who played the guitar and +read novels in the hammock all day, had more than a little romance in her +placid, yellow bosom. She had found in an old book an engraving of a flag that +purported to be the naval flag of Anchuria. Perhaps it had so been designed by +the founders of the nation; but, as no navy had ever been established, oblivion +had claimed the flag. Laboriously with her own hands she had made a flag after +the pattern—a red cross upon a blue-and-white ground. She presented it to +Felipe with these words: “Brave sailor, this flag is of your country. Be +true, and defend it with your life. Go you with God.” +</p> + +<p> +For the first time since his appointment the admiral showed a flicker of +emotion. He took the silken emblem, and passed his hand reverently over its +surface. “I am the admiral,” he said to the collector’s lady. +Being on land he could bring himself to no more exuberant expression of +sentiment. At sea with the flag at the masthead of his navy, some more eloquent +exposition of feelings might be forthcoming. +</p> + +<p> +Abruptly the admiral departed with his crew. For the next three days they were +busy giving the <i>Estrella del Noche</i> a new coat of white paint trimmed +with blue. And then Felipe further adorned himself by fastening a handful of +brilliant parrot’s plumes in his cap. Again he tramped with his faithful +crew to the collector’s office and formally notified him that the +sloop’s name had been changed to <i>El Nacional</i>. +</p> + +<p> +During the next few months the navy had its troubles. Even an admiral is +perplexed to know what to do without any orders. But none came. Neither did any +salaries. <i>El Nacional</i> swung idly at anchor. +</p> + +<p> +When Felipe’s little store of money was exhausted he went to the +collector and raised the question of finances. +</p> + +<p> +“Salaries!” exclaimed the collector, with hands raised; +“<i>Valgame Dios!</i> not one <i>centavo</i> of my own pay have I +received for the last seven months. The pay of an admiral, do you ask? <i>Quién +sabe?</i> Should it be less than three thousand <i>pesos</i>? <i>Mira!</i> you +will see a revolution in this country very soon. A good sign of it is when the +government calls all the time for <i>pesos</i>, <i>pesos</i>, <i>pesos</i>, and +pays none out.” +</p> + +<p> +Felipe left the collector’s office with a look almost of content on his +sombre face. A revolution would mean fighting, and then the government would +need his services. It was rather humiliating to be an admiral without anything +to do, and have a hungry crew at your heels begging for <i>reales</i> to buy +plantains and tobacco with. +</p> + +<p> +When he returned to where his happy-go-lucky Caribs were waiting they sprang up +and saluted, as he had drilled them to do. +</p> + +<p> +“Come, <i>muchachos</i>,” said the admiral; “it seems that +the government is poor. It has no money to give us. We will earn what we need +to live upon. Thus will we serve our country. Soon”—his heavy eyes +almost lighted up—“it may gladly call upon us for help.” +</p> + +<p> +Thereafter <i>El Nacional</i> turned out with the other coast craft and became +a wage-earner. She worked with the lighters freighting bananas and oranges out +to the fruit steamers that could not approach nearer than a mile from the +shore. Surely a self-supporting navy deserves red letters in the budget of any +nation. +</p> + +<p> +After earning enough at freighting to keep himself and his crew in provisions +for a week Felipe would anchor the navy and hang about the little telegraph +office, looking like one of the chorus of an insolvent comic opera troupe +besieging the manager’s den. A hope for orders from the capital was +always in his heart. That his services as admiral had never been called into +requirement hurt his pride and patriotism. At every call he would inquire, +gravely and expectantly, for despatches. The operator would pretend to make a +search, and then reply: +</p> + +<p> +“Not yet, it seems, <i>Señor el Almirante—poco tiempo!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +Outside in the shade of the lime-trees the crew chewed sugar cane or slumbered, +well content to serve a country that was contented with so little service. +</p> + +<p> +One day in the early summer the revolution predicted by the collector flamed +out suddenly. It had long been smouldering. At the first note of alarm the +admiral of the navy force and fleet made all sail for a larger port on the +coast of a neighbouring republic, where he traded a hastily collected cargo of +fruit for its value in cartridges for the five Martini rifles, the only guns +that the navy could boast. Then to the telegraph office sped the admiral. +Sprawling in his favourite corner, in his fast-decaying uniform, with his +prodigious sabre distributed between his red legs, he waited for the +long-delayed, but now soon expected, orders. +</p> + +<p> +“Not yet, <i>Señor el Almirante</i>,” the telegraph clerk would +call to him—“<i>poco tiempo!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +At the answer the admiral would plump himself down with a great rattling of +scabbard to await the infrequent tick of the little instrument on the table. +</p> + +<p> +“They will come,” would be his unshaken reply; “I am the +admiral.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap09"></a>IX<br/> +THE FLAG PARAMOUNT</h2> + +<p> +At the head of the insurgent party appeared that Hector and learned Theban of +the southern republics, Don Sabas Placido. A traveller, a soldier, a poet, a +scientist, a statesman and a connoisseur—the wonder was that he could +content himself with the petty, remote life of his native country. +</p> + +<p> +“It is a whim of Placido’s,” said a friend who knew him well, +“to take up political intrigue. It is not otherwise than as if he had +come upon a new <i>tempo</i> in music, a new bacillus in the air, a new scent, +or rhyme, or explosive. He will squeeze this revolution dry of sensations, and +a week afterward will forget it, skimming the seas of the world in his +brigantine to add to his already world-famous collections. Collections of what? +<i>Por Dios!</i> of everything from postage stamps to prehistoric stone +idols.” +</p> + +<p> +But, for a mere dilettante, the æsthetic Placido seemed to be creating a lively +row. The people admired him; they were fascinated by his brilliancy and +flattered by his taking an interest in so small a thing as his native country. +They rallied to the call of his lieutenants in the capital, where (somewhat +contrary to arrangements) the army remained faithful to the government. There +was also lively skirmishing in the coast towns. It was rumoured that the +revolution was aided by the Vesuvius Fruit Company, the power that forever +stood with chiding smile and uplifted finger to keep Anchuria in the class of +good children. Two of its steamers, the <i>Traveler</i> and the +<i>Salvador</i>, were known to have conveyed insurgent troops from point to +point along the coast. +</p> + +<p> +As yet there had been no actual uprising in Coralio. Military law prevailed, +and the ferment was bottled for the time. And then came the word that +everywhere the revolutionists were encountering defeat. In the capital the +president’s forces triumphed; and there was a rumour that the leaders of +the revolt had been forced to fly, hotly pursued. +</p> + +<p> +In the little telegraph office at Coralio there was always a gathering of +officials and loyal citizens, awaiting news from the seat of government. One +morning the telegraph key began clicking, and presently the operator called, +loudly: “One telegram for <i>el Almirante</i>, Don Señor Felipe +Carrera!” +</p> + +<p> +There was a shuffling sound, a great rattling of tin scabbard, and the admiral, +prompt at his spot of waiting, leaped across the room to receive it. +</p> + +<p> +The message was handed to him. Slowly spelling it out, he found it to be his +first official order—thus running: +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +Proceed immediately with your vessel to mouth of Rio Ruiz; transport beef and +provisions to barracks at Alforan. +</p> + +<p class="right"> +Martinez, General. +</p> + +<p> +Small glory, to be sure, in this, his country’s first call. But it had +called, and joy surged in the admiral’s breast. He drew his cutlass belt +to another buckle hole, roused his dozing crew, and in a quarter of an hour +<i>El Nacional</i> was tacking swiftly down coast in a stiff landward breeze. +</p> + +<p> +The Rio Ruiz is a small river, emptying into the sea ten miles below Coralio. +That portion of the coast is wild and solitary. Through a gorge in the +Cordilleras rushes the Rio Ruiz, cold and bubbling, to glide, at last, with +breadth and leisure, through an alluvial morass into the sea. +</p> + +<p> +In two hours <i>El Nacional</i> entered the river’s mouth. The banks were +crowded with a disposition of formidable trees. The sumptuous undergrowth of +the tropics overflowed the land, and drowned itself in the fallow waters. +Silently the sloop entered there, and met a deeper silence. Brilliant with +greens and ochres and floral scarlets, the umbrageous mouth of the Rio Ruiz +furnished no sound or movement save of the sea-going water as it purled against +the prow of the vessel. Small chance there seemed of wresting beef or +provisions from that empty solitude. +</p> + +<p> +The admiral decided to cast anchor, and, at the chain’s rattle, the +forest was stimulated to instant and resounding uproar. The mouth of the Rio +Ruiz had only been taking a morning nap. Parrots and baboons screeched and +barked in the trees; a whirring and a hissing and a booming marked the +awakening of animal life; a dark blue bulk was visible for an instant, as a +startled tapir fought his way through the vines. +</p> + +<p> +The navy, under orders, hung in the mouth of the little river for hours. The +crew served the dinner of shark’s fin soup, plantains, crab gumbo and +sour wine. The admiral, with a three-foot telescope, closely scanned the +impervious foliage fifty yards away. +</p> + +<p> +It was nearly sunset when a reverberating “hal-lo-o-o!” came from +the forest to their left. It was answered; and three men, mounted upon mules, +crashed through the tropic tangle to within a dozen yards of the river’s +bank. There they dismounted; and one, unbuckling his belt, struck each mule a +violent blow with his sword scabbard, so that they, with a fling of heels, +dashed back again into the forest. +</p> + +<p> +Those were strange-looking men to be conveying beef and provisions. One was a +large and exceedingly active man, of striking presence. He was of the purest +Spanish type, with curling, gray-besprinkled, dark hair, blue, sparkling eyes, +and the pronounced air of a <i>caballero grande</i>. The other two were small, +brown-faced men, wearing white military uniforms, high riding boots and swords. +The clothes of all were drenched, bespattered and rent by the thicket. Some +stress of circumstance must have driven them, <i>diable à quatre</i>, through +flood, mire and jungle. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>O-hé! Señor Almirante</i>,” called the large man. “Send +to us your boat.” +</p> + +<p> +The dory was lowered, and Felipe, with one of the Caribs, rowed toward the left +bank. +</p> + +<p> +The large man stood near the water’s brink, waist deep in the curling +vines. As he gazed upon the scarecrow figure in the stern of the dory a +sprightly interest beamed upon his mobile face. +</p> + +<p> +Months of wageless and thankless service had dimmed the admiral’s +splendour. His red trousers were patched and ragged. Most of the bright buttons +and yellow braid were gone from his jacket. The visor of his cap was torn, and +depended almost to his eyes. The admiral’s feet were bare. +</p> + +<p> +“Dear admiral,” cried the large man, and his voice was like a blast +from a horn, “I kiss your hands. I knew we could build upon your +fidelity. You had our despatch—from General Martinez. A little nearer +with your boat, dear Admiral. Upon these devils of shifting vines we stand with +the smallest security.” +</p> + +<p> +Felipe regarded him with a stolid face. +</p> + +<p> +“Provisions and beef for the barracks at Alforan,” he quoted. +</p> + +<p> +“No fault of the butchers, <i>Almirante mio</i>, that the beef awaits you +not. But you are come in time to save the cattle. Get us aboard your vessel, +señor, at once. You first, <i>caballeros—á priesa!</i> Come back for me. +The boat is too small.” +</p> + +<p> +The dory conveyed the two officers to the sloop, and returned for the large +man. +</p> + +<p> +“Have you so gross a thing as food, good admiral?” he cried, when +aboard. “And, perhaps, coffee? Beef and provisions! <i>Nombre de +Dios!</i> a little longer and we could have eaten one of those mules that you, +Colonel Rafael, saluted so feelingly with your sword scabbard at parting. Let +us have food; and then we will sail—for the barracks at +Alforan—no?” +</p> + +<p> +The Caribs prepared a meal, to which the three passengers of <i>El Nacional</i> +set themselves with famished delight. About sunset, as was its custom, the +breeze veered and swept back from the mountains, cool and steady, bringing a +taste of the stagnant lagoons and mangrove swamps that guttered the lowlands. +The mainsail of the sloop was hoisted and swelled to it, and at that moment +they heard shouts and a waxing clamour from the bosky profundities of the +shore. +</p> + +<p> +“The butchers, my dear admiral,” said the large man, smiling, +“too late for the slaughter.” +</p> + +<p> +Further than his orders to his crew, the admiral was saying nothing. The +topsail and jib were spread, and the sloop glided out of the estuary. The large +man and his companions had bestowed themselves with what comfort they could +about the bare deck. Belike, the thing big in their minds had been their +departure from that critical shore; and now that the hazard was so far reduced +their thoughts were loosed to the consideration of further deliverance. But +when they saw the sloop turn and fly up coast again they relaxed, satisfied +with the course the admiral had taken. +</p> + +<p> +The large man sat at ease, his spirited blue eye engaged in the contemplation +of the navy’s commander. He was trying to estimate this sombre and +fantastic lad, whose impenetrable stolidity puzzled him. Himself a fugitive, +his life sought, and chafing under the smart of defeat and failure, it was +characteristic of him to transfer instantly his interest to the study of a +thing new to him. It was like him, too, to have conceived and risked all upon +this last desperate and madcap scheme—this message to a poor, crazed +<i>fanatico</i> cruising about with his grotesque uniform and his farcical +title. But his companions had been at their wits’ end; escape had seemed +incredible; and now he was pleased with the success of the plan they had called +crack-brained and precarious. +</p> + +<p> +The brief, tropic twilight seemed to slide swiftly into the pearly splendour of +a moonlit night. And now the lights of Coralio appeared, distributed against +the darkening shore to their right. The admiral stood, silent, at the tiller; +the Caribs, like black panthers, held the sheets, leaping noiselessly at his +short commands. The three passengers were watching intently the sea before +them, and when at length they came in sight of the bulk of a steamer lying a +mile out from the town, with her lights radiating deep into the water, they +held a sudden voluble and close-headed converse. The sloop was speeding as if +to strike midway between ship and shore. +</p> + +<p> +The large man suddenly separated from his companions and approached the +scarecrow at the helm. +</p> + +<p> +“My dear admiral,” he said, “the government has been +exceedingly remiss. I feel all the shame for it that only its ignorance of your +devoted service has prevented it from sustaining. An inexcusable oversight has +been made. A vessel, a uniform and a crew worthy of your fidelity shall be +furnished you. But just now, dear admiral, there is business of moment afoot. +The steamer lying there is the <i>Salvador</i>. I and my friends desire to be +conveyed to her, where we are sent on the government’s business. Do us +the favour to shape your course accordingly.” +</p> + +<p> +Without replying, the admiral gave a sharp command, and put the tiller hard to +port. <i>El Nacional</i> swerved, and headed straight as an arrow’s +course for the shore. +</p> + +<p> +“Do me the favour,” said the large man, a trifle restively, +“to acknowledge, at least, that you catch the sound of my words.” +It was possible that the fellow might be lacking in senses as well as +intellect. +</p> + +<p> +The admiral emitted a croaking, harsh laugh, and spake. +</p> + +<p> +“They will stand you,” he said, “with your face to a wall and +shoot you dead. That is the way they kill traitors. I knew you when you stepped +into my boat. I have seen your picture in a book. You are Sabas Placido, +traitor to your country. With your face to a wall. So, you will die. I am the +admiral, and I will take you to them. With your face to a wall. Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +Don Sabas half turned and waved his hand, with a ringing laugh, toward his +fellow fugitives. “To you, <i>caballeros</i>, I have related the history +of that session when we issued that O! so ridiculous commission. Of a truth our +jest has been turned against us. Behold the Frankenstein’s monster we +have created!” +</p> + +<p> +Don Sabas glanced toward the shore. The lights of Coralio were drawing near. He +could see the beach, the warehouse of the <i>Bodega Nacional</i>, the long, low +<i>cuartel</i> occupied by the soldiers, and, behind that, gleaming in the +moonlight, a stretch of high adobe wall. He had seen men stood with their faces +to that wall and shot dead. +</p> + +<p> +Again he addressed the extravagant figure at the helm. +</p> + +<p> +“It is true,” he said, “that I am fleeing the country. But, +receive the assurance that I care very little for that. Courts and camps +everywhere are open to Sabas Placido. <i>Vaya!</i> what is this molehill of a +republic—this pig’s head of a country—to a man like me? I am +a <i>paisano</i> of everywhere. In Rome, in London, in Paris, in Vienna, you +will hear them say: ‘Welcome back, Don Sabas.’ +Come!—<i>tonto</i>—baboon of a boy—admiral, whatever you call +yourself, turn your boat. Put us on board the <i>Salvador</i>, and here is your +pay—five hundred <i>pesos</i> in money of the <i>Estados +Unidos</i>—more than your lying government will pay you in twenty +years.” +</p> + +<p> +Don Sabas pressed a plump purse against the youth’s hand. The admiral +gave no heed to the words or the movement. Braced against the helm, he was +holding the sloop dead on her shoreward course. His dull face was lit almost to +intelligence by some inward conceit that seemed to afford him joy, and found +utterance in another parrot-like cackle. +</p> + +<p> +“That is why they do it,” he said—“so that you will not +see the guns. They fire—oom!—and you fall dead. With your face to +the wall. Yes.” +</p> + +<p> +The admiral called a sudden order to his crew. The lithe, silent Caribs made +fast the sheets they held, and slipped down the hatchway into the hold of the +sloop. When the last one had disappeared, Don Sabas, like a big, brown leopard, +leaped forward, closed and fastened the hatch and stood, smiling. +</p> + +<p> +“No rifles, if you please, dear admiral,” he said. “It was a +whimsey of mine once to compile a dictionary of the Carib <i>lengua</i>. So, I +understood your order. Perhaps now you will—” +</p> + +<p> +He cut short his words, for he heard the dull “swish” of iron +scraping along tin. The admiral had drawn the cutlass of Pedro Lafitte, and was +darting upon him. The blade descended, and it was only by a display of +surprising agility that the large man escaped, with only a bruised shoulder, +the glancing weapon. He was drawing his pistol as he sprang, and the next +instant he shot the admiral down. +</p> + +<p> +Don Sabas stooped over him, and rose again. +</p> + +<p> +“In the heart,” he said briefly. “<i>Señores</i>, the navy is +abolished.” +</p> + +<p> +Colonel Rafael sprang to the helm, and the other officer hastened to loose the +mainsail sheets. The boom swung round; <i>El Nacional</i> veered and began to +tack industriously for the <i>Salvador</i>. +</p> + +<p> +“Strike that flag, señor,” called Colonel Rafael. “Our +friends on the steamer will wonder why we are sailing under it.” +</p> + +<p> +“Well said,” cried Don Sabas. Advancing to the mast he lowered the +flag to the deck, where lay its too loyal supporter. Thus ended the Minister of +War’s little piece of after-dinner drollery, and by the same hand that +began it. +</p> + +<p> +Suddenly Don Sabas gave a great cry of joy, and ran down the slanting deck to +the side of Colonel Rafael. Across his arm he carried the flag of the +extinguished navy. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Mire! mire! señor.</i> Ah, <i>Dios!</i> Already can I hear that great +bear of an <i>Oestreicher</i> shout, <i>‘Du hast mein herz +gebrochen!’ Mire!</i> Of my friend, Herr Grunitz, of Vienna, you have +heard me relate. That man has travelled to Ceylon for an orchid—to +Patagonia for a headdress—to Benares for a slipper—to Mozambique +for a spearhead to add to his famous collections. Thou knowest, also, +<i>amigo</i> Rafael, that I have been a gatherer of curios. My collection of +battle flags of the world’s navies was the most complete in existence +until last year. Then Herr Grunitz secured two, O! such rare specimens. One of +a Barbary state, and one of the Makarooroos, a tribe on the west coast of +Africa. I have not those, but they can be procured. But this flag, +señor—do you know what it is? Name of God! do you know? See that red +cross upon the blue and white ground! You never saw it before? <i>Seguramente +no.</i> It is the naval flag of your country. <i>Mire!</i> This rotten tub we +stand upon is its navy—that dead cockatoo lying there was its +commander—that stroke of cutlass and single pistol shot a sea battle. All +a piece of absurd foolery, I grant you—but authentic. There has never +been another flag like this, and there never will be another. No. It is unique +in the whole world. Yes. Think of what that means to a collector of flags! Do +you know, <i>Coronel mio</i>, how many golden crowns Herr Grunitz would give +for this flag? Ten thousand, likely. Well, a hundred thousand would not buy it. +Beautiful flag! Only flag! Little devil of a most heaven-born flag! +<i>O-hé!</i> old grumbler beyond the ocean. Wait till Don Sabas comes again to +the Königin Strasse. He will let you kneel and touch the folds of it with one +finger. <i>O-hé!</i> old spectacled ransacker of the world!” +</p> + +<p> +Forgotten was the impotent revolution, the danger, the loss, the gall of +defeat. Possessed solely by the inordinate and unparalleled passion of the +collector, he strode up and down the little deck, clasping to his breast with +one hand the paragon of a flag. He snapped his fingers triumphantly toward the +east. He shouted the paean to his prize in trumpet tones, as though he would +make old Grunitz hear in his musty den beyond the sea. +</p> + +<p> +They were waiting, on the <i>Salvador</i>, to welcome them. The sloop came +close alongside the steamer where her sides were sliced almost to the lower +deck for the loading of fruit. The sailors of the <i>Salvador</i> grappled and +held her there. +</p> + +<p> +Captain McLeod leaned over the side. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, señor, the jig is up, I’m told.” +</p> + +<p> +“The jig is up?” Don Sabas looked perplexed for a moment. +“That revolution—ah, yes!” With a shrug of his shoulders he +dismissed the matter. +</p> + +<p> +The captain learned of the escape and the imprisoned crew. +</p> + +<p> +“Caribs?” he said; “no harm in them.” He slipped down +into the sloop and kicked loose the hasp of the hatch. The black fellows came +tumbling up, sweating but grinning. +</p> + +<p> +“Hey! black boys!” said the captain, in a dialect of his own; +“you sabe, catchy boat and vamos back same place quick.” +</p> + +<p> +They saw him point to themselves, the sloop and Coralio. “Yas, +yas!” they cried, with broader grins and many nods. +</p> + +<p> +The four—Don Sabas, the two officers and the captain—moved to quit +the sloop. Don Sabas lagged a little behind, looking at the still form of the +late admiral, sprawled in his paltry trappings. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Pobrecito loco</i>,” he said softly. +</p> + +<p> +He was a brilliant cosmopolite and a <i>cognoscente</i> of high rank; but, +after all, he was of the same race and blood and instinct as this people. Even +as the simple <i>paisanos</i> of Coralio had said it, so said Don Sabas. +Without a smile, he looked, and said, “The poor little crazed one!” +</p> + +<p> +Stooping he raised the limp shoulders, drew the priceless and induplicable flag +under them and over the breast, pinning it there with the diamond star of the +Order of San Carlos that he took from the collar of his own coat. +</p> + +<p> +He followed after the others, and stood with them upon the deck of the +<i>Salvador</i>. The sailors that steadied <i>El Nacional</i> shoved her off. +The jabbering Caribs hauled away at the rigging; the sloop headed for the +shore. +</p> + +<p> +And Herr Grunitz’s collection of naval flags was still the finest in the +world. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap10"></a>X<br/> +THE SHAMROCK AND THE PALM</h2> + +<p> +One night when there was no breeze, and Coralio seemed closer than ever to the +gratings of Avernus, five men were grouped about the door of the photograph +establishment of Keogh and Clancy. Thus, in all the scorched and exotic places +of the earth, Caucasians meet when the day’s work is done to preserve the +fulness of their heritage by the aspersion of alien things. +</p> + +<p> +Johnny Atwood lay stretched upon the grass in the undress uniform of a Carib, +and prated feebly of cool water to be had in the cucumber-wood pumps of +Dalesburg. Dr. Gregg, through the prestige of his whiskers and as a bribe +against the relation of his imminent professional tales, was conceded the +hammock that was swung between the door jamb and a calabash-tree. Keogh had +moved out upon the grass a little table that held the instrument for burnishing +completed photographs. He was the only busy one of the group. Industriously +from between the cylinders of the burnisher rolled the finished depictments of +Coralio’s citizens. Blanchard, the French mining engineer, in his cool +linen viewed the smoke of his cigarette through his calm glasses, impervious to +the heat. Clancy sat on the steps, smoking his short pipe. His mood was the +gossip’s; the others were reduced, by the humidity, to the state of +disability desirable in an audience. +</p> + +<p> +Clancy was an American with an Irish diathesis and cosmopolitan proclivities. +Many businesses had claimed him, but not for long. The roadster’s blood +was in his veins. The voice of the tintype was but one of the many callings +that had wooed him upon so many roads. Sometimes he could be persuaded to oral +construction of his voyages into the informal and egregious. To-night there +were symptoms of divulgement in him. +</p> + +<p> +“’Tis elegant weather for filibusterin’,” he +volunteered. “It reminds me of the time I struggled to liberate a nation +from the poisonous breath of a tyrant’s clutch. ’Twas hard work. +’Tis strainin’ to the back and makes corns on the hands.” +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t know you had ever lent your sword to an oppressed +people,” murmured Atwood, from the grass. +</p> + +<p> +“I did,” said Clancy; “and they turned it into a +ploughshare.” +</p> + +<p> +“What country was so fortunate as to secure your aid?” airily +inquired Blanchard. +</p> + +<p> +“Where’s Kamchatka?” asked Clancy, with seeming irrelevance. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, off Siberia somewhere in the Arctic regions,” somebody +answered, doubtfully. +</p> + +<p> +“I thought that was the cold one,” said Clancy, with a satisfied +nod. “I’m always gettin’ the two names mixed. ’Twas +Guatemala, then—the hot one—I’ve been filibusterin’ +with. Ye’ll find that country on the map. ’Tis in the district +known as the tropics. By the foresight of Providence, it lies on the coast so +the geography man could run the names of the towns off into the water. +They’re an inch long, small type, composed of Spanish dialects, and, +’tis my opinion, of the same system of syntax that blew up the +<i>Maine</i>. Yes, ’twas that country I sailed against, single-handed, +and endeavoured to liberate it from a tyrannical government with a +single-barreled pickaxe, unloaded at that. Ye don’t understand, of +course. ’Tis a statement demandin’ elucidation and apologies. +</p> + +<p> +“’Twas in New Orleans one morning about the first of June; I was +standin’ down on the wharf, lookin’ about at the ships in the +river. There was a little steamer moored right opposite me that seemed about +ready to sail. The funnels of it were throwin’ out smoke, and a gang of +roustabouts were carryin’ aboard a pile of boxes that was stacked up on +the wharf. The boxes were about two feet square, and somethin’ like four +feet long, and they seemed to be pretty heavy. +</p> + +<p> +“I walked over, careless, to the stack of boxes. I saw one of them had +been broken in handlin’. ’Twas curiosity made me pull up the loose +top and look inside. The box was packed full of Winchester rifles. ‘So, +so,’ says I to myself; ‘somebody’s gettin’ a twist on +the neutrality laws. Somebody’s aidin’ with munitions of war. I +wonder where the popguns are goin’?’ +</p> + +<p> +“I heard somebody cough, and I turned around. There stood a little, +round, fat man with a brown face and white clothes, a first-class-looking +little man, with a four-karat diamond on his finger and his eye full of +interrogations and respects. I judged he was a kind of foreigner—may be +from Russia or Japan or the archipelagoes. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Hist!’ says the round man, full of concealments and +confidences. ‘Will the señor respect the discoveryments he has made, that +the mans on the ship shall not be acquaint? The señor will be a gentleman that +shall not expose one thing that by accident occur.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Monseer,’ says I—for I judged him to be a kind of +Frenchman—‘receive my most exasperated assurances that your secret +is safe with James Clancy. Furthermore, I will go so far as to remark, Veev la +Liberty—veev it good and strong. Whenever you hear of a Clancy +obstructin’ the abolishment of existin’ governments you may notify +me by return mail.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘The señor is good,’ says the dark, fat man, smilin’ +under his black mustache. ‘Wish you to come aboard my ship and drink of +wine a glass.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Bein’ a Clancy, in two minutes me and the foreigner man were +seated at a table in the cabin of the steamer, with a bottle between us. I +could hear the heavy boxes bein’ dumped into the hold. I judged that +cargo must consist of at least 2,000 Winchesters. Me and the brown man drank +the bottle of stuff, and he called the steward to bring another. When you +amalgamate a Clancy with the contents of a bottle you practically instigate +secession. I had heard a good deal about these revolutions in them tropical +localities, and I begun to want a hand in it. +</p> + +<p> +“‘You goin’ to stir things up in your country, ain’t +you, monseer?’ says I, with a wink to let him know I was on. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Yes, yes,’ said the little man, pounding his fist on the +table. ‘A change of the greatest will occur. Too long have the people +been oppressed with the promises and the never-to-happen things to become. The +great work it shall be carry on. Yes. Our forces shall in the capital city +strike of the soonest. <i>Carrambos!</i>’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>Carrambos</i> is the word,’ says I, beginning to invest +myself with enthusiasm and more wine, ‘likewise veeva, as I said before. +May the shamrock of old—I mean the banana-vine or the pie-plant, or +whatever the imperial emblem may be of your down-trodden country, wave +forever.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘A thousand thank-yous,’ says the round man, ‘for your +emission of amicable utterances. What our cause needs of the very most is mans +who will the work do, to lift it along. Oh, for one thousands strong, good mans +to aid the General De Vega that he shall to his country bring those success and +glory! It is hard—oh, so hard to find good mans to help in the +work.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Monseer,’ says I, leanin’ over the table and +graspin’ his hand, ‘I don’t know where your country is, but +me heart bleeds for it. The heart of a Clancy was never deaf to the sight of an +oppressed people. The family is filibusterers by birth, and foreigners by +trade. If you can use James Clancy’s arms and his blood in denudin’ +your shores of the tyrant’s yoke they’re yours to command.’ +</p> + +<p> +“General De Vega was overcome with joy to confiscate my condolence of his +conspiracies and predicaments. He tried to embrace me across the table, but his +fatness, and the wine that had been in the bottles, prevented. Thus was I +welcomed into the ranks of filibustery. Then the general man told me his +country had the name of Guatemala, and was the greatest nation laved by any +ocean whatever anywhere. He looked at me with tears in his eyes, and from time +to time he would emit the remark, ‘Ah! big, strong, brave mans! That is +what my country need.’ +</p> + +<p> +“General De Vega, as was the name by which he denounced himself, brought +out a document for me to sign, which I did, makin’ a fine flourish and +curlycue with the tail of the ‘y.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Your passage-money,’ says the general, business-like, +‘shall from your pay be deduct.’ +</p> + +<p> +“’Twill not,’ says I, haughty. ‘I’ll pay my own +passage.’ A hundred and eighty dollars I had in my inside pocket, and +’twas no common filibuster I was goin’ to be, filibusterin’ +for me board and clothes. +</p> + +<p> +“The steamer was to sail in two hours, and I went ashore to get some +things together I’d need. When I came aboard I showed the general with +pride the outfit. ’Twas a fine Chinchilla overcoat, Arctic overshoes, fur +cap and earmuffs, with elegant fleece-lined gloves and woolen muffler. +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>Carrambos!</i>’ says the little general. ‘What +clothes are these that shall go to the tropic?’ And then the little +spalpeen laughs, and he calls the captain, and the captain calls the purser, +and they pipe up the chief engineer, and the whole gang leans against the cabin +and laughs at Clancy’s wardrobe for Guatemala. +</p> + +<p> +“I reflects a bit, serious, and asks the general again to denominate the +terms by which his country is called. He tells me, and I see then that +’twas the t’other one, Kamchatka, I had in mind. Since then +I’ve had difficulty in separatin’ the two nations in name, climate +and geographic disposition. +</p> + +<p> +“I paid my passage—twenty-four dollars, first cabin—and ate +at table with the officer crowd. Down on the lower deck was a gang of +second-class passengers, about forty of them, seemin’ to be Dagoes and +the like. I wondered what so many of them were goin’ along for. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, then, in three days we sailed alongside that Guatemala. +’Twas a blue country, and not yellow as ’tis miscolored on the map. +We landed at a town on the coast, where a train of cars was waitin’ for +us on a dinky little railroad. The boxes on the steamer were brought ashore and +loaded on the cars. The gang of Dagoes got aboard, too, the general and me in +the front car. Yes, me and General De Vega headed the revolution, as it pulled +out of the seaport town. That train travelled about as fast as a policeman +goin’ to a riot. It penetrated the most conspicuous lot of fuzzy scenery +ever seen outside a geography. We run some forty miles in seven hours, and the +train stopped. There was no more railroad. ’Twas a sort of camp in a damp +gorge full of wildness and melancholies. They was gradin’ and +choppin’ out the forests ahead to continue the road. ‘Here,’ +says I to myself, ‘is the romantic haunt of the revolutionists. Here will +Clancy, by the virtue that is in a superior race and the inculcation of Fenian +tactics, strike a tremendous blow for liberty.’ +</p> + +<p> +“They unloaded the boxes from the train and begun to knock the tops off. +From the first one that was open I saw General De Vega take the Winchester +rifles and pass them around to a squad of morbid soldiery. The other boxes was +opened next, and, believe me or not, divil another gun was to be seen. Every +other box in the load was full of pickaxes and spades. +</p> + +<p> +“And then—sorrow be upon them tropics—the proud Clancy and +the dishonoured Dagoes, each one of them, had to shoulder a pick or a spade, +and march away to work on that dirty little railroad. Yes; ’twas that the +Dagoes shipped for, and ’twas that the filibusterin’ Clancy signed +for, though unbeknownst to himself at the time. In after days I found out about +it. It seems ’twas hard to get hands to work on that road. The +intelligent natives of the country was too lazy to work. Indeed, the saints +know, ’twas unnecessary. By stretchin’ out one hand, they could +seize the most delicate and costly fruits of the earth, and, by +stretchin’ out the other, they could sleep for days at a time without +hearin’ a seven-o’clock whistle or the footsteps of the rent man +upon the stairs. So, regular, the steamers travelled to the United States to +seduce labour. Usually the imported spade-slingers died in two or three months +from eatin’ the over-ripe water and breathin’ the violent tropical +scenery. Wherefore they made them sign contracts for a year, when they hired +them, and put an armed guard over the poor divils to keep them from +runnin’ away. +</p> + +<p> +“’Twas thus I was double-crossed by the tropics through a family +failin’ of goin’ out of the way to hunt disturbances. +</p> + +<p> +“They gave me a pick, and I took it, meditatin’ an insurrection on +the spot; but there was the guards handlin’ the Winchesters careless, and +I come to the conclusion that discretion was the best part of +filibusterin’. There was about a hundred of us in the gang startin’ +out to work, and the word was given to move. I steps out of the ranks and goes +up to that General De Vega man, who was smokin’ a cigar and gazin’ +upon the scene with satisfactions and glory. He smiles at me polite and +devilish. ‘Plenty work,’ says he, ‘for big, strong mans in +Guatemala. Yes. T’irty dollars in the month. Good pay. Ah, yes. You +strong, brave man. Bimeby we push those railroad in the capital very quick. +They want you go work now. <i>Adios</i>, strong mans.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Monseer,’ says I, lingerin’, ‘will you tell a +poor little Irishman this: When I set foot on your cockroachy steamer, and +breathed liberal and revolutionary sentiments into your sour wine, did you +think I was conspirin’ to sling a pick on your contemptuous little +railroad? And when you answered me with patriotic recitations, humping up the +star-spangled cause of liberty, did you have meditations of reducin’ me +to the ranks of the stump-grubbin’ Dagoes in the chain-gangs of your vile +and grovelin’ country?’ +</p> + +<p> +“The general man expanded his rotundity and laughed considerable. Yes, he +laughed very long and loud, and I, Clancy, stood and waited. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Comical mans!’ he shouts, at last. ‘So you will kill +me from the laughing. Yes; it is hard to find the brave, strong mans to aid my +country. Revolutions? Did I speak of r-r-revolutions? Not one word. I say, big, +strong mans is need in Guatemala. So. The mistake is of you. You have looked in +those one box containing those gun for the guard. You think all boxes is +contain gun? No. +</p> + +<p> +“‘There is not war in Guatemala. But work? Yes. Good. T’irty +dollar in the month. You shall shoulder one pickaxe, señor, and dig for the +liberty and prosperity of Guatemala. Off to your work. The guard waits for +you.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Little, fat, poodle dog of a brown man,’ says I, quiet, but +full of indignations and discomforts, ‘things shall happen to you. Maybe +not right away, but as soon as J. Clancy can formulate somethin’ in the +way of repartee.’ +</p> + +<p> +“The boss of the gang orders us to work. I tramps off with the Dagoes, +and I hears the distinguished patriot and kidnapper laughin’ hearty as we +go. +</p> + +<p> +“’Tis a sorrowful fact, for eight weeks I built railroads for that +misbehavin’ country. I filibustered twelve hours a day with a heavy pick +and a spade, choppin’ away the luxurious landscape that grew upon the +right of way. We worked in swamps that smelled like there was a leak in the gas +mains, trampin’ down a fine assortment of the most expensive hothouse +plants and vegetables. The scene was tropical beyond the wildest imagination of +the geography man. The trees was all sky-scrapers; the underbrush was full of +needles and pins; there was monkeys jumpin’ around and crocodiles and +pink-tailed mockin’-birds, and ye stood knee-deep in the rotten water and +grabbled roots for the liberation of Guatemala. Of nights we would build +smudges in camp to discourage the mosquitoes, and sit in the smoke, with the +guards pacin’ all around us. There was two hundred men workin’ on +the road—mostly Dagoes, nigger-men, Spanish-men and Swedes. Three or four +were Irish. +</p> + +<p> +“One old man named Halloran—a man of Hibernian entitlements and +discretions, explained it to me. He had been workin’ on the road a year. +Most of them died in less than six months. He was dried up to gristle and bone, +and shook with chills every third night. +</p> + +<p> +“‘When you first come,’ says he, ‘ye think ye’ll +leave right away. But they hold out your first month’s pay for your +passage over, and by that time the tropics has its grip on ye. Ye’re +surrounded by a ragin’ forest full of disreputable beasts—lions and +baboons and anacondas—waitin’ to devour ye. The sun strikes ye +hard, and melts the marrow in your bones. Ye get similar to the lettuce-eaters +the poetry-book speaks about. Ye forget the elevated sintiments of life, such +as patriotism, revenge, disturbances of the peace and the dacint love of a +clane shirt. Ye do your work, and ye swallow the kerosene ile and rubber +pipestems dished up to ye by the Dago cook for food. Ye light your pipeful, and +say to yoursilf, “Nixt week I’ll break away,” and ye go to +sleep and call yersilf a liar, for ye know ye’ll never do it.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Who is this general man,’ asks I, ‘that calls himself +De Vega?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘’Tis the man,’ says Halloran, ‘who is +tryin’ to complete the finishin’ of the railroad. ’Twas the +project of a private corporation, but it busted, and then the government took +it up. De Vegy is a big politician, and wants to be prisident. The people want +the railroad completed, as they’re taxed mighty on account of it. The De +Vegy man is pushin’ it along as a campaign move.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘’Tis not my way,’ says I, ‘to make threats +against any man, but there’s an account to be settled between the +railroad man and James O’Dowd Clancy.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘’Twas that way I thought, mesilf, at first,’ Halloran +says, with a big sigh, ‘until I got to be a lettuce-eater. The +fault’s wid these tropics. They rejuices a man’s system. ’Tis +a land, as the poet says, “Where it always seems to be after +dinner.” I does me work and smokes me pipe and sleeps. There’s +little else in life, anyway. Ye’ll get that way yersilf, mighty soon. +Don’t be harbourin’ any sintiments at all, Clancy.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I can’t help it,’ says I; ‘I’m full of +’em. I enlisted in the revolutionary army of this dark country in good +faith to fight for its liberty, honours and silver candlesticks; instead of +which I am set to amputatin’ its scenery and grubbin’ its roots. +’Tis the general man will have to pay for it.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Two months I worked on that railroad before I found a chance to get +away. One day a gang of us was sent back to the end of the completed line to +fetch some picks that had been sent down to Port Barrios to be sharpened. They +were brought on a hand-car, and I noticed, when I started away, that the car +was left there on the track. +</p> + +<p> +“That night, about twelve, I woke up Halloran and told him my scheme. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Run away?’ says Halloran. ‘Good Lord, Clancy, do ye +mean it? Why, I ain’t got the nerve. It’s too chilly, and I +ain’t slept enough. Run away? I told you, Clancy, I’ve eat the +lettuce. I’ve lost my grip. ’Tis the tropics that’s done it. +’Tis like the poet says: “Forgotten are our friends that we have +left behind; in the hollow lettuce-land we will live and lay reclined.” +You better go on, Clancy. I’ll stay, I guess. It’s too early and +cold, and I’m sleepy.’ +</p> + +<p> +“So I had to leave Halloran. I dressed quiet, and slipped out of the tent +we were in. When the guard came along I knocked him over, like a ninepin, with +a green cocoanut I had, and made for the railroad. I got on that hand-car and +made it fly. ’Twas yet a while before daybreak when I saw the lights of +Port Barrios about a mile away. I stopped the hand-car there and walked to the +town. I stepped inside the corporations of that town with care and hesitations. +I was not afraid of the army of Guatemala, but me soul quaked at the prospect +of a hand-to-hand struggle with its employment bureau. ’Tis a country +that hires its help easy and keeps ’em long. Sure I can fancy Missis +America and Missis Guatemala passin’ a bit of gossip some fine, still +night across the mountains. ‘Oh, dear,’ says Missis America, +‘and it’s a lot of trouble I’m havin’ ag’in with +the help, señora, ma’am.’ ‘Laws, now!’ says Missis +Guatemala, ‘you don’t say so, ma’am! Now, mine never think of +leavin’ me—te-he! ma’am,’ snickers Missis Guatemala. +</p> + +<p> +“I was wonderin’ how I was goin’ to move away from them +tropics without bein’ hired again. Dark as it was, I could see a steamer +ridin’ in the harbour, with smoke emergin’ from her stacks. I +turned down a little grass street that run down to the water. On the beach I +found a little brown nigger-man just about to shove off in a skiff. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Hold on, Sambo,’ says I, ‘savve English?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Heap plenty, yes,’ says he, with a pleasant grin. +</p> + +<p> +“‘What steamer is that?’ I asks him, ‘and where is it +going? And what’s the news, and the good word and the time of day?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘That steamer the <i>Conchita</i>,’ said the brown man, +affable and easy, rollin’ a cigarette. ‘Him come from New Orleans +for load banana. Him got load last night. I think him sail in one, two hour. +Verree nice day we shall be goin’ have. You hear some talkee ’bout +big battle, maybe so? You think catchee General De Vega, señor? Yes? No?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘How’s that, Sambo?’ says I. ‘Big battle? What +battle? Who wants catchee General De Vega? I’ve been up at my old gold +mines in the interior for a couple of months, and haven’t heard any +news.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Oh,’ says the nigger-man, proud to speak the English, +‘verree great revolution in Guatemala one week ago. General De Vega, him +try be president. Him raise armee—one—five—ten thousand mans +for fight at the government. Those one government send +five—forty—hundred thousand soldier to suppress revolution. They +fight big battle yesterday at Lomagrande—that about nineteen or fifty +mile in the mountain. That government soldier wheep General De Vega—oh, +most bad. Five hundred—nine hundred—two thousand of his mans is +kill. That revolution is smash suppress—bust—very quick. General De +Vega, him r-r-run away fast on one big mule. Yes, <i>carrambos!</i> The +general, him r-r-run away, and his armee is kill. That government soldier, they +try find General De Vega verree much. They want catchee him for shoot. You +think they catchee that general, señor?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Saints grant it!’ says I. ‘’Twould be the +judgment of Providence for settin’ the warlike talent of a Clancy to +gradin’ the tropics with a pick and shovel. But ’tis not so much a +question of insurrections now, me little man, as ’tis of the hired-man +problem. ’Tis anxious I am to resign a situation of responsibility and +trust with the white wings department of your great and degraded country. Row +me in your little boat out to that steamer, and I’ll give ye five +dollars—sinker pacers—sinker pacers,’ says I, reducin’ +the offer to the language and denomination of the tropic dialects. +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>Cinco pesos</i>,’ repeats the little man. ‘Five +dollee, you give?’ +</p> + +<p> +“’Twas not such a bad little man. He had hesitations at first, +sayin’ that passengers leavin’ the country had to have papers and +passports, but at last he took me out alongside the steamer. +</p> + +<p> +“Day was just breakin’ as we struck her, and there wasn’t a +soul to be seen on board. The water was very still, and the nigger-man gave me +a lift from the boat, and I climbed onto the steamer where her side was sliced +to the deck for loadin’ fruit. The hatches was open, and I looked down +and saw the cargo of bananas that filled the hold to within six feet of the +top. I thinks to myself, ‘Clancy, you better go as a stowaway. It’s +safer. The steamer men might hand you back to the employment bureau. The +tropic’ll get you, Clancy, if you don’t watch out.’ +</p> + +<p> +“So I jumps down easy among the bananas, and digs out a hole to hide in +among the bunches. In an hour or so I could hear the engines goin’, and +feel the steamer rockin’, and I knew we were off to sea. They left the +hatches open for ventilation, and pretty soon it was light enough in the hold +to see fairly well. I got to feelin’ a bit hungry, and thought I’d +have a light fruit lunch, by way of refreshment. I creeped out of the hole +I’d made and stood up straight. Just then I saw another man crawl up +about ten feet away and reach out and skin a banana and stuff it into his +mouth. ’Twas a dirty man, black-faced and ragged and disgraceful of +aspect. Yes, the man was a ringer for the pictures of the fat Weary Willie in +the funny papers. I looked again, and saw it was my general man—De Vega, +the great revolutionist, mule-rider and pickaxe importer. When he saw me the +general hesitated with his mouth filled with banana and his eyes the size of +cocoanuts. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Hist!’ I says. ‘Not a word, or they’ll put us +off and make us walk. “Veev la Liberty!”’ I adds, +copperin’ the sentiment by shovin’ a banana into the source of it. +I was certain the general wouldn’t recognize me. The nefarious work of +the tropics had left me lookin’ different. There was half an inch of roan +whiskers coverin’ me face, and me costume was a pair of blue overalls and +a red shirt. +</p> + +<p> +“‘How you come in the ship, señor?’ asked the general as soon +as he could speak. +</p> + +<p> +“‘By the back door—whist!’ says I. ‘’Twas a +glorious blow for liberty we struck,’ I continues; ‘but we was +overpowered by numbers. Let us accept our defeat like brave men and eat another +banana.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Were you in the cause of liberty fightin’, señor?’ +says the general, sheddin’ tears on the cargo. +</p> + +<p> +“‘To the last,’ says I. ‘’Twas I led the last +desperate charge against the minions of the tyrant. But it made them mad, and +we was forced to retreat. ’Twas I, general, procured the mule upon which +you escaped. Could you give that ripe bunch a little boost this way, general? +It’s a bit out of my reach. Thanks.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Say you so, brave patriot?’ said the general, again +weepin’. ‘Ah, <i>Dios!</i> And I have not the means to reward your +devotion. Barely did I my life bring away. <i>Carrambos!</i> what a +devil’s animal was that mule, señor! Like ships in one storm was I dashed +about. The skin on myself was ripped away with the thorns and vines. Upon the +bark of a hundred trees did that beast of the infernal bump, and cause outrage +to the legs of mine. In the night to Port Barrios I came. I dispossess myself +of that mountain of mule and hasten along the water shore. I find a little boat +to be tied. I launch myself and row to the steamer. I cannot see any mans on +board, so I climbed one rope which hang at the side. I then myself hide in the +bananas. Surely, I say, if the ship captains view me, they shall throw me again +to those Guatemala. Those things are not good. Guatemala will shoot General De +Vega. Therefore, I am hide and remain silent. Life itself is glorious. Liberty, +it is pretty good; but so good as life I do not think.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Three days, as I said, was the trip to New Orleans. The general man and +me got to be cronies of the deepest dye. Bananas we ate until they were +distasteful to the sight and an eyesore to the palate, but to bananas alone was +the bill of fare reduced. At night I crawls out, careful, on the lower deck, +and gets a bucket of fresh water. +</p> + +<p> +“That General De Vega was a man inhabited by an engorgement of words and +sentences. He added to the monotony of the voyage by divestin’ himself of +conversation. He believed I was a revolutionist of his own party, there +bein’, as he told me, a good many Americans and other foreigners in its +ranks. ’Twas a braggart and a conceited little gabbler it was, though he +considered himself a hero. ’Twas on himself he wasted all his regrets at +the failin’ of his plot. Not a word did the little balloon have to say +about the other misbehavin’ idiots that had been shot, or run themselves +to death in his revolution. +</p> + +<p> +“The second day out he was feelin’ pretty braggy and uppish for a +stowed-away conspirator that owed his existence to a mule and stolen bananas. +He was tellin’ me about the great railroad he had been buildin’, +and he relates what he calls a comic incident about a fool Irishman he +inveigled from New Orleans to sling a pick on his little morgue of a +narrow-gauge line. ’Twas sorrowful to hear the little, dirty general tell +the opprobrious story of how he put salt upon the tail of that reckless and +silly bird, Clancy. Laugh, he did, hearty and long. He shook with +laughin’, the black-faced rebel and outcast, standin’ neck-deep in +bananas, without friends or country. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Ah, señor,’ he snickers, ‘to the death you would have +laughed at that drollest Irish. I say to him: “Strong, big mans is need +very much in Guatemala.” “I will blows strike for your down-pressed +country,” he say. “That shall you do,” I tell him. Ah! it was +an Irish so comic. He sees one box break upon the wharf that contain for the +guard a few gun. He think there is gun in all the box. But that is all pickaxe. +Yes. Ah! señor, could you the face of that Irish have seen when they set him to +the work!’ +</p> + +<p> +“’Twas thus the ex-boss of the employment bureau contributed to the +tedium of the trip with merry jests and anecdote. But now and then he would +weep upon the bananas and make oration about the lost cause of liberty and the +mule. +</p> + +<p> +“’Twas a pleasant sound when the steamer bumped against the pier in +New Orleans. Pretty soon we heard the pat-a-pat of hundreds of bare feet, and +the Dago gang that unloads the fruit jumped on the deck and down into the hold. +Me and the general worked a while at passin’ up the bunches, and they +thought we were part of the gang. After about an hour we managed to slip off +the steamer onto the wharf. +</p> + +<p> +“’Twas a great honour on the hands of an obscure Clancy, +havin’ the entertainment of the representative of a great foreign +filibusterin’ power. I first bought for the general and myself many long +drinks and things to eat that were not bananas. The general man trotted along +at my side, leavin’ all the arrangements to me. I led him up to Lafayette +Square and set him on a bench in the little park. Cigarettes I had bought for +him, and he humped himself down on the seat like a little, fat, contented hobo. +I look him over as he sets there, and what I see pleases me. Brown by nature +and instinct, he is now brindled with dirt and dust. Praise to the mule, his +clothes is mostly strings and flaps. Yes, the looks of the general man is +agreeable to Clancy. +</p> + +<p> +“I ask him, delicate, if, by any chance, he brought away anybody’s +money with him from Guatemala. He sighs and bumps his shoulders against the +bench. Not a cent. All right. Maybe, he tells me, some of his friends in the +tropic outfit will send him funds later. The general was as clear a case of no +visible means as I ever saw. +</p> + +<p> +“I told him not to move from the bench, and then I went up to the corner +of Poydras and Carondelet. Along there is O’Hara’s beat. In five +minutes along comes O’Hara, a big, fine man, red-faced, with +shinin’ buttons, swingin’ his club. ’Twould be a fine thing +for Guatemala to move into O’Hara’s precinct. ’Twould be a +fine bit of recreation for Danny to suppress revolutions and uprisin’s +once or twice a week with his club. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Is 5046 workin’ yet, Danny?’ says I, walkin’ up +to him. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Overtime,’ says O’Hara, lookin’ over me +suspicious. ‘Want some of it?’ +</p> + +<p> +“Fifty-forty-six is the celebrated city ordinance authorizin’ +arrest, conviction and imprisonment of persons that succeed in concealin’ +their crimes from the police. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Don’t ye know Jimmy Clancy?’ says I. ‘Ye +pink-gilled monster.’ So, when O’Hara recognized me beneath the +scandalous exterior bestowed upon me by the tropics, I backed him into a +doorway and told him what I wanted, and why I wanted it. ‘All right, +Jimmy,’ says O’Hara. ‘Go back and hold the bench. I’ll +be along in ten minutes.’ +</p> + +<p> +“In that time O’Hara strolled through Lafayette Square and spied +two Weary Willies disgracin’ one of the benches. In ten minutes more J. +Clancy and General De Vega, late candidate for the presidency of Guatemala, was +in the station house. The general is badly frightened, and calls upon me to +proclaim his distinguishments and rank. +</p> + +<p> +“‘The man,’ says I to the police, ‘used to be a +railroad man. He’s on the bum now. ’Tis a little bughouse he is, on +account of losin’ his job.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘<i>Carrambos!</i>’ says the general, fizzin’ like a +little soda-water fountain, ‘you fought, señor, with my forces in my +native country. Why do you say the lies? You shall say I am the General De +Vega, one soldier, one <i>caballero</i>—’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Railroader,’ says I again. ‘On the hog. No good. Been +livin’ for three days on stolen bananas. Look at him. Ain’t that +enough?’ +</p> + +<p> +“Twenty-five dollars or sixty days, was what the recorder gave the +general. He didn’t have a cent, so he took the time. They let me go, as I +knew they would, for I had money to show, and O’Hara spoke for me. Yes; +sixty days he got. ’Twas just so long that I slung a pick for the great +country of Kam—Guatemala.” +</p> + +<p> +Clancy paused. The bright starlight showed a reminiscent look of happy content +on his seasoned features. Keogh leaned in his chair and gave his partner a slap +on his thinly-clad back that sounded like the crack of the surf on the sands. +</p> + +<p> +“Tell ’em, ye divil,” he chuckled, “how you got even +with the tropical general in the way of agricultural manœuvrings.” +</p> + +<p> +“Havin’ no money,” concluded Clancy, with unction, +“they set him to work his fine out with a gang from the parish prison +clearing Ursulines Street. Around the corner was a saloon decorated genially +with electric fans and cool merchandise. I made that me headquarters, and every +fifteen minutes I’d walk around and take a look at the little man +filibusterin’ with a rake and shovel. ’Twas just such a hot broth +of a day as this has been. And I’d call at him ‘Hey, +monseer!’ and he’d look at me black, with the damp showin’ +through his shirt in places. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Fat, strong mans,’ says I to General De Vega, ‘is +needed in New Orleans. Yes. To carry on the good work. Carrambos! Erin go +bragh!’” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap11"></a>XI<br/> +THE REMNANTS OF THE CODE</h2> + +<p> +Breakfast in Coralio was at eleven. Therefore the people did not go to market +early. The little wooden market-house stood on a patch of short-trimmed grass, +under the vivid green foliage of a bread-fruit tree. +</p> + +<p> +Thither one morning the venders leisurely convened, bringing their wares with +them. A porch or platform six feet wide encircled the building, shaded from the +mid-morning sun by the projecting, grass-thatched roof. Upon this platform the +venders were wont to display their goods—newly-killed beef, fish, crabs, +fruit of the country, cassava, eggs, <i>dulces</i> and high, tottering stacks +of native tortillas as large around as the sombrero of a Spanish grandee. +</p> + +<p> +But on this morning they whose stations lay on the seaward side of the +market-house, instead of spreading their merchandise formed themselves into a +softly jabbering and gesticulating group. For there upon their space of the +platform was sprawled, asleep, the unbeautiful figure of +“Beelzebub” Blythe. He lay upon a ragged strip of cocoa matting, +more than ever a fallen angel in appearance. His suit of coarse flax, soiled, +bursting at the seams, crumpled into a thousand diversified wrinkles and +creases, inclosed him absurdly, like the garb of some effigy that had been +stuffed in sport and thrown there after indignity had been wrought upon it. But +firmly upon the high bridge of his nose reposed his gold-rimmed glasses, the +surviving badge of his ancient glory. +</p> + +<p> +The sun’s rays, reflecting quiveringly from the rippling sea upon his +face, and the voices of the market-men woke “Beelzebub” Blythe. He +sat up, blinking, and leaned his back against the wall of the market. Drawing a +blighted silk handkerchief from his pocket, he assiduously rubbed and burnished +his glasses. And while doing this he became aware that his bedroom had been +invaded, and that polite brown and yellow men were beseeching him to vacate in +favour of their market stuff. +</p> + +<p> +If the señor would have the goodness—a thousand pardons for bringing to +him molestation—but soon would come the <i>compradores</i> for the +day’s provisions—surely they had ten thousand regrets at disturbing +him! +</p> + +<p> +In this manner they expanded to him the intimation that he must clear out and +cease to clog the wheels of trade. +</p> + +<p> +Blythe stepped from the platform with the air of a prince leaving his canopied +couch. He never quite lost that air, even at the lowest point of his fall. It +is clear that the college of good breeding does not necessarily maintain a +chair of morals within its walls. +</p> + +<p> +Blythe shook out his wry clothing, and moved slowly up the Calle Grande through +the hot sand. He moved without a destination in his mind. The little town was +languidly stirring to its daily life. Golden-skinned babies tumbled over one +another in the grass. The sea breeze brought him appetite, but nothing to +satisfy it. Throughout Coralio were its morning odors—those from the +heavily fragrant tropical flowers and from the bread baking in the outdoor +ovens of clay and the pervading smoke of their fires. Where the smoke cleared, +the crystal air, with some of the efficacy of faith, seemed to remove the +mountains almost to the sea, bringing them so near that one might count the +scarred glades on their wooded sides. The light-footed Caribs were swiftly +gliding to their tasks at the waterside. Already along the bosky trails from +the banana groves files of horses were slowly moving, concealed, except for +their nodding heads and plodding legs, by the bunches of green-golden fruit +heaped upon their backs. On doorsills sat women combing their long, black hair +and calling, one to another, across the narrow thoroughfares. Peace reigned in +Coralio—arid and bald peace; but still peace. +</p> + +<p> +On that bright morning when Nature seemed to be offering the lotus on the +Dawn’s golden platter “Beelzebub” Blythe had reached rock +bottom. Further descent seemed impossible. That last night’s slumber in a +public place had done for him. As long as he had had a roof to cover him there +had remained, unbridged, the space that separates a gentleman from the beasts +of the jungle and the fowls of the air. But now he was little more than a +whimpering oyster led to be devoured on the sands of a Southern sea by the +artful walrus, Circumstance, and the implacable carpenter, Fate. +</p> + +<p> +To Blythe money was now but a memory. He had drained his friends of all that +their good-fellowship had to offer; then he had squeezed them to the last drop +of their generosity; and at the last, Aaron-like, he had smitten the rock of +their hardening bosoms for the scattering, ignoble drops of Charity itself. +</p> + +<p> +He had exhausted his credit to the last <i>real</i>. With the minute keenness +of the shameless sponger he was aware of every source in Coralio from which a +glass of rum, a meal or a piece of silver could be wheedled. Marshalling each +such source in his mind, he considered it with all the thoroughness and +penetration that hunger and thirst lent him for the task. All his optimism +failed to thresh a grain of hope from the chaff of his postulations. He had +played out the game. That one night in the open had shaken his nerves. Until +then there had been left to him at least a few grounds upon which he could base +his unblushing demands upon his neighbours’ stores. Now he must beg +instead of borrowing. The most brazen sophistry could not dignify by the name +of “loan” the coin contemptuously flung to a beachcomber who slept +on the bare boards of the public market. +</p> + +<p> +But on this morning no beggar would have more thankfully received a charitable +coin, for the demon thirst had him by the throat—the drunkard’s +matutinal thirst that requires to be slaked at each morning station on the road +to Tophet. +</p> + +<p> +Blythe walked slowly up the street, keeping a watchful eye for any miracle that +might drop manna upon him in his wilderness. As he passed the popular eating +house of Madama Vasquez, Madama’s boarders were just sitting down to +freshly-baked bread, <i>aguacates</i>, pines and delicious coffee that sent +forth odorous guarantee of its quality upon the breeze. Madama was serving; she +turned her shy, stolid, melancholy gaze for a moment out the window; she saw +Blythe, and her expression turned more shy and embarrassed. +“Beelzebub” owed her twenty <i>pesos</i>. He bowed as he had once +bowed to less embarrassed dames to whom he owed nothing, and passed on. +</p> + +<p> +Merchants and their clerks were throwing open the solid wooden doors of their +shops. Polite but cool were the glances they cast upon Blythe as he lounged +tentatively by with the remains of his old jaunty air; for they were his +creditors almost without exception. +</p> + +<p> +At the little fountain in the <i>plaza</i> he made an apology for a toilet with +his wetted handkerchief. Across the open square filed the dolorous line of +friends of the prisoners in the <i>calaboza</i>, bearing the morning meal of +the immured. The food in their hands aroused small longing in Blythe. It was +drink that his soul craved, or money to buy it. +</p> + +<p> +In the streets he met many with whom he had been friends and equals, and whose +patience and liberality he had gradually exhausted. Willard Geddie and Paula +cantered past him with the coolest of nods, returning from their daily +horseback ride along the old Indian road. Keogh passed him at another corner, +whistling cheerfully and bearing a prize of newly-laid eggs for the breakfast +of himself and Clancy. The jovial scout of Fortune was one of Blythe’s +victims who had plunged his hand oftenest into his pocket to aid him. But now +it seemed that Keogh, too, had fortified himself against further invasions. His +curt greeting and the ominous light in his full, grey eye quickened the steps +of “Beelzebub,” whom desperation had almost incited to attempt an +additional “loan.” +</p> + +<p> +Three drinking shops the forlorn one next visited in succession. In all of +these his money, his credit and his welcome had long since been spent; but +Blythe felt that he would have fawned in the dust at the feet of an enemy that +morning for one draught of <i>aguardiente</i>. In two of the <i>pulperias</i> +his courageous petition for drink was met with a refusal so polite that it +stung worse than abuse. The third establishment had acquired something of +American methods; and here he was seized bodily and cast out upon his hands and +knees. +</p> + +<p> +This physical indignity caused a singular change in the man. As he picked +himself up and walked away, an expression of absolute relief came upon his +features. The specious and conciliatory smile that had been graven there was +succeeded by a look of calm and sinister resolve. “Beelzebub” had +been floundering in the sea of improbity, holding by a slender life-line to the +respectable world that had cast him overboard. He must have felt that with this +ultimate shock the line had snapped, and have experienced the welcome ease of +the drowning swimmer who has ceased to struggle. +</p> + +<p> +Blythe walked to the next corner and stood there while he brushed the sand from +his garments and re-polished his glasses. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve got to do it—oh, I’ve got to do it,” he +told himself, aloud. “If I had a quart of rum I believe I could stave it +off yet—for a little while. But there’s no more rum +for—‘Beelzebub,’ as they call me. By the flames of Tartarus! +if I’m to sit at the right hand of Satan somebody has got to pay the +court expenses. You’ll have to pony up, Mr. Frank Goodwin. You’re a +good fellow; but a gentleman must draw the line at being kicked into the +gutter. Blackmail isn’t a pretty word, but it’s the next station on +the road I’m travelling.” +</p> + +<p> +With purpose in his steps Blythe now moved rapidly through the town by way of +its landward environs. He passed through the squalid quarters of the +improvident negroes and on beyond the picturesque shacks of the poorer +<i>mestizos</i>. From many points along his course he could see, through the +umbrageous glades, the house of Frank Goodwin on its wooded hill. And as he +crossed the little bridge over the lagoon he saw the old Indian, Galvez, +scrubbing at the wooden slab that bore the name of Miraflores. Beyond the +lagoon the lands of Goodwin began to slope gently upward. A grassy road, shaded +by a munificent and diverse array of tropical flora wound from the edge of an +outlying banana grove to the dwelling. Blythe took this road with long and +purposeful strides. +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin was seated on his coolest gallery, dictating letters to his secretary, +a sallow and capable native youth. The household adhered to the American plan +of breakfast; and that meal had been a thing of the past for the better part of +an hour. +</p> + +<p> +The castaway walked to the steps, and flourished a hand. +</p> + +<p> +“Good morning, Blythe,” said Goodwin, looking up. “Come in +and have a chair. Anything I can do for you?” +</p> + +<p> +“I want to speak to you in private.” +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin nodded at his secretary, who strolled out under a mango tree and lit a +cigarette. Blythe took the chair that he had left vacant. +</p> + +<p> +“I want some money,” he began, doggedly. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m sorry,” said Goodwin, with equal directness, “but +you can’t have any. You’re drinking yourself to death, Blythe. Your +friends have done all they could to help you to brace up. You won’t help +yourself. There’s no use furnishing you with money to ruin yourself with +any longer.” +</p> + +<p> +“Dear man,” said Blythe, tilting back his chair, “it +isn’t a question of social economy now. It’s past that. I like you, +Goodwin; and I’ve come to stick a knife between your ribs. I was kicked +out of Espada’s saloon this morning; and Society owes me reparation for +my wounded feelings.” +</p> + +<p> +“I didn’t kick you out.” +</p> + +<p> +“No; but in a general way you represent Society; and in a particular way +you represent my last chance. I’ve had to come down to it, old +man—I tried to do it a month ago when Losada’s man was here turning +things over; but I couldn’t do it then. Now it’s different. I want +a thousand dollars, Goodwin; and you’ll have to give it to me.” +</p> + +<p> +“Only last week,” said Goodwin, with a smile, “a silver +dollar was all you were asking for.” +</p> + +<p> +“An evidence,” said Blythe, flippantly, “that I was still +virtuous—though under heavy pressure. The wages of sin should be +something higher than a <i>peso</i> worth forty-eight cents. Let’s talk +business. I am the villain in the third act; and I must have my merited, if +only temporary, triumph. I saw you collar the late president’s valiseful +of boodle. Oh, I know it’s blackmail; but I’m liberal about the +price. I know I’m a cheap villain—one of the regular sawmill-drama +kind—but you’re one of my particular friends, and I don’t +want to stick you hard.” +</p> + +<p> +“Suppose you go into the details,” suggested Goodwin, calmly +arranging his letters on the table. +</p> + +<p> +“All right,” said “Beelzebub.” “I like the way +you take it. I despise histrionics; so you will please prepare yourself for the +facts without any red fire, calcium or grace notes on the saxophone. +</p> + +<p> +“On the night that His Fly-by-night Excellency arrived in town I was very +drunk. You will excuse the pride with which I state that fact; but it was quite +a feat for me to attain that desirable state. Somebody had left a cot out under +the orange trees in the yard of Madama Ortiz’s hotel. I stepped over the +wall, laid down upon it, and fell asleep. I was awakened by an orange that +dropped from the tree upon my nose; and I laid there for awhile cursing Sir +Isaac Newton, or whoever it was that invented gravitation, for not confining +his theory to apples. +</p> + +<p> +“And then along came Mr. Miraflores and his true-love with the treasury +in a valise, and went into the hotel. Next you hove in sight, and held a +pow-wow with the tonsorial artist who insisted upon talking shop after hours. I +tried to slumber again; but once more my rest was disturbed—this time by +the noise of the popgun that went off upstairs. Then that valise came crashing +down into an orange tree just above my head; and I arose from my couch, not +knowing when it might begin to rain Saratoga trunks. When the army and the +constabulary began to arrive, with their medals and decorations hastily pinned +to their pajamas, and their snickersnees drawn, I crawled into the welcome +shadow of a banana plant. I remained there for an hour, by which time the +excitement and the people had cleared away. And then, my dear +Goodwin—excuse me—I saw you sneak back and pluck that ripe and +juicy valise from the orange tree. I followed you, and saw you take it to your +own house. A hundred-thousand-dollar crop from one orange tree in a season +about breaks the record of the fruit-growing industry. +</p> + +<p> +“Being a gentleman at that time, of course, I never mentioned the +incident to anyone. But this morning I was kicked out of a saloon, my code of +honour is all out at the elbows, and I’d sell my mother’s +prayer-book for three fingers of <i>aguardiente</i>. I’m not putting on +the screws hard. It ought to be worth a thousand to you for me to have slept on +that cot through the whole business without waking up and seeing +anything.” +</p> + +<p> +Goodwin opened two more letters, and made memoranda in pencil on them. Then he +called “Manuel!” to his secretary, who came, spryly. +</p> + +<p> +“The <i>Ariel</i>—when does she sail?” asked Goodwin. +</p> + +<p> +“Señor,” answered the youth, “at three this afternoon. She +drops down-coast to Punta Soledad to complete her cargo of fruit. From there +she sails for New Orleans without delay.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Bueno!</i>” said Goodwin. “These letters may wait yet +awhile.” +</p> + +<p> +The secretary returned to his cigarette under the mango tree. +</p> + +<p> +“In round numbers,” said Goodwin, facing Blythe squarely, +“how much money do you owe in this town, not including the sums you have +‘borrowed’ from me?” +</p> + +<p> +“Five hundred—at a rough guess,” answered Blythe, lightly. +</p> + +<p> +“Go somewhere in the town and draw up a schedule of your debts,” +said Goodwin. “Come back here in two hours, and I will send Manuel with +the money to pay them. I will also have a decent outfit of clothing ready for +you. You will sail on the <i>Ariel</i> at three. Manuel will accompany you as +far as the deck of the steamer. There he will hand you one thousand dollars in +cash. I suppose that we needn’t discuss what you will be expected to do +in return.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, I understand,” piped Blythe, cheerily. “I was asleep all +the time on the cot under Madama Ortiz’s orange trees; and I shake off +the dust of Coralio forever. I’ll play fair. No more of the lotus for me. +Your proposition is O. K. You’re a good fellow, Goodwin; and I let you +off light. I’ll agree to everything. But in the meantime—I’ve +a devil of a thirst on, old man—” +</p> + +<p> +“Not a <i>centavo</i>,” said Goodwin, firmly, “until you are +on board the <i>Ariel</i>. You would be drunk in thirty minutes if you had +money now.” +</p> + +<p> +But he noticed the blood-streaked eyeballs, the relaxed form and the shaking +hands of “Beelzebub;” and he stepped into the dining room through +the low window, and brought out a glass and a decanter of brandy. +</p> + +<p> +“Take a bracer, anyway, before you go,” he proposed, even as a man +to the friend whom he entertains. +</p> + +<p> +“Beelzebub” Blythe’s eyes glistened at the sight of the +solace for which his soul burned. To-day for the first time his poisoned nerves +had been denied their steadying dose; and their retort was a mounting torment. +He grasped the decanter and rattled its crystal mouth against the glass in his +trembling hand. He flushed the glass, and then stood erect, holding it aloft +for an instant. For one fleeting moment he held his head above the drowning +waves of his abyss. He nodded easily at Goodwin, raised his brimming glass and +murmured a “health” that men had used in his ancient Paradise Lost. +And then so suddenly that he spilled the brandy over his hand, he set down his +glass, untasted. +</p> + +<p> +“In two hours,” his dry lips muttered to Goodwin, as he marched +down the steps and turned his face toward the town. +</p> + +<p> +In the edge of the cool banana grove “Beelzebub” halted, and +snapped the tongue of his belt buckle into another hole. +</p> + +<p> +“I couldn’t do it,” he explained, feverishly, to the waving +banana fronds. “I wanted to, but I couldn’t. A gentleman +can’t drink with the man that he blackmails.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap12"></a>XII<br/> +SHOES</h2> + +<p> +John De Graffenreid Atwood ate of the lotus, root, stem, and flower. The +tropics gobbled him up. He plunged enthusiastically into his work, which was to +try to forget Rosine. +</p> + +<p> +Now, they who dine on the lotus rarely consume it plain. There is a sauce <i>au +diable</i> that goes with it; and the distillers are the chefs who prepare it. +And on Johnny’s menu card it read “brandy.” With a bottle +between them, he and Billy Keogh would sit on the porch of the little consulate +at night and roar out great, indecorous songs, until the natives, slipping +hastily past, would shrug a shoulder and mutter things to themselves about the +“<i>Americanos diablos</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +One day Johnny’s <i>mozo</i> brought the mail and dumped it on the table. +Johnny leaned from his hammock, and fingered the four or five letters +dejectedly. Keogh was sitting on the edge of the table chopping lazily with a +paper knife at the legs of a centipede that was crawling among the stationery. +Johnny was in that phase of lotus-eating when all the world tastes bitter in +one’s mouth. +</p> + +<p> +“Same old thing!” he complained. “Fool people writing for +information about the country. They want to know all about raising fruit, and +how to make a fortune without work. Half of ’em don’t even send +stamps for a reply. They think a consul hasn’t anything to do but write +letters. Slit those envelopes for me, old man, and see what they want. +I’m feeling too rocky to move.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh, acclimated beyond all possibility of ill-humour, drew his chair to the +table with smiling compliance on his rose-pink countenance, and began to slit +open the letters. Four of them were from citizens in various parts of the +United States who seemed to regard the consul at Coralio as a cyclopædia of +information. They asked long lists of questions, numerically arranged, about +the climate, products, possibilities, laws, business chances, and statistics of +the country in which the consul had the honour of representing his own +government. +</p> + +<p> +“Write ’em, please, Billy,” said that inert official, +“just a line, referring them to the latest consular report. Tell +’em the State Department will be delighted to furnish the literary gems. +Sign my name. Don’t let your pen scratch, Billy; it’ll keep me +awake.” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t snore,” said Keogh, amiably, “and I’ll do +your work for you. You need a corps of assistants, anyhow. Don’t see how +you ever get out a report. Wake up a minute!—here’s one more +letter—it’s from your own town, too—Dalesburg.” +</p> + +<p> +“That so?” murmured Johnny showing a mild and obligatory interest. +“What’s it about?” +</p> + +<p> +“Postmaster writes,” explained Keogh. “Says a citizen of the +town wants some facts and advice from you. Says the citizen has an idea in his +head of coming down where you are and opening a shoe store. Wants to know if +you think the business would pay. Says he’s heard of the boom along this +coast, and wants to get in on the ground floor.” +</p> + +<p> +In spite of the heat and his bad temper, Johnny’s hammock swayed with his +laughter. Keogh laughed too; and the pet monkey on the top shelf of the +bookcase chattered in shrill sympathy with the ironical reception of the letter +from Dalesburg. +</p> + +<p> +“Great bunions!” exclaimed the consul. “Shoe store! +What’ll they ask about next, I wonder? Overcoat factory, I reckon. Say, +Billy—of our 3,000 citizens, how many do you suppose ever had on a pair +of shoes?” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh reflected judicially. +</p> + +<p> +“Let’s see—there’s you and me and—” +</p> + +<p> +“Not me,” said Johnny, promptly and incorrectly, holding up a foot +encased in a disreputable deerskin <i>zapato</i>. “I haven’t been a +victim to shoes in months.” +</p> + +<p> +“But you’ve got ’em, though,” went on Keogh. “And +there’s Goodwin and Blanchard and Geddie and old Lutz and Doc Gregg and +that Italian that’s agent for the banana company, and there’s old +Delgado—no; he wears sandals. And, oh, yes; there’s Madama Ortiz, +‘what kapes the hotel’—she had on a pair of red slippers at +the <i>baile</i> the other night. And Miss Pasa, her daughter, that went to +school in the States—she brought back some civilized notions in the way +of footgear. And there’s the <i>comandante’s</i> sister that +dresses up her feet on feast-days—and Mrs. Geddie, who wears a two with a +Castilian instep—and that’s about all the ladies. Let’s +see—don’t some of the soldiers at the <i>cuartel</i>—no: +that’s so; they’re allowed shoes only when on the march. In +barracks they turn their little toeses out to grass.” +</p> + +<p> +“’Bout right,” agreed the consul. “Not over twenty out +of the three thousand ever felt leather on their walking arrangements. Oh, yes; +Coralio is just the town for an enterprising shoe store—that +doesn’t want to part with its goods. Wonder if old Patterson is trying to +jolly me! He always was full of things he called jokes. Write him a letter, +Billy. I’ll dictate it. We’ll jolly him back a few.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh dipped his pen, and wrote at Johnny’s dictation. With many pauses, +filled in with smoke and sundry travellings of the bottle and glasses, the +following reply to the Dalesburg communication was perpetrated: +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +Mr. Obadiah Patterson,<br/> + Dalesburg, Ala.<br/> + <i>Dear Sir:</i> In reply to your favour of July 2d, I have the honour to +inform you that, according to my opinion, there is no place on the habitable +globe that presents to the eye stronger evidence of the need of a first-class +shoe store than does the town of Coralio. There are 3,000 inhabitants in the +place, and not a single shoe store! The situation speaks for itself. This coast +is rapidly becoming the goal of enterprising business men, but the shoe +business is one that has been sadly overlooked or neglected. In fact, there are +a considerable number of our citizens actually without shoes at present.<br/> + Besides the want above mentioned, there is also a crying need for a +brewery, a college of higher mathematics, a coal yard, and a clean and +intellectual Punch and Judy show. I have the honour to be, sir, +</p> + +<p class="right"> +Your Obt. Servant,<br/> +J<small>OHN</small> D<small>E</small> G<small>RAFFENREID</small> +A<small>TWOOD</small>,<br/> +U. S. Consul at Coralio. +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +P.S.—Hello! Uncle Obadiah. How’s the old burg racking along? What +would the government do without you and me? Look out for a green-headed parrot +and a bunch of bananas soon, from your old friend +</p> + +<p class="right"> +J<small>OHNNY</small>. +</p> + +<p> +“I throw in that postscript,” explained the consul, “so Uncle +Obadiah won’t take offence at the official tone of the letter! Now, +Billy, you get that correspondence fixed up, and send Pancho to the post-office +with it. The <i>Ariadne</i> takes the mail out to-morrow if they make up that +load of fruit to-day.” +</p> + +<p> +The night programme in Coralio never varied. The recreations of the people were +soporific and flat. They wandered about, barefoot and aimless, speaking lowly +and smoking cigar or cigarette. Looking down on the dimly lighted ways one +seemed to see a threading maze of brunette ghosts tangled with a procession of +insane fireflies. In some houses the thrumming of lugubrious guitars added to +the depression of the <i>triste</i> night. Giant tree-frogs rattled in the +foliage as loudly as the end man’s “bones” in a minstrel +troupe. By nine o’clock the streets were almost deserted. +</p> + +<p> +Nor at the consulate was there often a change of bill. Keogh would come there +nightly, for Coralio’s one cool place was the little seaward porch of +that official residence. +</p> + +<p> +The brandy would be kept moving; and before midnight sentiment would begin to +stir in the heart of the self-exiled consul. Then he would relate to Keogh the +story of his ended romance. Each night Keogh would listen patiently to the +tale, and be ready with untiring sympathy. +</p> + +<p> +“But don’t you think for a minute”—thus Johnny would +always conclude his woeful narrative—“that I’m grieving about +that girl, Billy. I’ve forgotten her. She never enters my mind. If she +were to enter that door right now, my pulse wouldn’t gain a beat. +That’s all over long ago.” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t I know it?” Keogh would answer. “Of course +you’ve forgotten her. Proper thing to do. Wasn’t quite O. K. of her +to listen to the knocks that—er—Dink Pawson kept giving you.” +</p> + +<p> +“Pink Dawson!”—a world of contempt would be in Johnny’s +tones—“Poor white trash! That’s what he was. Had five hundred +acres of farming land, though; and that counted. Maybe I’ll have a chance +to get back at him some day. The Dawsons weren’t anybody. Everybody in +Alabama knows the Atwoods. Say, Billy—did you know my mother was a De +Graffenreid?” +</p> + +<p> +“Why, no,” Keogh would say; “is that so?” He had heard +it some three hundred times. +</p> + +<p> +“Fact. The De Graffenreids of Hancock County. But I never think of that +girl any more, do I, Billy?” +</p> + +<p> +“Not for a minute, my boy,” would be the last sounds heard by the +conqueror of Cupid. +</p> + +<p> +At this point Johnny would fall into a gentle slumber, and Keogh would saunter +out to his own shack under the calabash tree at the edge of the plaza. +</p> + +<p> +In a day or two the letter from the Dalesburg postmaster and its answer had +been forgotten by the Coralio exiles. But on the 26th day of July the fruit of +the reply appeared upon the tree of events. +</p> + +<p> +The <i>Andador</i>, a fruit steamer that visited Coralio regularly, drew into +the offing and anchored. The beach was lined with spectators while the +quarantine doctor and the custom-house crew rowed out to attend to their +duties. +</p> + +<p> +An hour later Billy Keogh lounged into the consulate, clean and cool in his +linen clothes, and grinning like a pleased shark. +</p> + +<p> +“Guess what?” he said to Johnny, lounging in his hammock. +</p> + +<p> +“Too hot to guess,” said Johnny, lazily. +</p> + +<p> +“Your shoe-store man’s come,” said Keogh, rolling the sweet +morsel on his tongue, “with a stock of goods big enough to supply the +continent as far down as Terra del Fuego. They’re carting his cases over +to the custom-house now. Six barges full they brought ashore and have paddled +back for the rest. Oh, ye saints in glory! won’t there be regalements in +the air when he gets onto the joke and has an interview with Mr. Consul? +It’ll be worth nine years in the tropics just to witness that one joyful +moment.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh loved to take his mirth easily. He selected a clean place on the matting +and lay upon the floor. The walls shook with his enjoyment. Johnny turned half +over and blinked. +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t tell me,” he said, “that anybody was fool enough +to take that letter seriously.” +</p> + +<p> +“Four-thousand-dollar stock of goods!” gasped Keogh, in ecstasy. +“Talk about coals to Newcastle! Why didn’t he take a ship-load of +palm-leaf fans to Spitzbergen while he was about it? Saw the old codger on the +beach. You ought to have been there when he put on his specs and squinted at +the five hundred or so barefooted citizens standing around.” +</p> + +<p> +“Are you telling the truth, Billy?” asked the consul, weakly. +</p> + +<p> +“Am I? You ought to see the buncoed gentleman’s daughter he brought +along. Looks! She makes the brick-dust señoritas here look like +tar-babies.” +</p> + +<p> +“Go on,” said Johnny, “if you can stop that asinine giggling. +I hate to see a grown man make a laughing hyena of himself.” +</p> + +<p> +“Name is Hemstetter,” went on Keogh. “He’s a— +Hello! what’s the matter now?” +</p> + +<p> +Johnny’s moccasined feet struck the floor with a thud as he wriggled out +of his hammock. +</p> + +<p> +“Get up, you idiot,” he said, sternly, “or I’ll brain +you with this inkstand. That’s Rosine and her father. Gad! what a +drivelling idiot old Patterson is! Get up, here, Billy Keogh, and help me. What +the devil are we going to do? Has all the world gone crazy?” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh rose and dusted himself. He managed to regain a decorous demeanour. +</p> + +<p> +“Situation has got to be met, Johnny,” he said, with some success +at seriousness. “I didn’t think about its being your girl until you +spoke. First thing to do is to get them comfortable quarters. You go down and +face the music, and I’ll trot out to Goodwin’s and see if Mrs. +Goodwin won’t take them in. They’ve got the decentest house in +town.” +</p> + +<p> +“Bless you, Billy!” said the consul. “I knew you +wouldn’t desert me. The world’s bound to come to an end, but maybe +we can stave it off for a day or two.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh hoisted his umbrella and set out for Goodwin’s house. Johnny put on +his coat and hat. He picked up the brandy bottle, but set it down again without +drinking, and marched bravely down to the beach. +</p> + +<p> +In the shade of the custom-house walls he found Mr. Hemstetter and Rosine +surrounded by a mass of gaping citizens. The customs officers were ducking and +scraping, while the captain of the <i>Andador</i> interpreted the business of +the new arrivals. Rosine looked healthy and very much alive. She was gazing at +the strange scenes around her with amused interest. There was a faint blush +upon her round cheek as she greeted her old admirer. Mr. Hemstetter shook hands +with Johnny in a very friendly way. He was an oldish, impractical man—one +of that numerous class of erratic business men who are forever dissatisfied, +and seeking a change. +</p> + +<p> +“I am very glad to see you, John—may I call you John?” he +said. “Let me thank you for your prompt answer to our postmaster’s +letter of inquiry. He volunteered to write to you on my behalf. I was looking +about for something different in the way of a business in which the profits +would be greater. I had noticed in the papers that this coast was receiving +much attention from investors. I am extremely grateful for your advice to come. +I sold out everything that I possess, and invested the proceeds in as fine a +stock of shoes as could be bought in the North. You have a picturesque town +here, John. I hope business will be as good as your letter justifies me in +expecting.” +</p> + +<p> +Johnny’s agony was abbreviated by the arrival of Keogh, who hurried up +with the news that Mrs. Goodwin would be much pleased to place rooms at the +disposal of Mr. Hemstetter and his daughter. So there Mr. Hemstetter and Rosine +were at once conducted and left to recuperate from the fatigue of the voyage, +while Johnny went down to see that the cases of shoes were safely stored in the +customs warehouse pending their examination by the officials. Keogh, grinning +like a shark, skirmished about to find Goodwin, to instruct him not to expose +to Mr. Hemstetter the true state of Coralio as a shoe market until Johnny had +been given a chance to redeem the situation, if such a thing were possible. +</p> + +<p> +That night the consul and Keogh held a desperate consultation on the breezy +porch of the consulate. +</p> + +<p> +“Send ’em back home,” began Keogh, reading Johnny’s +thoughts. +</p> + +<p> +“I would,” said Johnny, after a little silence; “but +I’ve been lying to you, Billy.” +</p> + +<p> +“All right about that,” said Keogh, affably. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ve told you hundreds of times,” said Johnny, slowly, +“that I had forgotten that girl, haven’t I?” +</p> + +<p> +“About three hundred and seventy-five,” admitted the monument of +patience. +</p> + +<p> +“I lied,” repeated the consul, “every time. I never forgot +her for one minute. I was an obstinate ass for running away just because she +said ‘No’ once. And I was too proud a fool to go back. I talked +with Rosine a few minutes this evening up at Goodwin’s. I found out one +thing. You remember that farmer fellow who was always after her?” +</p> + +<p> +“Dink Pawson?” asked Keogh. +</p> + +<p> +“Pink Dawson. Well, he wasn’t a hill of beans to her. She says she +didn’t believe a word of the things he told her about me. But I’m +sewed up now, Billy. That tomfool letter we sent ruined whatever chance I had +left. She’ll despise me when she finds out that her old father has been +made the victim of a joke that a decent school boy wouldn’t have been +guilty of. Shoes! Why he couldn’t sell twenty pairs of shoes in Coralio +if he kept store here for twenty years. You put a pair of shoes on one of these +Caribs or Spanish brown boys and what’d he do? Stand on his head and +squeal until he’d kicked ’em off. None of ’em ever wore shoes +and they never will. If I send ’em back home I’ll have to tell the +whole story, and what’ll she think of me? I want that girl worse than +ever, Billy, and now when she’s in reach I’ve lost her forever +because I tried to be funny when the thermometer was at 102.” +</p> + +<p> +“Keep cheerful,” said the optimistic Keogh. “And let +’em open the store. I’ve been busy myself this afternoon. We can +stir up a temporary boom in foot-gear anyhow. I’ll buy six pairs when the +doors open. I’ve been around and seen all the fellows and explained the +catastrophe. They’ll all buy shoes like they was centipedes. Frank +Goodwin will take cases of ’em. The Geddies want about eleven pairs +between ’em. Clancy is going to invest the savings of weeks, and even old +Doc Gregg wants three pairs of alligator-hide slippers if they’ve got any +tens. Blanchard got a look at Miss Hemstetter; and as he’s a Frenchman, +no less than a dozen pairs will do for him.” +</p> + +<p> +“A dozen customers,” said Johnny, “for a $4,000 stock of +shoes! It won’t work. There’s a big problem here to figure out. You +go home, Billy, and leave me alone. I’ve got to work at it all by myself. +Take that bottle of Three-star along with you—no, sir; not another ounce +of booze for the United States consul. I’ll sit here to-night and pull +out the think stop. If there’s a soft place on this proposition anywhere +I’ll land on it. If there isn’t there’ll be another wreck to +the credit of the gorgeous tropics.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh left, feeling that he could be of no use. Johnny laid a handful of cigars +on a table and stretched himself in a steamer chair. When the sudden daylight +broke, silvering the harbour ripples, he was still sitting there. Then he got +up, whistling a little tune, and took his bath. +</p> + +<p> +At nine o’clock he walked down to the dingy little cable office and hung +for half an hour over a blank. The result of his application was the following +message, which he signed and had transmitted at a cost of $33: +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +T<small>O</small> P<small>INKNEY</small> D<small>AWSON</small>,<br/> + Dalesburg, Ala.<br/> + Draft for $100 comes to you next mail. Ship me immediately 500 pounds +stiff, dry cockleburrs. New use here in arts. Market price twenty cents pound. +Further orders likely. Rush. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap13"></a>XIII<br/> +SHIPS</h2> + +<p> +Within a week a suitable building had been secured in the Calle Grande, and Mr. +Hemstetter’s stock of shoes arranged upon their shelves. The rent of the +store was moderate; and the stock made a fine showing of neat white boxes, +attractively displayed. +</p> + +<p> +Johnny’s friends stood by him loyally. On the first day Keogh strolled +into the store in a casual kind of way about once every hour, and bought shoes. +After he had purchased a pair each of extension soles, congress gaiters, button +kids, low-quartered calfs, dancing pumps, rubber boots, tans of various hues, +tennis shoes and flowered slippers, he sought out Johnny to be prompted as to +names of other kinds that he might inquire for. The other English-speaking +residents also played their parts nobly by buying often and liberally. Keogh +was grand marshal, and made them distribute their patronage, thus keeping up a +fair run of custom for several days. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Hemstetter was gratified by the amount of business done thus far; but +expressed surprise that the natives were so backward with their custom. +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, they’re awfully shy,” explained Johnny, as he wiped his +forehead nervously. “They’ll get the habit pretty soon. +They’ll come with a rush when they do come.” +</p> + +<p> +One afternoon Keogh dropped into the consul’s office, chewing an +unlighted cigar thoughtfully. +</p> + +<p> +“Got anything up your sleeve?” he inquired of Johnny. “If you +have it’s about time to show it. If you can borrow some gent’s hat +in the audience, and make a lot of customers for an idle stock of shoes come +out of it, you’d better spiel. The boys have all laid in enough footwear +to last ’em ten years; and there’s nothing doing in the shoe store +but dolcy far nienty. I just came by there. Your venerable victim was standing +in the door, gazing through his specs at the bare toes passing by his emporium. +The natives here have got the true artistic temperament. Me and Clancy took +eighteen tintypes this morning in two hours. There’s been but one pair of +shoes sold all day. Blanchard went in and bought a pair of fur-lined +house-slippers because he thought he saw Miss Hemstetter go into the store. I +saw him throw the slippers into the lagoon afterwards.” +</p> + +<p> +“There’s a Mobile fruit steamer coming in to-morrow or next +day,” said Johnny. “We can’t do anything until then.” +</p> + +<p> +“What are you going to do—try to create a demand?” +</p> + +<p> +“Political economy isn’t your strong point,” said the consul, +impudently. “You can’t create a demand. But you can create a +necessity for a demand. That’s what I am going to do.” +</p> + +<p> +Two weeks after the consul sent his cable, a fruit steamer brought him a huge, +mysterious brown bale of some unknown commodity. Johnny’s influence with +the custom-house people was sufficiently strong for him to get the goods turned +over to him without the usual inspection. He had the bale taken to the +consulate and snugly stowed in the back room. +</p> + +<p> +That night he ripped open a corner of it and took out a handful of the +cockleburrs. He examined them with the care with which a warrior examines his +arms before he goes forth to battle for his lady-love and life. The burrs were +the ripe August product, as hard as filberts, and bristling with spines as +tough and sharp as needles. Johnny whistled softly a little tune, and went out +to find Billy Keogh. +</p> + +<p> +Later in the night, when Coralio was steeped in slumber, he and Billy went +forth into the deserted streets with their coats bulging like balloons. All up +and down the Calle Grande they went, sowing the sharp burrs carefully in the +sand, along the narrow sidewalks, in every foot of grass between the silent +houses. And then they took the side streets and by-ways, missing none. No place +where the foot of man, woman or child might fall was slighted. Many trips they +made to and from the prickly hoard. And then, nearly at the dawn, they laid +themselves down to rest calmly, as great generals do after planning a victory +according to the revised tactics, and slept, knowing that they had sowed with +the accuracy of Satan sowing tares and the perseverance of Paul planting. +</p> + +<p> +With the rising sun came the purveyors of fruits and meats, and arranged their +wares in and around the little market-house. At one end of the town near the +seashore the market-house stood; and the sowing of the burrs had not been +carried that far. The dealers waited long past the hour when their sales +usually began. None came to buy. “<i>Qué hay?</i>” they began to +exclaim, one to another. +</p> + +<p> +At their accustomed time, from every ’dobe and palm hut and +grass-thatched shack and dim <i>patio</i> glided women—black women, brown +women, lemon-colored women, women dun and yellow and tawny. They were the +marketers starting to purchase the family supply of cassava, plantains, meat, +fowls, and tortillas. Décolleté they were and bare-armed and bare-footed, with +a single skirt reaching below the knee. Stolid and ox-eyed, they stepped from +their doorways into the narrow paths or upon the soft grass of the streets. +</p> + +<p> +The first to emerge uttered ambiguous squeals, and raised one foot quickly. +Another step and they sat down, with shrill cries of alarm, to pick at the new +and painful insects that had stung them upon the feet. “<i>Qué picadores +diablos!</i>” they screeched to one another across the narrow ways. Some +tried the grass instead of the paths, but there they were also stung and bitten +by the strange little prickly balls. They plumped down in the grass, and added +their lamentations to those of their sisters in the sandy paths. All through +the town was heard the plaint of the feminine jabber. The venders in the market +still wondered why no customers came. +</p> + +<p> +Then men, lords of the earth, came forth. They, too, began to hop, to dance, to +limp, and to curse. They stood stranded and foolish, or stooped to pluck at the +scourge that attacked their feet and ankles. Some loudly proclaimed the pest to +be poisonous spiders of an unknown species. +</p> + +<p> +And then the children ran out for their morning romp. And now to the uproar was +added the howls of limping infants and cockleburred childhood. Every minute the +advancing day brought forth fresh victims. +</p> + +<p> +Doña Maria Castillas y Buenventura de las Casas stepped from her honoured +doorway, as was her daily custom, to procure fresh bread from the +<i>panaderia</i> across the street. She was clad in a skirt of flowered yellow +satin, a chemise of ruffled linen, and wore a purple mantilla from the looms of +Spain. Her lemon-tinted feet, alas! were bare. Her progress was majestic, for +were not her ancestors hidalgos of Aragon? Three steps she made across the +velvety grass, and set her aristocratic sole upon a bunch of Johnny’s +burrs. Doña Maria Castillas y Buenventura de las Casas emitted a yowl even as a +wild-cat. Turning about, she fell upon hands and knees, and crawled—ay, +like a beast of the field she crawled back to her honourable door-sill. +</p> + +<p> +Don Señor Ildefonso Federico Valdazar, <i>Juez de la Paz</i>, weighing twenty +stone, attempted to convey his bulk to the <i>pulperia</i> at the corner of the +plaza in order to assuage his matutinal thirst. The first plunge of his unshod +foot into the cool grass struck a concealed mine. Don Ildefonso fell like a +crumpled cathedral, crying out that he had been fatally bitten by a deadly +scorpion. Everywhere were the shoeless citizens hopping, stumbling, limping, +and picking from their feet the venomous insects that had come in a single +night to harass them. +</p> + +<p> +The first to perceive the remedy was Estebán Delgado, the barber, a man of +travel and education. Sitting upon a stone, he plucked burrs from his toes, and +made oration: +</p> + +<p> +“Behold, my friends, these bugs of the devil! I know them well. They soar +through the skies in swarms like pigeons. These are the dead ones that fell +during the night. In Yucatan I have seen them as large as oranges. Yes! There +they hiss like serpents, and have wings like bats. It is the shoes—the +shoes that one needs! <i>Zapatos—zapatos para mi!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +Estebán hobbled to Mr. Hemstetter’s store, and bought shoes. Coming out, +he swaggered down the street with impunity, reviling loudly the bugs of the +devil. The suffering ones sat up or stood upon one foot and beheld the immune +barber. Men, women and children took up the cry: “<i>Zapatos! +zapatos!</i>” +</p> + +<p> +The necessity for the demand had been created. The demand followed. That day +Mr. Hemstetter sold three hundred pairs of shoes. +</p> + +<p> +“It is really surprising,” he said to Johnny, who came up in the +evening to help him straighten out the stock, “how trade is picking up. +Yesterday I made but three sales.” +</p> + +<p> +“I told you they’d whoop things up when they got started,” +said the consul. +</p> + +<p> +“I think I shall order a dozen more cases of goods, to keep the stock +up,” said Mr. Hemstetter, beaming through his spectacles. +</p> + +<p> +“I wouldn’t send in any orders yet,” advised Johnny. +“Wait till you see how the trade holds up.” +</p> + +<p> +Each night Johnny and Keogh sowed the crop that grew dollars by day. At the end +of ten days two-thirds of the stock of shoes had been sold; and the stock of +cockleburrs was exhausted. Johnny cabled to Pink Dawson for another 500 pounds, +paying twenty cents per pound as before. Mr. Hemstetter carefully made up an +order for $1500 worth of shoes from Northern firms. Johnny hung about the store +until this order was ready for the mail, and succeeded in destroying it before +it reached the postoffice. +</p> + +<p> +That night he took Rosine under the mango tree by Goodwin’s porch, and +confessed everything. She looked him in the eye, and said: “You are a +very wicked man. Father and I will go back home. You say it was a joke? I think +it is a very serious matter.” +</p> + +<p> +But at the end of half an hour’s argument the conversation had been +turned upon a different subject. The two were considering the respective merits +of pale blue and pink wall paper with which the old colonial mansion of the +Atwoods in Dalesburg was to be decorated after the wedding. +</p> + +<p> +On the next morning Johnny confessed to Mr. Hemstetter. The shoe merchant put +on his spectacles, and said through them: “You strike me as being a most +extraordinary young scamp. If I had not managed this enterprise with good +business judgment my entire stock of goods might have been a complete loss. +Now, how do you propose to dispose of the rest of it?” +</p> + +<p> +When the second invoice of cockleburrs arrived Johnny loaded them and the +remainder of the shoes into a schooner, and sailed down the coast to Alazan. +</p> + +<p> +There, in the same dark and diabolical manner, he repeated his success; and +came back with a bag of money and not so much as a shoestring. +</p> + +<p> +And then he besought his great Uncle of the waving goatee and starred vest to +accept his resignation, for the lotus no longer lured him. He hankered for the +spinach and cress of Dalesburg. +</p> + +<p> +The services of Mr. William Terence Keogh as acting consul, <i>pro tem.</i>, +were suggested and accepted, and Johnny sailed with the Hemstetters back to his +native shores. +</p> + +<p> +Keogh slipped into the sinecure of the American consulship with the ease that +never left him even in such high places. The tintype establishment was soon to +become a thing of the past, although its deadly work along the peaceful and +helpless Spanish Main was never effaced. The restless partners were about to be +off again, scouting ahead of the slow ranks of Fortune. But now they would take +different ways. There were rumours of a promising uprising in Peru; and thither +the martial Clancy would turn his adventurous steps. As for Keogh, he was +figuring in his mind and on quires of Government letter-heads a scheme that +dwarfed the art of misrepresenting the human countenance upon tin. +</p> + +<p> +“What suits me,” Keogh used to say, “in the way of a business +proposition is something diversified that looks like a longer shot than it +is—something in the way of a genteel graft that isn’t worked enough +for the correspondence schools to be teaching it by mail. I take the long end; +but I like to have at least as good a chance to win as a man learning to play +poker on an ocean steamer, or running for governor of Texas on the Republican +ticket. And when I cash in my winnings, I don’t want to find any +widows’ and orphans’ chips in my stack.” +</p> + +<p> +The grass-grown globe was the green table on which Keogh gambled. The games he +played were of his own invention. He was no grubber after the diffident dollar. +Nor did he care to follow it with horn and hounds. Rather he loved to coax it +with egregious and brilliant flies from its habitat in the waters of strange +streams. Yet Keogh was a business man; and his schemes, in spite of their +singularity, were as solidly set as the plans of a building contractor. In +Arthur’s time Sir William Keogh would have been a Knight of the Round +Table. In these modern days he rides abroad, seeking the Graft instead of the +Grail. +</p> + +<p> +Three days after Johnny’s departure, two small schooners appeared off +Coralio. After some delay a boat put off from one of them, and brought a +sunburned young man ashore. This young man had a shrewd and calculating eye; +and he gazed with amazement at the strange things that he saw. He found on the +beach some one who directed him to the consul’s office; and thither he +made his way at a nervous gait. +</p> + +<p> +Keogh was sprawled in the official chair, drawing caricatures of his +Uncle’s head on an official pad of paper. He looked up at his visitor. +</p> + +<p> +“Where’s Johnny Atwood?” inquired the sunburned young man, in +a business tone. +</p> + +<p> +“Gone,” said Keogh, working carefully at Uncle Sam’s necktie. +</p> + +<p> +“That’s just like him,” remarked the nut-brown one, leaning +against the table. “He always was a fellow to gallivant around instead of +’tending to business. Will he be in soon?” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t think so,” said Keogh, after a fair amount of +deliberation. +</p> + +<p> +“I s’pose he’s out at some of his tomfoolery,” +conjectured the visitor, in a tone of virtuous conviction. “Johnny never +would stick to anything long enough to succeed. I wonder how he manages to run +his business here, and never be ’round to look after it.” +</p> + +<p> +“I’m looking after the business just now,” admitted the +<i>pro tem.</i> consul. +</p> + +<p> +“Are you—then, say!—where’s the factory?” +</p> + +<p> +“What factory?” asked Keogh, with a mildly polite interest. +</p> + +<p> +“Why, the factory where they use them cockleburrs. Lord knows what they +use ’em for, anyway! I’ve got the basements of both them ships out +there loaded with ’em. I’ll give you a bargain in this lot. +I’ve had every man, woman and child around Dalesburg that wasn’t +busy pickin’ ’em for a month. I hired these ships to bring +’em over. Everybody thought I was crazy. Now, you can have this lot for +fifteen cents a pound, delivered on land. And if you want more I guess old +Alabam’ can come up to the demand. Johnny told me when he left home that +if he struck anything down here that there was any money in he’d let me +in on it. Shall I drive the ships in and hitch?” +</p> + +<p> +A look of supreme, almost incredulous, delight dawned in Keogh’s ruddy +countenance. He dropped his pencil. His eyes turned upon the sunburned young +man with joy in them mingled with fear lest his ecstasy should prove a dream. +</p> + +<p> +“For God’s sake, tell me,” said Keogh, earnestly, “are +you Dink Pawson?” +</p> + +<p> +“My name is Pinkney Dawson,” said the cornerer of the cockleburr +market. +</p> + +<p> +Billy Keogh slid rapturously and gently from his chair to his favourite strip +of matting on the floor. +</p> + +<p> +There were not many sounds in Coralio on that sultry afternoon. Among those +that were may be mentioned a noise of enraptured and unrighteous laughter from +a prostrate Irish-American, while a sunburned young man, with a shrewd eye, +looked on him with wonder and amazement. Also the “tramp, tramp, +tramp” of many well-shod feet in the streets outside. Also the lonesome +wash of the waves that beat along the historic shores of the Spanish Main. +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap14"></a>XIV<br/> +MASTERS OF ARTS</h2> + +<p> +A two-inch stub of a blue pencil was the wand with which Keogh performed the +preliminary acts of his magic. So, with this he covered paper with diagrams and +figures while he waited for the United States of America to send down to +Coralio a successor to Atwood, resigned. +</p> + +<p> +The new scheme that his mind had conceived, his stout heart indorsed, and his +blue pencil corroborated, was laid around the characteristics and human +frailties of the new president of Anchuria. These characteristics, and the +situation out of which Keogh hoped to wrest a golden tribute, deserve +chronicling contributive to the clear order of events. +</p> + +<p> +President Losada—many called him Dictator—was a man whose genius +would have made him conspicuous even among Anglo-Saxons, had not that genius +been intermixed with other traits that were petty and subversive. He had some +of the lofty patriotism of Washington (the man he most admired), the force of +Napoleon, and much of the wisdom of the sages. These characteristics might have +justified him in the assumption of the title of “The Illustrious +Liberator,” had they not been accompanied by a stupendous and amazing +vanity that kept him in the less worthy ranks of the dictators. +</p> + +<p> +Yet he did his country great service. With a mighty grasp he shook it nearly +free from the shackles of ignorance and sloth and the vermin that fed upon it, +and all but made it a power in the council of nations. He established schools +and hospitals, built roads, bridges, railroads and palaces, and bestowed +generous subsidies upon the arts and sciences. He was the absolute despot and +the idol of his people. The wealth of the country poured into his hands. Other +presidents had been rapacious without reason. Losada amassed enormous wealth, +but his people had their share of the benefits. +</p> + +<p> +The joint in his armour was his insatiate passion for monuments and tokens +commemorating his glory. In every town he caused to be erected statues of +himself bearing legends in praise of his greatness. In the walls of every +public edifice, tablets were fixed reciting his splendour and the gratitude of +his subjects. His statuettes and portraits were scattered throughout the land +in every house and hut. One of the sycophants in his court painted him as St. +John, with a halo and a train of attendants in full uniform. Losada saw nothing +incongruous in this picture, and had it hung in a church in the capital. He +ordered from a French sculptor a marble group including himself with Napoleon, +Alexander the Great, and one or two others whom he deemed worthy of the honour. +</p> + +<p> +He ransacked Europe for decorations, employing policy, money and intrigue to +cajole the orders he coveted from kings and rulers. On state occasions his +breast was covered from shoulder to shoulder with crosses, stars, golden roses, +medals and ribbons. It was said that the man who could contrive for him a new +decoration, or invent some new method of extolling his greatness, might plunge +a hand deep into the treasury. +</p> + +<p> +This was the man upon whom Billy Keogh had his eye. The gentle buccaneer had +observed the rain of favors that fell upon those who ministered to the +president’s vanities, and he did not deem it his duty to hoist his +umbrella against the scattering drops of liquid fortune. +</p> + +<p> +In a few weeks the new consul arrived, releasing Keogh from his temporary +duties. He was a young man fresh from college, who lived for botany alone. The +consulate at Coralio gave him the opportunity to study tropical flora. He wore +smoked glasses, and carried a green umbrella. He filled the cool, back porch of +the consulate with plants and specimens so that space for a bottle and chair +was not to be found. Keogh gazed on him sadly, but without rancour, and began +to pack his gripsack. For his new plot against stagnation along the Spanish +Main required of him a voyage overseas. +</p> + +<p> +Soon came the <i>Karlsefin</i> again—she of the trampish +habits—gleaning a cargo of cocoanuts for a speculative descent upon the +New York market. Keogh was booked for a passage on the return trip. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I’m going to New York,” he explained to the group of +his countrymen that had gathered on the beach to see him off. “But +I’ll be back before you miss me. I’ve undertaken the art education +of this piebald country, and I’m not the man to desert it while +it’s in the early throes of tintypes.” +</p> + +<p> +With this mysterious declaration of his intentions Keogh boarded the +<i>Karlsefin</i>. +</p> + +<p> +Ten days later, shivering, with the collar of his thin coat turned high, he +burst into the studio of Carolus White at the top of a tall building in Tenth +Street, New York City. +</p> + +<p> +Carolus White was smoking a cigarette and frying sausages over an oil stove. He +was only twenty-three, and had noble theories about art. +</p> + +<p> +“Billy Keogh!” exclaimed White, extending the hand that was not +busy with the frying pan. “From what part of the uncivilized world, I +wonder!” +</p> + +<p> +“Hello, Carry,” said Keogh, dragging forward a stool, and holding +his fingers close to the stove. “I’m glad I found you so soon. +I’ve been looking for you all day in the directories and art galleries. +The free-lunch man on the corner told me where you were, quick. I was sure +you’d be painting pictures yet.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh glanced about the studio with the shrewd eye of a connoisseur in +business. +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, you can do it,” he declared, with many gentle nods of his +head. “That big one in the corner with the angels and green clouds and +band-wagon is just the sort of thing we want. What would you call that, +Carry—scene from Coney Island, ain’t it?” +</p> + +<p> +“That,” said White, “I had intended to call ‘The +Translation of Elijah,’ but you may be nearer right than I am.” +</p> + +<p> +“Name doesn’t matter,” said Keogh, largely; “it’s +the frame and the varieties of paint that does the trick. Now, I can tell you +in a minute what I want. I’ve come on a little voyage of two thousand +miles to take you in with me on a scheme. I thought of you as soon as the +scheme showed itself to me. How would you like to go back with me and paint a +picture? Ninety days for the trip, and five thousand dollars for the +job.” +</p> + +<p> +“Cereal food or hair-tonic posters?” asked White. +</p> + +<p> +“It isn’t an ad.” +</p> + +<p> +“What kind of a picture is it to be?” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s a long story,” said Keogh. +</p> + +<p> +“Go ahead with it. If you don’t mind, while you talk I’ll +just keep my eye on these sausages. Let ’em get one shade deeper than a +Vandyke brown and you spoil ’em.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh explained his project. They were to return to Coralio, where White was to +pose as a distinguished American portrait painter who was touring in the +tropics as a relaxation from his arduous and remunerative professional labours. +It was not an unreasonable hope, even to those who had trod in the beaten paths +of business, that an artist with so much prestige might secure a commission to +perpetuate upon canvas the lineaments of the president, and secure a share of +the <i>pesos</i> that were raining upon the caterers to his weaknesses. +</p> + +<p> +Keogh had set his price at ten thousand dollars. Artists had been paid more for +portraits. He and White were to share the expenses of the trip, and divide the +possible profits. Thus he laid the scheme before White, whom he had known in +the West before one declared for Art and the other became a Bedouin. +</p> + +<p> +Before long the two machinators abandoned the rigour of the bare studio for a +snug corner of a café. There they sat far into the night, with old envelopes +and Keogh’s stub of blue pencil between them. +</p> + +<p> +At twelve o’clock White doubled up in his chair, with his chin on his +fist, and shut his eyes at the unbeautiful wall-paper. +</p> + +<p> +“I’ll go you, Billy,” he said, in the quiet tones of +decision. “I’ve got two or three hundred saved up for sausages and +rent; and I’ll take the chance with you. Five thousand! It will give me +two years in Paris and one in Italy. I’ll begin to pack to-morrow.” +</p> + +<p> +“You’ll begin in ten minutes,” said Keogh. “It’s +to-morrow now. The <i>Karlsefin</i> starts back at four P.M. Come on to your +painting shop, and I’ll help you.” +</p> + +<p> +For five months in the year Coralio is the Newport of Anchuria. Then only does +the town possess life. From November to March it is practically the seat of +government. The president with his official family sojourns there; and society +follows him. The pleasure-loving people make the season one long holiday of +amusement and rejoicing. <i>Fiestas</i>, balls, games, sea bathing, processions +and small theatres contribute to their enjoyment. The famous Swiss band from +the capital plays in the little plaza every evening, while the fourteen +carriages and vehicles in the town circle in funereal but complacent +procession. Indians from the interior mountains, looking like prehistoric stone +idols, come down to peddle their handiwork in the streets. The people throng +the narrow ways, a chattering, happy, careless stream of buoyant humanity. +Preposterous children rigged out with the shortest of ballet skirts and gilt +wings, howl, underfoot, among the effervescent crowds. Especially is the +arrival of the presidential party, at the opening of the season, attended with +pomp, show and patriotic demonstrations of enthusiasm and delight. +</p> + +<p> +When Keogh and White reached their destination, on the return trip of the +<i>Karlsefin</i>, the gay winter season was well begun. As they stepped upon +the beach they could hear the band playing in the plaza. The village maidens, +with fireflies already fixed in their dark locks, were gliding, barefoot and +coy-eyed, along the paths. Dandies in white linen, swinging their canes, were +beginning their seductive strolls. The air was full of human essence, of +artificial enticement, of coquetry, indolence, pleasure—the man-made +sense of existence. +</p> + +<p> +The first two or three days after their arrival were spent in preliminaries. +Keogh escorted the artist about town, introducing him to the little circle of +English-speaking residents and pulling whatever wires he could to effect the +spreading of White’s fame as a painter. And then Keogh planned a more +spectacular demonstration of the idea he wished to keep before the public. +</p> + +<p> +He and White engaged rooms in the Hotel de los Estranjeros. The two were clad +in new suits of immaculate duck, with American straw hats, and carried canes of +remarkable uniqueness and inutility. Few caballeros in Coralio—even the +gorgeously uniformed officers of the Anchurian army—were as conspicuous +for ease and elegance of demeanour as Keogh and his friend, the great American +painter, Señor White. +</p> + +<p> +White set up his easel on the beach and made striking sketches of the mountain +and sea views. The native population formed at his rear in a vast, chattering +semicircle to watch his work. Keogh, with his care for details, had arranged +for himself a pose which he carried out with fidelity. His rôle was that of +friend to the great artist, a man of affairs and leisure. The visible emblem of +his position was a pocket camera. +</p> + +<p> +“For branding the man who owns it,” said he, “a genteel +dilettante with a bank account and an easy conscience, a steam-yacht +ain’t in it with a camera. You see a man doing nothing but loafing around +making snap-shots, and you know right away he reads up well in +‘Bradstreet.’ You notice these old millionaire boys—soon as +they get through taking everything else in sight they go to taking photographs. +People are more impressed by a kodak than they are by a title or a four-carat +scarf-pin.” So Keogh strolled blandly about Coralio, snapping the scenery +and the shrinking señoritas, while White posed conspicuously in the higher +regions of art. +</p> + +<p> +Two weeks after their arrival, the scheme began to bear fruit. An aide-de-camp +of the president drove to the hotel in a dashing victoria. The president +desired that Señor White come to the Casa Morena for an informal interview. +</p> + +<p> +Keogh gripped his pipe tightly between his teeth. “Not a cent less than +ten thousand,” he said to the artist—“remember the price. And +in gold or its equivalent—don’t let him stick you with this +bargain-counter stuff they call money here.” +</p> + +<p> +“Perhaps it isn’t that he wants,” said White. +</p> + +<p> +“Get out!” said Keogh, with splendid confidence. “I know what +he wants. He wants his picture painted by the celebrated young American painter +and filibuster now sojourning in his down-trodden country. Off you go.” +</p> + +<p> +The victoria sped away with the artist. Keogh walked up and down, puffing great +clouds of smoke from his pipe, and waited. In an hour the victoria swept again +to the door of the hotel, deposited White, and vanished. The artist dashed up +the stairs, three at a step. Keogh stopped smoking, and became a silent +interrogation point. +</p> + +<p> +“Landed,” exclaimed White, with his boyish face flushed with +elation. “Billy, you are a wonder. He wants a picture. I’ll tell +you all about it. By Heavens! that dictator chap is a corker! He’s a +dictator clear down to his finger-ends. He’s a kind of combination of +Julius Cæsar, Lucifer and Chauncey Depew done in sepia. Polite and +grim—that’s his way. The room I saw him in was about ten acres big, +and looked like a Mississippi steamboat with its gilding and mirrors and white +paint. He talks English better than I can ever hope to. The matter of the price +came up. I mentioned ten thousand. I expected him to call the guard and have me +taken out and shot. He didn’t move an eyelash. He just waved one of his +chestnut hands in a careless way, and said, ‘Whatever you say.’ I +am to go back to-morrow and discuss with him the details of the picture.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh hung his head. Self-abasement was easy to read in his downcast +countenance. +</p> + +<p> +“I’m failing, Carry,” he said, sorrowfully. “I’m +not fit to handle these man’s-size schemes any longer. Peddling oranges +in a push-cart is about the suitable graft for me. When I said ten thousand, I +swear I thought I had sized up that brown man’s limit to within two +cents. He’d have melted down for fifteen thousand just as easy. +Say—Carry—you’ll see old man Keogh safe in some nice, quiet +idiot asylum, won’t you, if he makes a break like that again?” +</p> + +<p> +The Casa Morena, although only one story in height, was a building of brown +stone, luxurious as a palace in its interior. It stood on a low hill in a +walled garden of splendid tropical flora at the upper edge of Coralio. The next +day the president’s carriage came again for the artist. Keogh went out +for a walk along the beach, where he and his “picture box” were now +familiar sights. When he returned to the hotel White was sitting in a +steamer-chair on the balcony. +</p> + +<p> +“Well,” said Keogh, “did you and His Nibs decide on the kind +of a chromo he wants?” +</p> + +<p> +White got up and walked back and forth on the balcony a few times. Then he +stopped, and laughed strangely. His face was flushed, and his eyes were bright +with a kind of angry amusement. +</p> + +<p> +“Look here, Billy,” he said, somewhat roughly, “when you +first came to me in my studio and mentioned a picture, I thought you wanted a +Smashed Oats or a Hair Tonic poster painted on a range of mountains or the side +of a continent. Well, either of those jobs would have been Art in its highest +form compared to the one you’ve steered me against. I can’t paint +that picture, Billy. You’ve got to let me out. Let me try to tell you +what that barbarian wants. He had it all planned out and even a sketch made of +his idea. The old boy doesn’t draw badly at all. But, ye goddesses of +Art! listen to the monstrosity he expects me to paint. He wants himself in the +centre of the canvas, of course. He is to be painted as Jupiter sitting on +Olympus, with the clouds at his feet. At one side of him stands George +Washington, in full regimentals, with his hand on the president’s +shoulder. An angel with outstretched wings hovers overhead, and is placing a +laurel wreath on the president’s head, crowning him—Queen of the +May, I suppose. In the background is to be cannon, more angels and soldiers. +The man who would paint that picture would have to have the soul of a dog, and +would deserve to go down into oblivion without even a tin can tied to his tail +to sound his memory.” +</p> + +<p> +Little beads of moisture crept out all over Billy Keogh’s brow. The stub +of his blue pencil had not figured out a contingency like this. The machinery +of his plan had run with flattering smoothness until now. He dragged another +chair upon the balcony, and got White back to his seat. He lit his pipe with +apparent calm. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, sonny,” he said, with gentle grimness, “you and me will +have an Art to Art talk. You’ve got your art and I’ve got mine. +Yours is the real Pierian stuff that turns up its nose at bock-beer signs and +oleographs of the Old Mill. Mine’s the art of Business. This was my +scheme, and it worked out like two-and-two. Paint that president man as Old +King Cole, or Venus, or a landscape, or a fresco, or a bunch of lilies, or +anything he thinks he looks like. But get the paint on the canvas and collect +the spoils. You wouldn’t throw me down, Carry, at this stage of the game. +Think of that ten thousand.” +</p> + +<p> +“I can’t help thinking of it,” said White, “and +that’s what hurts. I’m tempted to throw every ideal I ever had down +in the mire, and steep my soul in infamy by painting that picture. That five +thousand meant three years of foreign study to me, and I’d almost sell my +soul for that.” +</p> + +<p> +“Now it ain’t as bad as that,” said Keogh, soothingly. +“It’s a business proposition. It’s so much paint and time +against money. I don’t fall in with your idea that that picture would so +everlastingly jolt the art side of the question. George Washington was all +right, you know, and nobody could say a word against the angel. I don’t +think so bad of that group. If you was to give Jupiter a pair of epaulets and a +sword, and kind of work the clouds around to look like a blackberry patch, it +wouldn’t make such a bad battle scene. Why, if we hadn’t already +settled on the price, he ought to pay an extra thousand for Washington, and the +angel ought to raise it five hundred.” +</p> + +<p> +“You don’t understand, Billy,” said White, with an uneasy +laugh. “Some of us fellows who try to paint have big notions about Art. I +wanted to paint a picture some day that people would stand before and forget +that it was made of paint. I wanted it to creep into them like a bar of music +and mushroom there like a soft bullet. And I wanted ’em to go away and +ask, ‘What else has he done?’ And I didn’t want ’em to +find a thing; not a portrait nor a magazine cover nor an illustration nor a +drawing of a girl—nothing but <i>the</i> picture. That’s why +I’ve lived on fried sausages, and tried to keep true to myself. I +persuaded myself to do this portrait for the chance it might give me to study +abroad. But this howling, screaming caricature! Good Lord! can’t you see +how it is?” +</p> + +<p> +“Sure,” said Keogh, as tenderly as he would have spoken to a child, +and he laid a long forefinger on White’s knee. “I see. It’s +bad to have your art all slugged up like that. I know. You wanted to paint a +big thing like the panorama of the battle of Gettysburg. But let me kalsomine +you a little mental sketch to consider. Up to date we’re out $385.50 on +this scheme. Our capital took every cent both of us could raise. We’ve +got about enough left to get back to New York on. I need my share of that ten +thousand. I want to work a copper deal in Idaho, and make a hundred thousand. +That’s the business end of the thing. Come down off your art perch, +Carry, and let’s land that hatful of dollars.” +</p> + +<p> +“Billy,” said White, with an effort, “I’ll try. I +won’t say I’ll do it, but I’ll try. I’ll go at it, and +put it through if I can.” +</p> + +<p> +“That’s business,” said Keogh heartily. “Good boy! Now, +here’s another thing—rush that picture—crowd it through as +quick as you can. Get a couple of boys to help you mix the paint if necessary. +I’ve picked up some pointers around town. The people here are beginning +to get sick of Mr. President. They say he’s been too free with +concessions; and they accuse him of trying to make a dicker with England to +sell out the country. We want that picture done and paid for before +there’s any row.” +</p> + +<p> +In the great <i>patio</i> of Casa Morena, the president caused to be stretched +a huge canvas. Under this White set up his temporary studio. For two hours each +day the great man sat to him. +</p> + +<p> +White worked faithfully. But, as the work progressed, he had seasons of bitter +scorn, of infinite self-contempt, of sullen gloom and sardonic gaiety. Keogh, +with the patience of a great general, soothed, coaxed, argued—kept him at +the picture. +</p> + +<p> +At the end of a month White announced that the picture was +completed—Jupiter, Washington, angels, clouds, cannon and all. His face +was pale and his mouth drawn straight when he told Keogh. He said the president +was much pleased with it. It was to be hung in the National Gallery of +Statesmen and Heroes. The artist had been requested to return to Casa Morena on +the following day to receive payment. At the appointed time he left the hotel, +silent under his friend’s joyful talk of their success. +</p> + +<p> +An hour later he walked into the room where Keogh was waiting, threw his hat on +the floor, and sat upon the table. +</p> + +<p> +“Billy,” he said, in strained and labouring tones, +“I’ve a little money out West in a small business that my brother +is running. It’s what I’ve been living on while I’ve been +studying art. I’ll draw out my share and pay you back what you’ve +lost on this scheme.” +</p> + +<p> +“Lost!” exclaimed Keogh, jumping up. “Didn’t you get +paid for the picture?” +</p> + +<p> +“Yes, I got paid,” said White. “But just now there +isn’t any picture, and there isn’t any pay. If you care to hear +about it, here are the edifying details. The president and I were looking at +the painting. His secretary brought a bank draft on New York for ten thousand +dollars and handed it to me. The moment I touched it I went wild. I tore it +into little pieces and threw them on the floor. A workman was repainting the +pillars inside the <i>patio</i>. A bucket of his paint happened to be +convenient. I picked up his brush and slapped a quart of blue paint all over +that ten-thousand-dollar nightmare. I bowed, and walked out. The president +didn’t move or speak. That was one time he was taken by surprise. +It’s tough on you, Billy, but I couldn’t help it.” +</p> + +<p> +There seemed to be excitement in Coralio. Outside there was a confused, rising +murmur pierced by high-pitched cries. “<i>Bajo el traidor—Muerte el +traidor!</i>” were the words they seemed to form. +</p> + +<p> +“Listen to that!” exclaimed White, bitterly: “I know that +much Spanish. They’re shouting, ‘Down with the traitor!’ I +heard them before. I felt that they meant me. I was a traitor to Art. The +picture had to go.” +</p> + +<p> +“‘Down with the blank fool’ would have suited your case +better,” said Keogh, with fiery emphasis. “You tear up ten thousand +dollars like an old rag because the way you’ve spread on five +dollars’ worth of paint hurts your conscience. Next time I pick a +side-partner in a scheme the man has got to go before a notary and swear he +never even heard the word ‘ideal’ mentioned.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh strode from the room, white-hot. White paid little attention to his +resentment. The scorn of Billy Keogh seemed a trifling thing beside the greater +self-scorn he had escaped. +</p> + +<p> +In Coralio the excitement waxed. An outburst was imminent. The cause of this +demonstration of displeasure was the presence in the town of a big, +pink-cheeked Englishman, who, it was said, was an agent of his government come +to clinch the bargain by which the president placed his people in the hands of +a foreign power. It was charged that not only had he given away priceless +concessions, but that the public debt was to be transferred into the hands of +the English, and the custom-houses turned over to them as a guarantee. The +long-enduring people had determined to make their protest felt. +</p> + +<p> +On that night, in Coralio and in other towns, their ire found vent. Yelling +mobs, mercurial but dangerous, roamed the streets. They overthrew the great +bronze statue of the president that stood in the centre of the plaza, and +hacked it to shapeless pieces. They tore from public buildings the tablets set +there proclaiming the glory of the “Illustrious Liberator.” His +pictures in the government offices were demolished. The mobs even attacked the +Casa Morena, but were driven away by the military, which remained faithful to +the executive. All the night terror reigned. +</p> + +<p> +The greatness of Losada was shown by the fact that by noon the next day order +was restored, and he was still absolute. He issued proclamations denying +positively that any negotiations of any kind had been entered into with +England. Sir Stafford Vaughn, the pink-cheeked Englishman, also declared in +placards and in public print that his presence there had no international +significance. He was a traveller without guile. In fact (so he stated), he had +not even spoken with the president or been in his presence since his arrival. +</p> + +<p> +During this disturbance, White was preparing for his homeward voyage in the +steamship that was to sail within two or three days. About noon, Keogh, the +restless, took his camera out with the hope of speeding the lagging hours. The +town was now as quiet as if peace had never departed from her perch on the +red-tiled roofs. +</p> + +<p> +About the middle of the afternoon, Keogh hurried back to the hotel with +something decidedly special in his air. He retired to the little room where he +developed his pictures. +</p> + +<p> +Later on he came out to White on the balcony, with a luminous, grim, predatory +smile on his face. +</p> + +<p> +“Do you know what that is?” he asked, holding up a 4 × 5 +photograph mounted on cardboard. +</p> + +<p> +“Snap-shot of a señorita sitting in the sand—alliteration +unintentional,” guessed White, lazily. +</p> + +<p> +“Wrong,” said Keogh with shining eyes. “It’s a +slung-shot. It’s a can of dynamite. It’s a gold mine. It’s a +sight-draft on your president man for twenty thousand dollars—yes, +sir—twenty thousand this time, and no spoiling the picture. No ethics of +art in the way. Art! You with your smelly little tubes! I’ve got you +skinned to death with a kodak. Take a look at that.” +</p> + +<p> +White took the picture in his hand, and gave a long whistle. +</p> + +<p> +“Jove!” he exclaimed, “but wouldn’t that stir up a row +in town if you let it be seen. How in the world did you get it, Billy?” +</p> + +<p> +“You know that high wall around the president man’s back garden? I +was up there trying to get a bird’s-eye of the town. I happened to notice +a chink in the wall where a stone and a lot of plaster had slid out. Thinks I, +I’ll take a peep through to see how Mr. President’s cabbages are +growing. The first thing I saw was him and this Sir Englishman sitting at a +little table about twenty feet away. They had the table all spread over with +documents, and they were hobnobbing over them as thick as two pirates. +’Twas a nice corner of the garden, all private and shady with palms and +orange trees, and they had a pail of champagne set by handy in the grass. I +knew then was the time for me to make my big hit in Art. So I raised the +machine up to the crack, and pressed the button. Just as I did so them old boys +shook hands on the deal—you see they took that way in the picture.” +</p> + +<p> +Keogh put on his coat and hat. +</p> + +<p> +“What are you going to do with it?” asked White. +</p> + +<p> +“Me,” said Keogh in a hurt tone, “why, I’m going to tie +a pink ribbon to it and hang it on the what-not, of course. I’m surprised +at you. But while I’m out you just try to figure out what ginger-cake +potentate would be most likely to want to buy this work of art for his private +collection—just to keep it out of circulation.” +</p> + +<p> +The sunset was reddening the tops of the cocoanut palms when Billy Keogh came +back from Casa Morena. He nodded to the artist’s questioning gaze; and +lay down on a cot with his hands under the back of his head. +</p> + +<p> +“I saw him. He paid the money like a little man. They didn’t want +to let me in at first. I told ’em it was important. Yes, that president +man is on the plenty-able list. He’s got a beautiful business system +about the way he uses his brains. All I had to do was to hold up the photograph +so he could see it, and name the price. He just smiled, and walked over to a +safe and got the cash. Twenty one-thousand-dollar brand-new United States +Treasury notes he laid on the table, like I’d pay out a dollar and a +quarter. Fine notes, too—they crackled with a sound like burning the +brush off a ten-acre lot.” +</p> + +<p> +“Let’s try the feel of one,” said White, curiously. “I +never saw a thousand-dollar bill.” Keogh did not immediately respond. +</p> + +<p> +“Carry,” he said, in an absent-minded way, “you think a heap +of your art, don’t you?” +</p> + +<p> +“More,” said White, frankly, “than has been for the financial +good of myself and my friends.” +</p> + +<p> +“I thought you were a fool the other day,” went on Keogh, quietly, +“and I’m not sure now that you wasn’t. But if you was, so am +I. I’ve been in some funny deals, Carry, but I’ve always managed to +scramble fair, and match my brains and capital against the other +fellow’s. But when it comes to—well, when you’ve got the +other fellow cinched, and the screws on him, and he’s got to put +up—why, it don’t strike me as being a man’s game. +They’ve got a name for it, you know; it’s—confound you, +don’t you understand? A fellow feels—it’s something like that +blamed art of yours—he—well, I tore that photograph up and laid the +pieces on that stack of money and shoved the whole business back across the +table. ‘Excuse me, Mr. Losada,’ I said, ‘but I guess +I’ve made a mistake in the price. You get the photo for nothing.’ +Now, Carry, you get out the pencil, and we’ll do some more figuring. +I’d like to save enough out of our capital for you to have some fried +sausages in your joint when you get back to New York.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap15"></a>XV<br/> +DICKY</h2> + +<p> +There is little consecutiveness along the Spanish Main. Things happen there +intermittently. Even Time seems to hang his scythe daily on the branch of an +orange tree while he takes a siesta and a cigarette. +</p> + +<p> +After the ineffectual revolt against the administration of President Losada, +the country settled again into quiet toleration of the abuses with which he had +been charged. In Coralio old political enemies went arm-in-arm, lightly +eschewing for the time all differences of opinion. +</p> + +<p> +The failure of the art expedition did not stretch the cat-footed Keogh upon his +back. The ups and downs of Fortune made smooth travelling for his nimble steps. +His blue pencil stub was at work again before the smoke of the steamer on which +White sailed had cleared away from the horizon. He had but to speak a word to +Geddie to find his credit negotiable for whatever goods he wanted from the +store of Brannigan & Company. On the same day on which White arrived in New +York Keogh, at the rear of a train of five pack mules loaded with hardware and +cutlery, set his face toward the grim, interior mountains. There the Indian +tribes wash gold dust from the auriferous streams; and when a market is brought +to them trading is brisk and <i>muy bueno</i> in the Cordilleras. +</p> + +<p> +In Coralio Time folded his wings and paced wearily along his drowsy path. They +who had most cheered the torpid hours were gone. Clancy had sailed on a Spanish +barque for Colon, contemplating a cut across the isthmus and then a further +voyage to end at Calao, where the fighting was said to be on. Geddie, whose +quiet and genial nature had once served to mitigate the frequent dull reaction +of lotus eating, was now a home-man, happy with his bright orchid, Paula, and +never even dreaming of or regretting the unsolved, sealed and monogramed Bottle +whose contents, now inconsiderable, were held safely in the keeping of the sea. +</p> + +<p> +Well may the Walrus, most discerning and eclectic of beasts, place sealing-wax +midway on his programme of topics that fall pertinent and diverting upon the +ear. +</p> + +<p> +Atwood was gone—he of the hospitable back porch and ingenuous cunning. +Dr. Gregg, with his trepanning story smouldering within him, was a whiskered +volcano, always showing signs of imminent eruption, and was not to be +considered in the ranks of those who might contribute to the amelioration of +ennui. The new consul’s note chimed with the sad sea waves and the +violent tropical greens—he had not a bar of Scheherezade or of the Round +Table in his lute. Goodwin was employed with large projects: what time he was +loosed from them found him at his home, where he loved to be. Therefore it will +be seen that there was a dearth of fellowship and entertainment among the +foreign contingent of Coralio. +</p> + +<p> +And then Dicky Maloney dropped down from the clouds upon the town, and amused +it. +</p> + +<p> +Nobody knew where Dicky Maloney hailed from or how he reached Coralio. He +appeared there one day; and that was all. He afterward said that he came on the +fruit steamer <i>Thor</i>; but an inspection of the <i>Thor’s</i> +passenger list of that date was found to be Maloneyless. Curiosity, however, +soon perished; and Dicky took his place among the odd fish cast up by the +Caribbean. +</p> + +<p> +He was an active, devil-may-care, rollicking fellow with an engaging gray eye, +the most irresistible grin, a rather dark or much sunburned complexion, and a +head of the fieriest red hair ever seen in that country. Speaking the Spanish +language as well as he spoke English, and seeming always to have plenty of +silver in his pockets, it was not long before he was a welcome companion +whithersoever he went. He had an extreme fondness for <i>vino blanco</i>, and +gained the reputation of being able to drink more of it than any three men in +town. Everybody called him “Dicky”; everybody cheered up at the +sight of him—especially the natives, to whom his marvellous red hair and +his free-and-easy style were a constant delight and envy. Wherever you went in +the town you would soon see Dicky or hear his genial laugh, and find around him +a group of admirers who appreciated him both for his good nature and the white +wine he was always so ready to buy. +</p> + +<p> +A considerable amount of speculation was had concerning the object of his +sojourn there, until one day he silenced this by opening a small shop for the +sale of tobacco, <i>dulces</i> and the handiwork of the interior +Indians—fibre-and-silk-woven goods, deerskin <i>zapatos</i> and +basketwork of <i>tule</i> reeds. Even then he did not change his habits; for he +was drinking and playing cards half the day and night with the +<i>comandante</i>, the collector of customs, the <i>Jefe Politico</i> and other +gay dogs among the native officials. +</p> + +<p> +One day Dicky saw Pasa, the daughter of Madama Ortiz, sitting in the side-door +of the Hotel de los Estranjeros. He stopped in his tracks, still, for the first +time in Coralio; and then he sped, swift as a deer, to find Vasquez, a gilded +native youth, to present him. +</p> + +<p> +The young men had named Pasa “<i>La Santita Naranjadita</i>.” +<i>Naranjadita</i> is a Spanish word for a certain colour that you must go to +more trouble to describe in English. By saying “The little saint, tinted +the most beautiful-delicate-slightly-orange-golden,” you will approximate +the description of Madama Ortiz’s daughter. +</p> + +<p> +La Madama Ortiz sold rum in addition to other liquors. Now, you must know that +the rum expiates whatever opprobrium attends upon the other commodities. For +rum-making, mind you, is a government monopoly; and to keep a government +dispensary assures respectability if not preëminence. Moreover, the saddest of +precisians could find no fault with the conduct of the shop. Customers drank +there in the lowest of spirits and fearsomely, as in the shadow of the dead; +for Madama’s ancient and vaunted lineage counteracted even the +rum’s behest to be merry. For, was she not of the Iglesias, who landed +with Pizarro? And had not her deceased husband been <i>comisionado de caminos y +puentes</i> for the district? +</p> + +<p> +In the evenings Pasa sat by the window in the room next to the one where they +drank, and strummed dreamily upon her guitar. And then, by twos and threes, +would come visiting young caballeros and occupy the prim line of chairs set +against the wall of this room. They were there to besiege the heart of +“<i>La Santita</i>.” Their method (which is not proof against +intelligent competition) consisted of expanding the chest, looking valorous, +and consuming a gross or two of cigarettes. Even saints delicately oranged +prefer to be wooed differently. +</p> + +<p> +Doña Pasa would tide over the vast chasms of nicotinized silence with music +from her guitar, while she wondered if the romances she had read about gallant +and more—more contiguous cavaliers were all lies. At somewhat regular +intervals Madama would glide in from the dispensary with a sort of +drought-suggesting gleam in her eye, and there would be a rustling of +stiffly-starched white trousers as one of the caballeros would propose an +adjournment to the bar. +</p> + +<p> +That Dicky Maloney would, sooner or later, explore this field was a thing to be +foreseen. There were few doors in Coralio into which his red head had not been +poked. +</p> + +<p> +In an incredibly short space of time after his first sight of her he was there, +seated close beside her rocking chair. There were no back-against-the-wall +poses in Dicky’s theory of wooing. His plan of subjection was an attack +at close range. To carry the fortress with one concentrated, ardent, eloquent, +irresistible <i>escalade</i>—that was Dicky’s way. +</p> + +<p> +Pasa was descended from the proudest Spanish families in the country. Moreover, +she had had unusual advantages. Two years in a New Orleans school had elevated +her ambitions and fitted her for a fate above the ordinary maidens of her +native land. And yet here she succumbed to the first red-haired scamp with a +glib tongue and a charming smile that came along and courted her properly. +</p> + +<p> +Very soon Dicky took her to the little church on the corner of the plaza, and +“Mrs. Maloney” was added to her string of distinguished names. +</p> + +<p> +And it was her fate to sit, with her patient, saintly eyes and figure like a +bisque Psyche, behind the sequestered counter of the little shop, while Dicky +drank and philandered with his frivolous acquaintances. +</p> + +<p> +The women, with their naturally fine instinct, saw a chance for vivisection, +and delicately taunted her with his habits. She turned upon them in a +beautiful, steady blaze of sorrowful contempt. +</p> + +<p> +“You meat-cows,” she said, in her level, crystal-clear tones; +“you know nothing of a man. Your men are <i>maromeros</i>. They are fit +only to roll cigarettes in the shade until the sun strikes and shrivels them +up. They drone in your hammocks and you comb their hair and feed them with +fresh fruit. My man is of no such blood. Let him drink of the wine. When he has +taken sufficient of it to drown one of your <i>flaccitos</i> he will come home +to me more of a man than one thousand of your <i>pobrecitos</i>. <i>My</i> hair +he smooths and braids; to me he sings; he himself removes my <i>zapatos</i>, +and there, there, upon each instep leaves a kiss. He holds— Oh, you will +never understand! Blind ones who have never known a <i>man</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +Sometimes mysterious things happened at night about Dicky’s shop. While +the front of it was dark, in the little room back of it Dicky and a few of his +friends would sit about a table carrying on some kind of very quiet +<i>negocios</i> until quite late. Finally he would let them out the front door +very carefully, and go upstairs to his little saint. These visitors were +generally conspirator-like men with dark clothes and hats. Of course, these +dark doings were noticed after a while, and talked about. +</p> + +<p> +Dicky seemed to care nothing at all for the society of the alien residents of +the town. He avoided Goodwin, and his skilful escape from the trepanning story +of Dr. Gregg is still referred to, in Coralio, as a masterpiece of lightning +diplomacy. +</p> + +<p> +Many letters arrived, addressed to “Mr. Dicky Maloney,” or +“Señor Dickee Maloney,” to the considerable pride of Pasa. That so +many people should desire to write to him only confirmed her own suspicion that +the light from his red head shone around the world. As to their contents she +never felt curiosity. There was a wife for you! +</p> + +<p> +The one mistake Dicky made in Coralio was to run out of money at the wrong +time. Where his money came from was a puzzle, for the sales of his shop were +next to nothing, but that source failed, and at a peculiarly unfortunate time. +It was when the <i>comandante</i>, Don Señor el Coronel Encarnación Rios, +looked upon the little saint seated in the shop and felt his heart go pitapat. +</p> + +<p> +The <i>comandante</i>, who was versed in all the intricate arts of gallantry, +first delicately hinted at his sentiments by donning his dress uniform and +strutting up and down fiercely before her window. Pasa, glancing demurely with +her saintly eyes, instantly perceived his resemblance to her parrot, Chichi, +and was diverted to the extent of a smile. The <i>comandante</i> saw the smile, +which was not intended for him. Convinced of an impression made, he entered the +shop, confidently, and advanced to open compliment. Pasa froze; he pranced; she +flamed royally; he was charmed to injudicious persistence; she commanded him to +leave the shop; he tried to capture her hand,—and Dicky entered, smiling +broadly, full of white wine and the devil. +</p> + +<p> +He spent five minutes in punishing the <i>comandante</i> scientifically and +carefully, so that the pain might be prolonged as far as possible. At the end +of that time he pitched the rash wooer out the door upon the stones of the +street, senseless. +</p> + +<p> +A barefooted policeman who had been watching the affair from across the street +blew a whistle. A squad of four soldiers came running from the <i>cuartel</i> +around the corner. When they saw that the offender was Dicky, they stopped, and +blew more whistles, which brought out reënforcements of eight. Deeming the odds +against them sufficiently reduced, the military advanced upon the disturber. +</p> + +<p> +Dicky, being thoroughly imbued with the martial spirit, stooped and drew the +<i>comandante’s</i> sword, which was girded about him, and charged his +foe. He chased the standing army four squares, playfully prodding its squealing +rear and hacking at its ginger-coloured heels. +</p> + +<p> +But he was not so successful with the civic authorities. Six muscular, nimble +policemen overpowered him and conveyed him, triumphantly but warily, to jail. +“<i>El Diablo Colorado</i>” they dubbed him, and derided the +military for its defeat. +</p> + +<p> +Dicky, with the rest of the prisoners, could look out through the barred door +at the grass of the little plaza, at a row of orange trees and the red tile +roofs and ’dobe walls of a line of insignificant stores. +</p> + +<p> +At sunset along a path across this plaza came a melancholy procession of +sad-faced women bearing plantains, cassaba, bread and fruit—each coming +with food to some wretch behind those bars to whom she still clung and +furnished the means of life. Twice a day—morning and evening—they +were permitted to come. Water was furnished to her compulsory guests by the +republic, but no food. +</p> + +<p> +That evening Dicky’s name was called by the sentry, and he stepped before +the bars of the door. There stood his little saint, a black mantilla draped +about her head and shoulders, her face like glorified melancholy, her clear +eyes gazing longingly at him as if they might draw him between the bars to her. +She brought a chicken, some oranges, <i>dulces</i> and a loaf of white bread. A +soldier inspected the food, and passed it in to Dicky. Pasa spoke calmly, as +she always did, briefly, in her thrilling, flute-like tones. “Angel of my +life,” she said, “let it not be long that thou art away from me. +Thou knowest that life is not a thing to be endured with thou not at my side. +Tell me if I can do aught in this matter. If not, I will wait—a little +while. I come again in the morning.” +</p> + +<p> +Dicky, with his shoes removed so as not to disturb his fellow prisoners, +tramped the floor of the jail half the night condemning his lack of money and +the cause of it—whatever that might have been. He knew very well that +money would have bought his release at once. +</p> + +<p> +For two days succeeding Pasa came at the appointed times and brought him food. +He eagerly inquired each time if a letter or package had come for him, and she +mournfully shook her head. +</p> + +<p> +On the morning of the third day she brought only a small loaf of bread. There +were dark circles under her eyes. She seemed as calm as ever. +</p> + +<p> +“By jingo,” said Dicky, who seemed to speak in English or Spanish +as the whim seized him, “this is dry provender, <i>muchachita</i>. Is +this the best you can dig up for a fellow?” +</p> + +<p> +Pasa looked at him as a mother looks at a beloved but capricious babe. +</p> + +<p> +“Think better of it,” she said, in a low voice; “since for +the next meal there will be nothing. The last <i>centavo</i> is spent.” +She pressed closer against the grating. +</p> + +<p> +“Sell the goods in the shop—take anything for them.” +</p> + +<p> +“Have I not tried? Did I not offer them for one-tenth their cost? Not +even one <i>peso</i> would any one give. There is not one <i>real</i> in this +town to assist Dickee Malonee.” +</p> + +<p> +Dick clenched his teeth grimly. “That’s the +<i>comandante</i>,” he growled. “He’s responsible for that +sentiment. Wait, oh, wait till the cards are all out.” +</p> + +<p> +Pasa lowered her voice to almost a whisper. “And, listen, heart of my +heart,” she said, “I have endeavoured to be brave, but I cannot +live without thee. Three days now—” +</p> + +<p> +Dicky caught a faint gleam of steel from the folds of her mantilla. For once +she looked in his face and saw it without a smile, stern, menacing and +purposeful. Then he suddenly raised his hand and his smile came back like a +gleam of sunshine. The hoarse signal of an incoming steamer’s siren +sounded in the harbour. Dicky called to the sentry who was pacing before the +door: “What steamer comes?” +</p> + +<p> +“The <i>Catarina</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +“Of the Vesuvius line?” +</p> + +<p> +“Without doubt, of that line.” +</p> + +<p> +“Go you, <i>picarilla</i>,” said Dicky joyously to Pasa, “to +the American consul. Tell him I wish to speak with him. See that he comes at +once. And look you! let me see a different look in those eyes, for I promise +your head shall rest upon this arm to-night.” +</p> + +<p> +It was an hour before the consul came. He held his green umbrella under his +arm, and mopped his forehead impatiently. +</p> + +<p> +“Now, see here, Maloney,” he began, captiously, “you fellows +seem to think you can cut up any kind of row, and expect me to pull you out of +it. I’m neither the War Department nor a gold mine. This country has its +laws, you know, and there’s one against pounding the senses out of the +regular army. You Irish are forever getting into trouble. I don’t see +what I can do. Anything like tobacco, now, to make you comfortable—or +newspapers—” +</p> + +<p> +“Son of Eli,” interrupted Dicky, gravely, “you haven’t +changed an iota. That is almost a duplicate of the speech you made when old +Koen’s donkeys and geese got into the chapel loft, and the culprits +wanted to hide in your room.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, heavens!” exclaimed the consul, hurriedly adjusting his +spectacles. “Are you a Yale man, too? Were you in that crowd? I +don’t seem to remember any one with red—any one named Maloney. Such +a lot of college men seem to have misused their advantages. One of the best +mathematicians of the class of ’91 is selling lottery tickets in Belize. +A Cornell man dropped off here last month. He was second steward on a guano +boat. I’ll write to the department if you like, Maloney. Or if +there’s any tobacco, or newspa—” +</p> + +<p> +“There’s nothing,” interrupted Dicky, shortly, “but +this. You go tell the captain of the <i>Catarina</i> that Dicky Maloney wants +to see him as soon as he can conveniently come. Tell him where I am. Hurry. +That’s all.” +</p> + +<p> +The consul, glad to be let off so easily, hurried away. The captain of the +<i>Catarina</i>, a stout man, Sicilian born, soon appeared, shoving, with +little ceremony, through the guards to the jail door. The Vesuvius Fruit +Company had a habit of doing things that way in Anchuria. +</p> + +<p> +“I am exceedingly sorry—exceedingly sorry,” said the captain, +“to see this occur. I place myself at your service, Mr. Maloney. What you +need shall be furnished. Whatever you say shall be done.” +</p> + +<p> +Dicky looked at him unsmilingly. His red hair could not detract from his +attitude of severe dignity as he stood, tall and calm, with his now grim mouth +forming a horizontal line. +</p> + +<p> +“Captain De Lucco, I believe I still have funds in the hands of your +company—ample and personal funds. I ordered a remittance last week. The +money has not arrived. You know what is needed in this game. Money and money +and more money. Why has it not been sent?” +</p> + +<p> +“By the <i>Cristobal</i>,” replied De Lucco, gesticulating, +“it was despatched. Where is the <i>Cristobal</i>? Off Cape Antonio I +spoke her with a broken shaft. A tramp coaster was towing her back to New +Orleans. I brought money ashore thinking your need for it might not withstand +delay. In this envelope is one thousand dollars. There is more if you need it, +Mr. Maloney.” +</p> + +<p> +“For the present it will suffice,” said Dicky, softening as he +crinkled the envelope and looked down at the half-inch thickness of smooth, +dingy bills. +</p> + +<p> +“The long green!” he said, gently, with a new reverence in his +gaze. “Is there anything it will not buy, Captain?” +</p> + +<p> +“I had three friends,” replied De Lucco, who was a bit of a +philosopher, “who had money. One of them speculated in stocks and made +ten million; another is in heaven, and the third married a poor girl whom he +loved.” +</p> + +<p> +“The answer, then,” said Dicky, “is held by the Almighty, +Wall Street and Cupid. So, the question remains.” +</p> + +<p> +“This,” queried the captain, including Dicky’s surroundings +in a significant gesture of his hand, “is it—it is not—it is +not connected with the business of your little shop? There is no failure in +your plans?” +</p> + +<p> +“No, no,” said Dicky. “This is merely the result of a little +private affair of mine, a digression from the regular line of business. They +say for a complete life a man must know poverty, love and war. But they +don’t go well together, <i>capitán mio</i>. No; there is no failure in my +business. The little shop is doing very well.” +</p> + +<p> +When the captain had departed Dicky called the sergeant of the jail squad and +asked: +</p> + +<p> +“Am I <i>preso</i> by the military or by the civil authority?” +</p> + +<p> +“Surely there is no martial law in effect now, señor.” +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Bueno</i>. Now go or send to the alcalde, the <i>Jues de la Paz</i> +and the <i>Jefe de los Policios</i>. Tell them I am prepared at once to satisfy +the demands of justice.” A folded bill of the “long green” +slid into the sergeant’s hand. +</p> + +<p> +Then Dicky’s smile came back again, for he knew that the hours of his +captivity were numbered; and he hummed, in time with the sentry’s tread: +</p> + +<p class="poem"> +“They’re hanging men and women now,<br/> + For lacking of the green.” +</p> + +<p> +So, that night Dicky sat by the window of the room over his shop and his little +saint sat close by, working at something silken and dainty. Dicky was +thoughtful and grave. His red hair was in an unusual state of disorder. +Pasa’s fingers often ached to smooth and arrange it, but Dicky would +never allow it. He was poring, to-night, over a great litter of maps and books +and papers on his table until that perpendicular line came between his brows +that always distressed Pasa. Presently she went and brought his hat, and stood +with it until he looked up, inquiringly. +</p> + +<p> +“It is sad for you here,” she explained. “Go out and drink +<i>vino blanco</i>. Come back when you get that smile you used to wear. That is +what I wish to see.” +</p> + +<p> +Dicky laughed and threw down his papers. “The <i>vino blanco</i> stage is +past. It has served its turn. Perhaps, after all, there was less entered my +mouth and more my ears than people thought. But, there will be no more maps or +frowns to-night. I promise you that. Come.” +</p> + +<p> +They sat upon a reed <i>silleta</i> at the window and watched the quivering +gleams from the lights of the <i>Catarina</i> reflected in the harbour. +</p> + +<p> +Presently Pasa rippled out one of her infrequent chirrups of audible laughter. +</p> + +<p> +“I was thinking,” she began, anticipating Dicky’s question, +“of the foolish things girls have in their minds. Because I went to +school in the States I used to have ambitions. Nothing less than to be the +president’s wife would satisfy me. And, look, thou red picaroon, to what +obscure fate thou hast stolen me!” +</p> + +<p> +“Don’t give up hope,” said Dicky, smiling. “More than +one Irishman has been the ruler of a South American country. There was a +dictator of Chili named O’Higgins. Why not a President Maloney, of +Anchuria? Say the word, <i>santita mia</i>, and we’ll make the +race.” +</p> + +<p> +“No, no, no, thou red-haired, reckless one!” sighed Pasa; “I +am content”—she laid her head against his +arm—“here.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap16"></a>XVI<br/> +ROUGE ET NOIR</h2> + +<p> +It has been indicated that disaffection followed the elevation of Losada to the +presidency. This feeling continued to grow. Throughout the entire republic +there seemed to be a spirit of silent, sullen discontent. Even the old Liberal +party to which Goodwin, Zavalla and other patriots had lent their aid was +disappointed. Losada had failed to become a popular idol. Fresh taxes, fresh +import duties and, more than all, his tolerance of the outrageous oppression of +citizens by the military had rendered him the most obnoxious president since +the despicable Alforan. The majority of his own cabinet were out of sympathy +with him. The army, which he had courted by giving it license to tyrannize, had +been his main, and thus far adequate support. +</p> + +<p> +But the most impolitic of the administration’s moves had been when it +antagonized the Vesuvius Fruit Company, an organization plying twelve steamers +and with a cash capital somewhat larger than Anchuria’s surplus and debt +combined. +</p> + +<p> +Reasonably an established concern like the Vesuvius would become irritated at +having a small, retail republic with no rating at all attempt to squeeze it. So +when the government proxies applied for a subsidy they encountered a polite +refusal. The president at once retaliated by clapping an export duty of one +<i>real</i> per bunch on bananas—a thing unprecedented in fruit-growing +countries. The Vesuvius Company had invested large sums in wharves and +plantations along the Anchurian coast, their agents had erected fine homes in +the towns where they had their headquarters, and heretofore had worked with the +republic in good-will and with advantage to both. It would lose an immense sum +if compelled to move out. The selling price of bananas from Vera Cruz to +Trinidad was three <i>reals</i> per bunch. This new duty of one <i>real</i> +would have ruined the fruit growers in Anchuria and have seriously discommoded +the Vesuvius Company had it declined to pay it. But for some reason, the +Vesuvius continued to buy Anchurian fruit, paying four <i>reals</i> for it; and +not suffering the growers to bear the loss. +</p> + +<p> +This apparent victory deceived His Excellency; and he began to hunger for more +of it. He sent an emissary to request a conference with a representative of the +fruit company. The Vesuvius sent Mr. Franzoni, a little, stout, cheerful man, +always cool, and whistling airs from Verdi’s operas. Señor Espirition, of +the office of the Minister of Finance, attempted the sandbagging in behalf of +Anchuria. The meeting took place in the cabin of the <i>Salvador</i>, of the +Vesuvius line. +</p> + +<p> +Señor Espirition opened negotiations by announcing that the government +contemplated the building of a railroad to skirt the alluvial coast lands. +After touching upon the benefits such a road would confer upon the interests of +the Vesuvius, he reached the definite suggestion that a contribution to the +road’s expenses of, say, fifty thousand <i>pesos</i> would not be more +than an equivalent to benefits received. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Franzoni denied that his company would receive any benefits from a +contemplated road. As its representative he must decline to contribute fifty +thousand <i>pesos</i>. But he would assume the responsibility of offering +twenty-five. +</p> + +<p> +Did Señor Espirition understand Señor Franzoni to mean twenty-five thousand +<i>pesos</i>? +</p> + +<p> +By no means. Twenty-five <i>pesos</i>. And in silver; not in gold. +</p> + +<p> +“Your offer insults my government,” cried Señor Espirition, rising +with indignation. +</p> + +<p> +“Then,” said Mr. Franzoni, in warning tone, “<i>we will +change it</i>.” +</p> + +<p> +The offer was never changed. Could Mr. Franzoni have meant the government? +</p> + +<p> +This was the state of affairs in Anchuria when the winter season opened at +Coralio at the end of the second year of Losada’s administration. So, +when the government and society made its annual exodus to the seashore it was +evident that the presidential advent would not be celebrated by unlimited +rejoicing. The tenth of November was the day set for the entrance into Coralio +of the gay company from the capital. A narrow-gauge railroad runs twenty miles +into the interior from Solitas. The government party travels by carriage from +San Mateo to this road’s terminal point, and proceeds by train to +Solitas. From here they march in grand procession to Coralio where, on the day +of their coming, festivities and ceremonies abound. But this season saw an +ominous dawning of the tenth of November. +</p> + +<p> +Although the rainy season was over, the day seemed to hark back to reeking +June. A fine drizzle of rain fell all during the forenoon. The procession +entered Coralio amid a strange silence. +</p> + +<p> +President Losada was an elderly man, grizzly bearded, with a considerable ratio +of Indian blood revealed in his cinnamon complexion. His carriage headed the +procession, surrounded and guarded by Captain Cruz and his famous troop of one +hundred light horse “<i>El Ciento Huilando</i>.” Colonel Rocas +followed, with a regiment of the regular army. +</p> + +<p> +The president’s sharp, beady eyes glanced about him for the expected +demonstration of welcome; but he faced a stolid, indifferent array of citizens. +Sight-seers the Anchurians are by birth and habit, and they turned out to their +last able-bodied unit to witness the scene; but they maintained an accusive +silence. They crowded the streets to the very wheel ruts; they covered the red +tile roofs to the eaves, but there was never a “<i>viva</i>” from +them. No wreaths of palm and lemon branches or gorgeous strings of paper roses +hung from the windows and balconies as was the custom. There was an apathy, a +dull, dissenting disapprobation, that was the more ominous because it puzzled. +No one feared an outburst, a revolt of the discontents, for they had no leader. +The president and those loyal to him had never even heard whispered a name +among them capable of crystallizing the dissatisfaction into opposition. No, +there could be no danger. The people always procured a new idol before they +destroyed an old one. +</p> + +<p> +At length, after a prodigious galloping and curvetting of red-sashed majors, +gold-laced colonels and epauletted generals, the procession formed for its +annual progress down the Calle Grande to the Casa Morena, where the ceremony of +welcome to the visiting president always took place. +</p> + +<p> +The Swiss band led the line of march. After it pranced the local +<i>comandante</i>, mounted, and a detachment of his troops. Next came a +carriage with four members of the cabinet, conspicuous among them the Minister +of War, old General Pilar, with his white moustache and his soldierly bearing. +Then the president’s vehicle, containing also the Ministers of Finance +and State; and surrounded by Captain Cruz’s light horse formed in a close +double file of fours. Following them, the rest of the officials of state, the +judges and distinguished military and social ornaments of public and private +life. +</p> + +<p> +As the band struck up, and the movement began, like a bird of ill-omen the +<i>Valhalla</i>, the swiftest steamship of the Vesuvius line, glided into the +harbour in plain view of the president and his train. Of course, there was +nothing menacing about its arrival—a business firm does not go to war +with a nation—but it reminded Señor Espirition and others in those +carriages that the Vesuvius Fruit Company was undoubtedly carrying something up +its sleeve for them. +</p> + +<p> +By the time the van of the procession had reached the government building, +Captain Cronin, of the <i>Valhalla</i>, and Mr. Vincenti, member of the +Vesuvius Company, had landed and were pushing their way, bluff, hearty and +nonchalant, through the crowd on the narrow sidewalk. Clad in white linen, big, +debonair, with an air of good-humoured authority, they made conspicuous figures +among the dark mass of unimposing Anchurians, as they penetrated to within a +few yards of the steps of the Casa Morena. Looking easily above the heads of +the crowd, they perceived another that towered above the undersized natives. It +was the fiery poll of Dicky Maloney against the wall close by the lower step; +and his broad, seductive grin showed that he recognized their presence. +</p> + +<p> +Dicky had attired himself becomingly for the festive occasion in a well-fitting +black suit. Pasa was close by his side, her head covered with the ubiquitous +black mantilla. +</p> + +<p> +Mr. Vincenti looked at her attentively. +</p> + +<p> +“Botticelli’s Madonna,” he remarked, gravely. “I wonder +when she got into the game. I don’t like his getting tangled with the +women. I hoped he would keep away from them.” +</p> + +<p> +Captain Cronin’s laugh almost drew attention from the parade. +</p> + +<p> +“With that head of hair! Keep away from the women! And a Maloney! +Hasn’t he got a license? But, nonsense aside, what do you think of the +prospects? It’s a species of filibustering out of my line.” +</p> + +<p> +Vincenti glanced again at Dicky’s head and smiled. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Rouge et noir</i>,” he said. “There you have it. Make +your play, gentlemen. Our money is on the red.” +</p> + +<p> +“The lad’s game,” said Cronin, with a commending look at the +tall, easy figure by the steps. “But ’tis all like fly-by-night +theatricals to me. The talk’s bigger than the stage; there’s a +smell of gasoline in the air, and they’re their own audience and +scene-shifters.” +</p> + +<p> +They ceased talking, for General Pilar had descended from the first carriage +and had taken his stand upon the top step of Casa Morena. As the oldest member +of the cabinet, custom had decreed that he should make the address of welcome, +presenting the keys of the official residence to the president at its close. +</p> + +<p> +General Pilar was one of the most distinguished citizens of the republic. Hero +of three wars and innumerable revolutions, he was an honoured guest at European +courts and camps. An eloquent speaker and a friend to the people, he +represented the highest type of the Anchurians. +</p> + +<p> +Holding in his hand the gilt keys of Casa Morena, he began his address in a +historical form, touching upon each administration and the advance of +civilization and prosperity from the first dim striving after liberty down to +present times. Arriving at the régime of President Losada, at which point, +according to precedent, he should have delivered a eulogy upon its wise conduct +and the happiness of the people, General Pilar paused. Then he silently held up +the bunch of keys high above his head, with his eyes closely regarding it. The +ribbon with which they were bound fluttered in the breeze. +</p> + +<p> +“It still blows,” cried the speaker, exultantly. “Citizens of +Anchuria, give thanks to the saints this night that our air is still +free.” +</p> + +<p> +Thus disposing of Losada’s administration, he abruptly reverted to that +of Olivarra, Anchuria’s most popular ruler. Olivarra had been +assassinated nine years before while in the prime of life and usefulness. A +faction of the Liberal party led by Losada himself had been accused of the +deed. Whether guilty or not, it was eight years before the ambitious and +scheming Losada had gained his goal. +</p> + +<p> +Upon this theme General Pilar’s eloquence was loosed. He drew the picture +of the beneficent Olivarra with a loving hand. He reminded the people of the +peace, the security and the happiness they had enjoyed during that period. He +recalled in vivid detail and with significant contrast the last winter sojourn +of President Olivarra in Coralio, when his appearance at their fiestas was the +signal for thundering <i>vivas</i> of love and approbation. +</p> + +<p> +The first public expression of sentiment from the people that day followed. A +low, sustained murmur went among them like the surf rolling along the shore. +</p> + +<p> +“Ten dollars to a dinner at the Saint Charles,” remarked Mr. +Vincenti, “that <i>rouge</i> wins.” +</p> + +<p> +“I never bet against my own interests,” said Captain Cronin, +lighting a cigar. “Long-winded old boy, for his age. What’s he +talking about?” +</p> + +<p> +“My Spanish,” replied Vincenti, “runs about ten words to the +minute; his is something around two hundred. Whatever he’s saying, +he’s getting them warmed up.” +</p> + +<p> +“Friends and brothers,” General Pilar was saying, “could I +reach out my hand this day across the lamentable silence of the grave to +Olivarra ‘the Good,’ to the ruler who was one of you, whose tears +fell when you sorrowed, and whose smile followed your joy—I would bring +him back to you, but—Olivarra is dead—dead at the hands of a craven +assassin!” +</p> + +<p> +The speaker turned and gazed boldly into the carriage of the president. His arm +remained extended aloft as if to sustain his peroration. The president was +listening, aghast, at this remarkable address of welcome. He was sunk back upon +his seat, trembling with rage and dumb surprise, his dark hands tightly +gripping the carriage cushions. +</p> + +<p> +Half rising, he extended one arm toward the speaker, and shouted a harsh +command at Captain Cruz. The leader of the “Flying Hundred” sat his +horse, immovable, with folded arms, giving no sign of having heard. Losada sank +back again, his dark features distinctly paling. +</p> + +<p> +“Who says that Olivarra is dead?” suddenly cried the speaker, his +voice, old as he was, sounding like a battle trumpet. “His body lies in +the grave, but to the people he loved he has bequeathed his spirit—yes, +more—his learning, his courage, his kindness—yes, more—his +youth, his image—people of Anchuria, have you forgotten Ramon, the son of +Olivarra?” +</p> + +<p> +Cronin and Vincenti, watching closely, saw Dicky Maloney suddenly raise his +hat, tear off his shock of red hair, leap up the steps and stand at the side of +General Pilar. The Minister of War laid his arm across the young man’s +shoulders. All who had known President Olivarra saw again his same lion-like +pose, the same frank, undaunted expression, the same high forehead with the +peculiar line of the clustering, crisp black hair. +</p> + +<p> +General Pilar was an experienced orator. He seized the moment of breathless +silence that preceded the storm. +</p> + +<p> +“Citizens of Anchuria,” he trumpeted, holding aloft the keys to +Casa Morena, “I am here to deliver these keys—the keys to your +homes and liberty—to your chosen president. Shall I deliver them to +Enrico Olivarra’s assassin, or to his son?” +</p> + +<p> +“Olivarra! Olivarra!” the crowd shrieked and howled. All +vociferated the magic name—men, women, children and the parrots. +</p> + +<p> +And the enthusiasm was not confined to the blood of the plebs. Colonel Rocas +ascended the steps and laid his sword theatrically at young Ramon +Olivarra’s feet. Four members of the cabinet embraced him. Captain Cruz +gave a command, and twenty of <i>El Ciento Huilando</i> dismounted and arranged +themselves in a cordon about the steps of Casa Morena. +</p> + +<p> +But Ramon Olivarra seized that moment to prove himself a born genius and +politician. He waved those soldiers aside, and descended the steps to the +street. There, without losing his dignity or the distinguished elegance that +the loss of his red hair brought him, he took the proletariat to his +bosom—the barefooted, the dirty, Indians, Caribs, babies, beggars, old, +young, saints, soldiers and sinners—he missed none of them. +</p> + +<p> +While this act of the drama was being presented, the scene shifters had been +busy at the duties that had been assigned to them. Two of Cruz’s dragoons +had seized the bridle reins of Losada’s horses; others formed a close +guard around the carriage; and they galloped off with the tyrant and his two +unpopular Ministers. No doubt a place had been prepared for them. There are a +number of well-barred stone apartments in Coralio. +</p> + +<p> +“<i>Rouge</i> wins,” said Mr. Vincenti, calmly lighting another +cigar. +</p> + +<p> +Captain Cronin had been intently watching the vicinity of the stone steps for +some time. +</p> + +<p> +“Good boy!” he exclaimed suddenly, as if relieved. “I +wondered if he was going to forget his Kathleen Mavourneen.” +</p> + +<p> +Young Olivarra had reascended the steps and spoken a few words to General +Pilar. Then that distinguished veteran descended to the ground and approached +Pasa, who still stood, wonder-eyed, where Dicky had left her. With his plumed +hat in his hand, and his medals and decorations shining on his breast, the +general spoke to her and gave her his arm, and they went up the stone steps of +the Casa Morena together. And then Ramon Olivarra stepped forward and took both +her hands before all the people. +</p> + +<p> +And while the cheering was breaking out afresh everywhere, Captain Cronin and +Mr. Vincenti turned and walked back toward the shore where the gig was waiting +for them. +</p> + +<p> +“There’ll be another ‘<i>presidente proclamada</i>’ in +the morning,” said Mr. Vincenti, musingly. “As a rule they are not +as reliable as the elected ones, but this youngster seems to have some good +stuff in him. He planned and manœuvred the entire campaign. Olivarra’s +widow, you know, was wealthy. After her husband was assassinated she went to +the States, and educated her son at Yale. The Vesuvius Company hunted him up, +and backed him in the little game.” +</p> + +<p> +“It’s a glorious thing,” said Cronin, half jestingly, +“to be able to discharge a government, and insert one of your own +choosing, in these days.” +</p> + +<p> +“Oh, it is only a matter of business,” said Vincenti, stopping and +offering the stump of his cigar to a monkey that swung down from a lime tree; +“and that is what moves the world of to-day. That extra <i>real</i> on +the price of bananas had to go. We took the shortest way of removing it.” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap17"></a>XVII<br/> +TWO RECALLS</h2> + +<p> +There remains three duties to be performed before the curtain falls upon the +patched comedy. Two have been promised: the third is no less obligatory. +</p> + +<p> +It was set forth in the programme of this tropic vaudeville that it would be +made known why Shorty O’Day, of the Columbia Detective Agency, lost his +position. Also that Smith should come again to tell us what mystery he followed +that night on the shores of Anchuria when he strewed so many cigar stumps +around the cocoanut palm during his lonely night vigil on the beach. These +things were promised; but a bigger thing yet remains to be +accomplished—the clearing up of a seeming wrong that has been done +according to the array of chronicled facts (truthfully set forth) that have +been presented. And one voice, speaking, shall do these three things. +</p> + +<p> +Two men sat on a stringer of a North River pier in the City of New York. A +steamer from the tropics had begun to unload bananas and oranges on the pier. +Now and then a banana or two would fall from an overripe bunch, and one of the +two men would shamble forward, seize the fruit and return to share it with his +companion. +</p> + +<p> +One of the men was in the ultimate stage of deterioration. As far as rain and +wind and sun could wreck the garments he wore, it had been done. In his person +the ravages of drink were as plainly visible. And yet, upon his high-bridged, +rubicund nose was jauntily perched a pair of shining and flawless gold-rimmed +glasses. +</p> + +<p> +The other man was not so far gone upon the descending Highway of the +Incompetents. Truly, the flower of his manhood had gone to seed—seed +that, perhaps, no soil might sprout. But there were still cross-cuts along +where he travelled through which he might yet regain the pathway of usefulness +without disturbing the slumbering Miracles. This man was short and compactly +built. He had an oblique, dead eye, like that of a sting-ray, and the moustache +of a cocktail mixer. We know the eye and the moustache; we know that Smith of +the luxurious yacht, the gorgeous raiment, the mysterious mission, the magic +disappearance, has come again, though shorn of the accessories of his former +state. +</p> + +<p> +At his third banana, the man with the nose glasses spat it from him with a +shudder. +</p> + +<p> +“Deuce take all fruit!” he remarked, in a patrician tone of +disgust. “I lived for two years where these things grow. The memory of +their taste lingers with you. The oranges are not so bad. Just see if you can +gather a couple of them, O’Day, when the next broken crate comes +up.” +</p> + +<p> +“Did you live down with the monkeys?” asked the other, made tepidly +garrulous by the sunshine and the alleviating meal of juicy fruit. “I was +down there, once myself. But only for a few hours. That was when I was with the +Columbia Detective Agency. The monkey people did me up. I’d have my job +yet if it hadn’t been for them. I’ll tell you about it. +</p> + +<p> +“One day the chief sent a note around to the office that read: +‘Send O’Day here at once for a big piece of business.’ I was +the crack detective of the agency at that time. They always handed me the big +jobs. The address the chief wrote from was down in the Wall Street district. +</p> + +<p> +“When I got there I found him in a private office with a lot of directors +who were looking pretty fuzzy. They stated the case. The president of the +Republic Insurance Company had skipped with about a tenth of a million dollars +in cash. The directors wanted him back pretty bad, but they wanted the money +worse. They said they needed it. They had traced the old gent’s movements +to where he boarded a tramp fruit steamer bound for South America that same +morning with his daughter and a big gripsack—all the family he had. +</p> + +<p> +“One of the directors had his steam yacht coaled and with steam up, ready +for the trip; and he turned her over to me, cart blongsh. In four hours I was +on board of her, and hot on the trail of the fruit tub. I had a pretty good +idea where old Wahrfield—that was his name, J. Churchill +Wahrfield—would head for. At that time we had a treaty with about every +foreign country except Belgium and that banana republic, Anchuria. There +wasn’t a photo of old Wahrfield to be had in New York—he had been +foxy there—but I had his description. And besides, the lady with him +would be a dead-give-away anywhere. She was one of the high-flyers in +Society—not the kind that have their pictures in the Sunday +papers—but the real sort that open chrysanthemum shows and christen +battleships. +</p> + +<p> +“Well, sir, we never got a sight of that fruit tub on the road. The ocean +is a pretty big place; and I guess we took different paths across it. But we +kept going toward this Anchuria, where the fruiter was bound for. +</p> + +<p> +“We struck the monkey coast one afternoon about four. There was a +ratty-looking steamer off shore taking on bananas. The monkeys were loading her +up with big barges. It might be the one the old man had taken, and it might +not. I went ashore to look around. The scenery was pretty good. I never saw any +finer on the New York stage. I struck an American on shore, a big, cool chap, +standing around with the monkeys. He showed me the consul’s office. The +consul was a nice young fellow. He said the fruiter was the <i>Karlsefin</i>, +running generally to New Orleans, but took her last cargo to New York. Then I +was sure my people were on board, although everybody told me that no passengers +had landed. I didn’t think they would land until after dark, for they +might have been shy about it on account of seeing that yacht of mine hanging +around. So, all I had to do was to wait and nab ’em when they came +ashore. I couldn’t arrest old Wahrfield without extradition papers, but +my play was to get the cash. They generally give up if you strike ’em +when they’re tired and rattled and short on nerve. +</p> + +<p> +“After dark I sat under a cocoanut tree on the beach for a while, and +then I walked around and investigated that town some, and it was enough to give +you the lions. If a man could stay in New York and be honest, he’d better +do it than to hit that monkey town with a million. +</p> + +<p> +“Dinky little mud houses; grass over your shoe tops in the streets; +ladies in low-neck-and-short-sleeves walking around smoking cigars; tree frogs +rattling like a hose cart going to a ten blow; big mountains dropping gravel in +the back yards, and the sea licking the paint off in front—no, +sir—a man had better be in God’s country living on free lunch than +there. +</p> + +<p> +“The main street ran along the beach, and I walked down it, and then +turned up a kind of lane where the houses were made of poles and straw. I +wanted to see what the monkeys did when they weren’t climbing cocoanut +trees. The very first shack I looked in I saw my people. They must have come +ashore while I was promenading. A man about fifty, smooth face, heavy eyebrows, +dressed in black broadcloth, looking like he was just about to say, ‘Can +any little boy in the Sunday school answer that?’ He was freezing on to a +grip that weighed like a dozen gold bricks, and a swell girl—a regular +peach, with a Fifth Avenue cut—was sitting on a wooden chair. An old +black woman was fixing some coffee and beans on a table. The light they had +come from a lantern hung on a nail. I went and stood in the door, and they +looked at me, and I said: +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mr. Wahrfield, you are my prisoner. I hope, for the lady’s +sake, you will take the matter sensibly. You know why I want you.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Who are you?’ says the old gent. +</p> + +<p> +“‘O’Day,’ says I, ‘of the Columbia Detective +Agency. And now, sir, let me give you a piece of good advice. You go back and +take your medicine like a man. Hand ’em back the boodle; and maybe +they’ll let you off light. Go back easy, and I’ll put in a word for +you. I’ll give you five minutes to decide.’ I pulled out my watch +and waited. +</p> + +<p> +“Then the young lady chipped in. She was one of the genuine +high-steppers. You could tell by the way her clothes fit and the style she had +that Fifth Avenue was made for her. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Come inside,’ she says. ‘Don’t stand in the +door and disturb the whole street with that suit of clothes. Now, what is it +you want?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Three minutes gone,’ I said. ‘I’ll tell you +again while the other two tick off. +</p> + +<p> +“‘You’ll admit being the president of the Republic, +won’t you?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I am,’ says he. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Well, then,’ says I, ‘it ought to be plain to you. +Wanted, in New York, J. Churchill Wahrfield, president of the Republic +Insurance Company. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Also the funds belonging to said company, now in that grip, in +the unlawful possession of said J. Churchill Wahrfield.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Oh-h-h-h!’ says the young lady, as if she was thinking, +‘you want to take us back to New York?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘To take Mr. Wahrfield. There’s no charge against you, miss. +There’ll be no objection, of course, to your returning with your +father.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Of a sudden the girl gave a tiny scream and grabbed the old boy around +the neck. ‘Oh, father, father!’ she says, kind of contralto, +‘can this be true? Have you taken money that is not yours? Speak, +father!’ It made you shiver to hear the tremolo stop she put on her +voice. +</p> + +<p> +“The old boy looked pretty bughouse when she first grappled him, but she +went on, whispering in his ear and patting his off shoulder till he stood +still, but sweating a little. +</p> + +<p> +“She got him to one side and they talked together a minute, and then he +put on some gold eyeglasses and walked up and handed me the grip. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mr. Detective,’ he says, talking a little broken, ‘I +conclude to return with you. I have finished to discover that life on this +desolate and displeased coast would be worse than to die, itself. I will go +back and hurl myself upon the mercy of the Republic Company. Have you brought a +sheep?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Sheep!’ says I; ‘I haven’t a +single—’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Ship,’ cut in the young lady. ‘Don’t get funny. +Father is of German birth, and doesn’t speak perfect English. How did you +come?’ +</p> + +<p> +“The girl was all broke up. She had a handkerchief to her face, and kept +saying every little bit, ‘Oh, father, father!’ She walked up to me +and laid her lily-white hand on the clothes that had pained her at first. I +smelt a million violets. She was a lulu. I told her I came in a private yacht. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Mr. O’Day,’ she says. ‘Oh, take us away from +this horrid country at once. Can you! Will you! Say you will.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘I’ll try,’ I said, concealing the fact that I was +dying to get them on salt water before they could change their mind. +</p> + +<p> +“One thing they both kicked against was going through the town to the +boat landing. Said they dreaded publicity, and now that they were going to +return, they had a hope that the thing might yet be kept out of the papers. +They swore they wouldn’t go unless I got them out to the yacht without +any one knowing it, so I agreed to humour them. +</p> + +<p> +“The sailors who rowed me ashore were playing billiards in a bar-room +near the water, waiting for orders, and I proposed to have them take the boat +down the beach half a mile or so, and take us up there. How to get them word +was the question, for I couldn’t leave the grip with the prisoner, and I +couldn’t take it with me, not knowing but what the monkeys might stick me +up. +</p> + +<p> +“The young lady says the old coloured woman would take them a note. I sat +down and wrote it, and gave it to the dame with plain directions what to do, +and she grins like a baboon and shakes her head. +</p> + +<p> +“Then Mr. Wahrfield handed her a string of foreign dialect, and she nods +her head and says, ‘See, señor,’ maybe fifty times, and lights out +with the note. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Old Augusta only understands German,’ said Miss Wahrfield, +smiling at me. ‘We stopped in her house to ask where we could find +lodging, and she insisted upon our having coffee. She tells us she was raised +in a German family in San Domingo.’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘Very likely,’ I said. ‘But you can search me for +German words, except <i>nix verstay</i> and <i>noch einst</i>. I would have +called that “See, señor” French, though, on a gamble.’ +</p> + +<p> +“Well, we three made a sneak around the edge of town so as not to be +seen. We got tangled in vines and ferns and the banana bushes and tropical +scenery a good deal. The monkey suburbs was as wild as places in Central Park. +We came out on the beach a good half mile below. A brown chap was lying asleep +under a cocoanut tree, with a ten-foot musket beside him. Mr. Wahrfield takes +up the gun and pitches it into the sea. ‘The coast is guarded,’ he +says. ‘Rebellion and plots ripen like fruit.’ He pointed to the +sleeping man, who never stirred. ‘Thus,’ he says, ‘they +perform trusts. Children!’ +</p> + +<p> +“I saw our boat coming, and I struck a match and lit a piece of newspaper +to show them where we were. In thirty minutes we were on board the yacht. +</p> + +<p> +“The first thing, Mr. Wahrfield and his daughter and I took the grip into +the owner’s cabin, opened it up, and took an inventory. There was one +hundred and five thousand dollars, United States treasury notes, in it, besides +a lot of diamond jewelry and a couple of hundred Havana cigars. I gave the old +man the cigars and a receipt for the rest of the lot, as agent for the company, +and locked the stuff up in my private quarters. +</p> + +<p> +“I never had a pleasanter trip than that one. After we got to sea the +young lady turned out to be the jolliest ever. The very first time we sat down +to dinner, and the steward filled her glass with champagne—that +director’s yacht was a regular floating Waldorf-Astoria—she winks +at me and says, ‘What’s the use to borrow trouble, Mr. Fly Cop? +Here’s hoping you may live to eat the hen that scratches on your +grave.’ There was a piano on board, and she sat down to it and sung +better than you give up two cases to hear plenty times. She knew about nine +operas clear through. She was sure enough <i>bon ton</i> and swell. She +wasn’t one of the ‘among others present’ kind; she belonged +on the special mention list! +</p> + +<p> +“The old man, too, perked up amazingly on the way. He passed the cigars, +and says to me once, quite chipper, out of a cloud of smoke, ‘Mr. +O’Day, somehow I think the Republic Company will not give me the much +trouble. Guard well the gripvalise of the money, Mr. O’Day, for that it +must be returned to them that it belongs when we finish to arrive.’ +</p> + +<p> +“When we landed in New York I ’phoned to the chief to meet us in +that director’s office. We got in a cab and went there. I carried the +grip, and we walked in, and I was pleased to see that the chief had got +together that same old crowd of moneybugs with pink faces and white vests to +see us march in. I set the grip on the table. ‘There’s the +money,’ I said. +</p> + +<p> +“‘And your prisoner?’ said the chief. +</p> + +<p> +“I pointed to Mr. Wahrfield, and he stepped forward and says: +</p> + +<p> +“‘The honour of a word with you, sir, to explain.’ +</p> + +<p> +“He and the chief went into another room and stayed ten minutes. When +they came back the chief looked as black as a ton of coal. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Did this gentleman,’ he says to me, ‘have this valise +in his possession when you first saw him?’ +</p> + +<p> +“‘He did,’ said I. +</p> + +<p> +“The chief took up the grip and handed it to the prisoner with a bow, and +says to the director crowd: ‘Do any of you recognize this +gentleman?’ +</p> + +<p> +“They all shook their pink faces. +</p> + +<p> +“‘Allow me to present,’ he goes on, Señor Miraflores, +president of the republic of Anchuria. The señor has generously consented to +overlook this outrageous blunder, on condition that we undertake to secure him +against the annoyance of public comment. It is a concession on his part to +overlook an insult for which he might claim international redress. I think we +can gratefully promise him secrecy in the matter.’ +</p> + +<p> +“They gave him a pink nod all round. +</p> + +<p> +“‘O’Day,’ he says to me. ‘As a private detective +you’re wasted. In a war, where kidnapping governments is in the rules, +you’d be invaluable. Come down to the office at eleven.’ +</p> + +<p> +“I knew what that meant. +</p> + +<p> +“‘So that’s the president of the monkeys,’ says I. +‘Well, why couldn’t he have said so?’ +</p> + +<p> +“Wouldn’t it jar you?” +</p> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div class="chapter"> + +<h2><a name="chap18"></a>XVIII<br/> +THE VITAGRAPHOSCOPE</h2> + +<p> +Vaudeville is intrinsically episodic and discontinuous. Its audiences do not +demand dénouements. Sufficient unto each “turn” is the evil +thereof. No one cares how many romances the singing comédienne may have had if +she can capably sustain the limelight and a high note or two. The audiences +reck not if the performing dogs get to the pound the moment they have jumped +through their last hoop. They do not desire bulletins about the possible +injuries received by the comic bicyclist who retires head-first from the stage +in a crash of (property) china-ware. Neither do they consider that their seat +coupons entitle them to be instructed whether or no there is a sentiment +between the lady solo banjoist and the Irish monologist. +</p> + +<p> +Therefore let us have no lifting of the curtain upon a tableau of the united +lovers, backgrounded by defeated villainy and derogated by the comic, +osculating maid and butler, thrown in as a sop to the Cerberi of the fifty-cent +seats. +</p> + +<p> +But our programme ends with a brief “turn” or two; and then to the +exits. Whoever sits the show out may find, if he will, the slender thread that +binds together, though ever so slightly, the story that, perhaps, only the +Walrus will understand. +</p> + +<p> +<i>Extracts from a letter from the first vice-president of the Republic +Insurance Company, of New York City, to Frank Goodwin, of Coralio, Republic of +Anchuria.</i> +</p> + +<p class="letter"> +My Dear Mr. Goodwin:—Your communication per Messrs. Howland and Fourchet, +of New Orleans, has reached us. Also their draft on N. Y. for $100,000, the +amount abstracted from the funds of this company by the late J. Churchill +Wahrfield, its former president. … The officers and directors unite in +requesting me to express to you their sincere esteem and thanks for your prompt +and much appreciated return of the entire missing sum within two weeks from the +time of its disappearance. … Can assure you that the matter will not be allowed +to receive the least publicity. … Regret exceedingly the distressing death of +Mr. Wahrfield by his own hand, but… Congratulations on your marriage to Miss +Wahrfield … many charms, winning manners, noble and womanly nature and envied +position in the best metropolitan society… +</p> + +<p class="right"> +Cordially yours,<br/> +Lucius E. Applegate,<br/> +First Vice-President the Republic Insurance Company. +</p> + +<h3><i>The Vitagraphoscope</i><br/> +(Moving Pictures)</h3> + +<h3><i>The Last Sausage</i></h3> + +<p> +SCENE—<i>An Artist’s Studio.</i> The artist, a young man of +prepossessing appearance, sits in a dejected attitude, amid a litter of +sketches, with his head resting upon his hand. An oil stove stands on a pine +box in the centre of the studio. The artist rises, tightens his waist belt to +another hole, and lights the stove. He goes to a tin bread box, half-hidden by +a screen, takes out a solitary link of sausage, turns the box upside-down to +show that there is no more, and chucks the sausage into a frying-pan, which he +sets upon the stove. The flame of the stove goes out, showing that there is no +more oil. The artist, in evident despair, seizes the sausage, in a sudden +access of rage, and hurls it violently from him. At the same time a door opens, +and a man who enters receives the sausage forcibly against his nose. He seems +to cry out; and is observed to make a dance step or two, vigorously. The +newcomer is a ruddy-faced, active, keen-looking man, apparently of Irish +ancestry. Next he is observed to laugh immoderately; he kicks over the stove; +he claps the artist (who is vainly striving to grasp his hand) vehemently upon +the back. Then he goes through a pantomime which to the sufficiently +intelligent spectator reveals that he has acquired large sums of money by +trading pot-metal hatchets and razors to the Indians of the Cordillera +Mountains for gold dust. He draws a roll of money as large as a small loaf of +bread from his pocket, and waves it above his head, while at the same time he +makes pantomime of drinking from a glass. The artist hurriedly secures his hat, +and the two leave the studio together. +</p> + +<h3><i>The Writing on the Sands</i></h3> + +<p> +SCENE—<i>The Beach at Nice.</i> A woman, beautiful, still young, +exquisitely clothed, complacent, poised, reclines near the water, idly +scrawling letters in the sand with the staff of her silken parasol. The beauty +of her face is audacious; her languid pose is one that you feel to be +impermanent—you wait, expectant, for her to spring or glide or crawl, +like a panther that has unaccountably become stock-still. She idly scrawls in +the sand; and the word that she always writes is “Isabel.” A man +sits a few yards away. You can see that they are companions, even if no longer +comrades. His face is dark and smooth, and almost inscrutable—but not +quite. The two speak little together. The man also scratches on the sand with +his cane. And the word that he writes is “Anchuria.” And then he +looks out where the Mediterranean and the sky intermingle, with death in his +gaze. +</p> + +<h3><i>The Wilderness and Thou</i></h3> + +<p> +SCENE—<i>The Borders of a Gentleman’s Estate in a Tropical +Land.</i> An old Indian, with a mahogany-coloured face, is trimming the grass +on a grave by a mangrove swamp. Presently he rises to his feet and walks slowly +toward a grove that is shaded by the gathering, brief twilight. In the edge of +the grove stand a man who is stalwart, with a kind and courteous air, and a +woman of a serene and clear-cut loveliness. When the old Indian comes up to +them the man drops money in his hand. The grave-tender, with the stolid pride +of his race, takes it as his due, and goes his way. The two in the edge of the +grove turn back along the dim pathway, and walk close, close—for, after +all, what is the world at its best but a little round field of the moving +pictures with two walking together in it? +</p> + +<h3>CURTAIN</h3> + +</div><!--end chapter--> + +<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CABBAGES AND KINGS ***</div> +<div style='text-align:left'> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will +be renamed. +</div> + +<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> +Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright +law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, +so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United +States without permission and without paying copyright +royalties. 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Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d42c22a --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #2777 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2777) diff --git a/old/2777-8.txt b/old/2777-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a1188b9 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/2777-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7609 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Cabbages and Kings, by O. Henry + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Cabbages and Kings + + +Author: O. Henry + + + +Release Date: July 23, 2000 [eBook #2777] +Most recently updated June 5, 2019 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CABBAGES AND KINGS*** + + +E-text prepared by Earle C. Beach +and revised by Joseph E. Loewenstein, M.D. + + + +Editorial note: + + This volume is the only work of O. Henry which approaches + being a novel. The stories are related and should be read + in the sequence in which they occur in the text. + + + Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustration. + See 2777-h.htm or 2777-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/7/7/2777/2777-h/24910-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/7/7/2777/2777-h.zip) + + + + + +CABBAGES AND KINGS + +by + +O. HENRY + +Author of "The Four Million," "The Voice of the City," +"The Trimmed Lamp," "Strictly Business," "Whirligigs," Etc. + + + + + + + +[ILLUSTRATION: "A little saint with a color more lightful +than orange" (frontispiece)] + + + + +"The time has come," the Walrus said, + "To talk of many things; +Of shoes and ships and sealing-wax, + And cabbages and kings." + + THE WALRUS AND THE CARPENTER + + + + + +CONTENTS + + THE PROEM: BY THE CARPENTER + I. "FOX-IN-THE-MORNING" + II. THE LOTUS AND THE BOTTLE + III. SMITH + IV. CAUGHT + V. CUPID'S EXILE NUMBER TWO + VI. THE PHONOGRAPH AND THE GRAFT + VII. MONEY MAZE + VIII. THE ADMIRAL + IX. THE FLAG PARAMOUNT + X. THE SHAMROCK AND THE PALM + XI. THE REMNANTS OF THE CODE + XII. SHOES + XIII. SHIPS + XIV. MASTERS OF ARTS + XV. DICKY + XVI. ROUGE ET NOIR + XVII. TWO RECALLS + XVIII. THE VITAGRAPHOSCOPE + + + + +THE PROEM + +BY THE CARPENTER + + +They will tell you in Anchuria, that President Miraflores, of that +volatile republic, died by his own hand in the coast town of Coralio; +that he had reached thus far in flight from the inconveniences of +an imminent revolution; and that one hundred thousand dollars, +government funds, which he carried with him in an American leather +valise as a souvenir of his tempestuous administration, was never +afterward recovered. + +For a _real_, a boy will show you his grave. It is back of the town +near a little bridge that spans a mangrove swamp. A plain slab of +wood stands at its head. Some one has burned upon the headstone with +a hot iron this inscription: + + + RAMON ANGEL DE LAS CRUZES + + Y MIRAFLORES + + PRESIDENTE DE LA REPUBLICA + + DE ANCHURIA + + QUE SEA SU JUEZ DIOS + + +It is characteristic of this buoyant people that they pursue no man +beyond the grave. "Let God be his judge!"--Even with the hundred +thousand unfound, though greatly coveted, the hue and cry went no +further than that. + +To the stranger or the guest the people of Coralio will relate the +story of the tragic end of their former president; how he strove to +escape from the country with the public funds and also with Doa +Isabel Guilbert, the young American opera singer; and how, being +apprehended by members of the opposing political party in Coralio, +he shot himself through the head rather than give up the funds, and, +in consequence, the Seorita Guilbert. They will relate further +that Doa Isabel, her adventurous bark of fortune shoaled by the +simultaneous loss of her distinguished admirer and the souvenir +hundred thousand, dropped anchor on this stagnant coast, awaiting a +rising tide. + +They say, in Coralio, that she found a prompt and prosperous tide +in the form of Frank Goodwin, an American resident of the town, an +investor who had grown wealthy by dealing in the products of the +country--a banana king, a rubber prince, a sarsaparilla, indigo, and +mahogany baron. The Seorita Guilbert, you will be told, married +Seor Goodwin one month after the president's death, thus, in the +very moment when Fortune had ceased to smile, wresting from her a +gift greater than the prize withdrawn. + +Of the American, Don Frank Goodwin, and of his wife the natives have +nothing but good to say. Don Frank has lived among them for years, +and has compelled their respect. His lady is easily queen of what +social life the sober coast affords. The wife of the governor of the +district, herself, who was of the proud Castilian family of Monteleon +y Dolorosa de los Santos y Mendez, feels honoured to unfold her +napkin with olive-hued, ringed hands at the table of Seora Goodwin. +Were you to refer (with your northern prejudices) to the vivacious +past of Mrs. Goodwin when her audacious and gleeful abandon in light +opera captured the mature president's fancy, or to her share in that +statesman's downfall and malfeasance, the Latin shrug of the shoulder +would be your only answer and rebuttal. What prejudices there were +in Coralio concerning Seora Goodwin seemed now to be in her favour, +whatever they had been in the past. + +It would seem that the story is ended, instead of begun; that the +close of tragedy and the climax of a romance have covered the ground +of interest; but, to the more curious reader it shall be some slight +instruction to trace the close threads that underlie the ingenuous +web of circumstances. + +The headpiece bearing the name of President Miraflores is daily +scrubbed with soap-bark and sand. An old half-breed Indian tends the +grave with fidelity and the dawdling minuteness of inherited sloth. +He chops down the weeds and ever-springing grass with his machete, he +plucks ants and scorpions and beetles from it with his horny fingers, +and sprinkles its turf with water from the plaza fountain. There is +no grave anywhere so well kept and ordered. + +Only by following out the underlying threads will it be made clear +why the old Indian, Galvez, is secretly paid to keep green the +grave of President Miraflores by one who never saw that unfortunate +statesman in life or in death, and why that one was wont to walk in +the twilight, casting from a distance looks of gentle sadness upon +that unhonoured mound. + +Elsewhere than at Coralio one learns of the impetuous career +of Isabel Guilbert. New Orleans gave her birth and the mingled +French and Spanish creole nature that tinctured her life with such +turbulence and warmth. She had little education, but a knowledge of +men and motives that seemed to have come by instinct. Far beyond the +common woman was she endowed with intrepid rashness, with a love for +the pursuit of adventure to the brink of danger, and with desire for +the pleasures of life. Her spirit was one to chafe under any curb; +she was Eve after the fall, but before the bitterness of it was felt. +She wore life as a rose in her bosom. + +Of the legion of men who had been at her feet it was said that but +one was so fortunate as to engage her fancy. To President Miraflores, +the brilliant but unstable ruler of Anchuria, she yielded the key to +her resolute heart. How, then, do we find her (as the Coralians would +have told you) the wife of Frank Goodwin, and happily living a life +of dull and dreamy inaction? + +The underlying threads reach far, stretching across the sea. +Following them out it will be made plain why "Shorty" O'Day, of the +Columbia Detective Agency, resigned his position. And, for a lighter +pastime, it shall be a duty and a pleasing sport to wander with Momus +beneath the tropic stars where Melpomene once stalked austere. Now to +cause laughter to echo from those lavish jungles and frowning crags +where formerly rang the cries of pirates' victims; to lay aside pike +and cutlass and attack with quip and jollity; to draw one saving +titter of mirth from the rusty casque of Romance--this were pleasant +to do in the shade of the lemon-trees on that coast that is curved +like lips set for smiling. + +For there are yet tales of the Spanish Main. That segment of +continent washed by the tempestuous Caribbean, and presenting to the +sea a formidable border of tropical jungle topped by the overweening +Cordilleras, is still begirt by mystery and romance. In past times +buccaneers and revolutionists roused the echoes of its cliffs, and +the condor wheeled perpetually above where, in the green groves, +they made food for him with their matchlocks and toledos. Taken and +retaken by sea rovers, by adverse powers and by sudden uprising of +rebellious factions, the historic 300 miles of adventurous coast has +scarcely known for hundreds of years whom rightly to call its master. +Pizarro, Balboa, Sir Francis Drake, and Bolivar did what they could +to make it a part of Christendom. Sir John Morgan, Lafitte and other +eminent swash-bucklers bombarded and pounded it in the name of +Abaddon. + +The game still goes on. The guns of the rovers are silenced; but the +tintype man, the enlarged photograph brigand, the kodaking tourist +and the scouts of the gentle brigade of fakirs have found it out, and +carry on the work. The hucksters of Germany, France, and Sicily now +bag its small change across their counters. Gentleman adventurers +throng the waiting-rooms of its rulers with proposals for railways +and concessions. The little _opra-bouffe_ nations play at government +and intrigue until some day a big, silent gunboat glides into the +offing and warns them not to break their toys. And with these changes +comes also the small adventurer, with empty pockets to fill, light of +heart, busy-brained--the modern fairy prince, bearing an alarm clock +with which, more surely than by the sentimental kiss, to awaken the +beautiful tropics from their centuries' sleep. Generally he wears a +shamrock, which he matches pridefully against the extravagant palms; +and it is he who has driven Melpomene to the wings, and set Comedy to +dancing before the footlights of the Southern Cross. + +So, there is a little tale to tell of many things. Perhaps to the +promiscuous ear of the Walrus it shall come with most avail; for in +it there are indeed shoes and ships and sealing-wax and cabbage-palms +and presidents instead of kings. + +Add to these a little love and counterplotting, and scatter +everywhere throughout the maze a trail of tropical dollars--dollars +warmed no more by the torrid sun than by the hot palms of the scouts +of Fortune--and, after all, here seems to be Life, itself, with talk +enough to weary the most garrulous of Walruses. + + + + +I + +"FOX-IN-THE-MORNING" + + +Coralio reclined, in the mid-day heat, like some vacuous beauty +lounging in a guarded harem. The town lay at the sea's edge on a +strip of alluvial coast. It was set like a little pearl in an emerald +band. Behind it, and seeming almost to topple, imminent, above it, +rose the sea-following range of the Cordilleras. In front the sea +was spread, a smiling jailer, but even more incorruptible than the +frowning mountains. The waves swished along the smooth beach; the +parrots screamed in the orange and ceiba-trees; the palms waved their +limber fronds foolishly like an awkward chorus at the prima donna's +cue to enter. + +Suddenly the town was full of excitement. A native boy dashed down a +grass-grown street, shrieking: "_Busca el Seor Goodwin. Ha venido un +telgrafo por el!_" + +The word passed quickly. Telegrams do not often come to anyone in +Coralio. The cry for Seor Goodwin was taken up by a dozen officious +voices. The main street running parallel to the beach became +populated with those who desired to expedite the delivery of the +despatch. Knots of women with complexions varying from palest olive +to deepest brown gathered at street corners and plaintively carolled: +"_Un telgrafo por Seor Goodwin!_" The _comandante_, Don Seor el +Coronel Encarnacin Rios, who was loyal to the Ins and suspected +Goodwin's devotion to the Outs, hissed: "Aha!" and wrote in his +secret memorandum book the accusive fact that Seor Goodwin had on +that momentous date received a telegram. + +In the midst of the hullabaloo a man stepped to the door of a small +wooden building and looked out. Above the door was a sign that read +"Keogh and Clancy"--a nomenclature that seemed not to be indigenous +to that tropical soil. The man in the door was Billy Keogh, scout +of fortune and progress and latter-day rover of the Spanish Main. +Tintypes and photographs were the weapons with which Keogh and Clancy +were at that time assailing the hopeless shores. Outside the shop +were set two large frames filled with specimens of their art and +skill. + +Keogh leaned in the doorway, his bold and humorous countenance +wearing a look of interest at the unusual influx of life and sound +into the street. When the meaning of the disturbance became clear to +him he placed a hand beside his mouth and shouted: "Hey! Frank!" in +such a robustious voice that the feeble clamour of the natives was +drowned and silenced. + +Fifty yards away, on the seaward side of the street, stood the abode +of the consul for the United States. Out from the door of this +building tumbled Goodwin at the call. He had been smoking with +Willard Geddie, the consul, on the back porch of the consulate, which +was conceded to be the coolest spot in Coralio. + +"Hurry up," shouted Keogh. "There's a riot in town on account of a +telegram that's come for you. You want to be careful about these +things, my boy. It won't do to trifle with the feelings of the +public this way. You'll be getting a pink note some day with violet +scent on it; and then the country'll be steeped in the throes of a +revolution." + +Goodwin had strolled up the street and met the boy with the message. +The ox-eyed women gazed at him with shy admiration, for his type drew +them. He was big, blonde, and jauntily dressed in white linen, with +buckskin _zapatos_. His manner was courtly, with a sort of kindly +truculence in it, tempered by a merciful eye. When the telegram had +been delivered, and the bearer of it dismissed with a gratuity, the +relieved populace returned to the contiguities of shade from which +curiosity had drawn it--the women to their baking in the mud ovens +under the orange-trees, or to the interminable combing of their +long, straight hair; the men to their cigarettes and gossip in the +cantinas. + +Goodwin sat on Keogh's doorstep, and read his telegram. It was from +Bob Englehart, an American, who lived in San Mateo, the capital city +of Anchuria, eighty miles in the interior. Englehart was a gold +miner, an ardent revolutionist and "good people." That he was a man +of resource and imagination was proven by the telegram he had sent. +It had been his task to send a confidential message to his friend in +Coralio. This could not have been accomplished in either Spanish or +English, for the eye politic in Anchuria was an active one. The Ins +and the Outs were perpetually on their guard. But Englehart was a +diplomatist. There existed but one code upon which he might make +requisition with promise of safety--the great and potent code of +Slang. So, here is the message that slipped, unconstrued, through +the fingers of curious officials, and came to the eye of Goodwin: + + + His Nibs skedaddled yesterday per jack-rabbit line with all + the coin in the kitty and the bundle of muslin he's spoony + about. The boodle is six figures short. Our crowd in good + shape, but we need the spondulicks. You collar it. The main + guy and the dry goods are headed for the briny. You know + what to do. + + BOB. + + +This screed, remarkable as it was, had no mystery for Goodwin. He +was the most successful of the small advance-guard of speculative +Americans that had invaded Anchuria, and he had not reached that +enviable pinnacle without having well exercised the arts of foresight +and deduction. He had taken up political intrigue as a matter of +business. He was acute enough to wield a certain influence among +the leading schemers, and he was prosperous enough to be able to +purchase the respect of the petty office-holders. There was always +a revolutionary party; and to it he had always allied himself; for +the adherents of a new administration received the rewards of their +labours. There was now a Liberal party seeking to overturn President +Miraflores. If the wheel successfully revolved, Goodwin stood to +win a concession to 30,000 manzanas of the finest coffee lands in +the interior. Certain incidents in the recent career of President +Miraflores had excited a shrewd suspicion in Goodwin's mind that the +government was near a dissolution from another cause than that of a +revolution, and now Englehart's telegram had come as a corroboration +of his wisdom. + +The telegram, which had remained unintelligible to the Anchurian +linguists who had applied to it in vain their knowledge of Spanish +and elemental English, conveyed a stimulating piece of news to +Goodwin's understanding. It informed him that the president of the +republic had decamped from the capital city with the contents of the +treasury. Furthermore, that he was accompanied in his flight by that +winning adventuress Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer, whose troupe +of performers had been entertained by the president at San Mateo +during the past month on a scale less modest than that with which +royal visitors are often content. The reference to the "jack-rabbit +line" could mean nothing else than the mule-back system of transport +that prevailed between Coralio and the capital. The hint that the +"boodle" was "six figures short" made the condition of the national +treasury lamentably clear. Also it was convincingly true that the +ingoing party--its way now made a pacific one--would need the +"spondulicks." Unless its pledges should be fulfilled, and the spoils +held for the delectation of the victors, precarious indeed, would +be the position of the new government. Therefore it was exceeding +necessary to "collar the main guy," and recapture the sinews of war +and government. + +Goodwin handed the message to Keogh. + +"Read that, Billy," he said. "It's from Bob Englehart. Can you manage +the cipher?" + +Keogh sat in the other half of the doorway, and carefully perused the +telegram. + +"'Tis not a cipher," he said, finally. "'Tis what they call +literature, and that's a system of language put in the mouths +of people that they've never been introduced to by writers of +imagination. The magazines invented it, but I never knew before that +President Norvin Green had stamped it with the seal of his approval. +'Tis now no longer literature, but language. The dictionaries tried, +but they couldn't make it go for anything but dialect. Sure, now that +the Western Union indorses it, it won't be long till a race of people +will spring up that speaks it." + +"You're running too much to philology, Billy," said Goodwin. "Do you +make out the meaning of it?" + +"Sure," replied the philosopher of Fortune. "All languages come easy +to the man who must know 'em. I've even failed to misunderstand an +order to evacuate in classical Chinese when it was backed up by the +muzzle of a breech-loader. This little literary essay I hold in my +hands means a game of Fox-in-the-Morning. Ever play that, Frank, when +you was a kid?" + +"I think so," said Goodwin, laughing. "You join hands all 'round, +and--" + +"You do not," interrupted Keogh. "You've got a fine sporting game +mixed up in your head with 'All Around the Rosebush.' The spirit of +'Fox-in-the-Morning' is opposed to the holding of hands. I'll tell +you how it's played. This president man and his companion in play, +they stand up over in San Mateo, ready for the run, and shout: +'Fox-in-the-Morning!' Me and you, standing here, we say: 'Goose and +the Gander!' They say: 'How many miles is it to London town?' We say: +'Only a few, if your legs are long enough. How many comes out?' They +say: 'More than you're able to catch.' And then the game commences." + +"I catch the idea," said Goodwin. "It won't do to let the goose +and gander slip through our fingers, Billy; their feathers are too +valuable. Our crowd is prepared and able to step into the shoes of +the government at once; but with the treasury empty we'd stay in +power about as long as a tenderfoot would stick on an untamed bronco. +We must play the fox on every foot of the coast to prevent their +getting out of the country." + +"By the mule-back schedule," said Keogh, "it's five days down from +San Mateo. We've got plenty of time to set our outposts. There's only +three places on the coast where they can hope to sail from--here and +Solitas and Alazan. They're the only points we'll have to guard. It's +as easy as a chess problem--fox to play, and mate in three moves. Oh, +goosey, goosey, gander, whither do you wander? By the blessing of the +literary telegraph the boodle of this benighted fatherland shall be +preserved to the honest political party that is seeking to overthrow +it." + +The situation had been justly outlined by Keogh. The down trail +from the capital was at all times a weary road to travel. A +jiggety-joggety journey it was; ice-cold and hot, wet and dry. The +trail climbed appalling mountains, wound like a rotten string about +the brows of breathless precipices, plunged through chilling snow-fed +streams, and wriggled like a snake through sunless forests teeming +with menacing insect and animal life. After descending to the +foothills it turned to a trident, the central prong ending at Alazan. +Another branched off to Coralio; the third penetrated to Solitas. +Between the sea and the foothills stretched the five miles breadth of +alluvial coast. Here was the flora of the tropics in its rankest and +most prodigal growth. Spaces here and there had been wrested from the +jungle and planted with bananas and cane and orange groves. The rest +was a riot of wild vegetation, the home of monkeys, tapirs, jaguars, +alligators and prodigious reptiles and insects. Where no road was cut +a serpent could scarcely make its way through the tangle of vines and +creepers. Across the treacherous mangrove swamps few things without +wings could safely pass. Therefore the fugitives could hope to reach +the coast only by one of the routes named. + +"Keep the matter quiet, Billy," advised Goodwin. "We don't want +the Ins to know that the president is in flight. I suppose Bob's +information is something of a scoop in the capital as yet. Otherwise +he would not have tried to make his message a confidential one; and +besides, everybody would have heard the news. I'm going around now to +see Dr. Zavalla, and start a man up the trail to cut the telegraph +wire." + +As Goodwin rose, Keogh threw his hat upon the grass by the door and +expelled a tremendous sigh. + +"What's the trouble, Billy?" asked Goodwin, pausing. "That's the +first time I ever heard you sigh." + +"'Tis the last," said Keogh. "With that sorrowful puff of wind I +resign myself to a life of praiseworthy but harassing honesty. What +are tintypes, if you please, to the opportunities of the great +and hilarious class of ganders and geese? Not that I would be a +president, Frank--and the boodle he's got is too big for me to +handle--but in some ways I feel my conscience hurting me for +addicting myself to photographing a nation instead of running away +with it. Frank, did you ever see the 'bundle of muslin' that His +Excellency has wrapped up and carried off?" + +"Isabel Guilbert?" said Goodwin, laughing. "No, I never did. From +what I've heard of her, though, I imagine that she wouldn't stick at +anything to carry her point. Don't get romantic, Billy. Sometimes I +begin to fear that there's Irish blood in your ancestry." + +"I never saw her either," went on Keogh; "but they say she's got all +the ladies of mythology, sculpture, and fiction reduced to chromos. +They say she can look at a man once, and he'll turn monkey and climb +trees to pick cocoanuts for her. Think of that president man with +Lord knows how many hundreds of thousands of dollars in one hand, and +this muslin siren in the other, galloping down hill on a sympathetic +mule amid songbirds and flowers! And here is Billy Keogh, because he +is virtuous, condemned to the unprofitable swindle of slandering the +faces of missing links on tin for an honest living! 'Tis an injustice +of nature." + +"Cheer up," said Goodwin. "You are a pretty poor fox to be envying a +gander. Maybe the enchanting Guilbert will take a fancy to you and +your tintypes after we impoverish her royal escort." + +"She could do worse," reflected Keogh; "but she won't. 'Tis not a +tintype gallery, but the gallery of the gods that she's fitted to +adorn. She's a very wicked lady, and the president man is in luck. +But I hear Clancy swearing in the back room for having to do all the +work." And Keogh plunged for the rear of the "gallery," whistling +gaily in a spontaneous way that belied his recent sigh over the +questionable good luck of the flying president. + +Goodwin turned from the main street into a much narrower one that +intersected it at a right angle. + +These side streets were covered by a growth of thick, rank grass, +which was kept to a navigable shortness by the machetes of the +police. Stone sidewalks, little more than a ledge in width, ran along +the base of the mean and monotonous adobe houses. At the outskirts +of the village these streets dwindled to nothing; and here were set +the palm-thatched huts of the Caribs and the poorer natives, and the +shabby cabins of negroes from Jamaica and the West India islands. A +few structures raised their heads above the red-tiled roofs of the +one-story houses--the bell tower of the _Calaboza_, the Hotel de los +Estranjeros, the residence of the Vesuvius Fruit Company's agent, +the store and residence of Bernard Brannigan, a ruined cathedral in +which Columbus had once set foot, and, most imposing of all, the +Casa Morena--the summer "White House" of the President of Anchuria. +On the principal street running along the beach--the Broadway +of Coralio--were the larger stores, the government _bodega_ and +post-office, the _cuartel_, the rum-shops and the market place. + +On his way Goodwin passed the house of Bernard Brannigan. It was a +modern wooden building, two stories in height. The ground floor was +occupied by Brannigan's store, the upper one contained the living +apartments. A wide cool porch ran around the house half way up its +outer walls. A handsome, vivacious girl neatly dressed in flowing +white leaned over the railing and smiled down upon Goodwin. She was +no darker than many an Andalusian of high descent; and she sparkled +and glowed like a tropical moonlight. + +"Good evening, Miss Paula," said Goodwin, taking off his hat, with +his ready smile. There was little difference in his manner whether +he addressed women or men. Everybody in Coralio liked to receive the +salutation of the big American. + +"Is there any news, Mr. Goodwin? Please don't say no. Isn't it +warm? I feel just like Mariana in her moated grange--or was it a +range?--it's hot enough." + +"No, there's no news to tell, I believe," said Goodwin, with a +mischievous look in his eye, "except that old Geddie is getting +grumpier and crosser every day. If something doesn't happen to +relieve his mind I'll have to quit smoking on his back porch--and +there's no other place available that is cool enough." + +"He isn't grumpy," said Paula Brannigan, impulsively, "when he--" + +But she ceased suddenly, and drew back with a deepening colour; for +her mother had been a _mestizo_ lady, and the Spanish blood had +brought to Paula a certain shyness that was an adornment to the other +half of her demonstrative nature. + + + + +II + +THE LOTUS AND THE BOTTLE + + +Willard Geddie, consul for the United States in Coralio, was working +leisurely on his yearly report. Goodwin, who had strolled in as he +did daily for a smoke on the much coveted porch, had found him so +absorbed in his work that he departed after roundly abusing the +consul for his lack of hospitality. + +"I shall complain to the civil service department," said +Goodwin;--"or is it a department?--perhaps it's only a theory. One +gets neither civility nor service from you. You won't talk; and +you won't set out anything to drink. What kind of a way is that of +representing your government?" + +Goodwin strolled out and across to the hotel to see if he could bully +the quarantine doctor into a game on Coralio's solitary billiard +table. His plans were completed for the interception of the fugitives +from the capital; and now it was but a waiting game that he had to +play. + +The consul was interested in his report. He was only twenty-four; and +he had not been in Coralio long enough for his enthusiasm to cool in +the heat of the tropics--a paradox that may be allowed between Cancer +and Capricorn. + +So many thousand bunches of bananas, so many thousand oranges and +cocoanuts, so many ounces of gold dust, pounds of rubber, coffee, +indigo and sarsaparilla--actually, exports were twenty per cent. +greater than for the previous year! + +A little thrill of satisfaction ran through the consul. Perhaps, he +thought, the State Department, upon reading his introduction, would +notice--and then he leaned back in his chair and laughed. He was +getting as bad as the others. For the moment he had forgotten that +Coralio was an insignificant town in an insignificant republic lying +along the by-ways of a second-rate sea. He thought of Gregg, the +quarantine doctor, who subscribed for the London _Lancet_, expecting +to find it quoting his reports to the home Board of Health concerning +the yellow fever germ. The consul knew that not one in fifty of his +acquaintances in the States had ever heard of Coralio. He knew that +two men, at any rate, would have to read his report--some underling +in the State Department and a compositor in the Public Printing +Office. Perhaps the typesticker would note the increase of commerce +in Coralio, and speak of it, over the cheese and beer, to a friend. + +He had just written: "Most unaccountable is the supineness of the +large exporters in the United States in permitting the French and +German houses to practically control the trade interests of this +rich and productive country"--when he heard the hoarse notes of a +steamer's siren. + +Geddie laid down his pen and gathered his Panama hat and umbrella. By +the sound he knew it to be the _Valhalla_, one of the line of fruit +vessels plying for the Vesuvius Company. Down to _nios_ of five +years, everyone in Coralio could name you each incoming steamer by +the note of her siren. + +The consul sauntered by a roundabout, shaded way to the beach. By +reason of long practice he gauged his stroll so accurately that +by the time he arrived on the sandy shore the boat of the customs +officials was rowing back from the steamer, which had been boarded +and inspected according to the laws of Anchuria. + +There is no harbour at Coralio. Vessels of the draught of the +_Valhalla_ must ride at anchor a mile from shore. When they take on +fruit it is conveyed on lighters and freighter sloops. At Solitas, +where there was a fine harbour, ships of many kinds were to be seen, +but in the roadstead off Coralio scarcely any save the fruiters +paused. Now and then a tramp coaster, or a mysterious brig from +Spain, or a saucy French barque would hang innocently for a few +days in the offing. Then the custom-house crew would become doubly +vigilant and wary. At night a sloop or two would be making strange +trips in and out along the shore; and in the morning the stock of +Three-Star Hennessey, wines and drygoods in Coralio would be found +vastly increased. It has also been said that the customs officials +jingled more silver in the pockets of their red-striped trousers, and +that the record books showed no increase in import duties received. + +The customs boat and the _Valhalla_ gig reached the shore at the same +time. When they grounded in the shallow water there was still five +yards of rolling surf between them and dry sand. Then half-clothed +Caribs dashed into the water, and brought in on their backs the +_Valhalla's_ purser and the little native officials in their cotton +undershirts, blue trousers with red stripes, and flapping straw hats. + +At college Geddie had been a treasure as a first-baseman. He now +closed his umbrella, stuck it upright in the sand, and stooped, +with his hands resting upon his knees. The purser, burlesquing +the pitcher's contortions, hurled at the consul the heavy roll of +newspapers, tied with a string, that the steamer always brought for +him. Geddie leaped high and caught the roll with a sounding "thwack." +The loungers on the beach--about a third of the population of the +town--laughed and applauded delightedly. Every week they expected to +see that roll of papers delivered and received in that same manner, +and they were never disappointed. Innovations did not flourish in +Coralio. + +The consul re-hoisted his umbrella and walked back to the consulate. + +This home of a great nation's representative was a wooden structure +of two rooms, with a native-built gallery of poles, bamboo and +nipa palm running on three sides of it. One room was the official +apartment, furnished chastely with a flat-top desk, a hammock, and +three uncomfortable cane-seated chairs. Engravings of the first and +latest president of the country represented hung against the wall. +The other room was the consul's living apartment. + +It was eleven o'clock when he returned from the beach, and therefore +breakfast time. Chanca, the Carib woman who cooked for him, was just +serving the meal on the side of the gallery facing the sea--a spot +famous as the coolest in Coralio. The breakfast consisted of shark's +fin soup, stew of land crabs, breadfruit, a boiled iguana steak, +aguacates, a freshly cut pineapple, claret and coffee. + +Geddie took his seat, and unrolled with luxurious laziness his bundle +of newspapers. Here in Coralio for two days or longer he would read +of goings-on in the world very much as we of the world read those +whimsical contributions to inexact science that assume to portray the +doings of the Martians. After he had finished with the papers they +would be sent on the rounds of the other English-speaking residents +of the town. + +The paper that came first to his hand was one of those bulky +mattresses of printed stuff upon which the readers of certain New +York journals are supposed to take their Sabbath literary nap. +Opening this the consul rested it upon the table, supporting its +weight with the aid of the back of a chair. Then he partook of his +meal deliberately, turning the leaves from time to time and glancing +half idly at the contents. + +Presently he was struck by something familiar to him in a picture--a +half-page, badly printed reproduction of a photograph of a vessel. +Languidly interested, he leaned for a nearer scrutiny and a view of +the florid headlines of the column next to the picture. + +Yes; he was not mistaken. The engraving was of the eight-hundred-ton +yacht _Idalia_, belonging to "that prince of good fellows, Midas +of the money market, and society's pink of perfection, J. Ward +Tolliver." + +Slowly sipping his black coffee, Geddie read the column of print. +Following a listed statement of Mr. Tolliver's real estate and bonds, +came a description of the yacht's furnishings, and then the grain of +news no bigger than a mustard seed. Mr. Tolliver, with a party of +favoured guests, would sail the next day on a six weeks' cruise along +the Central American and South American coasts and among the Bahama +Islands. Among the guests were Mrs. Cumberland Payne and Miss Ida +Payne, of Norfolk. + +The writer, with the fatuous presumption that was demanded of him +by his readers, had concocted a romance suited to their palates. +He bracketed the names of Miss Payne and Mr. Tolliver until he had +well-nigh read the marriage ceremony over them. He played coyly and +insinuatingly upon the strings of "_on dit_" and "Madame Rumour" +and "a little bird" and "no one would be surprised," and ended with +congratulations. + +Geddie, having finished his breakfast, took his papers to the edge of +the gallery, and sat there in his favourite steamer chair with his +feet on the bamboo railing. He lighted a cigar, and looked out upon +the sea. He felt a glow of satisfaction at finding he was so little +disturbed by what he had read. He told himself that he had conquered +the distress that had sent him, a voluntary exile, to this far +land of the lotus. He could never forget Ida, of course; but there +was no longer any pain in thinking about her. When they had had +that misunderstanding and quarrel he had impulsively sought this +consulship, with the desire to retaliate upon her by detaching +himself from her world and presence. He had succeeded thoroughly in +that. During the twelve months of his life in Coralio no word had +passed between them, though he had sometimes heard of her through the +dilatory correspondence with the few friends to whom he still wrote. +Still he could not repress a little thrill of satisfaction at knowing +that she had not yet married Tolliver or anyone else. But evidently +Tolliver had not yet abandoned hope. + +Well, it made no difference to him now. He had eaten of the lotus. He +was happy and content in this land of perpetual afternoon. Those old +days of life in the States seemed like an irritating dream. He hoped +Ida would be as happy as he was. The climate as balmy as that of +distant Avalon; the fetterless, idyllic round of enchanted days; +the life among this indolent, romantic people--a life full of music, +flowers, and low laughter; the influence of the imminent sea and +mountains, and the many shapes of love and magic and beauty that +bloomed in the white tropic nights--with all he was more than +content. Also, there was Paula Brannigan. + +Geddie intended to marry Paula--if, of course, she would consent; +but he felt rather sure that she would do that. Somehow, he kept +postponing his proposal. Several times he had been quite near to it; +but a mysterious something always held him back. Perhaps it was only +the unconscious, instinctive conviction that the act would sever the +last tie that bound him to his old world. + +He could be very happy with Paula. Few of the native girls could be +compared with her. She had attended a convent school in New Orleans +for two years; and when she chose to display her accomplishments no +one could detect any difference between her and the girls of Norfolk +and Manhattan. But it was delicious to see her at home dressed, as +she sometimes was, in the native costume, with bare shoulders and +flowing sleeves. + +Bernard Brannigan was the great merchant of Coralio. Besides his +store, he maintained a train of pack mules, and carried on a lively +trade with the interior towns and villages. He had married a native +lady of high Castilian descent, but with a tinge of Indian brown +showing through her olive cheek. The union of the Irish and the +Spanish had produced, as it so often has, an offshoot of rare beauty +and variety. They were very excellent people indeed, and the upper +story of their house was ready to be placed at the service of Geddie +and Paula as soon as he should make up his mind to speak about it. + +By the time two hours were whiled away the consul tired of reading. +The papers lay scattered about him on the gallery. Reclining there, +he gazed dreamily out upon an Eden. A clump of banana plants +interposed their broad shields between him and the sun. The gentle +slope from the consulate to the sea was covered with the dark-green +foliage of lemon-trees and orange-trees just bursting into bloom. A +lagoon pierced the land like a dark, jagged crystal, and above it a +pale ceiba-tree rose almost to the clouds. The waving cocoanut palms +on the beach flared their decorative green leaves against the slate +of an almost quiescent sea. His senses were cognizant of brilliant +scarlet and ochres amid the vert of the coppice, of odours of +fruit and bloom and the smoke from Chanca's clay oven under the +calabash-tree; of the treble laughter of the native women in their +huts, the song of the robin, the salt taste of the breeze, the +diminuendo of the faint surf running along the shore--and, gradually, +of a white speck, growing to a blur, that intruded itself upon the +drab prospect of the sea. + +Lazily interested, he watched this blur increase until it became +the _Idalia_ steaming at full speed, coming down the coast. Without +changing his position he kept his eyes upon the beautiful white yacht +as she drew swiftly near, and came opposite to Coralio. Then, sitting +upright, he saw her float steadily past and on. Scarcely a mile of +sea had separated her from the shore. He had seen the frequent flash +of her polished brass work and the stripes of her deck-awnings--so +much, and no more. Like a ship on a magic lantern slide the _Idalia_ +had crossed the illuminated circle of the consul's little world, and +was gone. Save for the tiny cloud of smoke that was left hanging +over the brim of the sea, she might have been an immaterial thing, a +chimera of his idle brain. + +Geddie went into his office and sat down to dawdle over his report. +If the reading of the article in the paper had left him unshaken, +this silent passing of the _Idalia_ had done for him still more. +It had brought the calm and peace of a situation from which all +uncertainty had been erased. He knew that men sometimes hope without +being aware of it. Now, since she had come two thousand miles and had +passed without a sign, not even his unconscious self need cling to +the past any longer. + +After dinner, when the sun was low behind the mountains, Geddie +walked on the little strip of beach under the cocoanuts. The wind was +blowing mildly landward, and the surface of the sea was rippled by +tiny wavelets. + +A miniature breaker, spreading with a soft "swish" upon the sand +brought with it something round and shiny that rolled back again as +the wave receded. The next influx beached it clear, and Geddie picked +it up. The thing was a long-necked wine bottle of colourless glass. +The cork had been driven in tightly to the level of the mouth, and +the end covered with dark-red sealing-wax. The bottle contained only +what seemed to be a sheet of paper, much curled from the manipulation +it had undergone while being inserted. In the sealing-wax was the +impression of a seal--probably of a signet-ring, bearing the initials +of a monogram; but the impression had been hastily made, and the +letters were past anything more certain than a shrewd conjecture. Ida +Payne had always worn a signet-ring in preference to any other finger +decoration. Geddie thought he could make out the familiar "I P"; and +a queer sensation of disquietude went over him. More personal and +intimate was this reminder of her than had been the sight of the +vessel she was doubtless on. He walked back to his house, and set the +bottle on his desk. + +Throwing off his hat and coat, and lighting a lamp--for the night had +crowded precipitately upon the brief twilight--he began to examine +his piece of sea salvage. + +By holding the bottle near the light and turning it judiciously, he +made out that it contained a double sheet of note-paper filled with +close writing; further, that the paper was of the same size and shade +as that always used by Ida; and that, to the best of his belief, the +handwriting was hers. The imperfect glass of the bottle so distorted +the rays of light that he could read no word of the writing; but +certain capital letters, of which he caught comprehensive glimpses, +were Ida's, he felt sure. + +There was a little smile both of perplexity and amusement in Geddie's +eyes as he set the bottle down, and laid three cigars side by side +on his desk. He fetched his steamer chair from the gallery, and +stretched himself comfortably. He would smoke those three cigars +while considering the problem. + +For it amounted to a problem. He almost wished that he had not found +the bottle; but the bottle was there. Why should it have drifted in +from the sea, whence come so many disquieting things, to disturb his +peace? + +In this dreamy land, where time seemed so redundant, he had fallen +into the habit of bestowing much thought upon even trifling matters. + +He began to speculate upon many fanciful theories concerning the +story of the bottle, rejecting each in turn. + +Ships in danger of wreck or disablement sometimes cast forth such +precarious messengers calling for aid. But he had seen the _Idalia_ +not three hours before, safe and speeding. Suppose the crew had +mutinied and imprisoned the passengers below, and the message was +one begging for succour! But, premising such an improbable outrage, +would the agitated captives have taken the pains to fill four pages +of note-paper with carefully penned arguments to their rescue. + +Thus by elimination he soon rid the matter of the more unlikely +theories, and was reduced--though aversely--to the less assailable +one that the bottle contained a message to himself. Ida knew he was +in Coralio; she must have launched the bottle while the yacht was +passing and the wind blowing fairly toward the shore. + +As soon as Geddie reached this conclusion a wrinkle came between his +brows and a stubborn look settled around his mouth. He sat looking +out through the doorway at the gigantic fire-flies traversing the +quiet streets. + +If this was a message to him from Ida, what could it mean save an +overture toward a reconciliation? And if that, why had she not used +the same methods of the post instead of this uncertain and even +flippant means of communication? A note in an empty bottle, cast into +the sea! There was something light and frivolous about it, if not +actually contemptuous. + +The thought stirred his pride and subdued whatever emotions had been +resurrected by the finding of the bottle. + +Geddie put on his coat and hat and walked out. He followed a street +that led him along the border of the little plaza where a band was +playing and people were rambling, care-free and indolent. Some +timorous _seoritas_ scurrying past with fire-flies tangled in the +jetty braids of their hair glanced at him with shy, flattering eyes. +The air was languorous with the scent of jasmin and orange-blossoms. + +The consul stayed his steps at the house of Bernard Brannigan. Paula +was swinging in a hammock on the gallery. She rose from it like a +bird from its nest. The colour came to her cheek at the sound of +Geddie's voice. + +He was charmed at the sight of her costume--a flounced muslin dress, +with a little jacket of white flannel, all made with neatness and +style. He suggested a stroll, and they walked out to the old Indian +well on the hill road. They sat on the curb, and there Geddie made +the expected but long-deferred speech. Certain though he had been +that she would not say him nay, he was thrilled with joy at the +completeness and sweetness of her surrender. Here was surely a heart +made for love and steadfastness. Here was no caprice or questionings +or captious standards of convention. + +When Geddie kissed Paula at her door that night he was happier than +he had ever been before. "Here in this hollow lotus land, ever to +live and lie reclined" seemed to him, as it has seemed to many +mariners, the best as well as the easiest. His future would be an +ideal one. He had attained a Paradise without a serpent. His Eve +would be indeed a part of him, unbeguiled, and therefore more +beguiling. He had made his decision to-night, and his heart was full +of serene, assured content. + +Geddie went back to his house whistling that finest and saddest love +song, "La Golondrina." At the door his tame monkey leaped down from +his shelf, chattering briskly. The consul turned to his desk to get +him some nuts he usually kept there. Reaching in the half-darkness, +his hand struck against the bottle. He started as if he had touched +the cold rotundity of a serpent. + +He had forgotten that the bottle was there. + +He lighted the lamp and fed the monkey. Then, very deliberately, he +lighted a cigar, and took the bottle in his hand, and walked down the +path to the beach. + +There was a moon, and the sea was glorious. The breeze had shifted, +as it did each evening, and was now rushing steadily seaward. + +Stepping to the water's edge, Geddie hurled the unopened bottle far +out into the sea. It disappeared for a moment, and then shot upward +twice its length. Geddie stood still, watching it. The moonlight was +so bright that he could see it bobbing up and down with the little +waves. Slowly it receded from the shore, flashing and turning as it +went. The wind was carrying it out to sea. Soon it became a mere +speck, doubtfully discerned at irregular intervals; and then the +mystery of it was swallowed up by the greater mystery of the ocean. +Geddie stood still upon the beach, smoking and looking out upon the +water. + + + +"Simon!--Oh, Simon!--wake up there, Simon!" bawled a sonorous voice +at the edge of the water. + +Old Simon Cruz was a half-breed fisherman and smuggler who lived in a +hut on the beach. Out of his earliest nap Simon was thus awakened. + +He slipped on his shoes and went outside. Just landing from one of +the _Valhalla's_ boats was the third mate of that vessel, who was an +acquaintance of Simon's, and three sailors from the fruiter. + +"Go up, Simon," called the mate, "and find Dr. Gregg or Mr. Goodwin +or anybody that's a friend to Mr. Geddie, and bring 'em here at +once." + +"Saints of the skies!" said Simon, sleepily, "nothing has happened to +Mr. Geddie?" + +"He's under that tarpauling," said the mate, pointing to the boat, +"and he's rather more than half drownded. We seen him from the +steamer nearly a mile out from shore, swimmin' like mad after a +bottle that was floatin' in the water, outward bound. We lowered the +gig and started for him. He nearly had his hand on the bottle, when +he gave out and went under. We pulled him out in time to save him, +maybe; but the doctor is the one to decide that." + +"A bottle?" said the old man, rubbing his eyes. He was not yet fully +awake. "Where is the bottle?" + +"Driftin' along out there some'eres," said the mate, jerking his +thumb toward the sea. "Get on with you, Simon." + + + + +III + +SMITH + + +Goodwin and the ardent patriot, Zavalla, took all the precautions +that their foresight could contrive to prevent the escape of +President Miraflores and his companion. They sent trusted messengers +up the coast to Solitas and Alazan to warn the local leaders of the +flight, and to instruct them to patrol the water line and arrest +the fugitives at all hazards should they reveal themselves in that +territory. After this was done there remained only to cover the +district about Coralio and await the coming of the quarry. The nets +were well spread. The roads were so few, the opportunities for +embarkation so limited, and the two or three probable points of exit +so well guarded that it would be strange indeed if there should slip +through the meshes so much of the country's dignity, romance, and +collateral. The president would, without doubt, move as secretly +as possible, and endeavour to board a vessel by stealth from some +secluded point along the shore. + +On the fourth day after the receipt of Englehart's telegram the +_Karlsefin_, a Norwegian steamer chartered by the New Orleans fruit +trade, anchored off Coralio with three hoarse toots of her siren. The +_Karlsefin_ was not one of the line operated by the Vesuvius Fruit +Company. She was something of a dilettante, doing odd jobs for a +company that was scarcely important enough to figure as a rival to +the Vesuvius. The movements of the _Karlsefin_ were dependent upon +the state of the market. Sometimes she would ply steadily between the +Spanish Main and New Orleans in the regular transport of fruit; next +she would be making erratic trips to Mobile or Charleston, or even +as far north as New York, according to the distribution of the fruit +supply. + +Goodwin lounged upon the beach with the usual crowd of idlers that +had gathered to view the steamer. Now that President Miraflores might +be expected to reach the borders of his abjured country at any time, +the orders were to keep a strict and unrelenting watch. Every vessel +that approached the shores might now be considered a possible means +of escape for the fugitives; and an eye was kept even on the sloops +and dories that belonged to the sea-going contingent of Coralio. +Goodwin and Zavalla moved everywhere, but without ostentation, +watching the loopholes of escape. + +The customs officials crowded importantly into their boat and rowed +out to the _Karlsefin_. A boat from the steamer landed her purser +with his papers, and took out the quarantine doctor with his green +umbrella and clinical thermometer. Next a swarm of Caribs began to +load upon lighters the thousands of bunches of bananas heaped upon +the shore and row them out to the steamer. The _Karlsefin_ had +no passenger list, and was soon done with the attention of the +authorities. The purser declared that the steamer would remain at +anchor until morning, taking on her fruit during the night. The +_Karlsefin_ had come, he said, from New York, to which port her +latest load of oranges and cocoanuts had been conveyed. Two or three +of the freighter sloops were engaged to assist in the work, for the +captain was anxious to make a quick return in order to reap the +advantage offered by a certain dearth of fruit in the States. + +About four o'clock in the afternoon another of those marine monsters, +not very familiar in those waters, hove in sight, following the +fateful _Idalia_--a graceful steam yacht, painted a light buff, +clean-cut as a steel engraving. The beautiful vessel hovered off +shore, see-sawing the waves as lightly as a duck in a rain barrel. +A swift boat manned by a crew in uniform came ashore, and a +stocky-built man leaped to the sands. + +The new-comer seemed to turn a disapproving eye upon the rather +motley congregation of native Anchurians, and made his way at once +toward Goodwin, who was the most conspicuously Anglo-Saxon figure +present. Goodwin greeted him with courtesy. + +Conversation developed that the newly landed one was named Smith, +and that he had come in a yacht. A meagre biography, truly; for the +yacht was most apparent; and the "Smith" not beyond a reasonable +guess before the revelation. Yet to the eye of Goodwin, who had seen +several things, there was a discrepancy between Smith and his yacht. +A bullet-headed man Smith was, with an oblique, dead eye and the +moustache of a cocktail-mixer. And unless he had shifted costumes +before putting off for shore he had affronted the deck of his correct +vessel clad in a pearl-gray derby, a gay plaid suit and vaudeville +neckwear. Men owning pleasure yachts generally harmonize better with +them. + +Smith looked business, but he was no advertiser. He commented upon +the scenery, remarking upon its fidelity to the pictures in the +geography; and then inquired for the United States consul. Goodwin +pointed out the starred-and-striped bunting hanging above the little +consulate, which was concealed behind the orange-trees. + +"Mr. Geddie, the consul, will be sure to be there," said Goodwin. "He +was very nearly drowned a few days ago while taking a swim in the +sea, and the doctor has ordered him to remain indoors for some time." + +Smith plowed his way through the sand to the consulate, his +haberdashery creating violent discord against the smooth tropical +blues and greens. + +Geddie was lounging in his hammock, somewhat pale of face and languid +in pose. On that night when the _Valhalla's_ boat had brought him +ashore apparently drenched to death by the sea, Doctor Gregg and his +other friends had toiled for hours to preserve the little spark of +life that remained to him. The bottle, with its impotent message, was +gone out to sea, and the problem that it had provoked was reduced +to a simple sum in addition--one and one make two, by the rule of +arithmetic; one by the rule of romance. + +There is a quaint old theory that man may have two souls--a +peripheral one which serves ordinarily, and a central one which is +stirred only at certain times, but then with activity and vigour. +While under the domination of the former a man will shave, vote, pay +taxes, give money to his family, buy subscription books and comport +himself on the average plan. But let the central soul suddenly become +dominant, and he may, in the twinkling of an eye, turn upon the +partner of his joys with furious execration; he may change his +politics while you could snap your fingers; he may deal out deadly +insult to his dearest friend; he may get him, instanter, to a +monastery or a dance hall; he may elope, or hang himself--or he may +write a song or poem, or kiss his wife unasked, or give his funds to +the search of a microbe. Then the peripheral soul will return; and we +have our safe, sane citizen again. It is but the revolt of the Ego +against Order; and its effect is to shake up the atoms only that they +may settle where they belong. + +Geddie's revulsion had been a mild one--no more than a swim in a +summer sea after so inglorious an object as a drifting bottle. And +now he was himself again. Upon his desk, ready for the post, was a +letter to his government tendering his resignation as consul, to be +effective as soon as another could be appointed in his place. For +Bernard Brannigan, who never did things in a half-way manner, was to +take Geddie at once for a partner in his very profitable and various +enterprises; and Paula was happily engaged in plans for refurnishing +and decorating the upper story of the Brannigan house. + +The consul rose from his hammock when he saw the conspicuous stranger +in his door. + +"Keep your seat, old man," said the visitor, with an airy wave of his +large hand. "My name's Smith; and I've come in a yacht. You are the +consul--is that right? A big, cool guy on the beach directed me here. +Thought I'd pay my respects to the flag." + +"Sit down," said Geddie. "I've been admiring your craft ever since it +came in sight. Looks like a fast sailer. What's her tonnage?" + +"Search me!" said Smith. "I don't know what she weighs in at. But +she's got a tidy gait. The _Rambler_--that's her name--don't take the +dust of anything afloat. This is my first trip on her. I'm taking a +squint along this coast just to get an idea of the countries where +the rubber and red pepper and revolutions come from. I had no idea +there was so much scenery down here. Why, Central Park ain't in it +with this neck of the woods. I'm from New York. They get monkeys, and +cocoanuts, and parrots down here--is that right?" + +"We have them all," said Geddie. "I'm quite sure that our fauna and +flora would take a prize over Central Park." + +"Maybe they would," admitted Smith, cheerfully. "I haven't seen them +yet. But I guess you've got us skinned on the animal and vegetation +question. You don't have much travel here, do you?" + +"Travel?" queried the consul. "I suppose you mean passengers on the +steamers. No; very few people land in Coralio. An investor now and +then--tourists and sight-seers generally go further down the coast to +one of the larger towns where there is a harbour." + +"I see a ship out there loading up with bananas," said Smith. "Any +passengers come on her?" + +"That's the _Karlsefin_," said the consul. "She's a tramp +fruiter--made her last trip to New York, I believe. No; she brought +no passengers. I saw her boat come ashore, and there was no one. +About the only exciting recreation we have here is watching steamers +when they arrive; and a passenger on one of them generally causes +the whole town to turn out. If you are going to remain in Coralio +a while, Mr. Smith, I'll be glad to take you around to meet some +people. There are four or five American chaps that are good to know, +besides the native high-fliers." + +"Thanks," said the yachtsman, "but I wouldn't put you to the trouble. +I'd like to meet the guys you speak of, but I won't be here long +enough to do much knocking around. That cool gent on the beach spoke +of a doctor; can you tell me where I could find him? The _Rambler_ +ain't quite as steady on her feet as a Broadway hotel; and a fellow +gets a touch of seasickness now and then. Thought I'd strike the +croaker for a handful of the little sugar pills, in case I need 'em." + +"You will be apt to find Dr. Gregg at the hotel," said the consul. +"You can see it from the door--it's that two-story building with the +balcony, where the orange-trees are." + +The Hotel de los Estranjeros was a dreary hostelry, in great disuse +both by strangers and friends. It stood at a corner of the Street of +the Holy Sepulchre. A grove of small orange-trees crowded against one +side of it, enclosed by a low, rock wall over which a tall man might +easily step. The house was of plastered adobe, stained a hundred +shades of colour by the salt breeze and the sun. Upon its upper +balcony opened a central door and two windows containing broad +jalousies instead of sashes. + +The lower floor communicated by two doorways with the narrow, +rock-paved sidewalk. The _pulperia_--or drinking shop--of the +proprietress, Madama Timotea Ortiz, occupied the ground floor. On the +bottles of brandy, _anisada_, Scotch "smoke" and inexpensive wines +behind the little counter the dust lay thick save where the fingers +of infrequent customers had left irregular prints. The upper story +contained four or five guest-rooms which were rarely put to their +destined use. Sometimes a fruit-grower, riding in from his plantation +to confer with his agent, would pass a melancholy night in the dismal +upper story; sometimes a minor native official on some trifling +government quest would have his pomp and majesty awed by Madama's +sepulchral hospitality. But Madama sat behind her bar content, not +desiring to quarrel with Fate. If anyone required meat, drink or +lodging at the Hotel de los Estranjeros they had but to come, and be +served. _Est bueno._ If they came not, why, then, they came not. +_Est bueno._ + +As the exceptional yachtsman was making his way down the precarious +sidewalk of the Street of the Holy Sepulchre, the solitary permanent +guest of that decaying hotel sat at its door, enjoying the breeze +from the sea. + +Dr. Gregg, the quarantine physician, was a man of fifty or sixty, +with a florid face and the longest beard between Topeka and Terra +del Fuego. He held his position by virtue of an appointment by the +Board of Health of a seaport city in one of the Southern states. +That city feared the ancient enemy of every Southern seaport--the +yellow fever--and it was the duty of Dr. Gregg to examine crew and +passengers of every vessel leaving Coralio for preliminary symptoms. +The duties were light, and the salary, for one who lived in Coralio, +ample. Surplus time there was in plenty; and the good doctor added +to his gains by a large private practice among the residents of the +coast. The fact that he did not know ten words of Spanish was no +obstacle; a pulse could be felt and a fee collected without one being +a linguist. Add to the description the facts that the doctor had +a story to tell concerning the operation of trepanning which no +listener had ever allowed him to conclude, and that he believed +in brandy as a prophylactic; and the special points of interest +possessed by Dr. Gregg will have become exhausted. + +The doctor had dragged a chair to the sidewalk. He was coatless, and +he leaned back against the wall and smoked, while he stroked his +beard. Surprise came into his pale blue eyes when he caught sight of +Smith in his unusual and prismatic clothes. + +"You're Dr. Gregg--is that right?" said Smith, feeling the dog's head +pin in his tie. "The constable--I mean the consul, told me you hung +out at this caravansary. My name's Smith; and I came in a yacht. +Taking a cruise around, looking at the monkeys and pineapple-trees. +Come inside and have a drink, Doc. This caf looks on the blink, but +I guess it can set out something wet." + +"I will join you, sir, in just a taste of brandy," said Dr. Gregg, +rising quickly. "I find that as a prophylactic a little brandy is +almost a necessity in this climate." + +As they turned to enter the _pulperia_ a native man, barefoot, +glided noiselessly up and addressed the doctor in Spanish. He was +yellowish-brown, like an over-ripe lemon; he wore a cotton shirt and +ragged linen trousers girded by a leather belt. His face was like an +animal's, live and wary, but without promise of much intelligence. +This man jabbered with animation and so much seriousness that it +seemed a pity that his words were to be wasted. + +Dr. Gregg felt his pulse. + +"You sick?" he inquired. + +"_Mi mujer est enferma en la casa_," said the man, thus endeavouring +to convey the news, in the only language open to him, that his wife +lay ill in her palm-thatched hut. + +The doctor drew a handful of capsules filled with a white powder from +his trousers pocket. He counted out ten of them into the native's +hand, and held up his forefinger impressively. + +"Take one," said the doctor, "every two hours." He then held up two +fingers, shaking them emphatically before the native's face. Next he +pulled out his watch and ran his finger round its dial twice. Again +the two fingers confronted the patient's nose. "Two--two--two hours," +repeated the doctor. + +"_Si, Seor_," said the native, sadly. + +He pulled a cheap silver watch from his own pocket and laid it in +the doctor's hand. "Me bring," said he, struggling painfully with +his scant English, "other watchy to-morrow." Then he departed +downheartedly with his capsules. + +"A very ignorant race of people, sir," said the doctor, as he slipped +the watch into his pocket. "He seems to have mistaken my directions +for taking the physic for the fee. However, it is all right. He owes +me an account, anyway. The chances are that he won't bring the other +watch. You can't depend on anything they promise you. About that +drink, now? How did you come to Coralio, Mr. Smith? I was not aware +that any boats except the _Karlsefin_ had arrived for some days." + +The two leaned against the deserted bar; and Madama set out a bottle +without waiting for the doctor's order. There was no dust on it. + +After they had drank twice Smith said: + +"You say there were no passengers on the _Karlsefin_, Doc? Are you +sure about that? It seems to me I heard somebody down on the beach +say that there was one or two aboard." + +"They were mistaken, sir. I myself went out and put all hands through +a medical examination, as usual. The _Karlsefin_ sails as soon as she +gets her bananas loaded, which will be about daylight in the morning, +and she got everything ready this afternoon. No, sir, there was no +passenger list. Like that Three-Star? A French schooner landed two +slooploads of it a month ago. If any customs duties on it went to the +distinguished republic of Anchuria you may have my hat. If you won't +have another, come out and let's sit in the cool a while. It isn't +often we exiles get a chance to talk with somebody from the outside +world." + +The doctor brought out another chair to the sidewalk for his new +acquaintance. The two seated themselves. + +"You are a man of the world," said Dr. Gregg; "a man of travel and +experience. Your decision in a matter of ethics and, no doubt, on +the points of equity, ability and professional probity should be of +value. I would be glad if you will listen to the history of a case +that I think stands unique in medical annals. + +"About nine years ago, while I was engaged in the practice of +medicine in my native city, I was called to treat a case of contusion +of the skull. I made the diagnosis that a splinter of bone was +pressing upon the brain, and that the surgical operation known as +trepanning was required. However, as the patient was a gentleman of +wealth and position, I called in for consultation Dr.--" + +Smith rose from his chair, and laid a hand, soft with apology, upon +the doctor's shirt sleeve. + +"Say, Doc," he said, solemnly, "I want to hear that story. You've got +me interested; and I don't want to miss the rest of it. I know it's a +loola by the way it begins; and I want to tell it at the next meeting +of the Barney O'Flynn Association, if you don't mind. But I've got +one or two matters to attend to first. If I get 'em attended to +in time I'll come right back and hear you spiel the rest before +bedtime--is that right?" + +"By all means," said the doctor, "get your business attended to, +and then return. I shall wait up for you. You see, one of the most +prominent physicians at the consultation diagnosed the trouble as a +blood clot; another said it was an abscess, but I--" + +"Don't tell me now, Doc. Don't spoil the story. Wait till I come +back. I want to hear it as it runs off the reel--is that right?" + +The mountains reached up their bulky shoulders to receive the level +gallop of Apollo's homing steeds, the day died in the lagoons and +in the shadowed banana groves and in the mangrove swamps, where the +great blue crabs were beginning to crawl to land for their nightly +ramble. And it died, at last, upon the highest peaks. Then the brief +twilight, ephemeral as the flight of a moth, came and went; the +Southern Cross peeped with its topmost eye above a row of palms, +and the fire-flies heralded with their torches the approach of +soft-footed night. + +In the offing the _Karlsefin_ swayed at anchor, her lights seeming +to penetrate the water to countless fathoms with their shimmering, +lanceolate reflections. The Caribs were busy loading her by means of +the great lighters heaped full from the piles of fruit ranged upon +the shore. + +On the sandy beach, with his back against a cocoanut-tree and the +stubs of many cigars lying around him, Smith sat waiting, never +relaxing his sharp gaze in the direction of the steamer. + +The incongruous yachtsman had concentrated his interest upon the +innocent fruiter. Twice had he been assured that no passengers had +come to Coralio on board of her. And yet, with a persistence not to +be attributed to an idling voyager, he had appealed the case to the +higher court of his own eyesight. Surprisingly like some gay-coated +lizard, he crouched at the foot of the cocoanut palm, and with the +beady, shifting eyes of the selfsame reptile, sustained his espionage +on the _Karlsefin_. + +On the white sands a whiter gig belonging to the yacht was drawn up, +guarded by one of the white-ducked crew. Not far away in a _pulperia_ +on the shore-following Calle Grande three other sailors swaggered +with their cues around Coralio's solitary billiard-table. The boat +lay there as if under orders to be ready for use at any moment. There +was in the atmosphere a hint of expectation, of waiting for something +to occur, which was foreign to the air of Coralio. + +Like some passing bird of brilliant plumage, Smith alights on this +palmy shore but to preen his wings for an instant and then to fly +away upon silent pinions. When morning dawned there was no Smith, no +waiting gig, no yacht in the offing. Smith left no intimation of his +mission there, no footprints to show where he had followed the trail +of his mystery on the sands of Coralio that night. He came; he spake +his strange jargon of the asphalt and the cafs; he sat under the +cocoanut-tree, and vanished. The next morning Coralio, Smithless, +ate its fried plantain and said: "The man of pictured clothing went +himself away." With the _siesta_ the incident passed, yawning, into +history. + +So, for a time, must Smith pass behind the scenes of the play. He +comes no more to Coralio nor to Doctor Gregg, who sits in vain, +wagging his redundant beard, waiting to enrich his derelict audience +with his moving tale of trepanning and jealousy. + +But prosperously to the lucidity of these loose pages, Smith shall +flutter among them again. In the nick of time he shall come to tell +us why he strewed so many anxious cigar stumps around the cocoanut +palm that night. This he must do; for, when he sailed away before +the dawn in his yacht _Rambler_, he carried with him the answer to a +riddle so big and preposterous that few in Anchuria had ventured even +to propound it. + + + + +IV + +CAUGHT + + +The plans for the detention of the flying President Miraflores +and his companion at the coast line seemed hardly likely to fail. +Dr. Zavalla himself had gone to the port of Alazan to establish a +guard at that point. At Solitas the Liberal patriot Varras could be +depended upon to keep close watch. Goodwin held himself responsible +for the district about Coralio. + +The news of the president's flight had been disclosed to no one in +the coast towns save trusted members of the ambitious political party +that was desirous of succeeding to power. The telegraph wire running +from San Mateo to the coast had been cut far up on the mountain trail +by an emissary of Zavalla's. Long before this could be repaired and +word received along it from the capital the fugitives would have +reached the coast and the question of escape or capture been solved. + +Goodwin had stationed armed sentinels at frequent intervals along the +shore for a mile in each direction from Coralio. They were instructed +to keep a vigilant lookout during the night to prevent Miraflores +from attempting to embark stealthily by means of some boat or sloop +found by chance at the water's edge. A dozen patrols walked the +streets of Coralio unsuspected, ready to intercept the truant +official should he show himself there. + +Goodwin was very well convinced that no precautions had been +overlooked. He strolled about the streets that bore such +high-sounding names and were but narrow, grass-covered lanes, lending +his own aid to the vigil that had been intrusted to him by Bob +Englehart. + +The town had begun the tepid round of its nightly diversions. A few +leisurely dandies, clad in white duck, with flowing neckties, and +swinging slim bamboo canes, threaded the grassy by-ways toward the +houses of their favoured seoritas. Those who wooed the art of music +dragged tirelessly at whining concertinas, or fingered lugubrious +guitars at doors and windows. An occasional soldier from the +_cuartel_, with flapping straw hat, without coat or shoes, hurried +by, balancing his long gun like a lance in one hand. From every +density of the foliage the giant tree frogs sounded their loud and +irritating clatter. Further out, where the by-ways perished at the +brink of the jungle, the guttural cries of marauding baboons and the +coughing of the alligators in the black estuaries fractured the vain +silence of the wood. + +By ten o'clock the streets were deserted. The oil lamps that had +burned, a sickly yellow, at random corners, had been extinguished +by some economical civic agent. Coralio lay sleeping calmly between +toppling mountains and encroaching sea like a stolen babe in the arms +of its abductors. Somewhere over in that tropical darkness--perhaps +already threading the profundities of the alluvial lowlands--the high +adventurer and his mate were moving toward land's end. The game of +Fox-in-the-Morning should be coming soon to its close. + +Goodwin, at his deliberate gait, passed the long, low _cuartel_ where +Coralio's contingent of Anchuria's military force slumbered, with its +bare toes pointed heavenward. There was a law that no civilian might +come so near the headquarters of that citadel of war after nine +o'clock, but Goodwin was always forgetting the minor statutes. + +"_Quin vive?_" shrieked the sentinel, wrestling prodigiously with +his lengthy musket. + +"_Americano_," growled Goodwin, without turning his head, and passed +on, unhalted. + +To the right he turned, and to the left up the street that ultimately +reached the Plaza Nacional. When within the toss of a cigar stump +from the intersecting Street of the Holy Sepulchre, he stopped +suddenly in the pathway. + +He saw the form of a tall man, clothed in black and carrying a large +valise, hurry down the cross-street in the direction of the beach. +And Goodwin's second glance made him aware of a woman at the man's +elbow on the farther side, who seemed to urge forward, if not even to +assist, her companion in their swift but silent progress. They were +no Coralians, those two. + +Goodwin followed at increased speed, but without any of the artful +tactics that are so dear to the heart of the sleuth. The American was +too broad to feel the instinct of the detective. He stood as an agent +for the people of Anchuria, and but for political reasons he would +have demanded then and there the money. It was the design of his +party to secure the imperilled fund, to restore it to the treasury +of the country, and to declare itself in power without bloodshed or +resistance. + +The couple halted at the door of the Hotel de los Estranjeros, and +the man struck upon the wood with the impatience of one unused to his +entry being stayed. Madama was long in response; but after a time her +light showed, the door was opened, and the guests housed. + +Goodwin stood in the quiet street, lighting another cigar. In +two minutes a faint gleam began to show between the slats of the +jalousies in the upper story of the hotel. "They have engaged rooms," +said Goodwin to himself. "So, then, their arrangements for sailing +have yet to be made." + +At that moment there came along one Estebn Delgado, a barber, an +enemy to existing government, a jovial plotter against stagnation +in any form. This barber was one of Coralio's saddest dogs, often +remaining out of doors as late as eleven, post meridian. He was a +partisan Liberal; and he greeted Goodwin with flatulent importance as +a brother in the cause. But he had something important to tell. + +"What think you, Don Frank!" he cried, in the universal tone of the +conspirator. "I have to-night shaved _la barba_--what you call the +'weeskers' of the _Presidente_ himself, of this countree! Consider! +He sent for me to come. In the poor _casita_ of an old woman he +awaited me--in a verree leetle house in a dark place. _Carramba!_--el +Seor Presidente to make himself thus secret and obscured! I think he +desired not to be known--but, _carajo!_ can you shave a man and not +see his face? This gold piece he gave me, and said it was to be all +quite still. I think, Don Frank, there is what you call a chip over +the bug." + +"Have you ever seen President Miraflores before?" asked Goodwin. + +"But once," answered Estebn. "He is tall; and he had weeskers, +verree black and sufficient." + +"Was anyone else present when you shaved him?" + +"An old Indian woman, Seor, that belonged with the _casa_, and one +seorita--a ladee of so much beautee!--_ah, Dios!_" + +"All right, Estebn," said Goodwin. "It's very lucky that +you happened along with your tonsorial information. The new +administration will be likely to remember you for this." + +Then in a few words he made the barber acquainted with the crisis +into which the affairs of the nation had culminated, and instructed +him to remain outside, keeping watch upon the two sides of the hotel +that looked upon the street, and observing whether anyone should +attempt to leave the house by any door or window. Goodwin himself +went to the door through which the guests had entered, opened it and +stepped inside. + +Madama had returned downstairs from her journey above to see after +the comfort of her lodgers. Her candle stood upon the bar. She was +about to take a thimbleful of rum as a solace for having her rest +disturbed. She looked up without surprise or alarm as her third +caller entered. + +"Ah! it is the Seor Goodwin. Not often does he honour my poor house +by his presence." + +"I must come oftener," said Goodwin, with the Goodwin smile. "I hear +that your cognac is the best between Belize to the north and Rio to +the south. Set out the bottle, Madama, and let us have the proof in +_un vasito_ for each of us." + +"My _aguardiente_," said Madama, with pride, "is the best. It grows, +in beautiful bottles, in the dark places among the banana-trees. _Si, +Seor._ Only at midnight can they be picked by sailor-men who bring +them, before daylight comes, to your back door. Good _aguardiente_ is +a verree difficult fruit to handle, Seor Goodwin." + +Smuggling, in Coralio, was much nearer than competition to being the +life of trade. One spoke of it slyly, yet with a certain conceit, +when it had been well accomplished. + +"You have guests in the house to-night," said Goodwin, laying a +silver dollar upon the counter. + +"Why not?" said Madama, counting the change. "Two; but the smallest +while finished to arrive. One seor, not quite old, and one seorita +of sufficient handsomeness. To their rooms they have ascended, not +desiring the to-eat nor the to-drink. Two rooms--_Numero_ 9 and +_Numero_ 10." + +"I was expecting that gentleman and that lady," said Goodwin. "I have +important _negocios_ that must be transacted. Will you allow me to +see them?" + +"Why not?" sighed Madama, placidly. "Why should not Seor Goodwin +ascend and speak to his friends? _Est bueno._ Room _Numero_ 9 and +room _Numero_ 10." + +Goodwin loosened in his coat pocket the American revolver that he +carried, and ascended the steep, dark stairway. + +In the hallway above, the saffron light from a hanging lamp allowed +him to select the gaudy numbers on the doors. He turned the knob of +Number 9, entered and closed the door behind him. + +If that was Isabel Guilbert seated by the table in that poorly +furnished room, report had failed to do her charms justice. She +rested her head upon one hand. Extreme fatigue was signified in every +line of her figure; and upon her countenance a deep perplexity was +written. Her eyes were gray-irised, and of that mould that seems to +have belonged to the orbs of all the famous queens of hearts. Their +whites were singularly clear and brilliant, concealed above the +irises by heavy horizontal lids, and showing a snowy line below them. +Such eyes denote great nobility, vigour, and, if you can conceive of +it, a most generous selfishness. She looked up when the American +entered with an expression of surprised inquiry, but without alarm. + +Goodwin took off his hat and seated himself, with his characteristic +deliberate ease, upon a corner of the table. He held a lighted cigar +between his fingers. He took this familiar course because he was sure +that preliminaries would be wasted upon Miss Guilbert. He knew her +history, and the small part that the conventions had played in it. + +"Good evening," he said. "Now, madame, let us come to business at +once. You will observe that I mention no names, but I know who is in +the next room, and what he carries in that valise. That is the point +which brings me here. I have come to dictate terms of surrender." + +The lady neither moved nor replied, but steadily regarded the cigar +in Goodwin's hand. + +"We," continued the dictator, thoughtfully regarding the neat +buckskin shoe on his gently swinging foot--"I speak for a +considerable majority of the people--demand the return of the stolen +funds belonging to them. Our terms go very little further than that. +They are very simple. As an accredited spokesman, I promise that our +interference will cease if they are accepted. Give up the money, and +you and your companion will be permitted to proceed wherever you +will. In fact, assistance will be given you in the matter of securing +a passage by any outgoing vessel you may choose. It is on my personal +responsibility that I add congratulations to the gentleman in Number +10 upon his taste in feminine charms." + +Returning his cigar to his mouth, Goodwin observed her, and saw that +her eyes followed it and rested upon it with icy and significant +concentration. Apparently she had not heard a word he had said. He +understood, tossed the cigar out the window, and, with an amused +laugh, slid from the table to his feet. + +"That is better," said the lady. "It makes it possible for me to +listen to you. For a second lesson in good manners, you might now +tell me by whom I am being insulted." + +"I am sorry," said Goodwin, leaning one hand on the table, "that my +time is too brief for devoting much of it to a course of etiquette. +Come, now; I appeal to your good sense. You have shown yourself, +in more than one instance, to be well aware of what is to your +advantage. This is an occasion that demands the exercise of your +undoubted intelligence. There is no mystery here. I am Frank Goodwin; +and I have come for the money. I entered this room at a venture. Had +I entered the other I would have had it before now. Do you want it in +words? The gentleman in Number 10 has betrayed a great trust. He has +robbed his people of a large sum, and it is I who will prevent their +losing it. I do not say who that gentleman is; but if I should be +forced to see him and he should prove to be a certain high official +of the republic, it will be my duty to arrest him. The house is +guarded. I am offering you liberal terms. It is not absolutely +necessary that I confer personally with the gentleman in the next +room. Bring me the valise containing the money, and we will call the +affair ended." + +The lady arose from her chair and stood for a moment, thinking +deeply. + +"Do you live here, Mr. Goodwin?" she asked, presently. + +"Yes." + +"What is your authority for this intrusion?" + +"I am an instrument of the republic. I was advised by wire of the +movements of the--gentleman in Number 10." + +"May I ask you two or three questions? I believe you to be a man more +apt to be truthful than--timid. What sort of a town is this--Coralio, +I think they call it?" + +"Not much of a town," said Goodwin, smiling. "A banana town, as they +run. Grass huts, 'dobes, five or six two-story houses, accommodations +limited, population half-breed Spanish and Indian, Caribs and +blackamoors. No sidewalks to speak of, no amusements. Rather unmoral. +That's an offhand sketch, of course." + +"Are there any inducements, say in a social or in a business way, for +people to reside here?" + +"Oh, yes," answered Goodwin, smiling broadly. "There are no afternoon +teas, no hand-organs, no department stores--and there is no +extradition treaty." + +"He told me," went on the lady, speaking as if to herself, and with +a slight frown, "that there were towns on this coast of beauty and +importance; that there was a pleasing social order--especially an +American colony of cultured residents." + +"There is an American colony," said Goodwin, gazing at her in some +wonder. "Some of the members are all right. Some are fugitives +from justice from the States. I recall two exiled bank presidents, +one army paymaster under a cloud, a couple of manslayers, and a +widow--arsenic, I believe, was the suspicion in her case. I myself +complete the colony, but, as yet, I have not distinguished myself by +any particular crime." + +"Do not lose hope," said the lady, dryly; "I see nothing in your +actions to-night to guarantee you further obscurity. Some mistake +has been made; I do not know just where. But _him_ you shall not +disturb to-night. The journey has fatigued him so that he has fallen +asleep, I think, in his clothes. You talk of stolen money! I do not +understand you. Some mistake has been made. I will convince you. +Remain where you are and I will bring you the valise that you seem to +covet so, and show it to you." + +She moved toward the closed door that connected the two rooms, but +stopped, and half turned and bestowed upon Goodwin a grave, searching +look that ended in a quizzical smile. + +"You force my door," she said, "and you follow your ruffianly +behaviour with the basest accusations; and yet"--she hesitated, as if +to reconsider what she was about to say--"and yet--it is a puzzling +thing--I am sure there has been some mistake." + +She took a step toward the door, but Goodwin stayed her by a light +touch upon her arm. I have said before that women turned to look at +him in the streets. He was the viking sort of man, big, good-looking, +and with an air of kindly truculence. She was dark and proud, glowing +or pale as her mood moved her. I do not know if Eve were light or +dark, but if such a woman had stood in the garden I know that the +apple would have been eaten. This woman was to be Goodwin's fate, +and he did not know it; but he must have felt the first throes of +destiny, for, as he faced her, the knowledge of what report named her +turned bitter in his throat. + +"If there has been any mistake," he said, hotly, "it was yours. I do +not blame the man who has lost his country, his honour, and is about +to lose the poor consolation of his stolen riches as much as I blame +you, for, by Heaven! I can very well see how he was brought to it. +I can understand, and pity him. It is such women as you that strew +this degraded coast with wretched exiles, that make men forget their +trusts, that drag--" + +The lady interrupted him with a weary gesture. + +"There is no need to continue your insults," she said, coldly. +"I do not understand what you are saying, nor do I know what mad +blunder you are making; but if the inspection of the contents of +a gentleman's portmanteau will rid me of you, let us delay it no +longer." + +She passed quickly and noiselessly into the other room, and returned +with the heavy leather valise, which she handed to the American with +an air of patient contempt. + +Goodwin set the valise quickly upon the table and began to unfasten +the straps. The lady stood by, with an expression of infinite scorn +and weariness upon her face. + +The valise opened wide to a powerful, sidelong wrench. Goodwin +dragged out two or three articles of clothing, exposing the bulk of +its contents--package after package of tightly packed United States +bank and treasury notes of large denomination. Reckoning from the +high figures written upon the paper bands that bound them, the total +must have come closely upon the hundred thousand mark. + +Goodwin glanced swiftly at the woman, and saw, with surprise and a +thrill of pleasure that he wondered at, that she had experienced +an unmistakable shock. Her eyes grew wide, she gasped, and leaned +heavily against the table. She had been ignorant, then, he inferred, +that her companion had looted the government treasury. But why, he +angrily asked himself, should he be so well pleased to think this +wandering and unscrupulous singer not so black as report had painted +her? + +A noise in the other room startled them both. The door swung open, +and a tall, elderly, dark complexioned man, recently shaven, hurried +into the room. + +All the pictures of President Miraflores represent him as the +possessor of a luxuriant supply of dark and carefully tended +whiskers; but the story of the barber, Estebn, had prepared Goodwin +for the change. + +The man stumbled in from the dark room, his eyes blinking at the +lamplight, and heavy from sleep. + +"What does this mean?" he demanded in excellent English, with a keen +and perturbed look at the American--"robbery?" + +"Very near it," answered Goodwin. "But I rather think I'm in time to +prevent it. I represent the people to whom this money belongs, and +I have come to convey it back to them." He thrust his hand into a +pocket of his loose, linen coat. + +The other man's hand went quickly behind him. + +"Don't draw," called Goodwin, sharply; "I've got you covered from my +pocket." + +The lady stepped forward, and laid one hand upon the shoulder of +her hesitating companion. She pointed to the table. "Tell me the +truth--the truth," she said, in a low voice. "Whose money is that?" + +The man did not answer. He gave a deep, long-drawn sigh, leaned and +kissed her on the forehead, stepped back into the other room and +closed the door. + +Goodwin foresaw his purpose, and jumped for the door, but the report +of the pistol echoed as his hand touched the knob. A heavy fall +followed, and some one swept him aside and struggled into the room of +the fallen man. + +A desolation, thought Goodwin, greater than that derived from +the loss of cavalier and gold must have been in the heart of the +enchantress to have wrung from her, in that moment, the cry of one +turning to the all-forgiving, all-comforting earthly consoler--to +have made her call out from that bloody and dishonoured room--"Oh, +mother, mother, mother!" + +But there was an alarm outside. The barber, Estebn, at the sound +of the shot, had raised his voice; and the shot itself had aroused +half the town. A pattering of feet came up the street, and official +orders rang out on the still air. Goodwin had a duty to perform. +Circumstances had made him the custodian of his adopted country's +treasure. Swiftly cramming the money into the valise, he closed it, +leaned far out of the window and dropped it into a thick orange-tree +in the little inclosure below. + + + +They will tell you in Coralio, as they delight in telling the +stranger, of the conclusion of that tragic flight. They will tell +you how the upholders of the law came apace when the alarm was +sounded--the _Comandante_ in red slippers and a jacket like a head +waiter's and girded sword, the soldiers with their interminable guns, +followed by outnumbering officers struggling into their gold lace and +epaulettes; the barefooted policemen (the only capables in the lot), +and ruffled citizens of every hue and description. + +They say that the countenance of the dead man was marred sadly by the +effects of the shot; but he was identified as the fallen president +by both Goodwin and the barber Estebn. On the next morning messages +began to come over the mended telegraph wire; and the story of the +flight from the capital was given out to the public. In San Mateo the +revolutionary party had seized the sceptre of government, without +opposition, and the _vivas_ of the mercurial populace quickly effaced +the interest belonging to the unfortunate Miraflores. + +They will relate to you how the new government sifted the towns and +raked the roads to find the valise containing Anchuria's surplus +capital, which the president was known to have carried with him, but +all in vain. In Coralio Seor Goodwin himself led the searching party +which combed that town as carefully as a woman combs her hair; but +the money was not found. + +So they buried the dead man, without honours, back of the town near +the little bridge that spans the mangrove swamp; and for a _real_ a +boy will show you his grave. They say that the old woman in whose hut +the barber shaved the president placed the wooden slab at his head, +and burned the inscription upon it with a hot iron. + +You will hear also that Seor Goodwin, like a tower of strength, +shielded Doa Isabel Guilbert through those subsequent distressful +days; and that his scruples as to her past career (if he had any) +vanished; and her adventuresome waywardness (if she had any) left +her, and they were wedded and were happy. + +The American built a home on a little foothill near the town. It is a +conglomerate structure of native woods that, exported, would be worth +a fortune, and of brick, palm, glass, bamboo and adobe. There is a +paradise of nature about it; and something of the same sort within. +The natives speak of its interior with hands uplifted in admiration. +There are floors polished like mirrors and covered with hand-woven +Indian rugs of silk fibre, tall ornaments and pictures, musical +instruments and papered walls--"figure-it-to-yourself!" they exclaim. + +But they cannot tell you in Coralio (as you shall learn) what became +of the money that Frank Goodwin dropped into the orange-tree. But +that shall come later; for the palms are fluttering in the breeze, +bidding us to sport and gaiety. + + + + +V + +CUPID'S EXILE NUMBER TWO + + +The United States of America, after looking over its stock of +consular timber, selected Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood, of +Dalesburg, Alabama, for a successor to Willard Geddie, resigned. + +Without prejudice to Mr. Atwood, it will have to be acknowledged +that, in this instance, it was the man who sought the office. As with +the self-banished Geddie, it was nothing less than the artful smiles +of lovely woman that had driven Johnny Atwood to the desperate +expedient of accepting office under a despised Federal Government so +that he might go far, far away and never see again the false, fair +face that had wrecked his young life. The consulship at Coralio +seemed to offer a retreat sufficiently removed and romantic enough +to inject the necessary drama into the pastoral scenes of Dalesburg +life. + +It was while playing the part of Cupid's exile that Johnny added his +handiwork to the long list of casualties along the Spanish Main by +his famous manipulation of the shoe market, and his unparalleled feat +of elevating the most despised and useless weed in his own country +from obscurity to be a valuable product in international commerce. + +The trouble began, as trouble often begins instead of ending, with a +romance. In Dalesburg there was a man named Elijah Hemstetter, who +kept a general store. His family consisted of one daughter called +Rosine, a name that atoned much for "Hemstetter." This young woman +was possessed of plentiful attractions, so that the young men of the +community were agitated in their bosoms. Among the more agitated +was Johnny, the son of Judge Atwood, who lived in the big colonial +mansion on the edge of Dalesburg. + +It would seem that the desirable Rosine should have been pleased to +return the affection of an Atwood, a name honoured all over the state +long before and since the war. It does seem that she should have +gladly consented to have been led into that stately but rather empty +colonial mansion. But not so. There was a cloud on the horizon, a +threatening, cumulus cloud, in the shape of a lively and shrewd young +farmer in the neighbourhood who dared to enter the lists as a rival +to the high-born Atwood. + +One night Johnny propounded to Rosine a question that is considered +of much importance by the young of the human species. The accessories +were all there--moonlight, oleanders, magnolias, the mock-bird's +song. Whether or no the shadow of Pinkney Dawson, the prosperous +young farmer, came between them on that occasion is not known; but +Rosine's answer was unfavourable. Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood +bowed till his hat touched the lawn grass, and went away with his +head high, but with a sore wound in his pedigree and heart. A +Hemstetter refuse an Atwood! Zounds! + +Among other accidents of that year was a Democratic president. Judge +Atwood was a warhorse of Democracy. Johnny persuaded him to set the +wheels moving for some foreign appointment. He would go away--away. +Perhaps in years to come Rosine would think how true, how faithful +his love had been, and would drop a tear--maybe in the cream she +would be skimming for Pink Dawson's breakfast. + +The wheels of politics revolved; and Johnny was appointed consul to +Coralio. Just before leaving he dropped in at Hemstetter's to say +good-bye. There was a queer, pinkish look about Rosine's eyes; and +had the two been alone, the United States might have had to cast +about for another consul. But Pink Dawson was there, of course, +talking about his 400-acre orchard, and the three-mile alfalfa tract, +and the 200-acre pasture. So Johnny shook hands with Rosine as coolly +as if he were only going to run up to Montgomery for a couple of +days. They had the royal manner when they chose, those Atwoods. + +"If you happen to strike anything in the way of a good investment +down there, Johnny," said Pink Dawson, "just let me know, will you? I +reckon I could lay my hands on a few extra thousands 'most any time +for a profitable deal." + +"Certainly, Pink," said Johnny, pleasantly. "If I strike anything of +the sort I'll let you in with pleasure." + +So Johnny went down to Mobile and took a fruit steamer for the coast +of Anchuria. + +When the new consul arrived in Coralio the strangeness of the scenes +diverted him much. He was only twenty-two; and the grief of youth is +not worn like a garment as it is by older men. It has its seasons +when it reigns; and then it is unseated for a time by the assertion +of the keen senses. + +Billy Keogh and Johnny seemed to conceive a mutual friendship at +once. Keogh took the new consul about town and presented him to the +handful of Americans and the smaller number of French and Germans +who made up the "foreign" contingent. And then, of course, he had to +be more formally introduced to the native officials, and have his +credentials transmitted through an interpreter. + +There was something about the young Southerner that the sophisticated +Keogh liked. His manner was simple almost to boyishness; but he +possessed the cool carelessness of a man of far greater age and +experience. Neither uniforms nor titles, red tape nor foreign +languages, mountains nor sea weighed upon his spirits. He was heir +to all the ages, an Atwood, of Dalesburg; and you might know every +thought conceived in his bosom. + +Geddie came down to the consulate to explain the duties and workings +of the office. He and Keogh tried to interest the new consul in their +description of the work that his government expected him to perform. + +"It's all right," said Johnny from the hammock that he had set up as +the official reclining place. "If anything turns up that has to be +done I'll let you fellows do it. You can't expect a Democrat to work +during his first term of holding office." + +"You might look over these headings," suggested Geddie, "of the +different lines of exports you will have to keep account of. The +fruit is classified; and there are the valuable woods, coffee, +rubber--" + +"That last account sounds all right," interrupted Mr. Atwood. "Sounds +as if it could be stretched. I want to buy a new flag, a monkey, a +guitar and a barrel of pineapples. Will that rubber account stretch +over 'em?" + +"That's merely statistics," said Geddie, smiling. "The expense +account is what you want. It is supposed to have a slight elasticity. +The 'stationery' items are sometimes carelessly audited by the State +Department." + +"We're wasting our time," said Keogh. "This man was born to hold +office. He penetrates to the root of the art at one step of his eagle +eye. The true genius of government shows its hand in every word of +his speech." + +"I didn't take this job with any intention of working," explained +Johnny, lazily. "I wanted to go somewhere in the world where they +didn't talk about farms. There are none here, are there?" + +"Not the kind you are acquainted with," answered the ex-consul. +"There is no such art here as agriculture. There never was a plow or +a reaper within the boundaries of Anchuria." + +"This is the country for me," murmured the consul, and immediately he +fell asleep. + +The cheerful tintypist pursued his intimacy with Johnny in spite +of open charges that he did so to obtain a premption on a seat in +that coveted spot, the rear gallery of the consulate. But whether +his designs were selfish or purely friendly, Keogh achieved that +desirable privilege. Few were the nights on which the two could not +be found reposing there in the sea breeze, with their heels on the +railing, and the cigars and brandy conveniently near. + +One evening they sat thus, mainly silent, for their talk had dwindled +before the stilling influence of an unusual night. + +There was a great, full moon; and the sea was mother-of-pearl. Almost +every sound was hushed, for the air was but faintly stirring; and +the town lay panting, waiting for the night to cool. Offshore lay +the fruit steamer _Andador_, of the Vesuvius line, full-laden and +scheduled to sail at six in the morning. There were no loiterers on +the beach. So bright was the moonlight that the two men could see the +small pebbles shining on the beach where the gentle surf wetted them. + +Then down the coast, tacking close to shore, slowly swam a little +sloop, white-winged like some snowy sea fowl. Its course lay within +twenty points of the wind's eye; so it veered in and out again in +long, slow strokes like the movements of a graceful skater. + +Again the tactics of its crew brought it close in shore, this time +nearly opposite the consulate; and then there blew from the sloop +clear and surprising notes as if from a horn of elfland. A fairy +bugle it might have been, sweet and silvery and unexpected, playing +with spirit the familiar air of "Home, Sweet Home." + +It was a scene set for the land of the lotus. The authority of the +sea and the tropics, the mystery that attends unknown sails, and the +prestige of drifting music on moonlit waters gave it an anodynous +charm. Johnny Atwood felt it, and thought of Dalesburg; but as soon +as Keogh's mind had arrived at a theory concerning the peripatetic +solo he sprang to the railing, and his ear-rending yawp fractured the +silence of Coralio like a cannon shot. + +"Mel-lin-ger a-hoy!" + +The sloop was now on its outward tack; but from it came a clear, +answering hail: + +"Good-bye, Billy . . . go-ing home--bye!" + +The _Andador_ was the sloop's destination. No doubt some passenger +with a sailing permit from some up-the-coast point had come down in +this sloop to catch the regular fruit steamer on its return trip. +Like a coquettish pigeon the little boat tacked on its eccentric way +until at last its white sail was lost to sight against the larger +bulk of the fruiter's side. + +"That's old H. P. Mellinger," explained Keogh, dropping back into his +chair. "He's going back to New York. He was private secretary of the +late hot-foot president of this grocery and fruit stand that they +call a country. His job's over now; and I guess old Mellinger is +glad." + +"Why does he disappear to music, like Zo-zo, the magic queen?" asked +Johnny. "Just to show 'em that he doesn't care?" + +"That noise you heard is a phonograph," said Keogh. "I sold him that. +Mellinger had a graft in this country that was the only thing of its +kind in the world. The tooting machine saved it for him once, and he +always carried it around with him afterward." + +"Tell me about it," demanded Johnny, betraying interest. + +"I'm no disseminator of narratives," said Keogh. "I can use language +for purposes of speech; but when I attempt a discourse the words +come out as they will, and they may make sense when they strike the +atmosphere, or they may not." + +"I want to hear about that graft," persisted Johnny. "You've got +no right to refuse. I've told you all about every man, woman and +hitching post in Dalesburg." + +"You shall hear it," said Keogh. "I said my instincts of narrative +were perplexed. Don't you believe it. It's an art I've acquired along +with many other of the graces and sciences." + + + + +VI + +THE PHONOGRAPH AND THE GRAFT + + +"What was this graft?" asked Johnny, with the impatience of the great +public to whom tales are told. + +"'Tis contrary to art and philosophy to give you the information," +said Keogh, calmly. "The art of narrative consists in concealing from +your audience everything it wants to know until after you expose your +favourite opinions on topics foreign to the subject. A good story is +like a bitter pill with the sugar coating inside of it. I will begin, +if you please, with a horoscope located in the Cherokee Nation; and +end with a moral tune on the phonograph. + +"Me and Henry Horsecollar brought the first phonograph to this +country. Henry was a quarter-breed, quarter-back Cherokee, educated +East in the idioms of football, and West in contraband whisky, and +a gentleman, the same as you and me. He was easy and romping in his +ways; a man about six foot, with a kind of rubber-tire movement. Yes, +he was a little man about five foot five, or five foot eleven. He was +what you would call a medium tall man of average smallness. Henry had +quit college once, and the Muscogee jail three times--the last-named +institution on account of introducing and selling whisky in the +territories. Henry Horsecollar never let any cigar stores come up and +stand behind him. He didn't belong to that tribe of Indians. + +"Henry and me met at Texarkana, and figured out this phonograph +scheme. He had $360 which came to him out of a land allotment in +the reservation. I had run down from Little Rock on account of a +distressful scene I had witnessed on the street there. A man stood on +a box and passed around some gold watches, screw case, stem-winders, +Elgin movement, very elegant. Twenty bucks they cost you over the +counter. At three dollars the crowd fought for the tickers. The man +happened to find a valise full of them handy, and he passed them out +like putting hot biscuits on a plate. The backs were hard to unscrew, +but the crowd put its ear to the case, and they ticked mollifying and +agreeable. Three of these watches were genuine tickers; the rest were +only kickers. Hey? Why, empty cases with one of them horny black bugs +that fly around electric lights in 'em. Them bugs kick off minutes +and seconds industrious and beautiful. So, this man I was speaking +of cleaned up $288; and then he went away, because he knew that when +it came time to wind watches in Little Rock an entomologist would be +needed, and he wasn't one. + +"So, as I say, Henry had $360, and I had $288. The idea of +introducing the phonograph to South America was Henry's; but I took +to it freely, being fond of machinery of all kinds. + +"'The Latin races,' says Henry, explaining easy in the idioms he +learned at college, 'are peculiarly adapted to be victims of the +phonograph. They have the artistic temperament. They yearn for music +and color and gaiety. They give wampum to the hand-organ man and the +four-legged chicken in the tent when they're months behind with the +grocery and the bread-fruit tree.' + +"'Then,' says I, 'we'll export canned music to the Latins; but I'm +mindful of Mr. Julius Csar's account of 'em where he says: "_Omnia +Gallia in tres partes divisa est_;" which is the same as to say, "We +will need all of our gall in devising means to tree them parties."' + +"I hated to make a show of education; but I was disinclined to be +overdone in syntax by a mere Indian, a member of a race to which we +owe nothing except the land on which the United States is situated. + +"We bought a fine phonograph in Texarkana--one of the best make--and +half a trunkful of records. We packed up, and took the T. and +P. for New Orleans. From that celebrated centre of molasses and +disfranchised coon songs we took a steamer for South America. + +"We landed at Solitas, forty miles up the coast from here. 'Twas a +palatable enough place to look at. The houses were clean and white; +and to look at 'em stuck around among the scenery they reminded +you of hard-boiled eggs served with lettuce. There was a block of +skyscraper mountains in the suburbs; and they kept pretty quiet, like +they had crept up there and were watching the town. And the sea was +remarking 'Sh-sh-sh' on the beach; and now and then a ripe cocoanut +would drop kerblip in the sand; and that was all there was doing. +Yes, I judge that town was considerably on the quiet. I judge that +after Gabriel quits blowing his horn, and the car starts, with +Philadelphia swinging to the last strap, and Pine Gully, Arkansas, +hanging onto the rear step, this town of Solitas will wake up and ask +if anybody spoke. + +"The captain went ashore with us, and offered to conduct what he +seemed to like to call the obsequies. He introduced Henry and me to +the United States Consul, and a roan man, the head of the Department +of Mercenary and Licentious Dispositions, the way it read upon his +sign. + +"'I touch here again a week from to-day,' says the captain. + +"'By that time,' we told him, 'we'll be amassing wealth in the +interior towns with our galvanized prima donna and correct imitations +of Sousa's band excavating a march from a tin mine.' + +"'Ye'll not,' says the captain. 'Ye'll be hypnotized. Any gentleman +in the audience who kindly steps upon the stage and looks this +country in the eye will be converted to the hypothesis that he's but +a fly in the Elgin creamery. Ye'll be standing knee deep in the surf +waiting for me, and your machine for making Hamburger steak out of +the hitherto respected art of music will be playing "There's no place +like home."' + +"Henry skinned a twenty off his roll, and received from the Bureau +of Mercenary Dispositions a paper bearing a red seal and a dialect +story, and no change. + +"Then we got the consul full of red wine, and struck him for a +horoscope. He was a thin, youngish kind of man, I should say past +fifty, sort of French-Irish in his affections, and puffed up with +disconsolation. Yes, he was a flattened kind of a man, in whom drink +lay stagnant, inclined to corpulence and misery. Yes, I think he was +a kind of Dutchman, being very sad and genial in his ways. + +"'The marvelous invention,' he says, 'entitled the phonograph, has +never invaded these shores. The people have never heard it. They +would not believe it if they should. Simple-hearted children of +nature, progress has never condemned them to accept the work of a +can-opener as an overture, and rag-time might incite them to a bloody +revolution. But you can try the experiment. The best chance you have +is that the populace may not wake up when you play. There's two +ways,' says the consul, 'they may take it. They may become inebriated +with attention, like an Atlanta colonel listening to "Marching +Through Georgia," or they will get excited and transpose the key of +the music with an axe and yourselves into a dungeon. In the latter +case,' says the consul, 'I'll do my duty by cabling to the State +Department, and I'll wrap the Stars and Stripes around you when you +come to be shot, and threaten them with the vengeance of the greatest +gold export and financial reserve nation on earth. The flag is +full of bullet holes now,' says the consul, 'made in that way. +Twice before,' says the consul, 'I have cabled our government for a +couple of gunboats to protect American citizens. The first time the +Department sent me a pair of gum boots. The other time was when a man +named Pease was going to be executed here. They referred that appeal +to the Secretary of Agriculture. Let us now disturb the seor behind +the bar for a subsequence of the red wine.' + +"Thus soliloquized the consul of Solitas to me and Henry Horsecollar. + +"But, notwithstanding, we hired a room that afternoon in the Calle de +los Angeles, the main street that runs along the shore, and put our +trunks there. 'Twas a good-sized room, dark and cheerful, but small. +'Twas on a various street, diversified by houses and conservatory +plants. The peasantry of the city passed to and fro on the fine +pasturage between the sidewalks. 'Twas, for the world, like an opera +chorus when the Royal Kafoozlum is about to enter. + +"We were rubbing the dust off the machine and getting fixed to +start business the next day, when a big, fine-looking white man in +white clothes stopped at the door and looked in. We extended the +invitations, and he walked inside and sized us up. He was chewing a +long cigar, and wrinkling his eyes, meditative, like a girl trying to +decide which dress to wear to the party. + +"'New York?' he says to me finally. + +"'Originally, and from time to time,' I says. 'Hasn't it rubbed off +yet?' + +"'It's simple,' says he, 'when you know how. It's the fit of the +vest. They don't cut vests right anywhere else. Coats, maybe, but not +vests.' + +"The white man looks at Henry Horsecollar and hesitates. + +"'Injun,' says Henry; 'tame Injun.' + +"'Mellinger,' says the man--'Homer P. Mellinger. Boys, you're +confiscated. You're babes in the wood without a chaperon or referee, +and it's my duty to start you going. I'll knock out the props and +launch you proper in the pellucid waters of this tropical mud puddle. +You'll have to be christened, and if you'll come with me I'll break a +bottle of wine across your bows, according to Hoyle.' + +"Well, for two days Homer P. Mellinger did the honors. That man cut +ice in Anchuria. He was It. He was the Royal Kafoozlum. If me and +Henry was babes in the wood, he was a Robin Redbreast from the +topmost bough. Him and me and Henry Horsecollar locked arms, and +toted that phonograph around, and had wassail and diversions. +Everywhere we found doors open we went inside and set the machine +going, and Mellinger called upon the people to observe the artful +music and his two lifelong friends, the Seors Americanos. The opera +chorus was agitated with esteem, and followed us from house to house. +There was a different kind of drink to be had with every tune. The +natives had acquirements of a pleasant thing in the way of a drink +that gums itself to the recollection. They chop off the end of a +green cocoanut, and pour in on the juice of it French brandy and +other adjuvants. We had them and other things. + +"Mine and Henry's money was counterfeit. Everything was on Homer P. +Mellinger. That man could find rolls of bills concealed in places +on his person where Hermann the Wizard couldn't have conjured out a +rabbit or an omelette. He could have founded universities, and made +orchid collections, and then had enough left to purchase the colored +vote of his country. Henry and me wondered what his graft was. One +evening he told us. + +"'Boys,' said he, 'I've deceived you. You think I'm a painted +butterfly; but in fact I'm the hardest worked man in this country. +Ten years ago I landed on its shores; and two years ago on the point +of its jaw. Yes, I guess I can get the decision over this ginger cake +commonwealth at the end of any round I choose. I'll confide in you +because you are my countrymen and guests, even if you have assaulted +my adopted shores with the worst system of noises ever set to music. + +"'My job is private secretary to the president of this republic; and +my duties are running it. I'm not headlined in the bills, but I'm the +mustard in the salad dressing just the same. There isn't a law goes +before Congress, there isn't a concession granted, there isn't an +import duty levied but what H. P. Mellinger he cooks and seasons +it. In the front office I fill the president's inkstand and search +visiting statesmen for dirks and dynamite; but in the back room I +dictate the policy of the government. You'd never guess in the world +how I got my pull. It's the only graft of its kind on earth. I'll put +you wise. You remember the old top-liner in the copy book--"Honesty +is the Best Policy"? That's it. I'm working honesty for a graft. I'm +the only honest man in the republic. The government knows it; the +people know it; the boodlers know it; the foreign investors know it. +I make the government keep its faith. If a man is promised a job he +gets it. If outside capital buys a concession it gets the goods. I +run a monopoly of square dealing here. There's no competition. If +Colonel Diogenes were to flash his lantern in this precinct he'd have +my address inside of two minutes. There isn't big money in it, but +it's a sure thing, and lets a man sleep of nights.' + +"Thus Homer P. Mellinger made oration to me and Henry Horsecollar. +And, later, he divested himself of this remark: + +"'Boys, I'm to hold a _soire_ this evening with a gang of leading +citizens, and I want your assistance. You bring the musical corn +sheller and give the affair the outside appearance of a function. +There's important business on hand, but it mustn't show. I can talk +to you people. I've been pained for years on account of not having +anybody to blow off and brag to. I get homesick sometimes, and I'd +swap the entire perquisites of office for just one hour to have a +stein and a caviare sandwich somewhere on Thirty-fourth Street, and +stand and watch the street cars go by, and smell the peanut roaster +at old Giuseppe's fruit stand.' + +"'Yes,' said I, 'there's fine caviare at Billy Renfrew's caf, corner +of Thirty-fourth and--' + +"'God knows it,' interrupts Mellinger, 'and if you'd told me you knew +Billy Renfrew I'd have invented tons of ways of making you happy. +Billy was my side-kicker in New York. There is a man who never knew +what crooked was. Here I am working Honesty for a graft, but that man +loses money on it. Carrambos! I get sick at times of this country. +Everything's rotten. From the executive down to the coffee pickers, +they're plotting to down each other and skin their friends. If a mule +driver takes off his hat to an official, that man figures it out that +he's a popular idol, and sets his pegs to stir up a revolution and +upset the administration. It's one of my little chores as private +secretary to smell out these revolutions and affix the kibosh before +they break out and scratch the paint off the government property. +That's why I'm down here now in this mildewed coast town. The +governor of the district and his crew are plotting to uprise. I've +got every one of their names, and they're invited to listen to the +phonograph to-night, compliments of H. P. M. That's the way I'll get +them in a bunch, and things are on the programme to happen to them.' + +"We three were sitting at table in the cantina of the Purified +Saints. Mellinger poured out wine, and was looking some worried; I +was thinking. + +"'They're a sharp crowd,' he says, kind of fretful. 'They're +capitalized by a foreign syndicate after rubber, and they're loaded +to the muzzle for bribing. I'm sick,' goes on Mellinger, 'of comic +opera. I want to smell East River and wear suspenders again. At times +I feel like throwing up my job, but I'm d----n fool enough to be sort +of proud of it. "There's Mellinger," they say here. "_Por Dios!_ you +can't touch him with a million." I'd like to take that record back +and show it to Billy Renfrew some day; and that tightens my grip +whenever I see a fat thing that I could corral just by winking one +eye--and losing my graft. By ----, they can't monkey with me. They +know it. What money I get I make honest and spend it. Some day I'll +make a pile and go back and eat caviare with Billy. To-night I'll +show you how to handle a bunch of corruptionists. I'll show them what +Mellinger, private secretary, means when you spell it with the cotton +and tissue paper off.' + +"Mellinger appears shaky, and breaks his glass against the neck of +the bottle. + +"I says to myself, 'White man, if I'm not mistaken there's been a +bait laid out where the tail of your eye could see it.' + +"That night, according to arrangements, me and Henry took the +phonograph to a room in a 'dobe house in a dirty side street, where +the grass was knee high. 'Twas a long room, lit with smoky oil lamps. +There was plenty of chairs, and a table at the back end. We set the +phonograph on the table. Mellinger was there, walking up and down, +disturbed in his predicaments. He chewed cigars and spat 'em out, and +he bit the thumb nail of his left hand. + +"By and by the invitations to the musicale came sliding in by pairs +and threes and spade flushes. Their colour was of a diversity, +running from a three-days' smoked meerschaum to a patent-leather +polish. They were as polite as wax, being devastated with enjoyments +to give Seor Mellinger the good evenings. I understood their Spanish +talk--I ran a pumping engine two years in a Mexican silver mine, and +had it pat--but I never let on. + +"Maybe fifty of 'em had come, and was seated, when in slid the king +bee, the governor of the district. Mellinger met him at the door, and +escorted him to the grand stand. When I saw that Latin man I knew +that Mellinger, private secretary, had all the dances on his card +taken. That was a big, squashy man, the colour of a rubber overshoe, +and he had an eye like a head waiter's. + +"Mellinger explained, fluent, in the Castilian idioms, that his soul +was disconcerted with joy at introducing to his respected friends +America's greatest invention, the wonder of the age. Henry got the +cue and run on an elegant brass-band record and the festivities +became initiated. The governor man had a bit of English under his +hat, and when the music was choked off he says: + +"'Ver-r-ree fine. _Gr-r-r-r-racias_, the American gentleemen, the so +esplendeed moosic as to playee.' + +"The table was a long one, and Henry and me sat at the end of it next +the wall. The governor sat at the other end. Homer P. Mellinger stood +at the side of it. I was just wondering how Mellinger was going to +handle his crowd, when the home talent suddenly opened the services. + +"That governor man was suitable for uprisings and policies. I judge +he was a ready kind of man, who took his own time. Yes, he was full +of attention and immediateness. He leaned his hands on the table and +imposed his face toward the secretary man. + +"'Do the American seors understand Spanish?' he asks in his native +accents. + +"'They do not,' says Mellinger. + +"'Then listen,' goes on the Latin man, prompt. 'The musics are +of sufficient prettiness, but not of necessity. Let us speak +of business. I well know why we are here, since I observe my +compatriots. You had a whisper yesterday, Seor Mellinger, of our +proposals. To-night we will speak out. We know that you stand in +the president's favour, and we know your influence. The government +will be changed. We know the worth of your services. We esteem your +friendship and aid so much that'--Mellinger raises his hand, but the +governor man bottles him up. 'Do not speak until I have done.' + +"The governor man then draws a package wrapped in paper from his +pocket, and lays it on the table by Mellinger's hand. + +"'In that you will find fifty thousand dollars in money of your +country. You can do nothing against us, but you can be worth that for +us. Go back to the capital and obey our instructions. Take that money +now. We trust you. You will find with it a paper giving in detail the +work you will be expected to do for us. Do not have the unwiseness to +refuse.' + +"The governor man paused, with his eyes fixed on Mellinger, full of +expressions and observances. I looked at Mellinger, and was glad +Billy Renfrew couldn't see him then. The sweat was popping out on his +forehead, and he stood dumb, tapping the little package with the ends +of his fingers. The colorado-maduro gang was after his graft. He had +only to change his politics, and stuff five fingers in his inside +pocket. + +"Henry whispers to me and wants the pause in the programme +interpreted. I whisper back: 'H. P. is up against a bribe, senator's +size, and the coons have got him going.' I saw Mellinger's hand +moving closer to the package. 'He's weakening,' I whispered to +Henry. 'We'll remind him,' says Henry, 'of the peanut-roaster on +Thirty-fourth Street, New York.' + +"Henry stooped down and got a record from the basketful we'd brought, +slid it in the phonograph, and started her off. It was a cornet solo, +very neat and beautiful, and the name of it was 'Home, Sweet Home.' +Not one of them fifty odd men in the room moved while it was playing, +and the governor man kept his eyes steady on Mellinger. I saw +Mellinger's head go up little by little, and his hand came creeping +away from the package. Not until the last note sounded did anybody +stir. And then Homer P. Mellinger takes up the bundle of boodle and +slams it in the governor man's face. + +"'That's my answer,' says Mellinger, private secretary, 'and there'll +be another in the morning. I have proofs of conspiracy against every +man of you. The show is over, gentlemen.' + +"'There's one more act,' puts in the governor man. 'You are a +servant, I believe, employed by the president to copy letters and +answer raps at the door. I am governor here. _Seores_, I call upon +you in the name of the cause to seize this man.' + +"That brindled gang of conspirators shoved back their chairs and +advanced in force. I could see where Mellinger had made a mistake in +massing his enemy so as to make a grand-stand play. I think he made +another one, too; but we can pass that, Mellinger's idea of a graft +and mine being different, according to estimations and points of +view. + +"There was only one window and door in that room, and they were in +the front end. Here was fifty odd Latin men coming in a bunch to +obstruct the legislation of Mellinger. You may say there were three +of us, for me and Henry, simultaneous, declared New York City and the +Cherokee Nation in sympathy with the weaker party. + +"Then it was that Henry Horsecollar rose to a point of disorder +and intervened, showing, admirable, the advantages of education +as applied to the American Indian's natural intellect and native +refinement. He stood up and smoothed back his hair on each side with +his hands as you have seen little girls do when they play. + +"'Get behind me, both of you,' says Henry. + +"'What's it to be, chief?' I asked. + +"'I'm going to buck centre,' says Henry, in his football idioms. +'There isn't a tackle in the lot of them. Follow me close, and rush +the game.' + +"Then that cultured Red Man exhaled an arrangement of sounds with +his mouth that made the Latin aggregation pause, with thoughtfulness +and hesitations. The matter of his proclamation seemed to be a +co-operation of the Carlisle war-whoop with the Cherokee college +yell. He went at the chocolate team like a bean out of a little boy's +nigger shooter. His right elbow laid out the governor man on the +gridiron, and he made a lane the length of the crowd so wide that a +woman could have carried a step-ladder through it without striking +against anything. All Mellinger and me had to do was to follow. + +"It took us just three minutes to get out of that street around to +military headquarters, where Mellinger had things his own way. A +colonel and a battalion of bare-toed infantry turned out and went +back to the scene of the musicale with us, but the conspirator gang +was gone. But we recaptured the phonograph with honours of war, and +marched back to the _cuartel_ with it playing 'All Coons Look Alike +to Me.' + +"The next day Mellinger takes me and Henry to one side, and begins to +shed tens and twenties. + +"'I want to buy that phonograph,' says he. 'I liked that last tune it +played at the _soire_.' + +"'This is more money than the machine is worth,' says I. + +"''Tis government expense money,' says Mellinger. 'The government +pays for it, and it's getting the tune-grinder cheap.' + +"Me and Henry knew that pretty well. We knew that it had saved Homer +P. Mellinger's graft when he was on the point of losing it; but we +never let him know we knew it. + +"'Now you boys better slide off further down the coast for a while,' +says Mellinger, 'till I get the screws put on these fellows here. If +you don't they'll give you trouble. And if you ever happen to see +Billy Renfrew again before I do, tell him I'm coming back to New York +as soon as I can make a stake--honest.' + +"Me and Henry laid low until the day the steamer came back. When we +saw the captain's boat on the beach we went down and stood in the +edge of the water. The captain grinned when he saw us. + +"'I told you you'd be waiting,' he says. 'Where's the Hamburger +machine?' + +"'It stays behind,' I says, 'to play "Home, Sweet Home."' + +"'I told you so,' says the captain again. 'Climb in the boat.' + +"And that," said Keogh, "is the way me and Henry Horsecollar +introduced the phonograph into this country. Henry went back to the +States, but I've been rummaging around in the tropics ever since. +They say Mellinger never travelled a mile after that without his +phonograph. I guess it kept him reminded about his graft whenever he +saw the siren voice of the boodler tip him the wink with a bribe in +its hand." + +"I suppose he's taking it home with him as a souvenir," remarked the +consul. + +"Not as a souvenir," said Keogh. "He'll need two of 'em in New York, +running day and night." + + + + +VII + +MONEY MAZE + + +The new administration of Anchuria entered upon its duties and +privileges with enthusiasm. Its first act was to send an agent to +Coralio with imperative orders to recover, if possible, the sum of +money ravished from the treasury by the ill-fated Miraflores. + +Colonel Emilio Falcon, the private secretary of Losada, the new +president, was despatched from the capital upon this important +mission. + +The position of private secretary to a tropical president is a +responsible one. He must be a diplomat, a spy, a ruler of men, a +body-guard to his chief, and a smeller-out of plots and nascent +revolutions. Often he is the power behind the throne, the dictator of +policy; and a president chooses him with a dozen times the care with +which he selects a matrimonial mate. + +Colonel Falcon, a handsome and urbane gentleman of Castilian courtesy +and dbonnaire manners, came to Coralio with the task before him of +striking upon the cold trail of the lost money. There he conferred +with the military authorities, who had received instructions to +co-operate with him in the search. + +Colonel Falcon established his headquarters in one of the rooms of +the Casa Morena. Here for a week he held informal sittings--much as +if he were a kind of unified grand jury--and summoned before him all +those whose testimony might illumine the financial tragedy that had +accompanied the less momentous one of the late president's death. + +Two or three who were thus examined, among whom was the barber +Estebn, declared that they had identified the body of the president +before its burial. + +"Of a truth," testified Estebn before the mighty secretary, "it was +he, the president. Consider!--how could I shave a man and not see his +face? He sent for me to shave him in a small house. He had a beard +very black and thick. Had I ever seen the president before? Why not? +I saw him once ride forth in a carriage from the _vapor_ in Solitas. +When I shaved him he gave me a gold piece, and said there was to be +no talk. But I am a Liberal--I am devoted to my country--and I spake +of these things to Seor Goodwin." + +"It is known," said Colonel Falcon, smoothly, "that the late +President took with him an American leather valise, containing a +large amount of money. Did you see that?" + +"_De veras_--no," Estebn answered. "The light in the little house +was but a small lamp by which I could scarcely see to shave the +President. Such a thing there may have been, but I did not see +it. No. Also in the room was a young lady--a seorita of much +beauty--that I could see even in so small a light. But the money, +seor, or the thing in which it was carried--that I did not see." + +The _comandante_ and other officers gave testimony that they had been +awakened and alarmed by the noise of a pistol-shot in the Hotel de +los Estranjeros. Hurrying thither to protect the peace and dignity of +the republic, they found a man lying dead, with a pistol clutched in +his hand. Beside him was a young woman, weeping sorely. Seor Goodwin +was also in the room when they entered it. But of the valise of money +they saw nothing. + +Madame Timotea Ortiz, the proprietress of the hotel in which the game +of Fox-in-the-Morning had been played out, told of the coming of the +two guests to her house. + +"To my house they came," said she--"one _seor_, not quite old, and +one _seorita_ of sufficient handsomeness. They desired not to eat or +to drink--not even of my _aguardiente_, which is the best. To their +rooms they ascended--_Numero Nueve_ and _Numero Diez_. Later came +Seor Goodwin, who ascended to speak with them. Then I heard a +great noise like that of a _canon_, and they said that the _pobre +Presidente_ had shot himself. _Est bueno._ I saw nothing of money or +of the thing you call _veliz_ that you say he carried it in." + +Colonel Falcon soon came to the reasonable conclusion that if anyone +in Coralio could furnish a clue to the vanished money, Frank Goodwin +must be the man. But the wise secretary pursued a different course in +seeking information from the American. Goodwin was a powerful friend +to the new administration, and one who was not to be carelessly +dealt with in respect to either his honesty or his courage. Even the +private secretary of His Excellency hesitated to have this rubber +prince and mahogany baron haled before him as a common citizen of +Anchuria. So he sent Goodwin a flowery epistle, each word-petal +dripping with honey, requesting the favour of an interview. Goodwin +replied with an invitation to dinner at his own house. + +Before the hour named the American walked over to the Casa Morena, +and greeted his guest frankly and friendly. Then the two strolled, in +the cool of the afternoon, to Goodwin's home in the environs. + +The American left Colonel Falcon in a big, cool, shadowed room with a +floor of inlaid and polished woods that any millionaire in the States +would have envied, excusing himself for a few minutes. He crossed a +_patio_, shaded with deftly arranged awnings and plants, and entered +a long room looking upon the sea in the opposite wing of the house. +The broad jalousies were opened wide, and the ocean breeze flowed +in through the room, an invisible current of coolness and health. +Goodwin's wife sat near one of the windows, making a water-color +sketch of the afternoon seascape. + +Here was a woman who looked to be happy. And more--she looked to be +content. Had a poet been inspired to pen just similes concerning +her favour, he would have likened her full, clear eyes, with their +white-encircled, gray irises, to moonflowers. With none of the +goddesses whose traditional charms have become coldly classic +would the discerning rhymester have compared her. She was purely +Paradisaic, not Olympian. If you can imagine Eve, after the eviction, +beguiling the flaming warriors and serenely re-entering the Garden, +you will have her. Just so human, and still so harmonious with Eden +seemed Mrs. Goodwin. + +When her husband entered she looked up, and her lips curved and +parted; her eyelids fluttered twice or thrice--a movement remindful +(Poesy forgive us!) of the tail-wagging of a faithful dog--and a +little ripple went through her like the commotion set up in a weeping +willow by a puff of wind. Thus she ever acknowledged his coming, were +it twenty times a day. If they who sometimes sat over their wine +in Coralio, reshaping old, diverting stories of the madcap career +of Isabel Guilbert, could have seen the wife of Frank Goodwin that +afternoon in the estimable aura of her happy wifehood, they might +have disbelieved, or have agreed to forget, those graphic annals of +the life of the one for whom their president gave up his country and +his honour. + +"I have brought a guest to dinner," said Goodwin. "One Colonel +Falcon, from San Mateo. He is come on government business. I do not +think you will care to see him, so I prescribe for you one of those +convenient and indisputable feminine headaches." + +"He has come to inquire about the lost money, has he not?" asked Mrs. +Goodwin, going on with her sketch. + +"A good guess!" acknowledged Goodwin. "He has been holding an +inquisition among the natives for three days. I am next on his list +of witnesses, but as he feels shy about dragging one of Uncle Sam's +subjects before him, he consents to give it the outward appearance +of a social function. He will apply the torture over my own wine and +provender." + +"Has he found anyone who saw the valise of money?" + +"Not a soul. Even Madama Ortiz, whose eyes are so sharp for the sight +of a revenue official, does not remember that there was any baggage." + +Mrs. Goodwin laid down her brush and sighed. + +"I am so sorry, Frank," she said, "that they are giving you so much +trouble about the money. But we can't let them know about it, can +we?" + +"Not without doing our intelligence a great injustice," said Goodwin, +with a smile and a shrug that he had picked up from the natives. +"_Americano_, though I am, they would have me in the _calaboza_ in +half an hour if they knew we had appropriated that valise. No; we +must appear as ignorant about the money as the other ignoramuses in +Coralio." + +"Do you think that this man they have sent suspects you?" she asked, +with a little pucker of her brows. + +"He'd better not," said the American, carelessly. "It's lucky that no +one caught a sight of the valise except myself. As I was in the rooms +when the shot was fired, it is not surprising that they should want +to investigate my part in the affair rather closely. But there's no +cause for alarm. This colonel is down on the list of events for a +good dinner, with a dessert of American 'bluff' that will end the +matter, I think." + +Mrs. Goodwin rose and walked to the window. Goodwin followed and +stood by her side. She leaned to him, and rested in the protection of +his strength, as she had always rested since that dark night on which +he had first made himself her tower of refuge. Thus they stood for a +little while. + +Straight through the lavish growth of tropical branch and leaf +and vine that confronted them had been cunningly trimmed a vista, +that ended at the cleared environs of Coralio, on the banks of the +mangrove swamp. At the other end of the aerial tunnel they could see +the grave and wooden headpiece that bore the name of the unhappy +President Miraflores. From this window when the rains forbade the +open, and from the green and shady slopes of Goodwin's fruitful +lands when the skies were smiling, his wife was wont to look upon +that grave with a gentle sadness that was now scarcely a mar to her +happiness. + +"I loved him so, Frank!" she said, "even after that terrible flight +and its awful ending. And you have been so good to me, and have made +me so happy. It has all grown into such a strange puzzle. If they +were to find out that we got the money do you think they would force +you to make the amount good to the government?" + +"They would undoubtedly try," answered Goodwin. "You are right about +its being a puzzle. And it must remain a puzzle to Falcon and all +his countrymen until it solves itself. You and I, who know more than +anyone else, only know half of the solution. We must not let even a +hint about this money get abroad. Let them come to the theory that +the president concealed it in the mountains during his journey, or +that he found means to ship it out of the country before he reached +Coralio. I don't think that Falcon suspects me. He is making a close +investigation, according to his orders, but he will find out +nothing." + +Thus they spake together. Had anyone overheard or overseen them as +they discussed the lost funds of Anchuria there would have been a +second puzzle presented. For upon the faces and in the bearing of +each of them was visible (if countenances are to be believed) Saxon +honesty and pride and honourable thoughts. In Goodwin's steady eye +and firm lineaments, moulded into material shape by the inward +spirit of kindness and generosity and courage, there was nothing +reconcilable with his words. + +As for his wife, physiognomy championed her even in the face of their +accusive talk. Nobility was in her guise; purity was in her glance. +The devotion that she manifested had not even the appearance of that +feeling that now and then inspires a woman to share the guilt of her +partner out of the pathetic greatness of her love. No, there was a +discrepancy here between what the eye would have seen and the ear +have heard. + +Dinner was served to Goodwin and his guest in the _patio_, under cool +foliage and flowers. The American begged the illustrious secretary to +excuse the absence of Mrs. Goodwin, who was suffering, he said, from +a headache brought on by a slight _calentura_. + +After the meal they lingered, according to the custom, over their +coffee and cigars. Colonel Falcon, with true Castilian delicacy, +waited for his host to open the question that they had met to +discuss. He had not long to wait. As soon as the cigars were lighted, +the American cleared the way by inquiring whether the secretary's +investigations in the town had furnished him with any clue to the +lost funds. + +"I have found no one yet," admitted Colonel Falcon, "who even had +sight of the valise or the money. Yet I have persisted. It has been +proven in the capital that President Miraflores set out from San +Mateo with one hundred thousand dollars belonging to the government, +accompanied by _Seorita_ Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer. The +Government, officially and personally, is loathe to believe," +concluded Colonel Falcon, with a smile, "that our late President's +tastes would have permitted him to abandon on the route, as excess +baggage, either of the desirable articles with which his flight was +burdened." + +"I suppose you would like to hear what I have to say about the +affair," said Goodwin, coming directly to the point. "It will not +require many words. + +"On that night, with others of our friends here, I was keeping a +lookout for the president, having been notified of his flight by a +telegram in our national cipher from Englehart, one of our leaders +in the capital. About ten o'clock that night I saw a man and a +woman hurrying along the streets. They went to the Hotel de los +Estranjeros, and engaged rooms. I followed them upstairs, leaving +Estebn, who had come up, to watch outside. The barber had told me +that he had shaved the beard from the president's face that night; +therefore I was prepared, when I entered the rooms, to find him with +a smooth face. When I apprehended him in the name of the people he +drew a pistol and shot himself instantly. In a few minutes many +officers and citizens were on the spot. I suppose you have been +informed of the subsequent facts." + +Goodwin paused. Losada's agent maintained an attitude of waiting, as +if he expected a continuance. + +"And now," went on the American, looking steadily into the eyes of +the other man, and giving each word a deliberate emphasis, "you will +oblige me by attending carefully to what I have to add. I saw no +valise or receptacle of any kind, or any money belonging to the +Republic of Anchuria. If President Miraflores decamped with any funds +belonging to the treasury of this country, or to himself, or to +anyone else, I saw no trace of it in the house or elsewhere, at that +time or at any other. Does that statement cover the ground of the +inquiry you wished to make of me?" + +Colonel Falcon bowed, and described a fluent curve with his cigar. +His duty was performed. Goodwin was not to be disputed. He was a +loyal supporter of the government, and enjoyed the full confidence +of the new president. His rectitude had been the capital that had +brought him fortune in Anchuria, just as it had formed the lucrative +"graft" of Mellinger, the secretary of Miraflores. + +"I thank you, _Seor_ Goodwin," said Falcon, "for speaking plainly. +Your word will be sufficient for the president. But, _Seor_ Goodwin, +I am instructed to pursue every clue that presents itself in this +matter. There is one that I have not yet touched upon. Our friends +in France, _seor_, have a saying, '_Cherchez la femme_,' when there +is a mystery without a clue. But here we do not have to search. The +woman who accompanied the late President in his flight must surely--" + +"I must interrupt you there," interposed Goodwin. "It is true that +when I entered the hotel for the purpose of intercepting President +Miraflores I found a lady there. I must beg of you to remember that +that lady is now my wife. I speak for her as I do for myself. She +knows nothing of the fate of the valise or of the money that you +are seeking. You will say to his excellency that I guarantee her +innocence. I do not need to add to you, Colonel Falcon, that I do not +care to have her questioned or disturbed." + +Colonel Falcon bowed again. + +"_Por supuesto_, no!" he cried. And to indicate that the inquiry was +ended he added: "And now, _seor_, let me beg of you to show me that +sea view from your _galeria_ of which you spoke. I am a lover of the +sea." + +In the early evening Goodwin walked back to the town with his guest, +leaving him at the corner of the Calle Grande. As he was returning +homeward one "Beelzebub" Blythe, with the air of a courtier and the +outward aspect of a scarecrow, pounced upon him hopefully from the +door of a _pulperia_. + +Blythe had been re-christened "Beelzebub" as an acknowledgment of the +greatness of his fall. Once in some distant Paradise Lost, he had +foregathered with the angels of the earth. But Fate had hurled him +headlong down to the tropics, where flamed in his bosom a fire that +was seldom quenched. In Coralio they called him a beachcomber; but he +was, in reality, a categorical idealist who strove to anamorphosize +the dull verities of life by the means of brandy and rum. As +Beelzebub, himself, might have held in his clutch with unwitting +tenacity his harp or crown during his tremendous fall, so his +namesake had clung to his gold-rimmed eyeglasses as the only souvenir +of his lost estate. These he wore with impressiveness and distinction +while he combed beaches and extracted toll from his friends. By some +mysterious means he kept his drink-reddened face always smoothly +shaven. For the rest he sponged gracefully upon whomsoever he could +for enough to keep him pretty drunk, and sheltered from the rains and +night dews. + +"Hallo, Goodwin!" called the derelict, airily. "I was hoping I'd +strike you. I wanted to see you particularly. Suppose we go where we +can talk. Of course you know there's a chap down here looking up the +money old Miraflores lost." + +"Yes," said Goodwin, "I've been talking with him. Let's go into +Espada's place. I can spare you ten minutes." + +They went into the _pulperia_ and sat at a little table upon stools +with rawhide tops. + +"Have a drink?" said Goodwin. + +"They can't bring it too quickly," said Blythe. "I've been in a +drought ever since morning. Hi--_muchacho!--el aguardiente por ac_." + +"Now, what do you want to see me about?" asked Goodwin, when the +drinks were before them. + +"Confound it, old man," drawled Blythe, "why do you spoil a golden +moment like this with business? I wanted to see you--well, this has +the preference." He gulped down his brandy, and gazed longingly into +the empty glass. + +"Have another?" suggested Goodwin. + +"Between gentlemen," said the fallen angel, "I don't quite like your +use of that word 'another.' It isn't quite delicate. But the concrete +idea that the word represents is not displeasing." + +The glasses were refilled. Blythe sipped blissfully from his, as he +began to enter the state of a true idealist. + +"I must trot along in a minute or two," hinted Goodwin. "Was there +anything in particular?" + +Blythe did not reply at once. + +"Old Losada would make it a hot country," he remarked at length, +"for the man who swiped that gripsack of treasury boodle, don't you +think?" + +"Undoubtedly, he would," agreed Goodwin calmly, as he rose leisurely +to his feet. "I'll be running over to the house now, old man. Mrs. +Goodwin is alone. There was nothing important you had to say, was +there?" + +"That's all," said Blythe. "Unless you wouldn't mind sending in +another drink from the bar as you go out. Old Espada has closed my +account to profit and loss. And pay for the lot, will you, like a +good fellow?" + +"All right," said Goodwin. "_Buenas noches._" + +"Beelzebub" Blythe lingered over his cups, polishing his eyeglasses +with a disreputable handkerchief. + +"I thought I could do it, but I couldn't," he muttered to himself +after a time. "A gentleman can't blackmail the man that he drinks +with." + + + + +VIII + +THE ADMIRAL + + +Spilled milk draws few tears from an Anchurian administration. Many +are its lacteal sources; and the clocks' hands point forever to +milking time. Even the rich cream skimmed from the treasury by the +bewitched Miraflores did not cause the newly-installed patriots to +waste time in unprofitable regrets. The government philosophically +set about supplying the deficiency by increasing the import duties +and by "suggesting" to wealthy private citizens that contributions +according to their means would be considered patriotic and in +order. Prosperity was expected to attend the reign of Losada, the +new president. The ousted office-holders and military favourites +organized a new "Liberal" party, and began to lay their plans for +a re-succession. Thus the game of Anchurian politics began, like a +Chinese comedy, to unwind slowly its serial length. Here and there +Mirth peeps for an instant from the wings and illumines the florid +lines. + +A dozen quarts of champagne in conjunction with an informal sitting +of the president and his cabinet led to the establishment of the navy +and the appointment of Felipe Carrera as its admiral. + +Next to the champagne the credit of the appointment belongs to Don +Sabas Placido, the newly confirmed Minister of War. + +The president had requested a convention of his cabinet for the +discussion of questions politic and for the transaction of certain +routine matters of state. The session had been signally tedious; the +business and the wine prodigiously dry. A sudden, prankish humour of +Don Sabas, impelling him to the deed, spiced the grave affairs of +state with a whiff of agreeable playfulness. + +In the dilatory order of business had come a bulletin from the +coast department of Orilla del Mar reporting the seizure by the +custom-house officers at the town of Coralio of the sloop _Estrella +del Noche_ and her cargo of drygoods, patent medicines, granulated +sugar and three-star brandy. Also six Martini rifles and a barrel of +American whisky. Caught in the act of smuggling, the sloop with its +cargo was now, according to law, the property of the republic. + +The Collector of Customs, in making his report, departed from the +conventional forms so far as to suggest that the confiscated vessel +be converted to the use of the government. The prize was the first +capture to the credit of the department in ten years. The collector +took opportunity to pat his department on the back. + +It often happened that government officers required transportation +from point to point along the coast, and means were usually lacking. +Furthermore, the sloop could be manned by a loyal crew and employed +as a coast guard to discourage the pernicious art of smuggling. The +collector also ventured to nominate one to whom the charge of the +boat could be safely intrusted--a young man of Coralio, Felipe +Carrera--not, be it understood, one of extreme wisdom, but loyal and +the best sailor along the coast. + +It was upon this hint that the Minister of War acted, executing a +rare piece of drollery that so enlivened the tedium of executive +session. + +In the constitution of this small, maritime banana republic was a +forgotten section that provided for the maintenance of a navy. This +provision--with many other wiser ones--had lain inert since the +establishment of the republic. Anchuria had no navy and had no use +for one. It was characteristic of Don Sabas--a man at once merry, +learned, whimsical and audacious--that he should have disturbed the +dust of this musty and sleeping statute to increase the humour of the +world by so much as a smile from his indulgent colleagues. + +With delightful mock seriousness the Minister of War proposed the +creation of a navy. He argued its need and the glories it might +achieve with such gay and witty zeal that the travesty overcame with +its humour even the swart dignity of President Losada himself. + +The champagne was bubbling trickily in the veins of the mercurial +statesmen. It was not the custom of the grave governors of Anchuria +to enliven their sessions with a beverage so apt to cast a veil of +disparagement over sober affairs. The wine had been a thoughtful +compliment tendered by the agent of the Vesuvius Fruit Company as a +token of amicable relations--and certain consummated deals--between +that company and the republic of Anchuria. + +The jest was carried to its end. A formidable, official document was +prepared, encrusted with chromatic seals and jaunty with fluttering +ribbons, bearing the florid signatures of state. This commission +conferred upon el Seor Don Felipe Carrera the title of Flag Admiral +of the Republic of Anchuria. Thus within the space of a few minutes +and the dominion of a dozen "extra dry," the country took its place +among the naval powers of the world, and Felipe Carrera became +entitled to a salute of nineteen guns whenever he might enter port. + +The southern races are lacking in that particular kind of humour +that finds entertainment in the defects and misfortunes bestowed by +Nature. Owing to this defect in their constitution they are not moved +to laughter (as are their northern brothers) by the spectacle of the +deformed, the feeble-minded or the insane. + +Felipe Carrera was sent upon earth with but half his wits. Therefore, +the people of Coralio called him "_El pobrecito loco_"--"the poor +little crazed one"--saying that God had sent but half of him to +earth, retaining the other half. + +A sombre youth, glowering, and speaking only at the rarest times, +Felipe was but negatively "loco." On shore he generally refused all +conversation. He seemed to know that he was badly handicapped on +land, where so many kinds of understanding are needed; but on the +water his one talent set him equal with most men. Few sailors whom +God had carefully and completely made could handle a sailboat as +well. Five points nearer the wind than even the best of them he +could sail his sloop. When the elements raged and set other men to +cowering, the deficiencies of Felipe seemed of little importance. +He was a perfect sailor, if an imperfect man. He owned no boat, but +worked among the crews of the schooners and sloops that skimmed the +coast, trading and freighting fruit out to the steamers where there +was no harbour. It was through his famous skill and boldness on the +sea, as well as for the pity felt for his mental imperfections, that +he was recommended by the collector as a suitable custodian of the +captured sloop. + +When the outcome of Don Sabas' little pleasantry arrived in the form +of the imposing and preposterous commission, the collector smiled. +He had not expected such prompt and overwhelming response to his +recommendation. He despatched a _muchacho_ at once to fetch the +future admiral. + +The collector waited in his official quarters. His office was in the +Calle Grande, and the sea breezes hummed through its windows all day. +The collector, in white linen and canvas shoes, philandered with +papers on an antique desk. A parrot, perched on a pen rack, seasoned +the official tedium with a fire of choice Castilian imprecations. Two +rooms opened into the collector's. In one the clerical force of young +men of variegated complexions transacted with glitter and parade +their several duties. Through the open door of the other room could +be seen a bronze babe, guiltless of clothing, that rollicked upon the +floor. In a grass hammock a thin woman, tinted a pale lemon, played +a guitar and swung contentedly in the breeze. Thus surrounded by +the routine of his high duties and the visible tokens of agreeable +domesticity, the collector's heart was further made happy by the +power placed in his hands to brighten the fortunes of the "innocent" +Felipe. + +Felipe came and stood before the collector. He was a lad of twenty, +not ill-favoured in looks, but with an expression of distant and +pondering vacuity. He wore white cotton trousers, down the seams +of which he had sewed red stripes with some vague aim at military +decoration. A flimsy blue shirt fell open at his throat; his feet +were bare; he held in his hand the cheapest of straw hats from the +States. + +"Seor Carrera," said the collector, gravely, producing the showy +commission, "I have sent for you at the president's bidding. This +document that I present to you confers upon you the title of Admiral +of this great republic, and gives you absolute command of the naval +forces and fleet of our country. You may think, friend Felipe, that +we have no navy--but yes! The sloop the _Estrella del Noche_, that my +brave men captured from the coast smugglers, is to be placed under +your command. The boat is to be devoted to the services of your +country. You will be ready at all times to convey officials of the +government to points along the coast where they may be obliged to +visit. You will also act as a coast-guard to prevent, as far as you +may be able, the crime of smuggling. You will uphold the honour and +prestige of your country at sea, and endeavour to place Anchuria +among the proudest naval powers of the world. These are your +instructions as the Minister of War desires me to convey them to you. +_Por Dios!_ I do not know how all this is to be accomplished, for +not one word did his letter contain in respect to a crew or to the +expenses of this navy. Perhaps you are to provide a crew yourself, +Seor Admiral--I do not know--but it is a very high honour that has +descended upon you. I now hand you your commission. When you are +ready for the boat I will give orders that she shall be made over +into your charge. That is as far as my instructions go." + +Felipe took the commission that the collector handed to him. He gazed +through the open window at the sea for a moment, with his customary +expression of deep but vain pondering. Then he turned without having +spoken a word, and walked swiftly away through the hot sand of the +street. + +"_Pobrecito loco!_" sighed the collector; and the parrot on the pen +racks screeched "Loco!--loco!--loco!" + +The next morning a strange procession filed through the streets to +the collector's office. At its head was the admiral of the navy. +Somewhere Felipe had raked together a pitiful semblance of a military +uniform--a pair of red trousers, a dingy blue short jacket heavily +ornamented with gold braid, and an old fatigue cap that must have +been cast away by one of the British soldiers in Belize and brought +away by Felipe on one of his coasting voyages. Buckled around his +waist was an ancient ship's cutlass contributed to his equipment by +Pedro Lafitte, the baker, who proudly asserted its inheritance from +his ancestor, the illustrious buccaneer. At the admiral's heels +tagged his newly-shipped crew--three grinning, glossy, black Caribs, +bare to the waist, the sand spurting in showers from the spring of +their naked feet. + +Briefly and with dignity Felipe demanded his vessel of the collector. +And now a fresh honour awaited him. The collector's wife, who played +the guitar and read novels in the hammock all day, had more than a +little romance in her placid, yellow bosom. She had found in an old +book an engraving of a flag that purported to be the naval flag of +Anchuria. Perhaps it had so been designed by the founders of the +nation; but, as no navy had ever been established, oblivion had +claimed the flag. Laboriously with her own hands she had made a flag +after the pattern--a red cross upon a blue-and-white ground. She +presented it to Felipe with these words: "Brave sailor, this flag is +of your country. Be true, and defend it with your life. Go you with +God." + +For the first time since his appointment the admiral showed a flicker +of emotion. He took the silken emblem, and passed his hand reverently +over its surface. "I am the admiral," he said to the collector's +lady. Being on land he could bring himself to no more exuberant +expression of sentiment. At sea with the flag at the masthead of his +navy, some more eloquent exposition of feelings might be forthcoming. + +Abruptly the admiral departed with his crew. For the next three days +they were busy giving the _Estrella del Noche_ a new coat of white +paint trimmed with blue. And then Felipe further adorned himself by +fastening a handful of brilliant parrot's plumes in his cap. Again he +tramped with his faithful crew to the collector's office and formally +notified him that the sloop's name had been changed to _El Nacional_. + +During the next few months the navy had its troubles. Even an admiral +is perplexed to know what to do without any orders. But none came. +Neither did any salaries. _El Nacional_ swung idly at anchor. + +When Felipe's little store of money was exhausted he went to the +collector and raised the question of finances. + +"Salaries!" exclaimed the collector, with hands raised; "_Valgame +Dios!_ not one _centavo_ of my own pay have I received for the last +seven months. The pay of an admiral, do you ask? _Quin sabe?_ Should +it be less than three thousand _pesos_? _Mira!_ you will see a +revolution in this country very soon. A good sign of it is when the +government calls all the time for _pesos_, _pesos_, _pesos_, and pays +none out." + +Felipe left the collector's office with a look almost of content +on his sombre face. A revolution would mean fighting, and then the +government would need his services. It was rather humiliating to be +an admiral without anything to do, and have a hungry crew at your +heels begging for _reales_ to buy plantains and tobacco with. + +When he returned to where his happy-go-lucky Caribs were waiting they +sprang up and saluted, as he had drilled them to do. + +"Come, _muchachos_," said the admiral; "it seems that the government +is poor. It has no money to give us. We will earn what we need to +live upon. Thus will we serve our country. Soon"--his heavy eyes +almost lighted up--"it may gladly call upon us for help." + +Thereafter _El Nacional_ turned out with the other coast craft and +became a wage-earner. She worked with the lighters freighting bananas +and oranges out to the fruit steamers that could not approach nearer +than a mile from the shore. Surely a self-supporting navy deserves +red letters in the budget of any nation. + +After earning enough at freighting to keep himself and his crew in +provisions for a week Felipe would anchor the navy and hang about +the little telegraph office, looking like one of the chorus of an +insolvent comic opera troupe besieging the manager's den. A hope for +orders from the capital was always in his heart. That his services as +admiral had never been called into requirement hurt his pride and +patriotism. At every call he would inquire, gravely and expectantly, +for despatches. The operator would pretend to make a search, and then +reply: + +"Not yet, it seems, _Seor el Almirante--poco tiempo!_" + +Outside in the shade of the lime-trees the crew chewed sugar cane or +slumbered, well content to serve a country that was contented with so +little service. + +One day in the early summer the revolution predicted by the collector +flamed out suddenly. It had long been smouldering. At the first note +of alarm the admiral of the navy force and fleet made all sail for a +larger port on the coast of a neighbouring republic, where he traded +a hastily collected cargo of fruit for its value in cartridges for +the five Martini rifles, the only guns that the navy could boast. +Then to the telegraph office sped the admiral. Sprawling in his +favourite corner, in his fast-decaying uniform, with his prodigious +sabre distributed between his red legs, he waited for the +long-delayed, but now soon expected, orders. + +"Not yet, _Seor el Almirante_," the telegraph clerk would call to +him--"_poco tiempo!_" + +At the answer the admiral would plump himself down with a great +rattling of scabbard to await the infrequent tick of the little +instrument on the table. + +"They will come," would be his unshaken reply; "I am the admiral." + + + + +IX + +THE FLAG PARAMOUNT + + +At the head of the insurgent party appeared that Hector and learned +Theban of the southern republics, Don Sabas Placido. A traveller, +a soldier, a poet, a scientist, a statesman and a connoisseur--the +wonder was that he could content himself with the petty, remote life +of his native country. + +"It is a whim of Placido's," said a friend who knew him well, "to +take up political intrigue. It is not otherwise than as if he had +come upon a new _tempo_ in music, a new bacillus in the air, a new +scent, or rhyme, or explosive. He will squeeze this revolution dry of +sensations, and a week afterward will forget it, skimming the seas +of the world in his brigantine to add to his already world-famous +collections. Collections of what? _Por Dios!_ of everything from +postage stamps to prehistoric stone idols." + +But, for a mere dilettante, the sthetic Placido seemed to be +creating a lively row. The people admired him; they were fascinated +by his brilliancy and flattered by his taking an interest in so +small a thing as his native country. They rallied to the call of his +lieutenants in the capital, where (somewhat contrary to arrangements) +the army remained faithful to the government. There was also lively +skirmishing in the coast towns. It was rumoured that the revolution +was aided by the Vesuvius Fruit Company, the power that forever +stood with chiding smile and uplifted finger to keep Anchuria in the +class of good children. Two of its steamers, the _Traveler_ and the +_Salvador_, were known to have conveyed insurgent troops from point +to point along the coast. + +As yet there had been no actual uprising in Coralio. Military law +prevailed, and the ferment was bottled for the time. And then came +the word that everywhere the revolutionists were encountering defeat. +In the capital the president's forces triumphed; and there was a +rumour that the leaders of the revolt had been forced to fly, hotly +pursued. + +In the little telegraph office at Coralio there was always a +gathering of officials and loyal citizens, awaiting news from the +seat of government. One morning the telegraph key began clicking, +and presently the operator called, loudly: "One telegram for _el +Almirante_, Don Seor Felipe Carrera!" + +There was a shuffling sound, a great rattling of tin scabbard, and +the admiral, prompt at his spot of waiting, leaped across the room to +receive it. + +The message was handed to him. Slowly spelling it out, he found it to +be his first official order--thus running: + + + Proceed immediately with your vessel to mouth of Rio Ruiz; + transport beef and provisions to barracks at Alforan. + + Martinez, General. + + +Small glory, to be sure, in this, his country's first call. But it +had called, and joy surged in the admiral's breast. He drew his +cutlass belt to another buckle hole, roused his dozing crew, and in a +quarter of an hour _El Nacional_ was tacking swiftly down coast in a +stiff landward breeze. + +The Rio Ruiz is a small river, emptying into the sea ten miles below +Coralio. That portion of the coast is wild and solitary. Through a +gorge in the Cordilleras rushes the Rio Ruiz, cold and bubbling, to +glide, at last, with breadth and leisure, through an alluvial morass +into the sea. + +In two hours _El Nacional_ entered the river's mouth. The banks +were crowded with a disposition of formidable trees. The sumptuous +undergrowth of the tropics overflowed the land, and drowned itself in +the fallow waters. Silently the sloop entered there, and met a deeper +silence. Brilliant with greens and ochres and floral scarlets, the +umbrageous mouth of the Rio Ruiz furnished no sound or movement save +of the sea-going water as it purled against the prow of the vessel. +Small chance there seemed of wresting beef or provisions from that +empty solitude. + +The admiral decided to cast anchor, and, at the chain's rattle, the +forest was stimulated to instant and resounding uproar. The mouth of +the Rio Ruiz had only been taking a morning nap. Parrots and baboons +screeched and barked in the trees; a whirring and a hissing and a +booming marked the awakening of animal life; a dark blue bulk was +visible for an instant, as a startled tapir fought his way through +the vines. + +The navy, under orders, hung in the mouth of the little river for +hours. The crew served the dinner of shark's fin soup, plantains, +crab gumbo and sour wine. The admiral, with a three-foot telescope, +closely scanned the impervious foliage fifty yards away. + +It was nearly sunset when a reverberating "hal-lo-o-o!" came from the +forest to their left. It was answered; and three men, mounted upon +mules, crashed through the tropic tangle to within a dozen yards of +the river's bank. There they dismounted; and one, unbuckling his +belt, struck each mule a violent blow with his sword scabbard, so +that they, with a fling of heels, dashed back again into the forest. + +Those were strange-looking men to be conveying beef and provisions. +One was a large and exceedingly active man, of striking presence. He +was of the purest Spanish type, with curling, gray-besprinkled, dark +hair, blue, sparkling eyes, and the pronounced air of a _caballero +grande_. The other two were small, brown-faced men, wearing white +military uniforms, high riding boots and swords. The clothes of all +were drenched, bespattered and rent by the thicket. Some stress of +circumstance must have driven them, _diable quatre_, through flood, +mire and jungle. + +"_O-h! Seor Almirante_," called the large man. "Send to us your +boat." + +The dory was lowered, and Felipe, with one of the Caribs, rowed +toward the left bank. + +The large man stood near the water's brink, waist deep in the curling +vines. As he gazed upon the scarecrow figure in the stern of the dory +a sprightly interest beamed upon his mobile face. + +Months of wageless and thankless service had dimmed the admiral's +splendour. His red trousers were patched and ragged. Most of the +bright buttons and yellow braid were gone from his jacket. The visor +of his cap was torn, and depended almost to his eyes. The admiral's +feet were bare. + +"Dear admiral," cried the large man, and his voice was like a blast +from a horn, "I kiss your hands. I knew we could build upon your +fidelity. You had our despatch--from General Martinez. A little +nearer with your boat, dear Admiral. Upon these devils of shifting +vines we stand with the smallest security." + +Felipe regarded him with a stolid face. + +"Provisions and beef for the barracks at Alforan," he quoted. + +"No fault of the butchers, _Almirante mio_, that the beef awaits you +not. But you are come in time to save the cattle. Get us aboard your +vessel, seor, at once. You first, _caballeros-- priesa!_ Come back +for me. The boat is too small." + +The dory conveyed the two officers to the sloop, and returned for the +large man. + +"Have you so gross a thing as food, good admiral?" he cried, when +aboard. "And, perhaps, coffee? Beef and provisions! _Nombre de Dios!_ +a little longer and we could have eaten one of those mules that you, +Colonel Rafael, saluted so feelingly with your sword scabbard at +parting. Let us have food; and then we will sail--for the barracks at +Alforan--no?" + +The Caribs prepared a meal, to which the three passengers of _El +Nacional_ set themselves with famished delight. About sunset, as was +its custom, the breeze veered and swept back from the mountains, cool +and steady, bringing a taste of the stagnant lagoons and mangrove +swamps that guttered the lowlands. The mainsail of the sloop was +hoisted and swelled to it, and at that moment they heard shouts and a +waxing clamour from the bosky profundities of the shore. + +"The butchers, my dear admiral," said the large man, smiling, "too +late for the slaughter." + +Further than his orders to his crew, the admiral was saying nothing. +The topsail and jib were spread, and the sloop glided out of the +estuary. The large man and his companions had bestowed themselves +with what comfort they could about the bare deck. Belike, the thing +big in their minds had been their departure from that critical shore; +and now that the hazard was so far reduced their thoughts were loosed +to the consideration of further deliverance. But when they saw the +sloop turn and fly up coast again they relaxed, satisfied with the +course the admiral had taken. + +The large man sat at ease, his spirited blue eye engaged in the +contemplation of the navy's commander. He was trying to estimate this +sombre and fantastic lad, whose impenetrable stolidity puzzled him. +Himself a fugitive, his life sought, and chafing under the smart +of defeat and failure, it was characteristic of him to transfer +instantly his interest to the study of a thing new to him. It +was like him, too, to have conceived and risked all upon this +last desperate and madcap scheme--this message to a poor, crazed +_fanatico_ cruising about with his grotesque uniform and his farcical +title. But his companions had been at their wits' end; escape had +seemed incredible; and now he was pleased with the success of the +plan they had called crack-brained and precarious. + +The brief, tropic twilight seemed to slide swiftly into the pearly +splendour of a moonlit night. And now the lights of Coralio appeared, +distributed against the darkening shore to their right. The admiral +stood, silent, at the tiller; the Caribs, like black panthers, held +the sheets, leaping noiselessly at his short commands. The three +passengers were watching intently the sea before them, and when at +length they came in sight of the bulk of a steamer lying a mile out +from the town, with her lights radiating deep into the water, they +held a sudden voluble and close-headed converse. The sloop was +speeding as if to strike midway between ship and shore. + +The large man suddenly separated from his companions and approached +the scarecrow at the helm. + +"My dear admiral," he said, "the government has been exceedingly +remiss. I feel all the shame for it that only its ignorance of your +devoted service has prevented it from sustaining. An inexcusable +oversight has been made. A vessel, a uniform and a crew worthy of +your fidelity shall be furnished you. But just now, dear admiral, +there is business of moment afoot. The steamer lying there is the +_Salvador_. I and my friends desire to be conveyed to her, where we +are sent on the government's business. Do us the favour to shape your +course accordingly." + +Without replying, the admiral gave a sharp command, and put the +tiller hard to port. _El Nacional_ swerved, and headed straight as an +arrow's course for the shore. + +"Do me the favour," said the large man, a trifle restively, "to +acknowledge, at least, that you catch the sound of my words." It +was possible that the fellow might be lacking in senses as well as +intellect. + +The admiral emitted a croaking, harsh laugh, and spake. + +"They will stand you," he said, "with your face to a wall and shoot +you dead. That is the way they kill traitors. I knew you when you +stepped into my boat. I have seen your picture in a book. You are +Sabas Placido, traitor to your country. With your face to a wall. So, +you will die. I am the admiral, and I will take you to them. With +your face to a wall. Yes." + +Don Sabas half turned and waved his hand, with a ringing laugh, +toward his fellow fugitives. "To you, _caballeros_, I have related +the history of that session when we issued that O! so ridiculous +commission. Of a truth our jest has been turned against us. Behold +the Frankenstein's monster we have created!" + +Don Sabas glanced toward the shore. The lights of Coralio were +drawing near. He could see the beach, the warehouse of the _Bodega +Nacional_, the long, low _cuartel_ occupied by the soldiers, and, +behind that, gleaming in the moonlight, a stretch of high adobe wall. +He had seen men stood with their faces to that wall and shot dead. + +Again he addressed the extravagant figure at the helm. + +"It is true," he said, "that I am fleeing the country. But, receive +the assurance that I care very little for that. Courts and camps +everywhere are open to Sabas Placido. _Vaya!_ what is this molehill +of a republic--this pig's head of a country--to a man like me? I am a +_paisano_ of everywhere. In Rome, in London, in Paris, in Vienna, you +will hear them say: 'Welcome back, Don Sabas.' Come!--_tonto_--baboon +of a boy--admiral, whatever you call yourself, turn your boat. Put us +on board the _Salvador_, and here is your pay--five hundred _pesos_ +in money of the _Estados Unidos_--more than your lying government +will pay you in twenty years." + +Don Sabas pressed a plump purse against the youth's hand. The admiral +gave no heed to the words or the movement. Braced against the helm, +he was holding the sloop dead on her shoreward course. His dull face +was lit almost to intelligence by some inward conceit that seemed to +afford him joy, and found utterance in another parrot-like cackle. + +"That is why they do it," he said--"so that you will not see the +guns. They fire--oom!--and you fall dead. With your face to the wall. +Yes." + +The admiral called a sudden order to his crew. The lithe, silent +Caribs made fast the sheets they held, and slipped down the hatchway +into the hold of the sloop. When the last one had disappeared, Don +Sabas, like a big, brown leopard, leaped forward, closed and fastened +the hatch and stood, smiling. + +"No rifles, if you please, dear admiral," he said. "It was a whimsey +of mine once to compile a dictionary of the Carib _lengua_. So, I +understood your order. Perhaps now you will--" + +He cut short his words, for he heard the dull "swish" of iron +scraping along tin. The admiral had drawn the cutlass of Pedro +Lafitte, and was darting upon him. The blade descended, and it was +only by a display of surprising agility that the large man escaped, +with only a bruised shoulder, the glancing weapon. He was drawing his +pistol as he sprang, and the next instant he shot the admiral down. + +Don Sabas stooped over him, and rose again. + +"In the heart," he said briefly. "_Seores_, the navy is abolished." + +Colonel Rafael sprang to the helm, and the other officer hastened to +loose the mainsail sheets. The boom swung round; _El Nacional_ veered +and began to tack industriously for the _Salvador_. + +"Strike that flag, seor," called Colonel Rafael. "Our friends on the +steamer will wonder why we are sailing under it." + +"Well said," cried Don Sabas. Advancing to the mast he lowered the +flag to the deck, where lay its too loyal supporter. Thus ended the +Minister of War's little piece of after-dinner drollery, and by the +same hand that began it. + +Suddenly Don Sabas gave a great cry of joy, and ran down the slanting +deck to the side of Colonel Rafael. Across his arm he carried the +flag of the extinguished navy. + +"_Mire! mire! seor._ Ah, _Dios!_ Already can I hear that great bear +of an _Oestreicher_ shout, _'Du hast mein herz gebrochen!' Mire!_ +Of my friend, Herr Grunitz, of Vienna, you have heard me relate. +That man has travelled to Ceylon for an orchid--to Patagonia for a +headdress--to Benares for a slipper--to Mozambique for a spearhead +to add to his famous collections. Thou knowest, also, _amigo_ Rafael, +that I have been a gatherer of curios. My collection of battle flags +of the world's navies was the most complete in existence until last +year. Then Herr Grunitz secured two, O! such rare specimens. One of a +Barbary state, and one of the Makarooroos, a tribe on the west coast +of Africa. I have not those, but they can be procured. But this flag, +seor--do you know what it is? Name of God! do you know? See that +red cross upon the blue and white ground! You never saw it before? +_Seguramente no._ It is the naval flag of your country. _Mire!_ +This rotten tub we stand upon is its navy--that dead cockatoo lying +there was its commander--that stroke of cutlass and single pistol +shot a sea battle. All a piece of absurd foolery, I grant you--but +authentic. There has never been another flag like this, and there +never will be another. No. It is unique in the whole world. Yes. +Think of what that means to a collector of flags! Do you know, +_Coronel mio_, how many golden crowns Herr Grunitz would give for +this flag? Ten thousand, likely. Well, a hundred thousand would not +buy it. Beautiful flag! Only flag! Little devil of a most heaven-born +flag! _O-h!_ old grumbler beyond the ocean. Wait till Don Sabas +comes again to the Knigin Strasse. He will let you kneel and touch +the folds of it with one finger. _O-h!_ old spectacled ransacker of +the world!" + +Forgotten was the impotent revolution, the danger, the loss, the +gall of defeat. Possessed solely by the inordinate and unparalleled +passion of the collector, he strode up and down the little deck, +clasping to his breast with one hand the paragon of a flag. He +snapped his fingers triumphantly toward the east. He shouted the +paean to his prize in trumpet tones, as though he would make old +Grunitz hear in his musty den beyond the sea. + +They were waiting, on the _Salvador_, to welcome them. The sloop came +close alongside the steamer where her sides were sliced almost to the +lower deck for the loading of fruit. The sailors of the _Salvador_ +grappled and held her there. + +Captain McLeod leaned over the side. + +"Well, seor, the jig is up, I'm told." + +"The jig is up?" Don Sabas looked perplexed for a moment. "That +revolution--ah, yes!" With a shrug of his shoulders he dismissed the +matter. + +The captain learned of the escape and the imprisoned crew. + +"Caribs?" he said; "no harm in them." He slipped down into the sloop +and kicked loose the hasp of the hatch. The black fellows came +tumbling up, sweating but grinning. + +"Hey! black boys!" said the captain, in a dialect of his own; "you +sabe, catchy boat and vamos back same place quick." + +They saw him point to themselves, the sloop and Coralio. "Yas, yas!" +they cried, with broader grins and many nods. + +The four--Don Sabas, the two officers and the captain--moved to quit +the sloop. Don Sabas lagged a little behind, looking at the still +form of the late admiral, sprawled in his paltry trappings. + +"_Pobrecito loco_," he said softly. + +He was a brilliant cosmopolite and a _cognoscente_ of high rank; but, +after all, he was of the same race and blood and instinct as this +people. Even as the simple _paisanos_ of Coralio had said it, so said +Don Sabas. Without a smile, he looked, and said, "The poor little +crazed one!" + +Stooping he raised the limp shoulders, drew the priceless and +induplicable flag under them and over the breast, pinning it there +with the diamond star of the Order of San Carlos that he took from +the collar of his own coat. + +He followed after the others, and stood with them upon the deck of +the _Salvador_. The sailors that steadied _El Nacional_ shoved her +off. The jabbering Caribs hauled away at the rigging; the sloop +headed for the shore. + +And Herr Grunitz's collection of naval flags was still the finest in +the world. + + + + +X + +THE SHAMROCK AND THE PALM + + +One night when there was no breeze, and Coralio seemed closer than +ever to the gratings of Avernus, five men were grouped about the door +of the photograph establishment of Keogh and Clancy. Thus, in all the +scorched and exotic places of the earth, Caucasians meet when the +day's work is done to preserve the fulness of their heritage by the +aspersion of alien things. + +Johnny Atwood lay stretched upon the grass in the undress uniform +of a Carib, and prated feebly of cool water to be had in the +cucumber-wood pumps of Dalesburg. Dr. Gregg, through the prestige of +his whiskers and as a bribe against the relation of his imminent +professional tales, was conceded the hammock that was swung between +the door jamb and a calabash-tree. Keogh had moved out upon the grass +a little table that held the instrument for burnishing completed +photographs. He was the only busy one of the group. Industriously +from between the cylinders of the burnisher rolled the finished +depictments of Coralio's citizens. Blanchard, the French mining +engineer, in his cool linen viewed the smoke of his cigarette through +his calm glasses, impervious to the heat. Clancy sat on the steps, +smoking his short pipe. His mood was the gossip's; the others were +reduced, by the humidity, to the state of disability desirable in an +audience. + +Clancy was an American with an Irish diathesis and cosmopolitan +proclivities. Many businesses had claimed him, but not for long. +The roadster's blood was in his veins. The voice of the tintype was +but one of the many callings that had wooed him upon so many roads. +Sometimes he could be persuaded to oral construction of his voyages +into the informal and egregious. To-night there were symptoms of +divulgement in him. + +"'Tis elegant weather for filibusterin'," he volunteered. "It reminds +me of the time I struggled to liberate a nation from the poisonous +breath of a tyrant's clutch. 'Twas hard work. 'Tis strainin' to the +back and makes corns on the hands." + +"I didn't know you had ever lent your sword to an oppressed people," +murmured Atwood, from the grass. + +"I did," said Clancy; "and they turned it into a ploughshare." + +"What country was so fortunate as to secure your aid?" airily +inquired Blanchard. + +"Where's Kamchatka?" asked Clancy, with seeming irrelevance. + +"Why, off Siberia somewhere in the Arctic regions," somebody +answered, doubtfully. + +"I thought that was the cold one," said Clancy, with a satisfied nod. +"I'm always gettin' the two names mixed. 'Twas Guatemala, then--the +hot one--I've been filibusterin' with. Ye'll find that country on the +map. 'Tis in the district known as the tropics. By the foresight of +Providence, it lies on the coast so the geography man could run the +names of the towns off into the water. They're an inch long, small +type, composed of Spanish dialects, and, 'tis my opinion, of the same +system of syntax that blew up the _Maine_. Yes, 'twas that country I +sailed against, single-handed, and endeavoured to liberate it from +a tyrannical government with a single-barreled pickaxe, unloaded +at that. Ye don't understand, of course. 'Tis a statement demandin' +elucidation and apologies. + +"'Twas in New Orleans one morning about the first of June; I was +standin' down on the wharf, lookin' about at the ships in the river. +There was a little steamer moored right opposite me that seemed about +ready to sail. The funnels of it were throwin' out smoke, and a gang +of roustabouts were carryin' aboard a pile of boxes that was stacked +up on the wharf. The boxes were about two feet square, and somethin' +like four feet long, and they seemed to be pretty heavy. + +"I walked over, careless, to the stack of boxes. I saw one of them +had been broken in handlin'. 'Twas curiosity made me pull up the +loose top and look inside. The box was packed full of Winchester +rifles. 'So, so,' says I to myself; 'somebody's gettin' a twist on +the neutrality laws. Somebody's aidin' with munitions of war. I +wonder where the popguns are goin'?' + +"I heard somebody cough, and I turned around. There stood a +little, round, fat man with a brown face and white clothes, a +first-class-looking little man, with a four-karat diamond on his +finger and his eye full of interrogations and respects. I judged +he was a kind of foreigner--may be from Russia or Japan or the +archipelagoes. + +"'Hist!' says the round man, full of concealments and confidences. +'Will the seor respect the discoveryments he has made, that the mans +on the ship shall not be acquaint? The seor will be a gentleman that +shall not expose one thing that by accident occur.' + +"'Monseer,' says I--for I judged him to be a kind of +Frenchman--'receive my most exasperated assurances that your secret +is safe with James Clancy. Furthermore, I will go so far as to +remark, Veev la Liberty--veev it good and strong. Whenever you hear +of a Clancy obstructin' the abolishment of existin' governments you +may notify me by return mail.' + +"'The seor is good,' says the dark, fat man, smilin' under his +black mustache. 'Wish you to come aboard my ship and drink of wine a +glass.' + +"Bein' a Clancy, in two minutes me and the foreigner man were seated +at a table in the cabin of the steamer, with a bottle between us. I +could hear the heavy boxes bein' dumped into the hold. I judged that +cargo must consist of at least 2,000 Winchesters. Me and the brown +man drank the bottle of stuff, and he called the steward to bring +another. When you amalgamate a Clancy with the contents of a bottle +you practically instigate secession. I had heard a good deal about +these revolutions in them tropical localities, and I begun to want a +hand in it. + +"'You goin' to stir things up in your country, ain't you, monseer?' +says I, with a wink to let him know I was on. + +"'Yes, yes,' said the little man, pounding his fist on the table. +'A change of the greatest will occur. Too long have the people been +oppressed with the promises and the never-to-happen things to become. +The great work it shall be carry on. Yes. Our forces shall in the +capital city strike of the soonest. _Carrambos!_' + +"'_Carrambos_ is the word,' says I, beginning to invest myself with +enthusiasm and more wine, 'likewise veeva, as I said before. May the +shamrock of old--I mean the banana-vine or the pie-plant, or whatever +the imperial emblem may be of your down-trodden country, wave +forever.' + +"'A thousand thank-yous,' says the round man, 'for your emission of +amicable utterances. What our cause needs of the very most is mans +who will the work do, to lift it along. Oh, for one thousands strong, +good mans to aid the General De Vega that he shall to his country +bring those success and glory! It is hard--oh, so hard to find good +mans to help in the work.' + +"'Monseer,' says I, leanin' over the table and graspin' his hand, +'I don't know where your country is, but me heart bleeds for it. The +heart of a Clancy was never deaf to the sight of an oppressed people. +The family is filibusterers by birth, and foreigners by trade. If you +can use James Clancy's arms and his blood in denudin' your shores of +the tyrant's yoke they're yours to command.' + +"General De Vega was overcome with joy to confiscate my condolence of +his conspiracies and predicaments. He tried to embrace me across the +table, but his fatness, and the wine that had been in the bottles, +prevented. Thus was I welcomed into the ranks of filibustery. Then +the general man told me his country had the name of Guatemala, and +was the greatest nation laved by any ocean whatever anywhere. He +looked at me with tears in his eyes, and from time to time he would +emit the remark, 'Ah! big, strong, brave mans! That is what my +country need.' + +"General De Vega, as was the name by which he denounced himself, +brought out a document for me to sign, which I did, makin' a fine +flourish and curlycue with the tail of the 'y.' + +"'Your passage-money,' says the general, business-like, 'shall from +your pay be deduct.' + +"'Twill not,' says I, haughty. 'I'll pay my own passage.' A hundred +and eighty dollars I had in my inside pocket, and 'twas no common +filibuster I was goin' to be, filibusterin' for me board and clothes. + +"The steamer was to sail in two hours, and I went ashore to get some +things together I'd need. When I came aboard I showed the general +with pride the outfit. 'Twas a fine Chinchilla overcoat, Arctic +overshoes, fur cap and earmuffs, with elegant fleece-lined gloves and +woolen muffler. + +"'_Carrambos!_' says the little general. 'What clothes are these that +shall go to the tropic?' And then the little spalpeen laughs, and he +calls the captain, and the captain calls the purser, and they pipe up +the chief engineer, and the whole gang leans against the cabin and +laughs at Clancy's wardrobe for Guatemala. + +"I reflects a bit, serious, and asks the general again to denominate +the terms by which his country is called. He tells me, and I see then +that 'twas the t'other one, Kamchatka, I had in mind. Since then I've +had difficulty in separatin' the two nations in name, climate and +geographic disposition. + +"I paid my passage--twenty-four dollars, first cabin--and ate at +table with the officer crowd. Down on the lower deck was a gang of +second-class passengers, about forty of them, seemin' to be Dagoes +and the like. I wondered what so many of them were goin' along for. + +"Well, then, in three days we sailed alongside that Guatemala. 'Twas +a blue country, and not yellow as 'tis miscolored on the map. We +landed at a town on the coast, where a train of cars was waitin' for +us on a dinky little railroad. The boxes on the steamer were brought +ashore and loaded on the cars. The gang of Dagoes got aboard, too, +the general and me in the front car. Yes, me and General De Vega +headed the revolution, as it pulled out of the seaport town. That +train travelled about as fast as a policeman goin' to a riot. It +penetrated the most conspicuous lot of fuzzy scenery ever seen +outside a geography. We run some forty miles in seven hours, and the +train stopped. There was no more railroad. 'Twas a sort of camp in a +damp gorge full of wildness and melancholies. They was gradin' and +choppin' out the forests ahead to continue the road. 'Here,' says I +to myself, 'is the romantic haunt of the revolutionists. Here will +Clancy, by the virtue that is in a superior race and the inculcation +of Fenian tactics, strike a tremendous blow for liberty.' + +"They unloaded the boxes from the train and begun to knock the tops +off. From the first one that was open I saw General De Vega take the +Winchester rifles and pass them around to a squad of morbid soldiery. +The other boxes was opened next, and, believe me or not, divil +another gun was to be seen. Every other box in the load was full of +pickaxes and spades. + +"And then--sorrow be upon them tropics--the proud Clancy and the +dishonoured Dagoes, each one of them, had to shoulder a pick or a +spade, and march away to work on that dirty little railroad. Yes; +'twas that the Dagoes shipped for, and 'twas that the filibusterin' +Clancy signed for, though unbeknownst to himself at the time. In +after days I found out about it. It seems 'twas hard to get hands +to work on that road. The intelligent natives of the country was +too lazy to work. Indeed, the saints know, 'twas unnecessary. By +stretchin' out one hand, they could seize the most delicate and +costly fruits of the earth, and, by stretchin' out the other, they +could sleep for days at a time without hearin' a seven-o'clock +whistle or the footsteps of the rent man upon the stairs. So, +regular, the steamers travelled to the United States to seduce +labour. Usually the imported spade-slingers died in two or three +months from eatin' the over-ripe water and breathin' the violent +tropical scenery. Wherefore they made them sign contracts for a year, +when they hired them, and put an armed guard over the poor divils to +keep them from runnin' away. + +"'Twas thus I was double-crossed by the tropics through a family +failin' of goin' out of the way to hunt disturbances. + +"They gave me a pick, and I took it, meditatin' an insurrection on +the spot; but there was the guards handlin' the Winchesters careless, +and I come to the conclusion that discretion was the best part of +filibusterin'. There was about a hundred of us in the gang startin' +out to work, and the word was given to move. I steps out of the ranks +and goes up to that General De Vega man, who was smokin' a cigar and +gazin' upon the scene with satisfactions and glory. He smiles at me +polite and devilish. 'Plenty work,' says he, 'for big, strong mans in +Guatemala. Yes. T'irty dollars in the month. Good pay. Ah, yes. You +strong, brave man. Bimeby we push those railroad in the capital very +quick. They want you go work now. _Adios_, strong mans.' + +"'Monseer,' says I, lingerin', 'will you tell a poor little Irishman +this: When I set foot on your cockroachy steamer, and breathed +liberal and revolutionary sentiments into your sour wine, did you +think I was conspirin' to sling a pick on your contemptuous little +railroad? And when you answered me with patriotic recitations, +humping up the star-spangled cause of liberty, did you have +meditations of reducin' me to the ranks of the stump-grubbin' Dagoes +in the chain-gangs of your vile and grovelin' country?' + +"The general man expanded his rotundity and laughed considerable. +Yes, he laughed very long and loud, and I, Clancy, stood and waited. + +"'Comical mans!' he shouts, at last. 'So you will kill me from the +laughing. Yes; it is hard to find the brave, strong mans to aid my +country. Revolutions? Did I speak of r-r-revolutions? Not one word. +I say, big, strong mans is need in Guatemala. So. The mistake is of +you. You have looked in those one box containing those gun for the +guard. You think all boxes is contain gun? No. + +"'There is not war in Guatemala. But work? Yes. Good. T'irty dollar +in the month. You shall shoulder one pickaxe, seor, and dig for the +liberty and prosperity of Guatemala. Off to your work. The guard +waits for you.' + +"'Little, fat, poodle dog of a brown man,' says I, quiet, but full of +indignations and discomforts, 'things shall happen to you. Maybe not +right away, but as soon as J. Clancy can formulate somethin' in the +way of repartee.' + +"The boss of the gang orders us to work. I tramps off with the +Dagoes, and I hears the distinguished patriot and kidnapper laughin' +hearty as we go. + +"'Tis a sorrowful fact, for eight weeks I built railroads for that +misbehavin' country. I filibustered twelve hours a day with a heavy +pick and a spade, choppin' away the luxurious landscape that grew +upon the right of way. We worked in swamps that smelled like there +was a leak in the gas mains, trampin' down a fine assortment of the +most expensive hothouse plants and vegetables. The scene was tropical +beyond the wildest imagination of the geography man. The trees was +all sky-scrapers; the underbrush was full of needles and pins; +there was monkeys jumpin' around and crocodiles and pink-tailed +mockin'-birds, and ye stood knee-deep in the rotten water and +grabbled roots for the liberation of Guatemala. Of nights we would +build smudges in camp to discourage the mosquitoes, and sit in the +smoke, with the guards pacin' all around us. There was two hundred +men workin' on the road--mostly Dagoes, nigger-men, Spanish-men and +Swedes. Three or four were Irish. + +"One old man named Halloran--a man of Hibernian entitlements and +discretions, explained it to me. He had been workin' on the road a +year. Most of them died in less than six months. He was dried up to +gristle and bone, and shook with chills every third night. + +"'When you first come,' says he, 'ye think ye'll leave right away. +But they hold out your first month's pay for your passage over, and +by that time the tropics has its grip on ye. Ye're surrounded by a +ragin' forest full of disreputable beasts--lions and baboons and +anacondas--waitin' to devour ye. The sun strikes ye hard, and melts +the marrow in your bones. Ye get similar to the lettuce-eaters the +poetry-book speaks about. Ye forget the elevated sintiments of life, +such as patriotism, revenge, disturbances of the peace and the dacint +love of a clane shirt. Ye do your work, and ye swallow the kerosene +ile and rubber pipestems dished up to ye by the Dago cook for food. +Ye light your pipeful, and say to yoursilf, "Nixt week I'll break +away," and ye go to sleep and call yersilf a liar, for ye know ye'll +never do it.' + +"'Who is this general man,' asks I, 'that calls himself De Vega?' + +"''Tis the man,' says Halloran, 'who is tryin' to complete +the finishin' of the railroad. 'Twas the project of a private +corporation, but it busted, and then the government took it up. De +Vegy is a big politician, and wants to be prisident. The people want +the railroad completed, as they're taxed mighty on account of it. The +De Vegy man is pushin' it along as a campaign move.' + +"''Tis not my way,' says I, 'to make threats against any man, but +there's an account to be settled between the railroad man and James +O'Dowd Clancy.' + +"''Twas that way I thought, mesilf, at first,' Halloran says, with a +big sigh, 'until I got to be a lettuce-eater. The fault's wid these +tropics. They rejuices a man's system. 'Tis a land, as the poet says, +"Where it always seems to be after dinner." I does me work and smokes +me pipe and sleeps. There's little else in life, anyway. Ye'll get +that way yersilf, mighty soon. Don't be harbourin' any sintiments at +all, Clancy.' + +"'I can't help it,' says I; 'I'm full of 'em. I enlisted in the +revolutionary army of this dark country in good faith to fight for +its liberty, honours and silver candlesticks; instead of which I +am set to amputatin' its scenery and grubbin' its roots. 'Tis the +general man will have to pay for it.' + +"Two months I worked on that railroad before I found a chance to get +away. One day a gang of us was sent back to the end of the completed +line to fetch some picks that had been sent down to Port Barrios to +be sharpened. They were brought on a hand-car, and I noticed, when I +started away, that the car was left there on the track. + +"That night, about twelve, I woke up Halloran and told him my scheme. + +"'Run away?' says Halloran. 'Good Lord, Clancy, do ye mean it? Why, I +ain't got the nerve. It's too chilly, and I ain't slept enough. Run +away? I told you, Clancy, I've eat the lettuce. I've lost my grip. +'Tis the tropics that's done it. 'Tis like the poet says: "Forgotten +are our friends that we have left behind; in the hollow lettuce-land +we will live and lay reclined." You better go on, Clancy. I'll stay, +I guess. It's too early and cold, and I'm sleepy.' + +"So I had to leave Halloran. I dressed quiet, and slipped out of the +tent we were in. When the guard came along I knocked him over, like +a ninepin, with a green cocoanut I had, and made for the railroad. +I got on that hand-car and made it fly. 'Twas yet a while before +daybreak when I saw the lights of Port Barrios about a mile away. I +stopped the hand-car there and walked to the town. I stepped inside +the corporations of that town with care and hesitations. I was not +afraid of the army of Guatemala, but me soul quaked at the prospect +of a hand-to-hand struggle with its employment bureau. 'Tis a country +that hires its help easy and keeps 'em long. Sure I can fancy Missis +America and Missis Guatemala passin' a bit of gossip some fine, still +night across the mountains. 'Oh, dear,' says Missis America, 'and +it's a lot of trouble I'm havin' ag'in with the help, seora, ma'am.' +'Laws, now!' says Missis Guatemala, 'you don't say so, ma'am! Now, +mine never think of leavin' me--te-he! ma'am,' snickers Missis +Guatemala. + +"I was wonderin' how I was goin' to move away from them tropics +without bein' hired again. Dark as it was, I could see a steamer +ridin' in the harbour, with smoke emergin' from her stacks. I turned +down a little grass street that run down to the water. On the beach I +found a little brown nigger-man just about to shove off in a skiff. + +"'Hold on, Sambo,' says I, 'savve English?' + +"'Heap plenty, yes,' says he, with a pleasant grin. + +"'What steamer is that?' I asks him, 'and where is it going? And +what's the news, and the good word and the time of day?' + +"'That steamer the _Conchita_,' said the brown man, affable and easy, +rollin' a cigarette. 'Him come from New Orleans for load banana. Him +got load last night. I think him sail in one, two hour. Verree nice +day we shall be goin' have. You hear some talkee 'bout big battle, +maybe so? You think catchee General De Vega, seor? Yes? No?' + +"'How's that, Sambo?' says I. 'Big battle? What battle? Who wants +catchee General De Vega? I've been up at my old gold mines in the +interior for a couple of months, and haven't heard any news.' + +"'Oh,' says the nigger-man, proud to speak the English, 'verree great +revolution in Guatemala one week ago. General De Vega, him try be +president. Him raise armee--one--five--ten thousand mans for fight +at the government. Those one government send five--forty--hundred +thousand soldier to suppress revolution. They fight big battle +yesterday at Lomagrande--that about nineteen or fifty mile in the +mountain. That government soldier wheep General De Vega--oh, most +bad. Five hundred--nine hundred--two thousand of his mans is kill. +That revolution is smash suppress--bust--very quick. General De Vega, +him r-r-run away fast on one big mule. Yes, _carrambos!_ The general, +him r-r-run away, and his armee is kill. That government soldier, +they try find General De Vega verree much. They want catchee him for +shoot. You think they catchee that general, seor?' + +"'Saints grant it!' says I. ''Twould be the judgment of Providence +for settin' the warlike talent of a Clancy to gradin' the tropics +with a pick and shovel. But 'tis not so much a question of +insurrections now, me little man, as 'tis of the hired-man problem. +'Tis anxious I am to resign a situation of responsibility and trust +with the white wings department of your great and degraded country. +Row me in your little boat out to that steamer, and I'll give ye five +dollars--sinker pacers--sinker pacers,' says I, reducin' the offer to +the language and denomination of the tropic dialects. + +"'_Cinco pesos_,' repeats the little man. 'Five dollee, you give?' + +"'Twas not such a bad little man. He had hesitations at first, sayin' +that passengers leavin' the country had to have papers and passports, +but at last he took me out alongside the steamer. + +"Day was just breakin' as we struck her, and there wasn't a soul to +be seen on board. The water was very still, and the nigger-man gave +me a lift from the boat, and I climbed onto the steamer where her +side was sliced to the deck for loadin' fruit. The hatches was open, +and I looked down and saw the cargo of bananas that filled the hold +to within six feet of the top. I thinks to myself, 'Clancy, you +better go as a stowaway. It's safer. The steamer men might hand you +back to the employment bureau. The tropic'll get you, Clancy, if you +don't watch out.' + +"So I jumps down easy among the bananas, and digs out a hole to hide +in among the bunches. In an hour or so I could hear the engines +goin', and feel the steamer rockin', and I knew we were off to sea. +They left the hatches open for ventilation, and pretty soon it +was light enough in the hold to see fairly well. I got to feelin' +a bit hungry, and thought I'd have a light fruit lunch, by way +of refreshment. I creeped out of the hole I'd made and stood up +straight. Just then I saw another man crawl up about ten feet away +and reach out and skin a banana and stuff it into his mouth. 'Twas +a dirty man, black-faced and ragged and disgraceful of aspect. Yes, +the man was a ringer for the pictures of the fat Weary Willie in the +funny papers. I looked again, and saw it was my general man--De Vega, +the great revolutionist, mule-rider and pickaxe importer. When he saw +me the general hesitated with his mouth filled with banana and his +eyes the size of cocoanuts. + +"'Hist!' I says. 'Not a word, or they'll put us off and make us walk. +"Veev la Liberty!"' I adds, copperin' the sentiment by shovin' a +banana into the source of it. I was certain the general wouldn't +recognize me. The nefarious work of the tropics had left me lookin' +different. There was half an inch of roan whiskers coverin' me face, +and me costume was a pair of blue overalls and a red shirt. + +"'How you come in the ship, seor?' asked the general as soon as he +could speak. + +"'By the back door--whist!' says I. ''Twas a glorious blow for +liberty we struck,' I continues; 'but we was overpowered by numbers. +Let us accept our defeat like brave men and eat another banana.' + +"'Were you in the cause of liberty fightin', seor?' says the +general, sheddin' tears on the cargo. + +"'To the last,' says I. ''Twas I led the last desperate charge +against the minions of the tyrant. But it made them mad, and we was +forced to retreat. 'Twas I, general, procured the mule upon which +you escaped. Could you give that ripe bunch a little boost this way, +general? It's a bit out of my reach. Thanks.' + +"'Say you so, brave patriot?' said the general, again weepin'. 'Ah, +_Dios!_ And I have not the means to reward your devotion. Barely did +I my life bring away. _Carrambos!_ what a devil's animal was that +mule, seor! Like ships in one storm was I dashed about. The skin +on myself was ripped away with the thorns and vines. Upon the bark +of a hundred trees did that beast of the infernal bump, and cause +outrage to the legs of mine. In the night to Port Barrios I came. I +dispossess myself of that mountain of mule and hasten along the water +shore. I find a little boat to be tied. I launch myself and row to +the steamer. I cannot see any mans on board, so I climbed one rope +which hang at the side. I then myself hide in the bananas. Surely, I +say, if the ship captains view me, they shall throw me again to those +Guatemala. Those things are not good. Guatemala will shoot General +De Vega. Therefore, I am hide and remain silent. Life itself is +glorious. Liberty, it is pretty good; but so good as life I do not +think.' + +"Three days, as I said, was the trip to New Orleans. The general man +and me got to be cronies of the deepest dye. Bananas we ate until +they were distasteful to the sight and an eyesore to the palate, but +to bananas alone was the bill of fare reduced. At night I crawls out, +careful, on the lower deck, and gets a bucket of fresh water. + +"That General De Vega was a man inhabited by an engorgement of words +and sentences. He added to the monotony of the voyage by divestin' +himself of conversation. He believed I was a revolutionist of his own +party, there bein', as he told me, a good many Americans and other +foreigners in its ranks. 'Twas a braggart and a conceited little +gabbler it was, though he considered himself a hero. 'Twas on himself +he wasted all his regrets at the failin' of his plot. Not a word did +the little balloon have to say about the other misbehavin' idiots +that had been shot, or run themselves to death in his revolution. + +"The second day out he was feelin' pretty braggy and uppish for a +stowed-away conspirator that owed his existence to a mule and stolen +bananas. He was tellin' me about the great railroad he had been +buildin', and he relates what he calls a comic incident about a fool +Irishman he inveigled from New Orleans to sling a pick on his little +morgue of a narrow-gauge line. 'Twas sorrowful to hear the little, +dirty general tell the opprobrious story of how he put salt upon the +tail of that reckless and silly bird, Clancy. Laugh, he did, hearty +and long. He shook with laughin', the black-faced rebel and outcast, +standin' neck-deep in bananas, without friends or country. + +"'Ah, seor,' he snickers, 'to the death you would have laughed at +that drollest Irish. I say to him: "Strong, big mans is need very +much in Guatemala." "I will blows strike for your down-pressed +country," he say. "That shall you do," I tell him. Ah! it was an +Irish so comic. He sees one box break upon the wharf that contain for +the guard a few gun. He think there is gun in all the box. But that +is all pickaxe. Yes. Ah! seor, could you the face of that Irish have +seen when they set him to the work!' + +"'Twas thus the ex-boss of the employment bureau contributed to the +tedium of the trip with merry jests and anecdote. But now and then he +would weep upon the bananas and make oration about the lost cause of +liberty and the mule. + +"'Twas a pleasant sound when the steamer bumped against the pier in +New Orleans. Pretty soon we heard the pat-a-pat of hundreds of bare +feet, and the Dago gang that unloads the fruit jumped on the deck and +down into the hold. Me and the general worked a while at passin' up +the bunches, and they thought we were part of the gang. After about +an hour we managed to slip off the steamer onto the wharf. + +"'Twas a great honour on the hands of an obscure Clancy, havin' the +entertainment of the representative of a great foreign filibusterin' +power. I first bought for the general and myself many long drinks +and things to eat that were not bananas. The general man trotted +along at my side, leavin' all the arrangements to me. I led him +up to Lafayette Square and set him on a bench in the little park. +Cigarettes I had bought for him, and he humped himself down on the +seat like a little, fat, contented hobo. I look him over as he sets +there, and what I see pleases me. Brown by nature and instinct, he +is now brindled with dirt and dust. Praise to the mule, his clothes +is mostly strings and flaps. Yes, the looks of the general man is +agreeable to Clancy. + +"I ask him, delicate, if, by any chance, he brought away anybody's +money with him from Guatemala. He sighs and bumps his shoulders +against the bench. Not a cent. All right. Maybe, he tells me, some +of his friends in the tropic outfit will send him funds later. The +general was as clear a case of no visible means as I ever saw. + +"I told him not to move from the bench, and then I went up to the +corner of Poydras and Carondelet. Along there is O'Hara's beat. In +five minutes along comes O'Hara, a big, fine man, red-faced, with +shinin' buttons, swingin' his club. 'Twould be a fine thing for +Guatemala to move into O'Hara's precinct. 'Twould be a fine bit of +recreation for Danny to suppress revolutions and uprisin's once or +twice a week with his club. + +"'Is 5046 workin' yet, Danny?' says I, walkin' up to him. + +"'Overtime,' says O'Hara, lookin' over me suspicious. 'Want some of +it?' + +"Fifty-forty-six is the celebrated city ordinance authorizin' arrest, +conviction and imprisonment of persons that succeed in concealin' +their crimes from the police. + +"'Don't ye know Jimmy Clancy?' says I. 'Ye pink-gilled monster.' So, +when O'Hara recognized me beneath the scandalous exterior bestowed +upon me by the tropics, I backed him into a doorway and told him what +I wanted, and why I wanted it. 'All right, Jimmy,' says O'Hara. 'Go +back and hold the bench. I'll be along in ten minutes.' + +"In that time O'Hara strolled through Lafayette Square and spied two +Weary Willies disgracin' one of the benches. In ten minutes more J. +Clancy and General De Vega, late candidate for the presidency of +Guatemala, was in the station house. The general is badly frightened, +and calls upon me to proclaim his distinguishments and rank. + +"'The man,' says I to the police, 'used to be a railroad man. He's on +the bum now. 'Tis a little bughouse he is, on account of losin' his +job.' + +"'_Carrambos!_' says the general, fizzin' like a little soda-water +fountain, 'you fought, seor, with my forces in my native country. +Why do you say the lies? You shall say I am the General De Vega, one +soldier, one _caballero_--' + +"'Railroader,' says I again. 'On the hog. No good. Been livin' for +three days on stolen bananas. Look at him. Ain't that enough?' + +"Twenty-five dollars or sixty days, was what the recorder gave the +general. He didn't have a cent, so he took the time. They let me go, +as I knew they would, for I had money to show, and O'Hara spoke for +me. Yes; sixty days he got. 'Twas just so long that I slung a pick +for the great country of Kam--Guatemala." + +Clancy paused. The bright starlight showed a reminiscent look of +happy content on his seasoned features. Keogh leaned in his chair and +gave his partner a slap on his thinly-clad back that sounded like the +crack of the surf on the sands. + +"Tell 'em, ye divil," he chuckled, "how you got even with the +tropical general in the way of agricultural manoeuvrings." + +"Havin' no money," concluded Clancy, with unction, "they set him +to work his fine out with a gang from the parish prison clearing +Ursulines Street. Around the corner was a saloon decorated genially +with electric fans and cool merchandise. I made that me headquarters, +and every fifteen minutes I'd walk around and take a look at the +little man filibusterin' with a rake and shovel. 'Twas just such +a hot broth of a day as this has been. And I'd call at him 'Hey, +monseer!' and he'd look at me black, with the damp showin' through +his shirt in places. + +"'Fat, strong mans,' says I to General De Vega, 'is needed in New +Orleans. Yes. To carry on the good work. Carrambos! Erin go bragh!'" + + + + +XI + +THE REMNANTS OF THE CODE + + +Breakfast in Coralio was at eleven. Therefore the people did not go +to market early. The little wooden market-house stood on a patch of +short-trimmed grass, under the vivid green foliage of a bread-fruit +tree. + +Thither one morning the venders leisurely convened, bringing their +wares with them. A porch or platform six feet wide encircled the +building, shaded from the mid-morning sun by the projecting, +grass-thatched roof. Upon this platform the venders were wont to +display their goods--newly-killed beef, fish, crabs, fruit of the +country, cassava, eggs, _dulces_ and high, tottering stacks of native +tortillas as large around as the sombrero of a Spanish grandee. + +But on this morning they whose stations lay on the seaward side of +the market-house, instead of spreading their merchandise formed +themselves into a softly jabbering and gesticulating group. For +there upon their space of the platform was sprawled, asleep, the +unbeautiful figure of "Beelzebub" Blythe. He lay upon a ragged strip +of cocoa matting, more than ever a fallen angel in appearance. His +suit of coarse flax, soiled, bursting at the seams, crumpled into +a thousand diversified wrinkles and creases, inclosed him absurdly, +like the garb of some effigy that had been stuffed in sport and +thrown there after indignity had been wrought upon it. But firmly +upon the high bridge of his nose reposed his gold-rimmed glasses, the +surviving badge of his ancient glory. + +The sun's rays, reflecting quiveringly from the rippling sea upon his +face, and the voices of the market-men woke "Beelzebub" Blythe. He +sat up, blinking, and leaned his back against the wall of the market. +Drawing a blighted silk handkerchief from his pocket, he assiduously +rubbed and burnished his glasses. And while doing this he became +aware that his bedroom had been invaded, and that polite brown and +yellow men were beseeching him to vacate in favour of their market +stuff. + +If the seor would have the goodness--a thousand pardons for bringing +to him molestation--but soon would come the _compradores_ for the +day's provisions--surely they had ten thousand regrets at disturbing +him! + +In this manner they expanded to him the intimation that he must clear +out and cease to clog the wheels of trade. + +Blythe stepped from the platform with the air of a prince leaving +his canopied couch. He never quite lost that air, even at the lowest +point of his fall. It is clear that the college of good breeding does +not necessarily maintain a chair of morals within its walls. + +Blythe shook out his wry clothing, and moved slowly up the Calle +Grande through the hot sand. He moved without a destination in his +mind. The little town was languidly stirring to its daily life. +Golden-skinned babies tumbled over one another in the grass. The sea +breeze brought him appetite, but nothing to satisfy it. Throughout +Coralio were its morning odors--those from the heavily fragrant +tropical flowers and from the bread baking in the outdoor ovens of +clay and the pervading smoke of their fires. Where the smoke cleared, +the crystal air, with some of the efficacy of faith, seemed to remove +the mountains almost to the sea, bringing them so near that one might +count the scarred glades on their wooded sides. The light-footed +Caribs were swiftly gliding to their tasks at the waterside. Already +along the bosky trails from the banana groves files of horses were +slowly moving, concealed, except for their nodding heads and plodding +legs, by the bunches of green-golden fruit heaped upon their backs. +On doorsills sat women combing their long, black hair and calling, +one to another, across the narrow thoroughfares. Peace reigned in +Coralio--arid and bald peace; but still peace. + +On that bright morning when Nature seemed to be offering the lotus on +the Dawn's golden platter "Beelzebub" Blythe had reached rock bottom. +Further descent seemed impossible. That last night's slumber in +a public place had done for him. As long as he had had a roof to +cover him there had remained, unbridged, the space that separates a +gentleman from the beasts of the jungle and the fowls of the air. But +now he was little more than a whimpering oyster led to be devoured on +the sands of a Southern sea by the artful walrus, Circumstance, and +the implacable carpenter, Fate. + +To Blythe money was now but a memory. He had drained his friends of +all that their good-fellowship had to offer; then he had squeezed +them to the last drop of their generosity; and at the last, +Aaron-like, he had smitten the rock of their hardening bosoms for the +scattering, ignoble drops of Charity itself. + +He had exhausted his credit to the last _real_. With the minute +keenness of the shameless sponger he was aware of every source in +Coralio from which a glass of rum, a meal or a piece of silver could +be wheedled. Marshalling each such source in his mind, he considered +it with all the thoroughness and penetration that hunger and thirst +lent him for the task. All his optimism failed to thresh a grain of +hope from the chaff of his postulations. He had played out the game. +That one night in the open had shaken his nerves. Until then there +had been left to him at least a few grounds upon which he could base +his unblushing demands upon his neighbours' stores. Now he must beg +instead of borrowing. The most brazen sophistry could not dignify by +the name of "loan" the coin contemptuously flung to a beachcomber who +slept on the bare boards of the public market. + +But on this morning no beggar would have more thankfully received +a charitable coin, for the demon thirst had him by the throat--the +drunkard's matutinal thirst that requires to be slaked at each +morning station on the road to Tophet. + +Blythe walked slowly up the street, keeping a watchful eye for any +miracle that might drop manna upon him in his wilderness. As he +passed the popular eating house of Madama Vasquez, Madama's boarders +were just sitting down to freshly-baked bread, _aguacates_, pines and +delicious coffee that sent forth odorous guarantee of its quality +upon the breeze. Madama was serving; she turned her shy, stolid, +melancholy gaze for a moment out the window; she saw Blythe, and her +expression turned more shy and embarrassed. "Beelzebub" owed her +twenty _pesos_. He bowed as he had once bowed to less embarrassed +dames to whom he owed nothing, and passed on. + +Merchants and their clerks were throwing open the solid wooden doors +of their shops. Polite but cool were the glances they cast upon +Blythe as he lounged tentatively by with the remains of his old +jaunty air; for they were his creditors almost without exception. + +At the little fountain in the _plaza_ he made an apology for a toilet +with his wetted handkerchief. Across the open square filed the +dolorous line of friends of the prisoners in the _calaboza_, bearing +the morning meal of the immured. The food in their hands aroused +small longing in Blythe. It was drink that his soul craved, or money +to buy it. + +In the streets he met many with whom he had been friends and equals, +and whose patience and liberality he had gradually exhausted. +Willard Geddie and Paula cantered past him with the coolest of nods, +returning from their daily horseback ride along the old Indian road. +Keogh passed him at another corner, whistling cheerfully and bearing +a prize of newly-laid eggs for the breakfast of himself and Clancy. +The jovial scout of Fortune was one of Blythe's victims who had +plunged his hand oftenest into his pocket to aid him. But now it +seemed that Keogh, too, had fortified himself against further +invasions. His curt greeting and the ominous light in his full, grey +eye quickened the steps of "Beelzebub," whom desperation had almost +incited to attempt an additional "loan." + +Three drinking shops the forlorn one next visited in succession. In +all of these his money, his credit and his welcome had long since +been spent; but Blythe felt that he would have fawned in the dust at +the feet of an enemy that morning for one draught of _aguardiente_. +In two of the _pulperias_ his courageous petition for drink was met +with a refusal so polite that it stung worse than abuse. The third +establishment had acquired something of American methods; and here he +was seized bodily and cast out upon his hands and knees. + +This physical indignity caused a singular change in the man. As he +picked himself up and walked away, an expression of absolute relief +came upon his features. The specious and conciliatory smile that +had been graven there was succeeded by a look of calm and sinister +resolve. "Beelzebub" had been floundering in the sea of improbity, +holding by a slender life-line to the respectable world that had +cast him overboard. He must have felt that with this ultimate shock +the line had snapped, and have experienced the welcome ease of the +drowning swimmer who has ceased to struggle. + +Blythe walked to the next corner and stood there while he brushed the +sand from his garments and re-polished his glasses. + +"I've got to do it--oh, I've got to do it," he told himself, aloud. +"If I had a quart of rum I believe I could stave it off yet--for a +little while. But there's no more rum for--'Beelzebub,' as they call +me. By the flames of Tartarus! if I'm to sit at the right hand of +Satan somebody has got to pay the court expenses. You'll have to pony +up, Mr. Frank Goodwin. You're a good fellow; but a gentleman must +draw the line at being kicked into the gutter. Blackmail isn't a +pretty word, but it's the next station on the road I'm travelling." + +With purpose in his steps Blythe now moved rapidly through the town +by way of its landward environs. He passed through the squalid +quarters of the improvident negroes and on beyond the picturesque +shacks of the poorer _mestizos_. From many points along his course he +could see, through the umbrageous glades, the house of Frank Goodwin +on its wooded hill. And as he crossed the little bridge over the +lagoon he saw the old Indian, Galvez, scrubbing at the wooden slab +that bore the name of Miraflores. Beyond the lagoon the lands of +Goodwin began to slope gently upward. A grassy road, shaded by a +munificent and diverse array of tropical flora wound from the edge of +an outlying banana grove to the dwelling. Blythe took this road with +long and purposeful strides. + +Goodwin was seated on his coolest gallery, dictating letters to his +secretary, a sallow and capable native youth. The household adhered +to the American plan of breakfast; and that meal had been a thing of +the past for the better part of an hour. + +The castaway walked to the steps, and flourished a hand. + +"Good morning, Blythe," said Goodwin, looking up. "Come in and have a +chair. Anything I can do for you?" + +"I want to speak to you in private." + +Goodwin nodded at his secretary, who strolled out under a mango tree +and lit a cigarette. Blythe took the chair that he had left vacant. + +"I want some money," he began, doggedly. + +"I'm sorry," said Goodwin, with equal directness, "but you can't have +any. You're drinking yourself to death, Blythe. Your friends have +done all they could to help you to brace up. You won't help yourself. +There's no use furnishing you with money to ruin yourself with any +longer." + +"Dear man," said Blythe, tilting back his chair, "it isn't a question +of social economy now. It's past that. I like you, Goodwin; and I've +come to stick a knife between your ribs. I was kicked out of Espada's +saloon this morning; and Society owes me reparation for my wounded +feelings." + +"I didn't kick you out." + +"No; but in a general way you represent Society; and in a particular +way you represent my last chance. I've had to come down to it, old +man--I tried to do it a month ago when Losada's man was here turning +things over; but I couldn't do it then. Now it's different. I want a +thousand dollars, Goodwin; and you'll have to give it to me." + +"Only last week," said Goodwin, with a smile, "a silver dollar was +all you were asking for." + +"An evidence," said Blythe, flippantly, "that I was still +virtuous--though under heavy pressure. The wages of sin should be +something higher than a _peso_ worth forty-eight cents. Let's talk +business. I am the villain in the third act; and I must have my +merited, if only temporary, triumph. I saw you collar the late +president's valiseful of boodle. Oh, I know it's blackmail; but I'm +liberal about the price. I know I'm a cheap villain--one of the +regular sawmill-drama kind--but you're one of my particular friends, +and I don't want to stick you hard." + +"Suppose you go into the details," suggested Goodwin, calmly +arranging his letters on the table. + +"All right," said "Beelzebub." "I like the way you take it. I despise +histrionics; so you will please prepare yourself for the facts +without any red fire, calcium or grace notes on the saxophone. + +"On the night that His Fly-by-night Excellency arrived in town I +was very drunk. You will excuse the pride with which I state that +fact; but it was quite a feat for me to attain that desirable state. +Somebody had left a cot out under the orange trees in the yard of +Madama Ortiz's hotel. I stepped over the wall, laid down upon it, and +fell asleep. I was awakened by an orange that dropped from the tree +upon my nose; and I laid there for awhile cursing Sir Isaac Newton, +or whoever it was that invented gravitation, for not confining his +theory to apples. + +"And then along came Mr. Miraflores and his true-love with the +treasury in a valise, and went into the hotel. Next you hove in +sight, and held a pow-wow with the tonsorial artist who insisted upon +talking shop after hours. I tried to slumber again; but once more my +rest was disturbed--this time by the noise of the popgun that went +off upstairs. Then that valise came crashing down into an orange +tree just above my head; and I arose from my couch, not knowing +when it might begin to rain Saratoga trunks. When the army and the +constabulary began to arrive, with their medals and decorations +hastily pinned to their pajamas, and their snickersnees drawn, I +crawled into the welcome shadow of a banana plant. I remained there +for an hour, by which time the excitement and the people had cleared +away. And then, my dear Goodwin--excuse me--I saw you sneak back and +pluck that ripe and juicy valise from the orange tree. I followed +you, and saw you take it to your own house. A hundred-thousand-dollar +crop from one orange tree in a season about breaks the record of the +fruit-growing industry. + +"Being a gentleman at that time, of course, I never mentioned the +incident to anyone. But this morning I was kicked out of a saloon, +my code of honour is all out at the elbows, and I'd sell my mother's +prayer-book for three fingers of _aguardiente_. I'm not putting on +the screws hard. It ought to be worth a thousand to you for me to +have slept on that cot through the whole business without waking up +and seeing anything." + +Goodwin opened two more letters, and made memoranda in pencil on +them. Then he called "Manuel!" to his secretary, who came, spryly. + +"The _Ariel_--when does she sail?" asked Goodwin. + +"Seor," answered the youth, "at three this afternoon. She drops +down-coast to Punta Soledad to complete her cargo of fruit. From +there she sails for New Orleans without delay." + +"_Bueno!_" said Goodwin. "These letters may wait yet awhile." + +The secretary returned to his cigarette under the mango tree. + +"In round numbers," said Goodwin, facing Blythe squarely, "how much +money do you owe in this town, not including the sums you have +'borrowed' from me?" + +"Five hundred--at a rough guess," answered Blythe, lightly. + +"Go somewhere in the town and draw up a schedule of your debts," said +Goodwin. "Come back here in two hours, and I will send Manuel with +the money to pay them. I will also have a decent outfit of clothing +ready for you. You will sail on the _Ariel_ at three. Manuel will +accompany you as far as the deck of the steamer. There he will hand +you one thousand dollars in cash. I suppose that we needn't discuss +what you will be expected to do in return." + +"Oh, I understand," piped Blythe, cheerily. "I was asleep all the +time on the cot under Madama Ortiz's orange trees; and I shake off +the dust of Coralio forever. I'll play fair. No more of the lotus +for me. Your proposition is O. K. You're a good fellow, Goodwin; +and I let you off light. I'll agree to everything. But in the +meantime--I've a devil of a thirst on, old man--" + +"Not a _centavo_," said Goodwin, firmly, "until you are on board the +_Ariel_. You would be drunk in thirty minutes if you had money now." + +But he noticed the blood-streaked eyeballs, the relaxed form and the +shaking hands of "Beelzebub;" and he stepped into the dining room +through the low window, and brought out a glass and a decanter of +brandy. + +"Take a bracer, anyway, before you go," he proposed, even as a man to +the friend whom he entertains. + +"Beelzebub" Blythe's eyes glistened at the sight of the solace for +which his soul burned. To-day for the first time his poisoned nerves +had been denied their steadying dose; and their retort was a mounting +torment. He grasped the decanter and rattled its crystal mouth +against the glass in his trembling hand. He flushed the glass, and +then stood erect, holding it aloft for an instant. For one fleeting +moment he held his head above the drowning waves of his abyss. He +nodded easily at Goodwin, raised his brimming glass and murmured a +"health" that men had used in his ancient Paradise Lost. And then so +suddenly that he spilled the brandy over his hand, he set down his +glass, untasted. + +"In two hours," his dry lips muttered to Goodwin, as he marched down +the steps and turned his face toward the town. + +In the edge of the cool banana grove "Beelzebub" halted, and snapped +the tongue of his belt buckle into another hole. + +"I couldn't do it," he explained, feverishly, to the waving banana +fronds. "I wanted to, but I couldn't. A gentleman can't drink with +the man that he blackmails." + + + + +XII + +SHOES + + +John De Graffenreid Atwood ate of the lotus, root, stem, and flower. +The tropics gobbled him up. He plunged enthusiastically into his +work, which was to try to forget Rosine. + +Now, they who dine on the lotus rarely consume it plain. There is a +sauce _au diable_ that goes with it; and the distillers are the chefs +who prepare it. And on Johnny's menu card it read "brandy." With a +bottle between them, he and Billy Keogh would sit on the porch of the +little consulate at night and roar out great, indecorous songs, until +the natives, slipping hastily past, would shrug a shoulder and mutter +things to themselves about the "_Americanos diablos_." + +One day Johnny's _mozo_ brought the mail and dumped it on the table. +Johnny leaned from his hammock, and fingered the four or five +letters dejectedly. Keogh was sitting on the edge of the table +chopping lazily with a paper knife at the legs of a centipede that +was crawling among the stationery. Johnny was in that phase of +lotus-eating when all the world tastes bitter in one's mouth. + +"Same old thing!" he complained. "Fool people writing for information +about the country. They want to know all about raising fruit, and how +to make a fortune without work. Half of 'em don't even send stamps +for a reply. They think a consul hasn't anything to do but write +letters. Slit those envelopes for me, old man, and see what they +want. I'm feeling too rocky to move." + +Keogh, acclimated beyond all possibility of ill-humour, drew +his chair to the table with smiling compliance on his rose-pink +countenance, and began to slit open the letters. Four of them were +from citizens in various parts of the United States who seemed to +regard the consul at Coralio as a cyclopdia of information. They +asked long lists of questions, numerically arranged, about the +climate, products, possibilities, laws, business chances, and +statistics of the country in which the consul had the honour of +representing his own government. + +"Write 'em, please, Billy," said that inert official, "just a line, +referring them to the latest consular report. Tell 'em the State +Department will be delighted to furnish the literary gems. Sign my +name. Don't let your pen scratch, Billy; it'll keep me awake." + +"Don't snore," said Keogh, amiably, "and I'll do your work for you. +You need a corps of assistants, anyhow. Don't see how you ever get +out a report. Wake up a minute!--here's one more letter--it's from +your own town, too--Dalesburg." + +"That so?" murmured Johnny showing a mild and obligatory interest. +"What's it about?" + +"Postmaster writes," explained Keogh. "Says a citizen of the town +wants some facts and advice from you. Says the citizen has an idea in +his head of coming down where you are and opening a shoe store. Wants +to know if you think the business would pay. Says he's heard of the +boom along this coast, and wants to get in on the ground floor." + +In spite of the heat and his bad temper, Johnny's hammock swayed +with his laughter. Keogh laughed too; and the pet monkey on the top +shelf of the bookcase chattered in shrill sympathy with the ironical +reception of the letter from Dalesburg. + +"Great bunions!" exclaimed the consul. "Shoe store! What'll they ask +about next, I wonder? Overcoat factory, I reckon. Say, Billy--of our +3,000 citizens, how many do you suppose ever had on a pair of shoes?" + +Keogh reflected judicially. + +"Let's see--there's you and me and--" + +"Not me," said Johnny, promptly and incorrectly, holding up a foot +encased in a disreputable deerskin _zapato_. "I haven't been a victim +to shoes in months." + +"But you've got 'em, though," went on Keogh. "And there's Goodwin +and Blanchard and Geddie and old Lutz and Doc Gregg and that Italian +that's agent for the banana company, and there's old Delgado--no; +he wears sandals. And, oh, yes; there's Madama Ortiz, 'what kapes +the hotel'--she had on a pair of red slippers at the _baile_ the +other night. And Miss Pasa, her daughter, that went to school in +the States--she brought back some civilized notions in the way of +footgear. And there's the _comandante's_ sister that dresses up her +feet on feast-days--and Mrs. Geddie, who wears a two with a Castilian +instep--and that's about all the ladies. Let's see--don't some of the +soldiers at the _cuartel_--no: that's so; they're allowed shoes only +when on the march. In barracks they turn their little toeses out to +grass." + +"'Bout right," agreed the consul. "Not over twenty out of the three +thousand ever felt leather on their walking arrangements. Oh, yes; +Coralio is just the town for an enterprising shoe store--that doesn't +want to part with its goods. Wonder if old Patterson is trying to +jolly me! He always was full of things he called jokes. Write him a +letter, Billy. I'll dictate it. We'll jolly him back a few." + +Keogh dipped his pen, and wrote at Johnny's dictation. With many +pauses, filled in with smoke and sundry travellings of the bottle +and glasses, the following reply to the Dalesburg communication was +perpetrated: + + + MR. OBADIAH PATTERSON, + Dalesburg, Ala. + + _Dear Sir:_ In reply to your favour of July 2d, I have the + honour to inform you that, according to my opinion, there + is no place on the habitable globe that presents to the eye + stronger evidence of the need of a first-class shoe store + than does the town of Coralio. There are 3,000 inhabitants + in the place, and not a single shoe store! The situation + speaks for itself. This coast is rapidly becoming the goal + of enterprising business men, but the shoe business is one + that has been sadly overlooked or neglected. In fact, there + are a considerable number of our citizens actually without + shoes at present. + + Besides the want above mentioned, there is also a crying + need for a brewery, a college of higher mathematics, a coal + yard, and a clean and intellectual Punch and Judy show. I + have the honour to be, sir, + + Your Obt. Servant, + + JOHN DE GRAFFENREID ATWOOD, + U. S. Consul at Coralio. + + P.S.--Hello! Uncle Obadiah. How's the old burg racking + along? What would the government do without you and me? + Look out for a green-headed parrot and a bunch of bananas + soon, from your old friend + + JOHNNY. + + +"I throw in that postscript," explained the consul, "so Uncle Obadiah +won't take offence at the official tone of the letter! Now, Billy, +you get that correspondence fixed up, and send Pancho to the +post-office with it. The _Ariadne_ takes the mail out to-morrow if +they make up that load of fruit to-day." + +The night programme in Coralio never varied. The recreations of the +people were soporific and flat. They wandered about, barefoot and +aimless, speaking lowly and smoking cigar or cigarette. Looking +down on the dimly lighted ways one seemed to see a threading maze +of brunette ghosts tangled with a procession of insane fireflies. +In some houses the thrumming of lugubrious guitars added to the +depression of the _triste_ night. Giant tree-frogs rattled in the +foliage as loudly as the end man's "bones" in a minstrel troupe. By +nine o'clock the streets were almost deserted. + +Nor at the consulate was there often a change of bill. Keogh would +come there nightly, for Coralio's one cool place was the little +seaward porch of that official residence. + +The brandy would be kept moving; and before midnight sentiment would +begin to stir in the heart of the self-exiled consul. Then he would +relate to Keogh the story of his ended romance. Each night Keogh +would listen patiently to the tale, and be ready with untiring +sympathy. + +"But don't you think for a minute"--thus Johnny would always conclude +his woeful narrative--"that I'm grieving about that girl, Billy. I've +forgotten her. She never enters my mind. If she were to enter that +door right now, my pulse wouldn't gain a beat. That's all over long +ago." + +"Don't I know it?" Keogh would answer. "Of course you've forgotten +her. Proper thing to do. Wasn't quite O. K. of her to listen to the +knocks that--er--Dink Pawson kept giving you." + +"Pink Dawson!"--a world of contempt would be in Johnny's tones--"Poor +white trash! That's what he was. Had five hundred acres of farming +land, though; and that counted. Maybe I'll have a chance to get back +at him some day. The Dawsons weren't anybody. Everybody in Alabama +knows the Atwoods. Say, Billy--did you know my mother was a De +Graffenreid?" + +"Why, no," Keogh would say; "is that so?" He had heard it some three +hundred times. + +"Fact. The De Graffenreids of Hancock County. But I never think of +that girl any more, do I, Billy?" + +"Not for a minute, my boy," would be the last sounds heard by the +conqueror of Cupid. + +At this point Johnny would fall into a gentle slumber, and Keogh +would saunter out to his own shack under the calabash tree at the +edge of the plaza. + +In a day or two the letter from the Dalesburg postmaster and its +answer had been forgotten by the Coralio exiles. But on the 26th day +of July the fruit of the reply appeared upon the tree of events. + +The _Andador_, a fruit steamer that visited Coralio regularly, drew +into the offing and anchored. The beach was lined with spectators +while the quarantine doctor and the custom-house crew rowed out to +attend to their duties. + +An hour later Billy Keogh lounged into the consulate, clean and cool +in his linen clothes, and grinning like a pleased shark. + +"Guess what?" he said to Johnny, lounging in his hammock. + +"Too hot to guess," said Johnny, lazily. + +"Your shoe-store man's come," said Keogh, rolling the sweet morsel on +his tongue, "with a stock of goods big enough to supply the continent +as far down as Terra del Fuego. They're carting his cases over to +the custom-house now. Six barges full they brought ashore and have +paddled back for the rest. Oh, ye saints in glory! won't there +be regalements in the air when he gets onto the joke and has an +interview with Mr. Consul? It'll be worth nine years in the tropics +just to witness that one joyful moment." + +Keogh loved to take his mirth easily. He selected a clean place +on the matting and lay upon the floor. The walls shook with his +enjoyment. Johnny turned half over and blinked. + +"Don't tell me," he said, "that anybody was fool enough to take that +letter seriously." + +"Four-thousand-dollar stock of goods!" gasped Keogh, in ecstasy. +"Talk about coals to Newcastle! Why didn't he take a ship-load of +palm-leaf fans to Spitzbergen while he was about it? Saw the old +codger on the beach. You ought to have been there when he put on his +specs and squinted at the five hundred or so barefooted citizens +standing around." + +"Are you telling the truth, Billy?" asked the consul, weakly. + +"Am I? You ought to see the buncoed gentleman's daughter he brought +along. Looks! She makes the brick-dust seoritas here look like +tar-babies." + +"Go on," said Johnny, "if you can stop that asinine giggling. I hate +to see a grown man make a laughing hyena of himself." + +"Name is Hemstetter," went on Keogh. "He's a-- Hello! what's the +matter now?" + +Johnny's moccasined feet struck the floor with a thud as he wriggled +out of his hammock. + +"Get up, you idiot," he said, sternly, "or I'll brain you with this +inkstand. That's Rosine and her father. Gad! what a drivelling idiot +old Patterson is! Get up, here, Billy Keogh, and help me. What the +devil are we going to do? Has all the world gone crazy?" + +Keogh rose and dusted himself. He managed to regain a decorous +demeanour. + +"Situation has got to be met, Johnny," he said, with some success +at seriousness. "I didn't think about its being your girl until you +spoke. First thing to do is to get them comfortable quarters. You go +down and face the music, and I'll trot out to Goodwin's and see if +Mrs. Goodwin won't take them in. They've got the decentest house in +town." + +"Bless you, Billy!" said the consul. "I knew you wouldn't desert me. +The world's bound to come to an end, but maybe we can stave it off +for a day or two." + +Keogh hoisted his umbrella and set out for Goodwin's house. Johnny +put on his coat and hat. He picked up the brandy bottle, but set it +down again without drinking, and marched bravely down to the beach. + +In the shade of the custom-house walls he found Mr. Hemstetter and +Rosine surrounded by a mass of gaping citizens. The customs officers +were ducking and scraping, while the captain of the _Andador_ +interpreted the business of the new arrivals. Rosine looked healthy +and very much alive. She was gazing at the strange scenes around her +with amused interest. There was a faint blush upon her round cheek as +she greeted her old admirer. Mr. Hemstetter shook hands with Johnny +in a very friendly way. He was an oldish, impractical man--one +of that numerous class of erratic business men who are forever +dissatisfied, and seeking a change. + +"I am very glad to see you, John--may I call you John?" he said. "Let +me thank you for your prompt answer to our postmaster's letter of +inquiry. He volunteered to write to you on my behalf. I was looking +about for something different in the way of a business in which the +profits would be greater. I had noticed in the papers that this coast +was receiving much attention from investors. I am extremely grateful +for your advice to come. I sold out everything that I possess, and +invested the proceeds in as fine a stock of shoes as could be bought +in the North. You have a picturesque town here, John. I hope business +will be as good as your letter justifies me in expecting." + +Johnny's agony was abbreviated by the arrival of Keogh, who hurried +up with the news that Mrs. Goodwin would be much pleased to place +rooms at the disposal of Mr. Hemstetter and his daughter. So there +Mr. Hemstetter and Rosine were at once conducted and left to +recuperate from the fatigue of the voyage, while Johnny went down +to see that the cases of shoes were safely stored in the customs +warehouse pending their examination by the officials. Keogh, grinning +like a shark, skirmished about to find Goodwin, to instruct him not +to expose to Mr. Hemstetter the true state of Coralio as a shoe +market until Johnny had been given a chance to redeem the situation, +if such a thing were possible. + +That night the consul and Keogh held a desperate consultation on the +breezy porch of the consulate. + +"Send 'em back home," began Keogh, reading Johnny's thoughts. + +"I would," said Johnny, after a little silence; "but I've been lying +to you, Billy." + +"All right about that," said Keogh, affably. + +"I've told you hundreds of times," said Johnny, slowly, "that I had +forgotten that girl, haven't I?" + +"About three hundred and seventy-five," admitted the monument of +patience. + +"I lied," repeated the consul, "every time. I never forgot her for +one minute. I was an obstinate ass for running away just because she +said 'No' once. And I was too proud a fool to go back. I talked with +Rosine a few minutes this evening up at Goodwin's. I found out one +thing. You remember that farmer fellow who was always after her?" + +"Dink Pawson?" asked Keogh. + +"Pink Dawson. Well, he wasn't a hill of beans to her. She says she +didn't believe a word of the things he told her about me. But I'm +sewed up now, Billy. That tomfool letter we sent ruined whatever +chance I had left. She'll despise me when she finds out that her old +father has been made the victim of a joke that a decent school boy +wouldn't have been guilty of. Shoes! Why he couldn't sell twenty +pairs of shoes in Coralio if he kept store here for twenty years. You +put a pair of shoes on one of these Caribs or Spanish brown boys and +what'd he do? Stand on his head and squeal until he'd kicked 'em off. +None of 'em ever wore shoes and they never will. If I send 'em back +home I'll have to tell the whole story, and what'll she think of +me? I want that girl worse than ever, Billy, and now when she's in +reach I've lost her forever because I tried to be funny when the +thermometer was at 102." + +"Keep cheerful," said the optimistic Keogh. "And let 'em open the +store. I've been busy myself this afternoon. We can stir up a +temporary boom in foot-gear anyhow. I'll buy six pairs when the doors +open. I've been around and seen all the fellows and explained the +catastrophe. They'll all buy shoes like they was centipedes. Frank +Goodwin will take cases of 'em. The Geddies want about eleven pairs +between 'em. Clancy is going to invest the savings of weeks, and even +old Doc Gregg wants three pairs of alligator-hide slippers if they've +got any tens. Blanchard got a look at Miss Hemstetter; and as he's a +Frenchman, no less than a dozen pairs will do for him." + +"A dozen customers," said Johnny, "for a $4,000 stock of shoes! It +won't work. There's a big problem here to figure out. You go home, +Billy, and leave me alone. I've got to work at it all by myself. Take +that bottle of Three-star along with you--no, sir; not another ounce +of booze for the United States consul. I'll sit here to-night and +pull out the think stop. If there's a soft place on this proposition +anywhere I'll land on it. If there isn't there'll be another wreck to +the credit of the gorgeous tropics." + +Keogh left, feeling that he could be of no use. Johnny laid a handful +of cigars on a table and stretched himself in a steamer chair. When +the sudden daylight broke, silvering the harbour ripples, he was +still sitting there. Then he got up, whistling a little tune, and +took his bath. + +At nine o'clock he walked down to the dingy little cable office and +hung for half an hour over a blank. The result of his application was +the following message, which he signed and had transmitted at a cost +of $33: + + + TO PINKNEY DAWSON, + Dalesburg, Ala. + + Draft for $100 comes to you next mail. Ship me immediately + 500 pounds stiff, dry cockleburrs. New use here in arts. + Market price twenty cents pound. Further orders likely. + Rush. + + + + +XIII + +SHIPS + + +Within a week a suitable building had been secured in the Calle +Grande, and Mr. Hemstetter's stock of shoes arranged upon their +shelves. The rent of the store was moderate; and the stock made a +fine showing of neat white boxes, attractively displayed. + +Johnny's friends stood by him loyally. On the first day Keogh +strolled into the store in a casual kind of way about once every +hour, and bought shoes. After he had purchased a pair each of +extension soles, congress gaiters, button kids, low-quartered calfs, +dancing pumps, rubber boots, tans of various hues, tennis shoes and +flowered slippers, he sought out Johnny to be prompted as to names +of other kinds that he might inquire for. The other English-speaking +residents also played their parts nobly by buying often and +liberally. Keogh was grand marshal, and made them distribute their +patronage, thus keeping up a fair run of custom for several days. + +Mr. Hemstetter was gratified by the amount of business done thus far; +but expressed surprise that the natives were so backward with their +custom. + +"Oh, they're awfully shy," explained Johnny, as he wiped his forehead +nervously. "They'll get the habit pretty soon. They'll come with a +rush when they do come." + +One afternoon Keogh dropped into the consul's office, chewing an +unlighted cigar thoughtfully. + +"Got anything up your sleeve?" he inquired of Johnny. "If you have +it's about time to show it. If you can borrow some gent's hat in the +audience, and make a lot of customers for an idle stock of shoes +come out of it, you'd better spiel. The boys have all laid in enough +footwear to last 'em ten years; and there's nothing doing in the shoe +store but dolcy far nienty. I just came by there. Your venerable +victim was standing in the door, gazing through his specs at the +bare toes passing by his emporium. The natives here have got the +true artistic temperament. Me and Clancy took eighteen tintypes this +morning in two hours. There's been but one pair of shoes sold all +day. Blanchard went in and bought a pair of fur-lined house-slippers +because he thought he saw Miss Hemstetter go into the store. I saw +him throw the slippers into the lagoon afterwards." + +"There's a Mobile fruit steamer coming in to-morrow or next day," +said Johnny. "We can't do anything until then." + +"What are you going to do--try to create a demand?" + +"Political economy isn't your strong point," said the consul, +impudently. "You can't create a demand. But you can create a +necessity for a demand. That's what I am going to do." + +Two weeks after the consul sent his cable, a fruit steamer brought +him a huge, mysterious brown bale of some unknown commodity. Johnny's +influence with the custom-house people was sufficiently strong for +him to get the goods turned over to him without the usual inspection. +He had the bale taken to the consulate and snugly stowed in the back +room. + +That night he ripped open a corner of it and took out a handful of +the cockleburrs. He examined them with the care with which a warrior +examines his arms before he goes forth to battle for his lady-love +and life. The burrs were the ripe August product, as hard as +filberts, and bristling with spines as tough and sharp as needles. +Johnny whistled softly a little tune, and went out to find Billy +Keogh. + +Later in the night, when Coralio was steeped in slumber, he and Billy +went forth into the deserted streets with their coats bulging like +balloons. All up and down the Calle Grande they went, sowing the +sharp burrs carefully in the sand, along the narrow sidewalks, in +every foot of grass between the silent houses. And then they took the +side streets and by-ways, missing none. No place where the foot of +man, woman or child might fall was slighted. Many trips they made to +and from the prickly hoard. And then, nearly at the dawn, they laid +themselves down to rest calmly, as great generals do after planning +a victory according to the revised tactics, and slept, knowing that +they had sowed with the accuracy of Satan sowing tares and the +perseverance of Paul planting. + +With the rising sun came the purveyors of fruits and meats, and +arranged their wares in and around the little market-house. At one +end of the town near the seashore the market-house stood; and the +sowing of the burrs had not been carried that far. The dealers waited +long past the hour when their sales usually began. None came to buy. +"_Qu hay?_" they began to exclaim, one to another. + +At their accustomed time, from every 'dobe and palm hut and +grass-thatched shack and dim _patio_ glided women--black women, brown +women, lemon-colored women, women dun and yellow and tawny. They +were the marketers starting to purchase the family supply of cassava, +plantains, meat, fowls, and tortillas. Dcollet they were and +bare-armed and bare-footed, with a single skirt reaching below the +knee. Stolid and ox-eyed, they stepped from their doorways into the +narrow paths or upon the soft grass of the streets. + +The first to emerge uttered ambiguous squeals, and raised one foot +quickly. Another step and they sat down, with shrill cries of alarm, +to pick at the new and painful insects that had stung them upon the +feet. "_Qu picadores diablos!_" they screeched to one another across +the narrow ways. Some tried the grass instead of the paths, but there +they were also stung and bitten by the strange little prickly balls. +They plumped down in the grass, and added their lamentations to those +of their sisters in the sandy paths. All through the town was heard +the plaint of the feminine jabber. The venders in the market still +wondered why no customers came. + +Then men, lords of the earth, came forth. They, too, began to hop, +to dance, to limp, and to curse. They stood stranded and foolish, or +stooped to pluck at the scourge that attacked their feet and ankles. +Some loudly proclaimed the pest to be poisonous spiders of an unknown +species. + +And then the children ran out for their morning romp. And now to +the uproar was added the howls of limping infants and cockleburred +childhood. Every minute the advancing day brought forth fresh +victims. + +Doa Maria Castillas y Buenventura de las Casas stepped from her +honoured doorway, as was her daily custom, to procure fresh bread +from the _panaderia_ across the street. She was clad in a skirt of +flowered yellow satin, a chemise of ruffled linen, and wore a purple +mantilla from the looms of Spain. Her lemon-tinted feet, alas! were +bare. Her progress was majestic, for were not her ancestors hidalgos +of Aragon? Three steps she made across the velvety grass, and +set her aristocratic sole upon a bunch of Johnny's burrs. Doa +Maria Castillas y Buenventura de las Casas emitted a yowl even +as a wild-cat. Turning about, she fell upon hands and knees, and +crawled--ay, like a beast of the field she crawled back to her +honourable door-sill. + +Don Seor Ildefonso Federico Valdazar, _Juez de la Paz_, weighing +twenty stone, attempted to convey his bulk to the _pulperia_ at +the corner of the plaza in order to assuage his matutinal thirst. +The first plunge of his unshod foot into the cool grass struck a +concealed mine. Don Ildefonso fell like a crumpled cathedral, crying +out that he had been fatally bitten by a deadly scorpion. Everywhere +were the shoeless citizens hopping, stumbling, limping, and picking +from their feet the venomous insects that had come in a single night +to harass them. + +The first to perceive the remedy was Estebn Delgado, the barber, a +man of travel and education. Sitting upon a stone, he plucked burrs +from his toes, and made oration: + +"Behold, my friends, these bugs of the devil! I know them well. They +soar through the skies in swarms like pigeons. These are the dead +ones that fell during the night. In Yucatan I have seen them as large +as oranges. Yes! There they hiss like serpents, and have wings like +bats. It is the shoes--the shoes that one needs! _Zapatos--zapatos +para mi!_" + +Estebn hobbled to Mr. Hemstetter's store, and bought shoes. Coming +out, he swaggered down the street with impunity, reviling loudly the +bugs of the devil. The suffering ones sat up or stood upon one foot +and beheld the immune barber. Men, women and children took up the +cry: "_Zapatos! zapatos!_" + +The necessity for the demand had been created. The demand followed. +That day Mr. Hemstetter sold three hundred pairs of shoes. + +"It is really surprising," he said to Johnny, who came up in the +evening to help him straighten out the stock, "how trade is picking +up. Yesterday I made but three sales." + +"I told you they'd whoop things up when they got started," said the +consul. + +"I think I shall order a dozen more cases of goods, to keep the stock +up," said Mr. Hemstetter, beaming through his spectacles. + +"I wouldn't send in any orders yet," advised Johnny. "Wait till you +see how the trade holds up." + +Each night Johnny and Keogh sowed the crop that grew dollars by day. +At the end of ten days two-thirds of the stock of shoes had been +sold; and the stock of cockleburrs was exhausted. Johnny cabled to +Pink Dawson for another 500 pounds, paying twenty cents per pound as +before. Mr. Hemstetter carefully made up an order for $1500 worth of +shoes from Northern firms. Johnny hung about the store until this +order was ready for the mail, and succeeded in destroying it before +it reached the postoffice. + +That night he took Rosine under the mango tree by Goodwin's porch, +and confessed everything. She looked him in the eye, and said: "You +are a very wicked man. Father and I will go back home. You say it was +a joke? I think it is a very serious matter." + +But at the end of half an hour's argument the conversation had +been turned upon a different subject. The two were considering the +respective merits of pale blue and pink wall paper with which the +old colonial mansion of the Atwoods in Dalesburg was to be decorated +after the wedding. + +On the next morning Johnny confessed to Mr. Hemstetter. The shoe +merchant put on his spectacles, and said through them: "You strike me +as being a most extraordinary young scamp. If I had not managed this +enterprise with good business judgment my entire stock of goods might +have been a complete loss. Now, how do you propose to dispose of the +rest of it?" + +When the second invoice of cockleburrs arrived Johnny loaded them and +the remainder of the shoes into a schooner, and sailed down the coast +to Alazan. + +There, in the same dark and diabolical manner, he repeated his +success; and came back with a bag of money and not so much as a +shoestring. + +And then he besought his great Uncle of the waving goatee and starred +vest to accept his resignation, for the lotus no longer lured him. He +hankered for the spinach and cress of Dalesburg. + +The services of Mr. William Terence Keogh as acting consul, _pro +tem._, were suggested and accepted, and Johnny sailed with the +Hemstetters back to his native shores. + +Keogh slipped into the sinecure of the American consulship with +the ease that never left him even in such high places. The tintype +establishment was soon to become a thing of the past, although its +deadly work along the peaceful and helpless Spanish Main was never +effaced. The restless partners were about to be off again, scouting +ahead of the slow ranks of Fortune. But now they would take different +ways. There were rumours of a promising uprising in Peru; and thither +the martial Clancy would turn his adventurous steps. As for Keogh, he +was figuring in his mind and on quires of Government letter-heads a +scheme that dwarfed the art of misrepresenting the human countenance +upon tin. + +"What suits me," Keogh used to say, "in the way of a business +proposition is something diversified that looks like a longer shot +than it is--something in the way of a genteel graft that isn't worked +enough for the correspondence schools to be teaching it by mail. I +take the long end; but I like to have at least as good a chance to +win as a man learning to play poker on an ocean steamer, or running +for governor of Texas on the Republican ticket. And when I cash in my +winnings, I don't want to find any widows' and orphans' chips in my +stack." + +The grass-grown globe was the green table on which Keogh gambled. The +games he played were of his own invention. He was no grubber after +the diffident dollar. Nor did he care to follow it with horn and +hounds. Rather he loved to coax it with egregious and brilliant flies +from its habitat in the waters of strange streams. Yet Keogh was a +business man; and his schemes, in spite of their singularity, were as +solidly set as the plans of a building contractor. In Arthur's time +Sir William Keogh would have been a Knight of the Round Table. In +these modern days he rides abroad, seeking the Graft instead of the +Grail. + +Three days after Johnny's departure, two small schooners appeared +off Coralio. After some delay a boat put off from one of them, and +brought a sunburned young man ashore. This young man had a shrewd and +calculating eye; and he gazed with amazement at the strange things +that he saw. He found on the beach some one who directed him to the +consul's office; and thither he made his way at a nervous gait. + +Keogh was sprawled in the official chair, drawing caricatures of +his Uncle's head on an official pad of paper. He looked up at his +visitor. + +"Where's Johnny Atwood?" inquired the sunburned young man, in a +business tone. + +"Gone," said Keogh, working carefully at Uncle Sam's necktie. + +"That's just like him," remarked the nut-brown one, leaning against +the table. "He always was a fellow to gallivant around instead of +'tending to business. Will he be in soon?" + +"Don't think so," said Keogh, after a fair amount of deliberation. + +"I s'pose he's out at some of his tomfoolery," conjectured the +visitor, in a tone of virtuous conviction. "Johnny never would stick +to anything long enough to succeed. I wonder how he manages to run +his business here, and never be 'round to look after it." + +"I'm looking after the business just now," admitted the _pro tem._ +consul. + +"Are you--then, say!--where's the factory?" + +"What factory?" asked Keogh, with a mildly polite interest. + +"Why, the factory where they use them cockleburrs. Lord knows what +they use 'em for, anyway! I've got the basements of both them ships +out there loaded with 'em. I'll give you a bargain in this lot. I've +had every man, woman and child around Dalesburg that wasn't busy +pickin' 'em for a month. I hired these ships to bring 'em over. +Everybody thought I was crazy. Now, you can have this lot for fifteen +cents a pound, delivered on land. And if you want more I guess old +Alabam' can come up to the demand. Johnny told me when he left home +that if he struck anything down here that there was any money in he'd +let me in on it. Shall I drive the ships in and hitch?" + +A look of supreme, almost incredulous, delight dawned in Keogh's +ruddy countenance. He dropped his pencil. His eyes turned upon the +sunburned young man with joy in them mingled with fear lest his +ecstasy should prove a dream. + +"For God's sake, tell me," said Keogh, earnestly, "are you Dink +Pawson?" + +"My name is Pinkney Dawson," said the cornerer of the cockleburr +market. + +Billy Keogh slid rapturously and gently from his chair to his +favourite strip of matting on the floor. + +There were not many sounds in Coralio on that sultry afternoon. +Among those that were may be mentioned a noise of enraptured and +unrighteous laughter from a prostrate Irish-American, while a +sunburned young man, with a shrewd eye, looked on him with wonder and +amazement. Also the "tramp, tramp, tramp" of many well-shod feet in +the streets outside. Also the lonesome wash of the waves that beat +along the historic shores of the Spanish Main. + + + + +XIV + +MASTERS OF ARTS + + +A two-inch stub of a blue pencil was the wand with which Keogh +performed the preliminary acts of his magic. So, with this he covered +paper with diagrams and figures while he waited for the United States +of America to send down to Coralio a successor to Atwood, resigned. + +The new scheme that his mind had conceived, his stout heart indorsed, +and his blue pencil corroborated, was laid around the characteristics +and human frailties of the new president of Anchuria. These +characteristics, and the situation out of which Keogh hoped to wrest +a golden tribute, deserve chronicling contributive to the clear order +of events. + +President Losada--many called him Dictator--was a man whose genius +would have made him conspicuous even among Anglo-Saxons, had not +that genius been intermixed with other traits that were petty and +subversive. He had some of the lofty patriotism of Washington (the +man he most admired), the force of Napoleon, and much of the wisdom +of the sages. These characteristics might have justified him in the +assumption of the title of "The Illustrious Liberator," had they not +been accompanied by a stupendous and amazing vanity that kept him in +the less worthy ranks of the dictators. + +Yet he did his country great service. With a mighty grasp he shook it +nearly free from the shackles of ignorance and sloth and the vermin +that fed upon it, and all but made it a power in the council of +nations. He established schools and hospitals, built roads, bridges, +railroads and palaces, and bestowed generous subsidies upon the arts +and sciences. He was the absolute despot and the idol of his people. +The wealth of the country poured into his hands. Other presidents had +been rapacious without reason. Losada amassed enormous wealth, but +his people had their share of the benefits. + +The joint in his armour was his insatiate passion for monuments and +tokens commemorating his glory. In every town he caused to be erected +statues of himself bearing legends in praise of his greatness. In +the walls of every public edifice, tablets were fixed reciting his +splendour and the gratitude of his subjects. His statuettes and +portraits were scattered throughout the land in every house and hut. +One of the sycophants in his court painted him as St. John, with a +halo and a train of attendants in full uniform. Losada saw nothing +incongruous in this picture, and had it hung in a church in the +capital. He ordered from a French sculptor a marble group including +himself with Napoleon, Alexander the Great, and one or two others +whom he deemed worthy of the honour. + +He ransacked Europe for decorations, employing policy, money and +intrigue to cajole the orders he coveted from kings and rulers. On +state occasions his breast was covered from shoulder to shoulder with +crosses, stars, golden roses, medals and ribbons. It was said that +the man who could contrive for him a new decoration, or invent some +new method of extolling his greatness, might plunge a hand deep into +the treasury. + +This was the man upon whom Billy Keogh had his eye. The gentle +buccaneer had observed the rain of favors that fell upon those who +ministered to the president's vanities, and he did not deem it his +duty to hoist his umbrella against the scattering drops of liquid +fortune. + +In a few weeks the new consul arrived, releasing Keogh from his +temporary duties. He was a young man fresh from college, who lived +for botany alone. The consulate at Coralio gave him the opportunity +to study tropical flora. He wore smoked glasses, and carried a green +umbrella. He filled the cool, back porch of the consulate with plants +and specimens so that space for a bottle and chair was not to be +found. Keogh gazed on him sadly, but without rancour, and began to +pack his gripsack. For his new plot against stagnation along the +Spanish Main required of him a voyage overseas. + +Soon came the _Karlsefin_ again--she of the trampish habits--gleaning +a cargo of cocoanuts for a speculative descent upon the New York +market. Keogh was booked for a passage on the return trip. + +"Yes, I'm going to New York," he explained to the group of his +countrymen that had gathered on the beach to see him off. "But I'll +be back before you miss me. I've undertaken the art education of this +piebald country, and I'm not the man to desert it while it's in the +early throes of tintypes." + +With this mysterious declaration of his intentions Keogh boarded the +_Karlsefin_. + +Ten days later, shivering, with the collar of his thin coat turned +high, he burst into the studio of Carolus White at the top of a tall +building in Tenth Street, New York City. + +Carolus White was smoking a cigarette and frying sausages over an oil +stove. He was only twenty-three, and had noble theories about art. + +"Billy Keogh!" exclaimed White, extending the hand that was not busy +with the frying pan. "From what part of the uncivilized world, I +wonder!" + +"Hello, Carry," said Keogh, dragging forward a stool, and holding his +fingers close to the stove. "I'm glad I found you so soon. I've been +looking for you all day in the directories and art galleries. The +free-lunch man on the corner told me where you were, quick. I was +sure you'd be painting pictures yet." + +Keogh glanced about the studio with the shrewd eye of a connoisseur +in business. + +"Yes, you can do it," he declared, with many gentle nods of his head. +"That big one in the corner with the angels and green clouds and +band-wagon is just the sort of thing we want. What would you call +that, Carry--scene from Coney Island, ain't it?" + +"That," said White, "I had intended to call 'The Translation of +Elijah,' but you may be nearer right than I am." + +"Name doesn't matter," said Keogh, largely; "it's the frame and the +varieties of paint that does the trick. Now, I can tell you in a +minute what I want. I've come on a little voyage of two thousand +miles to take you in with me on a scheme. I thought of you as soon as +the scheme showed itself to me. How would you like to go back with +me and paint a picture? Ninety days for the trip, and five thousand +dollars for the job." + +"Cereal food or hair-tonic posters?" asked White. + +"It isn't an ad." + +"What kind of a picture is it to be?" + +"It's a long story," said Keogh. + +"Go ahead with it. If you don't mind, while you talk I'll just keep +my eye on these sausages. Let 'em get one shade deeper than a Vandyke +brown and you spoil 'em." + +Keogh explained his project. They were to return to Coralio, where +White was to pose as a distinguished American portrait painter who +was touring in the tropics as a relaxation from his arduous and +remunerative professional labours. It was not an unreasonable hope, +even to those who had trod in the beaten paths of business, that an +artist with so much prestige might secure a commission to perpetuate +upon canvas the lineaments of the president, and secure a share of +the _pesos_ that were raining upon the caterers to his weaknesses. + +Keogh had set his price at ten thousand dollars. Artists had been +paid more for portraits. He and White were to share the expenses of +the trip, and divide the possible profits. Thus he laid the scheme +before White, whom he had known in the West before one declared for +Art and the other became a Bedouin. + +Before long the two machinators abandoned the rigour of the bare +studio for a snug corner of a caf. There they sat far into the +night, with old envelopes and Keogh's stub of blue pencil between +them. + +At twelve o'clock White doubled up in his chair, with his chin on his +fist, and shut his eyes at the unbeautiful wall-paper. + +"I'll go you, Billy," he said, in the quiet tones of decision. "I've +got two or three hundred saved up for sausages and rent; and I'll +take the chance with you. Five thousand! It will give me two years in +Paris and one in Italy. I'll begin to pack to-morrow." + +"You'll begin in ten minutes," said Keogh. "It's to-morrow now. The +_Karlsefin_ starts back at four P.M. Come on to your painting shop, +and I'll help you." + +For five months in the year Coralio is the Newport of Anchuria. +Then only does the town possess life. From November to March it is +practically the seat of government. The president with his official +family sojourns there; and society follows him. The pleasure-loving +people make the season one long holiday of amusement and rejoicing. +_Fiestas_, balls, games, sea bathing, processions and small theatres +contribute to their enjoyment. The famous Swiss band from the +capital plays in the little plaza every evening, while the fourteen +carriages and vehicles in the town circle in funereal but complacent +procession. Indians from the interior mountains, looking like +prehistoric stone idols, come down to peddle their handiwork in the +streets. The people throng the narrow ways, a chattering, happy, +careless stream of buoyant humanity. Preposterous children rigged out +with the shortest of ballet skirts and gilt wings, howl, underfoot, +among the effervescent crowds. Especially is the arrival of the +presidential party, at the opening of the season, attended with pomp, +show and patriotic demonstrations of enthusiasm and delight. + +When Keogh and White reached their destination, on the return trip +of the _Karlsefin_, the gay winter season was well begun. As they +stepped upon the beach they could hear the band playing in the plaza. +The village maidens, with fireflies already fixed in their dark +locks, were gliding, barefoot and coy-eyed, along the paths. Dandies +in white linen, swinging their canes, were beginning their seductive +strolls. The air was full of human essence, of artificial enticement, +of coquetry, indolence, pleasure--the man-made sense of existence. + +The first two or three days after their arrival were spent in +preliminaries. Keogh escorted the artist about town, introducing +him to the little circle of English-speaking residents and pulling +whatever wires he could to effect the spreading of White's fame as a +painter. And then Keogh planned a more spectacular demonstration of +the idea he wished to keep before the public. + +He and White engaged rooms in the Hotel de los Estranjeros. The +two were clad in new suits of immaculate duck, with American straw +hats, and carried canes of remarkable uniqueness and inutility. Few +caballeros in Coralio--even the gorgeously uniformed officers of +the Anchurian army--were as conspicuous for ease and elegance of +demeanour as Keogh and his friend, the great American painter, Seor +White. + +White set up his easel on the beach and made striking sketches of the +mountain and sea views. The native population formed at his rear in a +vast, chattering semicircle to watch his work. Keogh, with his care +for details, had arranged for himself a pose which he carried out +with fidelity. His rle was that of friend to the great artist, a +man of affairs and leisure. The visible emblem of his position was a +pocket camera. + +"For branding the man who owns it," said he, "a genteel dilettante +with a bank account and an easy conscience, a steam-yacht ain't in it +with a camera. You see a man doing nothing but loafing around making +snap-shots, and you know right away he reads up well in 'Bradstreet.' +You notice these old millionaire boys--soon as they get through +taking everything else in sight they go to taking photographs. +People are more impressed by a kodak than they are by a title or +a four-carat scarf-pin." So Keogh strolled blandly about Coralio, +snapping the scenery and the shrinking seoritas, while White posed +conspicuously in the higher regions of art. + +Two weeks after their arrival, the scheme began to bear fruit. +An aide-de-camp of the president drove to the hotel in a dashing +victoria. The president desired that Seor White come to the Casa +Morena for an informal interview. + +Keogh gripped his pipe tightly between his teeth. "Not a cent less +than ten thousand," he said to the artist--"remember the price. +And in gold or its equivalent--don't let him stick you with this +bargain-counter stuff they call money here." + +"Perhaps it isn't that he wants," said White. + +"Get out!" said Keogh, with splendid confidence. "I know what he +wants. He wants his picture painted by the celebrated young American +painter and filibuster now sojourning in his down-trodden country. +Off you go." + +The victoria sped away with the artist. Keogh walked up and down, +puffing great clouds of smoke from his pipe, and waited. In an hour +the victoria swept again to the door of the hotel, deposited White, +and vanished. The artist dashed up the stairs, three at a step. Keogh +stopped smoking, and became a silent interrogation point. + +"Landed," exclaimed White, with his boyish face flushed with elation. +"Billy, you are a wonder. He wants a picture. I'll tell you all about +it. By Heavens! that dictator chap is a corker! He's a dictator clear +down to his finger-ends. He's a kind of combination of Julius Csar, +Lucifer and Chauncey Depew done in sepia. Polite and grim--that's his +way. The room I saw him in was about ten acres big, and looked like +a Mississippi steamboat with its gilding and mirrors and white paint. +He talks English better than I can ever hope to. The matter of the +price came up. I mentioned ten thousand. I expected him to call the +guard and have me taken out and shot. He didn't move an eyelash. He +just waved one of his chestnut hands in a careless way, and said, +'Whatever you say.' I am to go back to-morrow and discuss with him +the details of the picture." + +Keogh hung his head. Self-abasement was easy to read in his downcast +countenance. + +"I'm failing, Carry," he said, sorrowfully. "I'm not fit to handle +these man's-size schemes any longer. Peddling oranges in a push-cart +is about the suitable graft for me. When I said ten thousand, I +swear I thought I had sized up that brown man's limit to within +two cents. He'd have melted down for fifteen thousand just as easy. +Say--Carry--you'll see old man Keogh safe in some nice, quiet idiot +asylum, won't you, if he makes a break like that again?" + +The Casa Morena, although only one story in height, was a building of +brown stone, luxurious as a palace in its interior. It stood on a low +hill in a walled garden of splendid tropical flora at the upper edge +of Coralio. The next day the president's carriage came again for the +artist. Keogh went out for a walk along the beach, where he and his +"picture box" were now familiar sights. When he returned to the hotel +White was sitting in a steamer-chair on the balcony. + +"Well," said Keogh, "did you and His Nibs decide on the kind of a +chromo he wants?" + +White got up and walked back and forth on the balcony a few times. +Then he stopped, and laughed strangely. His face was flushed, and his +eyes were bright with a kind of angry amusement. + +"Look here, Billy," he said, somewhat roughly, "when you first came +to me in my studio and mentioned a picture, I thought you wanted a +Smashed Oats or a Hair Tonic poster painted on a range of mountains +or the side of a continent. Well, either of those jobs would have +been Art in its highest form compared to the one you've steered me +against. I can't paint that picture, Billy. You've got to let me +out. Let me try to tell you what that barbarian wants. He had it +all planned out and even a sketch made of his idea. The old boy +doesn't draw badly at all. But, ye goddesses of Art! listen to the +monstrosity he expects me to paint. He wants himself in the centre +of the canvas, of course. He is to be painted as Jupiter sitting +on Olympus, with the clouds at his feet. At one side of him stands +George Washington, in full regimentals, with his hand on the +president's shoulder. An angel with outstretched wings hovers +overhead, and is placing a laurel wreath on the president's head, +crowning him--Queen of the May, I suppose. In the background is to +be cannon, more angels and soldiers. The man who would paint that +picture would have to have the soul of a dog, and would deserve to go +down into oblivion without even a tin can tied to his tail to sound +his memory." + +Little beads of moisture crept out all over Billy Keogh's brow. The +stub of his blue pencil had not figured out a contingency like this. +The machinery of his plan had run with flattering smoothness until +now. He dragged another chair upon the balcony, and got White back to +his seat. He lit his pipe with apparent calm. + +"Now, sonny," he said, with gentle grimness, "you and me will have +an Art to Art talk. You've got your art and I've got mine. Yours is +the real Pierian stuff that turns up its nose at bock-beer signs and +oleographs of the Old Mill. Mine's the art of Business. This was my +scheme, and it worked out like two-and-two. Paint that president man +as Old King Cole, or Venus, or a landscape, or a fresco, or a bunch +of lilies, or anything he thinks he looks like. But get the paint on +the canvas and collect the spoils. You wouldn't throw me down, Carry, +at this stage of the game. Think of that ten thousand." + +"I can't help thinking of it," said White, "and that's what hurts. +I'm tempted to throw every ideal I ever had down in the mire, and +steep my soul in infamy by painting that picture. That five thousand +meant three years of foreign study to me, and I'd almost sell my soul +for that." + +"Now it ain't as bad as that," said Keogh, soothingly. "It's a +business proposition. It's so much paint and time against money. I +don't fall in with your idea that that picture would so everlastingly +jolt the art side of the question. George Washington was all right, +you know, and nobody could say a word against the angel. I don't +think so bad of that group. If you was to give Jupiter a pair of +epaulets and a sword, and kind of work the clouds around to look +like a blackberry patch, it wouldn't make such a bad battle scene. +Why, if we hadn't already settled on the price, he ought to pay an +extra thousand for Washington, and the angel ought to raise it five +hundred." + +"You don't understand, Billy," said White, with an uneasy laugh. +"Some of us fellows who try to paint have big notions about Art. I +wanted to paint a picture some day that people would stand before and +forget that it was made of paint. I wanted it to creep into them like +a bar of music and mushroom there like a soft bullet. And I wanted +'em to go away and ask, 'What else has he done?' And I didn't want +'em to find a thing; not a portrait nor a magazine cover nor an +illustration nor a drawing of a girl--nothing but _the_ picture. +That's why I've lived on fried sausages, and tried to keep true +to myself. I persuaded myself to do this portrait for the chance +it might give me to study abroad. But this howling, screaming +caricature! Good Lord! can't you see how it is?" + +"Sure," said Keogh, as tenderly as he would have spoken to a child, +and he laid a long forefinger on White's knee. "I see. It's bad to +have your art all slugged up like that. I know. You wanted to paint a +big thing like the panorama of the battle of Gettysburg. But let me +kalsomine you a little mental sketch to consider. Up to date we're +out $385.50 on this scheme. Our capital took every cent both of us +could raise. We've got about enough left to get back to New York on. +I need my share of that ten thousand. I want to work a copper deal +in Idaho, and make a hundred thousand. That's the business end of +the thing. Come down off your art perch, Carry, and let's land that +hatful of dollars." + +"Billy," said White, with an effort, "I'll try. I won't say I'll do +it, but I'll try. I'll go at it, and put it through if I can." + +"That's business," said Keogh heartily. "Good boy! Now, here's +another thing--rush that picture--crowd it through as quick as you +can. Get a couple of boys to help you mix the paint if necessary. +I've picked up some pointers around town. The people here are +beginning to get sick of Mr. President. They say he's been too free +with concessions; and they accuse him of trying to make a dicker with +England to sell out the country. We want that picture done and paid +for before there's any row." + +In the great _patio_ of Casa Morena, the president caused to be +stretched a huge canvas. Under this White set up his temporary +studio. For two hours each day the great man sat to him. + +White worked faithfully. But, as the work progressed, he had seasons +of bitter scorn, of infinite self-contempt, of sullen gloom and +sardonic gaiety. Keogh, with the patience of a great general, +soothed, coaxed, argued--kept him at the picture. + +At the end of a month White announced that the picture was +completed--Jupiter, Washington, angels, clouds, cannon and all. His +face was pale and his mouth drawn straight when he told Keogh. He +said the president was much pleased with it. It was to be hung in +the National Gallery of Statesmen and Heroes. The artist had been +requested to return to Casa Morena on the following day to receive +payment. At the appointed time he left the hotel, silent under his +friend's joyful talk of their success. + +An hour later he walked into the room where Keogh was waiting, threw +his hat on the floor, and sat upon the table. + +"Billy," he said, in strained and labouring tones, "I've a little +money out West in a small business that my brother is running. It's +what I've been living on while I've been studying art. I'll draw out +my share and pay you back what you've lost on this scheme." + +"Lost!" exclaimed Keogh, jumping up. "Didn't you get paid for the +picture?" + +"Yes, I got paid," said White. "But just now there isn't any picture, +and there isn't any pay. If you care to hear about it, here are the +edifying details. The president and I were looking at the painting. +His secretary brought a bank draft on New York for ten thousand +dollars and handed it to me. The moment I touched it I went wild. I +tore it into little pieces and threw them on the floor. A workman +was repainting the pillars inside the _patio_. A bucket of his paint +happened to be convenient. I picked up his brush and slapped a quart +of blue paint all over that ten-thousand-dollar nightmare. I bowed, +and walked out. The president didn't move or speak. That was one time +he was taken by surprise. It's tough on you, Billy, but I couldn't +help it." + +There seemed to be excitement in Coralio. Outside there was a +confused, rising murmur pierced by high-pitched cries. "_Bajo el +traidor--Muerte el traidor!_" were the words they seemed to form. + +"Listen to that!" exclaimed White, bitterly: "I know that much +Spanish. They're shouting, 'Down with the traitor!' I heard them +before. I felt that they meant me. I was a traitor to Art. The +picture had to go." + +"'Down with the blank fool' would have suited your case better," said +Keogh, with fiery emphasis. "You tear up ten thousand dollars like an +old rag because the way you've spread on five dollars' worth of paint +hurts your conscience. Next time I pick a side-partner in a scheme +the man has got to go before a notary and swear he never even heard +the word 'ideal' mentioned." + +Keogh strode from the room, white-hot. White paid little attention +to his resentment. The scorn of Billy Keogh seemed a trifling thing +beside the greater self-scorn he had escaped. + +In Coralio the excitement waxed. An outburst was imminent. The cause +of this demonstration of displeasure was the presence in the town of +a big, pink-cheeked Englishman, who, it was said, was an agent of his +government come to clinch the bargain by which the president placed +his people in the hands of a foreign power. It was charged that not +only had he given away priceless concessions, but that the public +debt was to be transferred into the hands of the English, and the +custom-houses turned over to them as a guarantee. The long-enduring +people had determined to make their protest felt. + +On that night, in Coralio and in other towns, their ire found vent. +Yelling mobs, mercurial but dangerous, roamed the streets. They +overthrew the great bronze statue of the president that stood in the +centre of the plaza, and hacked it to shapeless pieces. They tore +from public buildings the tablets set there proclaiming the glory +of the "Illustrious Liberator." His pictures in the government +offices were demolished. The mobs even attacked the Casa Morena, but +were driven away by the military, which remained faithful to the +executive. All the night terror reigned. + +The greatness of Losada was shown by the fact that by noon the +next day order was restored, and he was still absolute. He issued +proclamations denying positively that any negotiations of any +kind had been entered into with England. Sir Stafford Vaughn, the +pink-cheeked Englishman, also declared in placards and in public +print that his presence there had no international significance. He +was a traveller without guile. In fact (so he stated), he had not +even spoken with the president or been in his presence since his +arrival. + +During this disturbance, White was preparing for his homeward voyage +in the steamship that was to sail within two or three days. About +noon, Keogh, the restless, took his camera out with the hope of +speeding the lagging hours. The town was now as quiet as if peace had +never departed from her perch on the red-tiled roofs. + +About the middle of the afternoon, Keogh hurried back to the hotel +with something decidedly special in his air. He retired to the little +room where he developed his pictures. + +Later on he came out to White on the balcony, with a luminous, grim, +predatory smile on his face. + +"Do you know what that is?" he asked, holding up a 4 5 photograph +mounted on cardboard. + +"Snap-shot of a seorita sitting in the sand--alliteration +unintentional," guessed White, lazily. + +"Wrong," said Keogh with shining eyes. "It's a slung-shot. It's a can +of dynamite. It's a gold mine. It's a sight-draft on your president +man for twenty thousand dollars--yes, sir--twenty thousand this time, +and no spoiling the picture. No ethics of art in the way. Art! You +with your smelly little tubes! I've got you skinned to death with a +kodak. Take a look at that." + +White took the picture in his hand, and gave a long whistle. + +"Jove!" he exclaimed, "but wouldn't that stir up a row in town if you +let it be seen. How in the world did you get it, Billy?" + +"You know that high wall around the president man's back garden? +I was up there trying to get a bird's-eye of the town. I happened +to notice a chink in the wall where a stone and a lot of plaster +had slid out. Thinks I, I'll take a peep through to see how Mr. +President's cabbages are growing. The first thing I saw was him and +this Sir Englishman sitting at a little table about twenty feet away. +They had the table all spread over with documents, and they were +hobnobbing over them as thick as two pirates. 'Twas a nice corner +of the garden, all private and shady with palms and orange trees, +and they had a pail of champagne set by handy in the grass. I knew +then was the time for me to make my big hit in Art. So I raised the +machine up to the crack, and pressed the button. Just as I did so +them old boys shook hands on the deal--you see they took that way in +the picture." + +Keogh put on his coat and hat. + +"What are you going to do with it?" asked White. + +"Me," said Keogh in a hurt tone, "why, I'm going to tie a pink ribbon +to it and hang it on the what-not, of course. I'm surprised at +you. But while I'm out you just try to figure out what ginger-cake +potentate would be most likely to want to buy this work of art for +his private collection--just to keep it out of circulation." + +The sunset was reddening the tops of the cocoanut palms when +Billy Keogh came back from Casa Morena. He nodded to the artist's +questioning gaze; and lay down on a cot with his hands under the back +of his head. + +"I saw him. He paid the money like a little man. They didn't want to +let me in at first. I told 'em it was important. Yes, that president +man is on the plenty-able list. He's got a beautiful business system +about the way he uses his brains. All I had to do was to hold +up the photograph so he could see it, and name the price. He +just smiled, and walked over to a safe and got the cash. Twenty +one-thousand-dollar brand-new United States Treasury notes he laid +on the table, like I'd pay out a dollar and a quarter. Fine notes, +too--they crackled with a sound like burning the brush off a ten-acre +lot." + +"Let's try the feel of one," said White, curiously. "I never saw a +thousand-dollar bill." Keogh did not immediately respond. + +"Carry," he said, in an absent-minded way, "you think a heap of your +art, don't you?" + +"More," said White, frankly, "than has been for the financial good of +myself and my friends." + +"I thought you were a fool the other day," went on Keogh, quietly, +"and I'm not sure now that you wasn't. But if you was, so am I. I've +been in some funny deals, Carry, but I've always managed to scramble +fair, and match my brains and capital against the other fellow's. But +when it comes to--well, when you've got the other fellow cinched, +and the screws on him, and he's got to put up--why, it don't strike +me as being a man's game. They've got a name for it, you know; +it's--confound you, don't you understand? A fellow feels--it's +something like that blamed art of yours--he--well, I tore that +photograph up and laid the pieces on that stack of money and shoved +the whole business back across the table. 'Excuse me, Mr. Losada,' +I said, 'but I guess I've made a mistake in the price. You get the +photo for nothing.' Now, Carry, you get out the pencil, and we'll do +some more figuring. I'd like to save enough out of our capital for +you to have some fried sausages in your joint when you get back to +New York." + + + + +XV + +DICKY + + +There is little consecutiveness along the Spanish Main. Things happen +there intermittently. Even Time seems to hang his scythe daily on the +branch of an orange tree while he takes a siesta and a cigarette. + +After the ineffectual revolt against the administration of President +Losada, the country settled again into quiet toleration of the abuses +with which he had been charged. In Coralio old political enemies +went arm-in-arm, lightly eschewing for the time all differences of +opinion. + +The failure of the art expedition did not stretch the cat-footed +Keogh upon his back. The ups and downs of Fortune made smooth +travelling for his nimble steps. His blue pencil stub was at work +again before the smoke of the steamer on which White sailed had +cleared away from the horizon. He had but to speak a word to Geddie +to find his credit negotiable for whatever goods he wanted from the +store of Brannigan & Company. On the same day on which White arrived +in New York Keogh, at the rear of a train of five pack mules loaded +with hardware and cutlery, set his face toward the grim, interior +mountains. There the Indian tribes wash gold dust from the auriferous +streams; and when a market is brought to them trading is brisk and +_muy bueno_ in the Cordilleras. + +In Coralio Time folded his wings and paced wearily along his drowsy +path. They who had most cheered the torpid hours were gone. Clancy +had sailed on a Spanish barque for Colon, contemplating a cut across +the isthmus and then a further voyage to end at Calao, where the +fighting was said to be on. Geddie, whose quiet and genial nature had +once served to mitigate the frequent dull reaction of lotus eating, +was now a home-man, happy with his bright orchid, Paula, and never +even dreaming of or regretting the unsolved, sealed and monogramed +Bottle whose contents, now inconsiderable, were held safely in the +keeping of the sea. + +Well may the Walrus, most discerning and eclectic of beasts, place +sealing-wax midway on his programme of topics that fall pertinent and +diverting upon the ear. + +Atwood was gone--he of the hospitable back porch and ingenuous +cunning. Dr. Gregg, with his trepanning story smouldering within him, +was a whiskered volcano, always showing signs of imminent eruption, +and was not to be considered in the ranks of those who might +contribute to the amelioration of ennui. The new consul's note chimed +with the sad sea waves and the violent tropical greens--he had not a +bar of Scheherezade or of the Round Table in his lute. Goodwin was +employed with large projects: what time he was loosed from them found +him at his home, where he loved to be. Therefore it will be seen that +there was a dearth of fellowship and entertainment among the foreign +contingent of Coralio. + +And then Dicky Maloney dropped down from the clouds upon the town, +and amused it. + +Nobody knew where Dicky Maloney hailed from or how he reached +Coralio. He appeared there one day; and that was all. He afterward +said that he came on the fruit steamer _Thor_; but an inspection of +the _Thor's_ passenger list of that date was found to be Maloneyless. +Curiosity, however, soon perished; and Dicky took his place among the +odd fish cast up by the Caribbean. + +He was an active, devil-may-care, rollicking fellow with an engaging +gray eye, the most irresistible grin, a rather dark or much sunburned +complexion, and a head of the fieriest red hair ever seen in that +country. Speaking the Spanish language as well as he spoke English, +and seeming always to have plenty of silver in his pockets, it was +not long before he was a welcome companion whithersoever he went. He +had an extreme fondness for _vino blanco_, and gained the reputation +of being able to drink more of it than any three men in town. +Everybody called him "Dicky"; everybody cheered up at the sight of +him--especially the natives, to whom his marvellous red hair and his +free-and-easy style were a constant delight and envy. Wherever you +went in the town you would soon see Dicky or hear his genial laugh, +and find around him a group of admirers who appreciated him both for +his good nature and the white wine he was always so ready to buy. + +A considerable amount of speculation was had concerning the object of +his sojourn there, until one day he silenced this by opening a small +shop for the sale of tobacco, _dulces_ and the handiwork of the +interior Indians--fibre-and-silk-woven goods, deerskin _zapatos_ and +basketwork of _tule_ reeds. Even then he did not change his habits; +for he was drinking and playing cards half the day and night with the +_comandante_, the collector of customs, the _Jefe Politico_ and other +gay dogs among the native officials. + +One day Dicky saw Pasa, the daughter of Madama Ortiz, sitting in the +side-door of the Hotel de los Estranjeros. He stopped in his tracks, +still, for the first time in Coralio; and then he sped, swift as a +deer, to find Vasquez, a gilded native youth, to present him. + +The young men had named Pasa "_La Santita Naranjadita_." +_Naranjadita_ is a Spanish word for a certain colour that you must go +to more trouble to describe in English. By saying "The little saint, +tinted the most beautiful-delicate-slightly-orange-golden," you will +approximate the description of Madama Ortiz's daughter. + +La Madama Ortiz sold rum in addition to other liquors. Now, you must +know that the rum expiates whatever opprobrium attends upon the other +commodities. For rum-making, mind you, is a government monopoly; +and to keep a government dispensary assures respectability if not +preminence. Moreover, the saddest of precisians could find no fault +with the conduct of the shop. Customers drank there in the lowest of +spirits and fearsomely, as in the shadow of the dead; for Madama's +ancient and vaunted lineage counteracted even the rum's behest to be +merry. For, was she not of the Iglesias, who landed with Pizarro? And +had not her deceased husband been _comisionado de caminos y puentes_ +for the district? + +In the evenings Pasa sat by the window in the room next to the one +where they drank, and strummed dreamily upon her guitar. And then, +by twos and threes, would come visiting young caballeros and occupy +the prim line of chairs set against the wall of this room. They were +there to besiege the heart of "_La Santita_." Their method (which is +not proof against intelligent competition) consisted of expanding the +chest, looking valorous, and consuming a gross or two of cigarettes. +Even saints delicately oranged prefer to be wooed differently. + +Doa Pasa would tide over the vast chasms of nicotinized silence +with music from her guitar, while she wondered if the romances she +had read about gallant and more--more contiguous cavaliers were all +lies. At somewhat regular intervals Madama would glide in from the +dispensary with a sort of drought-suggesting gleam in her eye, and +there would be a rustling of stiffly-starched white trousers as one +of the caballeros would propose an adjournment to the bar. + +That Dicky Maloney would, sooner or later, explore this field was a +thing to be foreseen. There were few doors in Coralio into which his +red head had not been poked. + +In an incredibly short space of time after his first sight of her +he was there, seated close beside her rocking chair. There were no +back-against-the-wall poses in Dicky's theory of wooing. His plan of +subjection was an attack at close range. To carry the fortress with +one concentrated, ardent, eloquent, irresistible _escalade_--that was +Dicky's way. + +Pasa was descended from the proudest Spanish families in the country. +Moreover, she had had unusual advantages. Two years in a New Orleans +school had elevated her ambitions and fitted her for a fate above the +ordinary maidens of her native land. And yet here she succumbed to +the first red-haired scamp with a glib tongue and a charming smile +that came along and courted her properly. + +Very soon Dicky took her to the little church on the corner of the +plaza, and "Mrs. Maloney" was added to her string of distinguished +names. + +And it was her fate to sit, with her patient, saintly eyes and figure +like a bisque Psyche, behind the sequestered counter of the little +shop, while Dicky drank and philandered with his frivolous +acquaintances. + +The women, with their naturally fine instinct, saw a chance for +vivisection, and delicately taunted her with his habits. She turned +upon them in a beautiful, steady blaze of sorrowful contempt. + +"You meat-cows," she said, in her level, crystal-clear tones; "you +know nothing of a man. Your men are _maromeros_. They are fit only to +roll cigarettes in the shade until the sun strikes and shrivels them +up. They drone in your hammocks and you comb their hair and feed +them with fresh fruit. My man is of no such blood. Let him drink of +the wine. When he has taken sufficient of it to drown one of your +_flaccitos_ he will come home to me more of a man than one thousand +of your _pobrecitos_. _My_ hair he smooths and braids; to me he +sings; he himself removes my _zapatos_, and there, there, upon each +instep leaves a kiss. He holds-- Oh, you will never understand! Blind +ones who have never known a _man_." + +Sometimes mysterious things happened at night about Dicky's shop. +While the front of it was dark, in the little room back of it Dicky +and a few of his friends would sit about a table carrying on some +kind of very quiet _negocios_ until quite late. Finally he would let +them out the front door very carefully, and go upstairs to his little +saint. These visitors were generally conspirator-like men with dark +clothes and hats. Of course, these dark doings were noticed after a +while, and talked about. + +Dicky seemed to care nothing at all for the society of the alien +residents of the town. He avoided Goodwin, and his skilful escape +from the trepanning story of Dr. Gregg is still referred to, in +Coralio, as a masterpiece of lightning diplomacy. + +Many letters arrived, addressed to "Mr. Dicky Maloney," or "Seor +Dickee Maloney," to the considerable pride of Pasa. That so many +people should desire to write to him only confirmed her own suspicion +that the light from his red head shone around the world. As to their +contents she never felt curiosity. There was a wife for you! + +The one mistake Dicky made in Coralio was to run out of money at the +wrong time. Where his money came from was a puzzle, for the sales +of his shop were next to nothing, but that source failed, and at a +peculiarly unfortunate time. It was when the _comandante_, Don Seor +el Coronel Encarnacion Rios, looked upon the little saint seated in +the shop and felt his heart go pitapat. + +The _comandante_, who was versed in all the intricate arts of +gallantry, first delicately hinted at his sentiments by donning his +dress uniform and strutting up and down fiercely before her window. +Pasa, glancing demurely with her saintly eyes, instantly perceived +his resemblance to her parrot, Chichi, and was diverted to the extent +of a smile. The _comandante_ saw the smile, which was not intended +for him. Convinced of an impression made, he entered the shop, +confidently, and advanced to open compliment. Pasa froze; he pranced; +she flamed royally; he was charmed to injudicious persistence; she +commanded him to leave the shop; he tried to capture her hand,--and +Dicky entered, smiling broadly, full of white wine and the devil. + +He spent five minutes in punishing the _comandante_ scientifically +and carefully, so that the pain might be prolonged as far as +possible. At the end of that time he pitched the rash wooer out the +door upon the stones of the street, senseless. + +A barefooted policeman who had been watching the affair from across +the street blew a whistle. A squad of four soldiers came running from +the _cuartel_ around the corner. When they saw that the offender +was Dicky, they stopped, and blew more whistles, which brought out +renforcements of eight. Deeming the odds against them sufficiently +reduced, the military advanced upon the disturber. + +Dicky, being thoroughly imbued with the martial spirit, stooped +and drew the _comandante's_ sword, which was girded about him, and +charged his foe. He chased the standing army four squares, playfully +prodding its squealing rear and hacking at its ginger-coloured heels. + +But he was not so successful with the civic authorities. Six +muscular, nimble policemen overpowered him and conveyed him, +triumphantly but warily, to jail. "_El Diablo Colorado_" they dubbed +him, and derided the military for its defeat. + +Dicky, with the rest of the prisoners, could look out through +the barred door at the grass of the little plaza, at a row of +orange trees and the red tile roofs and 'dobe walls of a line of +insignificant stores. + +At sunset along a path across this plaza came a melancholy procession +of sad-faced women bearing plantains, cassaba, bread and fruit--each +coming with food to some wretch behind those bars to whom she still +clung and furnished the means of life. Twice a day--morning and +evening--they were permitted to come. Water was furnished to her +compulsory guests by the republic, but no food. + +That evening Dicky's name was called by the sentry, and he stepped +before the bars of the door. There stood his little saint, a black +mantilla draped about her head and shoulders, her face like glorified +melancholy, her clear eyes gazing longingly at him as if they might +draw him between the bars to her. She brought a chicken, some +oranges, _dulces_ and a loaf of white bread. A soldier inspected the +food, and passed it in to Dicky. Pasa spoke calmly, as she always +did, briefly, in her thrilling, flute-like tones. "Angel of my life," +she said, "let it not be long that thou art away from me. Thou +knowest that life is not a thing to be endured with thou not at +my side. Tell me if I can do aught in this matter. If not, I will +wait--a little while. I come again in the morning." + +Dicky, with his shoes removed so as not to disturb his fellow +prisoners, tramped the floor of the jail half the night condemning +his lack of money and the cause of it--whatever that might have been. +He knew very well that money would have bought his release at once. + +For two days succeeding Pasa came at the appointed times and brought +him food. He eagerly inquired each time if a letter or package had +come for him, and she mournfully shook her head. + +On the morning of the third day she brought only a small loaf of +bread. There were dark circles under her eyes. She seemed as calm as +ever. + +"By jingo," said Dicky, who seemed to speak in English or Spanish as +the whim seized him, "this is dry provender, _muchachita_. Is this +the best you can dig up for a fellow?" + +Pasa looked at him as a mother looks at a beloved but capricious +babe. + +"Think better of it," she said, in a low voice; "since for the next +meal there will be nothing. The last _centavo_ is spent." She pressed +closer against the grating. + +"Sell the goods in the shop--take anything for them." + +"Have I not tried? Did I not offer them for one-tenth their cost? Not +even one _peso_ would any one give. There is not one _real_ in this +town to assist Dickee Malonee." + +Dick clenched his teeth grimly. "That's the _comandante_," he +growled. "He's responsible for that sentiment. Wait, oh, wait till +the cards are all out." + +Pasa lowered her voice to almost a whisper. "And, listen, heart of my +heart," she said, "I have endeavoured to be brave, but I cannot live +without thee. Three days now--" + +Dicky caught a faint gleam of steel from the folds of her mantilla. +For once she looked in his face and saw it without a smile, stern, +menacing and purposeful. Then he suddenly raised his hand and his +smile came back like a gleam of sunshine. The hoarse signal of an +incoming steamer's siren sounded in the harbour. Dicky called to the +sentry who was pacing before the door: "What steamer comes?" + +"The _Catarina_." + +"Of the Vesuvius line?" + +"Without doubt, of that line." + +"Go you, _picarilla_," said Dicky joyously to Pasa, "to the American +consul. Tell him I wish to speak with him. See that he comes at +once. And look you! let me see a different look in those eyes, for I +promise your head shall rest upon this arm to-night." + +It was an hour before the consul came. He held his green umbrella +under his arm, and mopped his forehead impatiently. + +"Now, see here, Maloney," he began, captiously, "you fellows seem to +think you can cut up any kind of row, and expect me to pull you out +of it. I'm neither the War Department nor a gold mine. This country +has its laws, you know, and there's one against pounding the senses +out of the regular army. You Irish are forever getting into trouble. +I don't see what I can do. Anything like tobacco, now, to make you +comfortable--or newspapers--" + +"Son of Eli," interrupted Dicky, gravely, "you haven't changed an +iota. That is almost a duplicate of the speech you made when old +Koen's donkeys and geese got into the chapel loft, and the culprits +wanted to hide in your room." + +"Oh, heavens!" exclaimed the consul, hurriedly adjusting his +spectacles. "Are you a Yale man, too? Were you in that crowd? I don't +seem to remember any one with red--any one named Maloney. Such a lot +of college men seem to have misused their advantages. One of the best +mathematicians of the class of '91 is selling lottery tickets in +Belize. A Cornell man dropped off here last month. He was second +steward on a guano boat. I'll write to the department if you like, +Maloney. Or if there's any tobacco, or newspa--" + +"There's nothing," interrupted Dicky, shortly, "but this. You go tell +the captain of the _Catarina_ that Dicky Maloney wants to see him as +soon as he can conveniently come. Tell him where I am. Hurry. That's +all." + +The consul, glad to be let off so easily, hurried away. The captain +of the _Catarina_, a stout man, Sicilian born, soon appeared, +shoving, with little ceremony, through the guards to the jail door. +The Vesuvius Fruit Company had a habit of doing things that way in +Anchuria. + +"I am exceedingly sorry--exceedingly sorry," said the captain, "to +see this occur. I place myself at your service, Mr. Maloney. What you +need shall be furnished. Whatever you say shall be done." + +Dicky looked at him unsmilingly. His red hair could not detract from +his attitude of severe dignity as he stood, tall and calm, with his +now grim mouth forming a horizontal line. + +"Captain De Lucco, I believe I still have funds in the hands of your +company--ample and personal funds. I ordered a remittance last week. +The money has not arrived. You know what is needed in this game. +Money and money and more money. Why has it not been sent?" + +"By the _Cristobal_," replied De Lucco, gesticulating, "it was +despatched. Where is the _Cristobal_? Off Cape Antonio I spoke her +with a broken shaft. A tramp coaster was towing her back to New +Orleans. I brought money ashore thinking your need for it might not +withstand delay. In this envelope is one thousand dollars. There is +more if you need it, Mr. Maloney." + +"For the present it will suffice," said Dicky, softening as he +crinkled the envelope and looked down at the half-inch thickness of +smooth, dingy bills. + +"The long green!" he said, gently, with a new reverence in his gaze. +"Is there anything it will not buy, Captain?" + +"I had three friends," replied De Lucco, who was a bit of a +philosopher, "who had money. One of them speculated in stocks and +made ten million; another is in heaven, and the third married a poor +girl whom he loved." + +"The answer, then," said Dicky, "is held by the Almighty, Wall Street +and Cupid. So, the question remains." + +"This," queried the captain, including Dicky's surroundings in +a significant gesture of his hand, "is it--it is not--it is not +connected with the business of your little shop? There is no failure +in your plans?" + +"No, no," said Dicky. "This is merely the result of a little private +affair of mine, a digression from the regular line of business. They +say for a complete life a man must know poverty, love and war. But +they don't go well together, _capitn mio_. No; there is no failure +in my business. The little shop is doing very well." + +When the captain had departed Dicky called the sergeant of the jail +squad and asked: + +"Am I _preso_ by the military or by the civil authority?" + +"Surely there is no martial law in effect now, seor." + +"_Bueno_. Now go or send to the alcalde, the _Jues de la Paz_ and the +_Jefe de los Policios_. Tell them I am prepared at once to satisfy +the demands of justice." A folded bill of the "long green" slid into +the sergeant's hand. + +Then Dicky's smile came back again, for he knew that the hours of his +captivity were numbered; and he hummed, in time with the sentry's +tread: + + + "_They're hanging men and women now, + For lacking of the green._" + + +So, that night Dicky sat by the window of the room over his shop +and his little saint sat close by, working at something silken and +dainty. Dicky was thoughtful and grave. His red hair was in an +unusual state of disorder. Pasa's fingers often ached to smooth and +arrange it, but Dicky would never allow it. He was poring, to-night, +over a great litter of maps and books and papers on his table until +that perpendicular line came between his brows that always distressed +Pasa. Presently she went and brought his hat, and stood with it until +he looked up, inquiringly. + +"It is sad for you here," she explained. "Go out and drink _vino +blanco_. Come back when you get that smile you used to wear. That is +what I wish to see." + +Dicky laughed and threw down his papers. "The _vino blanco_ stage +is past. It has served its turn. Perhaps, after all, there was less +entered my mouth and more my ears than people thought. But, there +will be no more maps or frowns to-night. I promise you that. Come." + +They sat upon a reed _silleta_ at the window and watched the +quivering gleams from the lights of the _Catarina_ reflected in the +harbour. + +Presently Pasa rippled out one of her infrequent chirrups of audible +laughter. + +"I was thinking," she began, anticipating Dicky's question, "of the +foolish things girls have in their minds. Because I went to school +in the States I used to have ambitions. Nothing less than to be the +president's wife would satisfy me. And, look, thou red picaroon, to +what obscure fate thou hast stolen me!" + +"Don't give up hope," said Dicky, smiling. "More than one Irishman +has been the ruler of a South American country. There was a dictator +of Chili named O'Higgins. Why not a President Maloney, of Anchuria? +Say the word, _santita mia_, and we'll make the race." + +"No, no, no, thou red-haired, reckless one!" sighed Pasa; "I am +content"--she laid her head against his arm--"here." + + + + +XVI + +ROUGE ET NOIR + + +It has been indicated that disaffection followed the elevation of +Losada to the presidency. This feeling continued to grow. Throughout +the entire republic there seemed to be a spirit of silent, sullen +discontent. Even the old Liberal party to which Goodwin, Zavalla and +other patriots had lent their aid was disappointed. Losada had failed +to become a popular idol. Fresh taxes, fresh import duties and, more +than all, his tolerance of the outrageous oppression of citizens by +the military had rendered him the most obnoxious president since +the despicable Alforan. The majority of his own cabinet were out +of sympathy with him. The army, which he had courted by giving it +license to tyrannize, had been his main, and thus far adequate +support. + +But the most impolitic of the administration's moves had been when it +antagonized the Vesuvius Fruit Company, an organization plying twelve +steamers and with a cash capital somewhat larger than Anchuria's +surplus and debt combined. + +Reasonably an established concern like the Vesuvius would become +irritated at having a small, retail republic with no rating at all +attempt to squeeze it. So when the government proxies applied for +a subsidy they encountered a polite refusal. The president at once +retaliated by clapping an export duty of one _real_ per bunch on +bananas--a thing unprecedented in fruit-growing countries. The +Vesuvius Company had invested large sums in wharves and plantations +along the Anchurian coast, their agents had erected fine homes in the +towns where they had their headquarters, and heretofore had worked +with the republic in good-will and with advantage to both. It would +lose an immense sum if compelled to move out. The selling price +of bananas from Vera Cruz to Trinidad was three _reals_ per bunch. +This new duty of one _real_ would have ruined the fruit growers in +Anchuria and have seriously discommoded the Vesuvius Company had it +declined to pay it. But for some reason, the Vesuvius continued to +buy Anchurian fruit, paying four _reals_ for it; and not suffering +the growers to bear the loss. + +This apparent victory deceived His Excellency; and he began to hunger +for more of it. He sent an emissary to request a conference with a +representative of the fruit company. The Vesuvius sent Mr. Franzoni, +a little, stout, cheerful man, always cool, and whistling airs from +Verdi's operas. Seor Espirition, of the office of the Minister of +Finance, attempted the sandbagging in behalf of Anchuria. The meeting +took place in the cabin of the _Salvador_, of the Vesuvius line. + +Seor Espirition opened negotiations by announcing that the +government contemplated the building of a railroad to skirt the +alluvial coast lands. After touching upon the benefits such a road +would confer upon the interests of the Vesuvius, he reached the +definite suggestion that a contribution to the road's expenses of, +say, fifty thousand _pesos_ would not be more than an equivalent to +benefits received. + +Mr. Franzoni denied that his company would receive any benefits +from a contemplated road. As its representative he must decline +to contribute fifty thousand _pesos_. But he would assume the +responsibility of offering twenty-five. + +Did Seor Espirition understand Seor Franzoni to mean twenty-five +thousand _pesos_? + +By no means. Twenty-five _pesos_. And in silver; not in gold. + +"Your offer insults my government," cried Seor Espirition, rising +with indignation. + +"Then," said Mr. Franzoni, in warning tone, "_we will change it_." + +The offer was never changed. Could Mr. Franzoni have meant the +government? + +This was the state of affairs in Anchuria when the winter season +opened at Coralio at the end of the second year of Losada's +administration. So, when the government and society made its annual +exodus to the seashore it was evident that the presidential advent +would not be celebrated by unlimited rejoicing. The tenth of November +was the day set for the entrance into Coralio of the gay company +from the capital. A narrow-gauge railroad runs twenty miles into the +interior from Solitas. The government party travels by carriage from +San Mateo to this road's terminal point, and proceeds by train to +Solitas. From here they march in grand procession to Coralio where, +on the day of their coming, festivities and ceremonies abound. But +this season saw an ominous dawning of the tenth of November. + +Although the rainy season was over, the day seemed to hark back to +reeking June. A fine drizzle of rain fell all during the forenoon. +The procession entered Coralio amid a strange silence. + +President Losada was an elderly man, grizzly bearded, with a +considerable ratio of Indian blood revealed in his cinnamon +complexion. His carriage headed the procession, surrounded and +guarded by Captain Cruz and his famous troop of one hundred light +horse "_El Ciento Huilando_." Colonel Rocas followed, with a regiment +of the regular army. + +The president's sharp, beady eyes glanced about him for the expected +demonstration of welcome; but he faced a stolid, indifferent array of +citizens. Sight-seers the Anchurians are by birth and habit, and they +turned out to their last able-bodied unit to witness the scene; but +they maintained an accusive silence. They crowded the streets to the +very wheel ruts; they covered the red tile roofs to the eaves, but +there was never a "_viva_" from them. No wreaths of palm and lemon +branches or gorgeous strings of paper roses hung from the windows and +balconies as was the custom. There was an apathy, a dull, dissenting +disapprobation, that was the more ominous because it puzzled. No +one feared an outburst, a revolt of the discontents, for they had +no leader. The president and those loyal to him had never even +heard whispered a name among them capable of crystallizing the +dissatisfaction into opposition. No, there could be no danger. The +people always procured a new idol before they destroyed an old one. + +At length, after a prodigious galloping and curvetting of red-sashed +majors, gold-laced colonels and epauletted generals, the procession +formed for its annual progress down the Calle Grande to the Casa +Morena, where the ceremony of welcome to the visiting president +always took place. + +The Swiss band led the line of march. After it pranced the local +_comandante_, mounted, and a detachment of his troops. Next came a +carriage with four members of the cabinet, conspicuous among them +the Minister of War, old General Pilar, with his white moustache and +his soldierly bearing. Then the president's vehicle, containing also +the Ministers of Finance and State; and surrounded by Captain Cruz's +light horse formed in a close double file of fours. Following them, +the rest of the officials of state, the judges and distinguished +military and social ornaments of public and private life. + +As the band struck up, and the movement began, like a bird of +ill-omen the _Valhalla_, the swiftest steamship of the Vesuvius line, +glided into the harbour in plain view of the president and his train. +Of course, there was nothing menacing about its arrival--a business +firm does not go to war with a nation--but it reminded Seor +Espirition and others in those carriages that the Vesuvius Fruit +Company was undoubtedly carrying something up its sleeve for them. + +By the time the van of the procession had reached the government +building, Captain Cronin, of the _Valhalla_, and Mr. Vincenti, member +of the Vesuvius Company, had landed and were pushing their way, +bluff, hearty and nonchalant, through the crowd on the narrow +sidewalk. Clad in white linen, big, debonair, with an air of +good-humoured authority, they made conspicuous figures among the +dark mass of unimposing Anchurians, as they penetrated to within a +few yards of the steps of the Casa Morena. Looking easily above the +heads of the crowd, they perceived another that towered above the +undersized natives. It was the fiery poll of Dicky Maloney against +the wall close by the lower step; and his broad, seductive grin +showed that he recognized their presence. + +Dicky had attired himself becomingly for the festive occasion in a +well-fitting black suit. Pasa was close by his side, her head covered +with the ubiquitous black mantilla. + +Mr. Vincenti looked at her attentively. + +"Botticelli's Madonna," he remarked, gravely. "I wonder when she got +into the game. I don't like his getting tangled with the women. I +hoped he would keep away from them." + +Captain Cronin's laugh almost drew attention from the parade. + +"With that head of hair! Keep away from the women! And a Maloney! +Hasn't he got a license? But, nonsense aside, what do you think of +the prospects? It's a species of filibustering out of my line." + +Vincenti glanced again at Dicky's head and smiled. + +"_Rouge et noir_," he said. "There you have it. Make your play, +gentlemen. Our money is on the red." + +"The lad's game," said Cronin, with a commending look at the tall, +easy figure by the steps. "But 'tis all like fly-by-night theatricals +to me. The talk's bigger than the stage; there's a smell of gasoline +in the air, and they're their own audience and scene-shifters." + +They ceased talking, for General Pilar had descended from the first +carriage and had taken his stand upon the top step of Casa Morena. As +the oldest member of the cabinet, custom had decreed that he should +make the address of welcome, presenting the keys of the official +residence to the president at its close. + +General Pilar was one of the most distinguished citizens of the +republic. Hero of three wars and innumerable revolutions, he was an +honoured guest at European courts and camps. An eloquent speaker +and a friend to the people, he represented the highest type of the +Anchurians. + +Holding in his hand the gilt keys of Casa Morena, he began his +address in a historical form, touching upon each administration +and the advance of civilization and prosperity from the first dim +striving after liberty down to present times. Arriving at the +rgime of President Losada, at which point, according to precedent, +he should have delivered a eulogy upon its wise conduct and the +happiness of the people, General Pilar paused. Then he silently held +up the bunch of keys high above his head, with his eyes closely +regarding it. The ribbon with which they were bound fluttered in the +breeze. + +"It still blows," cried the speaker, exultantly. "Citizens of +Anchuria, give thanks to the saints this night that our air is still +free." + +Thus disposing of Losada's administration, he abruptly reverted +to that of Olivarra, Anchuria's most popular ruler. Olivarra had +been assassinated nine years before while in the prime of life and +usefulness. A faction of the Liberal party led by Losada himself had +been accused of the deed. Whether guilty or not, it was eight years +before the ambitious and scheming Losada had gained his goal. + +Upon this theme General Pilar's eloquence was loosed. He drew the +picture of the beneficent Olivarra with a loving hand. He reminded +the people of the peace, the security and the happiness they had +enjoyed during that period. He recalled in vivid detail and with +significant contrast the last winter sojourn of President Olivarra +in Coralio, when his appearance at their fiestas was the signal for +thundering _vivas_ of love and approbation. + +The first public expression of sentiment from the people that day +followed. A low, sustained murmur went among them like the surf +rolling along the shore. + +"Ten dollars to a dinner at the Saint Charles," remarked Mr. +Vincenti, "that _rouge_ wins." + +"I never bet against my own interests," said Captain Cronin, lighting +a cigar. "Long-winded old boy, for his age. What's he talking about?" + +"My Spanish," replied Vincenti, "runs about ten words to the minute; +his is something around two hundred. Whatever he's saying, he's +getting them warmed up." + +"Friends and brothers," General Pilar was saying, "could I reach +out my hand this day across the lamentable silence of the grave to +Olivarra 'the Good,' to the ruler who was one of you, whose tears +fell when you sorrowed, and whose smile followed your joy--I would +bring him back to you, but--Olivarra is dead--dead at the hands of a +craven assassin!" + +The speaker turned and gazed boldly into the carriage of the +president. His arm remained extended aloft as if to sustain his +peroration. The president was listening, aghast, at this remarkable +address of welcome. He was sunk back upon his seat, trembling with +rage and dumb surprise, his dark hands tightly gripping the carriage +cushions. + +Half rising, he extended one arm toward the speaker, and shouted a +harsh command at Captain Cruz. The leader of the "Flying Hundred" +sat his horse, immovable, with folded arms, giving no sign of having +heard. Losada sank back again, his dark features distinctly paling. + +"Who says that Olivarra is dead?" suddenly cried the speaker, his +voice, old as he was, sounding like a battle trumpet. "His body +lies in the grave, but to the people he loved he has bequeathed his +spirit--yes, more--his learning, his courage, his kindness--yes, +more--his youth, his image--people of Anchuria, have you forgotten +Ramon, the son of Olivarra?" + +Cronin and Vincenti, watching closely, saw Dicky Maloney suddenly +raise his hat, tear off his shock of red hair, leap up the steps and +stand at the side of General Pilar. The Minister of War laid his +arm across the young man's shoulders. All who had known President +Olivarra saw again his same lion-like pose, the same frank, undaunted +expression, the same high forehead with the peculiar line of the +clustering, crisp black hair. + +General Pilar was an experienced orator. He seized the moment of +breathless silence that preceded the storm. + +"Citizens of Anchuria," he trumpeted, holding aloft the keys to Casa +Morena, "I am here to deliver these keys--the keys to your homes and +liberty--to your chosen president. Shall I deliver them to Enrico +Olivarra's assassin, or to his son?" + +"Olivarra! Olivarra!" the crowd shrieked and howled. All vociferated +the magic name--men, women, children and the parrots. + +And the enthusiasm was not confined to the blood of the plebs. +Colonel Rocas ascended the steps and laid his sword theatrically at +young Ramon Olivarra's feet. Four members of the cabinet embraced +him. Captain Cruz gave a command, and twenty of _El Ciento Huilando_ +dismounted and arranged themselves in a cordon about the steps of +Casa Morena. + +But Ramon Olivarra seized that moment to prove himself a born genius +and politician. He waved those soldiers aside, and descended the +steps to the street. There, without losing his dignity or the +distinguished elegance that the loss of his red hair brought him, +he took the proletariat to his bosom--the barefooted, the dirty, +Indians, Caribs, babies, beggars, old, young, saints, soldiers and +sinners--he missed none of them. + +While this act of the drama was being presented, the scene shifters +had been busy at the duties that had been assigned to them. Two +of Cruz's dragoons had seized the bridle reins of Losada's horses; +others formed a close guard around the carriage; and they galloped +off with the tyrant and his two unpopular Ministers. No doubt a place +had been prepared for them. There are a number of well-barred stone +apartments in Coralio. + +"_Rouge_ wins," said Mr. Vincenti, calmly lighting another cigar. + +Captain Cronin had been intently watching the vicinity of the stone +steps for some time. + +"Good boy!" he exclaimed suddenly, as if relieved. "I wondered if he +was going to forget his Kathleen Mavourneen." + +Young Olivarra had reascended the steps and spoken a few words to +General Pilar. Then that distinguished veteran descended to the +ground and approached Pasa, who still stood, wonder-eyed, where Dicky +had left her. With his plumed hat in his hand, and his medals and +decorations shining on his breast, the general spoke to her and gave +her his arm, and they went up the stone steps of the Casa Morena +together. And then Ramon Olivarra stepped forward and took both her +hands before all the people. + +And while the cheering was breaking out afresh everywhere, Captain +Cronin and Mr. Vincenti turned and walked back toward the shore where +the gig was waiting for them. + +"There'll be another '_presidente proclamada_' in the morning," +said Mr. Vincenti, musingly. "As a rule they are not as reliable as +the elected ones, but this youngster seems to have some good stuff +in him. He planned and manoeuvred the entire campaign. Olivarra's +widow, you know, was wealthy. After her husband was assassinated +she went to the States, and educated her son at Yale. The Vesuvius +Company hunted him up, and backed him in the little game." + +"It's a glorious thing," said Cronin, half jestingly, "to be able to +discharge a government, and insert one of your own choosing, in these +days." + +"Oh, it is only a matter of business," said Vincenti, stopping and +offering the stump of his cigar to a monkey that swung down from a +lime tree; "and that is what moves the world of to-day. That extra +_real_ on the price of bananas had to go. We took the shortest way of +removing it." + + + + +XVII + +TWO RECALLS + + +There remains three duties to be performed before the curtain falls +upon the patched comedy. Two have been promised: the third is no less +obligatory. + +It was set forth in the programme of this tropic vaudeville that +it would be made known why Shorty O'Day, of the Columbia Detective +Agency, lost his position. Also that Smith should come again to tell +us what mystery he followed that night on the shores of Anchuria when +he strewed so many cigar stumps around the cocoanut palm during his +lonely night vigil on the beach. These things were promised; but a +bigger thing yet remains to be accomplished--the clearing up of a +seeming wrong that has been done according to the array of chronicled +facts (truthfully set forth) that have been presented. And one voice, +speaking, shall do these three things. + +Two men sat on a stringer of a North River pier in the City of New +York. A steamer from the tropics had begun to unload bananas and +oranges on the pier. Now and then a banana or two would fall from an +overripe bunch, and one of the two men would shamble forward, seize +the fruit and return to share it with his companion. + +One of the men was in the ultimate stage of deterioration. As far as +rain and wind and sun could wreck the garments he wore, it had been +done. In his person the ravages of drink were as plainly visible. And +yet, upon his high-bridged, rubicund nose was jauntily perched a pair +of shining and flawless gold-rimmed glasses. + +The other man was not so far gone upon the descending Highway of the +Incompetents. Truly, the flower of his manhood had gone to seed--seed +that, perhaps, no soil might sprout. But there were still cross-cuts +along where he travelled through which he might yet regain the +pathway of usefulness without disturbing the slumbering Miracles. +This man was short and compactly built. He had an oblique, dead eye, +like that of a sting-ray, and the moustache of a cocktail mixer. We +know the eye and the moustache; we know that Smith of the luxurious +yacht, the gorgeous raiment, the mysterious mission, the magic +disappearance, has come again, though shorn of the accessories of his +former state. + +At his third banana, the man with the nose glasses spat it from him +with a shudder. + +"Deuce take all fruit!" he remarked, in a patrician tone of disgust. +"I lived for two years where these things grow. The memory of their +taste lingers with you. The oranges are not so bad. Just see if you +can gather a couple of them, O'Day, when the next broken crate comes +up." + +"Did you live down with the monkeys?" asked the other, made tepidly +garrulous by the sunshine and the alleviating meal of juicy fruit. "I +was down there, once myself. But only for a few hours. That was when +I was with the Columbia Detective Agency. The monkey people did me +up. I'd have my job yet if it hadn't been for them. I'll tell you +about it. + +"One day the chief sent a note around to the office that read: 'Send +O'Day here at once for a big piece of business.' I was the crack +detective of the agency at that time. They always handed me the big +jobs. The address the chief wrote from was down in the Wall Street +district. + +"When I got there I found him in a private office with a lot of +directors who were looking pretty fuzzy. They stated the case. The +president of the Republic Insurance Company had skipped with about +a tenth of a million dollars in cash. The directors wanted him back +pretty bad, but they wanted the money worse. They said they needed +it. They had traced the old gent's movements to where he boarded a +tramp fruit steamer bound for South America that same morning with +his daughter and a big gripsack--all the family he had. + +"One of the directors had his steam yacht coaled and with steam up, +ready for the trip; and he turned her over to me, cart blongsh. In +four hours I was on board of her, and hot on the trail of the fruit +tub. I had a pretty good idea where old Wahrfield--that was his name, +J. Churchill Wahrfield--would head for. At that time we had a treaty +with about every foreign country except Belgium and that banana +republic, Anchuria. There wasn't a photo of old Wahrfield to be +had in New York--he had been foxy there--but I had his description. +And besides, the lady with him would be a dead-give-away anywhere. +She was one of the high-flyers in Society--not the kind that have +their pictures in the Sunday papers--but the real sort that open +chrysanthemum shows and christen battleships. + +"Well, sir, we never got a sight of that fruit tub on the road. The +ocean is a pretty big place; and I guess we took different paths +across it. But we kept going toward this Anchuria, where the fruiter +was bound for. + +"We struck the monkey coast one afternoon about four. There was a +ratty-looking steamer off shore taking on bananas. The monkeys were +loading her up with big barges. It might be the one the old man had +taken, and it might not. I went ashore to look around. The scenery +was pretty good. I never saw any finer on the New York stage. I +struck an American on shore, a big, cool chap, standing around with +the monkeys. He showed me the consul's office. The consul was a +nice young fellow. He said the fruiter was the _Karlsefin_, running +generally to New Orleans, but took her last cargo to New York. Then +I was sure my people were on board, although everybody told me that +no passengers had landed. I didn't think they would land until after +dark, for they might have been shy about it on account of seeing that +yacht of mine hanging around. So, all I had to do was to wait and nab +'em when they came ashore. I couldn't arrest old Wahrfield without +extradition papers, but my play was to get the cash. They generally +give up if you strike 'em when they're tired and rattled and short on +nerve. + +"After dark I sat under a cocoanut tree on the beach for a while, +and then I walked around and investigated that town some, and it was +enough to give you the lions. If a man could stay in New York and +be honest, he'd better do it than to hit that monkey town with a +million. + +"Dinky little mud houses; grass over your shoe tops in the streets; +ladies in low-neck-and-short-sleeves walking around smoking cigars; +tree frogs rattling like a hose cart going to a ten blow; big +mountains dropping gravel in the back yards, and the sea licking the +paint off in front--no, sir--a man had better be in God's country +living on free lunch than there. + +"The main street ran along the beach, and I walked down it, and +then turned up a kind of lane where the houses were made of poles +and straw. I wanted to see what the monkeys did when they weren't +climbing cocoanut trees. The very first shack I looked in I saw +my people. They must have come ashore while I was promenading. A +man about fifty, smooth face, heavy eyebrows, dressed in black +broadcloth, looking like he was just about to say, 'Can any little +boy in the Sunday school answer that?' He was freezing on to a grip +that weighed like a dozen gold bricks, and a swell girl--a regular +peach, with a Fifth Avenue cut--was sitting on a wooden chair. An old +black woman was fixing some coffee and beans on a table. The light +they had come from a lantern hung on a nail. I went and stood in the +door, and they looked at me, and I said: + +"'Mr. Wahrfield, you are my prisoner. I hope, for the lady's sake, +you will take the matter sensibly. You know why I want you.' + +"'Who are you?' says the old gent. + +"'O'Day,' says I, 'of the Columbia Detective Agency. And now, sir, +let me give you a piece of good advice. You go back and take your +medicine like a man. Hand 'em back the boodle; and maybe they'll let +you off light. Go back easy, and I'll put in a word for you. I'll +give you five minutes to decide.' I pulled out my watch and waited. + +"Then the young lady chipped in. She was one of the genuine +high-steppers. You could tell by the way her clothes fit and the +style she had that Fifth Avenue was made for her. + +"'Come inside,' she says. 'Don't stand in the door and disturb the +whole street with that suit of clothes. Now, what is it you want?' + +"'Three minutes gone,' I said. 'I'll tell you again while the other +two tick off. + +"'You'll admit being the president of the Republic, won't you?' + +"'I am,' says he. + +"'Well, then,' says I, 'it ought to be plain to you. Wanted, in New +York, J. Churchill Wahrfield, president of the Republic Insurance +Company. + +"'Also the funds belonging to said company, now in that grip, in the +unlawful possession of said J. Churchill Wahrfield.' + +"'Oh-h-h-h!' says the young lady, as if she was thinking, 'you want +to take us back to New York?' + +"'To take Mr. Wahrfield. There's no charge against you, miss. +There'll be no objection, of course, to your returning with your +father.' + +"Of a sudden the girl gave a tiny scream and grabbed the old boy +around the neck. 'Oh, father, father!' she says, kind of contralto, +'can this be true? Have you taken money that is not yours? Speak, +father!' It made you shiver to hear the tremolo stop she put on her +voice. + +"The old boy looked pretty bughouse when she first grappled him, but +she went on, whispering in his ear and patting his off shoulder till +he stood still, but sweating a little. + +"She got him to one side and they talked together a minute, and then +he put on some gold eyeglasses and walked up and handed me the grip. + +"'Mr. Detective,' he says, talking a little broken, 'I conclude +to return with you. I have finished to discover that life on this +desolate and displeased coast would be worse than to die, itself. I +will go back and hurl myself upon the mercy of the Republic Company. +Have you brought a sheep?' + +"'Sheep!' says I; 'I haven't a single--' + +"'Ship,' cut in the young lady. 'Don't get funny. Father is of German +birth, and doesn't speak perfect English. How did you come?' + +"The girl was all broke up. She had a handkerchief to her face, and +kept saying every little bit, 'Oh, father, father!' She walked up to +me and laid her lily-white hand on the clothes that had pained her at +first. I smelt a million violets. She was a lulu. I told her I came +in a private yacht. + +"'Mr. O'Day,' she says. 'Oh, take us away from this horrid country at +once. Can you! Will you! Say you will.' + +"'I'll try,' I said, concealing the fact that I was dying to get them +on salt water before they could change their mind. + +"One thing they both kicked against was going through the town to the +boat landing. Said they dreaded publicity, and now that they were +going to return, they had a hope that the thing might yet be kept out +of the papers. They swore they wouldn't go unless I got them out to +the yacht without any one knowing it, so I agreed to humour them. + +"The sailors who rowed me ashore were playing billiards in a bar-room +near the water, waiting for orders, and I proposed to have them take +the boat down the beach half a mile or so, and take us up there. How +to get them word was the question, for I couldn't leave the grip with +the prisoner, and I couldn't take it with me, not knowing but what +the monkeys might stick me up. + +"The young lady says the old coloured woman would take them a note. I +sat down and wrote it, and gave it to the dame with plain directions +what to do, and she grins like a baboon and shakes her head. + +"Then Mr. Wahrfield handed her a string of foreign dialect, and she +nods her head and says, 'See, seor,' maybe fifty times, and lights +out with the note. + +"'Old Augusta only understands German,' said Miss Wahrfield, smiling +at me. 'We stopped in her house to ask where we could find lodging, +and she insisted upon our having coffee. She tells us she was raised +in a German family in San Domingo.' + +"'Very likely,' I said. 'But you can search me for German words, +except _nix verstay_ and _noch einst_. I would have called that "See, +seor" French, though, on a gamble.' + +"Well, we three made a sneak around the edge of town so as not to +be seen. We got tangled in vines and ferns and the banana bushes +and tropical scenery a good deal. The monkey suburbs was as wild as +places in Central Park. We came out on the beach a good half mile +below. A brown chap was lying asleep under a cocoanut tree, with +a ten-foot musket beside him. Mr. Wahrfield takes up the gun and +pitches it into the sea. 'The coast is guarded,' he says. 'Rebellion +and plots ripen like fruit.' He pointed to the sleeping man, who +never stirred. 'Thus,' he says, 'they perform trusts. Children!' + +"I saw our boat coming, and I struck a match and lit a piece of +newspaper to show them where we were. In thirty minutes we were on +board the yacht. + +"The first thing, Mr. Wahrfield and his daughter and I took the grip +into the owner's cabin, opened it up, and took an inventory. There +was one hundred and five thousand dollars, United States treasury +notes, in it, besides a lot of diamond jewelry and a couple of +hundred Havana cigars. I gave the old man the cigars and a receipt +for the rest of the lot, as agent for the company, and locked the +stuff up in my private quarters. + +"I never had a pleasanter trip than that one. After we got to +sea the young lady turned out to be the jolliest ever. The very +first time we sat down to dinner, and the steward filled her glass +with champagne--that director's yacht was a regular floating +Waldorf-Astoria--she winks at me and says, 'What's the use to borrow +trouble, Mr. Fly Cop? Here's hoping you may live to eat the hen that +scratches on your grave.' There was a piano on board, and she sat +down to it and sung better than you give up two cases to hear plenty +times. She knew about nine operas clear through. She was sure enough +_bon ton_ and swell. She wasn't one of the 'among others present' +kind; she belonged on the special mention list! + +"The old man, too, perked up amazingly on the way. He passed the +cigars, and says to me once, quite chipper, out of a cloud of smoke, +'Mr. O'Day, somehow I think the Republic Company will not give me the +much trouble. Guard well the gripvalise of the money, Mr. O'Day, for +that it must be returned to them that it belongs when we finish to +arrive.' + +"When we landed in New York I 'phoned to the chief to meet us in that +director's office. We got in a cab and went there. I carried the +grip, and we walked in, and I was pleased to see that the chief had +got together that same old crowd of moneybugs with pink faces and +white vests to see us march in. I set the grip on the table. 'There's +the money,' I said. + +"'And your prisoner?' said the chief. + +"I pointed to Mr. Wahrfield, and he stepped forward and says: + +"'The honour of a word with you, sir, to explain.' + +"He and the chief went into another room and stayed ten minutes. When +they came back the chief looked as black as a ton of coal. + +"'Did this gentleman,' he says to me, 'have this valise in his +possession when you first saw him?' + +"'He did,' said I. + +"The chief took up the grip and handed it to the prisoner with a +bow, and says to the director crowd: 'Do any of you recognize this +gentleman?' + +"They all shook their pink faces. + +"'Allow me to present,' he goes on, Seor Miraflores, president of +the republic of Anchuria. The seor has generously consented to +overlook this outrageous blunder, on condition that we undertake +to secure him against the annoyance of public comment. It is a +concession on his part to overlook an insult for which he might claim +international redress. I think we can gratefully promise him secrecy +in the matter.' + +"They gave him a pink nod all round. + +"'O'Day,' he says to me. 'As a private detective you're wasted. +In a war, where kidnapping governments is in the rules, you'd be +invaluable. Come down to the office at eleven.' + +"I knew what that meant. + +"'So that's the president of the monkeys,' says I. 'Well, why +couldn't he have said so?' + +"Wouldn't it jar you?" + + + + +XVIII + +THE VITAGRAPHOSCOPE + + +Vaudeville is intrinsically episodic and discontinuous. Its audiences +do not demand dnoements. Sufficient unto each "turn" is the evil +thereof. No one cares how many romances the singing comdienne may +have had if she can capably sustain the limelight and a high note or +two. The audiences reck not if the performing dogs get to the pound +the moment they have jumped through their last hoop. They do not +desire bulletins about the possible injuries received by the comic +bicyclist who retires head-first from the stage in a crash of +(property) china-ware. Neither do they consider that their seat +coupons entitle them to be instructed whether or no there is a +sentiment between the lady solo banjoist and the Irish monologist. + +Therefore let us have no lifting of the curtain upon a tableau of the +united lovers, backgrounded by defeated villainy and derogated by the +comic, osculating maid and butler, thrown in as a sop to the Cerberi +of the fifty-cent seats. + +But our programme ends with a brief "turn" or two; and then to the +exits. Whoever sits the show out may find, if he will, the slender +thread that binds together, though ever so slightly, the story that, +perhaps, only the Walrus will understand. + + +_Extracts from a letter from the first vice-president of the Republic +Insurance Company, of New York City, to Frank Goodwin, of Coralio, +Republic of Anchuria._ + + + My Dear Mr. Goodwin:--Your communication per Messrs. + Howland and Fourchet, of New Orleans, has reached us. Also + their draft on N. Y. for $100,000, the amount abstracted + from the funds of this company by the late J. Churchill + Wahrfield, its former president. . . . The officers + and directors unite in requesting me to express to you + their sincere esteem and thanks for your prompt and much + appreciated return of the entire missing sum within two + weeks from the time of its disappearance. . . . Can assure + you that the matter will not be allowed to receive the + least publicity. . . . Regret exceedingly the distressing + death of Mr. Wahrfield by his own hand, but . . . + Congratulations on your marriage to Miss Wahrfield . . . + many charms, winning manners, noble and womanly nature and + envied position in the best metropolitan society. . . . + + Cordially yours, + + LUCIUS E. APPLEGATE, + First Vice-President the Republic Insurance Company. + + + +The Vitagraphoscope +(Moving Pictures) + +The Last Sausage + +SCENE--_An Artist's Studio._ The artist, a young man of prepossessing +appearance, sits in a dejected attitude, amid a litter of sketches, +with his head resting upon his hand. An oil stove stands on a pine +box in the centre of the studio. The artist rises, tightens his waist +belt to another hole, and lights the stove. He goes to a tin bread +box, half-hidden by a screen, takes out a solitary link of sausage, +turns the box upside-down to show that there is no more, and chucks +the sausage into a frying-pan, which he sets upon the stove. The +flame of the stove goes out, showing that there is no more oil. The +artist, in evident despair, seizes the sausage, in a sudden access of +rage, and hurls it violently from him. At the same time a door opens, +and a man who enters receives the sausage forcibly against his nose. +He seems to cry out; and is observed to make a dance step or two, +vigorously. The newcomer is a ruddy-faced, active, keen-looking +man, apparently of Irish ancestry. Next he is observed to laugh +immoderately; he kicks over the stove; he claps the artist (who is +vainly striving to grasp his hand) vehemently upon the back. Then +he goes through a pantomime which to the sufficiently intelligent +spectator reveals that he has acquired large sums of money by trading +pot-metal hatchets and razors to the Indians of the Cordillera +Mountains for gold dust. He draws a roll of money as large as a small +loaf of bread from his pocket, and waves it above his head, while at +the same time he makes pantomime of drinking from a glass. The artist +hurriedly secures his hat, and the two leave the studio together. + + +The Writing on the Sands + +SCENE--_The Beach at Nice._ A woman, beautiful, still young, +exquisitely clothed, complacent, poised, reclines near the water, +idly scrawling letters in the sand with the staff of her silken +parasol. The beauty of her face is audacious; her languid pose is one +that you feel to be impermanent--you wait, expectant, for her to +spring or glide or crawl, like a panther that has unaccountably +become stock-still. She idly scrawls in the sand; and the word that +she always writes is "Isabel." A man sits a few yards away. You can +see that they are companions, even if no longer comrades. His face is +dark and smooth, and almost inscrutable--but not quite. The two speak +little together. The man also scratches on the sand with his cane. +And the word that he writes is "Anchuria." And then he looks out +where the Mediterranean and the sky intermingle, with death in his +gaze. + + +The Wilderness and Thou + +SCENE--_The Borders of a Gentleman's Estate in a Tropical Land._ An +old Indian, with a mahogany-coloured face, is trimming the grass on a +grave by a mangrove swamp. Presently he rises to his feet and walks +slowly toward a grove that is shaded by the gathering, brief +twilight. In the edge of the grove stand a man who is stalwart, with +a kind and courteous air, and a woman of a serene and clear-cut +loveliness. When the old Indian comes up to them the man drops money +in his hand. The grave-tender, with the stolid pride of his race, +takes it as his due, and goes his way. The two in the edge of the +grove turn back along the dim pathway, and walk close, close--for, +after all, what is the world at its best but a little round field of +the moving pictures with two walking together in it? + +CURTAIN + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CABBAGES AND KINGS*** + + +******* This file should be named 2777-8.txt or 2777-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/7/7/2777 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + diff --git a/old/2777-8.zip b/old/2777-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..42aadd7 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/2777-8.zip diff --git a/old/2777.txt b/old/2777.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..dbb194e --- /dev/null +++ b/old/2777.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7609 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Cabbages and Kings, by O. Henry + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Cabbages and Kings + + +Author: O. Henry + + + +Release Date: July 23, 2000 [eBook #2777] +Most recently updated June 5, 2019 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII) + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CABBAGES AND KINGS*** + + +E-text prepared by Earle C. Beach +and revised by Joseph E. Loewenstein, M.D. + + + +Editorial note: + + This volume is the only work of O. Henry which approaches + being a novel. The stories are related and should be read + in the sequence in which they occur in the text. + + + Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustration. + See 2777-h.htm or 2777-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/7/7/2777/2777-h/24910-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/7/7/2777/2777-h.zip) + + + + + +CABBAGES AND KINGS + +by + +O. HENRY + +Author of "The Four Million," "The Voice of the City," +"The Trimmed Lamp," "Strictly Business," "Whirligigs," Etc. + + + + + + + +[ILLUSTRATION: "A little saint with a color more lightful +than orange" (frontispiece)] + + + + +"The time has come," the Walrus said, + "To talk of many things; +Of shoes and ships and sealing-wax, + And cabbages and kings." + + THE WALRUS AND THE CARPENTER + + + + + +CONTENTS + + THE PROEM: BY THE CARPENTER + I. "FOX-IN-THE-MORNING" + II. THE LOTUS AND THE BOTTLE + III. SMITH + IV. CAUGHT + V. CUPID'S EXILE NUMBER TWO + VI. THE PHONOGRAPH AND THE GRAFT + VII. MONEY MAZE + VIII. THE ADMIRAL + IX. THE FLAG PARAMOUNT + X. THE SHAMROCK AND THE PALM + XI. THE REMNANTS OF THE CODE + XII. SHOES + XIII. SHIPS + XIV. MASTERS OF ARTS + XV. DICKY + XVI. ROUGE ET NOIR + XVII. TWO RECALLS + XVIII. THE VITAGRAPHOSCOPE + + + + +THE PROEM + +BY THE CARPENTER + + +They will tell you in Anchuria, that President Miraflores, of that +volatile republic, died by his own hand in the coast town of Coralio; +that he had reached thus far in flight from the inconveniences of +an imminent revolution; and that one hundred thousand dollars, +government funds, which he carried with him in an American leather +valise as a souvenir of his tempestuous administration, was never +afterward recovered. + +For a _real_, a boy will show you his grave. It is back of the town +near a little bridge that spans a mangrove swamp. A plain slab of +wood stands at its head. Some one has burned upon the headstone with +a hot iron this inscription: + + + RAMON ANGEL DE LAS CRUZES + + Y MIRAFLORES + + PRESIDENTE DE LA REPUBLICA + + DE ANCHURIA + + QUE SEA SU JUEZ DIOS + + +It is characteristic of this buoyant people that they pursue no man +beyond the grave. "Let God be his judge!"--Even with the hundred +thousand unfound, though greatly coveted, the hue and cry went no +further than that. + +To the stranger or the guest the people of Coralio will relate the +story of the tragic end of their former president; how he strove to +escape from the country with the public funds and also with Dona +Isabel Guilbert, the young American opera singer; and how, being +apprehended by members of the opposing political party in Coralio, +he shot himself through the head rather than give up the funds, and, +in consequence, the Senorita Guilbert. They will relate further +that Dona Isabel, her adventurous bark of fortune shoaled by the +simultaneous loss of her distinguished admirer and the souvenir +hundred thousand, dropped anchor on this stagnant coast, awaiting a +rising tide. + +They say, in Coralio, that she found a prompt and prosperous tide +in the form of Frank Goodwin, an American resident of the town, an +investor who had grown wealthy by dealing in the products of the +country--a banana king, a rubber prince, a sarsaparilla, indigo, and +mahogany baron. The Senorita Guilbert, you will be told, married +Senor Goodwin one month after the president's death, thus, in the +very moment when Fortune had ceased to smile, wresting from her a +gift greater than the prize withdrawn. + +Of the American, Don Frank Goodwin, and of his wife the natives have +nothing but good to say. Don Frank has lived among them for years, +and has compelled their respect. His lady is easily queen of what +social life the sober coast affords. The wife of the governor of the +district, herself, who was of the proud Castilian family of Monteleon +y Dolorosa de los Santos y Mendez, feels honoured to unfold her +napkin with olive-hued, ringed hands at the table of Senora Goodwin. +Were you to refer (with your northern prejudices) to the vivacious +past of Mrs. Goodwin when her audacious and gleeful abandon in light +opera captured the mature president's fancy, or to her share in that +statesman's downfall and malfeasance, the Latin shrug of the shoulder +would be your only answer and rebuttal. What prejudices there were +in Coralio concerning Senora Goodwin seemed now to be in her favour, +whatever they had been in the past. + +It would seem that the story is ended, instead of begun; that the +close of tragedy and the climax of a romance have covered the ground +of interest; but, to the more curious reader it shall be some slight +instruction to trace the close threads that underlie the ingenuous +web of circumstances. + +The headpiece bearing the name of President Miraflores is daily +scrubbed with soap-bark and sand. An old half-breed Indian tends the +grave with fidelity and the dawdling minuteness of inherited sloth. +He chops down the weeds and ever-springing grass with his machete, he +plucks ants and scorpions and beetles from it with his horny fingers, +and sprinkles its turf with water from the plaza fountain. There is +no grave anywhere so well kept and ordered. + +Only by following out the underlying threads will it be made clear +why the old Indian, Galvez, is secretly paid to keep green the +grave of President Miraflores by one who never saw that unfortunate +statesman in life or in death, and why that one was wont to walk in +the twilight, casting from a distance looks of gentle sadness upon +that unhonoured mound. + +Elsewhere than at Coralio one learns of the impetuous career +of Isabel Guilbert. New Orleans gave her birth and the mingled +French and Spanish creole nature that tinctured her life with such +turbulence and warmth. She had little education, but a knowledge of +men and motives that seemed to have come by instinct. Far beyond the +common woman was she endowed with intrepid rashness, with a love for +the pursuit of adventure to the brink of danger, and with desire for +the pleasures of life. Her spirit was one to chafe under any curb; +she was Eve after the fall, but before the bitterness of it was felt. +She wore life as a rose in her bosom. + +Of the legion of men who had been at her feet it was said that but +one was so fortunate as to engage her fancy. To President Miraflores, +the brilliant but unstable ruler of Anchuria, she yielded the key to +her resolute heart. How, then, do we find her (as the Coralians would +have told you) the wife of Frank Goodwin, and happily living a life +of dull and dreamy inaction? + +The underlying threads reach far, stretching across the sea. +Following them out it will be made plain why "Shorty" O'Day, of the +Columbia Detective Agency, resigned his position. And, for a lighter +pastime, it shall be a duty and a pleasing sport to wander with Momus +beneath the tropic stars where Melpomene once stalked austere. Now to +cause laughter to echo from those lavish jungles and frowning crags +where formerly rang the cries of pirates' victims; to lay aside pike +and cutlass and attack with quip and jollity; to draw one saving +titter of mirth from the rusty casque of Romance--this were pleasant +to do in the shade of the lemon-trees on that coast that is curved +like lips set for smiling. + +For there are yet tales of the Spanish Main. That segment of +continent washed by the tempestuous Caribbean, and presenting to the +sea a formidable border of tropical jungle topped by the overweening +Cordilleras, is still begirt by mystery and romance. In past times +buccaneers and revolutionists roused the echoes of its cliffs, and +the condor wheeled perpetually above where, in the green groves, +they made food for him with their matchlocks and toledos. Taken and +retaken by sea rovers, by adverse powers and by sudden uprising of +rebellious factions, the historic 300 miles of adventurous coast has +scarcely known for hundreds of years whom rightly to call its master. +Pizarro, Balboa, Sir Francis Drake, and Bolivar did what they could +to make it a part of Christendom. Sir John Morgan, Lafitte and other +eminent swash-bucklers bombarded and pounded it in the name of +Abaddon. + +The game still goes on. The guns of the rovers are silenced; but the +tintype man, the enlarged photograph brigand, the kodaking tourist +and the scouts of the gentle brigade of fakirs have found it out, and +carry on the work. The hucksters of Germany, France, and Sicily now +bag its small change across their counters. Gentleman adventurers +throng the waiting-rooms of its rulers with proposals for railways +and concessions. The little _opera-bouffe_ nations play at government +and intrigue until some day a big, silent gunboat glides into the +offing and warns them not to break their toys. And with these changes +comes also the small adventurer, with empty pockets to fill, light of +heart, busy-brained--the modern fairy prince, bearing an alarm clock +with which, more surely than by the sentimental kiss, to awaken the +beautiful tropics from their centuries' sleep. Generally he wears a +shamrock, which he matches pridefully against the extravagant palms; +and it is he who has driven Melpomene to the wings, and set Comedy to +dancing before the footlights of the Southern Cross. + +So, there is a little tale to tell of many things. Perhaps to the +promiscuous ear of the Walrus it shall come with most avail; for in +it there are indeed shoes and ships and sealing-wax and cabbage-palms +and presidents instead of kings. + +Add to these a little love and counterplotting, and scatter +everywhere throughout the maze a trail of tropical dollars--dollars +warmed no more by the torrid sun than by the hot palms of the scouts +of Fortune--and, after all, here seems to be Life, itself, with talk +enough to weary the most garrulous of Walruses. + + + + +I + +"FOX-IN-THE-MORNING" + + +Coralio reclined, in the mid-day heat, like some vacuous beauty +lounging in a guarded harem. The town lay at the sea's edge on a +strip of alluvial coast. It was set like a little pearl in an emerald +band. Behind it, and seeming almost to topple, imminent, above it, +rose the sea-following range of the Cordilleras. In front the sea +was spread, a smiling jailer, but even more incorruptible than the +frowning mountains. The waves swished along the smooth beach; the +parrots screamed in the orange and ceiba-trees; the palms waved their +limber fronds foolishly like an awkward chorus at the prima donna's +cue to enter. + +Suddenly the town was full of excitement. A native boy dashed down a +grass-grown street, shrieking: "_Busca el Senor Goodwin. Ha venido un +telegrafo por el!_" + +The word passed quickly. Telegrams do not often come to anyone in +Coralio. The cry for Senor Goodwin was taken up by a dozen officious +voices. The main street running parallel to the beach became +populated with those who desired to expedite the delivery of the +despatch. Knots of women with complexions varying from palest olive +to deepest brown gathered at street corners and plaintively carolled: +"_Un telegrafo por Senor Goodwin!_" The _comandante_, Don Senor el +Coronel Encarnacion Rios, who was loyal to the Ins and suspected +Goodwin's devotion to the Outs, hissed: "Aha!" and wrote in his +secret memorandum book the accusive fact that Senor Goodwin had on +that momentous date received a telegram. + +In the midst of the hullabaloo a man stepped to the door of a small +wooden building and looked out. Above the door was a sign that read +"Keogh and Clancy"--a nomenclature that seemed not to be indigenous +to that tropical soil. The man in the door was Billy Keogh, scout +of fortune and progress and latter-day rover of the Spanish Main. +Tintypes and photographs were the weapons with which Keogh and Clancy +were at that time assailing the hopeless shores. Outside the shop +were set two large frames filled with specimens of their art and +skill. + +Keogh leaned in the doorway, his bold and humorous countenance +wearing a look of interest at the unusual influx of life and sound +into the street. When the meaning of the disturbance became clear to +him he placed a hand beside his mouth and shouted: "Hey! Frank!" in +such a robustious voice that the feeble clamour of the natives was +drowned and silenced. + +Fifty yards away, on the seaward side of the street, stood the abode +of the consul for the United States. Out from the door of this +building tumbled Goodwin at the call. He had been smoking with +Willard Geddie, the consul, on the back porch of the consulate, which +was conceded to be the coolest spot in Coralio. + +"Hurry up," shouted Keogh. "There's a riot in town on account of a +telegram that's come for you. You want to be careful about these +things, my boy. It won't do to trifle with the feelings of the +public this way. You'll be getting a pink note some day with violet +scent on it; and then the country'll be steeped in the throes of a +revolution." + +Goodwin had strolled up the street and met the boy with the message. +The ox-eyed women gazed at him with shy admiration, for his type drew +them. He was big, blonde, and jauntily dressed in white linen, with +buckskin _zapatos_. His manner was courtly, with a sort of kindly +truculence in it, tempered by a merciful eye. When the telegram had +been delivered, and the bearer of it dismissed with a gratuity, the +relieved populace returned to the contiguities of shade from which +curiosity had drawn it--the women to their baking in the mud ovens +under the orange-trees, or to the interminable combing of their +long, straight hair; the men to their cigarettes and gossip in the +cantinas. + +Goodwin sat on Keogh's doorstep, and read his telegram. It was from +Bob Englehart, an American, who lived in San Mateo, the capital city +of Anchuria, eighty miles in the interior. Englehart was a gold +miner, an ardent revolutionist and "good people." That he was a man +of resource and imagination was proven by the telegram he had sent. +It had been his task to send a confidential message to his friend in +Coralio. This could not have been accomplished in either Spanish or +English, for the eye politic in Anchuria was an active one. The Ins +and the Outs were perpetually on their guard. But Englehart was a +diplomatist. There existed but one code upon which he might make +requisition with promise of safety--the great and potent code of +Slang. So, here is the message that slipped, unconstrued, through +the fingers of curious officials, and came to the eye of Goodwin: + + + His Nibs skedaddled yesterday per jack-rabbit line with all + the coin in the kitty and the bundle of muslin he's spoony + about. The boodle is six figures short. Our crowd in good + shape, but we need the spondulicks. You collar it. The main + guy and the dry goods are headed for the briny. You know + what to do. + + BOB. + + +This screed, remarkable as it was, had no mystery for Goodwin. He +was the most successful of the small advance-guard of speculative +Americans that had invaded Anchuria, and he had not reached that +enviable pinnacle without having well exercised the arts of foresight +and deduction. He had taken up political intrigue as a matter of +business. He was acute enough to wield a certain influence among +the leading schemers, and he was prosperous enough to be able to +purchase the respect of the petty office-holders. There was always +a revolutionary party; and to it he had always allied himself; for +the adherents of a new administration received the rewards of their +labours. There was now a Liberal party seeking to overturn President +Miraflores. If the wheel successfully revolved, Goodwin stood to +win a concession to 30,000 manzanas of the finest coffee lands in +the interior. Certain incidents in the recent career of President +Miraflores had excited a shrewd suspicion in Goodwin's mind that the +government was near a dissolution from another cause than that of a +revolution, and now Englehart's telegram had come as a corroboration +of his wisdom. + +The telegram, which had remained unintelligible to the Anchurian +linguists who had applied to it in vain their knowledge of Spanish +and elemental English, conveyed a stimulating piece of news to +Goodwin's understanding. It informed him that the president of the +republic had decamped from the capital city with the contents of the +treasury. Furthermore, that he was accompanied in his flight by that +winning adventuress Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer, whose troupe +of performers had been entertained by the president at San Mateo +during the past month on a scale less modest than that with which +royal visitors are often content. The reference to the "jack-rabbit +line" could mean nothing else than the mule-back system of transport +that prevailed between Coralio and the capital. The hint that the +"boodle" was "six figures short" made the condition of the national +treasury lamentably clear. Also it was convincingly true that the +ingoing party--its way now made a pacific one--would need the +"spondulicks." Unless its pledges should be fulfilled, and the spoils +held for the delectation of the victors, precarious indeed, would +be the position of the new government. Therefore it was exceeding +necessary to "collar the main guy," and recapture the sinews of war +and government. + +Goodwin handed the message to Keogh. + +"Read that, Billy," he said. "It's from Bob Englehart. Can you manage +the cipher?" + +Keogh sat in the other half of the doorway, and carefully perused the +telegram. + +"'Tis not a cipher," he said, finally. "'Tis what they call +literature, and that's a system of language put in the mouths +of people that they've never been introduced to by writers of +imagination. The magazines invented it, but I never knew before that +President Norvin Green had stamped it with the seal of his approval. +'Tis now no longer literature, but language. The dictionaries tried, +but they couldn't make it go for anything but dialect. Sure, now that +the Western Union indorses it, it won't be long till a race of people +will spring up that speaks it." + +"You're running too much to philology, Billy," said Goodwin. "Do you +make out the meaning of it?" + +"Sure," replied the philosopher of Fortune. "All languages come easy +to the man who must know 'em. I've even failed to misunderstand an +order to evacuate in classical Chinese when it was backed up by the +muzzle of a breech-loader. This little literary essay I hold in my +hands means a game of Fox-in-the-Morning. Ever play that, Frank, when +you was a kid?" + +"I think so," said Goodwin, laughing. "You join hands all 'round, +and--" + +"You do not," interrupted Keogh. "You've got a fine sporting game +mixed up in your head with 'All Around the Rosebush.' The spirit of +'Fox-in-the-Morning' is opposed to the holding of hands. I'll tell +you how it's played. This president man and his companion in play, +they stand up over in San Mateo, ready for the run, and shout: +'Fox-in-the-Morning!' Me and you, standing here, we say: 'Goose and +the Gander!' They say: 'How many miles is it to London town?' We say: +'Only a few, if your legs are long enough. How many comes out?' They +say: 'More than you're able to catch.' And then the game commences." + +"I catch the idea," said Goodwin. "It won't do to let the goose +and gander slip through our fingers, Billy; their feathers are too +valuable. Our crowd is prepared and able to step into the shoes of +the government at once; but with the treasury empty we'd stay in +power about as long as a tenderfoot would stick on an untamed bronco. +We must play the fox on every foot of the coast to prevent their +getting out of the country." + +"By the mule-back schedule," said Keogh, "it's five days down from +San Mateo. We've got plenty of time to set our outposts. There's only +three places on the coast where they can hope to sail from--here and +Solitas and Alazan. They're the only points we'll have to guard. It's +as easy as a chess problem--fox to play, and mate in three moves. Oh, +goosey, goosey, gander, whither do you wander? By the blessing of the +literary telegraph the boodle of this benighted fatherland shall be +preserved to the honest political party that is seeking to overthrow +it." + +The situation had been justly outlined by Keogh. The down trail +from the capital was at all times a weary road to travel. A +jiggety-joggety journey it was; ice-cold and hot, wet and dry. The +trail climbed appalling mountains, wound like a rotten string about +the brows of breathless precipices, plunged through chilling snow-fed +streams, and wriggled like a snake through sunless forests teeming +with menacing insect and animal life. After descending to the +foothills it turned to a trident, the central prong ending at Alazan. +Another branched off to Coralio; the third penetrated to Solitas. +Between the sea and the foothills stretched the five miles breadth of +alluvial coast. Here was the flora of the tropics in its rankest and +most prodigal growth. Spaces here and there had been wrested from the +jungle and planted with bananas and cane and orange groves. The rest +was a riot of wild vegetation, the home of monkeys, tapirs, jaguars, +alligators and prodigious reptiles and insects. Where no road was cut +a serpent could scarcely make its way through the tangle of vines and +creepers. Across the treacherous mangrove swamps few things without +wings could safely pass. Therefore the fugitives could hope to reach +the coast only by one of the routes named. + +"Keep the matter quiet, Billy," advised Goodwin. "We don't want +the Ins to know that the president is in flight. I suppose Bob's +information is something of a scoop in the capital as yet. Otherwise +he would not have tried to make his message a confidential one; and +besides, everybody would have heard the news. I'm going around now to +see Dr. Zavalla, and start a man up the trail to cut the telegraph +wire." + +As Goodwin rose, Keogh threw his hat upon the grass by the door and +expelled a tremendous sigh. + +"What's the trouble, Billy?" asked Goodwin, pausing. "That's the +first time I ever heard you sigh." + +"'Tis the last," said Keogh. "With that sorrowful puff of wind I +resign myself to a life of praiseworthy but harassing honesty. What +are tintypes, if you please, to the opportunities of the great +and hilarious class of ganders and geese? Not that I would be a +president, Frank--and the boodle he's got is too big for me to +handle--but in some ways I feel my conscience hurting me for +addicting myself to photographing a nation instead of running away +with it. Frank, did you ever see the 'bundle of muslin' that His +Excellency has wrapped up and carried off?" + +"Isabel Guilbert?" said Goodwin, laughing. "No, I never did. From +what I've heard of her, though, I imagine that she wouldn't stick at +anything to carry her point. Don't get romantic, Billy. Sometimes I +begin to fear that there's Irish blood in your ancestry." + +"I never saw her either," went on Keogh; "but they say she's got all +the ladies of mythology, sculpture, and fiction reduced to chromos. +They say she can look at a man once, and he'll turn monkey and climb +trees to pick cocoanuts for her. Think of that president man with +Lord knows how many hundreds of thousands of dollars in one hand, and +this muslin siren in the other, galloping down hill on a sympathetic +mule amid songbirds and flowers! And here is Billy Keogh, because he +is virtuous, condemned to the unprofitable swindle of slandering the +faces of missing links on tin for an honest living! 'Tis an injustice +of nature." + +"Cheer up," said Goodwin. "You are a pretty poor fox to be envying a +gander. Maybe the enchanting Guilbert will take a fancy to you and +your tintypes after we impoverish her royal escort." + +"She could do worse," reflected Keogh; "but she won't. 'Tis not a +tintype gallery, but the gallery of the gods that she's fitted to +adorn. She's a very wicked lady, and the president man is in luck. +But I hear Clancy swearing in the back room for having to do all the +work." And Keogh plunged for the rear of the "gallery," whistling +gaily in a spontaneous way that belied his recent sigh over the +questionable good luck of the flying president. + +Goodwin turned from the main street into a much narrower one that +intersected it at a right angle. + +These side streets were covered by a growth of thick, rank grass, +which was kept to a navigable shortness by the machetes of the +police. Stone sidewalks, little more than a ledge in width, ran along +the base of the mean and monotonous adobe houses. At the outskirts +of the village these streets dwindled to nothing; and here were set +the palm-thatched huts of the Caribs and the poorer natives, and the +shabby cabins of negroes from Jamaica and the West India islands. A +few structures raised their heads above the red-tiled roofs of the +one-story houses--the bell tower of the _Calaboza_, the Hotel de los +Estranjeros, the residence of the Vesuvius Fruit Company's agent, +the store and residence of Bernard Brannigan, a ruined cathedral in +which Columbus had once set foot, and, most imposing of all, the +Casa Morena--the summer "White House" of the President of Anchuria. +On the principal street running along the beach--the Broadway +of Coralio--were the larger stores, the government _bodega_ and +post-office, the _cuartel_, the rum-shops and the market place. + +On his way Goodwin passed the house of Bernard Brannigan. It was a +modern wooden building, two stories in height. The ground floor was +occupied by Brannigan's store, the upper one contained the living +apartments. A wide cool porch ran around the house half way up its +outer walls. A handsome, vivacious girl neatly dressed in flowing +white leaned over the railing and smiled down upon Goodwin. She was +no darker than many an Andalusian of high descent; and she sparkled +and glowed like a tropical moonlight. + +"Good evening, Miss Paula," said Goodwin, taking off his hat, with +his ready smile. There was little difference in his manner whether +he addressed women or men. Everybody in Coralio liked to receive the +salutation of the big American. + +"Is there any news, Mr. Goodwin? Please don't say no. Isn't it +warm? I feel just like Mariana in her moated grange--or was it a +range?--it's hot enough." + +"No, there's no news to tell, I believe," said Goodwin, with a +mischievous look in his eye, "except that old Geddie is getting +grumpier and crosser every day. If something doesn't happen to +relieve his mind I'll have to quit smoking on his back porch--and +there's no other place available that is cool enough." + +"He isn't grumpy," said Paula Brannigan, impulsively, "when he--" + +But she ceased suddenly, and drew back with a deepening colour; for +her mother had been a _mestizo_ lady, and the Spanish blood had +brought to Paula a certain shyness that was an adornment to the other +half of her demonstrative nature. + + + + +II + +THE LOTUS AND THE BOTTLE + + +Willard Geddie, consul for the United States in Coralio, was working +leisurely on his yearly report. Goodwin, who had strolled in as he +did daily for a smoke on the much coveted porch, had found him so +absorbed in his work that he departed after roundly abusing the +consul for his lack of hospitality. + +"I shall complain to the civil service department," said +Goodwin;--"or is it a department?--perhaps it's only a theory. One +gets neither civility nor service from you. You won't talk; and +you won't set out anything to drink. What kind of a way is that of +representing your government?" + +Goodwin strolled out and across to the hotel to see if he could bully +the quarantine doctor into a game on Coralio's solitary billiard +table. His plans were completed for the interception of the fugitives +from the capital; and now it was but a waiting game that he had to +play. + +The consul was interested in his report. He was only twenty-four; and +he had not been in Coralio long enough for his enthusiasm to cool in +the heat of the tropics--a paradox that may be allowed between Cancer +and Capricorn. + +So many thousand bunches of bananas, so many thousand oranges and +cocoanuts, so many ounces of gold dust, pounds of rubber, coffee, +indigo and sarsaparilla--actually, exports were twenty per cent. +greater than for the previous year! + +A little thrill of satisfaction ran through the consul. Perhaps, he +thought, the State Department, upon reading his introduction, would +notice--and then he leaned back in his chair and laughed. He was +getting as bad as the others. For the moment he had forgotten that +Coralio was an insignificant town in an insignificant republic lying +along the by-ways of a second-rate sea. He thought of Gregg, the +quarantine doctor, who subscribed for the London _Lancet_, expecting +to find it quoting his reports to the home Board of Health concerning +the yellow fever germ. The consul knew that not one in fifty of his +acquaintances in the States had ever heard of Coralio. He knew that +two men, at any rate, would have to read his report--some underling +in the State Department and a compositor in the Public Printing +Office. Perhaps the typesticker would note the increase of commerce +in Coralio, and speak of it, over the cheese and beer, to a friend. + +He had just written: "Most unaccountable is the supineness of the +large exporters in the United States in permitting the French and +German houses to practically control the trade interests of this +rich and productive country"--when he heard the hoarse notes of a +steamer's siren. + +Geddie laid down his pen and gathered his Panama hat and umbrella. By +the sound he knew it to be the _Valhalla_, one of the line of fruit +vessels plying for the Vesuvius Company. Down to _ninos_ of five +years, everyone in Coralio could name you each incoming steamer by +the note of her siren. + +The consul sauntered by a roundabout, shaded way to the beach. By +reason of long practice he gauged his stroll so accurately that +by the time he arrived on the sandy shore the boat of the customs +officials was rowing back from the steamer, which had been boarded +and inspected according to the laws of Anchuria. + +There is no harbour at Coralio. Vessels of the draught of the +_Valhalla_ must ride at anchor a mile from shore. When they take on +fruit it is conveyed on lighters and freighter sloops. At Solitas, +where there was a fine harbour, ships of many kinds were to be seen, +but in the roadstead off Coralio scarcely any save the fruiters +paused. Now and then a tramp coaster, or a mysterious brig from +Spain, or a saucy French barque would hang innocently for a few +days in the offing. Then the custom-house crew would become doubly +vigilant and wary. At night a sloop or two would be making strange +trips in and out along the shore; and in the morning the stock of +Three-Star Hennessey, wines and drygoods in Coralio would be found +vastly increased. It has also been said that the customs officials +jingled more silver in the pockets of their red-striped trousers, and +that the record books showed no increase in import duties received. + +The customs boat and the _Valhalla_ gig reached the shore at the same +time. When they grounded in the shallow water there was still five +yards of rolling surf between them and dry sand. Then half-clothed +Caribs dashed into the water, and brought in on their backs the +_Valhalla's_ purser and the little native officials in their cotton +undershirts, blue trousers with red stripes, and flapping straw hats. + +At college Geddie had been a treasure as a first-baseman. He now +closed his umbrella, stuck it upright in the sand, and stooped, +with his hands resting upon his knees. The purser, burlesquing +the pitcher's contortions, hurled at the consul the heavy roll of +newspapers, tied with a string, that the steamer always brought for +him. Geddie leaped high and caught the roll with a sounding "thwack." +The loungers on the beach--about a third of the population of the +town--laughed and applauded delightedly. Every week they expected to +see that roll of papers delivered and received in that same manner, +and they were never disappointed. Innovations did not flourish in +Coralio. + +The consul re-hoisted his umbrella and walked back to the consulate. + +This home of a great nation's representative was a wooden structure +of two rooms, with a native-built gallery of poles, bamboo and +nipa palm running on three sides of it. One room was the official +apartment, furnished chastely with a flat-top desk, a hammock, and +three uncomfortable cane-seated chairs. Engravings of the first and +latest president of the country represented hung against the wall. +The other room was the consul's living apartment. + +It was eleven o'clock when he returned from the beach, and therefore +breakfast time. Chanca, the Carib woman who cooked for him, was just +serving the meal on the side of the gallery facing the sea--a spot +famous as the coolest in Coralio. The breakfast consisted of shark's +fin soup, stew of land crabs, breadfruit, a boiled iguana steak, +aguacates, a freshly cut pineapple, claret and coffee. + +Geddie took his seat, and unrolled with luxurious laziness his bundle +of newspapers. Here in Coralio for two days or longer he would read +of goings-on in the world very much as we of the world read those +whimsical contributions to inexact science that assume to portray the +doings of the Martians. After he had finished with the papers they +would be sent on the rounds of the other English-speaking residents +of the town. + +The paper that came first to his hand was one of those bulky +mattresses of printed stuff upon which the readers of certain New +York journals are supposed to take their Sabbath literary nap. +Opening this the consul rested it upon the table, supporting its +weight with the aid of the back of a chair. Then he partook of his +meal deliberately, turning the leaves from time to time and glancing +half idly at the contents. + +Presently he was struck by something familiar to him in a picture--a +half-page, badly printed reproduction of a photograph of a vessel. +Languidly interested, he leaned for a nearer scrutiny and a view of +the florid headlines of the column next to the picture. + +Yes; he was not mistaken. The engraving was of the eight-hundred-ton +yacht _Idalia_, belonging to "that prince of good fellows, Midas +of the money market, and society's pink of perfection, J. Ward +Tolliver." + +Slowly sipping his black coffee, Geddie read the column of print. +Following a listed statement of Mr. Tolliver's real estate and bonds, +came a description of the yacht's furnishings, and then the grain of +news no bigger than a mustard seed. Mr. Tolliver, with a party of +favoured guests, would sail the next day on a six weeks' cruise along +the Central American and South American coasts and among the Bahama +Islands. Among the guests were Mrs. Cumberland Payne and Miss Ida +Payne, of Norfolk. + +The writer, with the fatuous presumption that was demanded of him +by his readers, had concocted a romance suited to their palates. +He bracketed the names of Miss Payne and Mr. Tolliver until he had +well-nigh read the marriage ceremony over them. He played coyly and +insinuatingly upon the strings of "_on dit_" and "Madame Rumour" +and "a little bird" and "no one would be surprised," and ended with +congratulations. + +Geddie, having finished his breakfast, took his papers to the edge of +the gallery, and sat there in his favourite steamer chair with his +feet on the bamboo railing. He lighted a cigar, and looked out upon +the sea. He felt a glow of satisfaction at finding he was so little +disturbed by what he had read. He told himself that he had conquered +the distress that had sent him, a voluntary exile, to this far +land of the lotus. He could never forget Ida, of course; but there +was no longer any pain in thinking about her. When they had had +that misunderstanding and quarrel he had impulsively sought this +consulship, with the desire to retaliate upon her by detaching +himself from her world and presence. He had succeeded thoroughly in +that. During the twelve months of his life in Coralio no word had +passed between them, though he had sometimes heard of her through the +dilatory correspondence with the few friends to whom he still wrote. +Still he could not repress a little thrill of satisfaction at knowing +that she had not yet married Tolliver or anyone else. But evidently +Tolliver had not yet abandoned hope. + +Well, it made no difference to him now. He had eaten of the lotus. He +was happy and content in this land of perpetual afternoon. Those old +days of life in the States seemed like an irritating dream. He hoped +Ida would be as happy as he was. The climate as balmy as that of +distant Avalon; the fetterless, idyllic round of enchanted days; +the life among this indolent, romantic people--a life full of music, +flowers, and low laughter; the influence of the imminent sea and +mountains, and the many shapes of love and magic and beauty that +bloomed in the white tropic nights--with all he was more than +content. Also, there was Paula Brannigan. + +Geddie intended to marry Paula--if, of course, she would consent; +but he felt rather sure that she would do that. Somehow, he kept +postponing his proposal. Several times he had been quite near to it; +but a mysterious something always held him back. Perhaps it was only +the unconscious, instinctive conviction that the act would sever the +last tie that bound him to his old world. + +He could be very happy with Paula. Few of the native girls could be +compared with her. She had attended a convent school in New Orleans +for two years; and when she chose to display her accomplishments no +one could detect any difference between her and the girls of Norfolk +and Manhattan. But it was delicious to see her at home dressed, as +she sometimes was, in the native costume, with bare shoulders and +flowing sleeves. + +Bernard Brannigan was the great merchant of Coralio. Besides his +store, he maintained a train of pack mules, and carried on a lively +trade with the interior towns and villages. He had married a native +lady of high Castilian descent, but with a tinge of Indian brown +showing through her olive cheek. The union of the Irish and the +Spanish had produced, as it so often has, an offshoot of rare beauty +and variety. They were very excellent people indeed, and the upper +story of their house was ready to be placed at the service of Geddie +and Paula as soon as he should make up his mind to speak about it. + +By the time two hours were whiled away the consul tired of reading. +The papers lay scattered about him on the gallery. Reclining there, +he gazed dreamily out upon an Eden. A clump of banana plants +interposed their broad shields between him and the sun. The gentle +slope from the consulate to the sea was covered with the dark-green +foliage of lemon-trees and orange-trees just bursting into bloom. A +lagoon pierced the land like a dark, jagged crystal, and above it a +pale ceiba-tree rose almost to the clouds. The waving cocoanut palms +on the beach flared their decorative green leaves against the slate +of an almost quiescent sea. His senses were cognizant of brilliant +scarlet and ochres amid the vert of the coppice, of odours of +fruit and bloom and the smoke from Chanca's clay oven under the +calabash-tree; of the treble laughter of the native women in their +huts, the song of the robin, the salt taste of the breeze, the +diminuendo of the faint surf running along the shore--and, gradually, +of a white speck, growing to a blur, that intruded itself upon the +drab prospect of the sea. + +Lazily interested, he watched this blur increase until it became +the _Idalia_ steaming at full speed, coming down the coast. Without +changing his position he kept his eyes upon the beautiful white yacht +as she drew swiftly near, and came opposite to Coralio. Then, sitting +upright, he saw her float steadily past and on. Scarcely a mile of +sea had separated her from the shore. He had seen the frequent flash +of her polished brass work and the stripes of her deck-awnings--so +much, and no more. Like a ship on a magic lantern slide the _Idalia_ +had crossed the illuminated circle of the consul's little world, and +was gone. Save for the tiny cloud of smoke that was left hanging +over the brim of the sea, she might have been an immaterial thing, a +chimera of his idle brain. + +Geddie went into his office and sat down to dawdle over his report. +If the reading of the article in the paper had left him unshaken, +this silent passing of the _Idalia_ had done for him still more. +It had brought the calm and peace of a situation from which all +uncertainty had been erased. He knew that men sometimes hope without +being aware of it. Now, since she had come two thousand miles and had +passed without a sign, not even his unconscious self need cling to +the past any longer. + +After dinner, when the sun was low behind the mountains, Geddie +walked on the little strip of beach under the cocoanuts. The wind was +blowing mildly landward, and the surface of the sea was rippled by +tiny wavelets. + +A miniature breaker, spreading with a soft "swish" upon the sand +brought with it something round and shiny that rolled back again as +the wave receded. The next influx beached it clear, and Geddie picked +it up. The thing was a long-necked wine bottle of colourless glass. +The cork had been driven in tightly to the level of the mouth, and +the end covered with dark-red sealing-wax. The bottle contained only +what seemed to be a sheet of paper, much curled from the manipulation +it had undergone while being inserted. In the sealing-wax was the +impression of a seal--probably of a signet-ring, bearing the initials +of a monogram; but the impression had been hastily made, and the +letters were past anything more certain than a shrewd conjecture. Ida +Payne had always worn a signet-ring in preference to any other finger +decoration. Geddie thought he could make out the familiar "I P"; and +a queer sensation of disquietude went over him. More personal and +intimate was this reminder of her than had been the sight of the +vessel she was doubtless on. He walked back to his house, and set the +bottle on his desk. + +Throwing off his hat and coat, and lighting a lamp--for the night had +crowded precipitately upon the brief twilight--he began to examine +his piece of sea salvage. + +By holding the bottle near the light and turning it judiciously, he +made out that it contained a double sheet of note-paper filled with +close writing; further, that the paper was of the same size and shade +as that always used by Ida; and that, to the best of his belief, the +handwriting was hers. The imperfect glass of the bottle so distorted +the rays of light that he could read no word of the writing; but +certain capital letters, of which he caught comprehensive glimpses, +were Ida's, he felt sure. + +There was a little smile both of perplexity and amusement in Geddie's +eyes as he set the bottle down, and laid three cigars side by side +on his desk. He fetched his steamer chair from the gallery, and +stretched himself comfortably. He would smoke those three cigars +while considering the problem. + +For it amounted to a problem. He almost wished that he had not found +the bottle; but the bottle was there. Why should it have drifted in +from the sea, whence come so many disquieting things, to disturb his +peace? + +In this dreamy land, where time seemed so redundant, he had fallen +into the habit of bestowing much thought upon even trifling matters. + +He began to speculate upon many fanciful theories concerning the +story of the bottle, rejecting each in turn. + +Ships in danger of wreck or disablement sometimes cast forth such +precarious messengers calling for aid. But he had seen the _Idalia_ +not three hours before, safe and speeding. Suppose the crew had +mutinied and imprisoned the passengers below, and the message was +one begging for succour! But, premising such an improbable outrage, +would the agitated captives have taken the pains to fill four pages +of note-paper with carefully penned arguments to their rescue. + +Thus by elimination he soon rid the matter of the more unlikely +theories, and was reduced--though aversely--to the less assailable +one that the bottle contained a message to himself. Ida knew he was +in Coralio; she must have launched the bottle while the yacht was +passing and the wind blowing fairly toward the shore. + +As soon as Geddie reached this conclusion a wrinkle came between his +brows and a stubborn look settled around his mouth. He sat looking +out through the doorway at the gigantic fire-flies traversing the +quiet streets. + +If this was a message to him from Ida, what could it mean save an +overture toward a reconciliation? And if that, why had she not used +the same methods of the post instead of this uncertain and even +flippant means of communication? A note in an empty bottle, cast into +the sea! There was something light and frivolous about it, if not +actually contemptuous. + +The thought stirred his pride and subdued whatever emotions had been +resurrected by the finding of the bottle. + +Geddie put on his coat and hat and walked out. He followed a street +that led him along the border of the little plaza where a band was +playing and people were rambling, care-free and indolent. Some +timorous _senoritas_ scurrying past with fire-flies tangled in the +jetty braids of their hair glanced at him with shy, flattering eyes. +The air was languorous with the scent of jasmin and orange-blossoms. + +The consul stayed his steps at the house of Bernard Brannigan. Paula +was swinging in a hammock on the gallery. She rose from it like a +bird from its nest. The colour came to her cheek at the sound of +Geddie's voice. + +He was charmed at the sight of her costume--a flounced muslin dress, +with a little jacket of white flannel, all made with neatness and +style. He suggested a stroll, and they walked out to the old Indian +well on the hill road. They sat on the curb, and there Geddie made +the expected but long-deferred speech. Certain though he had been +that she would not say him nay, he was thrilled with joy at the +completeness and sweetness of her surrender. Here was surely a heart +made for love and steadfastness. Here was no caprice or questionings +or captious standards of convention. + +When Geddie kissed Paula at her door that night he was happier than +he had ever been before. "Here in this hollow lotus land, ever to +live and lie reclined" seemed to him, as it has seemed to many +mariners, the best as well as the easiest. His future would be an +ideal one. He had attained a Paradise without a serpent. His Eve +would be indeed a part of him, unbeguiled, and therefore more +beguiling. He had made his decision to-night, and his heart was full +of serene, assured content. + +Geddie went back to his house whistling that finest and saddest love +song, "La Golondrina." At the door his tame monkey leaped down from +his shelf, chattering briskly. The consul turned to his desk to get +him some nuts he usually kept there. Reaching in the half-darkness, +his hand struck against the bottle. He started as if he had touched +the cold rotundity of a serpent. + +He had forgotten that the bottle was there. + +He lighted the lamp and fed the monkey. Then, very deliberately, he +lighted a cigar, and took the bottle in his hand, and walked down the +path to the beach. + +There was a moon, and the sea was glorious. The breeze had shifted, +as it did each evening, and was now rushing steadily seaward. + +Stepping to the water's edge, Geddie hurled the unopened bottle far +out into the sea. It disappeared for a moment, and then shot upward +twice its length. Geddie stood still, watching it. The moonlight was +so bright that he could see it bobbing up and down with the little +waves. Slowly it receded from the shore, flashing and turning as it +went. The wind was carrying it out to sea. Soon it became a mere +speck, doubtfully discerned at irregular intervals; and then the +mystery of it was swallowed up by the greater mystery of the ocean. +Geddie stood still upon the beach, smoking and looking out upon the +water. + + + +"Simon!--Oh, Simon!--wake up there, Simon!" bawled a sonorous voice +at the edge of the water. + +Old Simon Cruz was a half-breed fisherman and smuggler who lived in a +hut on the beach. Out of his earliest nap Simon was thus awakened. + +He slipped on his shoes and went outside. Just landing from one of +the _Valhalla's_ boats was the third mate of that vessel, who was an +acquaintance of Simon's, and three sailors from the fruiter. + +"Go up, Simon," called the mate, "and find Dr. Gregg or Mr. Goodwin +or anybody that's a friend to Mr. Geddie, and bring 'em here at +once." + +"Saints of the skies!" said Simon, sleepily, "nothing has happened to +Mr. Geddie?" + +"He's under that tarpauling," said the mate, pointing to the boat, +"and he's rather more than half drownded. We seen him from the +steamer nearly a mile out from shore, swimmin' like mad after a +bottle that was floatin' in the water, outward bound. We lowered the +gig and started for him. He nearly had his hand on the bottle, when +he gave out and went under. We pulled him out in time to save him, +maybe; but the doctor is the one to decide that." + +"A bottle?" said the old man, rubbing his eyes. He was not yet fully +awake. "Where is the bottle?" + +"Driftin' along out there some'eres," said the mate, jerking his +thumb toward the sea. "Get on with you, Simon." + + + + +III + +SMITH + + +Goodwin and the ardent patriot, Zavalla, took all the precautions +that their foresight could contrive to prevent the escape of +President Miraflores and his companion. They sent trusted messengers +up the coast to Solitas and Alazan to warn the local leaders of the +flight, and to instruct them to patrol the water line and arrest +the fugitives at all hazards should they reveal themselves in that +territory. After this was done there remained only to cover the +district about Coralio and await the coming of the quarry. The nets +were well spread. The roads were so few, the opportunities for +embarkation so limited, and the two or three probable points of exit +so well guarded that it would be strange indeed if there should slip +through the meshes so much of the country's dignity, romance, and +collateral. The president would, without doubt, move as secretly +as possible, and endeavour to board a vessel by stealth from some +secluded point along the shore. + +On the fourth day after the receipt of Englehart's telegram the +_Karlsefin_, a Norwegian steamer chartered by the New Orleans fruit +trade, anchored off Coralio with three hoarse toots of her siren. The +_Karlsefin_ was not one of the line operated by the Vesuvius Fruit +Company. She was something of a dilettante, doing odd jobs for a +company that was scarcely important enough to figure as a rival to +the Vesuvius. The movements of the _Karlsefin_ were dependent upon +the state of the market. Sometimes she would ply steadily between the +Spanish Main and New Orleans in the regular transport of fruit; next +she would be making erratic trips to Mobile or Charleston, or even +as far north as New York, according to the distribution of the fruit +supply. + +Goodwin lounged upon the beach with the usual crowd of idlers that +had gathered to view the steamer. Now that President Miraflores might +be expected to reach the borders of his abjured country at any time, +the orders were to keep a strict and unrelenting watch. Every vessel +that approached the shores might now be considered a possible means +of escape for the fugitives; and an eye was kept even on the sloops +and dories that belonged to the sea-going contingent of Coralio. +Goodwin and Zavalla moved everywhere, but without ostentation, +watching the loopholes of escape. + +The customs officials crowded importantly into their boat and rowed +out to the _Karlsefin_. A boat from the steamer landed her purser +with his papers, and took out the quarantine doctor with his green +umbrella and clinical thermometer. Next a swarm of Caribs began to +load upon lighters the thousands of bunches of bananas heaped upon +the shore and row them out to the steamer. The _Karlsefin_ had +no passenger list, and was soon done with the attention of the +authorities. The purser declared that the steamer would remain at +anchor until morning, taking on her fruit during the night. The +_Karlsefin_ had come, he said, from New York, to which port her +latest load of oranges and cocoanuts had been conveyed. Two or three +of the freighter sloops were engaged to assist in the work, for the +captain was anxious to make a quick return in order to reap the +advantage offered by a certain dearth of fruit in the States. + +About four o'clock in the afternoon another of those marine monsters, +not very familiar in those waters, hove in sight, following the +fateful _Idalia_--a graceful steam yacht, painted a light buff, +clean-cut as a steel engraving. The beautiful vessel hovered off +shore, see-sawing the waves as lightly as a duck in a rain barrel. +A swift boat manned by a crew in uniform came ashore, and a +stocky-built man leaped to the sands. + +The new-comer seemed to turn a disapproving eye upon the rather +motley congregation of native Anchurians, and made his way at once +toward Goodwin, who was the most conspicuously Anglo-Saxon figure +present. Goodwin greeted him with courtesy. + +Conversation developed that the newly landed one was named Smith, +and that he had come in a yacht. A meagre biography, truly; for the +yacht was most apparent; and the "Smith" not beyond a reasonable +guess before the revelation. Yet to the eye of Goodwin, who had seen +several things, there was a discrepancy between Smith and his yacht. +A bullet-headed man Smith was, with an oblique, dead eye and the +moustache of a cocktail-mixer. And unless he had shifted costumes +before putting off for shore he had affronted the deck of his correct +vessel clad in a pearl-gray derby, a gay plaid suit and vaudeville +neckwear. Men owning pleasure yachts generally harmonize better with +them. + +Smith looked business, but he was no advertiser. He commented upon +the scenery, remarking upon its fidelity to the pictures in the +geography; and then inquired for the United States consul. Goodwin +pointed out the starred-and-striped bunting hanging above the little +consulate, which was concealed behind the orange-trees. + +"Mr. Geddie, the consul, will be sure to be there," said Goodwin. "He +was very nearly drowned a few days ago while taking a swim in the +sea, and the doctor has ordered him to remain indoors for some time." + +Smith plowed his way through the sand to the consulate, his +haberdashery creating violent discord against the smooth tropical +blues and greens. + +Geddie was lounging in his hammock, somewhat pale of face and languid +in pose. On that night when the _Valhalla's_ boat had brought him +ashore apparently drenched to death by the sea, Doctor Gregg and his +other friends had toiled for hours to preserve the little spark of +life that remained to him. The bottle, with its impotent message, was +gone out to sea, and the problem that it had provoked was reduced +to a simple sum in addition--one and one make two, by the rule of +arithmetic; one by the rule of romance. + +There is a quaint old theory that man may have two souls--a +peripheral one which serves ordinarily, and a central one which is +stirred only at certain times, but then with activity and vigour. +While under the domination of the former a man will shave, vote, pay +taxes, give money to his family, buy subscription books and comport +himself on the average plan. But let the central soul suddenly become +dominant, and he may, in the twinkling of an eye, turn upon the +partner of his joys with furious execration; he may change his +politics while you could snap your fingers; he may deal out deadly +insult to his dearest friend; he may get him, instanter, to a +monastery or a dance hall; he may elope, or hang himself--or he may +write a song or poem, or kiss his wife unasked, or give his funds to +the search of a microbe. Then the peripheral soul will return; and we +have our safe, sane citizen again. It is but the revolt of the Ego +against Order; and its effect is to shake up the atoms only that they +may settle where they belong. + +Geddie's revulsion had been a mild one--no more than a swim in a +summer sea after so inglorious an object as a drifting bottle. And +now he was himself again. Upon his desk, ready for the post, was a +letter to his government tendering his resignation as consul, to be +effective as soon as another could be appointed in his place. For +Bernard Brannigan, who never did things in a half-way manner, was to +take Geddie at once for a partner in his very profitable and various +enterprises; and Paula was happily engaged in plans for refurnishing +and decorating the upper story of the Brannigan house. + +The consul rose from his hammock when he saw the conspicuous stranger +in his door. + +"Keep your seat, old man," said the visitor, with an airy wave of his +large hand. "My name's Smith; and I've come in a yacht. You are the +consul--is that right? A big, cool guy on the beach directed me here. +Thought I'd pay my respects to the flag." + +"Sit down," said Geddie. "I've been admiring your craft ever since it +came in sight. Looks like a fast sailer. What's her tonnage?" + +"Search me!" said Smith. "I don't know what she weighs in at. But +she's got a tidy gait. The _Rambler_--that's her name--don't take the +dust of anything afloat. This is my first trip on her. I'm taking a +squint along this coast just to get an idea of the countries where +the rubber and red pepper and revolutions come from. I had no idea +there was so much scenery down here. Why, Central Park ain't in it +with this neck of the woods. I'm from New York. They get monkeys, and +cocoanuts, and parrots down here--is that right?" + +"We have them all," said Geddie. "I'm quite sure that our fauna and +flora would take a prize over Central Park." + +"Maybe they would," admitted Smith, cheerfully. "I haven't seen them +yet. But I guess you've got us skinned on the animal and vegetation +question. You don't have much travel here, do you?" + +"Travel?" queried the consul. "I suppose you mean passengers on the +steamers. No; very few people land in Coralio. An investor now and +then--tourists and sight-seers generally go further down the coast to +one of the larger towns where there is a harbour." + +"I see a ship out there loading up with bananas," said Smith. "Any +passengers come on her?" + +"That's the _Karlsefin_," said the consul. "She's a tramp +fruiter--made her last trip to New York, I believe. No; she brought +no passengers. I saw her boat come ashore, and there was no one. +About the only exciting recreation we have here is watching steamers +when they arrive; and a passenger on one of them generally causes +the whole town to turn out. If you are going to remain in Coralio +a while, Mr. Smith, I'll be glad to take you around to meet some +people. There are four or five American chaps that are good to know, +besides the native high-fliers." + +"Thanks," said the yachtsman, "but I wouldn't put you to the trouble. +I'd like to meet the guys you speak of, but I won't be here long +enough to do much knocking around. That cool gent on the beach spoke +of a doctor; can you tell me where I could find him? The _Rambler_ +ain't quite as steady on her feet as a Broadway hotel; and a fellow +gets a touch of seasickness now and then. Thought I'd strike the +croaker for a handful of the little sugar pills, in case I need 'em." + +"You will be apt to find Dr. Gregg at the hotel," said the consul. +"You can see it from the door--it's that two-story building with the +balcony, where the orange-trees are." + +The Hotel de los Estranjeros was a dreary hostelry, in great disuse +both by strangers and friends. It stood at a corner of the Street of +the Holy Sepulchre. A grove of small orange-trees crowded against one +side of it, enclosed by a low, rock wall over which a tall man might +easily step. The house was of plastered adobe, stained a hundred +shades of colour by the salt breeze and the sun. Upon its upper +balcony opened a central door and two windows containing broad +jalousies instead of sashes. + +The lower floor communicated by two doorways with the narrow, +rock-paved sidewalk. The _pulperia_--or drinking shop--of the +proprietress, Madama Timotea Ortiz, occupied the ground floor. On the +bottles of brandy, _anisada_, Scotch "smoke" and inexpensive wines +behind the little counter the dust lay thick save where the fingers +of infrequent customers had left irregular prints. The upper story +contained four or five guest-rooms which were rarely put to their +destined use. Sometimes a fruit-grower, riding in from his plantation +to confer with his agent, would pass a melancholy night in the dismal +upper story; sometimes a minor native official on some trifling +government quest would have his pomp and majesty awed by Madama's +sepulchral hospitality. But Madama sat behind her bar content, not +desiring to quarrel with Fate. If anyone required meat, drink or +lodging at the Hotel de los Estranjeros they had but to come, and be +served. _Esta bueno._ If they came not, why, then, they came not. +_Esta bueno._ + +As the exceptional yachtsman was making his way down the precarious +sidewalk of the Street of the Holy Sepulchre, the solitary permanent +guest of that decaying hotel sat at its door, enjoying the breeze +from the sea. + +Dr. Gregg, the quarantine physician, was a man of fifty or sixty, +with a florid face and the longest beard between Topeka and Terra +del Fuego. He held his position by virtue of an appointment by the +Board of Health of a seaport city in one of the Southern states. +That city feared the ancient enemy of every Southern seaport--the +yellow fever--and it was the duty of Dr. Gregg to examine crew and +passengers of every vessel leaving Coralio for preliminary symptoms. +The duties were light, and the salary, for one who lived in Coralio, +ample. Surplus time there was in plenty; and the good doctor added +to his gains by a large private practice among the residents of the +coast. The fact that he did not know ten words of Spanish was no +obstacle; a pulse could be felt and a fee collected without one being +a linguist. Add to the description the facts that the doctor had +a story to tell concerning the operation of trepanning which no +listener had ever allowed him to conclude, and that he believed +in brandy as a prophylactic; and the special points of interest +possessed by Dr. Gregg will have become exhausted. + +The doctor had dragged a chair to the sidewalk. He was coatless, and +he leaned back against the wall and smoked, while he stroked his +beard. Surprise came into his pale blue eyes when he caught sight of +Smith in his unusual and prismatic clothes. + +"You're Dr. Gregg--is that right?" said Smith, feeling the dog's head +pin in his tie. "The constable--I mean the consul, told me you hung +out at this caravansary. My name's Smith; and I came in a yacht. +Taking a cruise around, looking at the monkeys and pineapple-trees. +Come inside and have a drink, Doc. This cafe looks on the blink, but +I guess it can set out something wet." + +"I will join you, sir, in just a taste of brandy," said Dr. Gregg, +rising quickly. "I find that as a prophylactic a little brandy is +almost a necessity in this climate." + +As they turned to enter the _pulperia_ a native man, barefoot, +glided noiselessly up and addressed the doctor in Spanish. He was +yellowish-brown, like an over-ripe lemon; he wore a cotton shirt and +ragged linen trousers girded by a leather belt. His face was like an +animal's, live and wary, but without promise of much intelligence. +This man jabbered with animation and so much seriousness that it +seemed a pity that his words were to be wasted. + +Dr. Gregg felt his pulse. + +"You sick?" he inquired. + +"_Mi mujer esta enferma en la casa_," said the man, thus endeavouring +to convey the news, in the only language open to him, that his wife +lay ill in her palm-thatched hut. + +The doctor drew a handful of capsules filled with a white powder from +his trousers pocket. He counted out ten of them into the native's +hand, and held up his forefinger impressively. + +"Take one," said the doctor, "every two hours." He then held up two +fingers, shaking them emphatically before the native's face. Next he +pulled out his watch and ran his finger round its dial twice. Again +the two fingers confronted the patient's nose. "Two--two--two hours," +repeated the doctor. + +"_Si, Senor_," said the native, sadly. + +He pulled a cheap silver watch from his own pocket and laid it in +the doctor's hand. "Me bring," said he, struggling painfully with +his scant English, "other watchy to-morrow." Then he departed +downheartedly with his capsules. + +"A very ignorant race of people, sir," said the doctor, as he slipped +the watch into his pocket. "He seems to have mistaken my directions +for taking the physic for the fee. However, it is all right. He owes +me an account, anyway. The chances are that he won't bring the other +watch. You can't depend on anything they promise you. About that +drink, now? How did you come to Coralio, Mr. Smith? I was not aware +that any boats except the _Karlsefin_ had arrived for some days." + +The two leaned against the deserted bar; and Madama set out a bottle +without waiting for the doctor's order. There was no dust on it. + +After they had drank twice Smith said: + +"You say there were no passengers on the _Karlsefin_, Doc? Are you +sure about that? It seems to me I heard somebody down on the beach +say that there was one or two aboard." + +"They were mistaken, sir. I myself went out and put all hands through +a medical examination, as usual. The _Karlsefin_ sails as soon as she +gets her bananas loaded, which will be about daylight in the morning, +and she got everything ready this afternoon. No, sir, there was no +passenger list. Like that Three-Star? A French schooner landed two +slooploads of it a month ago. If any customs duties on it went to the +distinguished republic of Anchuria you may have my hat. If you won't +have another, come out and let's sit in the cool a while. It isn't +often we exiles get a chance to talk with somebody from the outside +world." + +The doctor brought out another chair to the sidewalk for his new +acquaintance. The two seated themselves. + +"You are a man of the world," said Dr. Gregg; "a man of travel and +experience. Your decision in a matter of ethics and, no doubt, on +the points of equity, ability and professional probity should be of +value. I would be glad if you will listen to the history of a case +that I think stands unique in medical annals. + +"About nine years ago, while I was engaged in the practice of +medicine in my native city, I was called to treat a case of contusion +of the skull. I made the diagnosis that a splinter of bone was +pressing upon the brain, and that the surgical operation known as +trepanning was required. However, as the patient was a gentleman of +wealth and position, I called in for consultation Dr.--" + +Smith rose from his chair, and laid a hand, soft with apology, upon +the doctor's shirt sleeve. + +"Say, Doc," he said, solemnly, "I want to hear that story. You've got +me interested; and I don't want to miss the rest of it. I know it's a +loola by the way it begins; and I want to tell it at the next meeting +of the Barney O'Flynn Association, if you don't mind. But I've got +one or two matters to attend to first. If I get 'em attended to +in time I'll come right back and hear you spiel the rest before +bedtime--is that right?" + +"By all means," said the doctor, "get your business attended to, +and then return. I shall wait up for you. You see, one of the most +prominent physicians at the consultation diagnosed the trouble as a +blood clot; another said it was an abscess, but I--" + +"Don't tell me now, Doc. Don't spoil the story. Wait till I come +back. I want to hear it as it runs off the reel--is that right?" + +The mountains reached up their bulky shoulders to receive the level +gallop of Apollo's homing steeds, the day died in the lagoons and +in the shadowed banana groves and in the mangrove swamps, where the +great blue crabs were beginning to crawl to land for their nightly +ramble. And it died, at last, upon the highest peaks. Then the brief +twilight, ephemeral as the flight of a moth, came and went; the +Southern Cross peeped with its topmost eye above a row of palms, +and the fire-flies heralded with their torches the approach of +soft-footed night. + +In the offing the _Karlsefin_ swayed at anchor, her lights seeming +to penetrate the water to countless fathoms with their shimmering, +lanceolate reflections. The Caribs were busy loading her by means of +the great lighters heaped full from the piles of fruit ranged upon +the shore. + +On the sandy beach, with his back against a cocoanut-tree and the +stubs of many cigars lying around him, Smith sat waiting, never +relaxing his sharp gaze in the direction of the steamer. + +The incongruous yachtsman had concentrated his interest upon the +innocent fruiter. Twice had he been assured that no passengers had +come to Coralio on board of her. And yet, with a persistence not to +be attributed to an idling voyager, he had appealed the case to the +higher court of his own eyesight. Surprisingly like some gay-coated +lizard, he crouched at the foot of the cocoanut palm, and with the +beady, shifting eyes of the selfsame reptile, sustained his espionage +on the _Karlsefin_. + +On the white sands a whiter gig belonging to the yacht was drawn up, +guarded by one of the white-ducked crew. Not far away in a _pulperia_ +on the shore-following Calle Grande three other sailors swaggered +with their cues around Coralio's solitary billiard-table. The boat +lay there as if under orders to be ready for use at any moment. There +was in the atmosphere a hint of expectation, of waiting for something +to occur, which was foreign to the air of Coralio. + +Like some passing bird of brilliant plumage, Smith alights on this +palmy shore but to preen his wings for an instant and then to fly +away upon silent pinions. When morning dawned there was no Smith, no +waiting gig, no yacht in the offing. Smith left no intimation of his +mission there, no footprints to show where he had followed the trail +of his mystery on the sands of Coralio that night. He came; he spake +his strange jargon of the asphalt and the cafes; he sat under the +cocoanut-tree, and vanished. The next morning Coralio, Smithless, +ate its fried plantain and said: "The man of pictured clothing went +himself away." With the _siesta_ the incident passed, yawning, into +history. + +So, for a time, must Smith pass behind the scenes of the play. He +comes no more to Coralio nor to Doctor Gregg, who sits in vain, +wagging his redundant beard, waiting to enrich his derelict audience +with his moving tale of trepanning and jealousy. + +But prosperously to the lucidity of these loose pages, Smith shall +flutter among them again. In the nick of time he shall come to tell +us why he strewed so many anxious cigar stumps around the cocoanut +palm that night. This he must do; for, when he sailed away before +the dawn in his yacht _Rambler_, he carried with him the answer to a +riddle so big and preposterous that few in Anchuria had ventured even +to propound it. + + + + +IV + +CAUGHT + + +The plans for the detention of the flying President Miraflores +and his companion at the coast line seemed hardly likely to fail. +Dr. Zavalla himself had gone to the port of Alazan to establish a +guard at that point. At Solitas the Liberal patriot Varras could be +depended upon to keep close watch. Goodwin held himself responsible +for the district about Coralio. + +The news of the president's flight had been disclosed to no one in +the coast towns save trusted members of the ambitious political party +that was desirous of succeeding to power. The telegraph wire running +from San Mateo to the coast had been cut far up on the mountain trail +by an emissary of Zavalla's. Long before this could be repaired and +word received along it from the capital the fugitives would have +reached the coast and the question of escape or capture been solved. + +Goodwin had stationed armed sentinels at frequent intervals along the +shore for a mile in each direction from Coralio. They were instructed +to keep a vigilant lookout during the night to prevent Miraflores +from attempting to embark stealthily by means of some boat or sloop +found by chance at the water's edge. A dozen patrols walked the +streets of Coralio unsuspected, ready to intercept the truant +official should he show himself there. + +Goodwin was very well convinced that no precautions had been +overlooked. He strolled about the streets that bore such +high-sounding names and were but narrow, grass-covered lanes, lending +his own aid to the vigil that had been intrusted to him by Bob +Englehart. + +The town had begun the tepid round of its nightly diversions. A few +leisurely dandies, clad in white duck, with flowing neckties, and +swinging slim bamboo canes, threaded the grassy by-ways toward the +houses of their favoured senoritas. Those who wooed the art of music +dragged tirelessly at whining concertinas, or fingered lugubrious +guitars at doors and windows. An occasional soldier from the +_cuartel_, with flapping straw hat, without coat or shoes, hurried +by, balancing his long gun like a lance in one hand. From every +density of the foliage the giant tree frogs sounded their loud and +irritating clatter. Further out, where the by-ways perished at the +brink of the jungle, the guttural cries of marauding baboons and the +coughing of the alligators in the black estuaries fractured the vain +silence of the wood. + +By ten o'clock the streets were deserted. The oil lamps that had +burned, a sickly yellow, at random corners, had been extinguished +by some economical civic agent. Coralio lay sleeping calmly between +toppling mountains and encroaching sea like a stolen babe in the arms +of its abductors. Somewhere over in that tropical darkness--perhaps +already threading the profundities of the alluvial lowlands--the high +adventurer and his mate were moving toward land's end. The game of +Fox-in-the-Morning should be coming soon to its close. + +Goodwin, at his deliberate gait, passed the long, low _cuartel_ where +Coralio's contingent of Anchuria's military force slumbered, with its +bare toes pointed heavenward. There was a law that no civilian might +come so near the headquarters of that citadel of war after nine +o'clock, but Goodwin was always forgetting the minor statutes. + +"_Quien vive?_" shrieked the sentinel, wrestling prodigiously with +his lengthy musket. + +"_Americano_," growled Goodwin, without turning his head, and passed +on, unhalted. + +To the right he turned, and to the left up the street that ultimately +reached the Plaza Nacional. When within the toss of a cigar stump +from the intersecting Street of the Holy Sepulchre, he stopped +suddenly in the pathway. + +He saw the form of a tall man, clothed in black and carrying a large +valise, hurry down the cross-street in the direction of the beach. +And Goodwin's second glance made him aware of a woman at the man's +elbow on the farther side, who seemed to urge forward, if not even to +assist, her companion in their swift but silent progress. They were +no Coralians, those two. + +Goodwin followed at increased speed, but without any of the artful +tactics that are so dear to the heart of the sleuth. The American was +too broad to feel the instinct of the detective. He stood as an agent +for the people of Anchuria, and but for political reasons he would +have demanded then and there the money. It was the design of his +party to secure the imperilled fund, to restore it to the treasury +of the country, and to declare itself in power without bloodshed or +resistance. + +The couple halted at the door of the Hotel de los Estranjeros, and +the man struck upon the wood with the impatience of one unused to his +entry being stayed. Madama was long in response; but after a time her +light showed, the door was opened, and the guests housed. + +Goodwin stood in the quiet street, lighting another cigar. In +two minutes a faint gleam began to show between the slats of the +jalousies in the upper story of the hotel. "They have engaged rooms," +said Goodwin to himself. "So, then, their arrangements for sailing +have yet to be made." + +At that moment there came along one Esteban Delgado, a barber, an +enemy to existing government, a jovial plotter against stagnation +in any form. This barber was one of Coralio's saddest dogs, often +remaining out of doors as late as eleven, post meridian. He was a +partisan Liberal; and he greeted Goodwin with flatulent importance as +a brother in the cause. But he had something important to tell. + +"What think you, Don Frank!" he cried, in the universal tone of the +conspirator. "I have to-night shaved _la barba_--what you call the +'weeskers' of the _Presidente_ himself, of this countree! Consider! +He sent for me to come. In the poor _casita_ of an old woman he +awaited me--in a verree leetle house in a dark place. _Carramba!_--el +Senor Presidente to make himself thus secret and obscured! I think he +desired not to be known--but, _carajo!_ can you shave a man and not +see his face? This gold piece he gave me, and said it was to be all +quite still. I think, Don Frank, there is what you call a chip over +the bug." + +"Have you ever seen President Miraflores before?" asked Goodwin. + +"But once," answered Esteban. "He is tall; and he had weeskers, +verree black and sufficient." + +"Was anyone else present when you shaved him?" + +"An old Indian woman, Senor, that belonged with the _casa_, and one +senorita--a ladee of so much beautee!--_ah, Dios!_" + +"All right, Esteban," said Goodwin. "It's very lucky that +you happened along with your tonsorial information. The new +administration will be likely to remember you for this." + +Then in a few words he made the barber acquainted with the crisis +into which the affairs of the nation had culminated, and instructed +him to remain outside, keeping watch upon the two sides of the hotel +that looked upon the street, and observing whether anyone should +attempt to leave the house by any door or window. Goodwin himself +went to the door through which the guests had entered, opened it and +stepped inside. + +Madama had returned downstairs from her journey above to see after +the comfort of her lodgers. Her candle stood upon the bar. She was +about to take a thimbleful of rum as a solace for having her rest +disturbed. She looked up without surprise or alarm as her third +caller entered. + +"Ah! it is the Senor Goodwin. Not often does he honour my poor house +by his presence." + +"I must come oftener," said Goodwin, with the Goodwin smile. "I hear +that your cognac is the best between Belize to the north and Rio to +the south. Set out the bottle, Madama, and let us have the proof in +_un vasito_ for each of us." + +"My _aguardiente_," said Madama, with pride, "is the best. It grows, +in beautiful bottles, in the dark places among the banana-trees. _Si, +Senor._ Only at midnight can they be picked by sailor-men who bring +them, before daylight comes, to your back door. Good _aguardiente_ is +a verree difficult fruit to handle, Senor Goodwin." + +Smuggling, in Coralio, was much nearer than competition to being the +life of trade. One spoke of it slyly, yet with a certain conceit, +when it had been well accomplished. + +"You have guests in the house to-night," said Goodwin, laying a +silver dollar upon the counter. + +"Why not?" said Madama, counting the change. "Two; but the smallest +while finished to arrive. One senor, not quite old, and one senorita +of sufficient handsomeness. To their rooms they have ascended, not +desiring the to-eat nor the to-drink. Two rooms--_Numero_ 9 and +_Numero_ 10." + +"I was expecting that gentleman and that lady," said Goodwin. "I have +important _negocios_ that must be transacted. Will you allow me to +see them?" + +"Why not?" sighed Madama, placidly. "Why should not Senor Goodwin +ascend and speak to his friends? _Esta bueno._ Room _Numero_ 9 and +room _Numero_ 10." + +Goodwin loosened in his coat pocket the American revolver that he +carried, and ascended the steep, dark stairway. + +In the hallway above, the saffron light from a hanging lamp allowed +him to select the gaudy numbers on the doors. He turned the knob of +Number 9, entered and closed the door behind him. + +If that was Isabel Guilbert seated by the table in that poorly +furnished room, report had failed to do her charms justice. She +rested her head upon one hand. Extreme fatigue was signified in every +line of her figure; and upon her countenance a deep perplexity was +written. Her eyes were gray-irised, and of that mould that seems to +have belonged to the orbs of all the famous queens of hearts. Their +whites were singularly clear and brilliant, concealed above the +irises by heavy horizontal lids, and showing a snowy line below them. +Such eyes denote great nobility, vigour, and, if you can conceive of +it, a most generous selfishness. She looked up when the American +entered with an expression of surprised inquiry, but without alarm. + +Goodwin took off his hat and seated himself, with his characteristic +deliberate ease, upon a corner of the table. He held a lighted cigar +between his fingers. He took this familiar course because he was sure +that preliminaries would be wasted upon Miss Guilbert. He knew her +history, and the small part that the conventions had played in it. + +"Good evening," he said. "Now, madame, let us come to business at +once. You will observe that I mention no names, but I know who is in +the next room, and what he carries in that valise. That is the point +which brings me here. I have come to dictate terms of surrender." + +The lady neither moved nor replied, but steadily regarded the cigar +in Goodwin's hand. + +"We," continued the dictator, thoughtfully regarding the neat +buckskin shoe on his gently swinging foot--"I speak for a +considerable majority of the people--demand the return of the stolen +funds belonging to them. Our terms go very little further than that. +They are very simple. As an accredited spokesman, I promise that our +interference will cease if they are accepted. Give up the money, and +you and your companion will be permitted to proceed wherever you +will. In fact, assistance will be given you in the matter of securing +a passage by any outgoing vessel you may choose. It is on my personal +responsibility that I add congratulations to the gentleman in Number +10 upon his taste in feminine charms." + +Returning his cigar to his mouth, Goodwin observed her, and saw that +her eyes followed it and rested upon it with icy and significant +concentration. Apparently she had not heard a word he had said. He +understood, tossed the cigar out the window, and, with an amused +laugh, slid from the table to his feet. + +"That is better," said the lady. "It makes it possible for me to +listen to you. For a second lesson in good manners, you might now +tell me by whom I am being insulted." + +"I am sorry," said Goodwin, leaning one hand on the table, "that my +time is too brief for devoting much of it to a course of etiquette. +Come, now; I appeal to your good sense. You have shown yourself, +in more than one instance, to be well aware of what is to your +advantage. This is an occasion that demands the exercise of your +undoubted intelligence. There is no mystery here. I am Frank Goodwin; +and I have come for the money. I entered this room at a venture. Had +I entered the other I would have had it before now. Do you want it in +words? The gentleman in Number 10 has betrayed a great trust. He has +robbed his people of a large sum, and it is I who will prevent their +losing it. I do not say who that gentleman is; but if I should be +forced to see him and he should prove to be a certain high official +of the republic, it will be my duty to arrest him. The house is +guarded. I am offering you liberal terms. It is not absolutely +necessary that I confer personally with the gentleman in the next +room. Bring me the valise containing the money, and we will call the +affair ended." + +The lady arose from her chair and stood for a moment, thinking +deeply. + +"Do you live here, Mr. Goodwin?" she asked, presently. + +"Yes." + +"What is your authority for this intrusion?" + +"I am an instrument of the republic. I was advised by wire of the +movements of the--gentleman in Number 10." + +"May I ask you two or three questions? I believe you to be a man more +apt to be truthful than--timid. What sort of a town is this--Coralio, +I think they call it?" + +"Not much of a town," said Goodwin, smiling. "A banana town, as they +run. Grass huts, 'dobes, five or six two-story houses, accommodations +limited, population half-breed Spanish and Indian, Caribs and +blackamoors. No sidewalks to speak of, no amusements. Rather unmoral. +That's an offhand sketch, of course." + +"Are there any inducements, say in a social or in a business way, for +people to reside here?" + +"Oh, yes," answered Goodwin, smiling broadly. "There are no afternoon +teas, no hand-organs, no department stores--and there is no +extradition treaty." + +"He told me," went on the lady, speaking as if to herself, and with +a slight frown, "that there were towns on this coast of beauty and +importance; that there was a pleasing social order--especially an +American colony of cultured residents." + +"There is an American colony," said Goodwin, gazing at her in some +wonder. "Some of the members are all right. Some are fugitives +from justice from the States. I recall two exiled bank presidents, +one army paymaster under a cloud, a couple of manslayers, and a +widow--arsenic, I believe, was the suspicion in her case. I myself +complete the colony, but, as yet, I have not distinguished myself by +any particular crime." + +"Do not lose hope," said the lady, dryly; "I see nothing in your +actions to-night to guarantee you further obscurity. Some mistake +has been made; I do not know just where. But _him_ you shall not +disturb to-night. The journey has fatigued him so that he has fallen +asleep, I think, in his clothes. You talk of stolen money! I do not +understand you. Some mistake has been made. I will convince you. +Remain where you are and I will bring you the valise that you seem to +covet so, and show it to you." + +She moved toward the closed door that connected the two rooms, but +stopped, and half turned and bestowed upon Goodwin a grave, searching +look that ended in a quizzical smile. + +"You force my door," she said, "and you follow your ruffianly +behaviour with the basest accusations; and yet"--she hesitated, as if +to reconsider what she was about to say--"and yet--it is a puzzling +thing--I am sure there has been some mistake." + +She took a step toward the door, but Goodwin stayed her by a light +touch upon her arm. I have said before that women turned to look at +him in the streets. He was the viking sort of man, big, good-looking, +and with an air of kindly truculence. She was dark and proud, glowing +or pale as her mood moved her. I do not know if Eve were light or +dark, but if such a woman had stood in the garden I know that the +apple would have been eaten. This woman was to be Goodwin's fate, +and he did not know it; but he must have felt the first throes of +destiny, for, as he faced her, the knowledge of what report named her +turned bitter in his throat. + +"If there has been any mistake," he said, hotly, "it was yours. I do +not blame the man who has lost his country, his honour, and is about +to lose the poor consolation of his stolen riches as much as I blame +you, for, by Heaven! I can very well see how he was brought to it. +I can understand, and pity him. It is such women as you that strew +this degraded coast with wretched exiles, that make men forget their +trusts, that drag--" + +The lady interrupted him with a weary gesture. + +"There is no need to continue your insults," she said, coldly. +"I do not understand what you are saying, nor do I know what mad +blunder you are making; but if the inspection of the contents of +a gentleman's portmanteau will rid me of you, let us delay it no +longer." + +She passed quickly and noiselessly into the other room, and returned +with the heavy leather valise, which she handed to the American with +an air of patient contempt. + +Goodwin set the valise quickly upon the table and began to unfasten +the straps. The lady stood by, with an expression of infinite scorn +and weariness upon her face. + +The valise opened wide to a powerful, sidelong wrench. Goodwin +dragged out two or three articles of clothing, exposing the bulk of +its contents--package after package of tightly packed United States +bank and treasury notes of large denomination. Reckoning from the +high figures written upon the paper bands that bound them, the total +must have come closely upon the hundred thousand mark. + +Goodwin glanced swiftly at the woman, and saw, with surprise and a +thrill of pleasure that he wondered at, that she had experienced +an unmistakable shock. Her eyes grew wide, she gasped, and leaned +heavily against the table. She had been ignorant, then, he inferred, +that her companion had looted the government treasury. But why, he +angrily asked himself, should he be so well pleased to think this +wandering and unscrupulous singer not so black as report had painted +her? + +A noise in the other room startled them both. The door swung open, +and a tall, elderly, dark complexioned man, recently shaven, hurried +into the room. + +All the pictures of President Miraflores represent him as the +possessor of a luxuriant supply of dark and carefully tended +whiskers; but the story of the barber, Esteban, had prepared Goodwin +for the change. + +The man stumbled in from the dark room, his eyes blinking at the +lamplight, and heavy from sleep. + +"What does this mean?" he demanded in excellent English, with a keen +and perturbed look at the American--"robbery?" + +"Very near it," answered Goodwin. "But I rather think I'm in time to +prevent it. I represent the people to whom this money belongs, and +I have come to convey it back to them." He thrust his hand into a +pocket of his loose, linen coat. + +The other man's hand went quickly behind him. + +"Don't draw," called Goodwin, sharply; "I've got you covered from my +pocket." + +The lady stepped forward, and laid one hand upon the shoulder of +her hesitating companion. She pointed to the table. "Tell me the +truth--the truth," she said, in a low voice. "Whose money is that?" + +The man did not answer. He gave a deep, long-drawn sigh, leaned and +kissed her on the forehead, stepped back into the other room and +closed the door. + +Goodwin foresaw his purpose, and jumped for the door, but the report +of the pistol echoed as his hand touched the knob. A heavy fall +followed, and some one swept him aside and struggled into the room of +the fallen man. + +A desolation, thought Goodwin, greater than that derived from +the loss of cavalier and gold must have been in the heart of the +enchantress to have wrung from her, in that moment, the cry of one +turning to the all-forgiving, all-comforting earthly consoler--to +have made her call out from that bloody and dishonoured room--"Oh, +mother, mother, mother!" + +But there was an alarm outside. The barber, Esteban, at the sound +of the shot, had raised his voice; and the shot itself had aroused +half the town. A pattering of feet came up the street, and official +orders rang out on the still air. Goodwin had a duty to perform. +Circumstances had made him the custodian of his adopted country's +treasure. Swiftly cramming the money into the valise, he closed it, +leaned far out of the window and dropped it into a thick orange-tree +in the little inclosure below. + + + +They will tell you in Coralio, as they delight in telling the +stranger, of the conclusion of that tragic flight. They will tell +you how the upholders of the law came apace when the alarm was +sounded--the _Comandante_ in red slippers and a jacket like a head +waiter's and girded sword, the soldiers with their interminable guns, +followed by outnumbering officers struggling into their gold lace and +epaulettes; the barefooted policemen (the only capables in the lot), +and ruffled citizens of every hue and description. + +They say that the countenance of the dead man was marred sadly by the +effects of the shot; but he was identified as the fallen president +by both Goodwin and the barber Esteban. On the next morning messages +began to come over the mended telegraph wire; and the story of the +flight from the capital was given out to the public. In San Mateo the +revolutionary party had seized the sceptre of government, without +opposition, and the _vivas_ of the mercurial populace quickly effaced +the interest belonging to the unfortunate Miraflores. + +They will relate to you how the new government sifted the towns and +raked the roads to find the valise containing Anchuria's surplus +capital, which the president was known to have carried with him, but +all in vain. In Coralio Senor Goodwin himself led the searching party +which combed that town as carefully as a woman combs her hair; but +the money was not found. + +So they buried the dead man, without honours, back of the town near +the little bridge that spans the mangrove swamp; and for a _real_ a +boy will show you his grave. They say that the old woman in whose hut +the barber shaved the president placed the wooden slab at his head, +and burned the inscription upon it with a hot iron. + +You will hear also that Senor Goodwin, like a tower of strength, +shielded Dona Isabel Guilbert through those subsequent distressful +days; and that his scruples as to her past career (if he had any) +vanished; and her adventuresome waywardness (if she had any) left +her, and they were wedded and were happy. + +The American built a home on a little foothill near the town. It is a +conglomerate structure of native woods that, exported, would be worth +a fortune, and of brick, palm, glass, bamboo and adobe. There is a +paradise of nature about it; and something of the same sort within. +The natives speak of its interior with hands uplifted in admiration. +There are floors polished like mirrors and covered with hand-woven +Indian rugs of silk fibre, tall ornaments and pictures, musical +instruments and papered walls--"figure-it-to-yourself!" they exclaim. + +But they cannot tell you in Coralio (as you shall learn) what became +of the money that Frank Goodwin dropped into the orange-tree. But +that shall come later; for the palms are fluttering in the breeze, +bidding us to sport and gaiety. + + + + +V + +CUPID'S EXILE NUMBER TWO + + +The United States of America, after looking over its stock of +consular timber, selected Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood, of +Dalesburg, Alabama, for a successor to Willard Geddie, resigned. + +Without prejudice to Mr. Atwood, it will have to be acknowledged +that, in this instance, it was the man who sought the office. As with +the self-banished Geddie, it was nothing less than the artful smiles +of lovely woman that had driven Johnny Atwood to the desperate +expedient of accepting office under a despised Federal Government so +that he might go far, far away and never see again the false, fair +face that had wrecked his young life. The consulship at Coralio +seemed to offer a retreat sufficiently removed and romantic enough +to inject the necessary drama into the pastoral scenes of Dalesburg +life. + +It was while playing the part of Cupid's exile that Johnny added his +handiwork to the long list of casualties along the Spanish Main by +his famous manipulation of the shoe market, and his unparalleled feat +of elevating the most despised and useless weed in his own country +from obscurity to be a valuable product in international commerce. + +The trouble began, as trouble often begins instead of ending, with a +romance. In Dalesburg there was a man named Elijah Hemstetter, who +kept a general store. His family consisted of one daughter called +Rosine, a name that atoned much for "Hemstetter." This young woman +was possessed of plentiful attractions, so that the young men of the +community were agitated in their bosoms. Among the more agitated +was Johnny, the son of Judge Atwood, who lived in the big colonial +mansion on the edge of Dalesburg. + +It would seem that the desirable Rosine should have been pleased to +return the affection of an Atwood, a name honoured all over the state +long before and since the war. It does seem that she should have +gladly consented to have been led into that stately but rather empty +colonial mansion. But not so. There was a cloud on the horizon, a +threatening, cumulus cloud, in the shape of a lively and shrewd young +farmer in the neighbourhood who dared to enter the lists as a rival +to the high-born Atwood. + +One night Johnny propounded to Rosine a question that is considered +of much importance by the young of the human species. The accessories +were all there--moonlight, oleanders, magnolias, the mock-bird's +song. Whether or no the shadow of Pinkney Dawson, the prosperous +young farmer, came between them on that occasion is not known; but +Rosine's answer was unfavourable. Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood +bowed till his hat touched the lawn grass, and went away with his +head high, but with a sore wound in his pedigree and heart. A +Hemstetter refuse an Atwood! Zounds! + +Among other accidents of that year was a Democratic president. Judge +Atwood was a warhorse of Democracy. Johnny persuaded him to set the +wheels moving for some foreign appointment. He would go away--away. +Perhaps in years to come Rosine would think how true, how faithful +his love had been, and would drop a tear--maybe in the cream she +would be skimming for Pink Dawson's breakfast. + +The wheels of politics revolved; and Johnny was appointed consul to +Coralio. Just before leaving he dropped in at Hemstetter's to say +good-bye. There was a queer, pinkish look about Rosine's eyes; and +had the two been alone, the United States might have had to cast +about for another consul. But Pink Dawson was there, of course, +talking about his 400-acre orchard, and the three-mile alfalfa tract, +and the 200-acre pasture. So Johnny shook hands with Rosine as coolly +as if he were only going to run up to Montgomery for a couple of +days. They had the royal manner when they chose, those Atwoods. + +"If you happen to strike anything in the way of a good investment +down there, Johnny," said Pink Dawson, "just let me know, will you? I +reckon I could lay my hands on a few extra thousands 'most any time +for a profitable deal." + +"Certainly, Pink," said Johnny, pleasantly. "If I strike anything of +the sort I'll let you in with pleasure." + +So Johnny went down to Mobile and took a fruit steamer for the coast +of Anchuria. + +When the new consul arrived in Coralio the strangeness of the scenes +diverted him much. He was only twenty-two; and the grief of youth is +not worn like a garment as it is by older men. It has its seasons +when it reigns; and then it is unseated for a time by the assertion +of the keen senses. + +Billy Keogh and Johnny seemed to conceive a mutual friendship at +once. Keogh took the new consul about town and presented him to the +handful of Americans and the smaller number of French and Germans +who made up the "foreign" contingent. And then, of course, he had to +be more formally introduced to the native officials, and have his +credentials transmitted through an interpreter. + +There was something about the young Southerner that the sophisticated +Keogh liked. His manner was simple almost to boyishness; but he +possessed the cool carelessness of a man of far greater age and +experience. Neither uniforms nor titles, red tape nor foreign +languages, mountains nor sea weighed upon his spirits. He was heir +to all the ages, an Atwood, of Dalesburg; and you might know every +thought conceived in his bosom. + +Geddie came down to the consulate to explain the duties and workings +of the office. He and Keogh tried to interest the new consul in their +description of the work that his government expected him to perform. + +"It's all right," said Johnny from the hammock that he had set up as +the official reclining place. "If anything turns up that has to be +done I'll let you fellows do it. You can't expect a Democrat to work +during his first term of holding office." + +"You might look over these headings," suggested Geddie, "of the +different lines of exports you will have to keep account of. The +fruit is classified; and there are the valuable woods, coffee, +rubber--" + +"That last account sounds all right," interrupted Mr. Atwood. "Sounds +as if it could be stretched. I want to buy a new flag, a monkey, a +guitar and a barrel of pineapples. Will that rubber account stretch +over 'em?" + +"That's merely statistics," said Geddie, smiling. "The expense +account is what you want. It is supposed to have a slight elasticity. +The 'stationery' items are sometimes carelessly audited by the State +Department." + +"We're wasting our time," said Keogh. "This man was born to hold +office. He penetrates to the root of the art at one step of his eagle +eye. The true genius of government shows its hand in every word of +his speech." + +"I didn't take this job with any intention of working," explained +Johnny, lazily. "I wanted to go somewhere in the world where they +didn't talk about farms. There are none here, are there?" + +"Not the kind you are acquainted with," answered the ex-consul. +"There is no such art here as agriculture. There never was a plow or +a reaper within the boundaries of Anchuria." + +"This is the country for me," murmured the consul, and immediately he +fell asleep. + +The cheerful tintypist pursued his intimacy with Johnny in spite +of open charges that he did so to obtain a preemption on a seat in +that coveted spot, the rear gallery of the consulate. But whether +his designs were selfish or purely friendly, Keogh achieved that +desirable privilege. Few were the nights on which the two could not +be found reposing there in the sea breeze, with their heels on the +railing, and the cigars and brandy conveniently near. + +One evening they sat thus, mainly silent, for their talk had dwindled +before the stilling influence of an unusual night. + +There was a great, full moon; and the sea was mother-of-pearl. Almost +every sound was hushed, for the air was but faintly stirring; and +the town lay panting, waiting for the night to cool. Offshore lay +the fruit steamer _Andador_, of the Vesuvius line, full-laden and +scheduled to sail at six in the morning. There were no loiterers on +the beach. So bright was the moonlight that the two men could see the +small pebbles shining on the beach where the gentle surf wetted them. + +Then down the coast, tacking close to shore, slowly swam a little +sloop, white-winged like some snowy sea fowl. Its course lay within +twenty points of the wind's eye; so it veered in and out again in +long, slow strokes like the movements of a graceful skater. + +Again the tactics of its crew brought it close in shore, this time +nearly opposite the consulate; and then there blew from the sloop +clear and surprising notes as if from a horn of elfland. A fairy +bugle it might have been, sweet and silvery and unexpected, playing +with spirit the familiar air of "Home, Sweet Home." + +It was a scene set for the land of the lotus. The authority of the +sea and the tropics, the mystery that attends unknown sails, and the +prestige of drifting music on moonlit waters gave it an anodynous +charm. Johnny Atwood felt it, and thought of Dalesburg; but as soon +as Keogh's mind had arrived at a theory concerning the peripatetic +solo he sprang to the railing, and his ear-rending yawp fractured the +silence of Coralio like a cannon shot. + +"Mel-lin-ger a-hoy!" + +The sloop was now on its outward tack; but from it came a clear, +answering hail: + +"Good-bye, Billy . . . go-ing home--bye!" + +The _Andador_ was the sloop's destination. No doubt some passenger +with a sailing permit from some up-the-coast point had come down in +this sloop to catch the regular fruit steamer on its return trip. +Like a coquettish pigeon the little boat tacked on its eccentric way +until at last its white sail was lost to sight against the larger +bulk of the fruiter's side. + +"That's old H. P. Mellinger," explained Keogh, dropping back into his +chair. "He's going back to New York. He was private secretary of the +late hot-foot president of this grocery and fruit stand that they +call a country. His job's over now; and I guess old Mellinger is +glad." + +"Why does he disappear to music, like Zo-zo, the magic queen?" asked +Johnny. "Just to show 'em that he doesn't care?" + +"That noise you heard is a phonograph," said Keogh. "I sold him that. +Mellinger had a graft in this country that was the only thing of its +kind in the world. The tooting machine saved it for him once, and he +always carried it around with him afterward." + +"Tell me about it," demanded Johnny, betraying interest. + +"I'm no disseminator of narratives," said Keogh. "I can use language +for purposes of speech; but when I attempt a discourse the words +come out as they will, and they may make sense when they strike the +atmosphere, or they may not." + +"I want to hear about that graft," persisted Johnny. "You've got +no right to refuse. I've told you all about every man, woman and +hitching post in Dalesburg." + +"You shall hear it," said Keogh. "I said my instincts of narrative +were perplexed. Don't you believe it. It's an art I've acquired along +with many other of the graces and sciences." + + + + +VI + +THE PHONOGRAPH AND THE GRAFT + + +"What was this graft?" asked Johnny, with the impatience of the great +public to whom tales are told. + +"'Tis contrary to art and philosophy to give you the information," +said Keogh, calmly. "The art of narrative consists in concealing from +your audience everything it wants to know until after you expose your +favourite opinions on topics foreign to the subject. A good story is +like a bitter pill with the sugar coating inside of it. I will begin, +if you please, with a horoscope located in the Cherokee Nation; and +end with a moral tune on the phonograph. + +"Me and Henry Horsecollar brought the first phonograph to this +country. Henry was a quarter-breed, quarter-back Cherokee, educated +East in the idioms of football, and West in contraband whisky, and +a gentleman, the same as you and me. He was easy and romping in his +ways; a man about six foot, with a kind of rubber-tire movement. Yes, +he was a little man about five foot five, or five foot eleven. He was +what you would call a medium tall man of average smallness. Henry had +quit college once, and the Muscogee jail three times--the last-named +institution on account of introducing and selling whisky in the +territories. Henry Horsecollar never let any cigar stores come up and +stand behind him. He didn't belong to that tribe of Indians. + +"Henry and me met at Texarkana, and figured out this phonograph +scheme. He had $360 which came to him out of a land allotment in +the reservation. I had run down from Little Rock on account of a +distressful scene I had witnessed on the street there. A man stood on +a box and passed around some gold watches, screw case, stem-winders, +Elgin movement, very elegant. Twenty bucks they cost you over the +counter. At three dollars the crowd fought for the tickers. The man +happened to find a valise full of them handy, and he passed them out +like putting hot biscuits on a plate. The backs were hard to unscrew, +but the crowd put its ear to the case, and they ticked mollifying and +agreeable. Three of these watches were genuine tickers; the rest were +only kickers. Hey? Why, empty cases with one of them horny black bugs +that fly around electric lights in 'em. Them bugs kick off minutes +and seconds industrious and beautiful. So, this man I was speaking +of cleaned up $288; and then he went away, because he knew that when +it came time to wind watches in Little Rock an entomologist would be +needed, and he wasn't one. + +"So, as I say, Henry had $360, and I had $288. The idea of +introducing the phonograph to South America was Henry's; but I took +to it freely, being fond of machinery of all kinds. + +"'The Latin races,' says Henry, explaining easy in the idioms he +learned at college, 'are peculiarly adapted to be victims of the +phonograph. They have the artistic temperament. They yearn for music +and color and gaiety. They give wampum to the hand-organ man and the +four-legged chicken in the tent when they're months behind with the +grocery and the bread-fruit tree.' + +"'Then,' says I, 'we'll export canned music to the Latins; but I'm +mindful of Mr. Julius Caesar's account of 'em where he says: "_Omnia +Gallia in tres partes divisa est_;" which is the same as to say, "We +will need all of our gall in devising means to tree them parties."' + +"I hated to make a show of education; but I was disinclined to be +overdone in syntax by a mere Indian, a member of a race to which we +owe nothing except the land on which the United States is situated. + +"We bought a fine phonograph in Texarkana--one of the best make--and +half a trunkful of records. We packed up, and took the T. and +P. for New Orleans. From that celebrated centre of molasses and +disfranchised coon songs we took a steamer for South America. + +"We landed at Solitas, forty miles up the coast from here. 'Twas a +palatable enough place to look at. The houses were clean and white; +and to look at 'em stuck around among the scenery they reminded +you of hard-boiled eggs served with lettuce. There was a block of +skyscraper mountains in the suburbs; and they kept pretty quiet, like +they had crept up there and were watching the town. And the sea was +remarking 'Sh-sh-sh' on the beach; and now and then a ripe cocoanut +would drop kerblip in the sand; and that was all there was doing. +Yes, I judge that town was considerably on the quiet. I judge that +after Gabriel quits blowing his horn, and the car starts, with +Philadelphia swinging to the last strap, and Pine Gully, Arkansas, +hanging onto the rear step, this town of Solitas will wake up and ask +if anybody spoke. + +"The captain went ashore with us, and offered to conduct what he +seemed to like to call the obsequies. He introduced Henry and me to +the United States Consul, and a roan man, the head of the Department +of Mercenary and Licentious Dispositions, the way it read upon his +sign. + +"'I touch here again a week from to-day,' says the captain. + +"'By that time,' we told him, 'we'll be amassing wealth in the +interior towns with our galvanized prima donna and correct imitations +of Sousa's band excavating a march from a tin mine.' + +"'Ye'll not,' says the captain. 'Ye'll be hypnotized. Any gentleman +in the audience who kindly steps upon the stage and looks this +country in the eye will be converted to the hypothesis that he's but +a fly in the Elgin creamery. Ye'll be standing knee deep in the surf +waiting for me, and your machine for making Hamburger steak out of +the hitherto respected art of music will be playing "There's no place +like home."' + +"Henry skinned a twenty off his roll, and received from the Bureau +of Mercenary Dispositions a paper bearing a red seal and a dialect +story, and no change. + +"Then we got the consul full of red wine, and struck him for a +horoscope. He was a thin, youngish kind of man, I should say past +fifty, sort of French-Irish in his affections, and puffed up with +disconsolation. Yes, he was a flattened kind of a man, in whom drink +lay stagnant, inclined to corpulence and misery. Yes, I think he was +a kind of Dutchman, being very sad and genial in his ways. + +"'The marvelous invention,' he says, 'entitled the phonograph, has +never invaded these shores. The people have never heard it. They +would not believe it if they should. Simple-hearted children of +nature, progress has never condemned them to accept the work of a +can-opener as an overture, and rag-time might incite them to a bloody +revolution. But you can try the experiment. The best chance you have +is that the populace may not wake up when you play. There's two +ways,' says the consul, 'they may take it. They may become inebriated +with attention, like an Atlanta colonel listening to "Marching +Through Georgia," or they will get excited and transpose the key of +the music with an axe and yourselves into a dungeon. In the latter +case,' says the consul, 'I'll do my duty by cabling to the State +Department, and I'll wrap the Stars and Stripes around you when you +come to be shot, and threaten them with the vengeance of the greatest +gold export and financial reserve nation on earth. The flag is +full of bullet holes now,' says the consul, 'made in that way. +Twice before,' says the consul, 'I have cabled our government for a +couple of gunboats to protect American citizens. The first time the +Department sent me a pair of gum boots. The other time was when a man +named Pease was going to be executed here. They referred that appeal +to the Secretary of Agriculture. Let us now disturb the senor behind +the bar for a subsequence of the red wine.' + +"Thus soliloquized the consul of Solitas to me and Henry Horsecollar. + +"But, notwithstanding, we hired a room that afternoon in the Calle de +los Angeles, the main street that runs along the shore, and put our +trunks there. 'Twas a good-sized room, dark and cheerful, but small. +'Twas on a various street, diversified by houses and conservatory +plants. The peasantry of the city passed to and fro on the fine +pasturage between the sidewalks. 'Twas, for the world, like an opera +chorus when the Royal Kafoozlum is about to enter. + +"We were rubbing the dust off the machine and getting fixed to +start business the next day, when a big, fine-looking white man in +white clothes stopped at the door and looked in. We extended the +invitations, and he walked inside and sized us up. He was chewing a +long cigar, and wrinkling his eyes, meditative, like a girl trying to +decide which dress to wear to the party. + +"'New York?' he says to me finally. + +"'Originally, and from time to time,' I says. 'Hasn't it rubbed off +yet?' + +"'It's simple,' says he, 'when you know how. It's the fit of the +vest. They don't cut vests right anywhere else. Coats, maybe, but not +vests.' + +"The white man looks at Henry Horsecollar and hesitates. + +"'Injun,' says Henry; 'tame Injun.' + +"'Mellinger,' says the man--'Homer P. Mellinger. Boys, you're +confiscated. You're babes in the wood without a chaperon or referee, +and it's my duty to start you going. I'll knock out the props and +launch you proper in the pellucid waters of this tropical mud puddle. +You'll have to be christened, and if you'll come with me I'll break a +bottle of wine across your bows, according to Hoyle.' + +"Well, for two days Homer P. Mellinger did the honors. That man cut +ice in Anchuria. He was It. He was the Royal Kafoozlum. If me and +Henry was babes in the wood, he was a Robin Redbreast from the +topmost bough. Him and me and Henry Horsecollar locked arms, and +toted that phonograph around, and had wassail and diversions. +Everywhere we found doors open we went inside and set the machine +going, and Mellinger called upon the people to observe the artful +music and his two lifelong friends, the Senors Americanos. The opera +chorus was agitated with esteem, and followed us from house to house. +There was a different kind of drink to be had with every tune. The +natives had acquirements of a pleasant thing in the way of a drink +that gums itself to the recollection. They chop off the end of a +green cocoanut, and pour in on the juice of it French brandy and +other adjuvants. We had them and other things. + +"Mine and Henry's money was counterfeit. Everything was on Homer P. +Mellinger. That man could find rolls of bills concealed in places +on his person where Hermann the Wizard couldn't have conjured out a +rabbit or an omelette. He could have founded universities, and made +orchid collections, and then had enough left to purchase the colored +vote of his country. Henry and me wondered what his graft was. One +evening he told us. + +"'Boys,' said he, 'I've deceived you. You think I'm a painted +butterfly; but in fact I'm the hardest worked man in this country. +Ten years ago I landed on its shores; and two years ago on the point +of its jaw. Yes, I guess I can get the decision over this ginger cake +commonwealth at the end of any round I choose. I'll confide in you +because you are my countrymen and guests, even if you have assaulted +my adopted shores with the worst system of noises ever set to music. + +"'My job is private secretary to the president of this republic; and +my duties are running it. I'm not headlined in the bills, but I'm the +mustard in the salad dressing just the same. There isn't a law goes +before Congress, there isn't a concession granted, there isn't an +import duty levied but what H. P. Mellinger he cooks and seasons +it. In the front office I fill the president's inkstand and search +visiting statesmen for dirks and dynamite; but in the back room I +dictate the policy of the government. You'd never guess in the world +how I got my pull. It's the only graft of its kind on earth. I'll put +you wise. You remember the old top-liner in the copy book--"Honesty +is the Best Policy"? That's it. I'm working honesty for a graft. I'm +the only honest man in the republic. The government knows it; the +people know it; the boodlers know it; the foreign investors know it. +I make the government keep its faith. If a man is promised a job he +gets it. If outside capital buys a concession it gets the goods. I +run a monopoly of square dealing here. There's no competition. If +Colonel Diogenes were to flash his lantern in this precinct he'd have +my address inside of two minutes. There isn't big money in it, but +it's a sure thing, and lets a man sleep of nights.' + +"Thus Homer P. Mellinger made oration to me and Henry Horsecollar. +And, later, he divested himself of this remark: + +"'Boys, I'm to hold a _soiree_ this evening with a gang of leading +citizens, and I want your assistance. You bring the musical corn +sheller and give the affair the outside appearance of a function. +There's important business on hand, but it mustn't show. I can talk +to you people. I've been pained for years on account of not having +anybody to blow off and brag to. I get homesick sometimes, and I'd +swap the entire perquisites of office for just one hour to have a +stein and a caviare sandwich somewhere on Thirty-fourth Street, and +stand and watch the street cars go by, and smell the peanut roaster +at old Giuseppe's fruit stand.' + +"'Yes,' said I, 'there's fine caviare at Billy Renfrew's cafe, corner +of Thirty-fourth and--' + +"'God knows it,' interrupts Mellinger, 'and if you'd told me you knew +Billy Renfrew I'd have invented tons of ways of making you happy. +Billy was my side-kicker in New York. There is a man who never knew +what crooked was. Here I am working Honesty for a graft, but that man +loses money on it. Carrambos! I get sick at times of this country. +Everything's rotten. From the executive down to the coffee pickers, +they're plotting to down each other and skin their friends. If a mule +driver takes off his hat to an official, that man figures it out that +he's a popular idol, and sets his pegs to stir up a revolution and +upset the administration. It's one of my little chores as private +secretary to smell out these revolutions and affix the kibosh before +they break out and scratch the paint off the government property. +That's why I'm down here now in this mildewed coast town. The +governor of the district and his crew are plotting to uprise. I've +got every one of their names, and they're invited to listen to the +phonograph to-night, compliments of H. P. M. That's the way I'll get +them in a bunch, and things are on the programme to happen to them.' + +"We three were sitting at table in the cantina of the Purified +Saints. Mellinger poured out wine, and was looking some worried; I +was thinking. + +"'They're a sharp crowd,' he says, kind of fretful. 'They're +capitalized by a foreign syndicate after rubber, and they're loaded +to the muzzle for bribing. I'm sick,' goes on Mellinger, 'of comic +opera. I want to smell East River and wear suspenders again. At times +I feel like throwing up my job, but I'm d----n fool enough to be sort +of proud of it. "There's Mellinger," they say here. "_Por Dios!_ you +can't touch him with a million." I'd like to take that record back +and show it to Billy Renfrew some day; and that tightens my grip +whenever I see a fat thing that I could corral just by winking one +eye--and losing my graft. By ----, they can't monkey with me. They +know it. What money I get I make honest and spend it. Some day I'll +make a pile and go back and eat caviare with Billy. To-night I'll +show you how to handle a bunch of corruptionists. I'll show them what +Mellinger, private secretary, means when you spell it with the cotton +and tissue paper off.' + +"Mellinger appears shaky, and breaks his glass against the neck of +the bottle. + +"I says to myself, 'White man, if I'm not mistaken there's been a +bait laid out where the tail of your eye could see it.' + +"That night, according to arrangements, me and Henry took the +phonograph to a room in a 'dobe house in a dirty side street, where +the grass was knee high. 'Twas a long room, lit with smoky oil lamps. +There was plenty of chairs, and a table at the back end. We set the +phonograph on the table. Mellinger was there, walking up and down, +disturbed in his predicaments. He chewed cigars and spat 'em out, and +he bit the thumb nail of his left hand. + +"By and by the invitations to the musicale came sliding in by pairs +and threes and spade flushes. Their colour was of a diversity, +running from a three-days' smoked meerschaum to a patent-leather +polish. They were as polite as wax, being devastated with enjoyments +to give Senor Mellinger the good evenings. I understood their Spanish +talk--I ran a pumping engine two years in a Mexican silver mine, and +had it pat--but I never let on. + +"Maybe fifty of 'em had come, and was seated, when in slid the king +bee, the governor of the district. Mellinger met him at the door, and +escorted him to the grand stand. When I saw that Latin man I knew +that Mellinger, private secretary, had all the dances on his card +taken. That was a big, squashy man, the colour of a rubber overshoe, +and he had an eye like a head waiter's. + +"Mellinger explained, fluent, in the Castilian idioms, that his soul +was disconcerted with joy at introducing to his respected friends +America's greatest invention, the wonder of the age. Henry got the +cue and run on an elegant brass-band record and the festivities +became initiated. The governor man had a bit of English under his +hat, and when the music was choked off he says: + +"'Ver-r-ree fine. _Gr-r-r-r-racias_, the American gentleemen, the so +esplendeed moosic as to playee.' + +"The table was a long one, and Henry and me sat at the end of it next +the wall. The governor sat at the other end. Homer P. Mellinger stood +at the side of it. I was just wondering how Mellinger was going to +handle his crowd, when the home talent suddenly opened the services. + +"That governor man was suitable for uprisings and policies. I judge +he was a ready kind of man, who took his own time. Yes, he was full +of attention and immediateness. He leaned his hands on the table and +imposed his face toward the secretary man. + +"'Do the American senors understand Spanish?' he asks in his native +accents. + +"'They do not,' says Mellinger. + +"'Then listen,' goes on the Latin man, prompt. 'The musics are +of sufficient prettiness, but not of necessity. Let us speak +of business. I well know why we are here, since I observe my +compatriots. You had a whisper yesterday, Senor Mellinger, of our +proposals. To-night we will speak out. We know that you stand in +the president's favour, and we know your influence. The government +will be changed. We know the worth of your services. We esteem your +friendship and aid so much that'--Mellinger raises his hand, but the +governor man bottles him up. 'Do not speak until I have done.' + +"The governor man then draws a package wrapped in paper from his +pocket, and lays it on the table by Mellinger's hand. + +"'In that you will find fifty thousand dollars in money of your +country. You can do nothing against us, but you can be worth that for +us. Go back to the capital and obey our instructions. Take that money +now. We trust you. You will find with it a paper giving in detail the +work you will be expected to do for us. Do not have the unwiseness to +refuse.' + +"The governor man paused, with his eyes fixed on Mellinger, full of +expressions and observances. I looked at Mellinger, and was glad +Billy Renfrew couldn't see him then. The sweat was popping out on his +forehead, and he stood dumb, tapping the little package with the ends +of his fingers. The colorado-maduro gang was after his graft. He had +only to change his politics, and stuff five fingers in his inside +pocket. + +"Henry whispers to me and wants the pause in the programme +interpreted. I whisper back: 'H. P. is up against a bribe, senator's +size, and the coons have got him going.' I saw Mellinger's hand +moving closer to the package. 'He's weakening,' I whispered to +Henry. 'We'll remind him,' says Henry, 'of the peanut-roaster on +Thirty-fourth Street, New York.' + +"Henry stooped down and got a record from the basketful we'd brought, +slid it in the phonograph, and started her off. It was a cornet solo, +very neat and beautiful, and the name of it was 'Home, Sweet Home.' +Not one of them fifty odd men in the room moved while it was playing, +and the governor man kept his eyes steady on Mellinger. I saw +Mellinger's head go up little by little, and his hand came creeping +away from the package. Not until the last note sounded did anybody +stir. And then Homer P. Mellinger takes up the bundle of boodle and +slams it in the governor man's face. + +"'That's my answer,' says Mellinger, private secretary, 'and there'll +be another in the morning. I have proofs of conspiracy against every +man of you. The show is over, gentlemen.' + +"'There's one more act,' puts in the governor man. 'You are a +servant, I believe, employed by the president to copy letters and +answer raps at the door. I am governor here. _Senores_, I call upon +you in the name of the cause to seize this man.' + +"That brindled gang of conspirators shoved back their chairs and +advanced in force. I could see where Mellinger had made a mistake in +massing his enemy so as to make a grand-stand play. I think he made +another one, too; but we can pass that, Mellinger's idea of a graft +and mine being different, according to estimations and points of +view. + +"There was only one window and door in that room, and they were in +the front end. Here was fifty odd Latin men coming in a bunch to +obstruct the legislation of Mellinger. You may say there were three +of us, for me and Henry, simultaneous, declared New York City and the +Cherokee Nation in sympathy with the weaker party. + +"Then it was that Henry Horsecollar rose to a point of disorder +and intervened, showing, admirable, the advantages of education +as applied to the American Indian's natural intellect and native +refinement. He stood up and smoothed back his hair on each side with +his hands as you have seen little girls do when they play. + +"'Get behind me, both of you,' says Henry. + +"'What's it to be, chief?' I asked. + +"'I'm going to buck centre,' says Henry, in his football idioms. +'There isn't a tackle in the lot of them. Follow me close, and rush +the game.' + +"Then that cultured Red Man exhaled an arrangement of sounds with +his mouth that made the Latin aggregation pause, with thoughtfulness +and hesitations. The matter of his proclamation seemed to be a +co-operation of the Carlisle war-whoop with the Cherokee college +yell. He went at the chocolate team like a bean out of a little boy's +nigger shooter. His right elbow laid out the governor man on the +gridiron, and he made a lane the length of the crowd so wide that a +woman could have carried a step-ladder through it without striking +against anything. All Mellinger and me had to do was to follow. + +"It took us just three minutes to get out of that street around to +military headquarters, where Mellinger had things his own way. A +colonel and a battalion of bare-toed infantry turned out and went +back to the scene of the musicale with us, but the conspirator gang +was gone. But we recaptured the phonograph with honours of war, and +marched back to the _cuartel_ with it playing 'All Coons Look Alike +to Me.' + +"The next day Mellinger takes me and Henry to one side, and begins to +shed tens and twenties. + +"'I want to buy that phonograph,' says he. 'I liked that last tune it +played at the _soiree_.' + +"'This is more money than the machine is worth,' says I. + +"''Tis government expense money,' says Mellinger. 'The government +pays for it, and it's getting the tune-grinder cheap.' + +"Me and Henry knew that pretty well. We knew that it had saved Homer +P. Mellinger's graft when he was on the point of losing it; but we +never let him know we knew it. + +"'Now you boys better slide off further down the coast for a while,' +says Mellinger, 'till I get the screws put on these fellows here. If +you don't they'll give you trouble. And if you ever happen to see +Billy Renfrew again before I do, tell him I'm coming back to New York +as soon as I can make a stake--honest.' + +"Me and Henry laid low until the day the steamer came back. When we +saw the captain's boat on the beach we went down and stood in the +edge of the water. The captain grinned when he saw us. + +"'I told you you'd be waiting,' he says. 'Where's the Hamburger +machine?' + +"'It stays behind,' I says, 'to play "Home, Sweet Home."' + +"'I told you so,' says the captain again. 'Climb in the boat.' + +"And that," said Keogh, "is the way me and Henry Horsecollar +introduced the phonograph into this country. Henry went back to the +States, but I've been rummaging around in the tropics ever since. +They say Mellinger never travelled a mile after that without his +phonograph. I guess it kept him reminded about his graft whenever he +saw the siren voice of the boodler tip him the wink with a bribe in +its hand." + +"I suppose he's taking it home with him as a souvenir," remarked the +consul. + +"Not as a souvenir," said Keogh. "He'll need two of 'em in New York, +running day and night." + + + + +VII + +MONEY MAZE + + +The new administration of Anchuria entered upon its duties and +privileges with enthusiasm. Its first act was to send an agent to +Coralio with imperative orders to recover, if possible, the sum of +money ravished from the treasury by the ill-fated Miraflores. + +Colonel Emilio Falcon, the private secretary of Losada, the new +president, was despatched from the capital upon this important +mission. + +The position of private secretary to a tropical president is a +responsible one. He must be a diplomat, a spy, a ruler of men, a +body-guard to his chief, and a smeller-out of plots and nascent +revolutions. Often he is the power behind the throne, the dictator of +policy; and a president chooses him with a dozen times the care with +which he selects a matrimonial mate. + +Colonel Falcon, a handsome and urbane gentleman of Castilian courtesy +and debonnaire manners, came to Coralio with the task before him of +striking upon the cold trail of the lost money. There he conferred +with the military authorities, who had received instructions to +co-operate with him in the search. + +Colonel Falcon established his headquarters in one of the rooms of +the Casa Morena. Here for a week he held informal sittings--much as +if he were a kind of unified grand jury--and summoned before him all +those whose testimony might illumine the financial tragedy that had +accompanied the less momentous one of the late president's death. + +Two or three who were thus examined, among whom was the barber +Esteban, declared that they had identified the body of the president +before its burial. + +"Of a truth," testified Esteban before the mighty secretary, "it was +he, the president. Consider!--how could I shave a man and not see his +face? He sent for me to shave him in a small house. He had a beard +very black and thick. Had I ever seen the president before? Why not? +I saw him once ride forth in a carriage from the _vapor_ in Solitas. +When I shaved him he gave me a gold piece, and said there was to be +no talk. But I am a Liberal--I am devoted to my country--and I spake +of these things to Senor Goodwin." + +"It is known," said Colonel Falcon, smoothly, "that the late +President took with him an American leather valise, containing a +large amount of money. Did you see that?" + +"_De veras_--no," Esteban answered. "The light in the little house +was but a small lamp by which I could scarcely see to shave the +President. Such a thing there may have been, but I did not see +it. No. Also in the room was a young lady--a senorita of much +beauty--that I could see even in so small a light. But the money, +senor, or the thing in which it was carried--that I did not see." + +The _comandante_ and other officers gave testimony that they had been +awakened and alarmed by the noise of a pistol-shot in the Hotel de +los Estranjeros. Hurrying thither to protect the peace and dignity of +the republic, they found a man lying dead, with a pistol clutched in +his hand. Beside him was a young woman, weeping sorely. Senor Goodwin +was also in the room when they entered it. But of the valise of money +they saw nothing. + +Madame Timotea Ortiz, the proprietress of the hotel in which the game +of Fox-in-the-Morning had been played out, told of the coming of the +two guests to her house. + +"To my house they came," said she--"one _senor_, not quite old, and +one _senorita_ of sufficient handsomeness. They desired not to eat or +to drink--not even of my _aguardiente_, which is the best. To their +rooms they ascended--_Numero Nueve_ and _Numero Diez_. Later came +Senor Goodwin, who ascended to speak with them. Then I heard a +great noise like that of a _canon_, and they said that the _pobre +Presidente_ had shot himself. _Esta bueno._ I saw nothing of money or +of the thing you call _veliz_ that you say he carried it in." + +Colonel Falcon soon came to the reasonable conclusion that if anyone +in Coralio could furnish a clue to the vanished money, Frank Goodwin +must be the man. But the wise secretary pursued a different course in +seeking information from the American. Goodwin was a powerful friend +to the new administration, and one who was not to be carelessly +dealt with in respect to either his honesty or his courage. Even the +private secretary of His Excellency hesitated to have this rubber +prince and mahogany baron haled before him as a common citizen of +Anchuria. So he sent Goodwin a flowery epistle, each word-petal +dripping with honey, requesting the favour of an interview. Goodwin +replied with an invitation to dinner at his own house. + +Before the hour named the American walked over to the Casa Morena, +and greeted his guest frankly and friendly. Then the two strolled, in +the cool of the afternoon, to Goodwin's home in the environs. + +The American left Colonel Falcon in a big, cool, shadowed room with a +floor of inlaid and polished woods that any millionaire in the States +would have envied, excusing himself for a few minutes. He crossed a +_patio_, shaded with deftly arranged awnings and plants, and entered +a long room looking upon the sea in the opposite wing of the house. +The broad jalousies were opened wide, and the ocean breeze flowed +in through the room, an invisible current of coolness and health. +Goodwin's wife sat near one of the windows, making a water-color +sketch of the afternoon seascape. + +Here was a woman who looked to be happy. And more--she looked to be +content. Had a poet been inspired to pen just similes concerning +her favour, he would have likened her full, clear eyes, with their +white-encircled, gray irises, to moonflowers. With none of the +goddesses whose traditional charms have become coldly classic +would the discerning rhymester have compared her. She was purely +Paradisaic, not Olympian. If you can imagine Eve, after the eviction, +beguiling the flaming warriors and serenely re-entering the Garden, +you will have her. Just so human, and still so harmonious with Eden +seemed Mrs. Goodwin. + +When her husband entered she looked up, and her lips curved and +parted; her eyelids fluttered twice or thrice--a movement remindful +(Poesy forgive us!) of the tail-wagging of a faithful dog--and a +little ripple went through her like the commotion set up in a weeping +willow by a puff of wind. Thus she ever acknowledged his coming, were +it twenty times a day. If they who sometimes sat over their wine +in Coralio, reshaping old, diverting stories of the madcap career +of Isabel Guilbert, could have seen the wife of Frank Goodwin that +afternoon in the estimable aura of her happy wifehood, they might +have disbelieved, or have agreed to forget, those graphic annals of +the life of the one for whom their president gave up his country and +his honour. + +"I have brought a guest to dinner," said Goodwin. "One Colonel +Falcon, from San Mateo. He is come on government business. I do not +think you will care to see him, so I prescribe for you one of those +convenient and indisputable feminine headaches." + +"He has come to inquire about the lost money, has he not?" asked Mrs. +Goodwin, going on with her sketch. + +"A good guess!" acknowledged Goodwin. "He has been holding an +inquisition among the natives for three days. I am next on his list +of witnesses, but as he feels shy about dragging one of Uncle Sam's +subjects before him, he consents to give it the outward appearance +of a social function. He will apply the torture over my own wine and +provender." + +"Has he found anyone who saw the valise of money?" + +"Not a soul. Even Madama Ortiz, whose eyes are so sharp for the sight +of a revenue official, does not remember that there was any baggage." + +Mrs. Goodwin laid down her brush and sighed. + +"I am so sorry, Frank," she said, "that they are giving you so much +trouble about the money. But we can't let them know about it, can +we?" + +"Not without doing our intelligence a great injustice," said Goodwin, +with a smile and a shrug that he had picked up from the natives. +"_Americano_, though I am, they would have me in the _calaboza_ in +half an hour if they knew we had appropriated that valise. No; we +must appear as ignorant about the money as the other ignoramuses in +Coralio." + +"Do you think that this man they have sent suspects you?" she asked, +with a little pucker of her brows. + +"He'd better not," said the American, carelessly. "It's lucky that no +one caught a sight of the valise except myself. As I was in the rooms +when the shot was fired, it is not surprising that they should want +to investigate my part in the affair rather closely. But there's no +cause for alarm. This colonel is down on the list of events for a +good dinner, with a dessert of American 'bluff' that will end the +matter, I think." + +Mrs. Goodwin rose and walked to the window. Goodwin followed and +stood by her side. She leaned to him, and rested in the protection of +his strength, as she had always rested since that dark night on which +he had first made himself her tower of refuge. Thus they stood for a +little while. + +Straight through the lavish growth of tropical branch and leaf +and vine that confronted them had been cunningly trimmed a vista, +that ended at the cleared environs of Coralio, on the banks of the +mangrove swamp. At the other end of the aerial tunnel they could see +the grave and wooden headpiece that bore the name of the unhappy +President Miraflores. From this window when the rains forbade the +open, and from the green and shady slopes of Goodwin's fruitful +lands when the skies were smiling, his wife was wont to look upon +that grave with a gentle sadness that was now scarcely a mar to her +happiness. + +"I loved him so, Frank!" she said, "even after that terrible flight +and its awful ending. And you have been so good to me, and have made +me so happy. It has all grown into such a strange puzzle. If they +were to find out that we got the money do you think they would force +you to make the amount good to the government?" + +"They would undoubtedly try," answered Goodwin. "You are right about +its being a puzzle. And it must remain a puzzle to Falcon and all +his countrymen until it solves itself. You and I, who know more than +anyone else, only know half of the solution. We must not let even a +hint about this money get abroad. Let them come to the theory that +the president concealed it in the mountains during his journey, or +that he found means to ship it out of the country before he reached +Coralio. I don't think that Falcon suspects me. He is making a close +investigation, according to his orders, but he will find out +nothing." + +Thus they spake together. Had anyone overheard or overseen them as +they discussed the lost funds of Anchuria there would have been a +second puzzle presented. For upon the faces and in the bearing of +each of them was visible (if countenances are to be believed) Saxon +honesty and pride and honourable thoughts. In Goodwin's steady eye +and firm lineaments, moulded into material shape by the inward +spirit of kindness and generosity and courage, there was nothing +reconcilable with his words. + +As for his wife, physiognomy championed her even in the face of their +accusive talk. Nobility was in her guise; purity was in her glance. +The devotion that she manifested had not even the appearance of that +feeling that now and then inspires a woman to share the guilt of her +partner out of the pathetic greatness of her love. No, there was a +discrepancy here between what the eye would have seen and the ear +have heard. + +Dinner was served to Goodwin and his guest in the _patio_, under cool +foliage and flowers. The American begged the illustrious secretary to +excuse the absence of Mrs. Goodwin, who was suffering, he said, from +a headache brought on by a slight _calentura_. + +After the meal they lingered, according to the custom, over their +coffee and cigars. Colonel Falcon, with true Castilian delicacy, +waited for his host to open the question that they had met to +discuss. He had not long to wait. As soon as the cigars were lighted, +the American cleared the way by inquiring whether the secretary's +investigations in the town had furnished him with any clue to the +lost funds. + +"I have found no one yet," admitted Colonel Falcon, "who even had +sight of the valise or the money. Yet I have persisted. It has been +proven in the capital that President Miraflores set out from San +Mateo with one hundred thousand dollars belonging to the government, +accompanied by _Senorita_ Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer. The +Government, officially and personally, is loathe to believe," +concluded Colonel Falcon, with a smile, "that our late President's +tastes would have permitted him to abandon on the route, as excess +baggage, either of the desirable articles with which his flight was +burdened." + +"I suppose you would like to hear what I have to say about the +affair," said Goodwin, coming directly to the point. "It will not +require many words. + +"On that night, with others of our friends here, I was keeping a +lookout for the president, having been notified of his flight by a +telegram in our national cipher from Englehart, one of our leaders +in the capital. About ten o'clock that night I saw a man and a +woman hurrying along the streets. They went to the Hotel de los +Estranjeros, and engaged rooms. I followed them upstairs, leaving +Esteban, who had come up, to watch outside. The barber had told me +that he had shaved the beard from the president's face that night; +therefore I was prepared, when I entered the rooms, to find him with +a smooth face. When I apprehended him in the name of the people he +drew a pistol and shot himself instantly. In a few minutes many +officers and citizens were on the spot. I suppose you have been +informed of the subsequent facts." + +Goodwin paused. Losada's agent maintained an attitude of waiting, as +if he expected a continuance. + +"And now," went on the American, looking steadily into the eyes of +the other man, and giving each word a deliberate emphasis, "you will +oblige me by attending carefully to what I have to add. I saw no +valise or receptacle of any kind, or any money belonging to the +Republic of Anchuria. If President Miraflores decamped with any funds +belonging to the treasury of this country, or to himself, or to +anyone else, I saw no trace of it in the house or elsewhere, at that +time or at any other. Does that statement cover the ground of the +inquiry you wished to make of me?" + +Colonel Falcon bowed, and described a fluent curve with his cigar. +His duty was performed. Goodwin was not to be disputed. He was a +loyal supporter of the government, and enjoyed the full confidence +of the new president. His rectitude had been the capital that had +brought him fortune in Anchuria, just as it had formed the lucrative +"graft" of Mellinger, the secretary of Miraflores. + +"I thank you, _Senor_ Goodwin," said Falcon, "for speaking plainly. +Your word will be sufficient for the president. But, _Senor_ Goodwin, +I am instructed to pursue every clue that presents itself in this +matter. There is one that I have not yet touched upon. Our friends +in France, _senor_, have a saying, '_Cherchez la femme_,' when there +is a mystery without a clue. But here we do not have to search. The +woman who accompanied the late President in his flight must surely--" + +"I must interrupt you there," interposed Goodwin. "It is true that +when I entered the hotel for the purpose of intercepting President +Miraflores I found a lady there. I must beg of you to remember that +that lady is now my wife. I speak for her as I do for myself. She +knows nothing of the fate of the valise or of the money that you +are seeking. You will say to his excellency that I guarantee her +innocence. I do not need to add to you, Colonel Falcon, that I do not +care to have her questioned or disturbed." + +Colonel Falcon bowed again. + +"_Por supuesto_, no!" he cried. And to indicate that the inquiry was +ended he added: "And now, _senor_, let me beg of you to show me that +sea view from your _galeria_ of which you spoke. I am a lover of the +sea." + +In the early evening Goodwin walked back to the town with his guest, +leaving him at the corner of the Calle Grande. As he was returning +homeward one "Beelzebub" Blythe, with the air of a courtier and the +outward aspect of a scarecrow, pounced upon him hopefully from the +door of a _pulperia_. + +Blythe had been re-christened "Beelzebub" as an acknowledgment of the +greatness of his fall. Once in some distant Paradise Lost, he had +foregathered with the angels of the earth. But Fate had hurled him +headlong down to the tropics, where flamed in his bosom a fire that +was seldom quenched. In Coralio they called him a beachcomber; but he +was, in reality, a categorical idealist who strove to anamorphosize +the dull verities of life by the means of brandy and rum. As +Beelzebub, himself, might have held in his clutch with unwitting +tenacity his harp or crown during his tremendous fall, so his +namesake had clung to his gold-rimmed eyeglasses as the only souvenir +of his lost estate. These he wore with impressiveness and distinction +while he combed beaches and extracted toll from his friends. By some +mysterious means he kept his drink-reddened face always smoothly +shaven. For the rest he sponged gracefully upon whomsoever he could +for enough to keep him pretty drunk, and sheltered from the rains and +night dews. + +"Hallo, Goodwin!" called the derelict, airily. "I was hoping I'd +strike you. I wanted to see you particularly. Suppose we go where we +can talk. Of course you know there's a chap down here looking up the +money old Miraflores lost." + +"Yes," said Goodwin, "I've been talking with him. Let's go into +Espada's place. I can spare you ten minutes." + +They went into the _pulperia_ and sat at a little table upon stools +with rawhide tops. + +"Have a drink?" said Goodwin. + +"They can't bring it too quickly," said Blythe. "I've been in a +drought ever since morning. Hi--_muchacho!--el aguardiente por aca_." + +"Now, what do you want to see me about?" asked Goodwin, when the +drinks were before them. + +"Confound it, old man," drawled Blythe, "why do you spoil a golden +moment like this with business? I wanted to see you--well, this has +the preference." He gulped down his brandy, and gazed longingly into +the empty glass. + +"Have another?" suggested Goodwin. + +"Between gentlemen," said the fallen angel, "I don't quite like your +use of that word 'another.' It isn't quite delicate. But the concrete +idea that the word represents is not displeasing." + +The glasses were refilled. Blythe sipped blissfully from his, as he +began to enter the state of a true idealist. + +"I must trot along in a minute or two," hinted Goodwin. "Was there +anything in particular?" + +Blythe did not reply at once. + +"Old Losada would make it a hot country," he remarked at length, +"for the man who swiped that gripsack of treasury boodle, don't you +think?" + +"Undoubtedly, he would," agreed Goodwin calmly, as he rose leisurely +to his feet. "I'll be running over to the house now, old man. Mrs. +Goodwin is alone. There was nothing important you had to say, was +there?" + +"That's all," said Blythe. "Unless you wouldn't mind sending in +another drink from the bar as you go out. Old Espada has closed my +account to profit and loss. And pay for the lot, will you, like a +good fellow?" + +"All right," said Goodwin. "_Buenas noches._" + +"Beelzebub" Blythe lingered over his cups, polishing his eyeglasses +with a disreputable handkerchief. + +"I thought I could do it, but I couldn't," he muttered to himself +after a time. "A gentleman can't blackmail the man that he drinks +with." + + + + +VIII + +THE ADMIRAL + + +Spilled milk draws few tears from an Anchurian administration. Many +are its lacteal sources; and the clocks' hands point forever to +milking time. Even the rich cream skimmed from the treasury by the +bewitched Miraflores did not cause the newly-installed patriots to +waste time in unprofitable regrets. The government philosophically +set about supplying the deficiency by increasing the import duties +and by "suggesting" to wealthy private citizens that contributions +according to their means would be considered patriotic and in +order. Prosperity was expected to attend the reign of Losada, the +new president. The ousted office-holders and military favourites +organized a new "Liberal" party, and began to lay their plans for +a re-succession. Thus the game of Anchurian politics began, like a +Chinese comedy, to unwind slowly its serial length. Here and there +Mirth peeps for an instant from the wings and illumines the florid +lines. + +A dozen quarts of champagne in conjunction with an informal sitting +of the president and his cabinet led to the establishment of the navy +and the appointment of Felipe Carrera as its admiral. + +Next to the champagne the credit of the appointment belongs to Don +Sabas Placido, the newly confirmed Minister of War. + +The president had requested a convention of his cabinet for the +discussion of questions politic and for the transaction of certain +routine matters of state. The session had been signally tedious; the +business and the wine prodigiously dry. A sudden, prankish humour of +Don Sabas, impelling him to the deed, spiced the grave affairs of +state with a whiff of agreeable playfulness. + +In the dilatory order of business had come a bulletin from the +coast department of Orilla del Mar reporting the seizure by the +custom-house officers at the town of Coralio of the sloop _Estrella +del Noche_ and her cargo of drygoods, patent medicines, granulated +sugar and three-star brandy. Also six Martini rifles and a barrel of +American whisky. Caught in the act of smuggling, the sloop with its +cargo was now, according to law, the property of the republic. + +The Collector of Customs, in making his report, departed from the +conventional forms so far as to suggest that the confiscated vessel +be converted to the use of the government. The prize was the first +capture to the credit of the department in ten years. The collector +took opportunity to pat his department on the back. + +It often happened that government officers required transportation +from point to point along the coast, and means were usually lacking. +Furthermore, the sloop could be manned by a loyal crew and employed +as a coast guard to discourage the pernicious art of smuggling. The +collector also ventured to nominate one to whom the charge of the +boat could be safely intrusted--a young man of Coralio, Felipe +Carrera--not, be it understood, one of extreme wisdom, but loyal and +the best sailor along the coast. + +It was upon this hint that the Minister of War acted, executing a +rare piece of drollery that so enlivened the tedium of executive +session. + +In the constitution of this small, maritime banana republic was a +forgotten section that provided for the maintenance of a navy. This +provision--with many other wiser ones--had lain inert since the +establishment of the republic. Anchuria had no navy and had no use +for one. It was characteristic of Don Sabas--a man at once merry, +learned, whimsical and audacious--that he should have disturbed the +dust of this musty and sleeping statute to increase the humour of the +world by so much as a smile from his indulgent colleagues. + +With delightful mock seriousness the Minister of War proposed the +creation of a navy. He argued its need and the glories it might +achieve with such gay and witty zeal that the travesty overcame with +its humour even the swart dignity of President Losada himself. + +The champagne was bubbling trickily in the veins of the mercurial +statesmen. It was not the custom of the grave governors of Anchuria +to enliven their sessions with a beverage so apt to cast a veil of +disparagement over sober affairs. The wine had been a thoughtful +compliment tendered by the agent of the Vesuvius Fruit Company as a +token of amicable relations--and certain consummated deals--between +that company and the republic of Anchuria. + +The jest was carried to its end. A formidable, official document was +prepared, encrusted with chromatic seals and jaunty with fluttering +ribbons, bearing the florid signatures of state. This commission +conferred upon el Senor Don Felipe Carrera the title of Flag Admiral +of the Republic of Anchuria. Thus within the space of a few minutes +and the dominion of a dozen "extra dry," the country took its place +among the naval powers of the world, and Felipe Carrera became +entitled to a salute of nineteen guns whenever he might enter port. + +The southern races are lacking in that particular kind of humour +that finds entertainment in the defects and misfortunes bestowed by +Nature. Owing to this defect in their constitution they are not moved +to laughter (as are their northern brothers) by the spectacle of the +deformed, the feeble-minded or the insane. + +Felipe Carrera was sent upon earth with but half his wits. Therefore, +the people of Coralio called him "_El pobrecito loco_"--"the poor +little crazed one"--saying that God had sent but half of him to +earth, retaining the other half. + +A sombre youth, glowering, and speaking only at the rarest times, +Felipe was but negatively "loco." On shore he generally refused all +conversation. He seemed to know that he was badly handicapped on +land, where so many kinds of understanding are needed; but on the +water his one talent set him equal with most men. Few sailors whom +God had carefully and completely made could handle a sailboat as +well. Five points nearer the wind than even the best of them he +could sail his sloop. When the elements raged and set other men to +cowering, the deficiencies of Felipe seemed of little importance. +He was a perfect sailor, if an imperfect man. He owned no boat, but +worked among the crews of the schooners and sloops that skimmed the +coast, trading and freighting fruit out to the steamers where there +was no harbour. It was through his famous skill and boldness on the +sea, as well as for the pity felt for his mental imperfections, that +he was recommended by the collector as a suitable custodian of the +captured sloop. + +When the outcome of Don Sabas' little pleasantry arrived in the form +of the imposing and preposterous commission, the collector smiled. +He had not expected such prompt and overwhelming response to his +recommendation. He despatched a _muchacho_ at once to fetch the +future admiral. + +The collector waited in his official quarters. His office was in the +Calle Grande, and the sea breezes hummed through its windows all day. +The collector, in white linen and canvas shoes, philandered with +papers on an antique desk. A parrot, perched on a pen rack, seasoned +the official tedium with a fire of choice Castilian imprecations. Two +rooms opened into the collector's. In one the clerical force of young +men of variegated complexions transacted with glitter and parade +their several duties. Through the open door of the other room could +be seen a bronze babe, guiltless of clothing, that rollicked upon the +floor. In a grass hammock a thin woman, tinted a pale lemon, played +a guitar and swung contentedly in the breeze. Thus surrounded by +the routine of his high duties and the visible tokens of agreeable +domesticity, the collector's heart was further made happy by the +power placed in his hands to brighten the fortunes of the "innocent" +Felipe. + +Felipe came and stood before the collector. He was a lad of twenty, +not ill-favoured in looks, but with an expression of distant and +pondering vacuity. He wore white cotton trousers, down the seams +of which he had sewed red stripes with some vague aim at military +decoration. A flimsy blue shirt fell open at his throat; his feet +were bare; he held in his hand the cheapest of straw hats from the +States. + +"Senor Carrera," said the collector, gravely, producing the showy +commission, "I have sent for you at the president's bidding. This +document that I present to you confers upon you the title of Admiral +of this great republic, and gives you absolute command of the naval +forces and fleet of our country. You may think, friend Felipe, that +we have no navy--but yes! The sloop the _Estrella del Noche_, that my +brave men captured from the coast smugglers, is to be placed under +your command. The boat is to be devoted to the services of your +country. You will be ready at all times to convey officials of the +government to points along the coast where they may be obliged to +visit. You will also act as a coast-guard to prevent, as far as you +may be able, the crime of smuggling. You will uphold the honour and +prestige of your country at sea, and endeavour to place Anchuria +among the proudest naval powers of the world. These are your +instructions as the Minister of War desires me to convey them to you. +_Por Dios!_ I do not know how all this is to be accomplished, for +not one word did his letter contain in respect to a crew or to the +expenses of this navy. Perhaps you are to provide a crew yourself, +Senor Admiral--I do not know--but it is a very high honour that has +descended upon you. I now hand you your commission. When you are +ready for the boat I will give orders that she shall be made over +into your charge. That is as far as my instructions go." + +Felipe took the commission that the collector handed to him. He gazed +through the open window at the sea for a moment, with his customary +expression of deep but vain pondering. Then he turned without having +spoken a word, and walked swiftly away through the hot sand of the +street. + +"_Pobrecito loco!_" sighed the collector; and the parrot on the pen +racks screeched "Loco!--loco!--loco!" + +The next morning a strange procession filed through the streets to +the collector's office. At its head was the admiral of the navy. +Somewhere Felipe had raked together a pitiful semblance of a military +uniform--a pair of red trousers, a dingy blue short jacket heavily +ornamented with gold braid, and an old fatigue cap that must have +been cast away by one of the British soldiers in Belize and brought +away by Felipe on one of his coasting voyages. Buckled around his +waist was an ancient ship's cutlass contributed to his equipment by +Pedro Lafitte, the baker, who proudly asserted its inheritance from +his ancestor, the illustrious buccaneer. At the admiral's heels +tagged his newly-shipped crew--three grinning, glossy, black Caribs, +bare to the waist, the sand spurting in showers from the spring of +their naked feet. + +Briefly and with dignity Felipe demanded his vessel of the collector. +And now a fresh honour awaited him. The collector's wife, who played +the guitar and read novels in the hammock all day, had more than a +little romance in her placid, yellow bosom. She had found in an old +book an engraving of a flag that purported to be the naval flag of +Anchuria. Perhaps it had so been designed by the founders of the +nation; but, as no navy had ever been established, oblivion had +claimed the flag. Laboriously with her own hands she had made a flag +after the pattern--a red cross upon a blue-and-white ground. She +presented it to Felipe with these words: "Brave sailor, this flag is +of your country. Be true, and defend it with your life. Go you with +God." + +For the first time since his appointment the admiral showed a flicker +of emotion. He took the silken emblem, and passed his hand reverently +over its surface. "I am the admiral," he said to the collector's +lady. Being on land he could bring himself to no more exuberant +expression of sentiment. At sea with the flag at the masthead of his +navy, some more eloquent exposition of feelings might be forthcoming. + +Abruptly the admiral departed with his crew. For the next three days +they were busy giving the _Estrella del Noche_ a new coat of white +paint trimmed with blue. And then Felipe further adorned himself by +fastening a handful of brilliant parrot's plumes in his cap. Again he +tramped with his faithful crew to the collector's office and formally +notified him that the sloop's name had been changed to _El Nacional_. + +During the next few months the navy had its troubles. Even an admiral +is perplexed to know what to do without any orders. But none came. +Neither did any salaries. _El Nacional_ swung idly at anchor. + +When Felipe's little store of money was exhausted he went to the +collector and raised the question of finances. + +"Salaries!" exclaimed the collector, with hands raised; "_Valgame +Dios!_ not one _centavo_ of my own pay have I received for the last +seven months. The pay of an admiral, do you ask? _Quien sabe?_ Should +it be less than three thousand _pesos_? _Mira!_ you will see a +revolution in this country very soon. A good sign of it is when the +government calls all the time for _pesos_, _pesos_, _pesos_, and pays +none out." + +Felipe left the collector's office with a look almost of content +on his sombre face. A revolution would mean fighting, and then the +government would need his services. It was rather humiliating to be +an admiral without anything to do, and have a hungry crew at your +heels begging for _reales_ to buy plantains and tobacco with. + +When he returned to where his happy-go-lucky Caribs were waiting they +sprang up and saluted, as he had drilled them to do. + +"Come, _muchachos_," said the admiral; "it seems that the government +is poor. It has no money to give us. We will earn what we need to +live upon. Thus will we serve our country. Soon"--his heavy eyes +almost lighted up--"it may gladly call upon us for help." + +Thereafter _El Nacional_ turned out with the other coast craft and +became a wage-earner. She worked with the lighters freighting bananas +and oranges out to the fruit steamers that could not approach nearer +than a mile from the shore. Surely a self-supporting navy deserves +red letters in the budget of any nation. + +After earning enough at freighting to keep himself and his crew in +provisions for a week Felipe would anchor the navy and hang about +the little telegraph office, looking like one of the chorus of an +insolvent comic opera troupe besieging the manager's den. A hope for +orders from the capital was always in his heart. That his services as +admiral had never been called into requirement hurt his pride and +patriotism. At every call he would inquire, gravely and expectantly, +for despatches. The operator would pretend to make a search, and then +reply: + +"Not yet, it seems, _Senor el Almirante--poco tiempo!_" + +Outside in the shade of the lime-trees the crew chewed sugar cane or +slumbered, well content to serve a country that was contented with so +little service. + +One day in the early summer the revolution predicted by the collector +flamed out suddenly. It had long been smouldering. At the first note +of alarm the admiral of the navy force and fleet made all sail for a +larger port on the coast of a neighbouring republic, where he traded +a hastily collected cargo of fruit for its value in cartridges for +the five Martini rifles, the only guns that the navy could boast. +Then to the telegraph office sped the admiral. Sprawling in his +favourite corner, in his fast-decaying uniform, with his prodigious +sabre distributed between his red legs, he waited for the +long-delayed, but now soon expected, orders. + +"Not yet, _Senor el Almirante_," the telegraph clerk would call to +him--"_poco tiempo!_" + +At the answer the admiral would plump himself down with a great +rattling of scabbard to await the infrequent tick of the little +instrument on the table. + +"They will come," would be his unshaken reply; "I am the admiral." + + + + +IX + +THE FLAG PARAMOUNT + + +At the head of the insurgent party appeared that Hector and learned +Theban of the southern republics, Don Sabas Placido. A traveller, +a soldier, a poet, a scientist, a statesman and a connoisseur--the +wonder was that he could content himself with the petty, remote life +of his native country. + +"It is a whim of Placido's," said a friend who knew him well, "to +take up political intrigue. It is not otherwise than as if he had +come upon a new _tempo_ in music, a new bacillus in the air, a new +scent, or rhyme, or explosive. He will squeeze this revolution dry of +sensations, and a week afterward will forget it, skimming the seas +of the world in his brigantine to add to his already world-famous +collections. Collections of what? _Por Dios!_ of everything from +postage stamps to prehistoric stone idols." + +But, for a mere dilettante, the aesthetic Placido seemed to be +creating a lively row. The people admired him; they were fascinated +by his brilliancy and flattered by his taking an interest in so +small a thing as his native country. They rallied to the call of his +lieutenants in the capital, where (somewhat contrary to arrangements) +the army remained faithful to the government. There was also lively +skirmishing in the coast towns. It was rumoured that the revolution +was aided by the Vesuvius Fruit Company, the power that forever +stood with chiding smile and uplifted finger to keep Anchuria in the +class of good children. Two of its steamers, the _Traveler_ and the +_Salvador_, were known to have conveyed insurgent troops from point +to point along the coast. + +As yet there had been no actual uprising in Coralio. Military law +prevailed, and the ferment was bottled for the time. And then came +the word that everywhere the revolutionists were encountering defeat. +In the capital the president's forces triumphed; and there was a +rumour that the leaders of the revolt had been forced to fly, hotly +pursued. + +In the little telegraph office at Coralio there was always a +gathering of officials and loyal citizens, awaiting news from the +seat of government. One morning the telegraph key began clicking, +and presently the operator called, loudly: "One telegram for _el +Almirante_, Don Senor Felipe Carrera!" + +There was a shuffling sound, a great rattling of tin scabbard, and +the admiral, prompt at his spot of waiting, leaped across the room to +receive it. + +The message was handed to him. Slowly spelling it out, he found it to +be his first official order--thus running: + + + Proceed immediately with your vessel to mouth of Rio Ruiz; + transport beef and provisions to barracks at Alforan. + + Martinez, General. + + +Small glory, to be sure, in this, his country's first call. But it +had called, and joy surged in the admiral's breast. He drew his +cutlass belt to another buckle hole, roused his dozing crew, and in a +quarter of an hour _El Nacional_ was tacking swiftly down coast in a +stiff landward breeze. + +The Rio Ruiz is a small river, emptying into the sea ten miles below +Coralio. That portion of the coast is wild and solitary. Through a +gorge in the Cordilleras rushes the Rio Ruiz, cold and bubbling, to +glide, at last, with breadth and leisure, through an alluvial morass +into the sea. + +In two hours _El Nacional_ entered the river's mouth. The banks +were crowded with a disposition of formidable trees. The sumptuous +undergrowth of the tropics overflowed the land, and drowned itself in +the fallow waters. Silently the sloop entered there, and met a deeper +silence. Brilliant with greens and ochres and floral scarlets, the +umbrageous mouth of the Rio Ruiz furnished no sound or movement save +of the sea-going water as it purled against the prow of the vessel. +Small chance there seemed of wresting beef or provisions from that +empty solitude. + +The admiral decided to cast anchor, and, at the chain's rattle, the +forest was stimulated to instant and resounding uproar. The mouth of +the Rio Ruiz had only been taking a morning nap. Parrots and baboons +screeched and barked in the trees; a whirring and a hissing and a +booming marked the awakening of animal life; a dark blue bulk was +visible for an instant, as a startled tapir fought his way through +the vines. + +The navy, under orders, hung in the mouth of the little river for +hours. The crew served the dinner of shark's fin soup, plantains, +crab gumbo and sour wine. The admiral, with a three-foot telescope, +closely scanned the impervious foliage fifty yards away. + +It was nearly sunset when a reverberating "hal-lo-o-o!" came from the +forest to their left. It was answered; and three men, mounted upon +mules, crashed through the tropic tangle to within a dozen yards of +the river's bank. There they dismounted; and one, unbuckling his +belt, struck each mule a violent blow with his sword scabbard, so +that they, with a fling of heels, dashed back again into the forest. + +Those were strange-looking men to be conveying beef and provisions. +One was a large and exceedingly active man, of striking presence. He +was of the purest Spanish type, with curling, gray-besprinkled, dark +hair, blue, sparkling eyes, and the pronounced air of a _caballero +grande_. The other two were small, brown-faced men, wearing white +military uniforms, high riding boots and swords. The clothes of all +were drenched, bespattered and rent by the thicket. Some stress of +circumstance must have driven them, _diable a quatre_, through flood, +mire and jungle. + +"_O-he! Senor Almirante_," called the large man. "Send to us your +boat." + +The dory was lowered, and Felipe, with one of the Caribs, rowed +toward the left bank. + +The large man stood near the water's brink, waist deep in the curling +vines. As he gazed upon the scarecrow figure in the stern of the dory +a sprightly interest beamed upon his mobile face. + +Months of wageless and thankless service had dimmed the admiral's +splendour. His red trousers were patched and ragged. Most of the +bright buttons and yellow braid were gone from his jacket. The visor +of his cap was torn, and depended almost to his eyes. The admiral's +feet were bare. + +"Dear admiral," cried the large man, and his voice was like a blast +from a horn, "I kiss your hands. I knew we could build upon your +fidelity. You had our despatch--from General Martinez. A little +nearer with your boat, dear Admiral. Upon these devils of shifting +vines we stand with the smallest security." + +Felipe regarded him with a stolid face. + +"Provisions and beef for the barracks at Alforan," he quoted. + +"No fault of the butchers, _Almirante mio_, that the beef awaits you +not. But you are come in time to save the cattle. Get us aboard your +vessel, senor, at once. You first, _caballeros--a priesa!_ Come back +for me. The boat is too small." + +The dory conveyed the two officers to the sloop, and returned for the +large man. + +"Have you so gross a thing as food, good admiral?" he cried, when +aboard. "And, perhaps, coffee? Beef and provisions! _Nombre de Dios!_ +a little longer and we could have eaten one of those mules that you, +Colonel Rafael, saluted so feelingly with your sword scabbard at +parting. Let us have food; and then we will sail--for the barracks at +Alforan--no?" + +The Caribs prepared a meal, to which the three passengers of _El +Nacional_ set themselves with famished delight. About sunset, as was +its custom, the breeze veered and swept back from the mountains, cool +and steady, bringing a taste of the stagnant lagoons and mangrove +swamps that guttered the lowlands. The mainsail of the sloop was +hoisted and swelled to it, and at that moment they heard shouts and a +waxing clamour from the bosky profundities of the shore. + +"The butchers, my dear admiral," said the large man, smiling, "too +late for the slaughter." + +Further than his orders to his crew, the admiral was saying nothing. +The topsail and jib were spread, and the sloop glided out of the +estuary. The large man and his companions had bestowed themselves +with what comfort they could about the bare deck. Belike, the thing +big in their minds had been their departure from that critical shore; +and now that the hazard was so far reduced their thoughts were loosed +to the consideration of further deliverance. But when they saw the +sloop turn and fly up coast again they relaxed, satisfied with the +course the admiral had taken. + +The large man sat at ease, his spirited blue eye engaged in the +contemplation of the navy's commander. He was trying to estimate this +sombre and fantastic lad, whose impenetrable stolidity puzzled him. +Himself a fugitive, his life sought, and chafing under the smart +of defeat and failure, it was characteristic of him to transfer +instantly his interest to the study of a thing new to him. It +was like him, too, to have conceived and risked all upon this +last desperate and madcap scheme--this message to a poor, crazed +_fanatico_ cruising about with his grotesque uniform and his farcical +title. But his companions had been at their wits' end; escape had +seemed incredible; and now he was pleased with the success of the +plan they had called crack-brained and precarious. + +The brief, tropic twilight seemed to slide swiftly into the pearly +splendour of a moonlit night. And now the lights of Coralio appeared, +distributed against the darkening shore to their right. The admiral +stood, silent, at the tiller; the Caribs, like black panthers, held +the sheets, leaping noiselessly at his short commands. The three +passengers were watching intently the sea before them, and when at +length they came in sight of the bulk of a steamer lying a mile out +from the town, with her lights radiating deep into the water, they +held a sudden voluble and close-headed converse. The sloop was +speeding as if to strike midway between ship and shore. + +The large man suddenly separated from his companions and approached +the scarecrow at the helm. + +"My dear admiral," he said, "the government has been exceedingly +remiss. I feel all the shame for it that only its ignorance of your +devoted service has prevented it from sustaining. An inexcusable +oversight has been made. A vessel, a uniform and a crew worthy of +your fidelity shall be furnished you. But just now, dear admiral, +there is business of moment afoot. The steamer lying there is the +_Salvador_. I and my friends desire to be conveyed to her, where we +are sent on the government's business. Do us the favour to shape your +course accordingly." + +Without replying, the admiral gave a sharp command, and put the +tiller hard to port. _El Nacional_ swerved, and headed straight as an +arrow's course for the shore. + +"Do me the favour," said the large man, a trifle restively, "to +acknowledge, at least, that you catch the sound of my words." It +was possible that the fellow might be lacking in senses as well as +intellect. + +The admiral emitted a croaking, harsh laugh, and spake. + +"They will stand you," he said, "with your face to a wall and shoot +you dead. That is the way they kill traitors. I knew you when you +stepped into my boat. I have seen your picture in a book. You are +Sabas Placido, traitor to your country. With your face to a wall. So, +you will die. I am the admiral, and I will take you to them. With +your face to a wall. Yes." + +Don Sabas half turned and waved his hand, with a ringing laugh, +toward his fellow fugitives. "To you, _caballeros_, I have related +the history of that session when we issued that O! so ridiculous +commission. Of a truth our jest has been turned against us. Behold +the Frankenstein's monster we have created!" + +Don Sabas glanced toward the shore. The lights of Coralio were +drawing near. He could see the beach, the warehouse of the _Bodega +Nacional_, the long, low _cuartel_ occupied by the soldiers, and, +behind that, gleaming in the moonlight, a stretch of high adobe wall. +He had seen men stood with their faces to that wall and shot dead. + +Again he addressed the extravagant figure at the helm. + +"It is true," he said, "that I am fleeing the country. But, receive +the assurance that I care very little for that. Courts and camps +everywhere are open to Sabas Placido. _Vaya!_ what is this molehill +of a republic--this pig's head of a country--to a man like me? I am a +_paisano_ of everywhere. In Rome, in London, in Paris, in Vienna, you +will hear them say: 'Welcome back, Don Sabas.' Come!--_tonto_--baboon +of a boy--admiral, whatever you call yourself, turn your boat. Put us +on board the _Salvador_, and here is your pay--five hundred _pesos_ +in money of the _Estados Unidos_--more than your lying government +will pay you in twenty years." + +Don Sabas pressed a plump purse against the youth's hand. The admiral +gave no heed to the words or the movement. Braced against the helm, +he was holding the sloop dead on her shoreward course. His dull face +was lit almost to intelligence by some inward conceit that seemed to +afford him joy, and found utterance in another parrot-like cackle. + +"That is why they do it," he said--"so that you will not see the +guns. They fire--oom!--and you fall dead. With your face to the wall. +Yes." + +The admiral called a sudden order to his crew. The lithe, silent +Caribs made fast the sheets they held, and slipped down the hatchway +into the hold of the sloop. When the last one had disappeared, Don +Sabas, like a big, brown leopard, leaped forward, closed and fastened +the hatch and stood, smiling. + +"No rifles, if you please, dear admiral," he said. "It was a whimsey +of mine once to compile a dictionary of the Carib _lengua_. So, I +understood your order. Perhaps now you will--" + +He cut short his words, for he heard the dull "swish" of iron +scraping along tin. The admiral had drawn the cutlass of Pedro +Lafitte, and was darting upon him. The blade descended, and it was +only by a display of surprising agility that the large man escaped, +with only a bruised shoulder, the glancing weapon. He was drawing his +pistol as he sprang, and the next instant he shot the admiral down. + +Don Sabas stooped over him, and rose again. + +"In the heart," he said briefly. "_Senores_, the navy is abolished." + +Colonel Rafael sprang to the helm, and the other officer hastened to +loose the mainsail sheets. The boom swung round; _El Nacional_ veered +and began to tack industriously for the _Salvador_. + +"Strike that flag, senor," called Colonel Rafael. "Our friends on the +steamer will wonder why we are sailing under it." + +"Well said," cried Don Sabas. Advancing to the mast he lowered the +flag to the deck, where lay its too loyal supporter. Thus ended the +Minister of War's little piece of after-dinner drollery, and by the +same hand that began it. + +Suddenly Don Sabas gave a great cry of joy, and ran down the slanting +deck to the side of Colonel Rafael. Across his arm he carried the +flag of the extinguished navy. + +"_Mire! mire! senor._ Ah, _Dios!_ Already can I hear that great bear +of an _Oestreicher_ shout, _'Du hast mein herz gebrochen!' Mire!_ +Of my friend, Herr Grunitz, of Vienna, you have heard me relate. +That man has travelled to Ceylon for an orchid--to Patagonia for a +headdress--to Benares for a slipper--to Mozambique for a spearhead +to add to his famous collections. Thou knowest, also, _amigo_ Rafael, +that I have been a gatherer of curios. My collection of battle flags +of the world's navies was the most complete in existence until last +year. Then Herr Grunitz secured two, O! such rare specimens. One of a +Barbary state, and one of the Makarooroos, a tribe on the west coast +of Africa. I have not those, but they can be procured. But this flag, +senor--do you know what it is? Name of God! do you know? See that +red cross upon the blue and white ground! You never saw it before? +_Seguramente no._ It is the naval flag of your country. _Mire!_ +This rotten tub we stand upon is its navy--that dead cockatoo lying +there was its commander--that stroke of cutlass and single pistol +shot a sea battle. All a piece of absurd foolery, I grant you--but +authentic. There has never been another flag like this, and there +never will be another. No. It is unique in the whole world. Yes. +Think of what that means to a collector of flags! Do you know, +_Coronel mio_, how many golden crowns Herr Grunitz would give for +this flag? Ten thousand, likely. Well, a hundred thousand would not +buy it. Beautiful flag! Only flag! Little devil of a most heaven-born +flag! _O-he!_ old grumbler beyond the ocean. Wait till Don Sabas +comes again to the Koenigin Strasse. He will let you kneel and touch +the folds of it with one finger. _O-he!_ old spectacled ransacker of +the world!" + +Forgotten was the impotent revolution, the danger, the loss, the +gall of defeat. Possessed solely by the inordinate and unparalleled +passion of the collector, he strode up and down the little deck, +clasping to his breast with one hand the paragon of a flag. He +snapped his fingers triumphantly toward the east. He shouted the +paean to his prize in trumpet tones, as though he would make old +Grunitz hear in his musty den beyond the sea. + +They were waiting, on the _Salvador_, to welcome them. The sloop came +close alongside the steamer where her sides were sliced almost to the +lower deck for the loading of fruit. The sailors of the _Salvador_ +grappled and held her there. + +Captain McLeod leaned over the side. + +"Well, senor, the jig is up, I'm told." + +"The jig is up?" Don Sabas looked perplexed for a moment. "That +revolution--ah, yes!" With a shrug of his shoulders he dismissed the +matter. + +The captain learned of the escape and the imprisoned crew. + +"Caribs?" he said; "no harm in them." He slipped down into the sloop +and kicked loose the hasp of the hatch. The black fellows came +tumbling up, sweating but grinning. + +"Hey! black boys!" said the captain, in a dialect of his own; "you +sabe, catchy boat and vamos back same place quick." + +They saw him point to themselves, the sloop and Coralio. "Yas, yas!" +they cried, with broader grins and many nods. + +The four--Don Sabas, the two officers and the captain--moved to quit +the sloop. Don Sabas lagged a little behind, looking at the still +form of the late admiral, sprawled in his paltry trappings. + +"_Pobrecito loco_," he said softly. + +He was a brilliant cosmopolite and a _cognoscente_ of high rank; but, +after all, he was of the same race and blood and instinct as this +people. Even as the simple _paisanos_ of Coralio had said it, so said +Don Sabas. Without a smile, he looked, and said, "The poor little +crazed one!" + +Stooping he raised the limp shoulders, drew the priceless and +induplicable flag under them and over the breast, pinning it there +with the diamond star of the Order of San Carlos that he took from +the collar of his own coat. + +He followed after the others, and stood with them upon the deck of +the _Salvador_. The sailors that steadied _El Nacional_ shoved her +off. The jabbering Caribs hauled away at the rigging; the sloop +headed for the shore. + +And Herr Grunitz's collection of naval flags was still the finest in +the world. + + + + +X + +THE SHAMROCK AND THE PALM + + +One night when there was no breeze, and Coralio seemed closer than +ever to the gratings of Avernus, five men were grouped about the door +of the photograph establishment of Keogh and Clancy. Thus, in all the +scorched and exotic places of the earth, Caucasians meet when the +day's work is done to preserve the fulness of their heritage by the +aspersion of alien things. + +Johnny Atwood lay stretched upon the grass in the undress uniform +of a Carib, and prated feebly of cool water to be had in the +cucumber-wood pumps of Dalesburg. Dr. Gregg, through the prestige of +his whiskers and as a bribe against the relation of his imminent +professional tales, was conceded the hammock that was swung between +the door jamb and a calabash-tree. Keogh had moved out upon the grass +a little table that held the instrument for burnishing completed +photographs. He was the only busy one of the group. Industriously +from between the cylinders of the burnisher rolled the finished +depictments of Coralio's citizens. Blanchard, the French mining +engineer, in his cool linen viewed the smoke of his cigarette through +his calm glasses, impervious to the heat. Clancy sat on the steps, +smoking his short pipe. His mood was the gossip's; the others were +reduced, by the humidity, to the state of disability desirable in an +audience. + +Clancy was an American with an Irish diathesis and cosmopolitan +proclivities. Many businesses had claimed him, but not for long. +The roadster's blood was in his veins. The voice of the tintype was +but one of the many callings that had wooed him upon so many roads. +Sometimes he could be persuaded to oral construction of his voyages +into the informal and egregious. To-night there were symptoms of +divulgement in him. + +"'Tis elegant weather for filibusterin'," he volunteered. "It reminds +me of the time I struggled to liberate a nation from the poisonous +breath of a tyrant's clutch. 'Twas hard work. 'Tis strainin' to the +back and makes corns on the hands." + +"I didn't know you had ever lent your sword to an oppressed people," +murmured Atwood, from the grass. + +"I did," said Clancy; "and they turned it into a ploughshare." + +"What country was so fortunate as to secure your aid?" airily +inquired Blanchard. + +"Where's Kamchatka?" asked Clancy, with seeming irrelevance. + +"Why, off Siberia somewhere in the Arctic regions," somebody +answered, doubtfully. + +"I thought that was the cold one," said Clancy, with a satisfied nod. +"I'm always gettin' the two names mixed. 'Twas Guatemala, then--the +hot one--I've been filibusterin' with. Ye'll find that country on the +map. 'Tis in the district known as the tropics. By the foresight of +Providence, it lies on the coast so the geography man could run the +names of the towns off into the water. They're an inch long, small +type, composed of Spanish dialects, and, 'tis my opinion, of the same +system of syntax that blew up the _Maine_. Yes, 'twas that country I +sailed against, single-handed, and endeavoured to liberate it from +a tyrannical government with a single-barreled pickaxe, unloaded +at that. Ye don't understand, of course. 'Tis a statement demandin' +elucidation and apologies. + +"'Twas in New Orleans one morning about the first of June; I was +standin' down on the wharf, lookin' about at the ships in the river. +There was a little steamer moored right opposite me that seemed about +ready to sail. The funnels of it were throwin' out smoke, and a gang +of roustabouts were carryin' aboard a pile of boxes that was stacked +up on the wharf. The boxes were about two feet square, and somethin' +like four feet long, and they seemed to be pretty heavy. + +"I walked over, careless, to the stack of boxes. I saw one of them +had been broken in handlin'. 'Twas curiosity made me pull up the +loose top and look inside. The box was packed full of Winchester +rifles. 'So, so,' says I to myself; 'somebody's gettin' a twist on +the neutrality laws. Somebody's aidin' with munitions of war. I +wonder where the popguns are goin'?' + +"I heard somebody cough, and I turned around. There stood a +little, round, fat man with a brown face and white clothes, a +first-class-looking little man, with a four-karat diamond on his +finger and his eye full of interrogations and respects. I judged +he was a kind of foreigner--may be from Russia or Japan or the +archipelagoes. + +"'Hist!' says the round man, full of concealments and confidences. +'Will the senor respect the discoveryments he has made, that the mans +on the ship shall not be acquaint? The senor will be a gentleman that +shall not expose one thing that by accident occur.' + +"'Monseer,' says I--for I judged him to be a kind of +Frenchman--'receive my most exasperated assurances that your secret +is safe with James Clancy. Furthermore, I will go so far as to +remark, Veev la Liberty--veev it good and strong. Whenever you hear +of a Clancy obstructin' the abolishment of existin' governments you +may notify me by return mail.' + +"'The senor is good,' says the dark, fat man, smilin' under his +black mustache. 'Wish you to come aboard my ship and drink of wine a +glass.' + +"Bein' a Clancy, in two minutes me and the foreigner man were seated +at a table in the cabin of the steamer, with a bottle between us. I +could hear the heavy boxes bein' dumped into the hold. I judged that +cargo must consist of at least 2,000 Winchesters. Me and the brown +man drank the bottle of stuff, and he called the steward to bring +another. When you amalgamate a Clancy with the contents of a bottle +you practically instigate secession. I had heard a good deal about +these revolutions in them tropical localities, and I begun to want a +hand in it. + +"'You goin' to stir things up in your country, ain't you, monseer?' +says I, with a wink to let him know I was on. + +"'Yes, yes,' said the little man, pounding his fist on the table. +'A change of the greatest will occur. Too long have the people been +oppressed with the promises and the never-to-happen things to become. +The great work it shall be carry on. Yes. Our forces shall in the +capital city strike of the soonest. _Carrambos!_' + +"'_Carrambos_ is the word,' says I, beginning to invest myself with +enthusiasm and more wine, 'likewise veeva, as I said before. May the +shamrock of old--I mean the banana-vine or the pie-plant, or whatever +the imperial emblem may be of your down-trodden country, wave +forever.' + +"'A thousand thank-yous,' says the round man, 'for your emission of +amicable utterances. What our cause needs of the very most is mans +who will the work do, to lift it along. Oh, for one thousands strong, +good mans to aid the General De Vega that he shall to his country +bring those success and glory! It is hard--oh, so hard to find good +mans to help in the work.' + +"'Monseer,' says I, leanin' over the table and graspin' his hand, +'I don't know where your country is, but me heart bleeds for it. The +heart of a Clancy was never deaf to the sight of an oppressed people. +The family is filibusterers by birth, and foreigners by trade. If you +can use James Clancy's arms and his blood in denudin' your shores of +the tyrant's yoke they're yours to command.' + +"General De Vega was overcome with joy to confiscate my condolence of +his conspiracies and predicaments. He tried to embrace me across the +table, but his fatness, and the wine that had been in the bottles, +prevented. Thus was I welcomed into the ranks of filibustery. Then +the general man told me his country had the name of Guatemala, and +was the greatest nation laved by any ocean whatever anywhere. He +looked at me with tears in his eyes, and from time to time he would +emit the remark, 'Ah! big, strong, brave mans! That is what my +country need.' + +"General De Vega, as was the name by which he denounced himself, +brought out a document for me to sign, which I did, makin' a fine +flourish and curlycue with the tail of the 'y.' + +"'Your passage-money,' says the general, business-like, 'shall from +your pay be deduct.' + +"'Twill not,' says I, haughty. 'I'll pay my own passage.' A hundred +and eighty dollars I had in my inside pocket, and 'twas no common +filibuster I was goin' to be, filibusterin' for me board and clothes. + +"The steamer was to sail in two hours, and I went ashore to get some +things together I'd need. When I came aboard I showed the general +with pride the outfit. 'Twas a fine Chinchilla overcoat, Arctic +overshoes, fur cap and earmuffs, with elegant fleece-lined gloves and +woolen muffler. + +"'_Carrambos!_' says the little general. 'What clothes are these that +shall go to the tropic?' And then the little spalpeen laughs, and he +calls the captain, and the captain calls the purser, and they pipe up +the chief engineer, and the whole gang leans against the cabin and +laughs at Clancy's wardrobe for Guatemala. + +"I reflects a bit, serious, and asks the general again to denominate +the terms by which his country is called. He tells me, and I see then +that 'twas the t'other one, Kamchatka, I had in mind. Since then I've +had difficulty in separatin' the two nations in name, climate and +geographic disposition. + +"I paid my passage--twenty-four dollars, first cabin--and ate at +table with the officer crowd. Down on the lower deck was a gang of +second-class passengers, about forty of them, seemin' to be Dagoes +and the like. I wondered what so many of them were goin' along for. + +"Well, then, in three days we sailed alongside that Guatemala. 'Twas +a blue country, and not yellow as 'tis miscolored on the map. We +landed at a town on the coast, where a train of cars was waitin' for +us on a dinky little railroad. The boxes on the steamer were brought +ashore and loaded on the cars. The gang of Dagoes got aboard, too, +the general and me in the front car. Yes, me and General De Vega +headed the revolution, as it pulled out of the seaport town. That +train travelled about as fast as a policeman goin' to a riot. It +penetrated the most conspicuous lot of fuzzy scenery ever seen +outside a geography. We run some forty miles in seven hours, and the +train stopped. There was no more railroad. 'Twas a sort of camp in a +damp gorge full of wildness and melancholies. They was gradin' and +choppin' out the forests ahead to continue the road. 'Here,' says I +to myself, 'is the romantic haunt of the revolutionists. Here will +Clancy, by the virtue that is in a superior race and the inculcation +of Fenian tactics, strike a tremendous blow for liberty.' + +"They unloaded the boxes from the train and begun to knock the tops +off. From the first one that was open I saw General De Vega take the +Winchester rifles and pass them around to a squad of morbid soldiery. +The other boxes was opened next, and, believe me or not, divil +another gun was to be seen. Every other box in the load was full of +pickaxes and spades. + +"And then--sorrow be upon them tropics--the proud Clancy and the +dishonoured Dagoes, each one of them, had to shoulder a pick or a +spade, and march away to work on that dirty little railroad. Yes; +'twas that the Dagoes shipped for, and 'twas that the filibusterin' +Clancy signed for, though unbeknownst to himself at the time. In +after days I found out about it. It seems 'twas hard to get hands +to work on that road. The intelligent natives of the country was +too lazy to work. Indeed, the saints know, 'twas unnecessary. By +stretchin' out one hand, they could seize the most delicate and +costly fruits of the earth, and, by stretchin' out the other, they +could sleep for days at a time without hearin' a seven-o'clock +whistle or the footsteps of the rent man upon the stairs. So, +regular, the steamers travelled to the United States to seduce +labour. Usually the imported spade-slingers died in two or three +months from eatin' the over-ripe water and breathin' the violent +tropical scenery. Wherefore they made them sign contracts for a year, +when they hired them, and put an armed guard over the poor divils to +keep them from runnin' away. + +"'Twas thus I was double-crossed by the tropics through a family +failin' of goin' out of the way to hunt disturbances. + +"They gave me a pick, and I took it, meditatin' an insurrection on +the spot; but there was the guards handlin' the Winchesters careless, +and I come to the conclusion that discretion was the best part of +filibusterin'. There was about a hundred of us in the gang startin' +out to work, and the word was given to move. I steps out of the ranks +and goes up to that General De Vega man, who was smokin' a cigar and +gazin' upon the scene with satisfactions and glory. He smiles at me +polite and devilish. 'Plenty work,' says he, 'for big, strong mans in +Guatemala. Yes. T'irty dollars in the month. Good pay. Ah, yes. You +strong, brave man. Bimeby we push those railroad in the capital very +quick. They want you go work now. _Adios_, strong mans.' + +"'Monseer,' says I, lingerin', 'will you tell a poor little Irishman +this: When I set foot on your cockroachy steamer, and breathed +liberal and revolutionary sentiments into your sour wine, did you +think I was conspirin' to sling a pick on your contemptuous little +railroad? And when you answered me with patriotic recitations, +humping up the star-spangled cause of liberty, did you have +meditations of reducin' me to the ranks of the stump-grubbin' Dagoes +in the chain-gangs of your vile and grovelin' country?' + +"The general man expanded his rotundity and laughed considerable. +Yes, he laughed very long and loud, and I, Clancy, stood and waited. + +"'Comical mans!' he shouts, at last. 'So you will kill me from the +laughing. Yes; it is hard to find the brave, strong mans to aid my +country. Revolutions? Did I speak of r-r-revolutions? Not one word. +I say, big, strong mans is need in Guatemala. So. The mistake is of +you. You have looked in those one box containing those gun for the +guard. You think all boxes is contain gun? No. + +"'There is not war in Guatemala. But work? Yes. Good. T'irty dollar +in the month. You shall shoulder one pickaxe, senor, and dig for the +liberty and prosperity of Guatemala. Off to your work. The guard +waits for you.' + +"'Little, fat, poodle dog of a brown man,' says I, quiet, but full of +indignations and discomforts, 'things shall happen to you. Maybe not +right away, but as soon as J. Clancy can formulate somethin' in the +way of repartee.' + +"The boss of the gang orders us to work. I tramps off with the +Dagoes, and I hears the distinguished patriot and kidnapper laughin' +hearty as we go. + +"'Tis a sorrowful fact, for eight weeks I built railroads for that +misbehavin' country. I filibustered twelve hours a day with a heavy +pick and a spade, choppin' away the luxurious landscape that grew +upon the right of way. We worked in swamps that smelled like there +was a leak in the gas mains, trampin' down a fine assortment of the +most expensive hothouse plants and vegetables. The scene was tropical +beyond the wildest imagination of the geography man. The trees was +all sky-scrapers; the underbrush was full of needles and pins; +there was monkeys jumpin' around and crocodiles and pink-tailed +mockin'-birds, and ye stood knee-deep in the rotten water and +grabbled roots for the liberation of Guatemala. Of nights we would +build smudges in camp to discourage the mosquitoes, and sit in the +smoke, with the guards pacin' all around us. There was two hundred +men workin' on the road--mostly Dagoes, nigger-men, Spanish-men and +Swedes. Three or four were Irish. + +"One old man named Halloran--a man of Hibernian entitlements and +discretions, explained it to me. He had been workin' on the road a +year. Most of them died in less than six months. He was dried up to +gristle and bone, and shook with chills every third night. + +"'When you first come,' says he, 'ye think ye'll leave right away. +But they hold out your first month's pay for your passage over, and +by that time the tropics has its grip on ye. Ye're surrounded by a +ragin' forest full of disreputable beasts--lions and baboons and +anacondas--waitin' to devour ye. The sun strikes ye hard, and melts +the marrow in your bones. Ye get similar to the lettuce-eaters the +poetry-book speaks about. Ye forget the elevated sintiments of life, +such as patriotism, revenge, disturbances of the peace and the dacint +love of a clane shirt. Ye do your work, and ye swallow the kerosene +ile and rubber pipestems dished up to ye by the Dago cook for food. +Ye light your pipeful, and say to yoursilf, "Nixt week I'll break +away," and ye go to sleep and call yersilf a liar, for ye know ye'll +never do it.' + +"'Who is this general man,' asks I, 'that calls himself De Vega?' + +"''Tis the man,' says Halloran, 'who is tryin' to complete +the finishin' of the railroad. 'Twas the project of a private +corporation, but it busted, and then the government took it up. De +Vegy is a big politician, and wants to be prisident. The people want +the railroad completed, as they're taxed mighty on account of it. The +De Vegy man is pushin' it along as a campaign move.' + +"''Tis not my way,' says I, 'to make threats against any man, but +there's an account to be settled between the railroad man and James +O'Dowd Clancy.' + +"''Twas that way I thought, mesilf, at first,' Halloran says, with a +big sigh, 'until I got to be a lettuce-eater. The fault's wid these +tropics. They rejuices a man's system. 'Tis a land, as the poet says, +"Where it always seems to be after dinner." I does me work and smokes +me pipe and sleeps. There's little else in life, anyway. Ye'll get +that way yersilf, mighty soon. Don't be harbourin' any sintiments at +all, Clancy.' + +"'I can't help it,' says I; 'I'm full of 'em. I enlisted in the +revolutionary army of this dark country in good faith to fight for +its liberty, honours and silver candlesticks; instead of which I +am set to amputatin' its scenery and grubbin' its roots. 'Tis the +general man will have to pay for it.' + +"Two months I worked on that railroad before I found a chance to get +away. One day a gang of us was sent back to the end of the completed +line to fetch some picks that had been sent down to Port Barrios to +be sharpened. They were brought on a hand-car, and I noticed, when I +started away, that the car was left there on the track. + +"That night, about twelve, I woke up Halloran and told him my scheme. + +"'Run away?' says Halloran. 'Good Lord, Clancy, do ye mean it? Why, I +ain't got the nerve. It's too chilly, and I ain't slept enough. Run +away? I told you, Clancy, I've eat the lettuce. I've lost my grip. +'Tis the tropics that's done it. 'Tis like the poet says: "Forgotten +are our friends that we have left behind; in the hollow lettuce-land +we will live and lay reclined." You better go on, Clancy. I'll stay, +I guess. It's too early and cold, and I'm sleepy.' + +"So I had to leave Halloran. I dressed quiet, and slipped out of the +tent we were in. When the guard came along I knocked him over, like +a ninepin, with a green cocoanut I had, and made for the railroad. +I got on that hand-car and made it fly. 'Twas yet a while before +daybreak when I saw the lights of Port Barrios about a mile away. I +stopped the hand-car there and walked to the town. I stepped inside +the corporations of that town with care and hesitations. I was not +afraid of the army of Guatemala, but me soul quaked at the prospect +of a hand-to-hand struggle with its employment bureau. 'Tis a country +that hires its help easy and keeps 'em long. Sure I can fancy Missis +America and Missis Guatemala passin' a bit of gossip some fine, still +night across the mountains. 'Oh, dear,' says Missis America, 'and +it's a lot of trouble I'm havin' ag'in with the help, senora, ma'am.' +'Laws, now!' says Missis Guatemala, 'you don't say so, ma'am! Now, +mine never think of leavin' me--te-he! ma'am,' snickers Missis +Guatemala. + +"I was wonderin' how I was goin' to move away from them tropics +without bein' hired again. Dark as it was, I could see a steamer +ridin' in the harbour, with smoke emergin' from her stacks. I turned +down a little grass street that run down to the water. On the beach I +found a little brown nigger-man just about to shove off in a skiff. + +"'Hold on, Sambo,' says I, 'savve English?' + +"'Heap plenty, yes,' says he, with a pleasant grin. + +"'What steamer is that?' I asks him, 'and where is it going? And +what's the news, and the good word and the time of day?' + +"'That steamer the _Conchita_,' said the brown man, affable and easy, +rollin' a cigarette. 'Him come from New Orleans for load banana. Him +got load last night. I think him sail in one, two hour. Verree nice +day we shall be goin' have. You hear some talkee 'bout big battle, +maybe so? You think catchee General De Vega, senor? Yes? No?' + +"'How's that, Sambo?' says I. 'Big battle? What battle? Who wants +catchee General De Vega? I've been up at my old gold mines in the +interior for a couple of months, and haven't heard any news.' + +"'Oh,' says the nigger-man, proud to speak the English, 'verree great +revolution in Guatemala one week ago. General De Vega, him try be +president. Him raise armee--one--five--ten thousand mans for fight +at the government. Those one government send five--forty--hundred +thousand soldier to suppress revolution. They fight big battle +yesterday at Lomagrande--that about nineteen or fifty mile in the +mountain. That government soldier wheep General De Vega--oh, most +bad. Five hundred--nine hundred--two thousand of his mans is kill. +That revolution is smash suppress--bust--very quick. General De Vega, +him r-r-run away fast on one big mule. Yes, _carrambos!_ The general, +him r-r-run away, and his armee is kill. That government soldier, +they try find General De Vega verree much. They want catchee him for +shoot. You think they catchee that general, senor?' + +"'Saints grant it!' says I. ''Twould be the judgment of Providence +for settin' the warlike talent of a Clancy to gradin' the tropics +with a pick and shovel. But 'tis not so much a question of +insurrections now, me little man, as 'tis of the hired-man problem. +'Tis anxious I am to resign a situation of responsibility and trust +with the white wings department of your great and degraded country. +Row me in your little boat out to that steamer, and I'll give ye five +dollars--sinker pacers--sinker pacers,' says I, reducin' the offer to +the language and denomination of the tropic dialects. + +"'_Cinco pesos_,' repeats the little man. 'Five dollee, you give?' + +"'Twas not such a bad little man. He had hesitations at first, sayin' +that passengers leavin' the country had to have papers and passports, +but at last he took me out alongside the steamer. + +"Day was just breakin' as we struck her, and there wasn't a soul to +be seen on board. The water was very still, and the nigger-man gave +me a lift from the boat, and I climbed onto the steamer where her +side was sliced to the deck for loadin' fruit. The hatches was open, +and I looked down and saw the cargo of bananas that filled the hold +to within six feet of the top. I thinks to myself, 'Clancy, you +better go as a stowaway. It's safer. The steamer men might hand you +back to the employment bureau. The tropic'll get you, Clancy, if you +don't watch out.' + +"So I jumps down easy among the bananas, and digs out a hole to hide +in among the bunches. In an hour or so I could hear the engines +goin', and feel the steamer rockin', and I knew we were off to sea. +They left the hatches open for ventilation, and pretty soon it +was light enough in the hold to see fairly well. I got to feelin' +a bit hungry, and thought I'd have a light fruit lunch, by way +of refreshment. I creeped out of the hole I'd made and stood up +straight. Just then I saw another man crawl up about ten feet away +and reach out and skin a banana and stuff it into his mouth. 'Twas +a dirty man, black-faced and ragged and disgraceful of aspect. Yes, +the man was a ringer for the pictures of the fat Weary Willie in the +funny papers. I looked again, and saw it was my general man--De Vega, +the great revolutionist, mule-rider and pickaxe importer. When he saw +me the general hesitated with his mouth filled with banana and his +eyes the size of cocoanuts. + +"'Hist!' I says. 'Not a word, or they'll put us off and make us walk. +"Veev la Liberty!"' I adds, copperin' the sentiment by shovin' a +banana into the source of it. I was certain the general wouldn't +recognize me. The nefarious work of the tropics had left me lookin' +different. There was half an inch of roan whiskers coverin' me face, +and me costume was a pair of blue overalls and a red shirt. + +"'How you come in the ship, senor?' asked the general as soon as he +could speak. + +"'By the back door--whist!' says I. ''Twas a glorious blow for +liberty we struck,' I continues; 'but we was overpowered by numbers. +Let us accept our defeat like brave men and eat another banana.' + +"'Were you in the cause of liberty fightin', senor?' says the +general, sheddin' tears on the cargo. + +"'To the last,' says I. ''Twas I led the last desperate charge +against the minions of the tyrant. But it made them mad, and we was +forced to retreat. 'Twas I, general, procured the mule upon which +you escaped. Could you give that ripe bunch a little boost this way, +general? It's a bit out of my reach. Thanks.' + +"'Say you so, brave patriot?' said the general, again weepin'. 'Ah, +_Dios!_ And I have not the means to reward your devotion. Barely did +I my life bring away. _Carrambos!_ what a devil's animal was that +mule, senor! Like ships in one storm was I dashed about. The skin +on myself was ripped away with the thorns and vines. Upon the bark +of a hundred trees did that beast of the infernal bump, and cause +outrage to the legs of mine. In the night to Port Barrios I came. I +dispossess myself of that mountain of mule and hasten along the water +shore. I find a little boat to be tied. I launch myself and row to +the steamer. I cannot see any mans on board, so I climbed one rope +which hang at the side. I then myself hide in the bananas. Surely, I +say, if the ship captains view me, they shall throw me again to those +Guatemala. Those things are not good. Guatemala will shoot General +De Vega. Therefore, I am hide and remain silent. Life itself is +glorious. Liberty, it is pretty good; but so good as life I do not +think.' + +"Three days, as I said, was the trip to New Orleans. The general man +and me got to be cronies of the deepest dye. Bananas we ate until +they were distasteful to the sight and an eyesore to the palate, but +to bananas alone was the bill of fare reduced. At night I crawls out, +careful, on the lower deck, and gets a bucket of fresh water. + +"That General De Vega was a man inhabited by an engorgement of words +and sentences. He added to the monotony of the voyage by divestin' +himself of conversation. He believed I was a revolutionist of his own +party, there bein', as he told me, a good many Americans and other +foreigners in its ranks. 'Twas a braggart and a conceited little +gabbler it was, though he considered himself a hero. 'Twas on himself +he wasted all his regrets at the failin' of his plot. Not a word did +the little balloon have to say about the other misbehavin' idiots +that had been shot, or run themselves to death in his revolution. + +"The second day out he was feelin' pretty braggy and uppish for a +stowed-away conspirator that owed his existence to a mule and stolen +bananas. He was tellin' me about the great railroad he had been +buildin', and he relates what he calls a comic incident about a fool +Irishman he inveigled from New Orleans to sling a pick on his little +morgue of a narrow-gauge line. 'Twas sorrowful to hear the little, +dirty general tell the opprobrious story of how he put salt upon the +tail of that reckless and silly bird, Clancy. Laugh, he did, hearty +and long. He shook with laughin', the black-faced rebel and outcast, +standin' neck-deep in bananas, without friends or country. + +"'Ah, senor,' he snickers, 'to the death you would have laughed at +that drollest Irish. I say to him: "Strong, big mans is need very +much in Guatemala." "I will blows strike for your down-pressed +country," he say. "That shall you do," I tell him. Ah! it was an +Irish so comic. He sees one box break upon the wharf that contain for +the guard a few gun. He think there is gun in all the box. But that +is all pickaxe. Yes. Ah! senor, could you the face of that Irish have +seen when they set him to the work!' + +"'Twas thus the ex-boss of the employment bureau contributed to the +tedium of the trip with merry jests and anecdote. But now and then he +would weep upon the bananas and make oration about the lost cause of +liberty and the mule. + +"'Twas a pleasant sound when the steamer bumped against the pier in +New Orleans. Pretty soon we heard the pat-a-pat of hundreds of bare +feet, and the Dago gang that unloads the fruit jumped on the deck and +down into the hold. Me and the general worked a while at passin' up +the bunches, and they thought we were part of the gang. After about +an hour we managed to slip off the steamer onto the wharf. + +"'Twas a great honour on the hands of an obscure Clancy, havin' the +entertainment of the representative of a great foreign filibusterin' +power. I first bought for the general and myself many long drinks +and things to eat that were not bananas. The general man trotted +along at my side, leavin' all the arrangements to me. I led him +up to Lafayette Square and set him on a bench in the little park. +Cigarettes I had bought for him, and he humped himself down on the +seat like a little, fat, contented hobo. I look him over as he sets +there, and what I see pleases me. Brown by nature and instinct, he +is now brindled with dirt and dust. Praise to the mule, his clothes +is mostly strings and flaps. Yes, the looks of the general man is +agreeable to Clancy. + +"I ask him, delicate, if, by any chance, he brought away anybody's +money with him from Guatemala. He sighs and bumps his shoulders +against the bench. Not a cent. All right. Maybe, he tells me, some +of his friends in the tropic outfit will send him funds later. The +general was as clear a case of no visible means as I ever saw. + +"I told him not to move from the bench, and then I went up to the +corner of Poydras and Carondelet. Along there is O'Hara's beat. In +five minutes along comes O'Hara, a big, fine man, red-faced, with +shinin' buttons, swingin' his club. 'Twould be a fine thing for +Guatemala to move into O'Hara's precinct. 'Twould be a fine bit of +recreation for Danny to suppress revolutions and uprisin's once or +twice a week with his club. + +"'Is 5046 workin' yet, Danny?' says I, walkin' up to him. + +"'Overtime,' says O'Hara, lookin' over me suspicious. 'Want some of +it?' + +"Fifty-forty-six is the celebrated city ordinance authorizin' arrest, +conviction and imprisonment of persons that succeed in concealin' +their crimes from the police. + +"'Don't ye know Jimmy Clancy?' says I. 'Ye pink-gilled monster.' So, +when O'Hara recognized me beneath the scandalous exterior bestowed +upon me by the tropics, I backed him into a doorway and told him what +I wanted, and why I wanted it. 'All right, Jimmy,' says O'Hara. 'Go +back and hold the bench. I'll be along in ten minutes.' + +"In that time O'Hara strolled through Lafayette Square and spied two +Weary Willies disgracin' one of the benches. In ten minutes more J. +Clancy and General De Vega, late candidate for the presidency of +Guatemala, was in the station house. The general is badly frightened, +and calls upon me to proclaim his distinguishments and rank. + +"'The man,' says I to the police, 'used to be a railroad man. He's on +the bum now. 'Tis a little bughouse he is, on account of losin' his +job.' + +"'_Carrambos!_' says the general, fizzin' like a little soda-water +fountain, 'you fought, senor, with my forces in my native country. +Why do you say the lies? You shall say I am the General De Vega, one +soldier, one _caballero_--' + +"'Railroader,' says I again. 'On the hog. No good. Been livin' for +three days on stolen bananas. Look at him. Ain't that enough?' + +"Twenty-five dollars or sixty days, was what the recorder gave the +general. He didn't have a cent, so he took the time. They let me go, +as I knew they would, for I had money to show, and O'Hara spoke for +me. Yes; sixty days he got. 'Twas just so long that I slung a pick +for the great country of Kam--Guatemala." + +Clancy paused. The bright starlight showed a reminiscent look of +happy content on his seasoned features. Keogh leaned in his chair and +gave his partner a slap on his thinly-clad back that sounded like the +crack of the surf on the sands. + +"Tell 'em, ye divil," he chuckled, "how you got even with the +tropical general in the way of agricultural manoeuvrings." + +"Havin' no money," concluded Clancy, with unction, "they set him +to work his fine out with a gang from the parish prison clearing +Ursulines Street. Around the corner was a saloon decorated genially +with electric fans and cool merchandise. I made that me headquarters, +and every fifteen minutes I'd walk around and take a look at the +little man filibusterin' with a rake and shovel. 'Twas just such +a hot broth of a day as this has been. And I'd call at him 'Hey, +monseer!' and he'd look at me black, with the damp showin' through +his shirt in places. + +"'Fat, strong mans,' says I to General De Vega, 'is needed in New +Orleans. Yes. To carry on the good work. Carrambos! Erin go bragh!'" + + + + +XI + +THE REMNANTS OF THE CODE + + +Breakfast in Coralio was at eleven. Therefore the people did not go +to market early. The little wooden market-house stood on a patch of +short-trimmed grass, under the vivid green foliage of a bread-fruit +tree. + +Thither one morning the venders leisurely convened, bringing their +wares with them. A porch or platform six feet wide encircled the +building, shaded from the mid-morning sun by the projecting, +grass-thatched roof. Upon this platform the venders were wont to +display their goods--newly-killed beef, fish, crabs, fruit of the +country, cassava, eggs, _dulces_ and high, tottering stacks of native +tortillas as large around as the sombrero of a Spanish grandee. + +But on this morning they whose stations lay on the seaward side of +the market-house, instead of spreading their merchandise formed +themselves into a softly jabbering and gesticulating group. For +there upon their space of the platform was sprawled, asleep, the +unbeautiful figure of "Beelzebub" Blythe. He lay upon a ragged strip +of cocoa matting, more than ever a fallen angel in appearance. His +suit of coarse flax, soiled, bursting at the seams, crumpled into +a thousand diversified wrinkles and creases, inclosed him absurdly, +like the garb of some effigy that had been stuffed in sport and +thrown there after indignity had been wrought upon it. But firmly +upon the high bridge of his nose reposed his gold-rimmed glasses, the +surviving badge of his ancient glory. + +The sun's rays, reflecting quiveringly from the rippling sea upon his +face, and the voices of the market-men woke "Beelzebub" Blythe. He +sat up, blinking, and leaned his back against the wall of the market. +Drawing a blighted silk handkerchief from his pocket, he assiduously +rubbed and burnished his glasses. And while doing this he became +aware that his bedroom had been invaded, and that polite brown and +yellow men were beseeching him to vacate in favour of their market +stuff. + +If the senor would have the goodness--a thousand pardons for bringing +to him molestation--but soon would come the _compradores_ for the +day's provisions--surely they had ten thousand regrets at disturbing +him! + +In this manner they expanded to him the intimation that he must clear +out and cease to clog the wheels of trade. + +Blythe stepped from the platform with the air of a prince leaving +his canopied couch. He never quite lost that air, even at the lowest +point of his fall. It is clear that the college of good breeding does +not necessarily maintain a chair of morals within its walls. + +Blythe shook out his wry clothing, and moved slowly up the Calle +Grande through the hot sand. He moved without a destination in his +mind. The little town was languidly stirring to its daily life. +Golden-skinned babies tumbled over one another in the grass. The sea +breeze brought him appetite, but nothing to satisfy it. Throughout +Coralio were its morning odors--those from the heavily fragrant +tropical flowers and from the bread baking in the outdoor ovens of +clay and the pervading smoke of their fires. Where the smoke cleared, +the crystal air, with some of the efficacy of faith, seemed to remove +the mountains almost to the sea, bringing them so near that one might +count the scarred glades on their wooded sides. The light-footed +Caribs were swiftly gliding to their tasks at the waterside. Already +along the bosky trails from the banana groves files of horses were +slowly moving, concealed, except for their nodding heads and plodding +legs, by the bunches of green-golden fruit heaped upon their backs. +On doorsills sat women combing their long, black hair and calling, +one to another, across the narrow thoroughfares. Peace reigned in +Coralio--arid and bald peace; but still peace. + +On that bright morning when Nature seemed to be offering the lotus on +the Dawn's golden platter "Beelzebub" Blythe had reached rock bottom. +Further descent seemed impossible. That last night's slumber in +a public place had done for him. As long as he had had a roof to +cover him there had remained, unbridged, the space that separates a +gentleman from the beasts of the jungle and the fowls of the air. But +now he was little more than a whimpering oyster led to be devoured on +the sands of a Southern sea by the artful walrus, Circumstance, and +the implacable carpenter, Fate. + +To Blythe money was now but a memory. He had drained his friends of +all that their good-fellowship had to offer; then he had squeezed +them to the last drop of their generosity; and at the last, +Aaron-like, he had smitten the rock of their hardening bosoms for the +scattering, ignoble drops of Charity itself. + +He had exhausted his credit to the last _real_. With the minute +keenness of the shameless sponger he was aware of every source in +Coralio from which a glass of rum, a meal or a piece of silver could +be wheedled. Marshalling each such source in his mind, he considered +it with all the thoroughness and penetration that hunger and thirst +lent him for the task. All his optimism failed to thresh a grain of +hope from the chaff of his postulations. He had played out the game. +That one night in the open had shaken his nerves. Until then there +had been left to him at least a few grounds upon which he could base +his unblushing demands upon his neighbours' stores. Now he must beg +instead of borrowing. The most brazen sophistry could not dignify by +the name of "loan" the coin contemptuously flung to a beachcomber who +slept on the bare boards of the public market. + +But on this morning no beggar would have more thankfully received +a charitable coin, for the demon thirst had him by the throat--the +drunkard's matutinal thirst that requires to be slaked at each +morning station on the road to Tophet. + +Blythe walked slowly up the street, keeping a watchful eye for any +miracle that might drop manna upon him in his wilderness. As he +passed the popular eating house of Madama Vasquez, Madama's boarders +were just sitting down to freshly-baked bread, _aguacates_, pines and +delicious coffee that sent forth odorous guarantee of its quality +upon the breeze. Madama was serving; she turned her shy, stolid, +melancholy gaze for a moment out the window; she saw Blythe, and her +expression turned more shy and embarrassed. "Beelzebub" owed her +twenty _pesos_. He bowed as he had once bowed to less embarrassed +dames to whom he owed nothing, and passed on. + +Merchants and their clerks were throwing open the solid wooden doors +of their shops. Polite but cool were the glances they cast upon +Blythe as he lounged tentatively by with the remains of his old +jaunty air; for they were his creditors almost without exception. + +At the little fountain in the _plaza_ he made an apology for a toilet +with his wetted handkerchief. Across the open square filed the +dolorous line of friends of the prisoners in the _calaboza_, bearing +the morning meal of the immured. The food in their hands aroused +small longing in Blythe. It was drink that his soul craved, or money +to buy it. + +In the streets he met many with whom he had been friends and equals, +and whose patience and liberality he had gradually exhausted. +Willard Geddie and Paula cantered past him with the coolest of nods, +returning from their daily horseback ride along the old Indian road. +Keogh passed him at another corner, whistling cheerfully and bearing +a prize of newly-laid eggs for the breakfast of himself and Clancy. +The jovial scout of Fortune was one of Blythe's victims who had +plunged his hand oftenest into his pocket to aid him. But now it +seemed that Keogh, too, had fortified himself against further +invasions. His curt greeting and the ominous light in his full, grey +eye quickened the steps of "Beelzebub," whom desperation had almost +incited to attempt an additional "loan." + +Three drinking shops the forlorn one next visited in succession. In +all of these his money, his credit and his welcome had long since +been spent; but Blythe felt that he would have fawned in the dust at +the feet of an enemy that morning for one draught of _aguardiente_. +In two of the _pulperias_ his courageous petition for drink was met +with a refusal so polite that it stung worse than abuse. The third +establishment had acquired something of American methods; and here he +was seized bodily and cast out upon his hands and knees. + +This physical indignity caused a singular change in the man. As he +picked himself up and walked away, an expression of absolute relief +came upon his features. The specious and conciliatory smile that +had been graven there was succeeded by a look of calm and sinister +resolve. "Beelzebub" had been floundering in the sea of improbity, +holding by a slender life-line to the respectable world that had +cast him overboard. He must have felt that with this ultimate shock +the line had snapped, and have experienced the welcome ease of the +drowning swimmer who has ceased to struggle. + +Blythe walked to the next corner and stood there while he brushed the +sand from his garments and re-polished his glasses. + +"I've got to do it--oh, I've got to do it," he told himself, aloud. +"If I had a quart of rum I believe I could stave it off yet--for a +little while. But there's no more rum for--'Beelzebub,' as they call +me. By the flames of Tartarus! if I'm to sit at the right hand of +Satan somebody has got to pay the court expenses. You'll have to pony +up, Mr. Frank Goodwin. You're a good fellow; but a gentleman must +draw the line at being kicked into the gutter. Blackmail isn't a +pretty word, but it's the next station on the road I'm travelling." + +With purpose in his steps Blythe now moved rapidly through the town +by way of its landward environs. He passed through the squalid +quarters of the improvident negroes and on beyond the picturesque +shacks of the poorer _mestizos_. From many points along his course he +could see, through the umbrageous glades, the house of Frank Goodwin +on its wooded hill. And as he crossed the little bridge over the +lagoon he saw the old Indian, Galvez, scrubbing at the wooden slab +that bore the name of Miraflores. Beyond the lagoon the lands of +Goodwin began to slope gently upward. A grassy road, shaded by a +munificent and diverse array of tropical flora wound from the edge of +an outlying banana grove to the dwelling. Blythe took this road with +long and purposeful strides. + +Goodwin was seated on his coolest gallery, dictating letters to his +secretary, a sallow and capable native youth. The household adhered +to the American plan of breakfast; and that meal had been a thing of +the past for the better part of an hour. + +The castaway walked to the steps, and flourished a hand. + +"Good morning, Blythe," said Goodwin, looking up. "Come in and have a +chair. Anything I can do for you?" + +"I want to speak to you in private." + +Goodwin nodded at his secretary, who strolled out under a mango tree +and lit a cigarette. Blythe took the chair that he had left vacant. + +"I want some money," he began, doggedly. + +"I'm sorry," said Goodwin, with equal directness, "but you can't have +any. You're drinking yourself to death, Blythe. Your friends have +done all they could to help you to brace up. You won't help yourself. +There's no use furnishing you with money to ruin yourself with any +longer." + +"Dear man," said Blythe, tilting back his chair, "it isn't a question +of social economy now. It's past that. I like you, Goodwin; and I've +come to stick a knife between your ribs. I was kicked out of Espada's +saloon this morning; and Society owes me reparation for my wounded +feelings." + +"I didn't kick you out." + +"No; but in a general way you represent Society; and in a particular +way you represent my last chance. I've had to come down to it, old +man--I tried to do it a month ago when Losada's man was here turning +things over; but I couldn't do it then. Now it's different. I want a +thousand dollars, Goodwin; and you'll have to give it to me." + +"Only last week," said Goodwin, with a smile, "a silver dollar was +all you were asking for." + +"An evidence," said Blythe, flippantly, "that I was still +virtuous--though under heavy pressure. The wages of sin should be +something higher than a _peso_ worth forty-eight cents. Let's talk +business. I am the villain in the third act; and I must have my +merited, if only temporary, triumph. I saw you collar the late +president's valiseful of boodle. Oh, I know it's blackmail; but I'm +liberal about the price. I know I'm a cheap villain--one of the +regular sawmill-drama kind--but you're one of my particular friends, +and I don't want to stick you hard." + +"Suppose you go into the details," suggested Goodwin, calmly +arranging his letters on the table. + +"All right," said "Beelzebub." "I like the way you take it. I despise +histrionics; so you will please prepare yourself for the facts +without any red fire, calcium or grace notes on the saxophone. + +"On the night that His Fly-by-night Excellency arrived in town I +was very drunk. You will excuse the pride with which I state that +fact; but it was quite a feat for me to attain that desirable state. +Somebody had left a cot out under the orange trees in the yard of +Madama Ortiz's hotel. I stepped over the wall, laid down upon it, and +fell asleep. I was awakened by an orange that dropped from the tree +upon my nose; and I laid there for awhile cursing Sir Isaac Newton, +or whoever it was that invented gravitation, for not confining his +theory to apples. + +"And then along came Mr. Miraflores and his true-love with the +treasury in a valise, and went into the hotel. Next you hove in +sight, and held a pow-wow with the tonsorial artist who insisted upon +talking shop after hours. I tried to slumber again; but once more my +rest was disturbed--this time by the noise of the popgun that went +off upstairs. Then that valise came crashing down into an orange +tree just above my head; and I arose from my couch, not knowing +when it might begin to rain Saratoga trunks. When the army and the +constabulary began to arrive, with their medals and decorations +hastily pinned to their pajamas, and their snickersnees drawn, I +crawled into the welcome shadow of a banana plant. I remained there +for an hour, by which time the excitement and the people had cleared +away. And then, my dear Goodwin--excuse me--I saw you sneak back and +pluck that ripe and juicy valise from the orange tree. I followed +you, and saw you take it to your own house. A hundred-thousand-dollar +crop from one orange tree in a season about breaks the record of the +fruit-growing industry. + +"Being a gentleman at that time, of course, I never mentioned the +incident to anyone. But this morning I was kicked out of a saloon, +my code of honour is all out at the elbows, and I'd sell my mother's +prayer-book for three fingers of _aguardiente_. I'm not putting on +the screws hard. It ought to be worth a thousand to you for me to +have slept on that cot through the whole business without waking up +and seeing anything." + +Goodwin opened two more letters, and made memoranda in pencil on +them. Then he called "Manuel!" to his secretary, who came, spryly. + +"The _Ariel_--when does she sail?" asked Goodwin. + +"Senor," answered the youth, "at three this afternoon. She drops +down-coast to Punta Soledad to complete her cargo of fruit. From +there she sails for New Orleans without delay." + +"_Bueno!_" said Goodwin. "These letters may wait yet awhile." + +The secretary returned to his cigarette under the mango tree. + +"In round numbers," said Goodwin, facing Blythe squarely, "how much +money do you owe in this town, not including the sums you have +'borrowed' from me?" + +"Five hundred--at a rough guess," answered Blythe, lightly. + +"Go somewhere in the town and draw up a schedule of your debts," said +Goodwin. "Come back here in two hours, and I will send Manuel with +the money to pay them. I will also have a decent outfit of clothing +ready for you. You will sail on the _Ariel_ at three. Manuel will +accompany you as far as the deck of the steamer. There he will hand +you one thousand dollars in cash. I suppose that we needn't discuss +what you will be expected to do in return." + +"Oh, I understand," piped Blythe, cheerily. "I was asleep all the +time on the cot under Madama Ortiz's orange trees; and I shake off +the dust of Coralio forever. I'll play fair. No more of the lotus +for me. Your proposition is O. K. You're a good fellow, Goodwin; +and I let you off light. I'll agree to everything. But in the +meantime--I've a devil of a thirst on, old man--" + +"Not a _centavo_," said Goodwin, firmly, "until you are on board the +_Ariel_. You would be drunk in thirty minutes if you had money now." + +But he noticed the blood-streaked eyeballs, the relaxed form and the +shaking hands of "Beelzebub;" and he stepped into the dining room +through the low window, and brought out a glass and a decanter of +brandy. + +"Take a bracer, anyway, before you go," he proposed, even as a man to +the friend whom he entertains. + +"Beelzebub" Blythe's eyes glistened at the sight of the solace for +which his soul burned. To-day for the first time his poisoned nerves +had been denied their steadying dose; and their retort was a mounting +torment. He grasped the decanter and rattled its crystal mouth +against the glass in his trembling hand. He flushed the glass, and +then stood erect, holding it aloft for an instant. For one fleeting +moment he held his head above the drowning waves of his abyss. He +nodded easily at Goodwin, raised his brimming glass and murmured a +"health" that men had used in his ancient Paradise Lost. And then so +suddenly that he spilled the brandy over his hand, he set down his +glass, untasted. + +"In two hours," his dry lips muttered to Goodwin, as he marched down +the steps and turned his face toward the town. + +In the edge of the cool banana grove "Beelzebub" halted, and snapped +the tongue of his belt buckle into another hole. + +"I couldn't do it," he explained, feverishly, to the waving banana +fronds. "I wanted to, but I couldn't. A gentleman can't drink with +the man that he blackmails." + + + + +XII + +SHOES + + +John De Graffenreid Atwood ate of the lotus, root, stem, and flower. +The tropics gobbled him up. He plunged enthusiastically into his +work, which was to try to forget Rosine. + +Now, they who dine on the lotus rarely consume it plain. There is a +sauce _au diable_ that goes with it; and the distillers are the chefs +who prepare it. And on Johnny's menu card it read "brandy." With a +bottle between them, he and Billy Keogh would sit on the porch of the +little consulate at night and roar out great, indecorous songs, until +the natives, slipping hastily past, would shrug a shoulder and mutter +things to themselves about the "_Americanos diablos_." + +One day Johnny's _mozo_ brought the mail and dumped it on the table. +Johnny leaned from his hammock, and fingered the four or five +letters dejectedly. Keogh was sitting on the edge of the table +chopping lazily with a paper knife at the legs of a centipede that +was crawling among the stationery. Johnny was in that phase of +lotus-eating when all the world tastes bitter in one's mouth. + +"Same old thing!" he complained. "Fool people writing for information +about the country. They want to know all about raising fruit, and how +to make a fortune without work. Half of 'em don't even send stamps +for a reply. They think a consul hasn't anything to do but write +letters. Slit those envelopes for me, old man, and see what they +want. I'm feeling too rocky to move." + +Keogh, acclimated beyond all possibility of ill-humour, drew +his chair to the table with smiling compliance on his rose-pink +countenance, and began to slit open the letters. Four of them were +from citizens in various parts of the United States who seemed to +regard the consul at Coralio as a cyclopaedia of information. They +asked long lists of questions, numerically arranged, about the +climate, products, possibilities, laws, business chances, and +statistics of the country in which the consul had the honour of +representing his own government. + +"Write 'em, please, Billy," said that inert official, "just a line, +referring them to the latest consular report. Tell 'em the State +Department will be delighted to furnish the literary gems. Sign my +name. Don't let your pen scratch, Billy; it'll keep me awake." + +"Don't snore," said Keogh, amiably, "and I'll do your work for you. +You need a corps of assistants, anyhow. Don't see how you ever get +out a report. Wake up a minute!--here's one more letter--it's from +your own town, too--Dalesburg." + +"That so?" murmured Johnny showing a mild and obligatory interest. +"What's it about?" + +"Postmaster writes," explained Keogh. "Says a citizen of the town +wants some facts and advice from you. Says the citizen has an idea in +his head of coming down where you are and opening a shoe store. Wants +to know if you think the business would pay. Says he's heard of the +boom along this coast, and wants to get in on the ground floor." + +In spite of the heat and his bad temper, Johnny's hammock swayed +with his laughter. Keogh laughed too; and the pet monkey on the top +shelf of the bookcase chattered in shrill sympathy with the ironical +reception of the letter from Dalesburg. + +"Great bunions!" exclaimed the consul. "Shoe store! What'll they ask +about next, I wonder? Overcoat factory, I reckon. Say, Billy--of our +3,000 citizens, how many do you suppose ever had on a pair of shoes?" + +Keogh reflected judicially. + +"Let's see--there's you and me and--" + +"Not me," said Johnny, promptly and incorrectly, holding up a foot +encased in a disreputable deerskin _zapato_. "I haven't been a victim +to shoes in months." + +"But you've got 'em, though," went on Keogh. "And there's Goodwin +and Blanchard and Geddie and old Lutz and Doc Gregg and that Italian +that's agent for the banana company, and there's old Delgado--no; +he wears sandals. And, oh, yes; there's Madama Ortiz, 'what kapes +the hotel'--she had on a pair of red slippers at the _baile_ the +other night. And Miss Pasa, her daughter, that went to school in +the States--she brought back some civilized notions in the way of +footgear. And there's the _comandante's_ sister that dresses up her +feet on feast-days--and Mrs. Geddie, who wears a two with a Castilian +instep--and that's about all the ladies. Let's see--don't some of the +soldiers at the _cuartel_--no: that's so; they're allowed shoes only +when on the march. In barracks they turn their little toeses out to +grass." + +"'Bout right," agreed the consul. "Not over twenty out of the three +thousand ever felt leather on their walking arrangements. Oh, yes; +Coralio is just the town for an enterprising shoe store--that doesn't +want to part with its goods. Wonder if old Patterson is trying to +jolly me! He always was full of things he called jokes. Write him a +letter, Billy. I'll dictate it. We'll jolly him back a few." + +Keogh dipped his pen, and wrote at Johnny's dictation. With many +pauses, filled in with smoke and sundry travellings of the bottle +and glasses, the following reply to the Dalesburg communication was +perpetrated: + + + MR. OBADIAH PATTERSON, + Dalesburg, Ala. + + _Dear Sir:_ In reply to your favour of July 2d, I have the + honour to inform you that, according to my opinion, there + is no place on the habitable globe that presents to the eye + stronger evidence of the need of a first-class shoe store + than does the town of Coralio. There are 3,000 inhabitants + in the place, and not a single shoe store! The situation + speaks for itself. This coast is rapidly becoming the goal + of enterprising business men, but the shoe business is one + that has been sadly overlooked or neglected. In fact, there + are a considerable number of our citizens actually without + shoes at present. + + Besides the want above mentioned, there is also a crying + need for a brewery, a college of higher mathematics, a coal + yard, and a clean and intellectual Punch and Judy show. I + have the honour to be, sir, + + Your Obt. Servant, + + JOHN DE GRAFFENREID ATWOOD, + U. S. Consul at Coralio. + + P.S.--Hello! Uncle Obadiah. How's the old burg racking + along? What would the government do without you and me? + Look out for a green-headed parrot and a bunch of bananas + soon, from your old friend + + JOHNNY. + + +"I throw in that postscript," explained the consul, "so Uncle Obadiah +won't take offence at the official tone of the letter! Now, Billy, +you get that correspondence fixed up, and send Pancho to the +post-office with it. The _Ariadne_ takes the mail out to-morrow if +they make up that load of fruit to-day." + +The night programme in Coralio never varied. The recreations of the +people were soporific and flat. They wandered about, barefoot and +aimless, speaking lowly and smoking cigar or cigarette. Looking +down on the dimly lighted ways one seemed to see a threading maze +of brunette ghosts tangled with a procession of insane fireflies. +In some houses the thrumming of lugubrious guitars added to the +depression of the _triste_ night. Giant tree-frogs rattled in the +foliage as loudly as the end man's "bones" in a minstrel troupe. By +nine o'clock the streets were almost deserted. + +Nor at the consulate was there often a change of bill. Keogh would +come there nightly, for Coralio's one cool place was the little +seaward porch of that official residence. + +The brandy would be kept moving; and before midnight sentiment would +begin to stir in the heart of the self-exiled consul. Then he would +relate to Keogh the story of his ended romance. Each night Keogh +would listen patiently to the tale, and be ready with untiring +sympathy. + +"But don't you think for a minute"--thus Johnny would always conclude +his woeful narrative--"that I'm grieving about that girl, Billy. I've +forgotten her. She never enters my mind. If she were to enter that +door right now, my pulse wouldn't gain a beat. That's all over long +ago." + +"Don't I know it?" Keogh would answer. "Of course you've forgotten +her. Proper thing to do. Wasn't quite O. K. of her to listen to the +knocks that--er--Dink Pawson kept giving you." + +"Pink Dawson!"--a world of contempt would be in Johnny's tones--"Poor +white trash! That's what he was. Had five hundred acres of farming +land, though; and that counted. Maybe I'll have a chance to get back +at him some day. The Dawsons weren't anybody. Everybody in Alabama +knows the Atwoods. Say, Billy--did you know my mother was a De +Graffenreid?" + +"Why, no," Keogh would say; "is that so?" He had heard it some three +hundred times. + +"Fact. The De Graffenreids of Hancock County. But I never think of +that girl any more, do I, Billy?" + +"Not for a minute, my boy," would be the last sounds heard by the +conqueror of Cupid. + +At this point Johnny would fall into a gentle slumber, and Keogh +would saunter out to his own shack under the calabash tree at the +edge of the plaza. + +In a day or two the letter from the Dalesburg postmaster and its +answer had been forgotten by the Coralio exiles. But on the 26th day +of July the fruit of the reply appeared upon the tree of events. + +The _Andador_, a fruit steamer that visited Coralio regularly, drew +into the offing and anchored. The beach was lined with spectators +while the quarantine doctor and the custom-house crew rowed out to +attend to their duties. + +An hour later Billy Keogh lounged into the consulate, clean and cool +in his linen clothes, and grinning like a pleased shark. + +"Guess what?" he said to Johnny, lounging in his hammock. + +"Too hot to guess," said Johnny, lazily. + +"Your shoe-store man's come," said Keogh, rolling the sweet morsel on +his tongue, "with a stock of goods big enough to supply the continent +as far down as Terra del Fuego. They're carting his cases over to +the custom-house now. Six barges full they brought ashore and have +paddled back for the rest. Oh, ye saints in glory! won't there +be regalements in the air when he gets onto the joke and has an +interview with Mr. Consul? It'll be worth nine years in the tropics +just to witness that one joyful moment." + +Keogh loved to take his mirth easily. He selected a clean place +on the matting and lay upon the floor. The walls shook with his +enjoyment. Johnny turned half over and blinked. + +"Don't tell me," he said, "that anybody was fool enough to take that +letter seriously." + +"Four-thousand-dollar stock of goods!" gasped Keogh, in ecstasy. +"Talk about coals to Newcastle! Why didn't he take a ship-load of +palm-leaf fans to Spitzbergen while he was about it? Saw the old +codger on the beach. You ought to have been there when he put on his +specs and squinted at the five hundred or so barefooted citizens +standing around." + +"Are you telling the truth, Billy?" asked the consul, weakly. + +"Am I? You ought to see the buncoed gentleman's daughter he brought +along. Looks! She makes the brick-dust senoritas here look like +tar-babies." + +"Go on," said Johnny, "if you can stop that asinine giggling. I hate +to see a grown man make a laughing hyena of himself." + +"Name is Hemstetter," went on Keogh. "He's a-- Hello! what's the +matter now?" + +Johnny's moccasined feet struck the floor with a thud as he wriggled +out of his hammock. + +"Get up, you idiot," he said, sternly, "or I'll brain you with this +inkstand. That's Rosine and her father. Gad! what a drivelling idiot +old Patterson is! Get up, here, Billy Keogh, and help me. What the +devil are we going to do? Has all the world gone crazy?" + +Keogh rose and dusted himself. He managed to regain a decorous +demeanour. + +"Situation has got to be met, Johnny," he said, with some success +at seriousness. "I didn't think about its being your girl until you +spoke. First thing to do is to get them comfortable quarters. You go +down and face the music, and I'll trot out to Goodwin's and see if +Mrs. Goodwin won't take them in. They've got the decentest house in +town." + +"Bless you, Billy!" said the consul. "I knew you wouldn't desert me. +The world's bound to come to an end, but maybe we can stave it off +for a day or two." + +Keogh hoisted his umbrella and set out for Goodwin's house. Johnny +put on his coat and hat. He picked up the brandy bottle, but set it +down again without drinking, and marched bravely down to the beach. + +In the shade of the custom-house walls he found Mr. Hemstetter and +Rosine surrounded by a mass of gaping citizens. The customs officers +were ducking and scraping, while the captain of the _Andador_ +interpreted the business of the new arrivals. Rosine looked healthy +and very much alive. She was gazing at the strange scenes around her +with amused interest. There was a faint blush upon her round cheek as +she greeted her old admirer. Mr. Hemstetter shook hands with Johnny +in a very friendly way. He was an oldish, impractical man--one +of that numerous class of erratic business men who are forever +dissatisfied, and seeking a change. + +"I am very glad to see you, John--may I call you John?" he said. "Let +me thank you for your prompt answer to our postmaster's letter of +inquiry. He volunteered to write to you on my behalf. I was looking +about for something different in the way of a business in which the +profits would be greater. I had noticed in the papers that this coast +was receiving much attention from investors. I am extremely grateful +for your advice to come. I sold out everything that I possess, and +invested the proceeds in as fine a stock of shoes as could be bought +in the North. You have a picturesque town here, John. I hope business +will be as good as your letter justifies me in expecting." + +Johnny's agony was abbreviated by the arrival of Keogh, who hurried +up with the news that Mrs. Goodwin would be much pleased to place +rooms at the disposal of Mr. Hemstetter and his daughter. So there +Mr. Hemstetter and Rosine were at once conducted and left to +recuperate from the fatigue of the voyage, while Johnny went down +to see that the cases of shoes were safely stored in the customs +warehouse pending their examination by the officials. Keogh, grinning +like a shark, skirmished about to find Goodwin, to instruct him not +to expose to Mr. Hemstetter the true state of Coralio as a shoe +market until Johnny had been given a chance to redeem the situation, +if such a thing were possible. + +That night the consul and Keogh held a desperate consultation on the +breezy porch of the consulate. + +"Send 'em back home," began Keogh, reading Johnny's thoughts. + +"I would," said Johnny, after a little silence; "but I've been lying +to you, Billy." + +"All right about that," said Keogh, affably. + +"I've told you hundreds of times," said Johnny, slowly, "that I had +forgotten that girl, haven't I?" + +"About three hundred and seventy-five," admitted the monument of +patience. + +"I lied," repeated the consul, "every time. I never forgot her for +one minute. I was an obstinate ass for running away just because she +said 'No' once. And I was too proud a fool to go back. I talked with +Rosine a few minutes this evening up at Goodwin's. I found out one +thing. You remember that farmer fellow who was always after her?" + +"Dink Pawson?" asked Keogh. + +"Pink Dawson. Well, he wasn't a hill of beans to her. She says she +didn't believe a word of the things he told her about me. But I'm +sewed up now, Billy. That tomfool letter we sent ruined whatever +chance I had left. She'll despise me when she finds out that her old +father has been made the victim of a joke that a decent school boy +wouldn't have been guilty of. Shoes! Why he couldn't sell twenty +pairs of shoes in Coralio if he kept store here for twenty years. You +put a pair of shoes on one of these Caribs or Spanish brown boys and +what'd he do? Stand on his head and squeal until he'd kicked 'em off. +None of 'em ever wore shoes and they never will. If I send 'em back +home I'll have to tell the whole story, and what'll she think of +me? I want that girl worse than ever, Billy, and now when she's in +reach I've lost her forever because I tried to be funny when the +thermometer was at 102." + +"Keep cheerful," said the optimistic Keogh. "And let 'em open the +store. I've been busy myself this afternoon. We can stir up a +temporary boom in foot-gear anyhow. I'll buy six pairs when the doors +open. I've been around and seen all the fellows and explained the +catastrophe. They'll all buy shoes like they was centipedes. Frank +Goodwin will take cases of 'em. The Geddies want about eleven pairs +between 'em. Clancy is going to invest the savings of weeks, and even +old Doc Gregg wants three pairs of alligator-hide slippers if they've +got any tens. Blanchard got a look at Miss Hemstetter; and as he's a +Frenchman, no less than a dozen pairs will do for him." + +"A dozen customers," said Johnny, "for a $4,000 stock of shoes! It +won't work. There's a big problem here to figure out. You go home, +Billy, and leave me alone. I've got to work at it all by myself. Take +that bottle of Three-star along with you--no, sir; not another ounce +of booze for the United States consul. I'll sit here to-night and +pull out the think stop. If there's a soft place on this proposition +anywhere I'll land on it. If there isn't there'll be another wreck to +the credit of the gorgeous tropics." + +Keogh left, feeling that he could be of no use. Johnny laid a handful +of cigars on a table and stretched himself in a steamer chair. When +the sudden daylight broke, silvering the harbour ripples, he was +still sitting there. Then he got up, whistling a little tune, and +took his bath. + +At nine o'clock he walked down to the dingy little cable office and +hung for half an hour over a blank. The result of his application was +the following message, which he signed and had transmitted at a cost +of $33: + + + TO PINKNEY DAWSON, + Dalesburg, Ala. + + Draft for $100 comes to you next mail. Ship me immediately + 500 pounds stiff, dry cockleburrs. New use here in arts. + Market price twenty cents pound. Further orders likely. + Rush. + + + + +XIII + +SHIPS + + +Within a week a suitable building had been secured in the Calle +Grande, and Mr. Hemstetter's stock of shoes arranged upon their +shelves. The rent of the store was moderate; and the stock made a +fine showing of neat white boxes, attractively displayed. + +Johnny's friends stood by him loyally. On the first day Keogh +strolled into the store in a casual kind of way about once every +hour, and bought shoes. After he had purchased a pair each of +extension soles, congress gaiters, button kids, low-quartered calfs, +dancing pumps, rubber boots, tans of various hues, tennis shoes and +flowered slippers, he sought out Johnny to be prompted as to names +of other kinds that he might inquire for. The other English-speaking +residents also played their parts nobly by buying often and +liberally. Keogh was grand marshal, and made them distribute their +patronage, thus keeping up a fair run of custom for several days. + +Mr. Hemstetter was gratified by the amount of business done thus far; +but expressed surprise that the natives were so backward with their +custom. + +"Oh, they're awfully shy," explained Johnny, as he wiped his forehead +nervously. "They'll get the habit pretty soon. They'll come with a +rush when they do come." + +One afternoon Keogh dropped into the consul's office, chewing an +unlighted cigar thoughtfully. + +"Got anything up your sleeve?" he inquired of Johnny. "If you have +it's about time to show it. If you can borrow some gent's hat in the +audience, and make a lot of customers for an idle stock of shoes +come out of it, you'd better spiel. The boys have all laid in enough +footwear to last 'em ten years; and there's nothing doing in the shoe +store but dolcy far nienty. I just came by there. Your venerable +victim was standing in the door, gazing through his specs at the +bare toes passing by his emporium. The natives here have got the +true artistic temperament. Me and Clancy took eighteen tintypes this +morning in two hours. There's been but one pair of shoes sold all +day. Blanchard went in and bought a pair of fur-lined house-slippers +because he thought he saw Miss Hemstetter go into the store. I saw +him throw the slippers into the lagoon afterwards." + +"There's a Mobile fruit steamer coming in to-morrow or next day," +said Johnny. "We can't do anything until then." + +"What are you going to do--try to create a demand?" + +"Political economy isn't your strong point," said the consul, +impudently. "You can't create a demand. But you can create a +necessity for a demand. That's what I am going to do." + +Two weeks after the consul sent his cable, a fruit steamer brought +him a huge, mysterious brown bale of some unknown commodity. Johnny's +influence with the custom-house people was sufficiently strong for +him to get the goods turned over to him without the usual inspection. +He had the bale taken to the consulate and snugly stowed in the back +room. + +That night he ripped open a corner of it and took out a handful of +the cockleburrs. He examined them with the care with which a warrior +examines his arms before he goes forth to battle for his lady-love +and life. The burrs were the ripe August product, as hard as +filberts, and bristling with spines as tough and sharp as needles. +Johnny whistled softly a little tune, and went out to find Billy +Keogh. + +Later in the night, when Coralio was steeped in slumber, he and Billy +went forth into the deserted streets with their coats bulging like +balloons. All up and down the Calle Grande they went, sowing the +sharp burrs carefully in the sand, along the narrow sidewalks, in +every foot of grass between the silent houses. And then they took the +side streets and by-ways, missing none. No place where the foot of +man, woman or child might fall was slighted. Many trips they made to +and from the prickly hoard. And then, nearly at the dawn, they laid +themselves down to rest calmly, as great generals do after planning +a victory according to the revised tactics, and slept, knowing that +they had sowed with the accuracy of Satan sowing tares and the +perseverance of Paul planting. + +With the rising sun came the purveyors of fruits and meats, and +arranged their wares in and around the little market-house. At one +end of the town near the seashore the market-house stood; and the +sowing of the burrs had not been carried that far. The dealers waited +long past the hour when their sales usually began. None came to buy. +"_Que hay?_" they began to exclaim, one to another. + +At their accustomed time, from every 'dobe and palm hut and +grass-thatched shack and dim _patio_ glided women--black women, brown +women, lemon-colored women, women dun and yellow and tawny. They +were the marketers starting to purchase the family supply of cassava, +plantains, meat, fowls, and tortillas. Decollete they were and +bare-armed and bare-footed, with a single skirt reaching below the +knee. Stolid and ox-eyed, they stepped from their doorways into the +narrow paths or upon the soft grass of the streets. + +The first to emerge uttered ambiguous squeals, and raised one foot +quickly. Another step and they sat down, with shrill cries of alarm, +to pick at the new and painful insects that had stung them upon the +feet. "_Que picadores diablos!_" they screeched to one another across +the narrow ways. Some tried the grass instead of the paths, but there +they were also stung and bitten by the strange little prickly balls. +They plumped down in the grass, and added their lamentations to those +of their sisters in the sandy paths. All through the town was heard +the plaint of the feminine jabber. The venders in the market still +wondered why no customers came. + +Then men, lords of the earth, came forth. They, too, began to hop, +to dance, to limp, and to curse. They stood stranded and foolish, or +stooped to pluck at the scourge that attacked their feet and ankles. +Some loudly proclaimed the pest to be poisonous spiders of an unknown +species. + +And then the children ran out for their morning romp. And now to +the uproar was added the howls of limping infants and cockleburred +childhood. Every minute the advancing day brought forth fresh +victims. + +Dona Maria Castillas y Buenventura de las Casas stepped from her +honoured doorway, as was her daily custom, to procure fresh bread +from the _panaderia_ across the street. She was clad in a skirt of +flowered yellow satin, a chemise of ruffled linen, and wore a purple +mantilla from the looms of Spain. Her lemon-tinted feet, alas! were +bare. Her progress was majestic, for were not her ancestors hidalgos +of Aragon? Three steps she made across the velvety grass, and +set her aristocratic sole upon a bunch of Johnny's burrs. Dona +Maria Castillas y Buenventura de las Casas emitted a yowl even +as a wild-cat. Turning about, she fell upon hands and knees, and +crawled--ay, like a beast of the field she crawled back to her +honourable door-sill. + +Don Senor Ildefonso Federico Valdazar, _Juez de la Paz_, weighing +twenty stone, attempted to convey his bulk to the _pulperia_ at +the corner of the plaza in order to assuage his matutinal thirst. +The first plunge of his unshod foot into the cool grass struck a +concealed mine. Don Ildefonso fell like a crumpled cathedral, crying +out that he had been fatally bitten by a deadly scorpion. Everywhere +were the shoeless citizens hopping, stumbling, limping, and picking +from their feet the venomous insects that had come in a single night +to harass them. + +The first to perceive the remedy was Esteban Delgado, the barber, a +man of travel and education. Sitting upon a stone, he plucked burrs +from his toes, and made oration: + +"Behold, my friends, these bugs of the devil! I know them well. They +soar through the skies in swarms like pigeons. These are the dead +ones that fell during the night. In Yucatan I have seen them as large +as oranges. Yes! There they hiss like serpents, and have wings like +bats. It is the shoes--the shoes that one needs! _Zapatos--zapatos +para mi!_" + +Esteban hobbled to Mr. Hemstetter's store, and bought shoes. Coming +out, he swaggered down the street with impunity, reviling loudly the +bugs of the devil. The suffering ones sat up or stood upon one foot +and beheld the immune barber. Men, women and children took up the +cry: "_Zapatos! zapatos!_" + +The necessity for the demand had been created. The demand followed. +That day Mr. Hemstetter sold three hundred pairs of shoes. + +"It is really surprising," he said to Johnny, who came up in the +evening to help him straighten out the stock, "how trade is picking +up. Yesterday I made but three sales." + +"I told you they'd whoop things up when they got started," said the +consul. + +"I think I shall order a dozen more cases of goods, to keep the stock +up," said Mr. Hemstetter, beaming through his spectacles. + +"I wouldn't send in any orders yet," advised Johnny. "Wait till you +see how the trade holds up." + +Each night Johnny and Keogh sowed the crop that grew dollars by day. +At the end of ten days two-thirds of the stock of shoes had been +sold; and the stock of cockleburrs was exhausted. Johnny cabled to +Pink Dawson for another 500 pounds, paying twenty cents per pound as +before. Mr. Hemstetter carefully made up an order for $1500 worth of +shoes from Northern firms. Johnny hung about the store until this +order was ready for the mail, and succeeded in destroying it before +it reached the postoffice. + +That night he took Rosine under the mango tree by Goodwin's porch, +and confessed everything. She looked him in the eye, and said: "You +are a very wicked man. Father and I will go back home. You say it was +a joke? I think it is a very serious matter." + +But at the end of half an hour's argument the conversation had +been turned upon a different subject. The two were considering the +respective merits of pale blue and pink wall paper with which the +old colonial mansion of the Atwoods in Dalesburg was to be decorated +after the wedding. + +On the next morning Johnny confessed to Mr. Hemstetter. The shoe +merchant put on his spectacles, and said through them: "You strike me +as being a most extraordinary young scamp. If I had not managed this +enterprise with good business judgment my entire stock of goods might +have been a complete loss. Now, how do you propose to dispose of the +rest of it?" + +When the second invoice of cockleburrs arrived Johnny loaded them and +the remainder of the shoes into a schooner, and sailed down the coast +to Alazan. + +There, in the same dark and diabolical manner, he repeated his +success; and came back with a bag of money and not so much as a +shoestring. + +And then he besought his great Uncle of the waving goatee and starred +vest to accept his resignation, for the lotus no longer lured him. He +hankered for the spinach and cress of Dalesburg. + +The services of Mr. William Terence Keogh as acting consul, _pro +tem._, were suggested and accepted, and Johnny sailed with the +Hemstetters back to his native shores. + +Keogh slipped into the sinecure of the American consulship with +the ease that never left him even in such high places. The tintype +establishment was soon to become a thing of the past, although its +deadly work along the peaceful and helpless Spanish Main was never +effaced. The restless partners were about to be off again, scouting +ahead of the slow ranks of Fortune. But now they would take different +ways. There were rumours of a promising uprising in Peru; and thither +the martial Clancy would turn his adventurous steps. As for Keogh, he +was figuring in his mind and on quires of Government letter-heads a +scheme that dwarfed the art of misrepresenting the human countenance +upon tin. + +"What suits me," Keogh used to say, "in the way of a business +proposition is something diversified that looks like a longer shot +than it is--something in the way of a genteel graft that isn't worked +enough for the correspondence schools to be teaching it by mail. I +take the long end; but I like to have at least as good a chance to +win as a man learning to play poker on an ocean steamer, or running +for governor of Texas on the Republican ticket. And when I cash in my +winnings, I don't want to find any widows' and orphans' chips in my +stack." + +The grass-grown globe was the green table on which Keogh gambled. The +games he played were of his own invention. He was no grubber after +the diffident dollar. Nor did he care to follow it with horn and +hounds. Rather he loved to coax it with egregious and brilliant flies +from its habitat in the waters of strange streams. Yet Keogh was a +business man; and his schemes, in spite of their singularity, were as +solidly set as the plans of a building contractor. In Arthur's time +Sir William Keogh would have been a Knight of the Round Table. In +these modern days he rides abroad, seeking the Graft instead of the +Grail. + +Three days after Johnny's departure, two small schooners appeared +off Coralio. After some delay a boat put off from one of them, and +brought a sunburned young man ashore. This young man had a shrewd and +calculating eye; and he gazed with amazement at the strange things +that he saw. He found on the beach some one who directed him to the +consul's office; and thither he made his way at a nervous gait. + +Keogh was sprawled in the official chair, drawing caricatures of +his Uncle's head on an official pad of paper. He looked up at his +visitor. + +"Where's Johnny Atwood?" inquired the sunburned young man, in a +business tone. + +"Gone," said Keogh, working carefully at Uncle Sam's necktie. + +"That's just like him," remarked the nut-brown one, leaning against +the table. "He always was a fellow to gallivant around instead of +'tending to business. Will he be in soon?" + +"Don't think so," said Keogh, after a fair amount of deliberation. + +"I s'pose he's out at some of his tomfoolery," conjectured the +visitor, in a tone of virtuous conviction. "Johnny never would stick +to anything long enough to succeed. I wonder how he manages to run +his business here, and never be 'round to look after it." + +"I'm looking after the business just now," admitted the _pro tem._ +consul. + +"Are you--then, say!--where's the factory?" + +"What factory?" asked Keogh, with a mildly polite interest. + +"Why, the factory where they use them cockleburrs. Lord knows what +they use 'em for, anyway! I've got the basements of both them ships +out there loaded with 'em. I'll give you a bargain in this lot. I've +had every man, woman and child around Dalesburg that wasn't busy +pickin' 'em for a month. I hired these ships to bring 'em over. +Everybody thought I was crazy. Now, you can have this lot for fifteen +cents a pound, delivered on land. And if you want more I guess old +Alabam' can come up to the demand. Johnny told me when he left home +that if he struck anything down here that there was any money in he'd +let me in on it. Shall I drive the ships in and hitch?" + +A look of supreme, almost incredulous, delight dawned in Keogh's +ruddy countenance. He dropped his pencil. His eyes turned upon the +sunburned young man with joy in them mingled with fear lest his +ecstasy should prove a dream. + +"For God's sake, tell me," said Keogh, earnestly, "are you Dink +Pawson?" + +"My name is Pinkney Dawson," said the cornerer of the cockleburr +market. + +Billy Keogh slid rapturously and gently from his chair to his +favourite strip of matting on the floor. + +There were not many sounds in Coralio on that sultry afternoon. +Among those that were may be mentioned a noise of enraptured and +unrighteous laughter from a prostrate Irish-American, while a +sunburned young man, with a shrewd eye, looked on him with wonder and +amazement. Also the "tramp, tramp, tramp" of many well-shod feet in +the streets outside. Also the lonesome wash of the waves that beat +along the historic shores of the Spanish Main. + + + + +XIV + +MASTERS OF ARTS + + +A two-inch stub of a blue pencil was the wand with which Keogh +performed the preliminary acts of his magic. So, with this he covered +paper with diagrams and figures while he waited for the United States +of America to send down to Coralio a successor to Atwood, resigned. + +The new scheme that his mind had conceived, his stout heart indorsed, +and his blue pencil corroborated, was laid around the characteristics +and human frailties of the new president of Anchuria. These +characteristics, and the situation out of which Keogh hoped to wrest +a golden tribute, deserve chronicling contributive to the clear order +of events. + +President Losada--many called him Dictator--was a man whose genius +would have made him conspicuous even among Anglo-Saxons, had not +that genius been intermixed with other traits that were petty and +subversive. He had some of the lofty patriotism of Washington (the +man he most admired), the force of Napoleon, and much of the wisdom +of the sages. These characteristics might have justified him in the +assumption of the title of "The Illustrious Liberator," had they not +been accompanied by a stupendous and amazing vanity that kept him in +the less worthy ranks of the dictators. + +Yet he did his country great service. With a mighty grasp he shook it +nearly free from the shackles of ignorance and sloth and the vermin +that fed upon it, and all but made it a power in the council of +nations. He established schools and hospitals, built roads, bridges, +railroads and palaces, and bestowed generous subsidies upon the arts +and sciences. He was the absolute despot and the idol of his people. +The wealth of the country poured into his hands. Other presidents had +been rapacious without reason. Losada amassed enormous wealth, but +his people had their share of the benefits. + +The joint in his armour was his insatiate passion for monuments and +tokens commemorating his glory. In every town he caused to be erected +statues of himself bearing legends in praise of his greatness. In +the walls of every public edifice, tablets were fixed reciting his +splendour and the gratitude of his subjects. His statuettes and +portraits were scattered throughout the land in every house and hut. +One of the sycophants in his court painted him as St. John, with a +halo and a train of attendants in full uniform. Losada saw nothing +incongruous in this picture, and had it hung in a church in the +capital. He ordered from a French sculptor a marble group including +himself with Napoleon, Alexander the Great, and one or two others +whom he deemed worthy of the honour. + +He ransacked Europe for decorations, employing policy, money and +intrigue to cajole the orders he coveted from kings and rulers. On +state occasions his breast was covered from shoulder to shoulder with +crosses, stars, golden roses, medals and ribbons. It was said that +the man who could contrive for him a new decoration, or invent some +new method of extolling his greatness, might plunge a hand deep into +the treasury. + +This was the man upon whom Billy Keogh had his eye. The gentle +buccaneer had observed the rain of favors that fell upon those who +ministered to the president's vanities, and he did not deem it his +duty to hoist his umbrella against the scattering drops of liquid +fortune. + +In a few weeks the new consul arrived, releasing Keogh from his +temporary duties. He was a young man fresh from college, who lived +for botany alone. The consulate at Coralio gave him the opportunity +to study tropical flora. He wore smoked glasses, and carried a green +umbrella. He filled the cool, back porch of the consulate with plants +and specimens so that space for a bottle and chair was not to be +found. Keogh gazed on him sadly, but without rancour, and began to +pack his gripsack. For his new plot against stagnation along the +Spanish Main required of him a voyage overseas. + +Soon came the _Karlsefin_ again--she of the trampish habits--gleaning +a cargo of cocoanuts for a speculative descent upon the New York +market. Keogh was booked for a passage on the return trip. + +"Yes, I'm going to New York," he explained to the group of his +countrymen that had gathered on the beach to see him off. "But I'll +be back before you miss me. I've undertaken the art education of this +piebald country, and I'm not the man to desert it while it's in the +early throes of tintypes." + +With this mysterious declaration of his intentions Keogh boarded the +_Karlsefin_. + +Ten days later, shivering, with the collar of his thin coat turned +high, he burst into the studio of Carolus White at the top of a tall +building in Tenth Street, New York City. + +Carolus White was smoking a cigarette and frying sausages over an oil +stove. He was only twenty-three, and had noble theories about art. + +"Billy Keogh!" exclaimed White, extending the hand that was not busy +with the frying pan. "From what part of the uncivilized world, I +wonder!" + +"Hello, Carry," said Keogh, dragging forward a stool, and holding his +fingers close to the stove. "I'm glad I found you so soon. I've been +looking for you all day in the directories and art galleries. The +free-lunch man on the corner told me where you were, quick. I was +sure you'd be painting pictures yet." + +Keogh glanced about the studio with the shrewd eye of a connoisseur +in business. + +"Yes, you can do it," he declared, with many gentle nods of his head. +"That big one in the corner with the angels and green clouds and +band-wagon is just the sort of thing we want. What would you call +that, Carry--scene from Coney Island, ain't it?" + +"That," said White, "I had intended to call 'The Translation of +Elijah,' but you may be nearer right than I am." + +"Name doesn't matter," said Keogh, largely; "it's the frame and the +varieties of paint that does the trick. Now, I can tell you in a +minute what I want. I've come on a little voyage of two thousand +miles to take you in with me on a scheme. I thought of you as soon as +the scheme showed itself to me. How would you like to go back with +me and paint a picture? Ninety days for the trip, and five thousand +dollars for the job." + +"Cereal food or hair-tonic posters?" asked White. + +"It isn't an ad." + +"What kind of a picture is it to be?" + +"It's a long story," said Keogh. + +"Go ahead with it. If you don't mind, while you talk I'll just keep +my eye on these sausages. Let 'em get one shade deeper than a Vandyke +brown and you spoil 'em." + +Keogh explained his project. They were to return to Coralio, where +White was to pose as a distinguished American portrait painter who +was touring in the tropics as a relaxation from his arduous and +remunerative professional labours. It was not an unreasonable hope, +even to those who had trod in the beaten paths of business, that an +artist with so much prestige might secure a commission to perpetuate +upon canvas the lineaments of the president, and secure a share of +the _pesos_ that were raining upon the caterers to his weaknesses. + +Keogh had set his price at ten thousand dollars. Artists had been +paid more for portraits. He and White were to share the expenses of +the trip, and divide the possible profits. Thus he laid the scheme +before White, whom he had known in the West before one declared for +Art and the other became a Bedouin. + +Before long the two machinators abandoned the rigour of the bare +studio for a snug corner of a cafe. There they sat far into the +night, with old envelopes and Keogh's stub of blue pencil between +them. + +At twelve o'clock White doubled up in his chair, with his chin on his +fist, and shut his eyes at the unbeautiful wall-paper. + +"I'll go you, Billy," he said, in the quiet tones of decision. "I've +got two or three hundred saved up for sausages and rent; and I'll +take the chance with you. Five thousand! It will give me two years in +Paris and one in Italy. I'll begin to pack to-morrow." + +"You'll begin in ten minutes," said Keogh. "It's to-morrow now. The +_Karlsefin_ starts back at four P.M. Come on to your painting shop, +and I'll help you." + +For five months in the year Coralio is the Newport of Anchuria. +Then only does the town possess life. From November to March it is +practically the seat of government. The president with his official +family sojourns there; and society follows him. The pleasure-loving +people make the season one long holiday of amusement and rejoicing. +_Fiestas_, balls, games, sea bathing, processions and small theatres +contribute to their enjoyment. The famous Swiss band from the +capital plays in the little plaza every evening, while the fourteen +carriages and vehicles in the town circle in funereal but complacent +procession. Indians from the interior mountains, looking like +prehistoric stone idols, come down to peddle their handiwork in the +streets. The people throng the narrow ways, a chattering, happy, +careless stream of buoyant humanity. Preposterous children rigged out +with the shortest of ballet skirts and gilt wings, howl, underfoot, +among the effervescent crowds. Especially is the arrival of the +presidential party, at the opening of the season, attended with pomp, +show and patriotic demonstrations of enthusiasm and delight. + +When Keogh and White reached their destination, on the return trip +of the _Karlsefin_, the gay winter season was well begun. As they +stepped upon the beach they could hear the band playing in the plaza. +The village maidens, with fireflies already fixed in their dark +locks, were gliding, barefoot and coy-eyed, along the paths. Dandies +in white linen, swinging their canes, were beginning their seductive +strolls. The air was full of human essence, of artificial enticement, +of coquetry, indolence, pleasure--the man-made sense of existence. + +The first two or three days after their arrival were spent in +preliminaries. Keogh escorted the artist about town, introducing +him to the little circle of English-speaking residents and pulling +whatever wires he could to effect the spreading of White's fame as a +painter. And then Keogh planned a more spectacular demonstration of +the idea he wished to keep before the public. + +He and White engaged rooms in the Hotel de los Estranjeros. The +two were clad in new suits of immaculate duck, with American straw +hats, and carried canes of remarkable uniqueness and inutility. Few +caballeros in Coralio--even the gorgeously uniformed officers of +the Anchurian army--were as conspicuous for ease and elegance of +demeanour as Keogh and his friend, the great American painter, Senor +White. + +White set up his easel on the beach and made striking sketches of the +mountain and sea views. The native population formed at his rear in a +vast, chattering semicircle to watch his work. Keogh, with his care +for details, had arranged for himself a pose which he carried out +with fidelity. His role was that of friend to the great artist, a +man of affairs and leisure. The visible emblem of his position was a +pocket camera. + +"For branding the man who owns it," said he, "a genteel dilettante +with a bank account and an easy conscience, a steam-yacht ain't in it +with a camera. You see a man doing nothing but loafing around making +snap-shots, and you know right away he reads up well in 'Bradstreet.' +You notice these old millionaire boys--soon as they get through +taking everything else in sight they go to taking photographs. +People are more impressed by a kodak than they are by a title or +a four-carat scarf-pin." So Keogh strolled blandly about Coralio, +snapping the scenery and the shrinking senoritas, while White posed +conspicuously in the higher regions of art. + +Two weeks after their arrival, the scheme began to bear fruit. +An aide-de-camp of the president drove to the hotel in a dashing +victoria. The president desired that Senor White come to the Casa +Morena for an informal interview. + +Keogh gripped his pipe tightly between his teeth. "Not a cent less +than ten thousand," he said to the artist--"remember the price. +And in gold or its equivalent--don't let him stick you with this +bargain-counter stuff they call money here." + +"Perhaps it isn't that he wants," said White. + +"Get out!" said Keogh, with splendid confidence. "I know what he +wants. He wants his picture painted by the celebrated young American +painter and filibuster now sojourning in his down-trodden country. +Off you go." + +The victoria sped away with the artist. Keogh walked up and down, +puffing great clouds of smoke from his pipe, and waited. In an hour +the victoria swept again to the door of the hotel, deposited White, +and vanished. The artist dashed up the stairs, three at a step. Keogh +stopped smoking, and became a silent interrogation point. + +"Landed," exclaimed White, with his boyish face flushed with elation. +"Billy, you are a wonder. He wants a picture. I'll tell you all about +it. By Heavens! that dictator chap is a corker! He's a dictator clear +down to his finger-ends. He's a kind of combination of Julius Caesar, +Lucifer and Chauncey Depew done in sepia. Polite and grim--that's his +way. The room I saw him in was about ten acres big, and looked like +a Mississippi steamboat with its gilding and mirrors and white paint. +He talks English better than I can ever hope to. The matter of the +price came up. I mentioned ten thousand. I expected him to call the +guard and have me taken out and shot. He didn't move an eyelash. He +just waved one of his chestnut hands in a careless way, and said, +'Whatever you say.' I am to go back to-morrow and discuss with him +the details of the picture." + +Keogh hung his head. Self-abasement was easy to read in his downcast +countenance. + +"I'm failing, Carry," he said, sorrowfully. "I'm not fit to handle +these man's-size schemes any longer. Peddling oranges in a push-cart +is about the suitable graft for me. When I said ten thousand, I +swear I thought I had sized up that brown man's limit to within +two cents. He'd have melted down for fifteen thousand just as easy. +Say--Carry--you'll see old man Keogh safe in some nice, quiet idiot +asylum, won't you, if he makes a break like that again?" + +The Casa Morena, although only one story in height, was a building of +brown stone, luxurious as a palace in its interior. It stood on a low +hill in a walled garden of splendid tropical flora at the upper edge +of Coralio. The next day the president's carriage came again for the +artist. Keogh went out for a walk along the beach, where he and his +"picture box" were now familiar sights. When he returned to the hotel +White was sitting in a steamer-chair on the balcony. + +"Well," said Keogh, "did you and His Nibs decide on the kind of a +chromo he wants?" + +White got up and walked back and forth on the balcony a few times. +Then he stopped, and laughed strangely. His face was flushed, and his +eyes were bright with a kind of angry amusement. + +"Look here, Billy," he said, somewhat roughly, "when you first came +to me in my studio and mentioned a picture, I thought you wanted a +Smashed Oats or a Hair Tonic poster painted on a range of mountains +or the side of a continent. Well, either of those jobs would have +been Art in its highest form compared to the one you've steered me +against. I can't paint that picture, Billy. You've got to let me +out. Let me try to tell you what that barbarian wants. He had it +all planned out and even a sketch made of his idea. The old boy +doesn't draw badly at all. But, ye goddesses of Art! listen to the +monstrosity he expects me to paint. He wants himself in the centre +of the canvas, of course. He is to be painted as Jupiter sitting +on Olympus, with the clouds at his feet. At one side of him stands +George Washington, in full regimentals, with his hand on the +president's shoulder. An angel with outstretched wings hovers +overhead, and is placing a laurel wreath on the president's head, +crowning him--Queen of the May, I suppose. In the background is to +be cannon, more angels and soldiers. The man who would paint that +picture would have to have the soul of a dog, and would deserve to go +down into oblivion without even a tin can tied to his tail to sound +his memory." + +Little beads of moisture crept out all over Billy Keogh's brow. The +stub of his blue pencil had not figured out a contingency like this. +The machinery of his plan had run with flattering smoothness until +now. He dragged another chair upon the balcony, and got White back to +his seat. He lit his pipe with apparent calm. + +"Now, sonny," he said, with gentle grimness, "you and me will have +an Art to Art talk. You've got your art and I've got mine. Yours is +the real Pierian stuff that turns up its nose at bock-beer signs and +oleographs of the Old Mill. Mine's the art of Business. This was my +scheme, and it worked out like two-and-two. Paint that president man +as Old King Cole, or Venus, or a landscape, or a fresco, or a bunch +of lilies, or anything he thinks he looks like. But get the paint on +the canvas and collect the spoils. You wouldn't throw me down, Carry, +at this stage of the game. Think of that ten thousand." + +"I can't help thinking of it," said White, "and that's what hurts. +I'm tempted to throw every ideal I ever had down in the mire, and +steep my soul in infamy by painting that picture. That five thousand +meant three years of foreign study to me, and I'd almost sell my soul +for that." + +"Now it ain't as bad as that," said Keogh, soothingly. "It's a +business proposition. It's so much paint and time against money. I +don't fall in with your idea that that picture would so everlastingly +jolt the art side of the question. George Washington was all right, +you know, and nobody could say a word against the angel. I don't +think so bad of that group. If you was to give Jupiter a pair of +epaulets and a sword, and kind of work the clouds around to look +like a blackberry patch, it wouldn't make such a bad battle scene. +Why, if we hadn't already settled on the price, he ought to pay an +extra thousand for Washington, and the angel ought to raise it five +hundred." + +"You don't understand, Billy," said White, with an uneasy laugh. +"Some of us fellows who try to paint have big notions about Art. I +wanted to paint a picture some day that people would stand before and +forget that it was made of paint. I wanted it to creep into them like +a bar of music and mushroom there like a soft bullet. And I wanted +'em to go away and ask, 'What else has he done?' And I didn't want +'em to find a thing; not a portrait nor a magazine cover nor an +illustration nor a drawing of a girl--nothing but _the_ picture. +That's why I've lived on fried sausages, and tried to keep true +to myself. I persuaded myself to do this portrait for the chance +it might give me to study abroad. But this howling, screaming +caricature! Good Lord! can't you see how it is?" + +"Sure," said Keogh, as tenderly as he would have spoken to a child, +and he laid a long forefinger on White's knee. "I see. It's bad to +have your art all slugged up like that. I know. You wanted to paint a +big thing like the panorama of the battle of Gettysburg. But let me +kalsomine you a little mental sketch to consider. Up to date we're +out $385.50 on this scheme. Our capital took every cent both of us +could raise. We've got about enough left to get back to New York on. +I need my share of that ten thousand. I want to work a copper deal +in Idaho, and make a hundred thousand. That's the business end of +the thing. Come down off your art perch, Carry, and let's land that +hatful of dollars." + +"Billy," said White, with an effort, "I'll try. I won't say I'll do +it, but I'll try. I'll go at it, and put it through if I can." + +"That's business," said Keogh heartily. "Good boy! Now, here's +another thing--rush that picture--crowd it through as quick as you +can. Get a couple of boys to help you mix the paint if necessary. +I've picked up some pointers around town. The people here are +beginning to get sick of Mr. President. They say he's been too free +with concessions; and they accuse him of trying to make a dicker with +England to sell out the country. We want that picture done and paid +for before there's any row." + +In the great _patio_ of Casa Morena, the president caused to be +stretched a huge canvas. Under this White set up his temporary +studio. For two hours each day the great man sat to him. + +White worked faithfully. But, as the work progressed, he had seasons +of bitter scorn, of infinite self-contempt, of sullen gloom and +sardonic gaiety. Keogh, with the patience of a great general, +soothed, coaxed, argued--kept him at the picture. + +At the end of a month White announced that the picture was +completed--Jupiter, Washington, angels, clouds, cannon and all. His +face was pale and his mouth drawn straight when he told Keogh. He +said the president was much pleased with it. It was to be hung in +the National Gallery of Statesmen and Heroes. The artist had been +requested to return to Casa Morena on the following day to receive +payment. At the appointed time he left the hotel, silent under his +friend's joyful talk of their success. + +An hour later he walked into the room where Keogh was waiting, threw +his hat on the floor, and sat upon the table. + +"Billy," he said, in strained and labouring tones, "I've a little +money out West in a small business that my brother is running. It's +what I've been living on while I've been studying art. I'll draw out +my share and pay you back what you've lost on this scheme." + +"Lost!" exclaimed Keogh, jumping up. "Didn't you get paid for the +picture?" + +"Yes, I got paid," said White. "But just now there isn't any picture, +and there isn't any pay. If you care to hear about it, here are the +edifying details. The president and I were looking at the painting. +His secretary brought a bank draft on New York for ten thousand +dollars and handed it to me. The moment I touched it I went wild. I +tore it into little pieces and threw them on the floor. A workman +was repainting the pillars inside the _patio_. A bucket of his paint +happened to be convenient. I picked up his brush and slapped a quart +of blue paint all over that ten-thousand-dollar nightmare. I bowed, +and walked out. The president didn't move or speak. That was one time +he was taken by surprise. It's tough on you, Billy, but I couldn't +help it." + +There seemed to be excitement in Coralio. Outside there was a +confused, rising murmur pierced by high-pitched cries. "_Bajo el +traidor--Muerte el traidor!_" were the words they seemed to form. + +"Listen to that!" exclaimed White, bitterly: "I know that much +Spanish. They're shouting, 'Down with the traitor!' I heard them +before. I felt that they meant me. I was a traitor to Art. The +picture had to go." + +"'Down with the blank fool' would have suited your case better," said +Keogh, with fiery emphasis. "You tear up ten thousand dollars like an +old rag because the way you've spread on five dollars' worth of paint +hurts your conscience. Next time I pick a side-partner in a scheme +the man has got to go before a notary and swear he never even heard +the word 'ideal' mentioned." + +Keogh strode from the room, white-hot. White paid little attention +to his resentment. The scorn of Billy Keogh seemed a trifling thing +beside the greater self-scorn he had escaped. + +In Coralio the excitement waxed. An outburst was imminent. The cause +of this demonstration of displeasure was the presence in the town of +a big, pink-cheeked Englishman, who, it was said, was an agent of his +government come to clinch the bargain by which the president placed +his people in the hands of a foreign power. It was charged that not +only had he given away priceless concessions, but that the public +debt was to be transferred into the hands of the English, and the +custom-houses turned over to them as a guarantee. The long-enduring +people had determined to make their protest felt. + +On that night, in Coralio and in other towns, their ire found vent. +Yelling mobs, mercurial but dangerous, roamed the streets. They +overthrew the great bronze statue of the president that stood in the +centre of the plaza, and hacked it to shapeless pieces. They tore +from public buildings the tablets set there proclaiming the glory +of the "Illustrious Liberator." His pictures in the government +offices were demolished. The mobs even attacked the Casa Morena, but +were driven away by the military, which remained faithful to the +executive. All the night terror reigned. + +The greatness of Losada was shown by the fact that by noon the +next day order was restored, and he was still absolute. He issued +proclamations denying positively that any negotiations of any +kind had been entered into with England. Sir Stafford Vaughn, the +pink-cheeked Englishman, also declared in placards and in public +print that his presence there had no international significance. He +was a traveller without guile. In fact (so he stated), he had not +even spoken with the president or been in his presence since his +arrival. + +During this disturbance, White was preparing for his homeward voyage +in the steamship that was to sail within two or three days. About +noon, Keogh, the restless, took his camera out with the hope of +speeding the lagging hours. The town was now as quiet as if peace had +never departed from her perch on the red-tiled roofs. + +About the middle of the afternoon, Keogh hurried back to the hotel +with something decidedly special in his air. He retired to the little +room where he developed his pictures. + +Later on he came out to White on the balcony, with a luminous, grim, +predatory smile on his face. + +"Do you know what that is?" he asked, holding up a 4 x 5 photograph +mounted on cardboard. + +"Snap-shot of a senorita sitting in the sand--alliteration +unintentional," guessed White, lazily. + +"Wrong," said Keogh with shining eyes. "It's a slung-shot. It's a can +of dynamite. It's a gold mine. It's a sight-draft on your president +man for twenty thousand dollars--yes, sir--twenty thousand this time, +and no spoiling the picture. No ethics of art in the way. Art! You +with your smelly little tubes! I've got you skinned to death with a +kodak. Take a look at that." + +White took the picture in his hand, and gave a long whistle. + +"Jove!" he exclaimed, "but wouldn't that stir up a row in town if you +let it be seen. How in the world did you get it, Billy?" + +"You know that high wall around the president man's back garden? +I was up there trying to get a bird's-eye of the town. I happened +to notice a chink in the wall where a stone and a lot of plaster +had slid out. Thinks I, I'll take a peep through to see how Mr. +President's cabbages are growing. The first thing I saw was him and +this Sir Englishman sitting at a little table about twenty feet away. +They had the table all spread over with documents, and they were +hobnobbing over them as thick as two pirates. 'Twas a nice corner +of the garden, all private and shady with palms and orange trees, +and they had a pail of champagne set by handy in the grass. I knew +then was the time for me to make my big hit in Art. So I raised the +machine up to the crack, and pressed the button. Just as I did so +them old boys shook hands on the deal--you see they took that way in +the picture." + +Keogh put on his coat and hat. + +"What are you going to do with it?" asked White. + +"Me," said Keogh in a hurt tone, "why, I'm going to tie a pink ribbon +to it and hang it on the what-not, of course. I'm surprised at +you. But while I'm out you just try to figure out what ginger-cake +potentate would be most likely to want to buy this work of art for +his private collection--just to keep it out of circulation." + +The sunset was reddening the tops of the cocoanut palms when +Billy Keogh came back from Casa Morena. He nodded to the artist's +questioning gaze; and lay down on a cot with his hands under the back +of his head. + +"I saw him. He paid the money like a little man. They didn't want to +let me in at first. I told 'em it was important. Yes, that president +man is on the plenty-able list. He's got a beautiful business system +about the way he uses his brains. All I had to do was to hold +up the photograph so he could see it, and name the price. He +just smiled, and walked over to a safe and got the cash. Twenty +one-thousand-dollar brand-new United States Treasury notes he laid +on the table, like I'd pay out a dollar and a quarter. Fine notes, +too--they crackled with a sound like burning the brush off a ten-acre +lot." + +"Let's try the feel of one," said White, curiously. "I never saw a +thousand-dollar bill." Keogh did not immediately respond. + +"Carry," he said, in an absent-minded way, "you think a heap of your +art, don't you?" + +"More," said White, frankly, "than has been for the financial good of +myself and my friends." + +"I thought you were a fool the other day," went on Keogh, quietly, +"and I'm not sure now that you wasn't. But if you was, so am I. I've +been in some funny deals, Carry, but I've always managed to scramble +fair, and match my brains and capital against the other fellow's. But +when it comes to--well, when you've got the other fellow cinched, +and the screws on him, and he's got to put up--why, it don't strike +me as being a man's game. They've got a name for it, you know; +it's--confound you, don't you understand? A fellow feels--it's +something like that blamed art of yours--he--well, I tore that +photograph up and laid the pieces on that stack of money and shoved +the whole business back across the table. 'Excuse me, Mr. Losada,' +I said, 'but I guess I've made a mistake in the price. You get the +photo for nothing.' Now, Carry, you get out the pencil, and we'll do +some more figuring. I'd like to save enough out of our capital for +you to have some fried sausages in your joint when you get back to +New York." + + + + +XV + +DICKY + + +There is little consecutiveness along the Spanish Main. Things happen +there intermittently. Even Time seems to hang his scythe daily on the +branch of an orange tree while he takes a siesta and a cigarette. + +After the ineffectual revolt against the administration of President +Losada, the country settled again into quiet toleration of the abuses +with which he had been charged. In Coralio old political enemies +went arm-in-arm, lightly eschewing for the time all differences of +opinion. + +The failure of the art expedition did not stretch the cat-footed +Keogh upon his back. The ups and downs of Fortune made smooth +travelling for his nimble steps. His blue pencil stub was at work +again before the smoke of the steamer on which White sailed had +cleared away from the horizon. He had but to speak a word to Geddie +to find his credit negotiable for whatever goods he wanted from the +store of Brannigan & Company. On the same day on which White arrived +in New York Keogh, at the rear of a train of five pack mules loaded +with hardware and cutlery, set his face toward the grim, interior +mountains. There the Indian tribes wash gold dust from the auriferous +streams; and when a market is brought to them trading is brisk and +_muy bueno_ in the Cordilleras. + +In Coralio Time folded his wings and paced wearily along his drowsy +path. They who had most cheered the torpid hours were gone. Clancy +had sailed on a Spanish barque for Colon, contemplating a cut across +the isthmus and then a further voyage to end at Calao, where the +fighting was said to be on. Geddie, whose quiet and genial nature had +once served to mitigate the frequent dull reaction of lotus eating, +was now a home-man, happy with his bright orchid, Paula, and never +even dreaming of or regretting the unsolved, sealed and monogramed +Bottle whose contents, now inconsiderable, were held safely in the +keeping of the sea. + +Well may the Walrus, most discerning and eclectic of beasts, place +sealing-wax midway on his programme of topics that fall pertinent and +diverting upon the ear. + +Atwood was gone--he of the hospitable back porch and ingenuous +cunning. Dr. Gregg, with his trepanning story smouldering within him, +was a whiskered volcano, always showing signs of imminent eruption, +and was not to be considered in the ranks of those who might +contribute to the amelioration of ennui. The new consul's note chimed +with the sad sea waves and the violent tropical greens--he had not a +bar of Scheherezade or of the Round Table in his lute. Goodwin was +employed with large projects: what time he was loosed from them found +him at his home, where he loved to be. Therefore it will be seen that +there was a dearth of fellowship and entertainment among the foreign +contingent of Coralio. + +And then Dicky Maloney dropped down from the clouds upon the town, +and amused it. + +Nobody knew where Dicky Maloney hailed from or how he reached +Coralio. He appeared there one day; and that was all. He afterward +said that he came on the fruit steamer _Thor_; but an inspection of +the _Thor's_ passenger list of that date was found to be Maloneyless. +Curiosity, however, soon perished; and Dicky took his place among the +odd fish cast up by the Caribbean. + +He was an active, devil-may-care, rollicking fellow with an engaging +gray eye, the most irresistible grin, a rather dark or much sunburned +complexion, and a head of the fieriest red hair ever seen in that +country. Speaking the Spanish language as well as he spoke English, +and seeming always to have plenty of silver in his pockets, it was +not long before he was a welcome companion whithersoever he went. He +had an extreme fondness for _vino blanco_, and gained the reputation +of being able to drink more of it than any three men in town. +Everybody called him "Dicky"; everybody cheered up at the sight of +him--especially the natives, to whom his marvellous red hair and his +free-and-easy style were a constant delight and envy. Wherever you +went in the town you would soon see Dicky or hear his genial laugh, +and find around him a group of admirers who appreciated him both for +his good nature and the white wine he was always so ready to buy. + +A considerable amount of speculation was had concerning the object of +his sojourn there, until one day he silenced this by opening a small +shop for the sale of tobacco, _dulces_ and the handiwork of the +interior Indians--fibre-and-silk-woven goods, deerskin _zapatos_ and +basketwork of _tule_ reeds. Even then he did not change his habits; +for he was drinking and playing cards half the day and night with the +_comandante_, the collector of customs, the _Jefe Politico_ and other +gay dogs among the native officials. + +One day Dicky saw Pasa, the daughter of Madama Ortiz, sitting in the +side-door of the Hotel de los Estranjeros. He stopped in his tracks, +still, for the first time in Coralio; and then he sped, swift as a +deer, to find Vasquez, a gilded native youth, to present him. + +The young men had named Pasa "_La Santita Naranjadita_." +_Naranjadita_ is a Spanish word for a certain colour that you must go +to more trouble to describe in English. By saying "The little saint, +tinted the most beautiful-delicate-slightly-orange-golden," you will +approximate the description of Madama Ortiz's daughter. + +La Madama Ortiz sold rum in addition to other liquors. Now, you must +know that the rum expiates whatever opprobrium attends upon the other +commodities. For rum-making, mind you, is a government monopoly; +and to keep a government dispensary assures respectability if not +preeminence. Moreover, the saddest of precisians could find no fault +with the conduct of the shop. Customers drank there in the lowest of +spirits and fearsomely, as in the shadow of the dead; for Madama's +ancient and vaunted lineage counteracted even the rum's behest to be +merry. For, was she not of the Iglesias, who landed with Pizarro? And +had not her deceased husband been _comisionado de caminos y puentes_ +for the district? + +In the evenings Pasa sat by the window in the room next to the one +where they drank, and strummed dreamily upon her guitar. And then, +by twos and threes, would come visiting young caballeros and occupy +the prim line of chairs set against the wall of this room. They were +there to besiege the heart of "_La Santita_." Their method (which is +not proof against intelligent competition) consisted of expanding the +chest, looking valorous, and consuming a gross or two of cigarettes. +Even saints delicately oranged prefer to be wooed differently. + +Dona Pasa would tide over the vast chasms of nicotinized silence +with music from her guitar, while she wondered if the romances she +had read about gallant and more--more contiguous cavaliers were all +lies. At somewhat regular intervals Madama would glide in from the +dispensary with a sort of drought-suggesting gleam in her eye, and +there would be a rustling of stiffly-starched white trousers as one +of the caballeros would propose an adjournment to the bar. + +That Dicky Maloney would, sooner or later, explore this field was a +thing to be foreseen. There were few doors in Coralio into which his +red head had not been poked. + +In an incredibly short space of time after his first sight of her +he was there, seated close beside her rocking chair. There were no +back-against-the-wall poses in Dicky's theory of wooing. His plan of +subjection was an attack at close range. To carry the fortress with +one concentrated, ardent, eloquent, irresistible _escalade_--that was +Dicky's way. + +Pasa was descended from the proudest Spanish families in the country. +Moreover, she had had unusual advantages. Two years in a New Orleans +school had elevated her ambitions and fitted her for a fate above the +ordinary maidens of her native land. And yet here she succumbed to +the first red-haired scamp with a glib tongue and a charming smile +that came along and courted her properly. + +Very soon Dicky took her to the little church on the corner of the +plaza, and "Mrs. Maloney" was added to her string of distinguished +names. + +And it was her fate to sit, with her patient, saintly eyes and figure +like a bisque Psyche, behind the sequestered counter of the little +shop, while Dicky drank and philandered with his frivolous +acquaintances. + +The women, with their naturally fine instinct, saw a chance for +vivisection, and delicately taunted her with his habits. She turned +upon them in a beautiful, steady blaze of sorrowful contempt. + +"You meat-cows," she said, in her level, crystal-clear tones; "you +know nothing of a man. Your men are _maromeros_. They are fit only to +roll cigarettes in the shade until the sun strikes and shrivels them +up. They drone in your hammocks and you comb their hair and feed +them with fresh fruit. My man is of no such blood. Let him drink of +the wine. When he has taken sufficient of it to drown one of your +_flaccitos_ he will come home to me more of a man than one thousand +of your _pobrecitos_. _My_ hair he smooths and braids; to me he +sings; he himself removes my _zapatos_, and there, there, upon each +instep leaves a kiss. He holds-- Oh, you will never understand! Blind +ones who have never known a _man_." + +Sometimes mysterious things happened at night about Dicky's shop. +While the front of it was dark, in the little room back of it Dicky +and a few of his friends would sit about a table carrying on some +kind of very quiet _negocios_ until quite late. Finally he would let +them out the front door very carefully, and go upstairs to his little +saint. These visitors were generally conspirator-like men with dark +clothes and hats. Of course, these dark doings were noticed after a +while, and talked about. + +Dicky seemed to care nothing at all for the society of the alien +residents of the town. He avoided Goodwin, and his skilful escape +from the trepanning story of Dr. Gregg is still referred to, in +Coralio, as a masterpiece of lightning diplomacy. + +Many letters arrived, addressed to "Mr. Dicky Maloney," or "Senor +Dickee Maloney," to the considerable pride of Pasa. That so many +people should desire to write to him only confirmed her own suspicion +that the light from his red head shone around the world. As to their +contents she never felt curiosity. There was a wife for you! + +The one mistake Dicky made in Coralio was to run out of money at the +wrong time. Where his money came from was a puzzle, for the sales +of his shop were next to nothing, but that source failed, and at a +peculiarly unfortunate time. It was when the _comandante_, Don Senor +el Coronel Encarnacion Rios, looked upon the little saint seated in +the shop and felt his heart go pitapat. + +The _comandante_, who was versed in all the intricate arts of +gallantry, first delicately hinted at his sentiments by donning his +dress uniform and strutting up and down fiercely before her window. +Pasa, glancing demurely with her saintly eyes, instantly perceived +his resemblance to her parrot, Chichi, and was diverted to the extent +of a smile. The _comandante_ saw the smile, which was not intended +for him. Convinced of an impression made, he entered the shop, +confidently, and advanced to open compliment. Pasa froze; he pranced; +she flamed royally; he was charmed to injudicious persistence; she +commanded him to leave the shop; he tried to capture her hand,--and +Dicky entered, smiling broadly, full of white wine and the devil. + +He spent five minutes in punishing the _comandante_ scientifically +and carefully, so that the pain might be prolonged as far as +possible. At the end of that time he pitched the rash wooer out the +door upon the stones of the street, senseless. + +A barefooted policeman who had been watching the affair from across +the street blew a whistle. A squad of four soldiers came running from +the _cuartel_ around the corner. When they saw that the offender +was Dicky, they stopped, and blew more whistles, which brought out +reenforcements of eight. Deeming the odds against them sufficiently +reduced, the military advanced upon the disturber. + +Dicky, being thoroughly imbued with the martial spirit, stooped +and drew the _comandante's_ sword, which was girded about him, and +charged his foe. He chased the standing army four squares, playfully +prodding its squealing rear and hacking at its ginger-coloured heels. + +But he was not so successful with the civic authorities. Six +muscular, nimble policemen overpowered him and conveyed him, +triumphantly but warily, to jail. "_El Diablo Colorado_" they dubbed +him, and derided the military for its defeat. + +Dicky, with the rest of the prisoners, could look out through +the barred door at the grass of the little plaza, at a row of +orange trees and the red tile roofs and 'dobe walls of a line of +insignificant stores. + +At sunset along a path across this plaza came a melancholy procession +of sad-faced women bearing plantains, cassaba, bread and fruit--each +coming with food to some wretch behind those bars to whom she still +clung and furnished the means of life. Twice a day--morning and +evening--they were permitted to come. Water was furnished to her +compulsory guests by the republic, but no food. + +That evening Dicky's name was called by the sentry, and he stepped +before the bars of the door. There stood his little saint, a black +mantilla draped about her head and shoulders, her face like glorified +melancholy, her clear eyes gazing longingly at him as if they might +draw him between the bars to her. She brought a chicken, some +oranges, _dulces_ and a loaf of white bread. A soldier inspected the +food, and passed it in to Dicky. Pasa spoke calmly, as she always +did, briefly, in her thrilling, flute-like tones. "Angel of my life," +she said, "let it not be long that thou art away from me. Thou +knowest that life is not a thing to be endured with thou not at +my side. Tell me if I can do aught in this matter. If not, I will +wait--a little while. I come again in the morning." + +Dicky, with his shoes removed so as not to disturb his fellow +prisoners, tramped the floor of the jail half the night condemning +his lack of money and the cause of it--whatever that might have been. +He knew very well that money would have bought his release at once. + +For two days succeeding Pasa came at the appointed times and brought +him food. He eagerly inquired each time if a letter or package had +come for him, and she mournfully shook her head. + +On the morning of the third day she brought only a small loaf of +bread. There were dark circles under her eyes. She seemed as calm as +ever. + +"By jingo," said Dicky, who seemed to speak in English or Spanish as +the whim seized him, "this is dry provender, _muchachita_. Is this +the best you can dig up for a fellow?" + +Pasa looked at him as a mother looks at a beloved but capricious +babe. + +"Think better of it," she said, in a low voice; "since for the next +meal there will be nothing. The last _centavo_ is spent." She pressed +closer against the grating. + +"Sell the goods in the shop--take anything for them." + +"Have I not tried? Did I not offer them for one-tenth their cost? Not +even one _peso_ would any one give. There is not one _real_ in this +town to assist Dickee Malonee." + +Dick clenched his teeth grimly. "That's the _comandante_," he +growled. "He's responsible for that sentiment. Wait, oh, wait till +the cards are all out." + +Pasa lowered her voice to almost a whisper. "And, listen, heart of my +heart," she said, "I have endeavoured to be brave, but I cannot live +without thee. Three days now--" + +Dicky caught a faint gleam of steel from the folds of her mantilla. +For once she looked in his face and saw it without a smile, stern, +menacing and purposeful. Then he suddenly raised his hand and his +smile came back like a gleam of sunshine. The hoarse signal of an +incoming steamer's siren sounded in the harbour. Dicky called to the +sentry who was pacing before the door: "What steamer comes?" + +"The _Catarina_." + +"Of the Vesuvius line?" + +"Without doubt, of that line." + +"Go you, _picarilla_," said Dicky joyously to Pasa, "to the American +consul. Tell him I wish to speak with him. See that he comes at +once. And look you! let me see a different look in those eyes, for I +promise your head shall rest upon this arm to-night." + +It was an hour before the consul came. He held his green umbrella +under his arm, and mopped his forehead impatiently. + +"Now, see here, Maloney," he began, captiously, "you fellows seem to +think you can cut up any kind of row, and expect me to pull you out +of it. I'm neither the War Department nor a gold mine. This country +has its laws, you know, and there's one against pounding the senses +out of the regular army. You Irish are forever getting into trouble. +I don't see what I can do. Anything like tobacco, now, to make you +comfortable--or newspapers--" + +"Son of Eli," interrupted Dicky, gravely, "you haven't changed an +iota. That is almost a duplicate of the speech you made when old +Koen's donkeys and geese got into the chapel loft, and the culprits +wanted to hide in your room." + +"Oh, heavens!" exclaimed the consul, hurriedly adjusting his +spectacles. "Are you a Yale man, too? Were you in that crowd? I don't +seem to remember any one with red--any one named Maloney. Such a lot +of college men seem to have misused their advantages. One of the best +mathematicians of the class of '91 is selling lottery tickets in +Belize. A Cornell man dropped off here last month. He was second +steward on a guano boat. I'll write to the department if you like, +Maloney. Or if there's any tobacco, or newspa--" + +"There's nothing," interrupted Dicky, shortly, "but this. You go tell +the captain of the _Catarina_ that Dicky Maloney wants to see him as +soon as he can conveniently come. Tell him where I am. Hurry. That's +all." + +The consul, glad to be let off so easily, hurried away. The captain +of the _Catarina_, a stout man, Sicilian born, soon appeared, +shoving, with little ceremony, through the guards to the jail door. +The Vesuvius Fruit Company had a habit of doing things that way in +Anchuria. + +"I am exceedingly sorry--exceedingly sorry," said the captain, "to +see this occur. I place myself at your service, Mr. Maloney. What you +need shall be furnished. Whatever you say shall be done." + +Dicky looked at him unsmilingly. His red hair could not detract from +his attitude of severe dignity as he stood, tall and calm, with his +now grim mouth forming a horizontal line. + +"Captain De Lucco, I believe I still have funds in the hands of your +company--ample and personal funds. I ordered a remittance last week. +The money has not arrived. You know what is needed in this game. +Money and money and more money. Why has it not been sent?" + +"By the _Cristobal_," replied De Lucco, gesticulating, "it was +despatched. Where is the _Cristobal_? Off Cape Antonio I spoke her +with a broken shaft. A tramp coaster was towing her back to New +Orleans. I brought money ashore thinking your need for it might not +withstand delay. In this envelope is one thousand dollars. There is +more if you need it, Mr. Maloney." + +"For the present it will suffice," said Dicky, softening as he +crinkled the envelope and looked down at the half-inch thickness of +smooth, dingy bills. + +"The long green!" he said, gently, with a new reverence in his gaze. +"Is there anything it will not buy, Captain?" + +"I had three friends," replied De Lucco, who was a bit of a +philosopher, "who had money. One of them speculated in stocks and +made ten million; another is in heaven, and the third married a poor +girl whom he loved." + +"The answer, then," said Dicky, "is held by the Almighty, Wall Street +and Cupid. So, the question remains." + +"This," queried the captain, including Dicky's surroundings in +a significant gesture of his hand, "is it--it is not--it is not +connected with the business of your little shop? There is no failure +in your plans?" + +"No, no," said Dicky. "This is merely the result of a little private +affair of mine, a digression from the regular line of business. They +say for a complete life a man must know poverty, love and war. But +they don't go well together, _capitan mio_. No; there is no failure +in my business. The little shop is doing very well." + +When the captain had departed Dicky called the sergeant of the jail +squad and asked: + +"Am I _preso_ by the military or by the civil authority?" + +"Surely there is no martial law in effect now, senor." + +"_Bueno_. Now go or send to the alcalde, the _Jues de la Paz_ and the +_Jefe de los Policios_. Tell them I am prepared at once to satisfy +the demands of justice." A folded bill of the "long green" slid into +the sergeant's hand. + +Then Dicky's smile came back again, for he knew that the hours of his +captivity were numbered; and he hummed, in time with the sentry's +tread: + + + "_They're hanging men and women now, + For lacking of the green._" + + +So, that night Dicky sat by the window of the room over his shop +and his little saint sat close by, working at something silken and +dainty. Dicky was thoughtful and grave. His red hair was in an +unusual state of disorder. Pasa's fingers often ached to smooth and +arrange it, but Dicky would never allow it. He was poring, to-night, +over a great litter of maps and books and papers on his table until +that perpendicular line came between his brows that always distressed +Pasa. Presently she went and brought his hat, and stood with it until +he looked up, inquiringly. + +"It is sad for you here," she explained. "Go out and drink _vino +blanco_. Come back when you get that smile you used to wear. That is +what I wish to see." + +Dicky laughed and threw down his papers. "The _vino blanco_ stage +is past. It has served its turn. Perhaps, after all, there was less +entered my mouth and more my ears than people thought. But, there +will be no more maps or frowns to-night. I promise you that. Come." + +They sat upon a reed _silleta_ at the window and watched the +quivering gleams from the lights of the _Catarina_ reflected in the +harbour. + +Presently Pasa rippled out one of her infrequent chirrups of audible +laughter. + +"I was thinking," she began, anticipating Dicky's question, "of the +foolish things girls have in their minds. Because I went to school +in the States I used to have ambitions. Nothing less than to be the +president's wife would satisfy me. And, look, thou red picaroon, to +what obscure fate thou hast stolen me!" + +"Don't give up hope," said Dicky, smiling. "More than one Irishman +has been the ruler of a South American country. There was a dictator +of Chili named O'Higgins. Why not a President Maloney, of Anchuria? +Say the word, _santita mia_, and we'll make the race." + +"No, no, no, thou red-haired, reckless one!" sighed Pasa; "I am +content"--she laid her head against his arm--"here." + + + + +XVI + +ROUGE ET NOIR + + +It has been indicated that disaffection followed the elevation of +Losada to the presidency. This feeling continued to grow. Throughout +the entire republic there seemed to be a spirit of silent, sullen +discontent. Even the old Liberal party to which Goodwin, Zavalla and +other patriots had lent their aid was disappointed. Losada had failed +to become a popular idol. Fresh taxes, fresh import duties and, more +than all, his tolerance of the outrageous oppression of citizens by +the military had rendered him the most obnoxious president since +the despicable Alforan. The majority of his own cabinet were out +of sympathy with him. The army, which he had courted by giving it +license to tyrannize, had been his main, and thus far adequate +support. + +But the most impolitic of the administration's moves had been when it +antagonized the Vesuvius Fruit Company, an organization plying twelve +steamers and with a cash capital somewhat larger than Anchuria's +surplus and debt combined. + +Reasonably an established concern like the Vesuvius would become +irritated at having a small, retail republic with no rating at all +attempt to squeeze it. So when the government proxies applied for +a subsidy they encountered a polite refusal. The president at once +retaliated by clapping an export duty of one _real_ per bunch on +bananas--a thing unprecedented in fruit-growing countries. The +Vesuvius Company had invested large sums in wharves and plantations +along the Anchurian coast, their agents had erected fine homes in the +towns where they had their headquarters, and heretofore had worked +with the republic in good-will and with advantage to both. It would +lose an immense sum if compelled to move out. The selling price +of bananas from Vera Cruz to Trinidad was three _reals_ per bunch. +This new duty of one _real_ would have ruined the fruit growers in +Anchuria and have seriously discommoded the Vesuvius Company had it +declined to pay it. But for some reason, the Vesuvius continued to +buy Anchurian fruit, paying four _reals_ for it; and not suffering +the growers to bear the loss. + +This apparent victory deceived His Excellency; and he began to hunger +for more of it. He sent an emissary to request a conference with a +representative of the fruit company. The Vesuvius sent Mr. Franzoni, +a little, stout, cheerful man, always cool, and whistling airs from +Verdi's operas. Senor Espirition, of the office of the Minister of +Finance, attempted the sandbagging in behalf of Anchuria. The meeting +took place in the cabin of the _Salvador_, of the Vesuvius line. + +Senor Espirition opened negotiations by announcing that the +government contemplated the building of a railroad to skirt the +alluvial coast lands. After touching upon the benefits such a road +would confer upon the interests of the Vesuvius, he reached the +definite suggestion that a contribution to the road's expenses of, +say, fifty thousand _pesos_ would not be more than an equivalent to +benefits received. + +Mr. Franzoni denied that his company would receive any benefits +from a contemplated road. As its representative he must decline +to contribute fifty thousand _pesos_. But he would assume the +responsibility of offering twenty-five. + +Did Senor Espirition understand Senor Franzoni to mean twenty-five +thousand _pesos_? + +By no means. Twenty-five _pesos_. And in silver; not in gold. + +"Your offer insults my government," cried Senor Espirition, rising +with indignation. + +"Then," said Mr. Franzoni, in warning tone, "_we will change it_." + +The offer was never changed. Could Mr. Franzoni have meant the +government? + +This was the state of affairs in Anchuria when the winter season +opened at Coralio at the end of the second year of Losada's +administration. So, when the government and society made its annual +exodus to the seashore it was evident that the presidential advent +would not be celebrated by unlimited rejoicing. The tenth of November +was the day set for the entrance into Coralio of the gay company +from the capital. A narrow-gauge railroad runs twenty miles into the +interior from Solitas. The government party travels by carriage from +San Mateo to this road's terminal point, and proceeds by train to +Solitas. From here they march in grand procession to Coralio where, +on the day of their coming, festivities and ceremonies abound. But +this season saw an ominous dawning of the tenth of November. + +Although the rainy season was over, the day seemed to hark back to +reeking June. A fine drizzle of rain fell all during the forenoon. +The procession entered Coralio amid a strange silence. + +President Losada was an elderly man, grizzly bearded, with a +considerable ratio of Indian blood revealed in his cinnamon +complexion. His carriage headed the procession, surrounded and +guarded by Captain Cruz and his famous troop of one hundred light +horse "_El Ciento Huilando_." Colonel Rocas followed, with a regiment +of the regular army. + +The president's sharp, beady eyes glanced about him for the expected +demonstration of welcome; but he faced a stolid, indifferent array of +citizens. Sight-seers the Anchurians are by birth and habit, and they +turned out to their last able-bodied unit to witness the scene; but +they maintained an accusive silence. They crowded the streets to the +very wheel ruts; they covered the red tile roofs to the eaves, but +there was never a "_viva_" from them. No wreaths of palm and lemon +branches or gorgeous strings of paper roses hung from the windows and +balconies as was the custom. There was an apathy, a dull, dissenting +disapprobation, that was the more ominous because it puzzled. No +one feared an outburst, a revolt of the discontents, for they had +no leader. The president and those loyal to him had never even +heard whispered a name among them capable of crystallizing the +dissatisfaction into opposition. No, there could be no danger. The +people always procured a new idol before they destroyed an old one. + +At length, after a prodigious galloping and curvetting of red-sashed +majors, gold-laced colonels and epauletted generals, the procession +formed for its annual progress down the Calle Grande to the Casa +Morena, where the ceremony of welcome to the visiting president +always took place. + +The Swiss band led the line of march. After it pranced the local +_comandante_, mounted, and a detachment of his troops. Next came a +carriage with four members of the cabinet, conspicuous among them +the Minister of War, old General Pilar, with his white moustache and +his soldierly bearing. Then the president's vehicle, containing also +the Ministers of Finance and State; and surrounded by Captain Cruz's +light horse formed in a close double file of fours. Following them, +the rest of the officials of state, the judges and distinguished +military and social ornaments of public and private life. + +As the band struck up, and the movement began, like a bird of +ill-omen the _Valhalla_, the swiftest steamship of the Vesuvius line, +glided into the harbour in plain view of the president and his train. +Of course, there was nothing menacing about its arrival--a business +firm does not go to war with a nation--but it reminded Senor +Espirition and others in those carriages that the Vesuvius Fruit +Company was undoubtedly carrying something up its sleeve for them. + +By the time the van of the procession had reached the government +building, Captain Cronin, of the _Valhalla_, and Mr. Vincenti, member +of the Vesuvius Company, had landed and were pushing their way, +bluff, hearty and nonchalant, through the crowd on the narrow +sidewalk. Clad in white linen, big, debonair, with an air of +good-humoured authority, they made conspicuous figures among the +dark mass of unimposing Anchurians, as they penetrated to within a +few yards of the steps of the Casa Morena. Looking easily above the +heads of the crowd, they perceived another that towered above the +undersized natives. It was the fiery poll of Dicky Maloney against +the wall close by the lower step; and his broad, seductive grin +showed that he recognized their presence. + +Dicky had attired himself becomingly for the festive occasion in a +well-fitting black suit. Pasa was close by his side, her head covered +with the ubiquitous black mantilla. + +Mr. Vincenti looked at her attentively. + +"Botticelli's Madonna," he remarked, gravely. "I wonder when she got +into the game. I don't like his getting tangled with the women. I +hoped he would keep away from them." + +Captain Cronin's laugh almost drew attention from the parade. + +"With that head of hair! Keep away from the women! And a Maloney! +Hasn't he got a license? But, nonsense aside, what do you think of +the prospects? It's a species of filibustering out of my line." + +Vincenti glanced again at Dicky's head and smiled. + +"_Rouge et noir_," he said. "There you have it. Make your play, +gentlemen. Our money is on the red." + +"The lad's game," said Cronin, with a commending look at the tall, +easy figure by the steps. "But 'tis all like fly-by-night theatricals +to me. The talk's bigger than the stage; there's a smell of gasoline +in the air, and they're their own audience and scene-shifters." + +They ceased talking, for General Pilar had descended from the first +carriage and had taken his stand upon the top step of Casa Morena. As +the oldest member of the cabinet, custom had decreed that he should +make the address of welcome, presenting the keys of the official +residence to the president at its close. + +General Pilar was one of the most distinguished citizens of the +republic. Hero of three wars and innumerable revolutions, he was an +honoured guest at European courts and camps. An eloquent speaker +and a friend to the people, he represented the highest type of the +Anchurians. + +Holding in his hand the gilt keys of Casa Morena, he began his +address in a historical form, touching upon each administration +and the advance of civilization and prosperity from the first dim +striving after liberty down to present times. Arriving at the +regime of President Losada, at which point, according to precedent, +he should have delivered a eulogy upon its wise conduct and the +happiness of the people, General Pilar paused. Then he silently held +up the bunch of keys high above his head, with his eyes closely +regarding it. The ribbon with which they were bound fluttered in the +breeze. + +"It still blows," cried the speaker, exultantly. "Citizens of +Anchuria, give thanks to the saints this night that our air is still +free." + +Thus disposing of Losada's administration, he abruptly reverted +to that of Olivarra, Anchuria's most popular ruler. Olivarra had +been assassinated nine years before while in the prime of life and +usefulness. A faction of the Liberal party led by Losada himself had +been accused of the deed. Whether guilty or not, it was eight years +before the ambitious and scheming Losada had gained his goal. + +Upon this theme General Pilar's eloquence was loosed. He drew the +picture of the beneficent Olivarra with a loving hand. He reminded +the people of the peace, the security and the happiness they had +enjoyed during that period. He recalled in vivid detail and with +significant contrast the last winter sojourn of President Olivarra +in Coralio, when his appearance at their fiestas was the signal for +thundering _vivas_ of love and approbation. + +The first public expression of sentiment from the people that day +followed. A low, sustained murmur went among them like the surf +rolling along the shore. + +"Ten dollars to a dinner at the Saint Charles," remarked Mr. +Vincenti, "that _rouge_ wins." + +"I never bet against my own interests," said Captain Cronin, lighting +a cigar. "Long-winded old boy, for his age. What's he talking about?" + +"My Spanish," replied Vincenti, "runs about ten words to the minute; +his is something around two hundred. Whatever he's saying, he's +getting them warmed up." + +"Friends and brothers," General Pilar was saying, "could I reach +out my hand this day across the lamentable silence of the grave to +Olivarra 'the Good,' to the ruler who was one of you, whose tears +fell when you sorrowed, and whose smile followed your joy--I would +bring him back to you, but--Olivarra is dead--dead at the hands of a +craven assassin!" + +The speaker turned and gazed boldly into the carriage of the +president. His arm remained extended aloft as if to sustain his +peroration. The president was listening, aghast, at this remarkable +address of welcome. He was sunk back upon his seat, trembling with +rage and dumb surprise, his dark hands tightly gripping the carriage +cushions. + +Half rising, he extended one arm toward the speaker, and shouted a +harsh command at Captain Cruz. The leader of the "Flying Hundred" +sat his horse, immovable, with folded arms, giving no sign of having +heard. Losada sank back again, his dark features distinctly paling. + +"Who says that Olivarra is dead?" suddenly cried the speaker, his +voice, old as he was, sounding like a battle trumpet. "His body +lies in the grave, but to the people he loved he has bequeathed his +spirit--yes, more--his learning, his courage, his kindness--yes, +more--his youth, his image--people of Anchuria, have you forgotten +Ramon, the son of Olivarra?" + +Cronin and Vincenti, watching closely, saw Dicky Maloney suddenly +raise his hat, tear off his shock of red hair, leap up the steps and +stand at the side of General Pilar. The Minister of War laid his +arm across the young man's shoulders. All who had known President +Olivarra saw again his same lion-like pose, the same frank, undaunted +expression, the same high forehead with the peculiar line of the +clustering, crisp black hair. + +General Pilar was an experienced orator. He seized the moment of +breathless silence that preceded the storm. + +"Citizens of Anchuria," he trumpeted, holding aloft the keys to Casa +Morena, "I am here to deliver these keys--the keys to your homes and +liberty--to your chosen president. Shall I deliver them to Enrico +Olivarra's assassin, or to his son?" + +"Olivarra! Olivarra!" the crowd shrieked and howled. All vociferated +the magic name--men, women, children and the parrots. + +And the enthusiasm was not confined to the blood of the plebs. +Colonel Rocas ascended the steps and laid his sword theatrically at +young Ramon Olivarra's feet. Four members of the cabinet embraced +him. Captain Cruz gave a command, and twenty of _El Ciento Huilando_ +dismounted and arranged themselves in a cordon about the steps of +Casa Morena. + +But Ramon Olivarra seized that moment to prove himself a born genius +and politician. He waved those soldiers aside, and descended the +steps to the street. There, without losing his dignity or the +distinguished elegance that the loss of his red hair brought him, +he took the proletariat to his bosom--the barefooted, the dirty, +Indians, Caribs, babies, beggars, old, young, saints, soldiers and +sinners--he missed none of them. + +While this act of the drama was being presented, the scene shifters +had been busy at the duties that had been assigned to them. Two +of Cruz's dragoons had seized the bridle reins of Losada's horses; +others formed a close guard around the carriage; and they galloped +off with the tyrant and his two unpopular Ministers. No doubt a place +had been prepared for them. There are a number of well-barred stone +apartments in Coralio. + +"_Rouge_ wins," said Mr. Vincenti, calmly lighting another cigar. + +Captain Cronin had been intently watching the vicinity of the stone +steps for some time. + +"Good boy!" he exclaimed suddenly, as if relieved. "I wondered if he +was going to forget his Kathleen Mavourneen." + +Young Olivarra had reascended the steps and spoken a few words to +General Pilar. Then that distinguished veteran descended to the +ground and approached Pasa, who still stood, wonder-eyed, where Dicky +had left her. With his plumed hat in his hand, and his medals and +decorations shining on his breast, the general spoke to her and gave +her his arm, and they went up the stone steps of the Casa Morena +together. And then Ramon Olivarra stepped forward and took both her +hands before all the people. + +And while the cheering was breaking out afresh everywhere, Captain +Cronin and Mr. Vincenti turned and walked back toward the shore where +the gig was waiting for them. + +"There'll be another '_presidente proclamada_' in the morning," +said Mr. Vincenti, musingly. "As a rule they are not as reliable as +the elected ones, but this youngster seems to have some good stuff +in him. He planned and manoeuvred the entire campaign. Olivarra's +widow, you know, was wealthy. After her husband was assassinated +she went to the States, and educated her son at Yale. The Vesuvius +Company hunted him up, and backed him in the little game." + +"It's a glorious thing," said Cronin, half jestingly, "to be able to +discharge a government, and insert one of your own choosing, in these +days." + +"Oh, it is only a matter of business," said Vincenti, stopping and +offering the stump of his cigar to a monkey that swung down from a +lime tree; "and that is what moves the world of to-day. That extra +_real_ on the price of bananas had to go. We took the shortest way of +removing it." + + + + +XVII + +TWO RECALLS + + +There remains three duties to be performed before the curtain falls +upon the patched comedy. Two have been promised: the third is no less +obligatory. + +It was set forth in the programme of this tropic vaudeville that +it would be made known why Shorty O'Day, of the Columbia Detective +Agency, lost his position. Also that Smith should come again to tell +us what mystery he followed that night on the shores of Anchuria when +he strewed so many cigar stumps around the cocoanut palm during his +lonely night vigil on the beach. These things were promised; but a +bigger thing yet remains to be accomplished--the clearing up of a +seeming wrong that has been done according to the array of chronicled +facts (truthfully set forth) that have been presented. And one voice, +speaking, shall do these three things. + +Two men sat on a stringer of a North River pier in the City of New +York. A steamer from the tropics had begun to unload bananas and +oranges on the pier. Now and then a banana or two would fall from an +overripe bunch, and one of the two men would shamble forward, seize +the fruit and return to share it with his companion. + +One of the men was in the ultimate stage of deterioration. As far as +rain and wind and sun could wreck the garments he wore, it had been +done. In his person the ravages of drink were as plainly visible. And +yet, upon his high-bridged, rubicund nose was jauntily perched a pair +of shining and flawless gold-rimmed glasses. + +The other man was not so far gone upon the descending Highway of the +Incompetents. Truly, the flower of his manhood had gone to seed--seed +that, perhaps, no soil might sprout. But there were still cross-cuts +along where he travelled through which he might yet regain the +pathway of usefulness without disturbing the slumbering Miracles. +This man was short and compactly built. He had an oblique, dead eye, +like that of a sting-ray, and the moustache of a cocktail mixer. We +know the eye and the moustache; we know that Smith of the luxurious +yacht, the gorgeous raiment, the mysterious mission, the magic +disappearance, has come again, though shorn of the accessories of his +former state. + +At his third banana, the man with the nose glasses spat it from him +with a shudder. + +"Deuce take all fruit!" he remarked, in a patrician tone of disgust. +"I lived for two years where these things grow. The memory of their +taste lingers with you. The oranges are not so bad. Just see if you +can gather a couple of them, O'Day, when the next broken crate comes +up." + +"Did you live down with the monkeys?" asked the other, made tepidly +garrulous by the sunshine and the alleviating meal of juicy fruit. "I +was down there, once myself. But only for a few hours. That was when +I was with the Columbia Detective Agency. The monkey people did me +up. I'd have my job yet if it hadn't been for them. I'll tell you +about it. + +"One day the chief sent a note around to the office that read: 'Send +O'Day here at once for a big piece of business.' I was the crack +detective of the agency at that time. They always handed me the big +jobs. The address the chief wrote from was down in the Wall Street +district. + +"When I got there I found him in a private office with a lot of +directors who were looking pretty fuzzy. They stated the case. The +president of the Republic Insurance Company had skipped with about +a tenth of a million dollars in cash. The directors wanted him back +pretty bad, but they wanted the money worse. They said they needed +it. They had traced the old gent's movements to where he boarded a +tramp fruit steamer bound for South America that same morning with +his daughter and a big gripsack--all the family he had. + +"One of the directors had his steam yacht coaled and with steam up, +ready for the trip; and he turned her over to me, cart blongsh. In +four hours I was on board of her, and hot on the trail of the fruit +tub. I had a pretty good idea where old Wahrfield--that was his name, +J. Churchill Wahrfield--would head for. At that time we had a treaty +with about every foreign country except Belgium and that banana +republic, Anchuria. There wasn't a photo of old Wahrfield to be +had in New York--he had been foxy there--but I had his description. +And besides, the lady with him would be a dead-give-away anywhere. +She was one of the high-flyers in Society--not the kind that have +their pictures in the Sunday papers--but the real sort that open +chrysanthemum shows and christen battleships. + +"Well, sir, we never got a sight of that fruit tub on the road. The +ocean is a pretty big place; and I guess we took different paths +across it. But we kept going toward this Anchuria, where the fruiter +was bound for. + +"We struck the monkey coast one afternoon about four. There was a +ratty-looking steamer off shore taking on bananas. The monkeys were +loading her up with big barges. It might be the one the old man had +taken, and it might not. I went ashore to look around. The scenery +was pretty good. I never saw any finer on the New York stage. I +struck an American on shore, a big, cool chap, standing around with +the monkeys. He showed me the consul's office. The consul was a +nice young fellow. He said the fruiter was the _Karlsefin_, running +generally to New Orleans, but took her last cargo to New York. Then +I was sure my people were on board, although everybody told me that +no passengers had landed. I didn't think they would land until after +dark, for they might have been shy about it on account of seeing that +yacht of mine hanging around. So, all I had to do was to wait and nab +'em when they came ashore. I couldn't arrest old Wahrfield without +extradition papers, but my play was to get the cash. They generally +give up if you strike 'em when they're tired and rattled and short on +nerve. + +"After dark I sat under a cocoanut tree on the beach for a while, +and then I walked around and investigated that town some, and it was +enough to give you the lions. If a man could stay in New York and +be honest, he'd better do it than to hit that monkey town with a +million. + +"Dinky little mud houses; grass over your shoe tops in the streets; +ladies in low-neck-and-short-sleeves walking around smoking cigars; +tree frogs rattling like a hose cart going to a ten blow; big +mountains dropping gravel in the back yards, and the sea licking the +paint off in front--no, sir--a man had better be in God's country +living on free lunch than there. + +"The main street ran along the beach, and I walked down it, and +then turned up a kind of lane where the houses were made of poles +and straw. I wanted to see what the monkeys did when they weren't +climbing cocoanut trees. The very first shack I looked in I saw +my people. They must have come ashore while I was promenading. A +man about fifty, smooth face, heavy eyebrows, dressed in black +broadcloth, looking like he was just about to say, 'Can any little +boy in the Sunday school answer that?' He was freezing on to a grip +that weighed like a dozen gold bricks, and a swell girl--a regular +peach, with a Fifth Avenue cut--was sitting on a wooden chair. An old +black woman was fixing some coffee and beans on a table. The light +they had come from a lantern hung on a nail. I went and stood in the +door, and they looked at me, and I said: + +"'Mr. Wahrfield, you are my prisoner. I hope, for the lady's sake, +you will take the matter sensibly. You know why I want you.' + +"'Who are you?' says the old gent. + +"'O'Day,' says I, 'of the Columbia Detective Agency. And now, sir, +let me give you a piece of good advice. You go back and take your +medicine like a man. Hand 'em back the boodle; and maybe they'll let +you off light. Go back easy, and I'll put in a word for you. I'll +give you five minutes to decide.' I pulled out my watch and waited. + +"Then the young lady chipped in. She was one of the genuine +high-steppers. You could tell by the way her clothes fit and the +style she had that Fifth Avenue was made for her. + +"'Come inside,' she says. 'Don't stand in the door and disturb the +whole street with that suit of clothes. Now, what is it you want?' + +"'Three minutes gone,' I said. 'I'll tell you again while the other +two tick off. + +"'You'll admit being the president of the Republic, won't you?' + +"'I am,' says he. + +"'Well, then,' says I, 'it ought to be plain to you. Wanted, in New +York, J. Churchill Wahrfield, president of the Republic Insurance +Company. + +"'Also the funds belonging to said company, now in that grip, in the +unlawful possession of said J. Churchill Wahrfield.' + +"'Oh-h-h-h!' says the young lady, as if she was thinking, 'you want +to take us back to New York?' + +"'To take Mr. Wahrfield. There's no charge against you, miss. +There'll be no objection, of course, to your returning with your +father.' + +"Of a sudden the girl gave a tiny scream and grabbed the old boy +around the neck. 'Oh, father, father!' she says, kind of contralto, +'can this be true? Have you taken money that is not yours? Speak, +father!' It made you shiver to hear the tremolo stop she put on her +voice. + +"The old boy looked pretty bughouse when she first grappled him, but +she went on, whispering in his ear and patting his off shoulder till +he stood still, but sweating a little. + +"She got him to one side and they talked together a minute, and then +he put on some gold eyeglasses and walked up and handed me the grip. + +"'Mr. Detective,' he says, talking a little broken, 'I conclude +to return with you. I have finished to discover that life on this +desolate and displeased coast would be worse than to die, itself. I +will go back and hurl myself upon the mercy of the Republic Company. +Have you brought a sheep?' + +"'Sheep!' says I; 'I haven't a single--' + +"'Ship,' cut in the young lady. 'Don't get funny. Father is of German +birth, and doesn't speak perfect English. How did you come?' + +"The girl was all broke up. She had a handkerchief to her face, and +kept saying every little bit, 'Oh, father, father!' She walked up to +me and laid her lily-white hand on the clothes that had pained her at +first. I smelt a million violets. She was a lulu. I told her I came +in a private yacht. + +"'Mr. O'Day,' she says. 'Oh, take us away from this horrid country at +once. Can you! Will you! Say you will.' + +"'I'll try,' I said, concealing the fact that I was dying to get them +on salt water before they could change their mind. + +"One thing they both kicked against was going through the town to the +boat landing. Said they dreaded publicity, and now that they were +going to return, they had a hope that the thing might yet be kept out +of the papers. They swore they wouldn't go unless I got them out to +the yacht without any one knowing it, so I agreed to humour them. + +"The sailors who rowed me ashore were playing billiards in a bar-room +near the water, waiting for orders, and I proposed to have them take +the boat down the beach half a mile or so, and take us up there. How +to get them word was the question, for I couldn't leave the grip with +the prisoner, and I couldn't take it with me, not knowing but what +the monkeys might stick me up. + +"The young lady says the old coloured woman would take them a note. I +sat down and wrote it, and gave it to the dame with plain directions +what to do, and she grins like a baboon and shakes her head. + +"Then Mr. Wahrfield handed her a string of foreign dialect, and she +nods her head and says, 'See, senor,' maybe fifty times, and lights +out with the note. + +"'Old Augusta only understands German,' said Miss Wahrfield, smiling +at me. 'We stopped in her house to ask where we could find lodging, +and she insisted upon our having coffee. She tells us she was raised +in a German family in San Domingo.' + +"'Very likely,' I said. 'But you can search me for German words, +except _nix verstay_ and _noch einst_. I would have called that "See, +senor" French, though, on a gamble.' + +"Well, we three made a sneak around the edge of town so as not to +be seen. We got tangled in vines and ferns and the banana bushes +and tropical scenery a good deal. The monkey suburbs was as wild as +places in Central Park. We came out on the beach a good half mile +below. A brown chap was lying asleep under a cocoanut tree, with +a ten-foot musket beside him. Mr. Wahrfield takes up the gun and +pitches it into the sea. 'The coast is guarded,' he says. 'Rebellion +and plots ripen like fruit.' He pointed to the sleeping man, who +never stirred. 'Thus,' he says, 'they perform trusts. Children!' + +"I saw our boat coming, and I struck a match and lit a piece of +newspaper to show them where we were. In thirty minutes we were on +board the yacht. + +"The first thing, Mr. Wahrfield and his daughter and I took the grip +into the owner's cabin, opened it up, and took an inventory. There +was one hundred and five thousand dollars, United States treasury +notes, in it, besides a lot of diamond jewelry and a couple of +hundred Havana cigars. I gave the old man the cigars and a receipt +for the rest of the lot, as agent for the company, and locked the +stuff up in my private quarters. + +"I never had a pleasanter trip than that one. After we got to +sea the young lady turned out to be the jolliest ever. The very +first time we sat down to dinner, and the steward filled her glass +with champagne--that director's yacht was a regular floating +Waldorf-Astoria--she winks at me and says, 'What's the use to borrow +trouble, Mr. Fly Cop? Here's hoping you may live to eat the hen that +scratches on your grave.' There was a piano on board, and she sat +down to it and sung better than you give up two cases to hear plenty +times. She knew about nine operas clear through. She was sure enough +_bon ton_ and swell. She wasn't one of the 'among others present' +kind; she belonged on the special mention list! + +"The old man, too, perked up amazingly on the way. He passed the +cigars, and says to me once, quite chipper, out of a cloud of smoke, +'Mr. O'Day, somehow I think the Republic Company will not give me the +much trouble. Guard well the gripvalise of the money, Mr. O'Day, for +that it must be returned to them that it belongs when we finish to +arrive.' + +"When we landed in New York I 'phoned to the chief to meet us in that +director's office. We got in a cab and went there. I carried the +grip, and we walked in, and I was pleased to see that the chief had +got together that same old crowd of moneybugs with pink faces and +white vests to see us march in. I set the grip on the table. 'There's +the money,' I said. + +"'And your prisoner?' said the chief. + +"I pointed to Mr. Wahrfield, and he stepped forward and says: + +"'The honour of a word with you, sir, to explain.' + +"He and the chief went into another room and stayed ten minutes. When +they came back the chief looked as black as a ton of coal. + +"'Did this gentleman,' he says to me, 'have this valise in his +possession when you first saw him?' + +"'He did,' said I. + +"The chief took up the grip and handed it to the prisoner with a +bow, and says to the director crowd: 'Do any of you recognize this +gentleman?' + +"They all shook their pink faces. + +"'Allow me to present,' he goes on, Senor Miraflores, president of +the republic of Anchuria. The senor has generously consented to +overlook this outrageous blunder, on condition that we undertake +to secure him against the annoyance of public comment. It is a +concession on his part to overlook an insult for which he might claim +international redress. I think we can gratefully promise him secrecy +in the matter.' + +"They gave him a pink nod all round. + +"'O'Day,' he says to me. 'As a private detective you're wasted. +In a war, where kidnapping governments is in the rules, you'd be +invaluable. Come down to the office at eleven.' + +"I knew what that meant. + +"'So that's the president of the monkeys,' says I. 'Well, why +couldn't he have said so?' + +"Wouldn't it jar you?" + + + + +XVIII + +THE VITAGRAPHOSCOPE + + +Vaudeville is intrinsically episodic and discontinuous. Its audiences +do not demand denouements. Sufficient unto each "turn" is the evil +thereof. No one cares how many romances the singing comedienne may +have had if she can capably sustain the limelight and a high note or +two. The audiences reck not if the performing dogs get to the pound +the moment they have jumped through their last hoop. They do not +desire bulletins about the possible injuries received by the comic +bicyclist who retires head-first from the stage in a crash of +(property) china-ware. Neither do they consider that their seat +coupons entitle them to be instructed whether or no there is a +sentiment between the lady solo banjoist and the Irish monologist. + +Therefore let us have no lifting of the curtain upon a tableau of the +united lovers, backgrounded by defeated villainy and derogated by the +comic, osculating maid and butler, thrown in as a sop to the Cerberi +of the fifty-cent seats. + +But our programme ends with a brief "turn" or two; and then to the +exits. Whoever sits the show out may find, if he will, the slender +thread that binds together, though ever so slightly, the story that, +perhaps, only the Walrus will understand. + + +_Extracts from a letter from the first vice-president of the Republic +Insurance Company, of New York City, to Frank Goodwin, of Coralio, +Republic of Anchuria._ + + + My Dear Mr. Goodwin:--Your communication per Messrs. + Howland and Fourchet, of New Orleans, has reached us. Also + their draft on N. Y. for $100,000, the amount abstracted + from the funds of this company by the late J. Churchill + Wahrfield, its former president. . . . The officers + and directors unite in requesting me to express to you + their sincere esteem and thanks for your prompt and much + appreciated return of the entire missing sum within two + weeks from the time of its disappearance. . . . Can assure + you that the matter will not be allowed to receive the + least publicity. . . . Regret exceedingly the distressing + death of Mr. Wahrfield by his own hand, but . . . + Congratulations on your marriage to Miss Wahrfield . . . + many charms, winning manners, noble and womanly nature and + envied position in the best metropolitan society. . . . + + Cordially yours, + + LUCIUS E. APPLEGATE, + First Vice-President the Republic Insurance Company. + + + +The Vitagraphoscope +(Moving Pictures) + +The Last Sausage + +SCENE--_An Artist's Studio._ The artist, a young man of prepossessing +appearance, sits in a dejected attitude, amid a litter of sketches, +with his head resting upon his hand. An oil stove stands on a pine +box in the centre of the studio. The artist rises, tightens his waist +belt to another hole, and lights the stove. He goes to a tin bread +box, half-hidden by a screen, takes out a solitary link of sausage, +turns the box upside-down to show that there is no more, and chucks +the sausage into a frying-pan, which he sets upon the stove. The +flame of the stove goes out, showing that there is no more oil. The +artist, in evident despair, seizes the sausage, in a sudden access of +rage, and hurls it violently from him. At the same time a door opens, +and a man who enters receives the sausage forcibly against his nose. +He seems to cry out; and is observed to make a dance step or two, +vigorously. The newcomer is a ruddy-faced, active, keen-looking +man, apparently of Irish ancestry. Next he is observed to laugh +immoderately; he kicks over the stove; he claps the artist (who is +vainly striving to grasp his hand) vehemently upon the back. Then +he goes through a pantomime which to the sufficiently intelligent +spectator reveals that he has acquired large sums of money by trading +pot-metal hatchets and razors to the Indians of the Cordillera +Mountains for gold dust. He draws a roll of money as large as a small +loaf of bread from his pocket, and waves it above his head, while at +the same time he makes pantomime of drinking from a glass. The artist +hurriedly secures his hat, and the two leave the studio together. + + +The Writing on the Sands + +SCENE--_The Beach at Nice._ A woman, beautiful, still young, +exquisitely clothed, complacent, poised, reclines near the water, +idly scrawling letters in the sand with the staff of her silken +parasol. The beauty of her face is audacious; her languid pose is one +that you feel to be impermanent--you wait, expectant, for her to +spring or glide or crawl, like a panther that has unaccountably +become stock-still. She idly scrawls in the sand; and the word that +she always writes is "Isabel." A man sits a few yards away. You can +see that they are companions, even if no longer comrades. His face is +dark and smooth, and almost inscrutable--but not quite. The two speak +little together. The man also scratches on the sand with his cane. +And the word that he writes is "Anchuria." And then he looks out +where the Mediterranean and the sky intermingle, with death in his +gaze. + + +The Wilderness and Thou + +SCENE--_The Borders of a Gentleman's Estate in a Tropical Land._ An +old Indian, with a mahogany-coloured face, is trimming the grass on a +grave by a mangrove swamp. Presently he rises to his feet and walks +slowly toward a grove that is shaded by the gathering, brief +twilight. In the edge of the grove stand a man who is stalwart, with +a kind and courteous air, and a woman of a serene and clear-cut +loveliness. When the old Indian comes up to them the man drops money +in his hand. The grave-tender, with the stolid pride of his race, +takes it as his due, and goes his way. The two in the edge of the +grove turn back along the dim pathway, and walk close, close--for, +after all, what is the world at its best but a little round field of +the moving pictures with two walking together in it? + +CURTAIN + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CABBAGES AND KINGS*** + + +******* This file should be named 2777.txt or 2777.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/2/7/7/2777 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Beach (e_beach@hotmail.com) +Italicized text is bracketed by ~'s. + + + + + +CABBAGES AND KINGS + +by O Henry + + + + +Contents + +The Proem +"Fox-in-the-Morning" +The Lotus and the Bottle +Smith +Caught +Cupid's Exile Number Two +The Phonograph and the Graft +Money Maze +The Admiral +The Flag Paramount +The Shamrock and the Palm +The Remnants of the Code +Shoes +Ships +Masters of Arts +Dicky +Rouge et Noir +Two Recalls +The Vitagraphoscope + + + + +CABBAGES AND KINGS + + +The Proem + +By the Carpenter + +They will tell you in Anchuria, that President Miraflores, of that +volatile republic, died by his own hand in the coast town of Coralio; +that he had reached thus far in flight from the inconveniences of +an imminent revolution; and that one hundred thousand dollars, +government funds, which he carried with him in an American leather +valise as a souvenir of his tempestuous administration, was never +afterward recovered. + +For a ~real~, a boy will show you his grave. It is back of the town +near a little bridge that spans a mangrove swamp. A plain slab of +wood stands at its head. Some one has burned upon the headstone with +a hot iron this inscription: + + RAMON ANGEL DE LAS CRUZES + Y MIRAFLORES + PRESIDENTE DE LA REPUBLICA + DE ANCHURIA + QUE SEA SU JUEZ DIOS + +It is characteristic of this buoyant people that they pursue no man +beyond the grave. "Let God be his judge!"--Even with the hundred +thousand unfound, though they greatly coveted, the hue and cry went +no further than that. + +To the stranger or the guest the people of Coralio will relate the +story of the tragic end of their former president; how he strove +to escape from the country with the publice funds and also with Dona +Isabel Guilbert, the young American opera singer; and how, being +apprehended by members of the opposing political party in Coralio, +he shot himself through the head rather than give up the funds, and, +in consequence, the Senorita Guilbert. They will relate further +that Dona Isabel, her adventurous bark of fortune shoaled by the +simultaneous loss of her distinguished admirer and the souvenir +hundred thousand, dropped anchor on this stagnant coast, awaiting +a rising tide. + +They say, in Coralio, that she found a prompt and prosperous tide +in the form of Frank Goodwin, an American resident of the town, +an investor who had grown wealthy by dealing in the products of +the country--a banana king, a rubber prince, a sarsaparilla, indigo +and mahogany baron. The Senorita Guilbert, you will be told, married +Senor Goodwin one month after the president's death, thus, in the +very moment when Fortune had ceased to smile, wresting from her +a gift greater than the prize withdrawn. + +Of the American, Don Frank Goodwin, and of his wife the natives have +nothing but good to say. Don Frank has lived among them for years, +and has compelled their respect. His lady is easily queen of what +social life the sober coast affords. The wife of the governor of the +district, herself, who was of the proud Castilian family of Monteleon +y Dolorosa de los Santos y Mendez, feels honored to unfold her napkin +with olive-hued, ringed hands at the table of Senora Goodwin. Were +you to refer (with your northern prejudices) to the vivacious past +of Mrs. Goodwin when her audacious and gleeful abandon in light opera +captured the mature president's fancy, or to her share in that +statesman's downfall and malfeasance, the Latin shrug of the shoulder +would be your only answer and rebuttal. What prejudices there were +in Coralio concerning Senora Goodwin seemed now to be in her favor, +whatever they had been in the past. + +It would seem that the story is ended, instead of begun; that the +close of tragedy and the climax of a romance have covered the ground +of interest; but, to the more curious reader it shall be some slight +instruction to trace the close threads that underlie the ingenious +web of circumstances. + +The headpiece bearing the name of President Miraflores is daily +scrubbed with soap-bark and sand. An old half-breed Indian tends the +grave with fidelity and the dawdling minuteness of inherited sloth. +He chops down the weeds and ever-springing grass with his machete, he +plucks ants and scorpions and beetles from it with his horny fingers, +and sprinkles its turf with water from the plaza fountain. There is +no grave anywhere so well kept and ordered. + +Only by following out the underlying threads will it be made clear +why the old Indian, Galves, is secretly paid to keep green the grave +of President Miraflores by one who never saw that unfortunate +statesman in life or in death, and why that one was wont to walk +in the twilight, casting from a distance looks of gentle sadness upon +that unhonored mound. + +Elsewhere than at Coralio one learns of the impetuous career +of Isabel Guilbert. New Orleans gave her birth and the mingled +French and Spanish creole nature that tinctured her life with such +turbulence and warmth. She had little education, but a knowledge of +men and motives that seemed to have come by instinct. Far beyond the +common woman was she endowed with intrepid rashness, with a love for +the pursuit of adventure to the brink of danger, and with desire for +the pleasures of life. Her spirit was one to chafe under any curb; +she was Eve after the fall, but before the bitterness of it was felt. +She wore life as a rose in her bosom. + +Of the legion of men who had been at her feet it was said that +but one was so fortunate as to engage her fancy. To President +Miraflores, the brilliant but unstable ruler of Anchuria, she yielded +the key to her resolute heart. How, then, do we find her (as the +Coralians would have told you) the wife of Frank Goodwin, and happily +living a life of dull and dreamy inaction? + +The underlying threads reach far, stretching across the sea. +Following them out it will be made plain why "Shorty" O'Day, of the +Columbia Detective Agency, resigned his position. And, for a lighter +pastime, it shall be a duty and a pleasing sport to wander with Momus +beneath the tropic stars where Melpomene once stalked austere. Now +to cause laughter to echo from those lavish jungles and frowing crags +where formerly rang the cries of pirate's victims; to lay aside pike +and cutlass and attack with quip and jollity; to draw one saving +titter of mirth from the rusty casque of Romance--this were pleasant +to do in the shade of the lemon-trees on that coast that is curved +like lips set for smiling. + +For there are yet tales of the Spanish Main. That segment of +continent washed by the tempestuous Caribbean, and presenting to the +sea a formidable border of tropicle jungle topped by the overweening +Cordilleras, is still begirt by mystery and romance. In past times, +buccaneers and revolutionists roused the echoes of its cliffs, and +the condor wheeled perpetually above where, in the green groves, +they made food for him with their matchlocks and toledos. Taken and +retaken by sea rovers, by adverse powers and by sudden uprising of +rebellious factions, the historic 300 miles of adventurous coast has +scarcely known for hundreds of years whom rightly to call its master. +Pizarro, Balboa, Sir Francis Drake, and Bolivar did what they could +to make it a part of Christendom. Sir John Morgan, Lafitte and other +eminent swashbucklers bombarded and pounded it in the name of +Abaddon. + +The game still goes on. The guns of the rovers are silenced; but the +tintype man, the enlarged photograph brigand, the kodaking tourist +and the scouts of the gentle brigade of fakirs have found it out, and +carry on the work. The hucksters of Germany, France, and Sicily now +bag in small change across their counters. Gentlemen adventurers +throng the waiting-rooms of its rulers with proposals for railways +and concessions. The little ~opera-bouffe~ nations play at +government and intrigue until some day a big, silent gunboat glides +into the offing and warns them not to break their toys. And with +these changes comes also the small adventurer, with empty pockets to +fill, light of heart, busy-brained--the modern fairy prince, bearing +an alarm clock with which, more surely than by the sentimental +kiss, to awaken the beautiful tropics from their centuries' sleep. +Generally he wears a shamrock, which he matches pridefully against +the extravagant palms; and it is he who had driven Melpomene to +the wings, and set Comedy to dancing before the footlights of the +Southern Cross. + +So, there is a little tale to tell of many things. Perhaps to the +promiscuous ear of the Walrus it shall come with most avail; for in +it there are indeed shoes and ships and sealing-wax and cabbage-palms +and presidents instead of kings. + +Add to these a little love and counterplotting, and scatter +everywhere throughout the maze a trail of tropical dollars--dollars +warmed no more by the torrid sun than by the hot palms of the scouts +of Fortune--and, after all, here seems to be Life, itself, with talk +enough to weary the most garrulous of Walruses. + + + +I + +"Fox-in-the-Morning" + +Coralio reclined, in the mid-day heat, like some vacuous beauty +lounging in a guarded harem. The town lay at the sea's edge on +a strip of alluvial coast. It was set like a little pearl in an +emerald band. Behind it, and seeming almost to topple, imminent, +above it, rose the sea-following range of the Cordilleras. In front +the sea was spread, a smiling jailer, but even more incorruptible +than the frowning mountains. The waves swished along the smooth +beach; the parrots screamed in the orange and ceiba-trees; the palms +waved their limber fronds foolishly like an awkward chorus at the +prima donna's cue to enter. + +Suddenly the town was full of excitement. A native boy dashed down +a grass-grown street, shrieking: "~Busca el Senor~ Goodwin. ~Ha +venido un telegrafo por el!~" + +The word passed quickly. Telegrams do not come to any one in +Coralio. The cry for Senor Goodwin was taken up by a dozen officious +voices. The main street running parallel to the beach became +populated with those who desired to expedite the delivery of the +dispatch. Knots of women with complexions varying from palest olive +to deepest brown gathered at street corners and plaintively carolled: +"~Un telegrafo por Senor~ Goodwin!" The ~comandante~, Don Senor +el Coronel Encarnacion Rios, who was loyal to the Ins and suspected +Goodwin's devotion to the Outs, hissed: "Aha!" and wrote in his +secret memorandum book the accusive fact that Senor Goodwin had on +that momentous date received a telegram. + +In the midst of the hullabaloo a man stepped to the door of a small +wooden building and looked out. Above the door was a sign that read +"Keogh and Clancy"--a nomenclature that seemed not to be indigenous +to that tropical soil. The man in the door was Billy Keogh, scout +of fortune and progress and latter-day rover of the Spanish Main. +Tintypes and photographs were the weapons with which Keogh and Clancy +were at that time assailing the hopeless shores. Outside the shop +were set two large frames filled with specimens fo their art and +skill. + +Keogh leaned in the doorway, his bold and humorous countenance +wearing a look of interest at the unusual influx of life and sound +in the street. When the meaning of the disturbance became clear +to him he placed a hand beside his mouth and shouted: "Hey! Frank!" +in such a robustious voice that the feeble clamor of the natives was +drowned and silenced. + +Fifty yards away, on the seaward side of the street, stood the +abode of the consul for the United States. Out from the door of +this building tumbled Goodwin at the call. He had been smoking +with Willard Geddie, the consul, on the back porch of the consulate, +which was conceded to be the coolest spot in Coralio. + +"Hurry up," shouted Keogh. "There's a riot in town on account of +a telegram that's come for you. You want to be careful about these +things, my boy. It won't do to trifle with the feelings of the public +this way. You'll be getting a pink note some day with violet scent +on it; and then the country'll be steeped in the throes of a +revolution." + +Goodwin had strolled up the street and met the boy with the message. +The ox-eyed women gazed at him with shy admiration, for his type +drew them. He was big, blond, and jauntily dressed in white linen, +with buckskin ~zapatos~. His manner was courtly, with a merciful +eye. When the telegram had been delivered, and the bearer of it +dismissed with a gratuity, the relieved populace returned to the +contiguities of shade from which curiosity had drawn it--the women +to their baking in the mud ovens under the orange-trees, or to the +interminable combing of their long, straight hair; the men to their +cigarettes and gossip in the cantinas. + +Goodwin sat on Keogh's doorstep, and read his telegram. It was from +Bob Englehart, an American, who lived in San Mateo, the capital city +of Anchuria, eighty miles in the interior. Englehart was a gold +miner, an ardent revolutionist and "good people." That he was a man +of resource and imagination was proven by the telegram he had sent. +It had had been his task to send a confidential message to his friend +in Coralio. This could not have been accomplished in either Spanish +or English, for the eye politic in Anchuria was an active one. But +Englehart was a diplomatist. There existed but one code upon which +he might make requisition with promise of safety--the great and +potent code of Slang. So, here is the message that slipped, +unconstrued, through the fingers of curious officials, and came +to the eye of Goodwin: + + "His Nibs skedaddled yesterday per jack-rabbit line with all the + coin in the kitty and the bundle of muslin he's spoony about. The + boodle is six figures short. Our crowd in good shape, but we need + the spondulicks. You collar it. The main guy and the dry goods + are headed for the briny. You to know what to do. + + BOB." + +This screed, remarkable as it was, had no mystery for Goodwin. +He was the most successful of the small advance-guard of speculative +Americans that had invaded Anchuria, and he had not reached that +enviable pinnacle without having well exercised the arts of foresight +and deduction. He had taken up political intrigue as a matter of +business. He was acute enough to wield a certain influence among +the leading schemers, and he was prosperous enough to be able to +purchase the respect of the petty-officeholders. There was always +a revolutionary party; and to it he had allied himself; for the +adherents of a new administration received the rewards of their +labors. There was now a Liberal party seeking to overturn President +Miraflores. If the wheel successfully revolved, Goodwin stood to win +a concession to 30,000 manzanas of the finest coffee lands in the +interior. Certain incidents in the recent career of President +Miraflores had excited a shrewd suspicion in Goodwin's mind that the +government was near a dissolution from another cause than that of a +revolution, and now Englehart's telegram had come as a corroboration +of his wisdom. + +The telegram, which had remained unintelligible to the Anchurian +linguists who had applied to it in vain their knowledge of Spanish +and elemental English, conveyed a stimulating piece of news to +Goodwin's understanding. It informed him that the president of the +republic had decamped from the capital city with the contents of the +treasury. Furthermore, that he was accompanied in his flight by that +winning adventuress Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer, whose troupe +of performers had been entertained by the president at San Mateo +during the past month on a scale less modest than that with which +royal visitors are often content. The reference to the "jackrabbit +line" could mean nothing else than the mule-back system of transport +that prevailed between Coralio and the capital. The hint that the +"boodle" was "six figures short" made the condition of the national +treasury lamentably clear. Also it was convincingly true that the +ingoing party--its way now made a pacific one--would need the +"spondulicks." Unless its pledges should be fulfilled, and the +spoils held for the delectation of the victors, precarious indeed, +would be the position of the new government. Therefore it was +exceeding necessary to "collar the main guy," and recapture the +sinews of war and government. + +Goodwin handed the message to Keogh. + +"Read that, Billy," he said. "It's from Bob Englehart. Can you +manage the cipher?" + +Keogh sat in the other half of the doorway, and carefully perused +the telegram. + +"'Tis not a cipher," he said, finally. "'Tis what they call +literature, and that's a system of language put in the mouths +of people that they've never been introduced to by writers of +imagination. The magazines invented it, but I never knew before that +President Norvin Green had stamped it with the seal of his approval. +'Tis now no longer literature, but language. The dictionaries tried, +but they couldn't make it go for anything but dialect. Sure, now +that the Western Union indorses it, it won't be long till a race of +people will spring up that speaks it." + +"You're running too much to philology, Billy," said Goodwin. "Do you +make out the meaning of it?" + +"Sure," replied the philosopher of Fortune. "All languages come easy +to the man who must know 'em. I've even failed to misunderstand an +order to evacuate in classical Chinese when it was backed up by the +muzzle of a breech-loader. This little literary essay I hold in my +hands means a game of Fox-in-the-Morning. Ever play that, Frank, +when you was a kid?" + +"I think so," said Goodwin, laughing. "You join hands all 'round, +and--" + +"You do not," interrupted Keogh. "You've got a fine sporting game +mixed up in your head with 'All Around the Rosebush.' The spirit of +'Fox-in-the-Morning' is opposed to the holding of hands. I'll tell +you how it's played. This president man and his companion in play, +they stand up over in San Mateo, ready for the run, and shout: +"Fox-in-the-Morning!' Me and you, standing here, we say: 'Goose +and Gander!' They say: 'How many miles is it to London town?' We +say: 'Only a few, if your legs are long enough. How many comes out?' +They say: 'More than you're able to catch.' And then the game +commences." + +"I catch the idea," said Goodwin. "It won't do to let the goose +and gander slip through your fingers, Billy; their feathers are too +valuable. Our crowd is prepared and able to step into the shoes +of the government at once; but with the treasury empty we'd stay +in power about as long as a tenderfoot would stick on an untamed +bronco. We must play the fox on every foot of the coast to prevent +their getting out of the country." + +"By the mule-back schedule," said Keogh, "it's five days down from +San Mateo. We've got plenty of time to set our outposts. There's +only three places on the coast where they can hope to sail from--here +and Solitas and Alazan. They're the only points we'll have to guard. +It's as easy as a chess problem--fox to play, and mate in three +moves. Oh, goosey, goosey, gander, whither do you wander? By the +blessing of the literary telegraph the boodle of this benighted +fatherland shall be preserved to the honest political party that +is seeking to overthrow it." + +The situation had been justly outlined by Keogh. The down trail +from the capital was at all times a weary road to travel. A jiggety- +joggety journey it was; ice-cold and hot, wet and dry. The trail +climbed appalling mountains, wound like a rotten string about the +brows of breathless precipices, plunged through chilling snow-fed +streams, and wriggled like a snake through sunless forests teeming +with menacing insect and animal life. After descending to the +foothills it turned to a trident, the central prong ending at Alazan. +Another branched off to Coralio; the third penetrated to Solitas. +Between the sea and the foothills stretched the five miles breadth +of alluvial coast. Here was the flora ofthe tropics in its rankest +and most prodigal growth. Spaces here and there had been wrested +from the jungle and planted with bananas and cane and orange groves. +The rest was a riot of wild vegetation, the home of monkeys, tapirs, +jaguars, alligators, and prodigious reptiles and insects. Where no +road was cut a serpent could scarcely make its way through the tangle +of vines and creepers. Across the treacherous mangrove swamps few +things without wings could safely pass. Therefore the fugitives +could hope to reach the coast only by one of the routes named. + +"Keep the matter quiet, Billy," advised Goodwin. "We don't want +the Ins to know that the president is in flight. I suppose Bob's +information is something of a scoop in the capital as yet. Otherwise +he would not have tried to make his message a confidential one; and, +besides, everybody would have heard the news. I'm going around now +to see Dr. Zavalla, and start a man up the trail to cut the telegraph +wire." + +As Goodwin rose, Keogh threw his hat upon the grass by the door and +expelled a tremendous sigh. + +"What's the trouble, Billy?" asked Goodwin, pausing. "That's the +first time I heard you sigh." + +"'Tis the last," said Keogh. "With that sorrowful puff of wind +I resign myself to a life of praiseworthy but harassing honesty. +What are tintypes, if you please, to the opportunities of the great +and hilarious class of ganders and geese? Not that I would be a +president, Frank--and the boodle he's got is too big for me to handle +--but in some ways I feel my conscience hurting me for addicting +myself to photographing a nation instead of running away with it. +Frank, did you ever see the 'bundle of muslin' that His Excellency +has wrapped up and carried off?" + +"Isabel Guilbert?" said Goodwin, laughing. "No, I never did. From +what I've heard of her, though, I imagine that she wouldn't stick at +anything to carry her point. Don't get romantic, Billy. Sometimes +I begin to fear that there's Irish blood in your ancestry." + +"I never saw her either," went on Keogh; "but they say she's got all +the ladies of mythology, sculpture, and fiction reduced to chromos. +They say she can look at a man once, and he'll turn monkey and climb +trees to pick coconuts for her. Think of that president man with +Lord know how many hundreds of thousands of dollars in one hand, +and this muslin siren in the other, galloping down the hill on a +sympathetic mule amid songbirds and flowers! And here is Billy +Keogh, because he is virtuous, condemned to the unprofitable swindle +of slandering the faces of missing links on tin for an honest living! +'Tis an injustice of nature." + +"Cheer up," said Goodwin. "You are a pretty poor fox to be envying +a gander. Maybe the enchanting Guilbert will take a fancy to you and +your tintypes after we impoverish her royal escort." + +"She could do worse," reflected Keogh; "but she won't. 'Tis not +a tintype gallery, but a gallery of the gods that she's fitted to +adorn. She's a very wicked lady, and the president man is in luck. +But I hear Clancy swearing in the back room for having to do all the +work." And Keogh plunged for the rear of the "gallery," whistling +gaily in a spontaneous way that belied his recent sigh over the +questionable good luck of the flying president. + +Goodwin turned from the main street into a much narrower one that +intersected it at a right angle. + +These side streets were covered by a growth of thick, rank grass, +which was kept to a navigable shortness by the machetes of the +police. Stone sidewalks, little more than a ledge in width, ran +along the base of the mean and monotonous adobe houses. At the +outskirts of the village these streets dwindled to nothing; and here +were set the palm-thatched huts of the Caribs and the poorer natives, +and the shabby cabins of negroes from Jamaica and the West India +islands. A few structures raised their heads above the red-tiled +roofs of the one-story houses--the bell tower of the ~Calaboza~, +the Hotel de los Extranjeros, the residence of the Vesuvius Fruit +Company's agent, the store and residence of Bernard Brannigan, +a ruined cathedral in which Columbus had once set foot, and, most +imposing of all, the Casa Morena--the summer "White House" of +the President of Anchuria. On the principal street running along +the beach--the Broadway of Coralio--were the larger stores, the +government ~bodega~ and post-office, the ~cuartel~, the rum-shops +and the market place. + +On his way Goodwin passed the house of Bernard Brannigan. It was a +modern wooden building, two stories in height. The ground floor was +occupied by Brannigan's store, the upper one contained the living +apartments. A wide cool porch ran around the house half way up its +outer walls. A handsome, vivacious girl neatly dressed in flowing +white leaned over the railing and smiled down upon Goodwin. She was +no darker than many an Andalusian of high descent; and she sparkled +and glowed like a tropical moonlight. + +"Good evening, Miss Paula," said Goodwin, taking off his hat, with +his ready smile. There was little difference in his manner whether +he addressed women or men. Everybody in Coralio liked to receive +the salutation of the big American. + +"Is there any news, Mr. Goodwin? Please don't say no. Isn't it +warm? I feel just like Mariana in her moated grange--or was it a +range?--it's hot enough." + +"No, there's no news to tell, I believe," said Goodwin, with a +mischievous look in his eye, "except that old Geddie is getting +grumpier and crosser every day. If something doesn't happen to +relieve his mind I'll have to quit smoking on his back porch--and +there's no other place available that is cool enough." + +"He isn't grumpy," said Paula Brannigan, impulsively, "when he--" + +But she ceased suddenly, and drew back with a deepening color; +for her mother had been a ~mestizo~ lady, and the Spanish blood +had brought to Paula a certain shyness that was an adornment to +the other half of her demonstrative nature. + + + +II + +The Lotus And The Bottle + +Willard Greddie, consul for the United States in Coralio, was working +leisurely on his yearly report. Goodwin, who had strolled in as he +did daily for a smoke on the much coveted porch, had found him so +absorbed in his work that he departed after roundly abusing the +consul for his lack of hospitality. + +"I shall complain to the civil service department," said Goodwin;-- +"or is it a department?--perhaps it's only a theory. One gets neither +civility nor service from you. You won't talk; and you won't set out +anything to drink. What kind of a way is that of representing your +government?" + +Goodwin strolled out and across to the hotel to see if he could bully +the quarantine doctor into a game on Coralio's solitary billiard +table. His plans were completed for the interception of the +fugitives from the capital; and now it was but a waiting game that +he had to play. + +The consul was interested in his report. He was only twenty-four; +and he had not been in Coralio long enough for his enthusiasm to cool +in the heat of the tropics--a paradox that may be allowed between +Cancer and Capricorn. + +So many thousand bunches of bananas, so mnay thousand oranges and +coconuts, so many ounces of gold dust, pounds of rubber, coffee, +indigo and sarparilla--actually, exports were twenty per cent greater +than for the previous year! + +A little thrill of satisfaction ran through the consul. Perhaps, +he thought, the State Department, upon reading his introduction, +would notice--and then he leaned back in his chair and laughed. +He was getting as bad as the others. For the moment he had forgotten +that Coralio was an insignificant republic lying along the by-ways +of a second-rate sea. He thought of Gregg, the quarantine doctor, +who subscribed for the London ~Lancet~, expecting to find it quoting +his reports to the home Board of Health concerning the yellow fever +germ. The consul knew that not one in fifty of his acquaintances in +the States had ever heard of Coralio. He knew that two men, at any +rate, would have to read his report--some underling in the State +Department and a compositor in the Public Printing Office. Perhaps +the typesticker would note the increase of commerce in Coralio, and +speak of it, over the cheese and beer, to a friend. + +He had just written: "Most unaccountable is the supineness of the +large exporters in the United States in permitting the French and +German houses to practically control the trade interests of this +rich and productive country"--when he heard the hoarse notes of +a steamer's siren. + +Geddie laid down his pen and gathered his Panama hat and umbrella. +By the sound he knew it to be the ~Valhalla~, one of the line of +fruit vessels plying for the Vesuvius Company. Down to ~ninos~ of +five years, every one in Coralio could name you each incoming steamer +by the note of her siren. + +The consul sauntered by a roundabout, shaded way to the beach. +By reason of long practice he gauged his stroll so accurately that +by the time he arrived on the sandy shore the boat of the customs +officials was rowing back from the steamer, which had been boarded +and inspected according to the laws of Anchuria. + +There is no harbor at Coralio. Vessels of the draught of the +~Valhalla~ must ride at anchor a mile from shore. When they take on +fruit it is conveyed on lighters and freighter sloops. At Solitas, +where there was a fine harbor, ships of many kinds were to be seen, +but in the roadstead off Coralio scarcely any save the fruiters +paused. Now and then a tramp coaster, or a mysterious brig from +Spain, and then a tramp coaster, or a mysterious brig from Spain, +or a saucy French barque would hang innocently for a few days in +the offing. Then the custom-house crew would become doubly vigilant +and wary. At night a sloop or two would be making strange trips in +and out along the shore; and in the morning the stock of Three-Star +Hennessey, wines and drygoods in Coralio would be found vastly +increased. It has also been said that the customs officials jingled +more silver in the pockets of their red-striped trousers, and that +the record books showed no increase in import duties received. + +The custom's boat and the ~Valhalla~ gig reached the shore at the +same time. When they grounded in the shallow water there was still +five yards of rolling surf between them and dry sand. Then half- +clothed Caribs dashed into the water, and brought in on their backs +the ~Valhalla's~ purser, and the little native officials in their +cotton undershirts, blue trousers with red stripes, and flapping +straw hats. + +At college Geddie had been a treasure as a first-baseman. He now +closed his umbrella, stuck it upright in the sand, and stooped, +with his hands resting upon his knees. The purser, burlesquing +the pitcher's contortions, hurled at the consul the heavy roll of +newspapers, tied with a string, that the steamer always brought for +him. Geddie leaped high and caught the roll with a sounding "thwack." +The loungers on the beach--about a third of the population of the +town--laughed and applauded delightedly. Every week they expected +to see that roll of papers delivered and received in that same +manner, and they were never disappointed. Innovations did not +flourish in Coralio. + +The consul re-hoisted his umbrella and walked back to the consulate. + +This home of a great nation's representative was a wooden structure +of two rooms, with a native-built gallery of poles, bamboo and +nipa palm running on three sides of it. One room was the official +apartment, furnished chastely with a flat-top desk, a hammock, and +three uncomfortable cane-seated chairs. Engravings of the first and +latest president of the country represented hung against the wall. +The other room was the consul's living apartment. + +It was eleven o'clock when he returned from the beach, and therefore +breakfast time. Chanca, the Carib woman who cooked for him, was just +serving the meal on the side of the gallery facing the sea--a spot +famous as the coolest in Coralio. The breakfast consisted of shark's +fin soup, stew of land crabs, breadfruit, a boiled iguana steak, +aquacates, a freshly cut pineapple, claret and coffee. + +Geddie took his seat, and unrolled with luxurious laziness his bundle +of newspapers. Here in Coralio for two days or longer he would read +the goings-on in the world very much as we of the world read those +whimsical contributions to inexact science that assume to portray the +doings of the Martians. After he had finished with the papers they +would be sent on the rounds of the other English-speaking residents +of the town. + +The paper that came first to his hand was one of those bulky +mattresses of printed stuff upon which the readers of certain +New York journals are supposed to take their Sabbath literary nap. +Opening this the consul rested it upon the table, supporting its +weight with the aid of the back of a chair. Then he partook of his +meal deliberately, turning the leaves from time to time and glancing +half idly at the contents. + +Presently he was struck by something familiar to him in a picture-- +a half-page, badly printed reproduction of a photograph of a vessel. +Languidly interested, he leaned for a nearer scrutiny and a view of +the florid headlines of the column next to the picture. + +Yes; he was not mistaken. The engraving was of the eight-hundred-ton +yacht ~Idalia~, belonging to "that prince of good fellows, Midas of +the money market, and society's pink of perfection, J. Ward Tolliver." + +Slowly sipping his black coffee, Geddie read the column of print. +Following a listed statement of Mr. Tolliver's real estate and bonds, +came a description of the yacht's furnishings, and then the grain of +news no bigger than a mustard seed. Mr. Tolliver, with a party of +favored guests, would sail the next day on a six weeks' cruise along +the Central American and South American coasts and among the Bahama +Islands. Among the guests were Mrs. Cumberland Payne and Miss Ida +Payne, of Norfolk. + +The writer, with the fatuous presumption that was demanded of him +by his readers, had concocted a romance suited to their palates. +He bracketed the names of Miss Payne and Mr. Tolliver until he had +well-nigh read the marriage ceremony over them. He played coyly and +insinuatingly upon the strings of "~on dit~" and "Madame Rumor" and +"a little bird" and "no one would be surprised," and ended with +congratulations. + +Geddie, having finished his breakfast, took his papers to the edge +of the gallery, and sat there in his favorite steamer chair with his +feet on the bamboo railing. He lighted a cigar, and looked out upon +the sea. He felt a glow of satisfaction at finding he was so little +disturbed by what he had read. He told himself that he had conquered +the distress that had sent him, a voluntary exile, to this far land +of the lotus. He could never forget Ida, of course; but there was +no longer any pain in thinking about her. When they had had that +misunderstanding and quarrel he had impulsively sought this +consulship, with the desire to retaliate upon her by detaching +himself from her world and presence. He had succeeded thoroughly +in that. During the twelve months of his life in Coralio no word had +passed between them, though he had sometimes heard of her through the +dilatory correspondence with the few friends to whom he still wrote. +Still he could not repress a little thrill of satisfaction at knowing +that she had not yet married Tolliver or any one else. But evidently +Tolliver had not yet abandoned hope. + +Well, it made no difference to him now. He had eaten of the lotus. +He was happy and content in this land of perpetual afternoon. Those +old days of life in the States seemed like an irritating dream. He +hoped Ida would be as happy as he was. The climate as balmy as that +of distant Avalon; the fetterless, idyllic round of enchanted days; +the life among this indolent, romantic people--a life full of music, +flowers, and low laughter; the influence of the imminent sea and +mountains, and the many shapes of love and magic and beauty that +bloomed in the white tropic nights--with all he was more than +content. Also, there was Paula Brannigan. + +Geddie intended to marry Paula--if, of course, she would consent; +but he felt rather sure that she would do that. Somehow, he kept +postponing his proposal. Several times he had been quite near to it; +but a mysterious something always held him back. Perhaps it was only +the unconscious, instinctive conviction that the act would sever the +last tie that bound him to his old world. + +He could be very happy with Paula. Few of the native girls could be +compared with her. She had attended a convent school in New Orleans +for two years; and when she chose to display her accomplishments no +one could detect any difference between her and the girls of Norfolk +and Manhattan. But it was delicious to see her at home dressed, as +she sometimes was, in the native costume, with bare shoulders and +flowing sleeves. + +Bernard Brannigan was the great merchant of Coralio. Besides his +store, he maintained a train of pack mules, and carried on a lively +trade with the interior towns and villages. He had married a native +lady of high Castilian descent, but with a tinge of Indian brown +showing through her olive cheek. The union of the Irish and the +Spanish had produced, as it so often has, an offshoot of rare beauty +and variety. They were very excellent people indeed, and the upper +story of the house was ready to be placed at the service of Geddie +and Paula as soon as he should make up his mind to speak about it. + +By the time two hours were whiled away the consul tired of reading. +The papers lay scattered about him on the gallery. Reclining there, +he gazed dreamily out upon an Eden. A clump of banana plants +interposed their broad shields between him and the sun. The gentle +slope from the consulate to the sea was covered with the dark-green +foliage of lemon-trees and orange-trees just bursting into bloom. +A lagoon pierced the land like a dark, jagged crystal, and above it a +pale ceiba-tree rose almost to the clouds. The waving coconut palms +on the beach flared their decorative green leaves against the slate +of an almost quiescent sea. His senses were cognizant of brilliant +scarlet and ochres and the vert of the coppice, of odors of fruit and +bloom and the smoke from Chanca's clay oven under the calabash-tree; +of the treble laughter of the native women in their huts, the song of +the robin, the salt taste of the breeze, the diminuendo of the faint +surf running along the shore--and, gradually, of a white speck, +growing to a blur, that intruded itself upon the drab prospect of +the sea. + +Lazily interested, he watched this blur increase until it became +the ~Idalia~ steaming at full speed, coming down the coast. Without +changing his position he kept his eyes upon the beautiful white yacht +as she drew swiftly near, and came opposite to Coralio. Then, sitting +upright, he saw her float steadily past and on. He had seen the +frequent splash of her polished brass work and the stripes of her +deck-awnings--so much, and no more. Like a ship on a magic lantern +slide the ~Idalia~ had crossed the illuminated circle of the consul's +little world, and was gone. Save for the tiny cloud of smoke that +was left hanging over the brim of the sea, she might have been an +immaterial thing, a chimera of his idle brain. + +Geddie went into his office and sat down to dawdle over his report. +If the reading of the article in the paper had left him unshaken, +this silent passing of the ~Idalia~ had done for him still more. +It had brought the calm and peace of a situation from which all +uncertainty had been erased. He knew that men sometimes hope without +being aware of it. Now, since she had come two thousand miles and +had passed without a sign, not even his unconscious self need cling +to the past any longer. + +After dinner, when the sun was low behind the mountains, Geddie +walked on the little strip of beach under the coconuts. The wind +was blowing mildly landward, and the surface of the sea was rippled +by tiny wavelets. + +A miniature breaker, spreading with a soft "swish" upon the sand +brought with its something round and shiny that rolled back again +as the wave receded. The next influx beached it clear, and Geddie +picked it up. The thing was a long-necked wine bottle of colorless +glass. The cork had been driven in tightly to the level of the +mouth, and the end covered with dark-red sealing-wax. The bottle +contained only what seemed to be a sheet of paper, much curled from +the manipulation it had undergone while being inserted. In the +sealing-wax was the impression of a seal--probably of a signet-ring, +bearing the initials of a monogram; but the impression had been +hastily made, and the letters were past anything more certain than +a shrewd conjecture. Ida Payne had always worn a signet-ring in +preference to any other finger decoration. Geddie thought he could +make out the familiar "I P"; and a queer sensation of disquietude +went over him. More personal and intimate was this reminder of +her than had been the sight of the vessel she was doubtless on. +He walked back to his house, and set the bottle on his desk. + +Throwing off his hat and coat, and lighting a lamp--for the night had +crowded precipitately upon the brief twilight--he began to examine +his piece of sea salvage. + +By holding the bottle near the light and turning it judiciously, he +made out that it contained a double sheet of note-paper filled with +close writing; further, that the paper was of the same size and shade +as that always used by Ida; and that, to the best of his belief, the +handwriting was hers. The imperfect glass of the bottle so distorted +the rays of light that he could read no word of the writing; but +certain capital letters, of which he caught comprehensive glimpses, +were Ida's, he felt sure. + +There was a little smile both of perplexity and amusement in Geddie's +eyes as he set the bottle down, and laid three cigars side by side +on his desk. He fetched his steamer chair from the gallery, and +stretched himself comfortably. He would smoke those three cigars +while considering the problem. + +For it amounted to a problem. He almost wished that he had not found +the bottle; but the bottle was there. Why should it have drifted in +from the sea, whence come so many disquieting things, to disturb his +peace? + +In this dreamy land, where time seemed so redundant, he had fallen +into the habit of bestowing much thought upon even trifling matters. + +He bagan to speculate upon many fanciful theories concerning the +story of the bottle, rejecting each in turn. + +Ships in danger of wreck or disablement sometimes cast forth such +precarious messengers calling for aid. But he had seen the ~Idalia~ +not three hours before, safe and speeding. Suppose the crew had +mutinied and imprisoned the passengers below, and the message was one +begging for succor! But, premising such an improbable outrage, would +the agitated captives have taken the pains to fill four pages of +note-paper with carefully penned arguments to their rescue. + +Thus by elimination he soon rid the matter of the more unlikely +theories, and was reduced--though aversely--to the less assailable +ones that the bottle contained a message to himself. Ida knew he +was in Coralio; she must have launched the bottle while the yacht +was passing and the wind blowing fairly toward the shore. + +As soon as Geddie reached this conclusion a wrinkle came between his +brows and a stubborn look settled around his mouth. He sat looking +out through the doorway at the gigantic fire-flies traversing the +quiet streets. + +If this was a message to him from Ida, what could it mean save an +overture at reconciliation? And if that, why had she not used the +same methods of the post instead of this uncertain and even flippant +means of communication? A note in an empty bottle, cast into the +sea! There was something light and frivolous about it, if not +actually contemptuous. + +The thought stirred his pride, and subdued whatever emotions had been +resurrected by the finding of the bottle. + +Geddie put on his coat and hat and walked out. He followed a street +that led him along the border of the little plaza where a band was +playing and people were rambling, care-free and indolent. Some +timorous ~senoritas~ scurrying past with fire-flies tangled in the +jetty braids of their hair glanced at him with shy, flattering eyes. +The air was languorous with the scent of jasmin and orange-blossoms. + +The consul stayed his steps at the house of Bernard Brannigan. Paula +was swinging in a hammock on the gallery. She rose from it like a +bird from its nest. The color came to her cheeck at the sound of +Geddie's voice. + +He was charmed at the sight of her costume--a flounced muslin dress, +with a little jacket of white flannel, all made with neatness and +style. He suggested a stroll, and they walked out to the old Indian +well on the hill road. They sat on the curb, and there Geddie made +the expected but long-deferred speech. Certain though he had been +that she would not say him nay, he was still thrilled at the +completeness and sweetness of her surrender. Here was surely a heart +made for love and steadfastness. Here was no caprice or questionings +or captious standards of convention. + +When Geddie kissed Paula at her door that night he was happier than +he had ever been before. "Here in this hollow lotus land, ever +to live and lie reclined" seemed to him, as it has seemed to many +mariners, the best as well as the easiest. His future would be +an ideal one. He had attained a Paradise without a serpent. His +Eve would be indeed a part of him, unbeguiled, and therefore more +beguiling. He had made his decision tonight, and his heart was full +of serene, assured content. + +Geddie went back to his house whistling that finest and saddest love +song, "La Golondrina." At the door his tame monkey leaped down from +his shelf, chattering briskly. The consul turned to his desk to get +him some nuts he usually kept there. Reaching in the half-darkness, +his hand struck against the bottle. He started as if he had touched +the cold rotundity of a serpent. + +He had forgotten that the bottle was there. + +He lighted the lamp and fed the monkey. Then, very deliberately, +he lighted a cigar, and took the bottle in his hand, and walked down +the path to the beach. + +There was a moon, and the sea was glorious. The breeze had shifted, +as it did each evening, and was now rushing steadily seaward. + +Stepping to the water's edge, Geddie hurled the unopened bottle far +out into the sea. It disappeared for a moment, and then shot upward +twice its length. Geddie stood still, watching it. The moonlight +was so bright that he could see it bobbing up and down with the +little waves. Slowly it receded from the shore, flashing and turning +as it went. The wind was carrying it out to sea. Soon it became a +mere speck, doubtfully discerned at irregular intervals; and then the +mystery of it was swallowed up by the greater mystery of the ocean. +Geddie stood still upon the beach, smoking and looking out upon the +water. + + +"Simon!--Oh, Simon!--Wake up there, Simon!" bawled a sonorous voice +at the edge of the water. + +Old Simon Cruz was a half-breed fisherman and smuggler who lived in a +hut on the beach. Out of his earliest nap Simon was thus awakened. + +He slipped on his shoes and went outside. Just landing from one of +the ~Valhalla's~ boats was the third mate of that vessel, who was an +acquaintance of Simon's, and three sailors from the fruiter. + +"Go up, Simon," called the mate, "and find Doctor Gregg or Mr. +Goodwin or anybody that's a friend to Mr. Geddie, and bring 'em here +at once." + +"Saints of the skies!" said Simon, sleepily, "nothing has happened +to Mr. Geddie?" + +"He's under that tarpauling," said the mate, pointing to the boat, +"and he's rather more than half drowned. We seen him from the +steamer nearly a mile out from shore, swimmin' like mad after a +bottle that was floatin' in the water, outward bound. We lowered the +gig and started for him. He nearly had his hand on the bottle, when +he gave out and went under. We pulled him out in time to save him, +maybe; but the doctor is the one to decide that." + +"A bottle?" said the old man, rubbing his eyes. He was not yet fully +awake. "Where is the bottle?" + +"Driftin' along out there some'eres," said the mate, jerking his +thumb toward the sea. "Get on with you, Simon." + + + +III + +Smith + +Goodwin and the ardent patriot, Zavalla, took all the precautions +that their foresight could contrive to prevent the escape of +President Miraflores and his companion. The sent trusted messengers +up the coast to Solitas and Alazan to warn the local leaders of +the flight, and to instruct them to patrol the water line and arrest +the fugitives at all hazards should they reveal themselves in that +territory. After this was done there remained only to cover +the district about Coralio and await the coming of the quarry. +The nets were well spread. The roads were so few, the opportunities +for embarkation so limited, and the two or three probable points of +exit so well guarded that it would be strange indeed if there should +slip through the meshes so much of the country's dignity, romance, +and collateral. The president would, without doubt, move as secretly +as possible, and endeavor to board a vessel by stealth from some +secluded point along the shore. + +On the fourth day after the receipt of Englehart's telegram the +~Karlsefin~, a Norwegian steamer chartered by the New Orleans fruit +trade, anchored off Coralio with three horse toots of her siren. +The ~Karlesfin~ ws not one of the line operated by the Vesuvius Fruit +Company. She was something of a dilettante, doing odd jobs for a +company that was scarcely important enough to figure as a rival to +the Vesuvius. The movements of the ~Karlesfin~ were dependent upon +the state of the market. Sometimes she would ply steadily between +the Spanish Main and New Orleans in the regular transport of fruit; +next she would be maing erratic trips to Mobile or Charleston, or +even as far north as New York, according to the distribution of +the fruit supply. + +Goodwin lounged upon the beach with the susual crowd of idlers that +had gathered to view the steamer. Now that President Miraflores +might be expected to reach the borders of his abjured country at any +time, the orders were to keep a strict and unrelenting watch. Every +vessel that approached the shores might now be considered a possible +means of escape for the fugitives; and an eye was kept even on +the slopes and dories that belonged to the sea-going contingent +of Coralio. Goodwin and Zavalla moved everywhere, but without +ostentation, watching the loopholes of escape. + +The customs official crowded importantly into their boat and rowed +out to the ~Karlesfin~. A boat from the steamer landed her purser +with his papers, and took out the quarantine doctor with his green +umbrella and clinical thermometer. Next a swarm of Caribs began +to load upon lighters the thousands of bunches of bananas heaped +upon the shore and row them out to the steamer. The ~Karlesfin~ +had no passenger list, and was soon done with the attention of +the authorities. The purser declared that the steamer would remain +at anchor until morning, taking on her fruit during the night. +The ~Karlesfin~ had come, he said, from New York, to which port her +latest load of oranges and coconuts had been conveyed. Two or three +of the freighter sloops were engaged to assist in the work, for +the captain was anxious to make a quick return in order to reap +the advantage offered by a certain dearth of fruit in the States. + +About four o'clock in the afternoon another of those marine monsters, +not very familiar in those waters, hove in sight, following the +fateful ~Idalia~--a graceful steam yacht, painted a light buff, +clean-cut as a steel engraving. The beautiful vessel hovered off +shore, see-sawing the waves as lightly as a duck in a rain barrel. +A swift boat manned by a crew in uniform came ashore, and a stocky- +built man leaped to the sands. + +The newcomer seemed to turn a disapproving eye upon the rather motley +congregation of native Anchurians, and made his way at once toward +Goodwin, who was the most conspicuously Anglo-Saxon figure present. +Goodwin greeted him with courtesy. + +Conversation developed that the newly landed one was named Smith, +and that he had come in a yacht. A meagre biography, truly; for +the yacht was most apparent; and the "Smith" not beyond a reasonable +guess before the revelation. Yet to the eye of Goodwin, who has +seen several things, there was a discrepancy between Smith and his +yacht. A bullet-headed man Smith was, with an oblique, dead eye +and the moustache of a cocktail-mixer. And unless he had shifted +costumes before putting off for shore he had affronted the deck of +his correct vessel clad in a pearl-gray derby, a gay plaid suit and +vaudeville neckwear. Men owning pleasure yachts generally harmonize +better with them. + +Smith looked business, but he was no advertiser. He commented upon +the scenery, remarking upon its fidelity to the pictures in the +geography; and then inquired for the United States consul. Goodwin +pointed out the starred-and-striped bunting hanging from above the +little consulate, which was concealed behind the orange-trees. + +"Mr. Geddie, the consul, will be sure to be there," said Goodwin. +"He was very nearly drowned a few days ago while taking a swim in the +sea, and the doctor has ordered him to remain indoors for some time." + +Smith ploughed his way through the sand to the consulate, his +haberdashery creating violent discord against the smooth tropical +blues and greens. + +Geddie was lounging in his hammock, somewhat pale of face and languid +in pose. On that night when the ~Valhalla's~ boat had brought him +ashore apparently drenched to death by the sea, Doctor Gregg and his +other friends had toiled for hours to preserve the little spark of +life that remained to him. The bottle, with its impotent message, +was gone out to sea, and the problem that it had provoked was reduced +to a simple sum in addition--one and one make two, by the rule of +arithmetic; one by the rule of romance. + +There is a quaint old theory that man may have two souls--a +peripheral one which serves ordinarily, and a central one which +is stirred only at certain times, but then with activity and vigor. +While under the domination of the former a man will shave, vote, pay +taxes, give money to his family, buy subscription books and comport +himself on the average plan. But let the central soul suddenly +become dominant, and he may, in the twinkling of an eye, turn upon +the partner of his joys with furious execration; he may change his +politics while you could snap your fingers; he may deal out deadly +insult to his dearest friend; he may get him, instanter, to a +monastery or a dance hall; he may elope, or hang himself--or he may +write a song or poem, or kiss his wife unasked, or give his funds +to the search of a microbe. Then the peripheral soul will return; +and we have our safe, sane citizen again. It is but the revolt of +the Ego against Order; and its effect is to shake up the atoms only +that they may settle where they belong. + +Geddie's revulsion had been a mild one--no more than a swim in +a summer sea after so inglorious an object as a drifting bottle. +And now he was himself again. Upon his desk, ready for the post, +was a letter to his government tendering his resignation as consul, +to be effective as soon as another could be appointed in his place. +For Bernard Brannigan, who never did things in a half-way manner, +was to take Geddie at once for a partner in his very profitable +and various enterprises; and Paula was happily engaged in plans for +refurnishing and decorating the upper story of the Brannigan house. + +The consul rose from his hammock when he saw the conspicuous stranger +at this door. + +"Keep your seat, old man," said the visitor, with an airy wave of his +large hand. "My name's Smith; and I've come in a yacht. You are the +consul--is that right? A big, cool guy on the beach directed me here. +Thought I'd pay my respects to the flag." + +"Sit down, said Geddie. "I've been admiring your craft ever since it +came in sight. Looks like a fast sailer. What's her tonnage?" + +"Search me!" said Smith. "I don't know what she weighs in at. But +she's got a tidy gait. The ~Rambler~--that's her name--don't take +the dust of anything afloat. This is my first trip on her. I'm +taking a squint along this coast just to get an idea of the countries +where the rubber and red pepper and revolutions come from. I had no +idea there was so much scenery down here. Why, Central Park ain't +in it with this neck of the woods. I'm from New York. They get +monkeys, and coconuts, and parrots down here--is that right?" + +"We have them all," said Geddie. "I'm quite sure that our fauna and +flora would take a prize over Central Park." + +"Maybe they would," admitted Smith, cheerfully. "I haven't seen them +yet. But I guess you've got us skinned on the animal and vegetation +question. You don't have much travel here, do you?" + +"Travel?" queried the consul. "I suppose you mean passengers on +steamers. No; very few people land in Coralio. An investor now and +then--tourists and sightseers generally go further down the coast to +one of the larger towns where there is a harbor." + +"I see a ship out there loading up with bananas," said Smith. "Any +passengers come on her?" + +"That's the ~Karlesfin~," said the consul. "She's a tramp fruiter-- +made her last trip to New York, I believe. No; she brought no +passengers. I saw her boat come ashore, and there was no one. About +the only exciting recreation we have here is watching steamers when +they arrive; and a passenger on one of them generally causes the +whole town to turn out. If you are going to remain in Coralio +a while, Mr. Smith, I'll be glad to take you around to meet some +people. There are four or five American chaps that are good to know, +besides the native high-fliers." + +"Thanks," said the yachtsman, "but I wouldn't put you the trouble. +I'd like to meet the guys you speak of, but I won't be here long +enough to do much knocking around. That cool gent on the beach spoke +of a doctor; can you tell me where to find him? The ~Rambler~ ain't +quite as steady on her feet as a Broadway hotel; and a fellow gets +a touch of seasickness now and then. Thought I'd strike the croaker +for a handful of the little sugar pills, in case I need 'em." + +"You will be apt to find Doctor Gregg at the hotel," said the consul. +"You can see it from the door--it's that two-story building with the +balcony, where the orange-trees are." + +The Hotel de los Extranjeros was a dreary hostelry, in great disuse +both by strangers and friends. It stood at a corner of the Street +of the Holy Sepulchre. A grove of small orange-trees crowded against +one side of it, enclosed by a low, rock wall over which a tall man +might easily step. The house was of plastered adobe, stained a +hundred shades of color by the salt breeze and the sun. Upon its +upper balcony opened a central door and two windows containing broad +jalousies instead of sashes. + +The lower floor communicated by two doorways with the narrow, +rock-paved sidewalk. The ~pulperia~--or drinking shop--of the +proprietess, Madama Timotea Ortiz, occupied the ground floor. On +the bottles of brandy, ~anisada~, Scotch "smoke," and inexpensive +wines behind the little counter the dust lay thick save where the +fingers of infrequent customers had left irregular prints. The upper +story contained four or five guest-rooms which were rarely put to +their destined use. Sometimes a fruitgrower, riding in from his +plantation to confer with his agent, would pass a melancholy night +in the dismal upper story; sometimes a minor native official on some +trifling government quest would have his pomp and majesty awed by +Madama's sepulchral hospitality. But Madama sat behind her bar +content, not desiring to quarrel with Fate. If any one required +meat, drink or lodging at the Hotel de los Extranjeros they had but +to come, and be served. ~Esta bueno~. If they came not, why, then, +they came not. ~Esta bueno~. + +As the exceptional yachtsman was making his way down the precarious +sidewalk of the Street of the Holy Sepulchre, the solitary permanent +guest of that decaying hotel sat at its door, enjoying the breeze +from the sea. + +Doctor Gregg, the quarantine physician, was a man of fifty or sixty, +with a florid face and the longest beard between Topeka and Terra +del Fuego. He held his position by virtue of an appointment by +the Board of Health of a seaport city in one of the Southern states. +That city feared the ancient enemy of every Southern seaport--the +yellow fever--and it was the duty of Doctor Gregg to examine crew and +passengers of every vessel leaving Coralio for preliminary symptoms. +The duties were light, and the salary, for one who lived in Coralio, +ample. Surplus time there was in plenty; and the good doctor added +to his gains by a large private practice among the residents of the +coast. The fact that he did not know ten words of Spanish was no +obstacle; a pulse could be felt and a fee collected without one being +a linguist. Add to the description the facts that the doctor had +a story to tell concerning the operation of trepanning which no +listener had ever allowed him to conclude, and that he believed +in brandy as a prophylactic; and the special points of interest +possessed by Doctor Gregg will have become exhausted. + +The doctor had dragged a chair to the sidewalk. He was coatless, +and he leaned back against the wall and smoked, while he stroked his +beard. Surprise came into his pale blue eyes when he caught sight +of Smith in his unusual and prismatic clothes. + +"You're Doctor Gregg--is that right?" said Smith, feeling the dog's +head pin in his tie. "The constable--I mean the consul, told me +you hung out at this caravansary. My name's Smith; and I came in a +yacht. Taking a cruise around, looking at the monkeys and pineapple- +trees. Come inside and have a drink, Doc. This cafe looks on the +blink, but I guess it can set out something wet." + +"I will join you, sir, in just a taste of brandy," said Doctor Gregg, +rising quickly. "I find that as a prophylactic a little brandy is +almost a necessity in this climate." + +As they turned to enter the ~pulperia~ a native man, barefoot, +glided noiselessly up and addressed the doctor in Spanish. He was +yellowish-brown, like an over-ripe lemon; he wore a cotton shirt and +ragged linen trousers girded by a leather belt. His face was like +an animal's, live and wary, but without promise of much intelligence. +This man jabbered with animation and so much seriousness that it +seemed a pity that his words were to be wasted. + +Doctor Gregg felt his pulse. + +"You sick?" he inquired. + +"~Mi mujer es enferma en la casa,~" said the man, thus endeavoring +to convey the news, in the only language open to him, that his wife +lay ill in her palm-thatched hut. + +The doctor drew a handful of capsules filled with a white powder from +his trousers pocket. He counted out ten of them into the native's +hand, and held up his forefinger impressively. + +"Take one," said the doctor, "every two hours." He then held up two +fingers, shaking them emphatically before the native's face. Next he +pulled out his watch and ran his finger round the dial twice. Again +the two fingers confronted the patient's nose. "Two--two--two +hours," repeated the doctor. + +"~Si, Senor,~" said the native, sadly. + +He pulled a cheap silver watch from his own pocket and laid it in +the doctor's hand. "Me bring," said he, struggling painfully with +his scant English, "other watchy tomorrow," then he departed +downheartedly with his capsules. + +"A very ignorant race of people, sir," said the doctor, as he slipped +the watch into his pocket. "He seems to have mistaken my directions +for taking the physic for the fee. However, it is all right. He owes +me an account, anyway. The chances are that he won't bring the other +watch. You can't depend on anything they promise you. About that +drink, now? How did you come to Coralio, Mr. Smith? I was not aware +that any boats except the ~Karlesfin~ had arrived for some days." + +The two leaned against the deserted bar; and Madama set out a bottle +without waiting for the doctor's order. There was no dust on it. + +After they had drank twice Smith said: + +"You say there were no passengers on the ~Karlesfin~, Doc? Are you +sure about that? It seems to me I heard somebody down on the beach +say that there was one or two aboard." + +"They were mistaken, sir. I myself went out and put all hands +through a medical examination, as usual. The ~Karlesfin~ sails +as soon as she gets her bananas loaded, which will be about daylight +in the morning, and she got everything ready this afternoon. No, +sir, there was no passenger list. Like that Three-Star? A French +schooner landed two slooploads of it a month ago. If any customs +duties on it went to the distinguished republic of Anchuria you may +have my hat. If you won't have another, come out and let's sit +in the cool a while. It isn't often we exiles get a chance to talk +with somebody from the outside world." + +The doctor brought out another chair to the sidewalk for his new +acquaintance. The two seated themselves. + +"You are a man of the world," said Doctor Gregg; "a man of travel +and experience. Your decision in a matter of ethics and, no doubt, +on the points of equity, ability and professional probity should be +of value. I would be glad if you will listen to the history of a +case that I think stands unique in medical annals. + +"About nine years ago, while I was engaged in the practice of +medicine in my native city, I was called to treat a case of contusion +of the skull. I made the diagnosis that a splinter of bone was +pressing upon the brain, and that the surgical operation known as +trepanning was required. However, as the patient was a gentleman +of wealth and position, I called in for consultation Doctor--" + +Smith rose from his chair, and laid a hand, soft with apology, +upon the doctor's shirt sleeve. + +"Say, Doc," he said, solemnly, "I want to hear that story. You've +got me interrested; and I don't want to miss the rest of it. I know +it's a loola by the way it begins; and I want to tell it at the next +meeting of the Barney O'Flynn Association, if you don't mind. +But I've got one or two matters to attend to first. If I get 'em +attended to in time I'll come right back and hear you spiel the rest +before bedtime--is that right?" + +"By all means," said the doctor, "get your business attended to, +and then return. I shall wait up for you. You see, one of the most +prominent physicians at the consultation diagnosed the trouble as +a blood clot; another said it was an abscess, but I--" + +"Don't tell me now, Doc. Don't spoil the story. Wait till I come +back. I want to hear it as it runs off the reel--is that right?" + +The mountains reached up their bulky shoulders to receive the level +gallop of Apollo's homing steeds, the day died in the lagoons and +in the shadowed banana groves and in the mangrove swamps, where the +great blue crabs were beginning to crawl to land for their nightly +ramble. And it died, at last, upon the highest peaks. Then the +brief twilight, ephemeral as the flight of a moth, came and went; +the Southern Cross peeped with its topmost eye above a row of palms, +and the fire-flies heralded with their torches and approach of +soft-footed night. + +In the offing the ~Karlesfin~ swayed at anchor, her lights seeming +to penetrate the water to countless fathoms with their shimmering, +lanceolate reflections. The Caribs were busy loading her by means +of the great lighters heaped full from the piles of fruit ranged upon +the shore. + +On the sandy beach, with his back against a coconut-tree and the stubs +of many cigars lying around him, Smith sat waiting, never relaxing +his sharp gaze in the direction of the steamer. + +The incongruous yachtsman had concentrated his interest upon the +innocent fruiter. Twice had he been assured that no passengers had +come to Coralio on board of her. And yet, with a persistence not to +be attributed to an idling voyager, he had appealed the case to the +higher court of his own eyesight. Surprisingly like some gay-coated +lizard, he crouched at the foot of the coconut palm, and with the +beady, shifting eyes of the selfsame reptile, sustained his espionage +on the ~Karlesfin~. + +On the white sands a whiter gig belonging to the yacht was drawn up, +guarded by one of the white-ducked crew. Not far away in a ~pulperia~ +on the shore-following Calle Grande three other sailors swaggerred +with their cues around Coralio's solitary billiard-table. The boat +lay there as if under orders to be ready for use at any moment. +There was in the atmosphere a hint of expectation, of waiting for +something to occur, which was foreign to the air of Coralio. + +Like some passing bird of brilliant plumage, Smith alights on this +palmy shore but to preen his wings for an instant and then to fly +away upon silent pinions. When morning dawned there was no Smith, +no waiting gig, no yacht in the offing, Smith left no intimation of +his mission there, no footprints to show where he had followed the +trail of his mystery on the sands of Coralio that night. He came; +he spake his strange jargon of the asphalt and the cafes; he sat +under the coconut-tree, and vanished. The next morning Coralio, +Smithless, ate its fried plantain and said: "The man of pictured +clothing went himself away." With the ~siesta~ the incident passed, +yawning, into history. + +So, for a time, must Smith pass behind the scenes of the play. +He comes no more to Coralio, nor to Doctor Gregg, who sits in vain, +wagging his redundant beard, waiting to enrich his derelict audience +with his moving tale of trepanning and jealousy. + +But prosperously to the lucidity of these loose pages, Smith shall +flutter among them again. In the nick of time he shall come to tell +us why he strewed so many anxious cigar stumps around the coconut +palm that night. This he must do; for, when he sailed away before +the dawn in his yacht ~Rambler~, he carried with him the answer to +a riddle so big and preposterous that few in Anchuria had ventured +even to propound it. + + + +IV + +Caught + +The plans for the detention of the flying President Miraflores and +his companion at the coast line seemed hardly likely to fail. Doctor +Zavalla himself had gone to the port of Alazan to establish a guard +at that point. At Solitas the Liberal patriot Varras could be +depended upon to keep close watch. Goodwin held himself responsible +for the district about Coralio. + +The news of the president's flight had been disclosed to no one in +the coast towns save trusted members of the ambitious political party +that was desirous of succeeding to power. The telegraph wire running +from San Mateo to the coast had been cut far up on the mountain trail +by an emissary of Zavalla's. Long before this could be repaired and +word received along it from the capital the fugitives would have +reached the coast and the question of escape or capture been solved. + +Goodwin had stationed armed sentinels at frequent intervals along +the shore for a mile in each direction from Coralio. They were +instructed to keep a vigilant lookout during the night to prevent +Miraflores from attempting to embark stealthily by means of some boat +or sloop found by chance at the water's edge. A dozen patrols walked +the streets of Coralio unsuspected, ready to intercept the truant +official should he show himself there. + +Goodwin was very well convinced that no precautions had been +overlooked. He strolled about the streets that bore such high- +sounding names and were but narrow, grass-covered lanes, lending his +own aid to the vigil that had been intrusted to him by Bob Englehart. + +The town had begun the tepid round of its nightly diversions. A few +leisurely dandies, cald in white duck, with flowing neckties, and +swinging slim bamboo canes, threaded the grassy by-ways toward the +houses of their favored senoritas. Those who wooed the art of music +dragged tirelessly at whining concertinas, or fingered lugubrious +guitars at doors and windows. An occasional soldier from the +~cuartel~, with flapping straw hat, without coat or shoes, hurried +by, balancing his long gun like a lance in one hand. From every +density of the foliage the giant tree frogs sounded their loud and +irritating clatter. Further out, the guttural cries of marauding +baboons and the coughing of the alligators in the black estuaries +fractured the vain silence of the wood. + +By ten o'clock the streets were deserted. The oil lamps that had +burned, a sickly yellow, at random corners, had been extinguished +by some economical civic agent. Coralio lay sleeping calmly between +toppling mountains and encroaching sea like a stolen babe in the arms +of its abductors. Somewhere over in that tropical darkness--perhaps +already threading the profundities of the alluvial lowlands--the high +adventurer and his mate were moving toward land's end. The game of +Fox-in-the-Morning should be coming soon to its close. + +Goodwin, at his deliberate gait, passed the long, low ~cuartel~ where +Coralio's contingent of Anchuria's military force slumbered, with its +bare toes pointed heavenward. There was a law that no civilian might +come so near the headquarters of that citadel of war after nine +o'clock, but Goodwin was always forgetting the minor statutes. + +"~Quien vive,~" shrieked the sentinel, wrestling prodigiously with +his lengthy musket. + +"~Americano,~" growled Goodwin, without turning his head, and passed +on, unhalted. + +To the right he turned, and to the left up the street that ultimately +reached the Plaza Nacional. When within the toss of a cigar stump +from the intersecting Street of the Holy Sepulchre, he stopped +suddenly in the pathway. + +He saw the form of a tall man, clothed in black and carrying a large +valise, hurry down the cross-street in the direction of the beach. +And Goodwin's second glance made him aware of a woman at the man's +elbow on the farther side, who seemed to urge forward, if not even +to assist, her companion in their swift but silent progress. They +were no Coralians, those two. + +Goodwin followed at increased speed, but without any of the artful +tactics that are so dear to the heart of the sleuth. The American +was too broad to feel the instinct of the detective. He stood as +an agent for the people of Anchuria, and but for political reasons +he would have demanded then and there the money. It was the design +of his party to secure the imperilled fund, to restore it to the +treasury of the country, and to declare itself in power without +bloodshed or resistance. + +The couple halted at the door of the Hotel de los Extranjeros, +and the man struck upon the wood with the impatience of one unused +to his entry being stayed. Madama was long in response, but after +a time her light showed, the door was opened, and the guests housed. + +Goodwin stoodin the quiet street, lighting another cigar. In +two minutes, a faint gleam began to show between the slats of the +jalousies in the upper story of the hotel. "They have engaged rooms," +said Goodwin to himself. "So, then, their arrangements for sailing +have yet to be made." + +At the moment there came along one Esteban Delgado, a barber, +an enemy to existing government, a jovial plotter against stagnation +in any form. This barber was one of Coralio's saddest dogs, often +remaining out of doors as late as eleven, post meridian. He was +a partisan Liberal; and he greeted Goodwin with flatulent importance +as a brother in the cause. But he had something important to tell. + +"What think you, Don Frank!" he cried, in the universal tone of the +conspirator. "I have tonight shaved ~la barba~--what you call the +'weeskers' of the ~Presidente~ himself, of this countree! Consider! +He sent for me to come. In the poor ~casita~ of an old woman he +awaited me--in a verree leetle house in a dark place. ~Carramba!~ +--el Senor Presidente to make himself thus secret and obscured! +I shave a man and not see his face? This gold piece he gave me, and +said it was to be all quite still. I think, Don Frank, there is what +you call a chip over the bug." + +"Have you ever seen President Miraflores before?" asked Goodwin. + +"But once," answered Esteban. "He is tall; and he had weeskers, +verree black and sufficient." + +"Was any one else present when you shaved him?" + +"An old Indian woman, Senor, that belonged with the ~casa~, and one +senorita--a ladee of so much beautee!--~ah, Dios!~" + +"All right, Esteban," said Goodwin. "It's very lucky that you +happened along with your tonsorial information. The new +administration will be likely to remember you for this." + +Then in a few words he made the barber acquainted with the crisis +into which the affairs of the nation had culminated, and instructed +him to remain outside, keeping watch upon the two sides of the hotel +that looked upon the street, and observing whether any one should +attempt to leave the house by any door or window. Goodwin himself +went to the door through which the guests had entered, opened it and +stepped inside. + +Madama had returned downstairs from her journey above to see after +the comfort of her lodgers. Her candle stood upon the bar. She was +about to take a thimbleful of rum as a solace for having her rest +disturbed. She looked up without surprise or alarm as her third +caller entered. + +"Ah! it is the Senor Goodwin. Not often does he honor my poor house +with his presence." + +"I must come oftener," said Goodwin, with a Goodwin smile. "I hear +that your cognac is the best between Belize to the north and Rio to +the south. Set out the bottle, Madama, and let us have the proof in +~un vasito~ for each of us." + +"My ~aguardiente~," said Madama, with pride, "is the best. It grows, +in beautiful bottles, in the dark places among the banana-trees. +~Si, Senor~. Only at midnight can they be picked by sailor-men +who bring them, before daylight comes, to your back door. Good +~aguardiente~ is a verree difficult fruit to handle, Senor Goodwin." + +Smuggling, in Coralio, was much nearer than competition to being the +life of trade. One spoke of it slyly, yet with a certain conceit, +when it had been well accomplished. + +"You have guests in the house tonight," said Goodwin, laying a silver +dollar upon the counter. + +"Why not?" said Madama, counting the change. "Two; but the smallest +while finished to arrive. One senor, not quite old, and one senorita +of sufficient hadsomeness. To their rooms they have ascended, not +desiring the to-eat nor the to-drink. Two rooms--~Numero~9 and +~Numero~ 10." + +"I was expecting that gentleman and that lady," said Goodwin. "I have +important ~negocios~ that must be transacted. Will you allow me +to see them?" + +"Why not?" sighed Madama, placidly. "Why should not Senor Goodwin +ascend and speak to his friends? ~Esta bueno~. Romm ~Numero~ 9 and +romm ~Numero~ 10." + +Goodwin loosened in his coat pocket the American revolver that he +carried, and ascended the steep, dark stairway. + +In the hallway above, the saffron light from a hanging lamp allowed +him to select the gaudy numbers on the doors. He turned the knob on +Number 9, entered and closed the door behind him. + +If that was Isabel Guilbert seated by the table in that poorly +furnished room, report had failed to do her charms justice. She +rested her head upon one hand. Extreme fatigue was signified in +every line of her figure; and upon her countenance a deep perplexity +was written. Her eyes were gray-irised, and of that mold that seems +to have belonged to the orbs of all the famous queens of hearts. +Their whites were singularly clear and brilliant, concealed above +the irises by heavy horizontal lids, and showing a snowy line between +them. Such eyes denote great nobility, vigor, and, if you can +conceive of it, a most generous selfishness. She looked up when +the American entered, with an expression of surprised inquiry, but +without alarm. + +Goodwin took off his hat and seated himself, with his characteristic +deliberate ease, upon a corner of the table. He held a lighted cigar +between his fingers. He took this familiar course because he was +sure that preliminaries would be wasted upon Miss Guilbert. He knew +her history, and the small part that the conventions had played in it. + +"Good evening," he said. "Now, madame, let us come to business at +once. You will observe that I mention no names, but I know who is in +the next room, and what he carries in that valise. That is the point +which brings me here. I have come to dictate terms of surrender." + +The lady neither moved nor replied, but steadily regarded the cigar +in Goodwin's hand. + +"We," continued the dictator, thoughtfully regarding the neat buckskin +shoe on his gently swinging foot--"I speak for a considerable majority +of the people--demand the return of the stolen funds belonging to +them. Our terms go very little further than that. They are very +simple. As an accredited spokesman, I promise that our interference +will cease if they are accepted. Give up the money, and you and your +companion will be permitted to proceed wherever you will. In fact, +assistance will be given you in the matter of securing a passage +by any outgoing vessel you may choose. It is on my personal +responsibility that I add congratulations to the gentleman in Number +10 upon his taste in feminine charms." + +Returning his cigar to his mouth, Goodwin observed her, and saw that +her eyes followed it and rested upon it with icy and significant +concentration. Apparently she had not heard a word he had said. +He understood, tossed the cigar out the window, and, with an amused +laugh, slid from the table to his feet. + +"That is better," said the lady. "It makes it possible for me to +listen to you. For a second lesson in good manners, you might now +tell me by whom I am being insulted." + +"I am sorry," said Goodwin, leaning one hand on the table, "that my +time is too brief for devoting much of it to a course of etiquette. +Come, now; I appeal to you good sense. You have shown yourself, +in more than one instance, to be well aware of what is to your +advantage. This is an occasion that demands the exercise of your +undoubted intelligence. There is no mystery here. I am Frank +Goodwin; and I have come for the money. I entered this room at a +venture. Had I entered the other I would have had it before me now. +Do you want it in words? The gentleman in Number 10 has betrayed +a great trust. He has robbed his people of a large sum, and it is +I who will prevent their losing it. I do not say who that gentleman +is; but if I should be forced to see him and he should prove to be +a certain high official of the republic, it will be my duty to arrest +him. The house is guarded. I am offering you liberal terms. It is +not absolutely necessary that I confer personally with the gentleman +in the next room. Bring me the valise containing the money, and we +will call the affair ended." + +The lady arose from her chair and stood for a moment, thinking +deeply. + +"Do you live here, Mr. Goodwin?" she asked, presently. + +"Yes." + +"What is your authority for this intrusion?" + +"I am an instrument of the republic. I was advised by wire of the +movements of the--gentleman in Number 10." + +"May I ask you two or three questions? I believe you to be a man +more apt to be truthful than--timid. What sort of town is this-- +Coralio, I think they call it?" + +"Not much of a town," said Goodwin, smiling. "A banana town, as they +run. Grass huts, 'dobes, five or six two-story houses, accomodations +limited, population half-breed Spanish and Indian, Caribs and +blackamoors. No sidewalks to speak of, no amusements. Rather +unmoral. That'a an offhand sketch, of course." + +"Are there any inducements, say in a social or in a business way, +for people to reside here?" + +"Oh, yes," answered Goodwin, smiling broadly. "There are no +afternoon teas, no hand-organs, no department stores--and there +is no extradition treaty." + +"He told me," went on the lady, speaking as if to herself, and with +a slight frown, "that there were towns on this coast of beauty and +importance; that there was a pleasing social order--especially an +American colony of cultured residents." + +"There is an American colony," said Goodwin, gazing at her in some +wonder. "Some of the members are all right. Some are fugitives from +justice from the States. I recall two exiled bank presidents, one +army paymaster under a cloud, a couple of manslayers, and a widow-- +arsenic, I believe, was the suspicion in her case. I myself complete +the colony, but, as yet, I have not distinguished myself by any +particular crime." + +"Do not lose hope," said the lady, dryly; "I see nothing in your +actions tonight to guarantee you further obscurity. Some mistake has +been made; I do not know just where. But ~him~ you shall not disturb +tonight. The journey has fatigued him so that he has fallen asleep, +I think, in his clothes. You talk of stolen money! I do not +understand you. Some mistake has been made. I will convince you. +Remain where you are and I will bring you the valise that you seem +to covet so, and show it to you." + +She moved toward the closed door that connected the two rooms, but +stopped, and half turned and bestowed upon Goodwin a grave, searching +look that ended in a quizzical smile. + +"You force my door," she said, "and you follow your ruffianly behavior +with the basest accusations; and yet"--she hesitated, as if to +reconsider what she was about to say--"and yet--it is a puzzling +thing--I am sure there has been some mistake." + +She took a step toward the door, but Goodwin stayed her by a light +touch upon her arm. I have said before that women turned to look +at him in the streets. He was the viking sort of man, big, good- +looking, and with an air of kindly truculence. She was dark and +proud, glowing or pale as her mood moved her. I do not know if Eve +were light or dark, but if such a woman had stood in the garden +I know that the apple would have been eaten. This woman was to be +Goodwin's fate, and he did not know it; but he must have felt the +first throes of destiny, for, as he faced her, the knowledge of what +report named her turned bitter in her throat. + +"If there has been any mistake," he said, hotly, "it was yours. I do +not blame the man who has lost his country, his honor, and is about +to lose the poor consolation of his stolen riches as much as I blame +you, for, by Heaven! I can very well see how he was brought to it. +I can understand, and pity him. It is such women as you that strew +this degraded coast with wretched exiles, that make men forget their +trusts, that drag--" + +The lady interrupted him with a weary gesture. + +"There is no need to continue your insults," she said, coldly. +"I do not understand what you are saying, nor do I know what mad +blunder you are making; but if the inspection of the contents of +a gentleman's portmanteau will rid me of you, let us delay it no +longer." + +She passed quickly and noiselessly into the other room, and returned +with the heavy leather valise, which she handed to the American with +an air of patient contempt. + +Goodwin set the valise quickly upon the table and began to unfasten +the straps. The Lady stood by, with an expression of infinite scorn +and weariness upon her face. + +The valise opened wide to a powerful, sidelong wrench. Goodwin +dragged out two or three articles of clothing, exposing the bulk of +its contents--package after package of tightly packed United States +bank and treasury notes of large denomination. Reckoning from the +high figures written upon the paper bands that bound them, the total +must have come closely upon the hundred thousand mark. + +Goodwin glanced swiftly at the woman, and saw, with surprise and +a thrill of pleasure that he wondered at, that she had experienced +an unmistakeable shock. Her eyes grew wide, she gasped, and leaned +heavily against the table. She had been ignorant, then, he inferred, +that her companion had looted the government treasury. But why, +he angrily asked himself, should he be so well pleased to think this +wandering and unscrupulous singer not so black as report had painted +her? + +A noise in the other room startled them both. The door swung open, +and a tall, elderly, dark complexioned man, recently shaven, hurried +into the room. + +All the pictures of President Miraflores represent him as the +possessor of a luxuriant supply of dark and carefully tended whiskers; +but the story of the barber, Esteban, had prepared Goodwin for +the change. + +The man stumbled in from the dark room, his eyes blinking at the +lamplight, and heavy from sleep. + +"What does this mean?" he demanded in excellent English, with a keen +and perturbed look at the American--"robbery?" + +"Very near it," answered Goodwin. "But I rather think I'm in time +to prevent it. I represent the people to whom this money belongs, +and I have come to convey it back to them." He thrust his hand into +a pocket of his loose, linen coat. + +The other man's hand went quickly behind him. + +"Don't draw," called Goodwin, sharply; "I've got you covered from +my pocket." + +The lady stepped forward, and laid one hand upon the shoulder of her +hesitating companion. She pointed to the table. "Tell me the truth +--the truth," she said, in a low voice. "Whose money is that?" + +The man did not answer. He gave a deep, long-drawn sigh, leaned +and kissed her on the forehead, stepped back into the other room +and closed the door. + +Goodwin foresaw his purpose, and jumped for the door, but the report +of the pistol echoed as his hand touched the knob. A heavy fall +followed, and some one swept him aside and struggled into the room +of the fallen man. + +A desolation, thought Goodwin, greater than that derived from +the loss of cavalier and gold must have been in the heart of the +enchantress to have wrung from her, in that moment, the cry of one +turning to the all-forgiving, all-comforting earthly consoler--to +have made her call out from that bloody and dishonored room--"Oh, +mother, mother, mother!" + +But there was an alarm outside. The barber, Esteban, at the sound +of the shot, had raised his voice; and the shot itself had aroused +half the town. A pattering of feet came up the street, and official +orders rang out on the still air. Goodwin had a duty to perform. +Circumstances had made him the custodian of his adopted country's +treasure. Swiftly cramming the money into the valise, he closed it, +leaned far out of the window and dropped it into a thick orange-tree +in the little inclosure below. + + +They will tell you in Coralio, as they delight in telling the +stranger, of the conclusion of that tragic flight. They will tell +you how the upholders of the law came apace when the alarm was +sounded--the ~Comandante~ in red slippers and a jacket like a head +waiter's and girded sword, the soldiers with their interminable guns, +followed by outnumbering officers struggling into their gold and lace +epaulettes; the bare-footed policemen (the only capables in the lot), +and ruffled citizens of every hue and description. + +They say that the countenance of the dead man was marred sadly by +the effects of the shot; but he was identified as the fallen president +by both Goodwin and the barber Esteban. On the next morning messages +began to come over the mended telegraph wire; and the story of the +flight from the capital was given out to the public. In San Mateo +the revolutionary party had seized the sceptre of government, without +opposition, and the ~vivas~ of the mercurial populace quickly effaced +the interest belonging to the unfortunate Miraflores. + +They will relate to you how the new government sifted the towns +and raked the roads to find the valise containing Anchuria's surplus +capital, which the president was known to have carried with him, +but all in vain. In Coralio Senor Goodwin himself led the searching +party which combed that town as carefully as a woman combs her hair; +but the money was not found. + +So they buried the dead man, without honors, back of the town near +the little bridge that spans the mangrove swamp; and for a ~real~ +a boy will show you his grave. They say that the old woman in whose +hut the barber shaved the president placed the wooden slab at his +head, and burned the inscription upon it with a hot iron. + +You will hear also that Senor Goodwin, like a tower of strength, +shielded Dona Isabel Guilbert through those subsequent distressful +days; and that his scruples as to her past career (if he had any) +vanished; and her adventuresome waywardness (if she had any) left +her, and they were wedded and were happy. + +The American built a home on a little foothill near the town. It is +a conglomerate structure of native woods that, exported, would be +worth a fortune, and of brick, palm, glass, bamboo and adobe. There +is a paradise of nature about it; and something of the same sort +within. The natives speak of its interior with hands uplifted in +admiration. There are floors polished like mirrors and covered with +hand-woven Indian rugs of silk fibre, tall ornaments and pictures, +musical instruments and papered walls--"figure-it-to-yourself!" +they exclaim. + +But they cannot tell you in Coralio (as you shall learn) what became +of the money that Frank Goodwin dropped into the orange-tree. But +that shall come later; for the palms are fluttering in the breeze, +bidding us to sport and gaiety. + + + +V + +Cupid's Exile Number Two + +The United States of America, after looking over its stock of +consular timber, selected Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood, of +Dalesburg, Alabama, for a successor to Willard Geddie, resigned. + +Without prejudice to Mr. Atwood, it will have to be acknowledged +that, in this instance, it was the man who sought the office. As +with the self-banished Geddie, it was nothing less than the artful +smiles of lovely woman that had driven Johnny Atwood to the desperate +expedient of accepting office under a despised Federal Government +so that he might go far, far away and never see again the false, fair +face that had wrecked his young life. The consulship at Coralio +seemed to offer a retreat sufficiently removed and romantic enough +to inject the necessary drama into the pastoral scenes of Dalesburg +life. + +It was while playing the part of Cupid's exile that Johnny added his +handiwork to the long list of casualties along the Spanish Main by +his famous manipulation of the shoe market, and his unparalleled feat +of elevating the most despised and useless weed in his own country +from obscurity to be a valuable product in international commerce. + +The trouble began, as trouble often begins instead of ending, with +a romance. In Dalesburg there was a man named Elijah Hemstetter, who +kept a general store. His family consisted of one daughter called +Rosine, a name that atoned much for "Hemstetter." This young woman +was possessed of plentiful attractions, so that the young men of +the community were agitated in their bosoms. Among the more agitated +was Johnny, the son of Judge Atwood, who lived in the big colonial +mansion on the edge of Dalesburg. + +It would seem that the desirable Rosine should have been pleased to +return the affection of an Atwood, a name honored all over the state +long before and since the war. It does seem that she should have +gladly consented to have been led into that stately but rather empty +colonial mansion. But not so. There was a cloud on the horizon, a +threatening, cumulus cloud, in the shape of a lively and shrewd young +farmer in the neighborhood who dared to enter the lists as a rival to +the high-born Atwood. + +One night Johnny propounded to Rosine a question that is considered +of much importance by the young of the human species. The accessories +were all there--moonlight, oleanders, magnolias, the mockingbird's +song. Whether or no the shadow of Pinkney Dawson, that prosperous +young farmer came between them on that occasion is not known; but +Rosine's answer was unfavorable. Mr. John De Graffenreid Atwood bowed +till his hat touched the lawn grass, and went away with his head high, +but with a sore wound in his pedigree and heart. A Hemstetter refuse +an Atwood! Zounds! + +Among other accidents of that year was a Democratic president. Judge +Atwood was a warhorse of Democracy. Johnny persuaded him to set the +wheels moving for some foreign appointment. He would go away--away. +Perhaps in years to come Rosine would think how true, how faithful +his love had been, and would drop a tear--maybe in the cream she +would be skimming for Pink Dawson's breakfast. + +The wheels of politics revolved; and Johnny was appointed consul to +Coralio. Just before leaving he dropped in at Hemstetter's to say +good-bye. There was a queer, pinkish look about Rosine's eyes; and +had the two been alone, the United States might have had to cast +about for another consul. But Pink Dawson was there, of course, +talking about his 400-acre orchard, and the three-mile alfalfa tract, +and the 200-acre pasture. So Johnny shook hands with Rosine as +coolly as if he were only going to run up to Montgomery for a couple +of days. They had the royal manner when they chose, those Atwoods. + +"If you happen to strike anything in the way of a good investment +down there, Johnny," said Pink Dawson, "just let me know, will you? +I reckon I could lay my hands on a few extra thousands 'most any time +for a profitable deal." + +"Certainly, Pink," said Johnny, pleasantly. "If I strike anything of +that sort I'll let you in with pleasure." + +So Johnny went down to Mobile and took a fruit steamer for the coast +of Anchuria. + +When the new consul arrived in Coralio the strangeness of the scenes +diverted him much. He was only twenty-two; and the grief of youth +was not worn like a garment as it is by older men. It has its +seasons when it reigns; and then it is unseated for time by the +assertion of the keen senses. + +Billy Keogh and Johnny seemed to conceive a mutual friendship at +once. Keogh took the new consul about town and presented him to the +handful of Americans and the smaller number of French and Germans who +made up the "foreign" contingent. And then, of course, he had to be +more formally introduced to the native officials, and have his +credentials transmitted through an interpreter. + +There was something about the young Southerner that the sophisticated +Keogh liked. His manner was simple almost to boyishness; but he +possessed the cool carelessness of a man of far greater age and +experience. Neither uniforms nor titles, red tape nor foreign +languages, mountains nor sea weighed upon his spirits. He was heir +to all ages, an Atwood, of Dalesburg; and you might know every +thought conceived to his bosom. + +Geddie came down to the consulate to explain the duties and workings +of the office. He and Keogh tried to interest the new consul in +their description of the work that his government expected him to +perform. + +"It's all right," said Johnnie from the hammock that he had set up as +the official reclining place. "If anything turns up that has to be +done I'll let you fellows do it. You can't expect a Democrat to work +during his first term of holding office." + +"You might look over these headings," suggested Geddie, "of the +different lines of exports you will have to keep account of. The +fruit is classified; and there are the valuable woods, coffee, +rubber--" + +"That last account sounds all right," interrupted Mr. Atwood. "Sounds +as if it could be stretched. I want to buy a new flag, a monkey, a +guitar and a barrel of pineapples. Will the rubber account stretch +over 'em?" + +"That's merely statistics," said Geddie, smiling. "The expense +account is what you want. It is supposed to have a slight elasticity. +The 'stationery' items are sometimes carelessly audited by the State +Department." + +"We're wasting our time," said Keogh. "This man was born to hold +office. He penetrates to the root of the art at one step of his +eagle eye. The true genius of government shows its hand in every +word of his speech." + +"I didn't take this job with any intention of working," explained +Johnny, lazily. "I wanted to go somewhere in the world where they +didn't talk about farms. There are none here, are there?" + +"Not the kind you are acquainted with," answered the ex-consul. +"There is no such art here as agriculture. There never was a plow +or a reaper within the boundaries of Anchuria." + +"This is the country for me," murmured the consul, and immediately +he fell asleep. + +The cheerful tintypist pursued his intimacy with Johnny in spite +of open charges that he did so to obtain a preemption on a seat in +that coveted spot, the rear gallery of the consulate. But whether +his designs were selfish or purely friendly, Keogh achieved that +desirable privilege. Few were the nights on which the two could +not be found reposing there in the sea breeze, with their heels on +the railing, and the cigars and brandy conveniently near. + +One evening they sat thus, mainly silent, for their talk had dwindled +before the stilling influence of an unusual night. + +There was a great, full moon; and the sea mother-of-pearl. Almost +every sound was hushed, for the air was but faintly stirring; and +the town lay panting, waiting for the night to cool. Offshore lay +the fruit steamer ~Andador~, of the Vesuvius line, full-laden and +scheduled to sail at six in the morning. There were no loiterers on +the beach. So bright was the moonlight that the two men could see +the small pebbles shining on the beach where the gentle surf wetted +them. + +Then down the coast, tacking close to shore, slowly swam a little +sloop, white-winged like some snowy sea fowl. Its course lay within +twenty points of the wind's eye; so it veered in and out again in +long, slow strokes like the movements of a graceful skater. + +Again the tactics of its crew brought it close in shore, this time +nearly opposite the consulate; and then there blew from the sloop +clear and surprising notes as if from a horn of elfland. A fairy +bugle it might have been, sweet and silvery and unexpected, playing +with spirit the familiar air of "Home, Sweet Home." + +It was a scene set for the land of the lotus. The authority of the +sea and the tropics, the mystery that attends unknown sails, and the +prestige of drifting music on moonlit waters gave it an anodynous +charm. Johnny Atwood felt it, and thought of Dalesburg; but as soon +as Keogh's mind had arrived at a theory concerning the peripatetic +solo he sprang to the railing, and his ear-rending yawp fractured +the silence of Coralio like a cannon shot. + +"Mel-lin-ger a-hoy!" + +The sloop was now on its outward tack; but from it came a clear, +answering hail: + +"Good-bye, Billy... go-ing home--bye!" + +The ~Andador~ was the sloop's destination. No doubt some passenger +with a sailing permit from some up-the-coast point had come down +in this sloop to catch the regular fruit steamer on its return trip. +Like a coquettish pigeon the little boat tacked on its eccentric way +until at last its white sail was lost to sight against the larger +bulk of the fruiter's side. + +"That's old H. P. Mellinger," explained Keogh, dropping back into his +chair. "He's going back to New York. He was a private secretary of +the late hot-foot president of this grocery and fruit stand that they +call a country. His job's over now; and I guess old Mellinger is +glad." + +"Why does he disappear to music, like Zo-zo, the magic queen?" asked +Johnny. "Just to show 'em that he doesn't care?" + +"That noise you heard is a phonograph," said Keogh. "I sold him +that. Mellinger had a graft in this country that was the only thing +of its kind in the world. The tooting machine saved it for him once, +and he always carried it around with him afterward." + +"Tell me about it," demanded Johnny, betraying interest. + +"I'm no disseminator of narratives," said Keogh. "I can use language +for purposes of speech; but when I attempt a discourse the words come +out as they will, and they may make sense when they strike the +atmosphere, or they may not." + +"I want to hear about the graft," persisted Johnny, "You've got no +right to refuse. I've told you all about every man, woman and +hitching post in Dalesburg." + +"You shall hear it," said Keogh. "I said my instincts of narrative +were perplexed. Don't you believe it. It's an art I've acquired +along with many other of the graces and sciences." + + + +VI + +The Phonograph and the Graft + +"What was this this graft? asked Johnny, with the impatience of +the great public to whom tales are told. + +"'Tis contrary to art and philosophy to give you the information," +said Keogh, calmly. "The art of narrative consists in concealing +from your audience everything it wants to know until after you expose +your favorite opinions on topics foreign to the subject. A good +story is like a bitter pill with the sugar coating inside of it. +I will begin, if you please, with a horoscope located in the Cherokee +Nation; and end with a moral tune on the phonograph. + +"Me and Henry Horsecollar brought the first phonograph to this +country. Henry was a quarter-breed, quarter-back cherokee, educated +East in the idioms of football, and West in contraband whiskey, and +a gentleman, the same as you and me. He was easy and romping in +his ways; a man about six foot, with a kind of rubber-tire movement. +Yes, he was a little man about five foot five, or five foot eleven. +He was what you would call a medium tall man of average smallness. +Henry had quit college once, and the Muscogee jail three times--the +last-named institution on account of introducing and selling whisky +in the territories. Henry Horsecollar never let any cigar stores +come up and stand behind him. He didn't belong to that tribe of +Indians. + +"Henry and me met at Texarkana, and figured out this phonograph +scheme. He had $360 which came to him out of a land allotment +in the reservation. I had run down from Little Rock on account +of a distressful scene I had witnessed on the street there. A man +stood on a box and passed around some gold watches, screw case, +stem-winders, Elgin movement, very elegant. Twenty bucks they cost +you over the counter. At three dollars the crowd fought for the +tickers. The man happened to find a valise full of them handy, and +he passed them out like putting hot biscuits on a plate. The backs +were hard to unscrew, but the crowd put its ear to the case, and +they ticked mollifying and agreeable. Three of these watches were +genuine tickers; the rest were only kickers. Hey? Why, empty cases +with one of them horny black bugs that fly around electric lights +in 'em. Them bugs kick off minutes and seconds industrious and +beautiful. So, this man I was speaking of cleaned up $288; and then +he went away, because he knew that when it came time to wind watches +in Little Rock an entomologist would be needed, and he wasn't one. + +"So, as I say, Henry had $360 and I had $288. The idea of introducing +the phonograph to South America was Henry's; but I took to it freely, +being fond of machinery of all kinds. + +"'The Latin races,' says Henry, explaining easy in the idioms he +learned at college, 'are peculiarly adapted to be victims of the +phonograph. They yearn for music and color and gaiety. They give +wampum to the hand-organ man and the four-legged chicken in the tent +when they're three months behind with the grocery and the bread-fruit +tree." + +"'Then,' says I, 'we'll export canned music to the Latins; but I'm +mindful of Mr. Julius Caesar's account of 'em where he says: ~"Omnia +Gallia in tres partes divisa est"~; which is the same as to say, "We +will need all of our gall in devising means to tree them parties."' + +"I hated to make a show of education; but I was disinclined to be +overdone in syntax by a mere Indian, a member of a race to which we +owe nothing except the land on which the United States is situated. + +"We bought a fine phonograph in Texarkana--one of the best make--and +half a trunkful of records. We packed up, and took the T. and P. +for New Orleans. From that celebrated center of molasses and +disfranchised coon songs we took a steamer for South America. + +"We landed at Solitas, forty miles up the coast from here. 'Twas +a palatable enough place to look at. The houses were clean and white; +and to look at 'em stuck around among the scenery they reminded you +of hard-boiled eggs served with lettuce. There was a block of +skyscraper mountains in the suburbs; and they kept pretty quiet, +like they had crept up there and were watching the town. And the sea +was remarking 'Sh-sh-sh' on the beach; and now and then a ripe coconut +would drop kerblip in the sand; and that was all there was doing. +Yes, I judge that town was considerably on the quiet. I judge that +after Gabriel quits blowing his horn, and the car starts, with +Philadelphia swinging to the last strap, and Pine Gully, Arkansas, +hanging onto the rear step, this town of Solitas will wake up and ask +if anybody spoke. + +"The captain went ashore with us, and offered to conduct what he +seemed to like to call the obsequies. He introduced Henry and me to +the United States Consul, and a roan man, the head of the Department +of Mercenary and Licentious Dispostions, the way it read upon his +sign. + +"'I thouch here again a week from today,' says the captain. + +"'By that time,' we told him, 'we'll be amassing wealth in the +interior towns with our galvanized prima donna and correct imitations +of Sousa's band excavating a march from a tin mine.' + +"'Ye'll not,' says the captain. 'Ye'll be hypnotized. Any gentleman +in the audience who kindly steps upon the stage and looks this country +in the eye will be converted to the hypothesis that he's but a fly +in the Elgin creamery. Ye'll be standing knee deep in the surf +waiting for me, and your machine for making Hamburger steak out of +the hitherto respected art of music will be playing "There's no place +like home."' + +"Henry skinned a twenty off his roll, and received from the Bureau +of Mercenary Dispositions a paper bearing a red seal and a dialect +story, and no change. + +"Then we got the consul full of red wine, and struck him for a +horoscope. He was a thin, youngish kind of man, I should say past +fifty, sort of French-Irish in his affections, and puffed up with +disconsolation. Yes, he was a flattened kind of man, in whom drink +lay stagnant, inclined to corpulence and misery. Yes, I think he +was a kind of Dutchman, being very sad and genial in his ways. + +"'The marvelous invention,' he says, 'entitled the phonograph, has +never invaded these shores. The people have never heard it. They +would not believe it if they should. Simple-hearted children of +nature, progress has never condemned them to accept the work of +a can-opener as an overture, and rag-time might incite them to a +bloody revolution. But you can try the experiment. The best chance +you have is that the populace may not wake up when you play. There's +two ways,' says the consul, 'they may take it. They may become +inebriated with attention, like an Atlanta colonel listening to +"Marching Through Georgia," or they will get excited and transpose +the key of the music with an axe and yourselves into a dungeon. In +the latter case,' says the consul, 'I'll do my duty by cabling to the +State Department, and I'll wrap the Stars and Stripes around you when +you come to be shot, and threaten them with the vengeance of the +greatest gold export and financial reserve nation on earth. The flag +is full of bullet holes now,' says the consul, 'made in that way. +Twice before,' says the consul, 'I have cabled our government for a +couple of gunboats to protect American citizens. The first time the +Department sent me a pair of gum boots. The other time was when a man +named Pease was going to be executed here. They referred that appeal +to the Secretary of Agriculture. Let us now disturb the senor behind +the bar for a subsequence of the red wine.' + +"Thus soliloquized the consul of Solitas to me and Henry Horsecollar. + +"But, notwithstanding, we hired a room that afternoon in the Calle de +los Angeles, the main street that runs along the shore, and put our +trunks there. 'Twas a good-sized room, dark and cheerful, but small. +'Twas on a various street, diversified by houses and conservatory +plants. The peasantry of the city passed to and fro on the fine +pasturage between the sidewalks. 'Twas, for the world, like an opera +chorus when the Royal Kafoozlum is about to enter. + +"We were rubbing the dust off the machine and getting fixed to start +business the next day, when a big, fine-looking white man in white +clothes stopped at the door and looked in. We extended the +invitations, and he walked inside and sized us up. He was chewing +a long cigar, and wrinkling his eyes, meditative, like a girl trying +to decide which dress to wear to the party. + +"'New York?' he says to me finally. + +"'Originally, and from time to time,' I says. 'Hasn't it rubbed off +yet?' + +"'It's simple,' says he, 'when you know how. It's the fit of +the vest. They don't cut vests right anywhere else. Coats, maybe, +but not vests.' + +"The white man looks at Henry Horsecollar and hesitates. + +"'Injun,' says Henry; 'tame Injun.' + +"'Mellinger,' says the man--'Homer P. Mellinger. Boys, you're +confiscated. You're babes in the wood without a chaperon or referee, +and it's my duty to start you going. I'll knock out the props and +launch you proper in the pellucid waters of this tropical mud puddle. +You'll have to be christened, and if you'll come with me I'll break +a bottle of wine across your bows, according to Hoyle.' + +"Well, for two days Homer P. Mellinger did the honors. That man cut +ice in Anchuria. He was It. He was the Royal Kafoozlum. If me and +Henry was babes in the wood, he was a Robin Redbreast from the topmost +bough. Him and me and Henry Horsecollar locked arms, and toted that +phonograph around, and had wassail and diversions. Everywhere we +found doors open we went inside and set the machine going, and +Mellinger called upon the people to observe the artful music and his +two lifelong friends, the Senores Americanos. The opera chorus was +agitated with esteem, and followed us from house to house. There was +a different kind of drink to be had with every tune. The natives +had acquirements of a pleasant thing in the way of a drink that gums +itself to the recollection. They chop off the end of a green coconut, +and pour in on the juice of it French brandy and other adjuvants. +We had them and other things. + +"Mine and Henry's money was counterfeit. Everything was on Homer +P. Mellinger. That man could find rolls of bills concealed in places +on his person where Hermann the Wizard couldn't have conjured out a +rabbit or an omelette. He could have founded universities, and made +orchid collections, and then had enough left to purchase the colored +vote of his country. Henry and me wondered what his graft was. One +evening he told us. + +"'Boys, said he, I've deceived you. You think I'm a painted +butterfly; but in fact I'm the hardest worked man in this country. +Ten years ago I landed on its shores; and two years ago on the point +of its jaw. Yes, I guess I can get the decision over this ginger cake +commonwealth at the end of any round I choose. I'll confide in you +because you are my countrymen and guests, even if you have assaulted +my adopted shores with the worst system of noises ever set to music. + +"'My job is private secretary to the president of this republic; +and my duties are running it. I'm not headlined in the bills, but I'm +the mustard in the salad dressing just the same. There isn't a law +goes before Congress, there isn't a concession granted, there isn't +an import duty levied but what H. P. Mellinger he cooks and seasons +it. In the front office I fill the president's inkstand and search +visiting statesmen for dirks and dynamite; but in the back room I +dictate the policy of the government. You'd never guess in the world +how I got my pull. It's the only graft of its kind on earth. I'll +put you wise. You remember the old top-liner in the copy book-- +Honesty is the Best Policy?" That's it. I'm working honestly for a +graft. I'm the only honest man in the republic. The government knows +it; the people know it; the boodlers know it; the foreign investors +know it. I make the government keep its faith. If a man is promised +a job he gets it. If outside capital buys a concession it gets +the goods. I run the monopoly of square dealing here. There's no +competition. If Colonel Diogenes were to flash his lantern in this +precinct he'd have my address inside of two minutes. There isn't big +money in it, but it's a sure thing, and lets a man sleep of nights.' + +"Thus Homer P. Mellinger made oration to me and Henry Horsecollar. +And, later, he divested himself of this remark: + +"'Boys, I'm to hold a ~soiree~ this evening with a gang of leading +citizens, and I want your assistance. You bring the musical corn +sheller and give the affair the outside appearance of a function. +There's important business on hand, but it mustn't show. I can talk +to you people. I've been pained for years on account of not having +anybody to blow off and brag to. I get homesick sometimes, and I'd +swap the entire perquisites of office for just one hour to have a +stein and a caviar sandwich somewhere on Thirty-fourth Street, and +stand and watch the street cars go by, and smell the peanut roaster +at old Giuseppe's fruit stand.' + +"'Yes,' said I, 'there's fine caviar at Billy Renfrew's cafe, corner +of Thirty-fourth and--' + +"'God knows it,' interrupts Mellinger, 'and if you'd told me you knew +Billy Renfrew I'd have invented tons of ways of making you happy. +Billy was my side-kicker in New York. There is a man who never knew +what crooked was. Here I am working Honesty for a graft, but that +man loses money on it. Carrambos! I get sick at times of this +country. Everything's rotten. From the executive down to the coffee +pickers, they're plotting to down each other and skin their friends. +If a mule driver takes off his hat to an official, that man figures +it out that he's a popular idol, and set his pegs to stir up a +revolution and upset the administration. It's one of my little chores +as private secretary to smell out these revolutions and affix the +kibosh before they break out and scratch the paint off the government +property. That's why I'm down here now in this mildewed coast town. +The governor of the district and his crew are plotting to uprise. +I've got every one of their names, and they're invited to listen +to the phonograph tonight, compliments of H. P. M. That's the way +I'll get them in a bunch, and things are on the program to happen +to them.' + +"We three were sitting at table in the cantina of the Purified Saints. +Mellinger poured out wine, and was looking some worried; I was +thinking. + +"'They're a sharp crowd,' he says, kind of fretful. 'They're +capitalized by a foreign syndicate after rubber, and they're loaded +to the muzzle for bribing. I'm sick,' goes on Mellinger, 'of comic +opera. I want to smell East River and wear suspenders again. At +times I feel loke throwing up my job, but I'm d--n fool enough to +be sort of proud of it. "There's Mellinger," they say here. "~Por +dios!~ you can't touch him with a million." I'd like to take that +record back and show it to Billy Renfrow some day; and that tightens +my grip whenever I see a fat thing that I could corral just by +winking one eye--and losing my graft. By--, they can't monkey +with me. They know it. What money I get I make honest and spend it. +Some day, I'll make a pile and go back and eat caviar with Billy. +Tonight I'll show you how to handle a bunch of corruptionists. I'll +show them what Mellinger, private secretary, means when you spell it +with the cotton and tissue paper off.' + +"Mellinger appears shaky, and breaks his glass against the neck of +the bottle. + +"I says to myself, 'White man, if I'm not mistaken there's been a +bait laid out where the tail of your eye could see it.' + +"That night, according to arrangements, me and Henry took the +phonograph to a room in a 'dobe house in a dirty side street, where +the grass was knee high. 'Twas a long room, lit with smoky oil lamps. +There was plenty of chairs, and a table at the back end. We set the +phonograph on the table. Mellinger was there, walking up and down, +disturbed in his predicaments. He chewed cigars and spat 'em out, +and he bit the thumb nail of his left hand. + +"By and by the invitations to the musicale come sliding in by pairs +and threes and spade flushes. Their color was of a diversity, running +from a three-day's smoked meerschaum to a patent-leather polish. +They were as polite as wax, being devastated with enjoyments to give +Senor Mellinger the good evenings. I understood their Spanish talk +--I ran a pumping engine two years in a Mexican silver mine, and had +it pat--but I never let on. + +"Maybe fifty of 'em had come, and was seated, when in slid the king +bee, the governor of the district. Mellinger met him at the door, +and escorted him to the grand stand. When I saw that Latin man I +knew that Mellinger, private secretary, had all the dances on his card +taken. That was a big, squashy man, the color of a rubber overshoe, +and he had an eye like a head waiter's. + +"Mellinger explained, fluent, in the Castilian idioms, that his soul +was disconcerted with joy at introducing to his respected friends +America's greatest invention, the wonder of the age. Henry got the +cue and run on an elegant brass-band record and the festivities became +initiated. The governor man had a bit of English under his hat, and +when the music was choked off he says: + +"'Ver-r-ree fine. ~Gr-r'r-r-racias~, the American gentlemen, the so +esplendeed moosic as to playee.' + +"The table was a long one, and Henry and me sat at the end of it next +the wall. The governor sat at the other end. Homer P. Mellinger +stood at the side of it. I was just wondering how Mellinger was +going to handle his crowd, when the home talent suddenly opened the +services. + +"That governor man was suitable for uprisings and policies. I judge +he was a ready kind of man, who took his own time. Yes, he was full +of attention and immediateness. He leaned his hands on the table and +imposed his face toward the secretary man. + +"'Do the American senors understand Spanish?' he asks in his native +accents. + +"'They do not,' says Mellinger. + +"'Then listen,' goes on the Latin man, prompt. 'The musics are +of sufficient prettiness, but not of necessity. Let us speak +of business. I well know why we are here, since I observe my +compatriots. You had a whisper yesterday, Senor Mellinger, of our +proposals. Tonight we will speak out. We know that you stand in +the president's favor, and we know your influence. The government +will be changed. We know the worth of your services. We esteem +your friendship and aid so much that'--Mellinger praises his hand, +but the governor man bottles him up. 'Do not speak until I have +done.' + +"The governor man then draws a package wrapped in paper from his +pocket, and lays it on the table by Mellinger's hand. + +"'In that you will find fifty thousand dollars in money of your +country. You can do nothing against us, but you can be worth that +for us. Go back to the capital and obey our instructions. Take +that money now. We trust you. You will find with it a paper giving +in detail the work you will be expected to do for us. Do not have +the unwiseness to refuse.' + +"'The governor man paused, with his eyes fixed on Mellinger, full +of expressions and observances. I looked at Mellinger, and was glad +Billy Renfrew couldn't see him then. The sweat was popping out on his +forehead, and he stood dumb, tapping the little package with the ends +of his fingers. The colorado-maduro gang was after his graft. He had +only to change his politics, and stuff five fingers in his inside +pocket. + +"Henry whispers to me and wants the pause in the program interpreted. +I whisper back: 'H. P. is up against a bribe, senator's size, and the +coons have got him going.' I saw Mellinger's hand moving closer to +the package. 'He's weakening,' I whispered to Henry. 'We'll remind +him,' says Henry, 'of the peanut-roaster on Thirty-fourth Street, +New York." + +"Henry stooped down and got a record from the basketful we'd brought, +slid it in the phonograph, and started her off. It was a cornet solo, +very neat and beautiful, and the name of it was 'Home, Sweet Home.' +Not one of them fifty odd men in the room moved while it was playing, +and the governor man kept his eyes steady on Mellinger. I saw +Mellinger's head go up little by little and his hand came creeping +away from the package. Not until the last note sounded did anybody +stir. And there Homer P. Mellinger takes up the bundle of boodle +and slams it in the governor man's face. + +"'That's my answer,' says Mellinger, private secretary, 'and there'll +be another in the morning. I have proofs of conspiracy against every +man of you. The show is over, gentlemen.' + +"'There's one more act,' puts in the governor man. 'You are a +servant, I believe, employed by the president to copy letters and +answer raps at the door. I am governor here. Senores, I call upon +you in the name of the cause to seize this man.' + +"That brindled gang of conspirators shoved back their chairs and +advanced in force. I could see where Mellinger had made a mistake in +massing his enemy so as to make a grand-stand play. I think he made +another one, too; but we can pass that, Mellinger's idea of a graft +and mine being different, according to estimations and points of view. + +"There was only one window and door in that room, and they were in +the front end. Here was fifty odd Latin men coming in a bunch to +obstruct the legislation of Mellinger. You may say there were three +of us, for me and Henry, simultaneous, declared New York City and +the Cherokee Nation in sympathy with the weaker party. + +"Then it was that Henry Horsecollar rose to a point of disorder and +intervened, showing, admirable, the advantages of education as applied +to the American Indian's natural intellect and native refinement. +He stood up and smoothed back his hair on each side with his hands +as you have seen little girls do when they play. + +"'Get behind me, both of you,' says Henry + +"'What's it to be, chief?' I asked. + +"'I'm going to buck center,' says Henry, in his football idioms. +There isn't a tackle in the lot of them. Follow me close, and rush +the game.' + +"'Then that cultured Red Man exhaled an arrangement of sounds with +his mouth that made the Latin aggregation pause, with thoughtfulness +and hesitations. The matter of his proclamation seemed to be a +cooperation of the Carlisle war-whoop with the Cherokee college yell. +He went at the chocolate team like a bean out of a little boy's nigger +shooter. His right elbow laid out the governor man on the gridiron, +and he made a lane the length of the crowd so wide that a woman +could have carried a stepladder through it without striking against +anything. All Mellinger and me had to do was to follow. + +"It took us just three minutes to get out of that street around +to military headquarters, where Mellinger had things his own way. +A colonel and a battalion of bare-toed infantry turned out and went +back to the scene of the musicale with us, but the conspirator gang +was gone. But we recaptured the phonograph with honors of war, and +marched back to the ~cuartel~ with it playing 'All Coons Look Alike +to Me.' + +"The next day Mellinger takes me and Henry to one side, and begins +to shed tens and twenties. + +"'I want to buy that phonograph,' says he. I liked that last tune +it played at the ~soiree~.' + +"'This is more money than the machine is worth,' says I. + +"'Tis government expense money,' says Mellinger. The government pays +for it, and it's getting the tune-grinder cheap.' + +"Me and Henry knew that pretty well. We knew that it had saved Homer +P. Mellinger's graft when he was on the point of losing it; but we +never let him know we knew it. + +"'Now you boys better slide off further down the coast for a while,' +says Mellinger, 'till I get the screws put on these fellows here. +If you don't they'll give you trouble. And if you ever happen to see +Billy Renfrew again before I do, tell him I'm coming back to New York +as soon as I can make a stake--honest.' + +"Me and Henry laid low until the day the steamer came back. When we +saw the captain's boat on the beach we went down and stood in the edge +of the water. The captain grinned when he saw us. + +"'I told you you'd be waiting,' he says. 'Where's the Hamburger +machine?' + +"'It stays behind,' I says, 'to play "Home, Sweet Home."' + +"'I told you so,' says the captain again. 'Climb in the boat.' + +"And that," said Keogh, "is the way me and Henry Horsecollar +introduced the phonograph into this country. Henry went back to +the States, but I've been rummaging around in the tropics ever since. +They say Mellinger never travelled a mile after that without his +phonograph. I guess it kept him reminded about his graft whenever +he saw the siren voice of the boodler tip him the wink with a bribe +in his hand." + +"I suppose he's taking it home with him as a souvenir, remarked the +consul. + +"Not as a souvenir," said Keogh. "He'll need two of 'em in New York, +running day and night." + + + +VII + +Money Maze + +The new administration of Anchuria entered upon its duties and +privileges with enthusiasm. Its first act was to send an agent +to Coralio with imperative orders to recover, if possible, the sum +of money ravished from the treasury by the ill-fated Miraflores. + +Colonel Emilio Falcon, the private secretary of Losada, the new +president, was despatched from the capital upon this important +mission. + +The position of private secretary to a tropical president is +a responsible one. He must be a diplomat, a spy, a ruler of men, +a body-guard to his chief, and a smeller-out of plots and nascent +revolutions. Often he is the power behind the throne, the dictator +of policy; and a president chooses him with a dozen times the care +with which he selects a matrimonial mate. + +Colonel Falcon, a handsome and urbane gentleman of Castilian courtesy +and debonnaire manners, came to Coralio with the task before him of +striking upon the cold trail of the lost money. There he conferred +with the military authorities, who had received instructions to +cooperate with him in the search. + +Colonel Falcon established his headquarters in one of the rooms of +the Casa Morena. Here for a week he held informal sittings--much as +if he were a kind of unified grand jury--and summoned before him all +those whose testimony might illumine the financial tragedy that had +accompanied the less momentous one of the late president's death. + +Two or three who were thus examined, among whom was the barber +Esteban, declared that they had identified the body of the president +before its burial. + +"Of a truth," testified Esteban before the mighty secretary, "it was +he, the president. Consider!--how could I shave a man and not see his +face? He sent for me to shave him in a small house. He had a beard +very black and thick. Had I ever seen the president before? Why not? +I saw him once ride forth in a carriage from the ~vapor~ in Solitas. +When I shaved him he gave me a gold piece, and said there was to be no +talk. But I am a Liberal--I am devoted to my country--and I spake of +these things to Senor Goodwin." + +"It is known," said Colonel Falcon, smoothly, "that the late President +took with him an American leather valise, containing a large amount of +money. Did you see that?" + +"~De veras~--no," Esteban answered. "The light in the little house +was but a small lamp by which I could scarcely see to shave the +President. Such a thing there may have been, but I did not see it. +No. Also in the room was a young lady--a senorita of much beauty-- +that I could see even in so small a light. But the money, senor, or +the thing in which it was carried--that I did not see." + +The ~comandante~ and other officers gave testimony that they had been +awakened and alarmed by the noise of a pistol-shot in the Hotel de +los Extranjeros. Hurrying thither to protect the peace and dignity +of the republic, they found a man lying dead, with a pistol clutched +in his hand. Beside him was a young woman, weeping sorely. Senor +Goodwin was also in the room when they entered it. But of the valise +of money they saw nothing. + +Madame Timotea Ortiz, the proprietress of the hotel in which the game +of Fox-in-the-Morning had been played out, told of the coming of the +two guests to her house. + +"To my house they came," said she--"one ~senor~ not quite old, and +one ~senorita~ of sufficient handsomeness. They desired not to eat +or to drink--not even of my ~aguardiente~, which is the best. To +their rooms they ascended--~Numero Nueve~ and ~Numero Diez~. Later +came Senor Goodwin, who ascended to speak with them. Then I heard +a great noise like that of a ~canon~, and they said that the ~pobre +Presidente~ had shot himself. ~Esta bueno~. I saw nothing of money +or of the thing you call ~veliz~ that you say he carried it in." + +Colonel Falcon soon came to the reasonable conclusion that if any one +in Coralio could furnish a clue to the vanished money, Frank Goodwin +must be the man. But the wise secretary pursued a different course +in seeking information from the American. Goodwin was a powerful +friend to the new administration, and one who was not to be carelessly +dealt with in respect to either his honesty or his courage. Even +the private secretary of His Excellency hesitated to have this rubber +prince and mahogany baron haled before him as a common citizen +of Anchuria. So he sent Goodwin a flowery epistle, each word-petal +dripping with honey, requesting the favor of an interview. Goodwin +replied with an invitation to dinner at his own house. + +Before the hour named the American walked over to the Casa Morena, +and greeted his guest frankly and friendly. Then the two strolled, +in the cool of the afternoon, to Goodwin's home in the environs. + +The American left Colonel Falcon in a big, cool, shadowed room +with a floor of inlaid and polished woods that any millionaire +in the States Would have envied, excusing himself for a few minutes. +He crossed a ~patio~, shaded with deftly arranged awnings and plants, +and entered a long room looking upon the sea in the opposite wing +of the house. The broad jalousies were opened wide, and the ocean +breeze flowed in through the room, an invisible current of coolness +and health. Goodwin's wife sat near one of the windows, making +a water-color sketch of the afternoon seascape. + +Here was a woman who looked to be happy. And more--she looked to +be content. Had a poet been inspired to pen just similes concerning +her favor, he would have likened her full, clear eyes, with their +white-encircled, gray irises, to moonflowers. With none of the +goddesses whose traditional charms have become coldly classic +would the discerning rhymester have compared her. She was purely +Paradisaic, not Olympian. If you can imagine Eve, after the eviction, +beguiling the flaming warriors and serenely reentering the Garden, +you will have her. Just so human, and still so harmonious with Eden +seemed Mrs. Goodwin. + +When her husband entered she looked up, and her lips curved and +parted; her eyelids fluttered twice or thrice--a movement remindful +(Proesy forgive us!) of the tail-wagging of a faithful dog--and a +little ripple went through her like the commotion set up in a weeping +willow by a puff of wind. Thus she ever acknowledged his coming, +were it twenty times a day. If they who sometimes sat over their wine +in Coralio, reshaping old, diverting stories of the madcap career +of Isabel Guilbert, could have seen the wife of Frank Goodwin that +afternoon in the estimable aura of her happy wifehood, they might +have disbelieved, or have agreed to forget, those graphic annals of +the life of the one for whom their president gave up his country and +his honor. + +"I have brought a guest to dinner," said Goodwin. "One Colonel +Falcon, from San Mateo. He is come on government business. I do not +think you will care to see him, so I prescribe for you one of those +convenient and indisputable feminine headaches." + +"He has come to inquire about the lost money, has he not?" asked +Mrs. Goodwin, going on with her sketch. + +"A good guess!" acknowledged Goodwin. "He has been holding an +inquisition among the natives for three days. I am next on his list +of witnesses, but as he feels shy about dragging one of Uncle Sam's +subjects before him, he consents to give it the outward appearance +of a social function. He will apply the torture over my own wine +and provender." + +"Has he found any one who saw the valise of money?" + +"Not a soul. Even Madama Ortiz, whose eyes are so sharp for the sight +of a revenue official, does not remember that there was any baggage." + +Mrs. Goodwin laid down her brush and sighed. + +"I am so sorry, Frank," she said, "that they are giving you so much +trouble about the money. But we can't let them know about it, can +we?" + +"Not without doing our intelligence a great injustice," said Goodwin, +with a smile and a shrug that he had picked up from the natives. +"~Americano~, though I am, they would have me in the ~calaboza~ in +half an hour if they knew we had appropriated that valise. No; we +must appear as ignorant about the money as the other ignoramuses in +Coralio." + +"Do you think that this man they have sent suspects you?" she asked, +with a little pucker of her brows. "He'd better not," said the +American, carelessly. "It's lucky that no one caught a sight of the +valise except myself. As I was in the rooms when the shot was fired, +it is not surprising that they should want to investigate my part +in the affair rather closely. But there's no cause for alarm. +This colonel is down on the list of events for a good dinner, with +a dessert of American 'bluff' that will end the matter, I think." + +Mrs. Goodwin rose and walked to the window. Goodwin followed and +stood by her side. She leaned to him, and rested in the protection +of his strength, as she had always rested since that dark night +on which he had first made himself her tower of refuge. Thus they +stood for a little while. + +Straight through the lavish growth of tropical branch and leaf and +vine that confronted them had been cunningly trimmed a vista, that +ended at the cleared environs of Coralio, on the banks of the mangrove +swamp. At the other end of the aerial tunnel they could see the grave +and wooden headpiece that bore the name of the unhappy President +Miraflores. From this window when the rains forbade the open, +and from the green and shady slopes of Goodwin's fruitful lands when +the skies were smiling, his wife was wont to look upon that grave +with a gentle sadness that was now scarcely a mar to her happiness. + +"I loved him so, Frank!" she said, "even after that terrible flight +and its awful ending. And you have been so good to me, and have made +me so happy. It has all grown into such a strange puzzle. If they +were to find out that we got the money do you think they would force +you to make the amount good to the government?" + +"They would undoubtedly try," answered Goodwin. "You are right about +its being a puzzle. And it must remain a puzzle to Falcon and all +his countrymen until it solves itself. You and I, who know more than +any one else, only know half of the solution. We must not let even +a hint about this money get abroad. Let them come to the theory that +the president concealed it in the mountains during his journey, or +that he found means to ship it out of the country before he reached +Coralio. I don't think that Falcon suspects me. He is making +a closer investigation, according to his orders, but he will find out +nothing." + +Thus they spake together. Had any one overheard or overseen them +as they discussed the lost funds of Anchuria there would have been +a second puzzle presented. For upon the faces and in the bearing +of each of them was visible (if countenances are to be believed) Saxon +honesty and pride and honorable thoughts. In Goodwin's steady eye +and firm lineaments, molded into material shape by the inward spirit +of kindness and generosity and courage, there was nothing reconcilable +with his words. + +As for his wife, physiognomy championed her even in the face of their +accusive talk. Nobility was in her guise; purity was in her glance. +The devotion that she manifested had not even the appearance of that +feeling that now and then inspires a woman to share the guilt of +her partner out of the pathetic greatness other love. No, there was +a discrepancy here between what the eye would have seen and the ear +have heard. + +Dinner was served to Goodwin and his guest in the patio, under cool +foliage and flowers. The American begged the illustrious secretary +to excuse the absence of Mrs. Goodwin, who was suffering, he said, +from a headache brought on by a slight ~calentura~. + +After the meal they lingered, according to the custom, over their +coffee and cigars. Colonel Falcon, with true Castilian delicacy, +waited for his host to open the question that they had met to discuss. +He had not long to wait. As soon as the cigars were lighted, +the American cleared the way by inquiring whether the secretary's +investigations in the town had furnished him with any clue to +the lost funds. + +"I have found no one yet," admitted Colonel Falcon, "who even had +sight of the valise or the money. Yet I have persisted. It has +been proven in the capital that President Miraflores set out +from San Mateo with one hundred thousand dollars belonging to the +government, accompanied by Senorita Isabel Guilbert, the opera singer. +The Government, officially and personally, is loathe to believe," +concluded Colonel Falcon, with a smile, "that our late President's +tastes would have permitted him to abandon on the route, as excess +baggage, either of the desirable articles with which his flight was +burdened." + +"I suppose you would like to hear what I have to say about the +affair," said Goodwin, coming directly to the point. "It will not +require many words." + +"On that night, with others of our friends here, I was keeping +a lookout for the president, having been notified of his flight +by a telegram in our national cipher from Englehart, one of our +leaders in the capital. About ten o'clock that night I saw a man +and a woman hurrying along the streets. They went to the Hotel de +los Extranjeros, and engaged rooms. I followed them upstairs, leaving +Esteban, who had come up, to watch outside. The barber had told me +that he had shaved the beard from the president's face that night; +therefore I was prepared, when I entered the rooms, to find him +with a smooth face. When I apprehended him in the name of the people +he drew a pistol and shot himself instantly. In a few minutes many +officers and citizens were on the spot. I suppose you have been +informed of the subsequent facts." + +Goodwin paused. Losada's agent maintained an attitude of waiting, +as if he expected a continuance. + +"And now," went on the American, looking steadily into the eyes of +the other man, and giving each word a deliberate emphasis, "you will +oblige me by attending carefully to what I have to add. I saw no +valise or receptacle of any kind, or any money belonging to the +Republic of Anchuria. If President Miraflores decamped with any funds +belonging to the treasury of this country, or to himself, or to any +one else, I saw no trace of it in the house or elsewhere, at that time +or at any other. Does that statement cover the ground of the inquiry +you wished to make of me?" + +Colonel Falcon bowed, and described a fluent curve with his cigar. +His duty was performed. Goodwin was not to be disputed. He was +a loyal supporter of the government, and enjoyed the full confidence +of the new president. His rectitude had been the capital that had +brought him fortune in Anchuria, just as it had formed the lucrative +"graft" of Mellinger, the secretary of Miraflores. + +"I thank you, ~Senor~ Goodwin, " said Falcon, "for speaking plainly. +But, ~Senor~ Goodwin, I am instructed to pursue every clue that +presents itself in this matter. There is one that I have not yet +touched upon. Our friends in France, senor, have a saying, '~Cherchez +la femme~,' when there is a mystery without a clue. But here we do +not have to search. The woman who accompanied the late President +in his flight must surely--" + +"I must interrupt you there," interposed Goodwin. "It is true that +when I entered the hotel for the purpose of intercepting President +Miraflores I found a lady there. I must beg of you to remember that +that lady is now my wife. I speak for her as I do for myself. She +knows nothing of the fate of the valise or of the money that you +are seeking. You will say to his excellency that I guarantee her +innocence. I do not need to add to you, Colonel Falcon, that I do +not care to have her questioned or disturbed." + +Colonel Falcon bowed again. + +"~Por supuesto~, no!" he cried. And to indicate that the inquiry +was ended he added: "And now, senor, let me beg of you to show me +that sea view from your galeria of which you spoke. I am a lover +of the sea." + +In the early evening Goodwin walked back to the town with his guest, +leaving him at the corner of the Calle Grande. As he was returning +homeward one "Beelzebub" Blythe, with the air of a courtier and +the outward aspect of a scarecrow, pounced upon him hopefully from +the door of a ~pulperia~. + +Blythe had been re-christened "Beelzebub" as an acknowledgement of +the greatness of his fall. Once in some distant Paradise Lost, he had +foregathered with the angels of the earth. But Fate had hurled him +headlong down to the tropics, where flamed in his bosom a fire that +was seldom quenched. In Coralio they called him a beach-comber; but +he was, in reality, a categorical idealist who strove to anamorphosize +the dull verities of life by the means of brandy and rum. As +Beelzebub, himself, might have held in his clutch with unwitting +tenacity his harp or crown during his tremendous fall, so his namesake +had clung to his gold-rimmed eyeglasses as the only souvenir of his +lost estate. These he wore with impressiveness and distinction while +he combed beaches and extracted toll from his friends. By some +mysterious means he kept his drink-reddened face always smoothly +shaven. For the rest he sponged gracefully upon whomsoever he could +for enough to keep him pretty drunk, and sheltered from the rains and +night dews. + +"Hallo, Goodwin!" called the derelict, airily. "I was hoping I'd +strike you. I wanted to see you particularly. Suppose we go where +we can talk. Of course you know there's a chap down here looking up +the money old Miraflores lost." + +"Yes," said Goodwin, "I've been talking with him. Let's go into +Espada's place. I can spare you ten minutes." + +They went into the ~pulperia~ and sat at a little table upon stools +with rawhide tops. + +"Have a drink?" said Goodwin. + +"They can't bring it too quickly," said Blythe. "I've been in +a drought ever since morning. Hi!--~muchacho!--el aguardiente por +aca~." + +"Now, what do you want to see me about?" asked Goodwin, when the +drinks were before them. + +"Confound it, old man," drawled Blythe, "why do you spoil a golden +moment like this with business? I wanted to see you--well, this +has the preference." He gulped down his brandy, and gazed longingly +into the empty glass. + +"Have another?" suggested Goodwin. + +"Between gentlemen," said the fallen angel, "I don't quite like +your use of that word 'another.' It isn't quite delicate. But +the concrete idea that the word represents is not displeasing." + +The glasses were refilled. Blythe sipped blissfully from his, as +he began to enter the state of a true idealist. + +"I must trot along in a minute or two," hinted Goodwin. "Was there +anything in particular?" + +Blythe did not reply at once. + +"Old Losada would make it a hot country," he remarked at length, "for +the man who swiped that gripsack of treasury boodle, don't you think?" + +"Undoubtedly, he would," agreed Goodwin calmly, as he rose leisurely +to his feet. "I'll be running over to the house, now old man. Mrs. +Goodwin is alone. There was nothing important you had to say, was +there?" + +"That's all," said Blythe. "Unless you wouldn't mind sending in +another drink from the bar as you go out. Old Espada has closed my +account to profit and loss. And pay for the lot, will you, like a +good fellow?" + +"All right," said Goodwin. "~Buenas noches~." + +"Beezlebub" Blythe lingered over his cups, polishing his eyeglasses +with a disreputable handkerchief. + +"I thought I could do it, but I couldn't," he muttered to himself +after a time. "A gentleman can't blackmail the man that he drinks +with." + + + +VIII + +The Admiral + +Spilled milk draws few tears from an Anchurian administration. +Many are its lacteal sources; and the clocks' hands point forever +to milking time. Even the rich cream skimmed from the treasury by +the bewitched Miraflores did not cause the newly installed patriots +to waste time in unprofitable regrets. The government philosophically +set about supplying the deficiency by increasing the import duties +and by "suggesting" to wealthy private citizens that contributions +according to their means would be considered patriotic and in order. +Prosperity was expected to attend the reign of Losada, the new +president. The ousted office-holders and military favorites +organized a new "Liberal" party, and began to lay their plans +for a re-succession. Thus the game of Anchurian politics began, like +a Chinese comedy, to unwind slowly its serial length. Here and there +Mirth peeps for an instant from the wings and illumines the florid +lines. + +A dozen quarts of champagne in conjunction with an informal sitting +of the president and his cabinet led to the establishment of the navy +and the appointment of Felipe Carrera as its admiral. + +Next to the champagne the credit of the appointment belongs to Don +Sabas Placido, the newly confirmed Minister of War. + +The president had requested a convention of his cabinet for the +discussion of questions politic and for the transaction of certain +routine matters of state. The session had been signally tedious; +the business and the wine prodigiously dry. A sudden, prankish humor +of Don Sabas, impelling him to the deed, spiced the grave affairs +of state with a whiff of agreeable playfulness. In the dilatory +order of business had come a bulletin from the coast department +of Orilla del Mar reporting the seizure by the custom-house officers +at the town of Coralio of the sloop ~Estrella del Noche~ and her cargo +of drygoods, patent medicines, granulated sugar and three-star brandy. +Also six Martini rifles and a barrel of American whiskey. Caught +in the act of smuggling, the sloop with its cargo was now, according +to law, the property of the republic. + +The Collector of Customs, in making his report, departed from the +conventional forms so far as to suggest that the confiscated vessel +be converted to the use of the government. The prize was the first +capture to the credit of the department in ten years. The collector +took opportunity to pat his department on the back. + +It often happened that government officers required transportation +from point to point along the coast, and means were usually lacking. +Furthermore, the sloop could be manned by a loyal crew and employed +as a coast guard to discourage the pernicious art of smuggling. The +collector also ventured to nominate one to whom the charge of the boat +could be safely intrusted--a young man of Coralio, Felipe Carrera-- +not, be it understood, one of extreme wisdom, but loyal and the best +sailor along the coast. + +It was upon this hint that the Minister of War acted, executing a +rare piece of drollery that so enlivened the tedium of the executive +session. + +In the consultation of this small, maritime banana republic was +a forgotten section that provided for the maintenance of a navy. +This provision--with many other wiser ones--had lain inert since +the establishment of the republic. Anchuria had no navy and had +no use for one. It was characteristic of Don Sabasa man at once +merry, learned, whimsical and audacious--that he should have disturbed +the dust of this musty and sleeping statute to increase the humor +of the world by so much as a smile from his indulgent colleagues. + +With delightful mock seriousness the Minister of War proposed the +creation of a navy. He argued its need and the glories it might +achieve with such gay and witty zeal that the travesty overcame with +its humor even the swart dignity of President Losada himself. + +The champagne was bubbling trickily in the veins of the mercurial +statesmen. It was not the custom of the grave governors of Anchuria +to enliven their sessions with a beverage so apt to cast a veil +of disparagement over sober affairs. The wine had been a thoughtful +compliment tendered by the agent of the Vesuvius Fruit Company as +a token of amicable relations--and certain consummated deals--between +that company and the republic of Anchuria. + +The jest was carried to its end. A formidable, official document was +prepared, encrusted with chromatic seals and jaunty with fluttering +ribbons, bearing the florid signatures of state. This commission +conferred upon el Senor Don Felipe Carrera the title of Flag Admiral +of the Republic of Anchuria. Thus within the space of a few minutes +and the dominion of a dozen "extra dry" the country took its place +among the naval powers of the world, and Felipe Carrera became +entitled to a salute of nineteen guns whenever he might enter port. + +The southern races are lacking in that particular kind of humor that +finds entertainment in the defects and misfortunes bestowed by Nature. +Owing to this defect in their constitution they are not moved to +laughter (as are their northern brothers) by the spectacle of the +deformed, the feeble-minded or the insane. + +Felipe Carrera was sent upon earth with but half his wits. Therefore, +the people of Coralio called him "~El pobrecito loco~" the poor little +crazed one"--saying that God had sent but half of him to earth, +retaining the other half. + +A sombre youth, glowering, and speaking only at the rarest times, +Felipe was but negatively "loco." On shore he generally refused all +conversation. He seemed to know that he was badly handicapped on +land, where so many kinds of understanding are needed; but on the +water his one talent set him equal with most men. Few sailors whom +God had carefully and completely made could handle a sailboat as well. +Five points nearer the wind than the best of them he could sail his +sloop. When the elements raged and set other men to cowering, the +deficiencies of Felipe seemed of little importance. He was a perfect +sailor, if an imperfect man. He owned no boat, but worked among the +crews of the schooners and sloops that skimmed the coast, trading and +freighting fruit out to the steamers where there was no harbor. It +was through his famous skill and boldness on the sea, as well as for +the pity felt for his mental imperfections, that he was recommended by +the collector as a suitable custodian of the captured sloop. + +When the outcome of Don Sabas' little pleasantry arrived in the form +of the imposing and preposterous commission, the collector smiled. +He had not expected such prompt and overwhelming response to +his recommendation. He despatched a ~muchacho~ at once to fetch +the future admiral. + +The collector waited in his official quarters. His office was in +the Calle Grande, and the sea breezes hummed through its windows all +day. The collector, in white linen and canvas shoes, philandered with +papers on an antique desk. A parrot, perched on a pen rack, seasoned +the official tedium with a fire of choice Castilian imprecations. +Two rooms opened into the Collector's. In one the clerical force of +young men of variegated complexions transacted with glitter and parade +their several duties. Through the open door of the other room could +be seen a bronze babe, guiltless of clothing, that rollicked upon the +floor. In a grass hammock a thin woman, tinted a pale lemon, played +a guitar and swung contentedly in the breeze. Thus surrounded by +the routine of his high duties and the visible tokens of agreeable +domesticity, the collector's heart was further made happy by the power +placed in his hands to brighten the fortunes of the "innocent" Felipe. + +Felipe came and stood before the collector. He was a lad of twenty, +not ill-favored in looks, but with an expression of distant and +pondering vacuity. He wore white cotton trousers, down the seams +of which he had sewed red stripes with some vague aim at military +decoration. A flimsy blue shirt fell open at his throat; his feet +were bare; he held in his hand the cheapest of straw hats from the +States. + +"Senor Carrera," said the collector, gravely, producing the showy +commission, "I have sent for you at the president's bidding. This +document that I present to you confers upon you the title of Admiral +of this great republic, and gives you absolute command of the naval +forces and fleet of our country. You may think, friend Felipe, that +we have no navy--but yes! The sloop the ~Estrella del Noche~, that +my brave men captured from the coast smugglers, is to be placed under +your command. The boat is to be devoted to the services of your +country. You will be ready at all times to convey officials of the +government to points along the coast where they may be obliged to +visit. You will also act as a coast-guard to prevent, as far as you +may be able, the crime of smuggling. You will uphold the honor and +prestige of your country at sea, and endeavor to place Anchuria among +the proudest naval powers of the world. These are your instructions +as the Minister of War desires me to convey them to you. ~Por Dios!~ +I do not know how all this is to be accomplished, for not one word +did his letter contain in respect to a crew or to the expenses of this +navy. Perhaps you are to provide a crew yourself, Senor Admiral--I do +not know--but it is a very high honor that has descended upon you. I +now hand you your commission. When you are ready for the boat I will +give orders that she shall be made over into your charge. That is as +far as my instructions go." + +Felipe took the commission that the collector handed to him. He gazed +through the open window at the sea for a moment, with his customary +expression of deep but vain pondering. Then he turned without having +spoken a word, and walked swiftly away through the hot sand of the +street. + +"~Pobrecito loco!~" sighed the collector; and the parrot on the pen +racks screeched "Loco!loco!loco!" + +The next morning a strange procession filed through the streets +to the collector's office. At its head was the admiral of the navy. +Somewhere Felipe had raked together a pitiful semblance of a military +uniform--a pair of red trousers, a dingy blue short jacket heavily +ornamented with gold braid, and an old fatigue cap that must have been +cast away by one of the British soldiers in Belize and brought away +by Felipe on one of his coasting voyages. Buckled around his waist +was an ancient ship's cutlass contributed to his equipment by Pedro +Lafitte, the baker, who proudly asserted its inheritance from his +ancestor, the illustrious buccaneer. At the admiral's heels tagged +his newly shipped crew--three grinning, glossy, black Caribs, bare to +the waist, the sand spurting in showers from the spring of their naked +feet. + +Briefly and with dignity Felipe demanded his vessel of the collector. +And now a fresh honor awaited him. The collector's wife, who played +the guitar and read novels in the hammock all day, had more than +a little romance in her placid, yellow bosom. She had found in +an old book an engraving of a flag that purported to be the naval +flag of Anchuria. Perhaps it had so been designed by the founders +of the nation; but, as no navy had ever been established, oblivion +had claimed the flag. Laboriously with her own hands she had made +a flag after the pattern--a red cross upon a blue-and-white ground. +he presented it to Felipe with these words: "Brave sailor, this flag +is of your country. Be true, and defend it with your life. Go you +with God." + +For the first time since his appointment the admiral showed a flicker +of emotion. He took the silken emblem, and passed his hand reverently +over its surface, "I am the admiral," he said to the collector's lady. +Being on land he could bring himself to no more exuberant expression +of sentiment. At sea with the flag at the masthead of his navy, some +more eloquent exposition of feelings might be forthcoming. + +Abruptly the admiral departed with his crew. For the next three days +they were busy giving the ~Estrella del Noche~ a new coat of white +paint trimmed with blue. And then Felipe further adorned himself by +fastening a handful of brilliant parrot's plumes in his cap. Again +he tramped with his faithful crew to the collector's office and +formally notified him that the sloop's name had been changed to ~El +Nacional~. + +During the next few months the navy had its troubles. Even an admiral +is perplexed to know what to do without any orders. But none came. +Neither did any salaries. ~El Nacional~ swung idly at anchor. + +When Felipe's little store of money was exhausted he went to the +collector and raised the question of finances. + +"Salaries!" exclaimed the collector, with hands raised; "~Valgame +Dios~! not one ~centavo~ of my own pay have I received for the last +seven months. The pay of an admiral, do you ask? ~Quien sabe~? +Should it be less than three thousand ~pesos~? ~Mira~! you will see +a revolution in this country very soon. A good sign of it is when +the government calls all the time for ~pesos, pesos, pesos~, and pays +none out." + +Felipe left the collector's office with a look almost of content +on his sombre face. A revolution would mean fighting, and then +the government would need his services. It was rather humiliating +to be an admiral without anything to do, and have a hungry crew at your +heels begging for ~reales~ to buy plantains and tobacco with. + +When he returned to where his happy-go-lucky Caribs were waiting +they sprang up and saluted, as he had drilled them to do. "Come, +~muchachos~," said the admiral; "it seems that the government is poor. +It has no money to give us. We will earn what we need to live upon. +Thus will we serve our country. Soon"--his heavy eyes almost lighted +up--"it may gladly call upon us for help." + +Thereafter ~El Nacional~ turned out with the other coast craft and +became a wage-earner. She worked with the lighters freighting bananas +and oranges out to the fruit steamers that could not approach nearer +than a mile from the shore. Surely a self-supporting navy deserves +red letters in the budget of any nation. + +After earning enough at freighting to keep himself and his crew +in provisions for a week Felipe would anchor the navy and hang about +the little telegraph office, looking like one of the chorus of an +insolvent comic opera troupe besieging the manager's den. A hope for +orders from the capital was always in his heart. That his services +as admiral had never been called into requirement hurt his pride and +patriotism. At every call he would inquire, gravely and expectantly, +for despatches. The operator would pretend to make a search, and +then reply: + +"Not yet, it seems, ~Senor el Almirante--poco tiempo~!" + +Outside in the shade of the lime-trees the crew chewed sugar cane +or slumbered, well content to serve a country that was contented +with so little service. + +One day in the early summer the revolution predicted by the collector +flamed out suddenly. It had long been smoldering. At the first note +of alarm the admiral of the navy force and fleet made all sail for +a larger port on the coast of a neighboring republic, where he traded +a hastily collected cargo of fruit for its value in cartridges for the +five Martini rifles, the only guns that the navy could boast. Then +to the telegraph office sped the admiral. Sprawling in his favorite +corner, in his fast-decaying uniform, with his prodigious sabre +distributed between his red legs, he waited for the long-delayed, +but now soon expected, orders. + +"Not yet, ~Senor el Almirante~" the telegraph clerk would call to him +--"~poco tiempo~!" + +At the answer the admiral would plump himself down with a great +rattling of scabbard to await the infrequent tick of the little +instrument on the table. + +"They will come," would be his unshaken reply; "I am the admiral." + + + +IX + +The Flag Paramount + +At the head of the insurgent party appeared that Hector and learned +Theban of the southern republics, Don Sabas Placido. A traveller, +a soldier, a poet, a scientist, a statesman and a connoisseur--the +wonder was that he could content himself with the petty, remote life +of his native country. + +"It is a whim of Placido's," said a friend who knew him well, +"to take up political intrigue. It is not otherwise than as if he +had come upon a new tempo in music, a new bacillus in the air, a new +scent, or rhyme, or explosive. He will squeeze this revolution dry +of sensations, and a week afterward will forget it, skimming the seas +of the world in his brigantine to add to his already world-famous +collections. Collections of what? ~Por Dios~! of everything from +postage stamps to prehistoric stone idols." + +But, for a mere dilettante, the aesthetic Placido seemed to be +creating a lively row. The people admired him; they were fascinated +by his brilliancy and flattered by his taking an interest in so small +a thing as his native country. They rallied to the call of his +lieutenants in the capital, where (somewhat contrary to arrangements) +the army remained faithful to the government. There was also lively +skirmishing in the coast towns. It was rumored that the revolution +was aided by the Vesuvius Fruit Company, the power that forever stood +with chiding smile and uplifted finger to keep Anchuria in the class +of good children. Two of its steamers, the ~Traveler~ and the +~Salvador~, were known to have conveyed insurgent troops from point +to point along the coast. + +As yet there had been no actual uprising in Coralio. Military law +prevailed, and the ferment was bottled for the time. And then came +the word that everywhere the revolutionists were encountering defeat. +In the capital the president's forces triumphed; and there was a rumor +that the leaders of the revolt had been forced to fly, hotly pursued. + +In the little telegraph office at Coralio there was always +a gathering of officials and loyal citizens, awaiting news from +the seat of government. One morning the telegraph key began clicking, +and presently the operator called, loudly: "One telegram for +~el Almirante~, Don Senor Felipe Carrera!" + +There was a shuffling sound, a great rattling of tin scabbard, and +the admiral, prompt at his spot of waiting, leaped across the room +to receive it. + +The message was handed to him. Slowly spelling it out, he found it +to be his first official order--thus running: + + "Proceed immediately with your vessel to mouth of Rio Ruiz; + transport beef and provisions to barracks at Alforan. + ~Martinez, General.~" + +Small glory, to be sure, in this, his country's first call. But +it had called, and joy surged in the admiral's breast. He drew his +cutlass belt to another buckle hole, roused his dozing crew, and in +a quarter of an hour ~El Nacional~ was tacking swiftly down coast in +a stiff landward breeze. + +The Rio Ruiz is a small river, emptying into the sea ten miles below +Coralio. That portion of the coast is wild and solitary. Through +a gorge in the Cordilleras rushes the Rio Ruiz, cold and bubbling, +to glide at last, with breadth and leisure, through an alluvial morass +into the sea. + +In two hours ~El Nacional~ entered the river's mouth. The banks +were crowded with a disposition of formidable trees. The sumptuous +undergrowth of the tropics overflowed the land, and drowned itself +in the fallow waters. + +Silently the sloop entered there, and met a deeper silence. Brilliant +with greens and ochres and floral, scarlets, the umbrageous mouth +of the Rio Ruiz furnished no sound or movement save of the sea-going +water as it purled against the prow of the vessel. Small chance there +seemed of wresting beef or provisions from that empty solitude. + +The admiral decided to cast anchor, and, at the chain's rattle, +the forest was stimulated to instant and resounding uproar. The mouth +of the Rio Ruiz had only been taking a morning nap. Parrots and +baboons screeched and barked in the trees; a whirring and a hissing +and a booming marked the awakening of animal life; a dark blue bulk +was visible for an instant, as a startled tapir fought his way through +the vines. + +The navy, under orders, hung in the mouth of the little river for +hours. The crew served the dinner of shark's fin soup, plantains, +crab gumbo and sour wine. The admiral, with a three-foot telescope, +closely scanned the impervious foliage fifty yards away. + +It was nearly sunset when a reverberating "hal-lo-o-o!" came from +the forest to their left. It was answered; and three men, mounted +upon mules, crashed through the tropic tangle to within a dozen yards +of the river's bank. There they dismounted; and one, unbuckling +his belt, struck each mule a violent blow with his sword scabbard, +so that they, with a fling of heels, dashed back again into +the forest. + +Those were strange-looking men to be conveying beef and provisions. +One was a large and exceedingly active man, of striking presence. He +was of the purest Spanish type, with curling, gray-besprinkled, dark +hair, blue, sparkling eyes, and the pronounced air of a ~caballero +grande~. The other two were small, brown-faced men, wearing white +military uniforms, high riding boots and swords. The clothes of all +were drenched, bespattered and rent by the thicket. Some stress of +circumstance must have driven them, ~diable a quatre~, through flood, +mire and jungle. + +"~O-he! Senor Almirante~," called the large man. "Send to us your +boat." + +The dory was lowered, and Felipe, with one of the Caribs, rowed toward +the left bank. + +The large man stood near the water's brink, waist deep in the curling +vines. As he gazed upon the scarecrow figure in the stern of the dory +a sprightly interest beamed upon his mobile face. + +Months of wageless and thankless service had dimmed the admiral's +splendor. His red trousers were patched and ragged. Most of the +bright buttons and yellow braid were gone from his jacket. The visor +of his cap was torn, and depended almost to his eyes. The admiral's +feet were bare. + +"Dear Admiral," cried the large man, and his voice was like a blast +from a horn, "I kiss your hands. I knew we could build upon your +fidelity. You had our despatch--from General Martinez. A little +nearer with your boat, dear Admiral. Upon these devils of shifting +vines we stand with the smallest security." + +Felipe regarded him with a stolid face. + +"Provisions and beef for the barracks at Alforan," he quoted. + +"No fault of the butchers, ~Almirante mio~, that the beef awaits you +not. But you are come in time to save the cattle. Get us aboard your +vessel, senor, at once. You first, ~caballeros--a priesa!~ Come back +for me. The boat is too small." + +The dory conveyed the two officers to the sloop, and returned for +the large man. + +"Have you so gross a thing as food, good Admiral?" he cried, when +aboard. "And, perhaps, coffee? Beef and provisions! ~Nombre de +Dios!~ a little longer and we could have eaten one of those mules that +you, Colonel Rafael, saluted so feelingly with your sword scabbard at +parting. Let us have food; and then we will sail--for the barracks +at Alforan--no?" + +The Caribs prepared a meal, to which the three passengers of ~El +Nacional~ set themselves with famished delight. About sunset, as was +its custom, the breeze veered and swept back from the mountains, cool +and steady, bringing a taste of the stagnant lagoons and mangrove +swamps that guttered the lowlands. The mainsail of the sloop was +hoisted and swelled to it, and at that moment they heard shouts and +a waxing clamor from the bosky profundities of the shore. + +"The butchers, my dear Admiral," said the large man, smiling, "too +late for the slaughter." + +Further than his orders to his crew, the admiral was saying nothing. +The topsail and jib were spread, and the sloop elided out of the +estuary. The large man and his companions had bestowed themselves +with what comfort they could about the bare deck. Belike, the thing +big in their minds had been their departure from that critical shore; +and now that the hazard was so far reduced their thoughts were loosed +to the consideration of further deliverance. But when they saw the +sloop turn and fly up coast again they relaxed, satisfied with the +course the admiral had taken. + +The large man sat at ease, his spirited blue eye engaged in +the contemplation of the navy's commander. He was trying to estimate +this sombre and fantastic lad, whose impenetrable stolidity puzzled +him. Himself a fugitive, his life sought, and chafing under the smart +of defeat and failure, it was characteristic of him to transfer +instantly his interest to the study of a thing new to him. It was +like him, too, to have conceived and risked all upon this last +desperate and madcap scheme--this message to a poor, crazed ~fanatico~ +cruising about with his grotesque uniform and his farcical title. +But his companions had been at their wits' end; escape had seemed +incredible; and now he was pleased with the success of the plan they +had called crack-brained and precarious. + +The brief, tropic twilight seemed to slide swiftly into the pearly +splendor of a moonlit night. And now the lights of Coralio appeared, +distributed against the darkening shore to their right. The admiral +stood, silent, at the tiller; the Caribs, like black panthers, held +the sheets, leaping noiselessly at his short commands. The three +passengers were watching intently the sea before them, and when at +length they came in sight of the bulk of a steamer lying a mile out +from the town, with her lights radiating deep into the water, they +held a sudden voluble and close-headed converse. The sloop was +speeding as if to strike midway between ship and shore. + +The large man suddenly separated from his companions and approached +the scarecrow at the helm. + +"My dear Admiral," he said, "the government has been exceedingly +remiss. I feel all the shame for it that only its ignorance of your +devoted service has prevented it from sustaining. An inexcusable +oversight has been made. A vessel, a uniform and a crew worthy +of your fidelity shall be furnished you. But just now, dear Admiral, +there is business of moment afoot. The steamer lying there is the +~Salvador~. I and my friends desire to be conveyed to her, where we +are sent on the government's business. Do us the favor to shape your +course accordingly." + +Without replying, the admiral gave a sharp command, and put the tiller +hard to port. ~El Nacional~ swerved, and headed straight as an +arrow's course for the shore. + +"Do me the favor," said the large man, a trifle restively, +"to acknowledge, at least, that you catch the sound of my words." +It was possible that the fellow might be lacking in senses as well +as intellect. + +The admiral emitted a croaking, harsh laugh, and spake. + +"They will stand you," he said, "with your face to a wall and shoot +you dead. That is the way they kill traitors. I knew you when you +stepped into my boat. I have seen your picture in a book. You are +Sabas Placido, traitor to your country. With your face to a wall. +So, you will die. I am the admiral, and I will take you to them. +With your face to a wall. Yes." + +Don Sabas half turned and waved his hand, with a ringing laugh, +toward his fellow fugitives. "To you, ~caballeros~, I have related +the history of that session when we issued that 0! so ridiculous +commission. Of a truth our jest has been turned against us. Behold +the Frankenstein's monster we have created!" + +Don Sabas glanced toward the shore. The lights of Coralio were +drawing near. He could see the beach, the warehouse of the ~Bodega +Nacional~, the long, low ~cuartel~ occupied by the soldiers, and +behind that, gleaming in the moonlight, a stretch of high adobe wall. +He had seen men stood with their faces to that wall and shot dead. + +Again he addressed the extravagant figure at the helm. + +"It is true," he said, "that I am fleeing the country. But, receive +the assurance that I care very little for that. Courts and camps +everywhere are open to Sabas Placido. ~Vaya!~ what is this molehill +of a republic--this pig's head of a country--to a man like me? I am +a ~paisano~ of everywhere. In Rome, in London, in Paris, in Vienna, +you will hear them say: 'Welcome back, Don Sabas.' Come!--~tonto~-- +baboon of a boy--admiral, whatever you call yourself, turn your boat. +Put us on board the ~Salvador~, and here is your pay--five hundred +pesos in money of the ~Estados Unidos~--more than your lying +government will pay you in twenty years." + +Don Sabas pressed a plump purse against the youth's hand. The admiral +gave no heed to the words or the movement. Braced against the helm, +he was holding the sloop dead on her shoreward course. His dull face +was lit almost to intelligence by some inward conceit that seemed to +afford him joy, and found utterance in another parrot-like cackle. + +"That is why they do it," he said--"so that you will not see the guns. +They fire--boom!--and you fall dead. With your face to the wall. +Yes." + +The admiral called a sudden order to his crew. The lithe, silent +Caribs made fast the sheets they held, and slipped down the hatchway +into the hold of the sloop. When the last one had disappeared, Don +Sabas, like a big, brown leopard, leaped forward, closed and fastened +the hatch and stood, smiling. + +"No rifles, if you please, dear admiral," he said. "It was a whimsey +of mine once to compile a dictionary of the Carib ~lengua~. So, +I understood your order. Perhaps now you will--" + +He cut short his words, for he heard the dull "swish" of iron scraping +along tin. The admiral had drawn the cutlass of Pedro Lafitte, +and was darting upon him. The blade descended, and it was only by +a display of surprising agility that the large man escaped, with only +a bruised shoulder, the glancing weapon. He was drawing his pistol +as he sprang, and the next instant he shot the admiral down. + +Don Sabas stooped over him, and rose again. + +"In the heart," he said briefly. "~Senores~, the navy is abolished." + +Colonel Rafael sprang to the helm, and the other officer hastened to +loose the mainsail sheets. The boom swung round; ~El Nacional~ veered +and began to tack industriously for the ~Salvador~. + +"Strike that flag, senor," called Colonel Rafael. "Our friends on +the steamer will wonder why we are sailing under it." + +"Well said," cried Don Sabas. Advancing to the mast he lowered the +flag to the deck, where lay its too loyal supporter. Thus ended the +Minister of War's little piece of after-dinner drollery, and by the +same hand that began it. + +Suddenly Don Sabas gave a great cry of joy, and ran down the slanting +deck to the side of Colonel Rafael. Across his arm he carried the +flag of the extinguished navy. + +"~Mire! mire! senor. Ah, ~Dios!~ Already can I hear that great bear +of an Oestreicher~ shout, ~'Du hast mein herz gebrochen!' Mire!~ +Of my friend, Herr Grunitz, of Vienna, you have heard me relate. +That man has travelled to Ceylon for an orchid--to Patagonia for +a headdress --to Benares for a slipper--to Mozambique for a spearhead +to add to his famous collections. Thou knowest, also, ~amigo~ Rafael, +that I have been a gatherer of curios. My collection of battle flags +of the world's navies was the most complete in existence until last +year. Then Herr Grunitz secured two, 0! such rare specimens. One +of a Barberry state, and one of the Makarooroos, a tribe on the west +coast of Africa. I have not those, but they can be procured. But +this flag, senor--do you know what it is? Name of God! do you know? +See that red cross upon the blue and white ground! You never saw +it before? ~Seguramente no~. It is the naval flag of your country. +~Mire!~ This rotten tub we stand upon is its navy--that dead cockatoo +lying there was its commander--that stroke of cutlass and single +pistol shot a sea battle. All a piece of absurd foolery, I grant you +--but authentic. There has never been another flag like this, and +there never will be another. No. It is unique in the whole world. +Yes. Think of what that means to a collector of flags! Do you know, +~Coronel mio~, how many golden crowns Herr Grunitz would give for this +flag? Ten thousand, likely. Well, a hundred thousand would not buy +it. Beautiful flag! Only flag! Little devil of a most heaven-born +flag! ~O'he!~ old grumbler beyond the ocean. Wait till Don Sabas +comes again to the Konigin Strasse. He will let you kneel and touch +the folds of it with one finger. ~O-he!~ old spectacled ransacker +of the world!" + +Forgotten was the impotent revolution, the danger, the loss, the gall +of defeat. Possessed solely by the inordinate and unparalleled +passion of the collector, he strode up and down the little deck, +clasping to his breast with one hand the paragon of a flag. He +snapped his fingers triumphantly toward the east. He shouted the +paean to his prize in trumpet tones, as though he would make old +Grunitz hear in his musty den beyond the sea. + +They were waiting, on the ~Salvador~, to welcome them. The sloop came +close alongside the steamer where her sides were sliced almost to the +lower deck for the loading of fruit. The sailors of the ~Salvador~ +grappled and held her there. + +Captain McLeod leaned over the side. + +"Well, ~senor~, the jig is up, I'm told." + +"The jig is up?" Don Sabas looked perplexed for a moment. "That +revolution--ah, yes!" With a shrug of his shoulders he dismissed +the matter. + +The captain learned of the escape and the imprisoned crew. + +"Caribs!" he said; "no harm in them." He slipped down into the sloop +and kicked loose the hasp of the hatch. The black fellows came +tumbling up, sweating but grinning. + +"Hey! black boys!" said the captain, in a dialect of his own; "you +sabe, catchy boat and vamos back same place quick." + +They saw him point to themselves, the sloop and Coralio. "Yas, yas!" +they cried, with broader grins and many nods. + +The four--Don Sabas, the two officers and the captain--moved to quit +the sloop. Don Sabas lagged a little behind, looking at the still +form of the late admiral, sprawled in his paltry trappings. + +"~Pobrecito loco~," he said softly. + +He was a brilliant cosmopolite and a ~cognoscente~ of high rank; +but, after all, he was of the same race and blood and instinct as +this people. Even as the simple ~paisanos~ of Coralio had said it, +so said Don Sabas. Without a smile, he looked, and said, "The poor +little crazed one!" + +Stooping he raised the limp shoulders, drew the priceless and +induplicable flag under them and over the breast, pinning it there +with the diamond star of the Order of San Carlos that he took from +the collar of his own coat. + +He followed after the others, and stood with them upon the deck of +the ~Salvador~. The sailors that steadied ~El Nacional~ shoved her +off. The jabbering Caribs hauled away at the rigging; the sloop +headed for the shore. + +And Herr Grunitz's collection of naval flags was still the finest +in the world. + + + +X + +The Shamrock and the Palm + +One night when there was no breeze, and Coralio seemed closer than +ever to the gratings of Avernus, five men were grouped about the door +of the photograph establishment of Keogh and Clancy. Thus, in all +the scorched and exotic places of the earth, Caucasians meet when +the day's work is done to preserve the fulness of their heritage +by the aspersion of alien things. + +Johnny Atwood lay stretched upon the grass in the undress uniform of +a Carib, and prated feebly of cool water to be had in the cucumber- +wood pumps of Dalesburg. Doctor Gregg, through the prestige of +his whiskers and as a bribe against the relation of his imminent +professional tales, was conceded the hammock that was swung between +the door jamb and a calabash-tree. Keogh had moved out upon the grass +a little table that held the instrument for burnishing completed +photographs. He was the only busy one of the group. Industriously +from between the cylinders of the burnisher rolled the finished +depictments of Coralio's citizens. Blanchard, the French mining +engineer, in his cool linen viewed the smoke of his cigarette through +his calm glasses, impervious to the heat. Clancy sat on the steps, +smoking his short pipe. His mood was the gossip's; the others were +reduced, by the humidity, to the state of disability desirable in +an audience. + +Clancy was an American with an Irish diathesis and cosmopolitan +proclivities. Many businesses had claimed him, but not for long. +The roadster's blood was in his veins. The voice of the tintype was +but one of the many callings that had wooed him upon so many roads. +Sometimes he could be persuaded to oral construction of his voyages +into the informal and egregious. Tonight there were symptoms of +divulgement in him. + +"'Tis elegant weather for filibustering'," he volunteered. "It +reminds me of the time I struggled to liberate a nation from the +poisonous breath of a tyrant's clutch. 'Twas hard work. 'Tis +straining to the back and makes corns on the hands." + +"I didn't know you had ever lent your sword to an oppressed people," +murmured Atwood, from the grass. + +"I did," said Clancy; "and they turned it into a plowshare." + +"What country was so fortunate as to secure your aid?" airily inquired +Blanchard. + +"Where's Kamchatka?" asked Clancy, with seeming irrelevance. + +"Why, off Siberia somewhere in the Arctic regions," somebody answered, +doubtfully. + +"I thought that was the cold one," said Clancy, with a satisfied nod. +"I'm always gettin' the two names mixed. 'Twas Guatemala, then--the +hot one--I've been filibusterin' with. Ye'll find that country on +the map. 'Tis in the district known as the tropics. By the foresight +of Providence, it lies on the coast so the geography men could run the +names of the towns off into the water. They're an inch long, small +type, composed of Spanish dialects, and, 'tis my opinion, of the same +system of syntax that blew up the ~Maine~. Yes, 'twas that country +I sailed against, single-handed, and endeavored to liberate it from +a tyrannical government with a single-barrelled pickaxe, unloaded +at that. Ye don't understand, of course. 'Tis a statement demandin' +elucidation and apologies. + +"'Twas in New Orleans one morning about the first ofJune; I was +standing down on the wharf, looking about at the ships in the river. +There was a little steamer moored right opposite me that seemed about +ready to sail. The funnels of it were throwing out smoke, and a gang +of roustabouts were carrying aboard a pile of boxes that was stacked +up on the wharf. The boxes were about two feet square, and something +like four feet long, and they seemed to be pretty heavy. + +"I walked over, careless, to the stack of boxes. I saw one of them +had been broken in handlin'. 'Twas curiosity made me pull up +the loose top and look inside. The box was packed full of Winchester +rifles. 'So, so,' says I to myself; 'somebody's gettin' a twist +on the neutrality laws. Somebody's aidin' with munitions of war. +I wonder where the popguns are goin'?' + +"I heard somebody cough, and I turned around. There stood a little, +round, fat man with a brown face and white clothes, a first-class- +looking little man, with a four-karat diamond on his finger and +his eye full of interrogations and respects. I judged he was a kind +of foreigner--may be from Russia or Japan or the archipelagoes. + +"'Hist!' says the round man, full of concealments and confidences. +'Will the senor respect the discoveryments he has made, that the mans +on the ship shall not be acquaint? The senor will be a gentleman +that shall not expose one thing that by accident occur.' + +"'Monseer,' says I--for I judged him to be a kind of Frenchman-- +'receive my most exasperated assurances that your secret is safe with +James Clancy. Furthermore, I will go so far as to remark, Veev la +Liberty--veev it good and strong. Whenever you hear of a Clancy +obstructin' the abolishment of existin' governments you may notify +me by return mail.' + +"'The senor is good,' says the dark, fat man, smilin' under his black +mustache. 'Wish you to come aboard my ship and drink of wine a glass.' + +"Bein' a Clancy, in two minutes me and the foreigner man were seated +at a table in the cabin of the steamer, with a bottle between us. I +could hear the heavy boxes bein' dumped into the hold. I judged that +cargo must consist of at least 2,000 Winchesters. Me and the brown +man drank the bottle of stuff, and he called the steward to bring +another. When you amalgamate a Clancy with the contents of a bottle +you practically instigate secession. I had heard a good deal about +these revolutions in them tropical localities, and I begun to want +a hand in it. + +"'You goin' to stir things up in your country, ain't you, monseer?' +says I, with a wink to let him know I was on. + +"'Yes, yes,' said the little man, pounding his fist on the table. +'A change of the greatest will occur. Too long have the people been +oppressed with the promises and the never-to-happen things to become. +The great work it shall be carry on. Yes. Our forces shall in the +capital city strike of the soonest. ~Carrambos!~' + +"'~Carrambos~ is the word,' says I, beginning to invest myself with +enthusiasm and more wine, 'likewise veeva, as I said before. May the +shamrock of old--I mean the banana-vine or the pie-plant, or whatever +the imperial emblem may be of your down-trodden country, wave +forever.' + +"'A thousand thank-yous,' says the round man, 'for your emission of +amicable utterances. What our cause needs of the very most is mans +who will the work do, to lift it along. Oh, for one thousands strong, +good mans to aid the General De Vega that he shall to his country +bring those success and glory! It is hard--oh, so hard to find good +mans to help in the work.' + +"'Monseer,' says I, leanin' over the table and graspin' his hand, +I don't know where your country is, but me heart bleeds for it. The +heart of a Clancy was never deaf to the sight of an oppressed people. +The family is filibusterers by birth, and foreigners by trade. If you +can use James Clancy's arms and his blood in denuding your shores of +the tyrant's yoke they're yours to command.' + +"General De Vega was overcome with joy to confiscate my condolence +of his conspiracies and predicaments. He tried to embrace me across +the table, but his fatness, and the wine that had been in the bottles, +prevented. Thus was I welcomed into the ranks of filibustery. Then +the general man told me his country had the name of Guatemala, and was +the greatest nation laved by any ocean whatever anywhere. He looked +at me with tears in his eyes, and from time to time he would emit the +remark, 'Ah! big, strong, brave mans! That is what my country need.' + +"General De Vega, as was the name by which he denounced himself, +brought out a document for me to sign, which I did, makin' a fine +flourish and curlycue with the tail of the 'y.' + +"'Your passage-money,' says the general, business-like, 'shall from +your pay be deduct.' + +"''Twill not,' says I, haughty. I'll pay my own passage.' A hundred +and eighty dollars I had in my inside pocket, and 'twas no common +filibuster I was goin' to be, filibusterin' for me board and clothes. + +"The steamer was to sail in two hours, and I went ashore to get some +things together I'd need. When I came aboard I showed the general +with pride the outfit. 'Twas a fine Chinchilla overcoat, Arctic +overshoes, fur cap and earmuffs, with elegant fleece-lined gloves +and woollen muffler. + +"~'Carrambos!~ says the little general. 'What clothes are these that +shall go to the tropic?' And then the little spalpeen laughs, and he +calls the captain, and the captain calls the purser, and they pipe up +the chief engineer, and the whole gang leans against the cabin and +laughs at Clancy's wardrobe for Guatemala. + +"I reflects a bit, serious, and asks the general again to denominate +the terms by which his country is called. He tells me, and I see then +that 'twas the t'other one, Kamchatka, I had in mind. Since then I've +had difficulty in separatin' the two nations in name, climate and +geographic disposition. + +"I paid my passage--twenty-four dollars, first cabin--and ate at +table with the officer crowd. Down on the lower deck was a gang +of second-class passengers, about forty of them, seemin' to be Dagoes +and the like. I wondered what so many of them were goin' along for. + +"Well, then, in three days we sailed alongside that Guatemala. 'Twas +a blue country, and not yellow as 'tis miscolored on the map. We +landed at a town on the coast, where a train of cars was waitin' for +us on a dinky little railroad. The boxes on the steamer were brought +ashore and loaded on the cars. The gang of Dagoes got aboard, too, +the general and me in the front car. Yes, me and General De Vega +headed the revolution, as it pulled out of the seaport town. That +train travelled about as fast as a policeman goin' to a riot. It +penetrated the most conspicuous lot of fuzzy scenery ever seen outside +a geography. We run some forty miles in seven hours, and the train +stopped. There was no more railroad. 'Twas a sort of camp in a damp +gorge full of wildness and melancholies. They was grading and +choppin' out the forests ahead to continue the road. 'Here,' says +I to myself, 'is the romantic haunt of the revolutionists. Here will +Clancy, by the virtue that is in a superior race and the inculcation +of Fenian tactics, strike a tremendous blow for liberty.' + +"They unloaded the boxes from the train and begun to knock the tops +off. From the first one that was open I saw General De Vega take the +Winchester rifles and pass them around to a squad of morbid soldiery. +The other boxes was opened next, and, believe me or not, divil another +gun was to be seen. Every other box in the load was full of pickaxes +and spades. + +"And then--sorrow be upon them tropics--the proud Clancy and +the dishonored Dagoes, each one of them, had to shoulder a pick or +a spade, and march away to work on that dirty little railroad. Yes; +'twas that the Dagoes shipped for, and 'twas that the filibusterin' +Clancy signed for, though unbeknownst to himself at the time. In +after days I found out about it. It seems 'twas hard to get hands +to work on that road. The intelligent natives of the country was +too lazy to work. Indeed, the saints know, 'twas unnecessary. By +stretchin' out one hand, they could seize the most delicate and costly +fruits of the earth, and, by stretchin' out the other, they could +sleep for days at a time without hearin' a seven o'clock whistle +or the footsteps of the rent man upon the stairs. So, regular, the +steamers travelled to the United States to seduce labor. Usually the +imported spade-slingers died in two or three months from eatin' the +over-ripe water and breathing the violent tropical scenery. Wherefore +they made them sign contracts for a year, when they hired them, and +put an armed guard over the poor devils to keep them from runnin' +away. + +"'Twas thus I was double-crossed by the tropics through a family +failing of goin' out of the way to hunt disturbances. + +"They gave me a pick, and I took it, meditating an insurrection on +the spot; but there was the guards handling the Winchesters careless, +and I come to the conclusion that discretion was the best part of +filibusterin'. There was about a hundred of us in the gang starting +out to work, and the word was given to move. I steps out of the ranks +and goes up to that General De Vega man, who was smokin' a cigar and +gazin' upon the scene with satisfactions and glory. He smiles at me +polite and devilish. 'Plenty work,' says he, 'for big, strong mans +in Guatemala. Yes. Thirty dollars in the month. Good pay. Ah, yes. +You strong, brave man. Bimeby we push those railroad in the capital +very quick. They want you go work now. ~Adios~, strong mans.' + +"'Monseer,' says I, lingerin', 'will you tell a poor little Irishman +this: When I set foot on your cockroachy steamer, and breathed +liberal and revolutionary sentiments into your sour wine, did you +think I was conspirin' to sling a pick on your contemptuous little +railroad? And when you answered me with patriotic recitations, +humping up the star-spangled cause of liberty, did you have +meditations of reducin' me to the ranks of the stump-grubbin' Dagoes +in the chain-gangs of your vile and grovelin' country?' + +'The general man expanded his rotundity and laughed considerable. +Yes, he laughed very long and loud, and I, Clancy, stood and waited. + +"'Comical mans!' he shouts, at last. 'So you will kill me from the +laughing. Yes; it is hard to find the brave, strong mans to aid my +country. Revolutions? Did I speak of r-r-revolutions? Not one +word. I say, big, strong man is need in Guatemala. So. The mistake +is of you. You have looked in those one box containing those gun +for the guard. You think all boxes is contain gun? No. + +"'There is not war in Guatemala. But work? Yes. Good. Thirty dollar +in the month. You shall shoulder one pickaxe, senor, and dig for +the liberty and prosperity of Guatemala. Off to your work. The guard +waits for you.' + +"'Little, fat, poodle dog of a brown man,' says I, quiet, but full of +indignations and discomforts, 'things shall happen to you. Maybe not +right away, but as soon as J. Clancy can formulate somethin' in the +way of repartee.' + +"The boss of the gang orders us to work. I tramps off with the +Dagoes, and I hears the distinguished patriot and kidnapper laughin' +hearty as we go. + +"Tis a sorrowful fact, for eight weeks I built railroads for that +misbehavin' country. I filibustered twelve hours a day with a heavy +pick and a spade, choppin' away the luxurious landscape that grew +upon the right of way. We worked in swamps that smelled like there +was a leak in the gas mains, trampin' down a fine assortment of +the most expensive hothouse plants and vegetables. The scene was +tropical beyond the wildest imagination of the geography man. The +trees was all sky-scrapers; the underbrush was full of needles and +pins; there was monkeys jumpin' around and crocodiles and pink-tailed +mockin'-birds, and ye stood knee-deep in the rotten water and grabbled +roots for the liberation of Guatemala. Of nights we would build +smudges in camp to discourage the mosquitoes, and sit in the smoke, +with the guards pacin' all around us. There was two hundred men +working on the road--mostly Dagoes, nigger-men, Spanish-men and +Swedes. Three or four were Irish. + +"One old man named Halloran--a man of Hibernian entitlements and +discretions, explained it to me. He had been working on the road +a year. Most of them died in less than six months. He was dried up +to gristle and bone, and shook with chills every third night. "'When +you first come,' says he, 'ye think ye'll leave right away. But they +hold out your first month's pay for your passage over, and by that +time the tropics has its grip on ye. Ye're surrounded by a ragin' +forest full of disreputable beasts--lions and baboons and anacondas-- +waiting to devour ye. The sun strikes ye hard, and melts the marrow +in your bones. Ye get similar to the lettuce--eaters the poetry-books +speaks about. Ye forget the elevated sintiments of life, such as +patriotism, revenge, disturbances of the peace and the dacint love of +a clane shirt. Ye do your work, and ye swallow the kerosene ile and +rubber pipestems dished up to ye by the Dago cook for food. Ye light +your pipeful, and say to yourself, "Nixt week I'll break away," and ye +go to sleep and call yersilf a liar, for ye know yell never do it.' + + 'Who is this general man,' asks I, 'that calls himself De Vega?' + +"'Tis the man,' says Halloran, 'who is tryin' to complete the +finishin' of the railroad. 'Twas the project of a private +corporation, but it busted, and then the government took it up. +De Vegy is a big politician, and wants to be president. The people +want the railroad completed, as they're taxed mighty on account of it. +The De Vegy man is pushing it along as a campaign move.' + +"''Tis not my way,' says I, 'to make threats against any man, but +there's an account to be settled between the railroad man and James +O'Dowd Clancy.' + +"''Twas that way I thought, mesilf, at first,' Halloran says, with +a big sigh, 'until I got to be a lettuce-eater. The fault's wid these +tropics. They rejuices a man's system. 'Tis a land, as the poet +says, "Where it always seems to be after dinner." I does me work +and smokes me pipe and sleeps. There's little else in life, anyway. +Ye'll get that way yersilf, mighty soon. Don't be harborin' any +sentiments at all, Clancy.' + +"'I can't help it,' says I; I'm full of 'em. I enlisted in the +revolutionary army of this dark country in good faith to fight for +its liberty, honors, and silver candlesticks; instead of which I am +set to amputatin' its scenery and grubbin' its roots. 'Tis the +general man will have to pay for it.' + +"Two months I worked on that railroad before I found a chance to get +away. One day a gang of us was sent back to the end of the completed +line to fetch some picks that had been sent down to Port Barrios to +be sharpened. They were brought on a hand-car, and I noticed, when +I started away, that the car was left there on the track. + +"That night, about twelve, I woke up Halloran and told him my scheme. + +"'Run away?' says Halloran. 'Good Lord, Clancy, do ye mean it? Why, +I ain't got the nerve. It's too chilly, and I ain't slept enough. +Run away? I told you, Clancy, I've eat the lettuce. I've lost my +grip. 'Tis the tropics that's done it. 'Tis like the poet says: +"Forgotten are our friends that we have left behind; in the hollow +lettuce-land we will live and lay reclined." You better go on, +Clancy. I'll stay, I guess. It's too early and cold, and I'm +sleepy.' + +"So I had to leave Halloran. I dressed quiet, and slipped out +of the tent we were in. When the guard came along I knocked him +over, like a ninepin, with a green coconut I had, and made for the +railroad. I got on that hand-car and made it fly. 'Twas yet a while +before daybreak when I saw the lights of Port Barrios about a mile +away. I stopped the hand-car there and walked to the town. I stepped +inside the corporations of that town with care and hesitations. +I was not afraid of the army of Guatemala, but me soul quaked at +the prospect of a hand-to-hand struggle with its employment bureau. +'Tis a country that hires its help easy and keeps 'em long. Sure I +can fancy Missis America and Missis Guatemala passin' a bit of gossip +some fine, still night across the mountains. 'Oh, dear,' says Missis +America, 'and it's a lot of trouble I'm havin' ag'in with the help, +senora, ma'am.' 'Laws, now!' says Missis Guatemala, 'you don't say +so, ma'am! now, mine never think ofleavin me--te-he! ma'am,' snickers +Missis Guatemala. + +"I was wonderin' how I was goin' to move away from them tropics +without bein' hired again. Dark as it was, I could see a steamer +ridin' in the harbor, with smoke emergin' from her stacks. I turned +down a little grass street that run down to the water. On the beach +I found a little brown nigger-man just about to shove off in a skiff. + +"'Hold on, Sambo,' says I, 'savve English?' + +"'Heap plenty, yes,' says he, with a pleasant grin. + +"'What steamer is that?' I asks him, 'and where is it going? And +what's the news, and the good word and the time of day?' + +" 'That steamer the ~Conchita~,' said the brown man, affable and easy, +rollin' a cigarette. 'Him come from New Orleans for load banana. +Him got load last night. I think him sail in one, two hour. Verree +nice day we shall be goin' have. You hear some talkee 'bout big +battle, maybe so? You think catchee General De Vega, senor? Yes? +No?' + +"'How's that, Sambo?' says I. 'Big battle? What battle? Who wants +catchee General De Vega? I've been up at my old gold mines in the +interior for a couple of months, and haven't heard any news.' + +"'Oh,' says the nigger-man, proud to speak the English, 'verree great +revolution in Guatemala one week ago. General De Vega, him try be +president. Him raise armee--one--five--ten thousand mans for fight +at the government. Those one government send five--forty--hundred +thousand soldier to suppress revolution. They fight big battle +yesterday at Lomagrande--that about nineteen or fifty mile in the +mountain. That government soldier wheep General De Vega--oh, most +bad. Five hundred--nine hundred--two thousand of his mans is kill. +That revolution is smash suppress--bust--very quick. General De Vega, +him r-r-run away fast on one big mule. Yes, ~carrambos!~ The +general, him r-r-run away, and his armee is kill. That government +soldier, they try find General De Vega verree much. They want catchee +him for shoot. You think they catchee that general, senor?' + +"'Saints grant it!' says I. ''Twould be the judgment of Providence +for settin' the warlike talent of a Clancy to gradin' the tropics +with a pick and shovel. But 'tis not so much a question of +insurrections now, me little man, as 'tis of the hired-man problem. +'Tis anxious I am to resign a situation of responsibility and trust +with the white wings department of your great and degraded country. +Row me in your little boat out to that steamer, and I'll give ye five +dollars--sinker pacers--sinker pacers,' says I, reducing the offer +to the language and denomination of the tropic dialects. + +"'Cinco pesos,' repeats the little man. Five dollee, you give?' + +"'Twas not such a bad little man. He had hesitations at first, +sayin' that passengers leavin' the country had to have papers and +passports, but at last he took me out alongside the steamer. + +"Day was just breakin' as we struck her, and there wasn't a soul to +be seen on board. The water was very still, and the nigger-man gave +me a lift from the boat, and I climbed onto the steamer where her side +was sliced to the deck for loadin' fruit. The hatches was open, and +I looked down and saw the cargo of bananas that filled the hold to +within six feet of the top. I thinks to myself, 'Clancy, you better +go as a stowaway. It's safer. The steamer men might hand you back +to the employment bureau. The tropic'll get you, Clancy, if you +don't watch out.' + +"So I jumps down easy among the bananas, and digs out a hole to hide +in among the bunches. In an hour or so I could hear the engines +goin', and feel the steamer rockin', and I knew we were off to sea. +They left the hatches open for ventilation, and pretty soon it was +light enough in the hold to see fairly well. I got to feelin' +a bit hungry, and thought I'd have a light fruit lunch, by way +of refreshment. I creeped out of the hole I'd made and stood up +straight. Just then I saw another man crawl up about ten feet away +and reach out and skin a banana and stuff it into his mouth. 'Twas +a dirty man, black-faced and ragged and disgraceful of aspect. Yes, +the man was a ringer for the pictures of the fat Weary Willie in the +funny papers. I looked again, and saw it was my general man--De Vega, +the great revolutionist, mule-rider and pickaxe importer. When he +saw me the general hesitated with his mouth filled with banana and +his eyes the size of coconuts. + +"'Hist!' I says. 'Not a word, or they'll put us off and make us walk. +"Veev la Liberty!"' I adds, copperin' the sentiment by shovin' a +banana into the source of it. I was certain the general wouldn't +recognize me. The nefarious work of the tropics had left me lookin' +different. There was half an inch of roan whiskers coverin' me face, +and me costume was a pair of blue overalls and a red shirt. + +"'How you come in the ship, senor?' asked the general as soon as he +could speak. + +"'By the back door--whist!' says I. ''Twas a glorious blow for +liberty we struck,' I continues; 'but we was overpowered by numbers. +Let us accept our defeat like brave men and eat another banana.' + +"'Were you in the cause of liberty fightin', senor?' says the general, +sheddin' tears on the cargo. + +"'To the last,' says I. ''Twas I led the last desperate charge +against the minions of the tyrant. But it made them mad, and we was +forced to retreat. 'Twas I, general, procured the mule upon which +you escaped. Could you give that ripe bunch a little boost this way, +general? It's a bit out of my reach. Thanks.' + +"'Say you so, brave patriot?' said the general, again weepin'. 'Ah, +~Dios!~ And I have not the means to reward your devotion. Barely +did I my life bring away. ~Carrambos!~ what a devil's animal was that +mule, senor! Like ships in one storm was I dashed about. The skin +on myself was ripped away with the thorns and vines. Upon the bark +of a hundred trees did that beast of the infernal bump, and cause +outrage to the legs of mine. In the night to Port Barrios I came. +I dispossess myself of that mountain of mule and hasten along the +water shore. I find a little boat to be tied. I launch myself and +row to the steamer. I cannot see any mans on board, so I climbed one +rope which hang at the side. I then myself hide in the bananas. +Surely, I say, if the ship captains view me, they shall throw me again +to those Guatemala. Those things are not good. Guatemala will shoot +General De Vega. Therefore, I am hide and remain silent. Life itself +is glorious. Liberty, it is pretty good; but so good as life I do not +think.' + +"Three days, as I said, was the trip to New Orleans. The general man +and me got to be cronies of the deepest dye. Bananas we ate until +they were distasteful to the sight and an eyesore to the palate, but +to bananas alone was the bill of fare reduced. At night I crawls out, +careful, on the lower deck, and gets a bucketful of fresh water. + +"That General De Vega was a man inhabited by an engorgement of words +and sentences. He added to the monotony of the voyage by divestin' +himself of conversation. He believed I was a revolutionist of his +own party, there bein' as he told me, a good many Americans and other +foreigners in its ranks. 'Twas a braggart and a conceited little +gabbler it was, though he considered himself a hero. 'Twas on himself +he wasted all his regrets at the failing of his plot. Not a word did +the little balloon have to say about the other misbehaving idiots that +had been shot, or run themselves to death in his revolution. + +"The second day out he was feelin' pretty braggy and uppish for a +stowed-away conspirator that owed his existence to a mule and stolen +bananas. He was tellin' me about the great railroad he had been +buildin', and he relates what he calls a comic incident about a fool +Irishman he inveigled from New Orleans to sling a pick on his little +morgue of a narrow-gauge line. 'Twas sorrowful to hear the little, +dirty general tell the opprobrious story of how he put salt upon the +tail of that reckless and silly bird, Clancy. Laugh, he did, hearty +and long. He shook with laughin', the black-faced rebel and outcast, +standing neck-deep in bananas, without friends or country. + +"'Ah, senor,' he snickers, 'to death you would have laughed at that +drollest Irish. I say to him: "Strong, big mans is need very much +in Guatemala." "I will blows strike for your down-pressed country," +he say. "That shall you do," I tell him. Ah! it was an Irish so +comic. He sees one box break upon the wharf that contain for the +guard a few gun. He think there is gun in all the box. But that is +all pickaxe. Yes. Ah! senor, could you the face of that Irish have +seen when they set him to the work!' + +"'Twas thus the ex-boss of the employment bureau contributed to the +tedium of the trip with merry jests and anecdote. But now and then +he would weep upon the bananas and make oration about the lost cause +of liberty and the mule. + +"'Twas a pleasant sound when the steamer bumped against the pier in +New Orleans. Pretty soon we heard the pat-a-pat of hundreds of bare +feet, and the Dago gang that unloads the fruit jumped on the deck and +down into the hold. Me and the general worked a while at passing up +the bunches, and they thought we were part of the gang. After about +an hour we managed to slip off the steamer onto the wharf. + +"'Twas a great honor on the hands of an obscure Clancy, havin' the +entertainment of the representative of a great foreign filibustering +power. I first bought for the general and myself many long drinks +and things to eat that were not bananas. The general man trotted +along at my side, leaving all the arrangements to me. I led him +up to Lafayette Square and set him on a bench in the little park. +Cigarettes I had bought for him, and he humped himself down on the +seat like a little, fat, contented hobo. I look him over as he sets +there, and what I see pleases me. Brown by nature and instinct, he +is now brindled with dirt and dust. Praise to the mule, his clothes +is mostly strings and flaps. Yes, the looks of the general man is +agreeable to Clancy. + +"I asks him, delicate, if, by any chance, he brought away anybody's +money with him from Guatemala. He sighs and humps his shoulders +against the bench. Not a cent. All right. Maybe, he tells me, +some of his friends in the tropic outfit will send him funds later. +The general was as clear a case of no visible means as I ever saw. + +"I told him not to move from the bench, and then I went up to the +corner of Poydras and Carondelet. Along there is O'Hara's beat. +In five minutes along comes O'Hara, a big, fine man, red-faced, +with shinin' buttons, swinging his club. 'Twould be a fine thing +for Guatemala to move into O'Hara's precinct. 'Twould be a fine bit +of recreation for Danny to suppress revolutions and uprisins once or +twice a week with his club. + +"'Is 5046 workin' yet, Danny?' says I, walking up to him. + +"'Overtime,' says O'Hara, looking over me suspicious. 'Want some +of it?' + +"Fifty-forty-six is the celebrated city ordinance authorizing arrest, +conviction and imprisonment of persons that succeed in concealing +their crimes from the police. + +"'Don't ye know Jimmy Clancy?' says I. 'Ye pink-gilled monster.' +So, when O'Hara recognized me beneath the scandalous exterior bestowed +upon me by the tropics, I backed him into a doorway and told him what +I wanted, and why I wanted it. 'All right, Jimmy,' says O'Hara. 'Go +back and hold the bench. I'll be along in ten minutes.' + +"In that time O'Hara strolled through Lafayette Square and spied two +Weary Willies disgracin' one of the benches. In ten minutes more +J. Clancy and General De Vega, late candidate for the presidency of +Guatemala, was in the station house. The general is badly frightened, +and calls upon me to proclaim his distinguishments and rank. + +"'The man,' says I to the police, 'used to be a railroad man. He's +on the bum now. 'Tis a little bughouse he is, on account of losin' +his job.' + +"'~Carrambos!~' says the general, fizzin' like a little soda-fountain, +'you fought, senor, with my forces in my native country. Why do you +say the lies? You shall say I am the General De Vega, one soldier, +one ~caballero~--' + +"'Railroader,' says I again. 'On the hog. No good. Been livin' for +three days on stolen bananas. Look at him. Ain't that enough?' + +"Twenty-five dollars or sixty days, was what the recorder gave the +general. He didn't have a cent, so he took the time. They let me go, +as I knew they would, for I had money to show, and O'Hara spoke for +me. Yes; sixty days he got. 'Twas just so long as I slung a pick +for the great country of Kam--Guatemala." + +Clancy paused. The bright starlight showed a reminiscent look of +happy content on his seasoned features. Keogh leaned in his chair +and gave his partner a slap on his thinly clad back that sounded +like the crack of the surf on the sands. + +"Tell 'em, ye divil," he chuckled, "how you got even with the tropical +general in the way of agricultural maneuverings." + +"'Having no money," concluded Clancy, with unction, "they set him +to work his fine out with a gang from the parish prison clearing +Ursulines Street. Around the corner was a saloon decorated genially +with electric fans and cool merchandise. I made that me headquarters, +and every fifteen minutes I'd walk around and take a look at the +little man filibusterin' with a rake and shovel. 'Twas just such +a hot broth of a day as this has been. And I'd call at him 'Hey, +monseer!' and he'd look at me black, with the damp showin' through +his shirt in places. + +"'Fat, strong mans,' says I to General De Vega, 'is needed in New +Orleans. Yes. To carry on the good work. Carrambos! Erin go +bragh!" + + + +XI + +The Remnants of the Code + +Breakfast in Coralio was at eleven. Therefore the people did not go +to market early. The little wooden market-house stood on a patch of +short-trimmed grass, under the vivid green foliage of a bread-fruit +tree. + +Thither one morning the venders leisurely convened, bringing their +wares with them. A porch or platform six feet wide encircled the +building, shaded from the mid-morning sun by the projecting, grass- +thatched roof. Upon this platform the venders were wont to display +their goods--newly killed beef, fish, crabs, fruit of the country, +cassava, eggs, ~dulces~ and high, tottering stacks of native tortillas +as large around as the sombrero of a Spanish grandee. + +But on this morning they whose stations lay on the seaward side +of the market-house, instead of spreading their merchandise formed +themselves into a softly jabbering and gesticulating group. For there +upon their space of the platform was sprawled, asleep, the unbeautiful +figure of "Beelzebub" Blythe. He lay upon a ragged strip of cocoa +matting, more than ever a fallen angel in appearance. His suit of +coarse flax, soiled, bursting at the seams, crumpled into a thousand +diversified wrinkles and creases, inclosed him absurdly, like the garb +of some effigy that had been stuffed in sport and thrown there after +indignity had been wrought upon it. But firmly upon the high bridge +of his nose reposed his gold-rimmed glasses, the surviving badge of +his ancient glory. + +The sun's rays, reflecting quiveringly from the rippling sea upon his +face, and the voices of the market-men woke "Beelzebub" Blythe. He +sat up, blinking, and leaned his back against the wall of the market. +Drawing a blighted silk handkerchief from his pocket, he assiduously +rubbed and burnished his glasses. And while doing this he became +aware that his bedroom had been invaded, and that polite brown and +yellow men were beseeching him to vacate in favor of their market +stuff. + +If the senor would have the goodness--a thousand pardons for bringing +to him molestation--but soon would come the ~compradores~ for the +day's provisions--surely they had ten thousand regrets at disturbing +him! + +In this manner they expanded to him the intimation that he must clear +out and cease to clog the wheels of trade. + +Blythe stepped from the platform with the air of a prince leaving +his canopied couch. He never quite lost that air, even at the lowest +point of his fall. It is clear that the college of good breeding does +not necessarily maintain a chair of morals within its walls. + +Blythe shook out his wry clothing, and moved slowly up the Calle +Grande through the hot sand. He moved without a destination in +his mind. The little town was languidly stirring to its daily life. +Golden-skinned babies tumbled over one another in the grass. The sea +breeze brought him appetite, but nothing to satisfy it. Throughout +Coralio were its morning odors--those from the heavily fragrant +tropical flowers and from the bread baking in the outdoor ovens of +clay and the pervading smoke of their fires. Where the smoke cleared, +the crystal air, with some of the efficacy of faith, seemed to remove +the mountains almost to the sea, bringing them so near that one might +count the scarred glades on their wooded sides. The light-footed +Caribs were swiftly gliding to their tasks at the waterside. Already +along the bosky trails from the banana groves files of horses were +slowly moving, concealed, except for their nodding heads and plodding +legs, by the bunches of green-golden fruit heaped upon their backs. +On doorsills sat women combing their long, black hair and calling, one +to another, across the narrow thoroughfares. Peace reigned in Coralio +--arid and bald peace; but still peace. + +On that bright morning when Nature seemed to be offering the lotus +on the Dawn's golden platter "Beelzebub" Blythe had reached rock +bottom. Further descent seemed impossible. That last night's slumber +in a public place had done for him. As long as he had had a roof +to cover him there had remained, unbridged, the space that separates +a gentleman from the beasts of the jungle and the fowls of the air. +But now he was little more than a whimpering oyster led to be devoured +on the sands of a Southern sea by the artful walrus, Circumstance, +and the implacable carpenter, Fate. + +To Blythe money was now but a memory. He had drained his friends +of all that their good-fellowship had to offer; then he had squeezed +them to the last drop of their generosity; and at last, Aaron-like, +he had smitten the rock of their hardening bosoms for the scattering, +ignoble drops of Charity itself. + +He had exhausted his credit to the last real. With the minute +keenness of the shameless sponger he was aware of every source in +Coralio from which a glass of rum, a meal or a piece of silver could +be wheedled. Marshalling each such source in his mind, he considered +it with all the thoroughness and penetration that hunger and thirst +lent him for the task. All his optimism failed to thresh a grain of +hope from the chaff of his postulations. He had played out the game. +That one night in the open had shaken his nerves. Until then there +had been left to him at least a few grounds upon which he could base +his unblushing demands upon his neighbors' stores. Now he must beg +instead of borrowing. The most brazen sophistry could not dignify +by the name of "loan" the coin contemptuously flung to a beachcomber +who slept on the bare boards of the public market. + +But on this morning no beggar would have more thankfully received +a charitable coin, for the demon thirst had him by the throat--the +drunkard's matutinal thirst that requires to be slaked at each morning +station on the road to Tophet. + +Blythe walked slowly up the street, keeping a watchful eye for any +miracle that might drop manna upon him in his wilderness. As he +passed the popular eating house of Madama Vasquez, Madama's boarders +were just sitting down to freshly baked bread, ~aguacates~, pines +and delicious coffee that sent forth odorous guarantee of its quality +upon the breeze. Madama was serving; she turned her shy, stolid, +melancholy gaze for a moment out the window; she saw Blythe, and +her expression turned more shy and embarrassed. "Beelzebub" owed +her twenty pesos. He bowed as he had once bowed to less embarrassed +dames to whom he owed nothing, and passed on. + +Merchants and their clerks were throwing open the solid wooden doors +of their shops. Polite but cool were the glances they cast upon +Blythe as he lounged tentatively by with the remains of his old jaunty +air; for they were his creditors almost without exception. + +At the little fountain in the ~plaza~ he made an apology for a toilet +with his wetted handkerchief. Across the open square filed the +dolorous line of friends to the prisoners in the calaboza, bearing +the morning meal of the immured. The food in their hands roused small +longing in Blythe. + +It was drink that his soul craved, or money to buy it. In the streets +he met many with whom he had been friends and equals, and whose +patience and liberality he had gradually exhausted. Willard Geddie +and Paula cantered past him with the coolest of nods, returning from +their daily horseback ride along the old Indian road. Keogh passed +him at another corner, whistling cheerfully and bearing a prize of +newly laid eggs for the breakfast of himself and Clancy. The jovial +scout of Fortune was one of Blythe's victims who had plunged his hand +oftenest into his pocket to aid him. But now it seemed that Keogh, +too, had fortified himself against further invasions. His curt +greeting and the ominous light in his full, gray eye quickened the +steps of "Beelzebub," whom desperation had almost incited to attempt +an additional "loan." + +Three drinking shops the forlorn one next visited in succession. +In all of these his money, his credit and his welcome had long since +been spent; but Blythe felt that he would have fawned in the dust at +the feet of an enemy that morning for one draught of ~aguardiente~. +In two of the ~pulperias~ his courageous petition for drink was met +with a refusal so polite that it stung worse than abuse. The third +establishment had acquired something of American methods; and here +he was seized bodily and cast out upon his hands and knees. + +This physical indignity caused a singular change in the man. +As he picked himself up and walked away, an expression of absolute +relief came upon his features. The specious and conciliatory +smile that had been graven there was succeeded by a look of calm +and sinister resolve. "Beelzebub" had been floundering in the sea +of improbability, holding by a slender life-line to the respectable +world that had cast him overboard. He must have felt that with this +ultimate shock the line had snapped, and have experienced the welcome +ease of the drowning swimmer who has ceased to struggle. + +Blythe walked to the next corner and stood there while he brushed +the sand from his garments and repolished his glasses. + +"I've got to do it--oh, I've got to do it," he told himself, aloud. +"If I had a quart of rum I believe I could stave it off yet--for a +little while. But there's no more rum for--'Beelzebub,' as they call +me. By the flames of Tartarus! if I'm to sit at the right hand of +Satan somebody has got to pay the court expenses. You'll have to pony +up, Mr. Frank Goodwin. You're a good fellow; but a gentleman must +draw the line at being kicked into the gutter. Blackmail isn't a +pretty word, but it's the next station on the road I'm travelling." + +With purpose in his steps Blythe now moved rapidly through the town +by way of its landward environs. He passed through the squalid +quarters of the improvident negroes and on beyond the picturesque +shacks of the poorer mestizos. From many points along his course he +could see, through the umbrageous glades, the house of Frank Goodwin +on its wooded hill. And as he crossed the little bridge over the +lagoon he saw the old Indian, Galvez, scrubbing at the wooden slab +that bore the name of Miraflores. Beyond the lagoon the lands of +Goodwin began to slope gently upward. A grassy road, shaded by +a munificent and diverse array of tropical flora wound from the edge +of an outlying banana grove to the dwelling. Blythe took this road +with long and purposeful strides. + +Goodwin was seated on his coolest gallery, dictating letters to his +secretary, a sallow and capable native youth. The household adhered +to the American plan of breakfast; and that meal had been a thing of +the past for the better part of an hour. + +The castaway walked to the steps, and flourished a hand. + +"Good morning, Blythe, said Goodwin, looking up. "Come in and have +a chair. Anything I can do for you?" + +"I want to speak to you in private." + +Goodwin nodded at his secretary, who strolled out under a mango tree +and lit a cigarette. Blythe took the chair that he had left vacant. + +"I want some money," he began, doggedly. + +"I'm sorry," said Goodwin, with equal directness, "but you can't have +any. You're drinking yourself to death, Blythe. Your friends have +done all they could to help you to brace up. You won't help yourself. +There's no use furnishing you with money to ruin yourself with any +longer." + +"Dear man," said Blythe, tilting back his chair, "it isn't a question +of social economy now. It's past that. I like you, Goodwin; and I've +come to stick a knife between your ribs. I was kicked out of Espada's +saloon this morning; and Society owes me reparation for my wounded +feelings." + +"I didn't kick you out." + +"No--but in a general way you represent Society; and in a particular +way you represent my last chance. I've had to come down to it, old +man--I tried to do it a month ago when Losada's man was here turning +things over; but I couldn't do it then. Now it's different. I want +a thousand dollars, Goodwin; and you'll have to give it to me." + +"Only last week," said Goodwin, with a smile, "a silver dollar was +all you were asking for." + +"An evidence," said Blythe, flippantly, "that I was still virtuous-- +though under heavy pressure. The wages of sin should be something +higher than a peso worth forty-eight cents. Let's talk business. +I am the villain in the third act; and I must have my merited, +if only temporary, triumph. I saw you collar the late president's +valiseful of boodle. Oh, I know it's blackmail; but I'm liberal +about the price. I know I'm a cheap villain--one of the regular +sawmill-drama kind--but you're one of my particular friends, and +I don't want to stick you hard." + +"Suppose you go into the details," suggested Goodwin, calmly +arranging his letters on the table. + +"All right," said "Beelzebub." "I like the way you take it. +I despise histrionics; so you will please prepare yourself for +the facts without any red fire, calcium or grace notes on +the saxophone. + +"On the night that His Fly-by-night Excellency arrived in town I was +very drunk. You will excuse the pride with which I state that fact; +but it was quite a feat for me to attain that desirable state. +Somebody had left a cot out under the orange trees in the yard of +Madama Ortiz's hotel. I stepped over the wall, laid down upon it, +and fell asleep. I was awakened by an orange that dropped from +the tree upon my nose; and I laid there for a while cursing Sir Isaac +Newton, or whoever it was that invented gravitation, for not confining +his theory to apples. + +"And then along came Mr. Miraflores and his true-love with the +treasury in a valise, and went into the hotel. Next you hove in +sight, and held a pow-wow with the tonsorial artist who insisted +upon talking shop after hours. I tried to slumber again; but once +more my rest was disturbed--this time by the noise of the popgun +that went off upstairs. Then that valise came crashing down into +an orange tree just above my head; and I arose from my couch, not +knowing when it might begin to rain Saratoga trunks. When the army +and the constabulary began to arrive, with their medals and +decorations hastily pinned to their pajamas, and their snickersnees +drawn, I crawled into the welcome shadow of a banana plant. I +remained there for an hour, by which time the excitement and the +people had cleared away. And then, my dear Goodwin--excuse me--I saw +you sneak back and pluck that ripe and juicy valise from the orange +tree. I followed you, and saw you take it to your own house. A +hundred-thousand-dollar crop from one orange tree in a season about +breaks the record of the fruit-growing industry. + +"Being a gentleman at that time, of course I never mentioned the +incident to any one. But this morning I was kicked out of a saloon, +my code of honor is all out at the elbows, and I'd sell my mother's +prayer-book for three fingers of ~aguardiente~. I'm not putting +on the screws hard. It ought to be worth a thousand to you for me +to have slept on that cot through the whole business without waking +up and seeing anything." + +Goodwin opened two more letters, and made memoranda in pencil on them. +Then he called "Manuel!" to his secretary, who came, spryly. + +"The ~Ariel~--when does she sail?" asked Goodwin. "Senor," answered +the youth, "at three this afternoon. She drops down-coast to Punta +Soledad to complete her cargo of fruit. From there she sails for New +Orleans without delay." + +"~Bueno!~" said Goodwin. "These letters may wait yet awhile." + +The secretary returned to his cigarette under the mango tree. + +In round numbers," said Goodwin, facing Blythe squarely, "how much +money do you owe in this town, not including the sums you have +'borrowed' from me?" + +"Five hundred--at a rough guess," answered Blythe, lightly. + +"Go somewhere in the town and draw up a schedule of your debts," said +Goodwin. "Come back here in two hours, and I will send Manuel with +the money to pay them. I will also have a decent outfit of clothing +ready for you. You will sail on the ~Ariel~ at three. Manuel will +accompany you as far as the deck of the steamer. There he will hand +you one thousand dollars in cash. I suppose that we needn't discuss +what you will be expected to do in return?" + +"Oh, I understand," piped Blythe, cheerily. "I was asleep all the +time on the cot under Madama Ortiz's orange trees; and I shake off +the dust of Coralio forever. I'll play fair. No more of the lotus +for me. Your proposition is 0. K. Youre a good fellow, Goodwin; and +I let you off light. I'll agree to everything. But in the meantime +--I've a devil of a thirst on, old man--" + +"Not a ~centavo~," said Goodwin, firmly, "until you are on board the +~Ariel~. You would be drunk in thirty minutes if you had money now." + +But he noticed the blood-streaked eyeballs, the relaxed form and +the shaking hands of "Beelzebub"; and he stepped into the dining +room through the low window, and brought out a glass and a decanter +of brandy. + +"Take a bracer, anyway, before you go," he proposed, even as a man +to the friend whom he entertains. + +"Beelzebub" Blythe's eyes glistened at the sight of the solace for +which his soul burned. Today for the first time his poisoned nerves +had been denied their steadying dose; and their retort was a mounting +torment. He grasped the decanter and rattled its crystal mouth +against the glass in his trembling hand. He flushed the glass, +and then stood erect, holding it aloft for an instant. For one +fleeting moment he held his head above the drowning waves of +his abyss. He nodded easily at Goodwin, raised his brimming glass +and murmured a "health" that men had used in his ancient Paradise +Lost. And then so suddenly that he spilled the brandy over his hand, +he set down his glass, untasted. + +"In two hours," his dry lips muttered to Goodwin, as he marched down +the steps and turned his face toward the town. + +In the edge of the cool banana grove "Beelzebub" halted, and snapped +the tongue of his belt buckle into another hole. + +"I couldn't do it," he explained, feverishly, to the waving banana +fronds. "I wanted to, but I couldn't. A gentleman can't drink with +the man that he blackmails." + + + +XII + +Shoes + +John De Graffenreid Atwood ate of the lotus, root, stem, and flower. +The tropics gobbled him up. He plunged enthusiastically into his +work, which was to try to forget Rosine. + +Now, they who dine on the lotus rarely consume it plain. There is +a sauce ~au diable~ that goes with it; and the distillers are the +chefs who prepare it. And on Johnny's menu card it read "brandy." +With a bottle between them, he and Billy Keogh would sit on the porch +of the little consulate at night and roar out great, indecorous songs, +until the natives, slipping hastily past, would shrug a shoulder and +mutter things to themselves about the "~Americanos diablos~." + +One day Johnny's ~mozo~ brought the mail and dumped it on the table. +Johnny leaned from his hammock, and fingered the four or five letters +dejectedly. Keogh was sitting on the edge of the table chopping +lazily with a paper knife at the legs of a centipede that was crawling +among the stationery. Johnny was in that phase of lotus-eating when +all the world tastes bitter in one's mouth. + +"Same old thing!" he complained. "Fool people writing for information +about the country. They want to know all about raising fruit, and how +to make a fortune without work. Half of 'em don't even send stamps +for a reply. They think a consul hasn't anything to do but write +letters. Slit those envelopes for me, old man, and see what they +want. I'm feeling too rocky to move." + +Keogh, acclimated beyond all possibility of ill-humor, drew his chair +to the table with smiling compliance on his rose-pink countenance, +and began to slit open the letters. Four of them were from citizens +in various parts of the United States who seemed to regard the consul +at Coralio as a cyclopedia of information. They asked long lists +of questions, numerically arranged, about the climate, products, +possibilities, laws, business chances, and statistics of the country +in which the consul had the honor of representing his own government. + +"Write 'em, please, Billy," said that inert official, "just a line, +referring them to the latest consular report. Tell 'em the State +Department will be delighted to furnish the literary gems. Sign my +name. Don't let your pen scratch, Billy; it'll keep me awake." + +"Don't snore," said Keogh, amiably, "and I'll do your work for you. +You need a corps of assistants, anyhow. Don't see how you ever get +out a report. Wake up a minute--here's one more letter--it's from +your own town, too--Dalesburg." + +"That so?" murmured Johnny showing a mild and obligatory interest. +"What's it about?" + +"Postmaster writes," explained Keogh. "Says a citizen of the town +wants some facts and advice from you. Says the citizen has an idea +in his head of coming down where you are and opening a shoe store. +Wants to know if you think the business would pay. Says he's heard +of the boom along this coast, and wants to get in on the ground +floor." + +In spite of the heat and his bad temper, Johnny's hammock swayed +with his laughter. Keogh laughed too; and the pet monkey on the top +shelf of the bookcase chattered in shrill sympathy with the ironical +reception of the letter from Dalesburg. + +"Great bunions!" exclaimed the consul. "Shoe store! What'll they ask +about next, I wonder? Overcoat factory, I reckon. Say, Billy--of our +3,000 citizens, how many do you suppose ever had on a pair of shoes?" + +Keogh reflected judicially. + +"Let's see--there's you and me and--" + +"Not me," said Johnny, promptly and incorrectly, holding up a foot +encased in a disreputable deerskin ~zapato~. "I haven't been a victim +to shoes in months." + +"But you've got 'em, though," went on Keogh. "And there's Goodwin +and Blanchard and Geddie and old Lutz and Doc Gregg and that Italian +that's agent for the banana company, and there's old Delgado--no; he +wears sandals. And, oh, yes; there's Madama Ortiz, 'what kapes the +hotel'--she had on a pair of red kid slippers at the ~baile~ the other +night. And Miss Pasa, her daughter, that went to school in the States +--she brought back some civilized notions in the way of footgear. And +there's the ~comandante's~ sister that dresses up her feet on feast- +days--and Mrs. Geddie, who wears a two with a Castilian instep--and +that's about all the ladies. Let's see--don't some of the soldiers at +the ~cuartel~--no: that's so; they're allowed shoes only when on the +march. In barracks they turn their little toeses out to grass." + +"'Bout right," agreed the consul. "Not over twenty out of the three +thousand ever felt leather on their walking arrangements. Oh, yes; +Coralio is just the town for an enterprising shoe store--that doesn't +want to part with its goods. Wonder if old Patterson is trying to +jolly me! He always was full of things he called jokes. Write him +a letter, Billy. I'll dictate it. We'll jolly him back a few." + +Keogh dipped his pen, and wrote at Johnny's dictation. With many +pauses, filled in with smoke and sundry travellings of the bottle +and glasses, the following reply to the Dalesburg communication was +perpetrated: + + MR. OBADIAH PATTERSON, + Dalesburg, Ala. + + ~Dear Sir~: in reply to your favor of July 2d. I have the honor + to inform you that, according to my opinion, there is no place on + the habitable globe that presents to the eye stronger evidence of + the need of a first-class shoe store than does the town of Coralio. + There are 3,000 inhabitants in the place, and not a single shoe + store! The situation speaks for itself. This coast is rapidly + becoming the goal of enterprising business men, but the shoe + business is one that has been sadly overlooked or neglected. + In fact, there are a considerable number of our citizens actually + without shoes at present. + + Besides the want above mentioned, there is also a crying need + for a brewery, a college of higher mathematics, a coal yard, and a + clean and intellectual Punch and Judy show. I have the honor to be, + + Your Obt. Servant, + ~John De Graffenreid Atwood~, + U.S. CONSUL AT CORALIO. + + P.S.--Hello! Uncle Obadiah. How's the old burg racking along? + What would the government do without you and me? Look out for + a green-headed parrot and a bunch of bananas soon, from your old + friend + + ~Johnny~, + + +"I throw in that postscript," explained the consul, "so Uncle Obadiah +won't take offense at the official tone of the letter! Now, Billy, +you get that correspondence fixed up, and send Pancho to the post- +office with it. The ~Ariadne~ takes the mail out tomorrow if they +make up that load of fruit today." + +The night programme in Coralio never varied. The recreations of +the people were soporific and flat. They wandered about, barefoot +and aimless, speaking lowly and smoking cigar or cigarette. Looking +down on the dimly lighted ways one seemed to see a threading maze +of brunette ghosts tangled with a procession of insane fireflies. +In some houses the thrumming of lugubrious guitars added to +the depression of the ~triste~ night. Giant tree-frogs rattled in +the foliage as loudly as the end man's "bones" in a minstrel troupe. +By nine o'clock the streets were almost deserted. + +Not at the consulate was there often a change of bill. Keogh would +come there nightly, for Coralio's one cool place was the little porch +of that official residence. The brandy would be kept moving; and +before midnight sentiment would begin to stir in the heart of the +self-exiled consul. Then he would relate to Keogh the story of his +ended romance. Each night Keogh would listen patiently to the tale, +and be ready with untiring sympathy. + +"But don't you think for a minute"--thus Johnny would always conclude +his woeful narrative--"that I'm grieving about that girl, Billy. I've +forgotten her. She never enters my mind. If she were to enter that +door right now, my pulse wouldn't gain a beat. That's all over long +ago." + +"Don't I know it?" Keogh would answer. "Of course you've forgotten +her. Proper thing to do. Wasn't quite 0. K. of her to listen to the +knocks that--er--Dink Pawson kept giving you." + +"Pink Dawson!"--a word of contempt would be in Johnny's tones--"Poor +white trash! That's what he was. Had five hundred acres of farming +land, though; and that counted. Maybe I'll have a chance to get back +at him some day. The Dawsons weren't anybody. Everybody in Alabama +knows the Atwoods. Say, Billy--did you know my mother was a +De Graffenreid?" + +"Why, no," Keogh would say; "is that so?" He had heard it some three +hundred times. + +"Fact. The De Graffenreids of Hancock County. But I never think +of that girl any more, do I, Billy?" + +"Not for a minute, my boy," would be the last sounds heard by +the conqueror of Cupid. + +At this point Johnny would fall into a gentle slumber, and Keogh would +saunter out to his own shack under the calabash tree at the edge of +the plaza. + +In a day or two the letter from the Dalesburg postmaster and its +answer had been forgotten by the Coralio exiles. But on the 26th day +of July the fruit of the reply appeared upon the tree of events. + +The ~Andador~, a fruit steamer that visited Coralio regularly, drew +into the offing and anchored. The beach was lined with spectators +while the quarantine doctor and the custom-house crew rowed out to +attend to their duties. + +An hour later Billy Keogh lounged into the consulate, clean and cool +in his linen clothes, and grinning like a pleased shark. "Guess +what?" he said to Johnny, lounging in his hammock. + +"Too hot to guess," said Johnny, lazily. + +"Your shoe-store man's come," said Keogh, rolling the sweet morsel on +his tongue, "with a stock of goods big enough to supply the continent +as far down as Tierra del Fuego. They're carting his cases over to +the custom-house now. Six barges full they brought ashore and have +paddled back for the rest. Oh, ye saints in glory! won't there be +regalements in the air when he gets onto the joke and has an interview +with Mr. Consul? It'll be worth nine years in the tropics just to +witness that one joyful moment." + +Keogh loved to take his mirth easily. He selected a clean place +on the matting and lay upon the floor. The walls shook with his +enjoyment. Johnny turned half over and blinked. + +"Didn't tell me," he said, "that anybody was fool enough to take +that letter seriously." + +"Four-thousand-dollar stock of goods!" gasped Keogh, in ecstasy. +"Talk about coals to Newcastle! Why didn't he take a ship-load of +palm-leaf fans to Spitzenbergen while he was about it? Saw the old +codger on the beach. You ought to have been there when he put on +his specs and squinted at the five hundred or so barefooted citizens +standing around." + +"Are you telling the truth, Billy?" asked the consul, weakly. + +"Am I? You ought to see the buncoed gentleman's daughter he brought +along. Looks! She makes the brick-dust senoritas here look like +tar-babies." + +"Go on," said Johnny, "if you can stop that asinine giggling. I hate +to see a grown man make a laughing hyena of himself." + +"Name is Hemstetter," went on Keogh. "He's a--Hello! what's the matter +now?" + +Johnny's moccasined feet struck the floor with a thud as he wriggled +out of his hammock. + +"Get up, you idiot," he said, sternly, "or I'll brain you with this +inkstand. That's Rosine and her father. Gad! what a drivelling idiot +old Patterson is! Get up, here, Billy Keogh, and help me. What the +devil are we going to do? Has all the world gone crazy?" + +Keogh rose and dusted himself. He managed to regain a decorous +demeanor. + +"Situation has got to be met, Johnny," he said, with some success +at seriousness. "I didn't think about its being your girl until you +spoke. First thing to do is to get them comfortable quarters. You +go down and face the music, and I'll trot out to Goodwin's and see +if Mrs. Goodwin won't take them in. They've got the decentest house +in town." + +"Bless you, Billy!" said the consul. "I knew you wouldn't desert me. +The world's bound to come to an end, but maybe we can stave it off for +a day or two." + +Keogh hoisted his umbrella and set out for Goodwin's house. Johnny +put on his coat and hat. He picked up the brandy bottle, but set it +down again without drinking, and marched bravely down to the beach. + +In the shade of the custom-house walls he found Mr. Hemstetter +and Rosine surrounded by a mass of gaping citizens. The customs +officers were ducking and scraping, while the captain of the Andador +interpreted the business of the new arrivals. Rosine looked healthy +and very much alive. She was gazing at the strange scenes around her +with amused interest. There was a faint blush upon her round cheek +as she greeted her old admirer. Mr. Hemstetter shook hands with +Johnny in a very friendly way. He was an oldish, impractical man +--one of that numerous class of erratic business men who are forever +dissatisfied, and seeking a change. + +"I am very glad to see you, John--may I call you John?" he said. +"Let me thank you for your prompt answer to our postmaster's letter +of inquiry. He volunteered to write to you on my behalf. I was +looking about for something different in the way of a business +in which the profits would be greater. I had noticed in the papers +that this coast was receiving much attention from investors. I am +extremely grateful for your advice to come. I sold out everything +that I possess, and invested the proceeds in as fine a stock of shoes +as could be bought in the North. You have a picturesque town here, +John. I hope business will be as good as your letter justifies me +in expecting." + +Johnny's agony was abbreviated by the arrival of Keogh, who hurried up +with the news that Mrs. Goodwin would be much pleased to place rooms +at the disposal of Mr. Hemstetter and his daughter. So there Mr. +Hemstetter and Rosine were at once conducted and left to recuperate +from the fatigue of the voyage, while Johnny went down to see that +the cases of shoes were safely stored in the customs warehouse pending +their examination by the officials. Keogh, grinning like a shark, +skirmished about to find Goodwin, to instruct him not to expose to +Mr. Hemstetter the true state of Coralio as a shoe market until Johnny +had been given a chance to redeem the situation, if such a thing were +possible. + +That night the consul and Keogh held a desperate consultation on +the breezy porch of the consulate. + +Send em back home," began Keogh, reading Johnny's thoughts. + +"I would," said Johnny, after a little silence; "but I've been lying +to you, Billy." + +"All right about that," said Keogh, affably. + +"I've told you hundreds of times," said Johnny, slowly, "that I had +forgotten that girl, haven't I?" + +"About three hundred and seventy-five," admitted the monument +of patience. + +"I lied," repeated the consul, "every time. I never forgot her for +one moment. I was an obstinate ass for running away just because she +said 'No' once. And I was too proud a fool to go back. I talked with +Rosine a few minutes this evening up at Goodwin's. I found out one +thing. You remember that farmer fellow who was always after her?" + +"Dink Pawson?" asked Keogh. + +"Pink Dawson. Well, he wasn't a hill of beans to her. She says she +didn't believe a word of the things be told her about me. But I'm +sewed up now, Billy. That tomfool letter we sent ruined whatever +chance I had left. She'll despise me when she finds out that her +old father has been made the victim of a joke that a decent schoolboy +wouldn't have been guilty of. Shoes! Why he couldn't sell twenty +pairs of shoes in Coralio if he kept store here for twenty years. You +put a pair of shoes on one of these Caribs or Spanish brown boys and +what'd he do? Stand on his head and squeal until he'd kicked 'em off. +None of 'em ever wore shoes and they never will. If I send 'em back +home I'll have to tell the whole story, and what'll she think of me? +I want that girl worse than ever, Billy, and now when she's in reach +I've lost her forever because I tried to be funny when the thermometer +was at 102." + +"Keep cheerful," said the optimistic Keogh. "And let 'em open +the store. I've been busy myself this afternoon. We can stir up a +temporary boom in foot-gear anyhow. I'll buy six pairs when the doors +open. I've been around and seen all the fellows and explained the +catastrophe. They'll all buy shoes like they was centipedes. Frank +Goodwin will take cases of 'em. The Geddies want about eleven pairs +between 'em. Clancy is going to invest the savings of weeks, and even +old Doc Gregg wants three pairs of alligator-hide slippers if they've +got any tens. Blanchard got a look at Miss Hemstetter; and as he's +a Frenchman, no less than a dozen pairs will do for him." + +"A dozen customers," said Johnny, "for a $4,000 stock of shoes! +It won't work. There's a big problem here to figure out. You go +home, Billy, and leave me alone. I've got to work at it all by +myself. Take that bottle of Three-star along with you--no, sir; +not another ounce of booze for the United States consul. I'll sit +here tonight and pull out the think stop. If there's a soft place +on this proposition anywhere I'll land on it. If there isn't +there'll be another wreck to the credit of the gorgeous tropics." + +Keogh left, feeling that he could be of no use. Johnny laid a handful +of cigars on a table and stretched himself in a steamer chair. When +the sudden daylight broke, silvering the harbor ripples, he was still +sitting there. Then he got up, whistling a little tune, and took his +bath. + +At nine o'clock he walked down to the dingy little cable office and +hung for half an hour over a blank. The result of his application was +the following message, which he signed and had transmitted at a cost +of $33: + + TO PINKNEY DAWSON, + Dalesburg, Ala. + + Draft for $100 comes to you next mail. Ship me immediately 500 + pounds stiff, dry cockleburrs. New use here in arts. Market price + twenty cents pound. Further orders likely. Rush. + + + +XIII + +Ships + +Within a week a suitable building had been secured in the Calle +Grande, and Mr. Hemstetter's stock of shoes arranged upon their +shelves. The rent of the store was moderate; and the stock made +a fine showing of neat white boxes, attractively displayed. + +Johnny's friends stood by him loyally. On the first day Keogh +strolled into the store in a casual kind of way about once every hour, +and bought shoes. After he had purchased a pair each of extension +soles, congress gaiters, button kids, low-quartered calfs, dancing +pumps, rubber boots, tans of various hues, tennis shoes and flowered +slippers, he sought out Johnny to be prompted as to the names of other +kinds that he might inquire for. The other English-speaking residents +also played their parts nobly by buying often and liberally. Keogh +was grand marshal, and made them distribute their patronage, thus +keeping up a fair run of custom for several days. + +Mr. Hemstetter was gratified by the amount of business done thus far; +but expressed surprise that the natives were so backward with their +custom. + +"Oh, they're awfully shy," explained Johnny, as he wiped his forehead +nervously. "They'll get the habit pretty soon. They'll come with +a rush when they do come." + +One afternoon Keogh dropped into the consul's office, chewing an +unlighted cigar thoughtfully. + +"Got anything up your sleeve?" he inquired of Johnny. "If you have +it's about time to show it. If you can borrow some gent's hat in +the audience, and make a lot of customers for an idle stock of shoes +come out of it you'd better spiel. The boys have all laid in enough +footwear to last 'em ten years; and there's nothing doing in the shoe +store but dolcy far nienty. I just came by there. Your venerable +victim was standing in the door, gazing through his specs at the bare +toes passing by his emporium. The natives here have got the true +artistic temperament. Me and Clancy took eighteen tintypes this +morning in two hours. There's been but one pair of shoes sold all +day. Blanchard went in and bought a pair of furlined house-slippers +because he thought he saw Miss Hemstetter go into the store. I saw +him throw the slippers into the lagoon afterwards." + +"There's a Mobile fruit steamer coming in tomorrow or next day," said +Johnny. We can't do anything until then." + +"What are you going to do--try to create a demand?" + +"Political economy isn't your strong point," said the consul, +impudently. "You can't create a demand. But you can create +a necessity for a demand. That's what I am going to do." + +Two weeks after the consul sent his cable, a fruit steamer brought +him a huge, mysterious brown bale of some unknown commodity. Johnny's +influence with the custom-house people was sufficiently strong for +him to get the goods turned over to him without the usual inspection. +He had the bale taken to the consulate and snugly stowed in the back +room. That night he ripped open a corner of it and took out a handful +of the cockleburrs. He examined them with the care with which a +warrior examines his arms before he goes forth to battle for his +lady-love and life. The burrs were the ripe August product, as hard +as filberts, and bristling with spines as tough and sharp as needles. +Johnny whistled softly a little tune, and went out to find Billy +Keogh. + +Later in the night, when Coralio was steeped in slumber, he and Billy +went forth into the deserted streets with their coats bulging like +balloons. All up and down the Calle Grande they went, sowing the +sharp burrs carefully in the sand, along the narrow sidewalks, in +every foot of grass between the silent houses. And then they took +the side streets and byways, missing none. No place where the foot of +man, woman or child might fall was slighted. Many trips they made to +and from the prickly hoard. And then, nearly at the dawn, they laid +themselves down to rest calmly, as great generals do after planning +a victory according to the revised tactics, and slept, knowing that +they had sowed with the accuracy of Satan sowing tares and the +perseverance of Paul planting. + +With the rising sun came the purveyors of fruits and meats, and +arranged their wares in and around the little market-house. At +one end of the town near the seashore the market-house stood; and +the sowing of the burrs had not been carried that far. The dealers +waited long past the hour when their sales usually began. None +came to buy. "!Que hay?~" they began to exclaim, one to another. +At their accustomed time, from every 'dobe and palm hut and grass- +thatched shack and dim ~patio~ glided women--black women, brown +women, lemon-colored women, women dun and yellow and tawny. They +were the marketers starting to purchase the family supply of cassava, +plantains, meat, fowls, and tortillas. Decollete they were and +bare-armed and bare-footed, with a single skirt reaching below +the knee. Stolid and ox-eyed, they stepped from their doorways +into the narrow paths or upon the soft grass of the streets. + +The first to emerge uttered ambiguous squeals, and raised one foot +quickly. Another step and they sat down, with shrill cries of alarm, +to pick at the new and painful insects that had stung them upon the +feet. "~Que picadores diablos!~" they screeched to one another across +the narrow ways. Some tried the grass instead of the paths, but there +they were also stung and bitten by the strange little prickly balls. +They plumped down in the grass, and added their lamentations to those +of their sisters in the sandy paths. All through the town was heard +the plaint of the feminine jabber. The venders in the market still +wondered why no customers came. + +Then men, lords of the earth, came forth. They, too, began to hop, +to dance, to limp, and to curse. They stood stranded and foolish, +or stopped to pluck at the scourge that attacked their feet and +ankles. Some loudly proclaimed the pest to be poisonous spiders +of an unknown species. + +And then the children ran out for their morning romp. And now to +the uproar was added the howls of limping infants and cockleburred +childhood. Every minute the advancing day brought forth fresh +victims. + +Dona Maria Castillas y Buenventura de las Casas stepped from her +honored doorway, as was her daily custom, to procure fresh bread +from the ~panaderia~ across the street. She was clad in a skirt of +flowered, yellow satin, a chemise of ruffled linen, and wore a purple +mantilla from the looms of Spain. Her lemon-tinted feet, alas! were +bare. Her progress was majestic, for were not her ancestors hidalgos +of Aragon? Three steps she made across the velvety grass, and set +her aristocratic sole upon a bunch of Johnny's burrs. Dona Maria +Castillas y Buenventura de las Casas emitted a yowl even as a +wild-cat. Turning about, she fell upon hands and knees, and crawled +--ay, like a beast of the field she crawled back to her honorable +door-sill. + +Don Senor Ildefonso Federico Valdazar, ~Juez de la Paz~, weighing +twenty stone, attempted to convey his bulk to the ~pulperia~ at the +corner of the plaza in order to assuage his matutinal thirst. The +first plunge of his unshod foot into the cool grass struck a concealed +mine. Don Ildefonso fell like a crumpled cathedral, crying out that +he had been fatally bitten by a deadly scorpion. Everywhere were the +shoeless citizens hopping, stumbling, limping, and picking from their +feet the venomous insects that had come in a single night to harass +them. + +The first to perceive the remedy was Esteban Delgado, the barber, a +man of travel and education. Sitting upon a stone, he plucked burrs +from his toes, and made oration: + +"Behold, my friends, these bugs of the devil! I know them well. +They soar through the skies in swarms like pigeons. These are dead +ones that fell during the night. In Yucatan I have seen them as large +as oranges. Yes! There they hiss like serpents, and have wings like +bats. It is the shoes--the shoes that one needs! ~Zapatos--zapatos +para mi!~" + +Esteban hobbled to Mr. Hemstetter's store, and bought shoes. Coming +out, he swaggered down the street with impunity, reviling loudly the +bugs of the devil. The suffering ones sat up or stood upon one foot +and beheld the immune barber. Men, women and children took up the +cry: "~Zapatos! zapatos!~" + +The necessity for the demand had been created. The demand followed. +That day Mr. Hemstetter sold three hundred pairs of shoes. + +"It is really surprising," he said to Johnny, who came up in the +evening to help him straighten out the stock, "how trade is picking +up. Yesterday I made but three sales." + +"I told you they'd whoop things up when they got started," said the +consul. + +"I think I shall order a dozen more cases of goods, to keep the stock +up," said Mr. Hemstetter, beaming through his spectacles. + +"I wouldn't send in any orders yet," advised Johnny. "Wait till you +see how the trade holds up." + +Each night Johnny and Keogh sowed the crop that grew dollars by day. +At the end of ten days two-thirds of the stock of shoes had been +sold; and the stock of cockleburrs was exhausted. Johnny cabled +to Pink Dawson for another 500 pounds, paying twenty cents per pound +as before. Mr. Hemstetter carefully made up an order for $1500 worth +of shoes from Northern firms. Johnny hung about the store until this +order was ready for the mail, and succeeded in destroying it before +it reached the postoffice. + +That night he took Rosine under the mango tree by Godwin's porch, +and confessed everything. She looked him in the eye, and said: "You +are a very wicked man. Father and I will go back home. You say it +was a joke? I think it is a very serious matter." + +But at the end of half an hour's argument the conversation had been +turned upon a different subject. The two were considering the +respective merits of pale blue and pink wall-paper with which the old +colonial mansion of the Atwoods in Dalesburg was to be decorated after +the wedding. + +On the next morning Johnny confessed to Mr. Hemstetter. The shoe +merchant put on his spectacles, and said through them: "You strike me +as being a most extraordinary young scamp. If I had not managed this +enterprise with good business judgment my entire stock of goods might +have been a complete loss. Now, how do you propose to dispose of the +rest of it?" + +When the second invoice of cockleburrs arrived Johnny loaded them and +the remainder of the shoes into schooner, and sailed down the coast +to Alazan. There, in the same dark and diabolical manner, he repeated +his success: and came back with a bag of money and not so much as +a shoestring. + +And then he besought his great Uncle of the waving goatee and starred +vest to accept his resignation, for the lotus no longer lured him. +He hankered for the spinach and cress of Dalesburg. + +The services of Mr. William Terence Keogh as acting consul, pro term., +were suggested and accepted, and Johnny sailed with the Hemstetters +back to his native shores. + +Keogh slipped into the sinecure of the American consulship with +the ease that never left him even in such high places. The tintype +establishment was soon to become a thing of the past, although its +deadly work along the peaceful and helpless Spanish Main was never +effaced. The restless partners were about to be off again, scouting +ahead of the slow ranks of Fortune. But now they would take different +ways. There were rumors of a promising uprising in Peru; and thither +the martial Clancy would turn his adventurous steps. As for Keogh, +he was figuring in his mind and on quires of Government letter-heads +a scheme that dwarfed the art of misrepresenting the human countenance +upon tin. + +"What suits me," Keogh used to say, "in the way of a business +proposition is something diversified that looks like a longer shot +than it is--something in the way of a genteel graft that isn't worked +enough for the correspondence schools to be teaching it by mail. +I take the long end; but I like to have at least as good a chance to +win as a man learning to play poker on an ocean steamer, or running +for governor of Texas on the Republican ticket. And when I cash in +my winnings I don't want to find any widows' and orphans' chips in +my stack." + +The grass-grown globe was the green table on which Keogh gambled. +The games he played were of his own invention. He was no grubber +after the diffident dollar. Nor did he care to follow it with horn +and hounds. Rather he loved to coax it with egregious and brilliant +flies from its habitat in the waters of strange streams. Yet Keogh +was a business man; and his schemes, in spite of their singularity, +were as solidly set as the plans of a building contractor. In +Arthur's time Sir William Keogh would have been a Knight of the Round +Table. In these modern days he rides abroad, seeking the Graft +instead of the Grail. + +Three days after Johnny's departure, two small schooners appeared +off Coralio. After some delay a boat put off from one of them, and +brought a sunburned young man ashore. This young man had a shrewd +and calculating eye; and he gazed with amazement at the strange things +that he saw. He found on the beach some one who directed him to the +consul's office; and thither he made his way at a nervous gait. + +Keogh was sprawled in the official chair, drawing caricatures +of his Uncle's head on an official pad of paper. He looked up +at his visitor. + +"Where's Johnny Atwood?" inquired the sunburned young man, in +a business tone. + +"Gone," said Keogh, working carefully at Uncle Sam's necktie. + +"That's just like him," remarked the nut-brown one, leaning against +the table. "He always was a fellow to gallivant around instead of +'tending to business. Will he be in soon?" + +"Don't think so," said Keogh, after a fair amount of deliberation. +"I s'pose he's out at some of his tomfoolery," conjectured the +visitor, in a tone of virtuous conviction. "Johnny never would stick +to anything long enough to succeed. I wonder how he manages to run +his business here, and never be 'round to look after it." + +"I'm looking after the business just now," admitted the pro term. +consul. + +"Are you--then, say--where's the factory?" + +"What factory?" asked Keogh, with a mildly polite interest. + +"Why, the factory where they use them cockleburrs. Lord knows what +they use 'em for, anyway! I've got the basements of both them ships +out there loaded with 'em. I'll give you a bargain in this lot. +I've had every man, woman and child around Dalesburg that wasn't +busy pickin' 'em for a month. I hired these ships to bring 'em over. +Everybody thought I was crazy. Now, you can have this lot for fifteen +cents a pound, delivered on land. And if you want more I guess old +Alabam' can come up to the demand. Johnny told me when he left home +that if he struck anything down here that there was any money in he'd +let me in on it. Shall I drive the ships in and hitch?" + +A look of supreme, almost incredulous, delight dawned in Keogh's +ruddy countenance. He dropped his pencil. His eyes turned upon +the sunburned young man with joy in them mingled with fear lest +his ecstasy should prove a dream. + +"For God's sake tell me," said Keogh, earnestly, "are you Dink +Pawson?" + +"My name is Pinkney Dawson," said the cornerer of the cockleburr +market. + +Billy Keogh slid rapturously and gently from his chair to his favorite +strip of matting on the floor. + +There were not many sounds in Coralio on that sultry afternoon. Among +those that were may be mentioned a noise of enraptured and unrighteous +laughter from a prostrate Irish-American, while a sunburned young man, +with a shrewd eye, looked on him with wonder and amazement. Also the +"tramp, tramp, tramp" of many well-shod feet in the streets outside. +Also the lonesome wash of the waves that beat along the historic +shores of the Spanish Main. + + + +XIV + +Masters of Arts + +A two-inch stub of a blue pencil was the wand with which Keogh +performed the preliminary acts of his magic. So, with this he covered +paper with diagrams and figures while he waited for the United States +of America to send down to Coralio a successor to Atwood, resigned. + +The new scheme that his mind had conceived, his stout heart indorsed, +and his blue pencil corroborated, was laid around the characteristics +and human frailties of the new president ofAnchuria. These +characteristics, and the situation out of which Keogh hoped to wrest +a golden tribute, deserve chronicling contributive to the clear order +of events. + +President Losada--many called him Dictator--was a man whose genius +would have made him conspicuous even among Anglo-Saxons, had not +that genius been intermixed with other traits that were petty and +subversive. He had some of the lofty patriotism of Washington (the +man he most admired), the force of Napoleon, and much of the wisdom +of the sages. These characteristics might have justified him the +assumption of the title of "The Illustrious Liberator," had they not +been accompanied by a stupendous and amazing vanity that kept him +in the less worthy ranks of the dictators. + +Yet he did his country great service. With a mighty grasp he shook +it nearly free from the shackles of ignorance and sloth and the vermin +that fed upon it, and all but made it a power in the council of +nations. He established schools and hospitals, built roads, bridges, +railroads and palaces, and bestowed generous subsidies upon the arts +and sciences. He was the absolute despot and the idol of his people. +The wealth of the country poured into his hands. Other presidents had +been rapacious without reason. Losada amassed enormous wealth, but +his people had their share of the benefits. + +The joint in his armor was his insatiate passion for monuments and +tokens commemorating his glory. In every town he caused to be erected +statues of himself bearing legends in praise of his greatness. In +the walls of every public edifice, tablets were fixed reciting his +splendor and the gratitude of his subjects. His statuettes and +portraits were scattered throughout the land in every house and hut. +One of the sycophants in his court painted him as St. John, with a +halo and a train of attendants in full uniform. Losada saw nothing +incongruous in this picture, and had it hung in a church in the +capital. He ordered from a French sculptor a marble group including +himself with Napoleon, Alexander the Great, and one or two others whom +he deemed worthy of the honor. + +He ransacked Europe for decorations, employing policy, money and +intrigue to cajole the orders he coveted from kings and rulers. +On state occasions his breast was covered from shoulder to shoulder +with crosses, stars, golden roses, medals and ribbons. It was said +that the man who could contrive for him a new decoration, or invent +some new method of extolling his greatness, might plunge a hand deep +into the treasury. + +This was the man upon whom Billy Keogh had his eye. The gentle +buccaneer had observed the rain of favors that fell upon those who +ministered to the president's vanities, and he did not deem it his +duty to hoist his umbrella against the scattering drops of liquid +fortune. + +In a few weeks the new consul arrived, releasing Keogh from his +temporary duties. He was a young man fresh from college, who lived +for botany alone. The consulate at Coralio gave him the opportunity +to study tropical flora. He wore smoked glasses, and carried a green +umbrella. He filled the cool, back porch of the consulate with +plants and specimens so that space for a bottle and chair was not +to be found. Keogh gazed on him sadly, but without rancor, and began +to pack his gripsack. For his new plot against stagnation along the +Spanish Main required of him a voyage overseas. + +Soon came the ~Karlsefin~ again--she of the trampish habits--gleaning +a cargo of coconuts for a speculative descent upon the New York +market. Keogh was booked for a passage on the return trip. + +"Yes, I'm going to New York," he explained to the group of his +countrymen that had gathered on the beach to see him off. "But +I'll be back before you miss me. I've undertaken the art education +of this piebald country, and I'm not the man to desert it while it's +in the early throes of tintypes." + +With this mysterious declaration of his intentions Keogh boarded +the ~Karlsefin~. + +Ten days later, shivering, with the collar of his thin coat turned +high, he burst into the studio of Carolus White at the top of a tall +building in Tenth Street, New York City. + +Carolus White was smoking a cigarette and frying sausages over an oil +stove. He was only twenty-three, and had noble theories about art. + +"Billy Knight!" exclaimed White, extending the hand that was not +busy with the frying pan. "From what part of the uncivilized world, +I wonder!" + +"Hello, Carry," said Keogh, dragging forward a stool, and holding +his fingers close to the stove. "I'm glad I found you so soon. I've +been looking for you all day in the directories and art galleries. +The free-lunch man on the corner told me where you were, quick. +I was sure you'd be painting pictures yet." + +Keogh glanced about the studio with the shrewd eye of a connoisseur +in business. + +"Yes, you can do it," he declared, with many gentle nods of his head. +"That big one in the corner with the angels and greeh clouds and +band-wagon is just the sort of thing we want. What would you call +that, Carry--scene from Coney Island, ain't it?" + +'That," said White, "I had intended to call The Translation of +Elijah,' but you may be nearer right than I am." + +"Name doesn't matter," said Keogh, largely; "it's the frame and +the varieties of paint that does the trick. Now, I can tell you in +a minute what I want. I've come on a little voyage of two thousand +miles to take you in with me on a scheme. I thought of you as soon +as the scheme showed itself to me. How would you like to go back +with me and paint a picture? Ninety days for the trip, and five +thousand dollars for the job." + +"Cereal food or hair-tonic posters?" asked White. + +"It isn't an ad." + +"What kind of a picture is it to be?" + +"It's a long story," said Keogh. + +"Go ahead with it. If you don't mind, while you talk I'll just keep +my eye on these sausages. Let 'em get one shade deeper than a Vandyke +brown and you spoil 'em." + +Keogh explained his project. They were to return to Coralio, where +White was to pose as a distinguished American portrait painter who +was touring in the tropics as a relaxation from his arduous and +remunerative professional labors. It was not an unreasonable hope, +even to those who trod in the beaten paths of business, that an artist +with so much prestige might secure a commission to perpetuate upon +canvas the lineaments of the president, and secure a share of the +~pesos~ that were raining upon the caterers to his weaknesses. + +Keogh had set his price at ten thousand dollars. Artists had been +paid more for portraits. He and White were to share the expenses of +the trip, and divide the possible profits. Thus he laid the scheme +before White, whom he had known in the West before one declared for +Art and the other became a Bedouin. + +Before long the two machinators abandoned the rigor of the bare studio +for a snug corner of a cafe. There they sat far into the night, with +old envelopes and Keogh's stub of blue pencil between them. + +At twelve o'clock White doubled up in his chair, with his chin on +his fist, and shut his eyes at the unbeautiful wall-paper. + +"I'll go you, Billy," he said, in the quiet tones of decision. "I've +got two or three hundred saved up for sausages and rent; and I'll take +the chance with you. Five thousand! It will give me two years in +Paris and one in Italy. I'll begin to pack tomorrow." + +"You'll begin in ten minutes," said Keogh. "It's to-morrow now. The +~Karlsefin~ starts back at four P.M. Come on to your painting shop, +and I'll help you." + +For five months in the year Coralio is the Newport of Anchuria. +Then only does the town possess life. From November to March it is +practically the seat of government. The president with his official +family sojourns there; and society follows him. The pleasure-loving +people make the season one long holiday of amusement and rejoicing. +~Fiestas~, balls, games, sea bathing, processions and small theatres +contribute to their enjoyment. The famous Swiss band from the capital +plays in the little plaza every evening, while the fourteen carriages +and vehicles in the town circle in funereal but complacent procession. +Indians from the interior mountains, looking like pre-historic stone +idols, come down to peddle their handiwork in the streets. The people +throng the narrow ways, a chattering, happy, careless stream of +buoyant humanity. Preposterous children rigged out with the +shortest of ballet skirts and gilt wings, howl, underfoot, among the +effervescent crowds. Especially is the arrival of the presidential +party, at the opening of the season, attended with pomp, show and +patriotic demonstrations of enthusiasm and delight. + +When Keogh and White reached their destination, on the return trip +of the ~Karlsefin~, the gay winter season was well begun. As they +stepped upon the beach they could hear the band playing in the plaza. +The village maidens, with fireflies already fixed in their dark locks, +were gliding, barefoot and coy-eyed, along the paths. Dandies in +white linen, swinging their canes, were beginning their seductive +strolls. The air was full of human essence, of artificial enticement, +of coquetry, indolence, pleasure--the man-made sense of existence. + +The first two or three days after their arrival were spent in +preliminaries. Keogh escorted the artist about town, introducing +him to the little circle of English-speaking residents and pulling +whatever wires he could to effect the spreading of White's fame as +a painter. And then Keogh planned a more spectacular demonstration +of the idea he wished to keep before the public. + +He and White engaged rooms in the Hotel de los Extranjeros. The two +were clad in new suits of immaculate duck, with American straw hats, +and carried canes of remarkable uniqueness and inutility. Few +caballeros in Coralio--even the gorgeously uniformed officers of the +Anchurian army--were as conspicuous for ease and elegance of demeanor +as Keogh and his friend, the great American painter, Senor White. + +White set up his easel on the beach and made striking sketches of the +mountain and sea views. The native population formed at his rear in +a vast, chattering semicircle to watch his work. Keogh, with his care +for details, had arranged for himself a pose which he carried out with +fidelity. His ro1e was that of friend to the great artist, a man of +affairs and leisure. The visible emblem of his position was a pocket +camera. + +"For branding the man who owns it," said he, "a genteel dilettante +with a bank account and an easy conscience, a steam-yacht ain't in it +with a camera. You see a man doing nothing but loafing around making +snap-shots, and you know right away he reads up well in 'Bradstreet.' +You notice these old millionaire boys--soon as they get through taking +everything else in sight they go to taking photographs. People are +more impressed by a kodak than they are by a title or a four-karat +scarf-pin." So Keogh strolled blandly about Coralio, snapping the +scenery and the shrinking senoritas, while White posed conspicuously +in the higher regions of art. + +Two weeks after their arrival, the scheme began to bear fruit. +An aide-de-camp of the president drove to the hotel in a dashing +victoria. The president desired that Senor White come to the Casa +Morena for an informal interview. + +Keogh gripped his pipe tightly between his teeth. "Not a cent +less than ten thousand," he said to the artist--"remember the price. +And in gold or its equivalent--don't let him stick you with this +bargain-counter stuff they call money here." + +"Perhaps it isn't that he wants," said White. + +"Get out!" said Keogh, with splendid confidence. "I know what he +wants. He wants his picture painted by the celebrated young American +painter and filibuster now sojourning in his down-trodden country. +Off you go." + +The victoria sped away with the artist. Keogh walked up and down, +puffing great clouds of smoke from his pipe, and waited. In an hour +the victoria swept again to the door of the hotel, deposited White, +and vanished. The artist dashed up the stairs, three at a step. +Keogh stopped smoking, and became a silent interrogation point. + +"Landed," exclaimed White, with his boyish face flushed with elation. +"Billy, you are a wonder. He wants a picture. I'll tell you all +about it. By Heavens! that dictator chap is a corker! He's a +dictator clear down to his finger-ends. He's a kind of combination +of Julius Caesar, Lucifer and Chauncey Depew done in sepia. Polite +and grim--that's his way. The room I saw him in was about ten acres +big, and looked like a Mississippi steamboat with its gilding and +mirrors and white paint. He talks English better than I can ever +hope to. The matter of the price came up. I mentioned ten thousand. +I expected him to call the guard and have me taken out and shot. +He didn't move an eyelash. He just waved one of his chestnut hands +in a careless way, and said, 'Whatever you say.' I am to go back +tomorrow and discuss with him the details of the picture." + +Keogh hung his head. Self-abasement was easy to read in his downcast +countenance. + +"I'm failing, Carry," he said, sorrowfully. "I'm not fit to handle +these man's-size schemes any longer. Peddling oranges in a push-cart +is about the suitable graft for me. When I said ten thousand, I swear +I thought I had sized up that brown man's limit to within two cents. +He'd have melted down for fifteen thousand just as easy. Say--Carry-- +you'll see old man Keogh safe in some nice, quiet idiot asylum, won't +you, if he makes a break like that again?" + +The Casa Morena, although only one story in height, was a building +of brown stone, luxurious as a palace in its interior. It stood on +a low hill in a walled garden of splendid tropical flora at the upper +edge of Coralio. The next day the president's carriage came again +for the artist. Keogh went out for a walk along the beach, where he +and his "picture box" were now familiar sights. When he returned to +the hotel White was sitting in a steamer-chair on the balcony. + +"Well," said Keogh, "did you and His Nibs decide on the kind of +a chromo he wants?" + +White got up and walked back and forth on the balcony a few times. +Then he stopped, and laughed strangely. His face was flushed, and +his eyes were bright with a kind of angry amusement. + +"Look here, Billy," he said, somewhat roughly, "when you first came +to me in my studio and mentioned a picture, I thought you wanted a +Smashed Oats or a Hair Tonic poster painted on a range of mountains +or the side of a continent. Well, either of those jobs would have +been Art in its highest form compared to the one you've steered me +against. I can't paint that picture, Billy. You've got to let me +out. Let me try to tell you what that barbarian wants. He had it +all planned out and even a sketch made of his idea. The old boy +doesn't draw badly at all. But, ye goddesses of Art! listen to the +monstrosity he expects me to paint. He wants himself in the center +of the canvas, of course. He is to be painted as Jupiter sitting +on Olympus, with the clouds at his feet. At one side of him stands +George Washington, in full regimentals, with his hand on the +president's shoulder. An angel with outstretched wings hovers +overhead, and is placing a laurel wreath on the president's head, +crowning him--Queen of the May, I suppose. In the background is +to be cannon, more angels and soldiers. The man who would paint +that picture would have to have the soul of a dog, and would deserve +to go down into oblivion without even a tin can tied to his tail +to sound his memory." + +Little beads of moisture crept out all over Billy Keogh's brow. +The stub of his blue pencil had not figured out a contingency like +this. The machinery of his plan had run with flattering smoothness +until now. He dragged another chair upon the balcony, and got White +back to his seat. He lit his pipe with apparent calm. + +"Now, sonny," he said, with gentle grimness, "you and me will have +an Art to Art talk. You've got your art and I've got mine. Yours +is the real Pierian stuff that turns up its nose at bock-beer signs +and oleographs of the Old Mill. Mine's the art of Business. + This was my scheme, and it worked out like two-and-two. Paint +that president man as Old King Cole, or Venus, or a landscape, or +a fresco, or a bunch of lilies, or anything he thinks he looks like. +But get the paint on the canvas and collect the spoils. You wouldn't +throw me down, Carry, at this stage of the game. Think of that ten +thousand." + +"I can't help thinking of it," said White, "and that's what hurts. +I'm tempted to throw every ideal I ever had down in the mire, and +steep my soul in infamy by painting that picture. That five thousand +meant three years of foreign study to me, and I'd almost sell my soul +for that. " + +"Now it ain't as bad as that," said Keogh, soothingly. "It's a +business proposition. It's so much paint and time against money. I +don't fall in with your idea that that picture would so everlastingly +jolt the art side of the question. George Washington was all right, +you know, and nobody could say a word against the angel. I don't +think so bad of that group. If you was to give Jupiter a pair of +epaulets and a sword, and kind of work the clouds around to look like +a blackberry patch, it wouldn't make such a bad battle scene. Why, +if we hadn't already settled on the price, he ought to pay an extra +thousand for Washington, and the angel ought to raise it five +hundred." + +"You don't understand, Billy," said White, with an uneasy laugh. +"Some of us fellows who try to paint have big notions about Art. +I wanted to paint a picture some day that people would stand before +and forget that it was made of paint. I wanted it to creep into them +like a bar of music and mushroom there like a soft bullet. And I +wanted 'em to go away and ask, 'What else has he done?' And I didn't +want 'em to find a thing; not a portrait nor a magazine cover nor an +illustration nor a drawing of a girl--nothing but the picture. That's +why I've lived on fried sausages, and tried to keep true to myself. +I persuaded myself to do this portrait for the chance it might give me +to study abroad. But this howling, screaming caricature! Good Lord! +can't you see how it is?" + +"Sure," said Keogh, as tenderly as he would have spoken to a child, +and he laid a long forefinger on White's knee. "I see. It's bad to +have your art all slugged up like that. I know. You wanted to paint +a big thing like the panorama of the battle of Gettysburg. But let me +kalsomine you a little mental sketch to consider. Up to date we're +out $385.50 on this scheme. Our capital took every cent both of us +could raise. We've got about enough left to get back to New York on. +I need my share of that ten thousand. I want to work a copper deal +in Idaho, and make a hundred thousand. That's the business end of +the thing. Come down off your art perch, Carry, and let's land that +hatful of dollars." + +"Billy," said White, with an effort, "I'll try. I won't say I'll +do it, but I'll try. I'll go at it, and put it through if I can." + +"That's business," said Keogh, heartily. "Good boy! Now, here's +another thing--rush that picture--crowd it through as quick as you +can. Get a couple of boys to help you mix the paint if necessary. +I've picked up some pointers around town. The people here are +beginning to get sick of Mr. President. They say he's been too free +with concessions; and they accuse him of trying to make a dicker with +England to sell out the country. We want that picture done and paid +for before there's any row." + +In the great patio of Casa Morena, the president caused to be +stretched a huge canvas. Under this White set up his temporary +studio. For two hours each day the great man sat to him. + +White worked faithfully. But, as the work progressed, he had seasons +of bitter scorn, of infinite self-contempt, of sullen gloom and +sardonic gaiety. Keogh, with the patience of a great general, +soothed, coaxed, argued--kept him at the picture. + +At the end of a month White announced that the picture was completed-- +Jupiter, Washington, angels, clouds, cannon and all. His face was +pale and his mouth drawn straight when he told Keogh. He said the +president was much pleased with it. It was to be hung in the National +Gallery of Statesmen and Heroes. The artist had been requested to +return to Casa Morena on the following day to receive payment. At +the appointed time he left the hotel, silent under his friend's +joyful talk of their success. + +An hour later he walked into the room where Keogh was waiting, threw +his hat on the floor, and sat upon the table. + +"Billy," he said, in strained and laboring tones, "I've a little money +out West in a small business that my brother is running. It's what +I've been living on while I've been studying art. I'll draw out my +share and pay you back what you've lost on this scheme." + +"Lost!" exclaimed Keogh, jumping up. "Didn't you get paid for +the picture?" + +"Yes, I got paid," said White. "But just now there isn't any picture, +and there isn't any pay. If you care to hear about it, here are the +edifying details. The president and I were looking at the painting. +His secretary brought a bank draft on New York for ten thousand +dollars and handed it to me. The moment I touched it I went wild. +I tore it into little pieces and threw them on the floor. A workman +was repainting the pillars inside the ~patio~. A bucket of his paint +happened to be convenient. I picked up his brush and slapped a quart +of blue paint all over that ten-thousand-dollar nightmare. I bowed, +and walked out. The president didn't move or speak. That was one +time he was taken by surprise. It's tough on you, Billy, but I +couldn't help it." + +There seemed to be excitement in Coralio. Outside there was +a confused, rising murmur pierced by high-pitched cries. "~Bajo +el traidor--Muerte el traidor!~" were the words they seemed +to form. + +"Listen to that!" exclaimed White, bitterly; "I know that much +Spanish. They're shouting, 'Down with the traitor!' I heard them +before. I felt that they meant me. I was a traitor to Art. +The picture had to go." + +"'Down with the blank fool' would have suited your case better," +said Keogh, with fiery emphasis. "You tear up ten thousand dollars +like an old rag because the way you've spread on five dollars' worth +of paint hurts your conscience. Next time I pick a side-partner in +a scheme the man has got to go before a notary and swear he never +even heard the word 'ideal' mentioned." + +Keogh strode from the room, white-hot. White paid little attention +to his resentment. The scorn of Billy Keogh seemed a trifling thing +beside the greater self-scorn he had escaped. + +In Coralio the excitement waxed. An outburst was imminent. The cause +of this demonstration of displeasure was,the presence in the town of +a big, pink-cheeked Englishman, who, it was said, was an agent of his +government come to clinch the bargain by which the president placed +his people in the hands of a foreign power. It was charged that not +only had he given away priceless concessions, but that the public debt +was to be transferred into the hands of the English, and the custom- +houses turned over to them as a guarantee. The long-enduring people +had determined to make their protest felt. + +On that night, in Coralio and in other towns, their ire found vent. +Veiling mobs, mercurial but dangerous, roamed the streets. They +overthrew the great bronze statue of the president that stood in +the center of the plaza, and hacked it to shapeless pieces. They +tore from public buildings the tablets set there proclaiming the glory +of the "Illustrious Liberator." His pictures in the government +offices were demolished. The mobs even attacked the Casa Morena, +but were driven away by the military, which remained faithful to +the executive. All the night terror reigned. + +The greatness of Losada was shown by the fact that by noon the next +day order was restored and he was still absolute. He issued +proclamations denying positively that any negotiation of any kind had +been entered into with England. Sir Stafford Vaughn, the pink-cheeked +Englishman, also declared in placards and in public print that his +presence there had no international significance. He was a traveller +without guile. In fact (so he stated), he had not even spoken with +the president or been in his presence since his arrival. + +During this disturbance, White was preparing for his homeward voyage +in the steamship that was to sail within two or three days. About +noon, Keogh, the restless, took his camera out with the hope of +speeding the lagging hours. The town was now as quiet as if peace +had never departed from her perch on the red-tiled roofs. + +About the middle of the afternoon, Keogh hurried back to the hotel +with something decidedly special in his air. He retired to the little +room where he developed his pictures. + +Later on he came out to White on the balcony, with a luminous, grim +predatory smile on his face. + +"Do you know what that is?" he asked, holding up a 4 x 5 photograph +mounted on cardboard. + +"Snap-shot of a senorita sitting in the sand--alliteration +unintentional," guessed White, lazily. + + VVVV +"Wrong," saidKeogh with shining eyes. "It's a slung-shot. It's a can +of dynamite. It's a gold mine. It's a sight-draft on your president +man for twenty thousand dollars--yes, sir--twenty thousand this time, +and no spoiling the picture. No ethics of art in the way. Art! You +with your smelly little tubes! I've got you skinned to death with +a kodak. Take a look at that." + +White took the picture in his hand, and gave a long whistle. + +"Jove!" he exclaimed, "but wouldn't that stir up a row in town if +you let it be seen. How in the world did you get it, Billy?" + +"You know that high wall around the president man's back garden? +I was up there trying to get a bird's eye of the town. I happened to +notice a chink in the wall where a stone and a lot of plaster had slid +out. Thinks I, I'll take a peep through to see how Mr. President's +cabbages are growing. The first thing I saw was him and this Sir +Englishman sitting at a little table about twenty feet away. They +had the table all spread over with documents, and they were hobnobbing +over them as thick as two pirates. 'Twas a nice corner of the garden, +all private and shady with palms and orange trees, and they had a pail +of champagne set by handy in the grass. I knew then was the time +for me to make my big hit in Art. So I raised the machine up to the +crack, and pressed the button. Just as I did so them old boys shook +hands on the deal--you see they took that way in the picture." + +Keogh put on his coat and hat. + +"What are you going to do with it?" asked White. + +"Me," said Keogh in a hurt tone, "why, I'm going to tie a pink ribbon +to it and hang it on the what-not, of course. I'm surprised at you. +But while I'm out you just try to figure out what ginger-cake +potentate would be most likely to want to buy this work of art for +his private collection--just to keep it out of circulation." + +The sunset was reddening the tops of the coconut palms when Billy +Keogh came back from Casa Morena. He nodded to the artist's +questioning gaze; and lay down on a cot with his hands under the back +of his head. + +"I saw him. He paid the money like a little man. They didn't want +to let me in at first. I told 'em it was important. Yes, that +president man is on the plenty-able list. He's got a beautiful +business system about the way he uses his brains. All I had to do +was to hold up the photograph so he could see it, and name the price. +He just smiled, and walked over to a safe and got the cash. Twenty +one-thousand-dollar brand-new United States Treasury notes he laid on +the table, like I'd pay out a dollar and a quarter. Fine notes, too +--they crackled with a sound like burning the brush off a ten-acre +lot." + +"Let's try the feel of one," said White, curiously. "I never saw +a thousand-dollar bill." Keogh did not immediately respond. + +"Carry," he said, in an absent-minded way, "you think a heap of +your art, don't you? + +"More," said White, frankly, "than has been for the financial good +of my self and my friends." + +"I thought you were a fool the other day," went on Keogh, quietly, +"and I'm not sure now that you wasn't. But if you was, so am I. I've +been in some funny deals, Carry, but I've always managed to scramble +fair, and match my brains and capital against the other fellow's. + But when it comes to--well, when you've got the other fellow cinched, +and the screws on him, and he's got to put up--why, it don't strike me +as being a man's game. They've got a name for it, you know; it's-- +confound you, don't you understand. A fellow feels--it's some thing +like that blamed art of yours--he--well, I tore that photograph up and +laid the pieces on that stack of money and shoved the whole business +back across the table. 'Excuse me, Mr. Losada,' I said, 'but I guess +I've made a mistake in the price. You get the photo for nothing. +Now, Carry, you get out the pencil, and we'll do some more figuring. +I'd like to save enough out of our capital for you to have some fried +sausages in your joint when you get back to New York. + + + +XV + +Dickey + +There is little consecutiveness along the Spanish Main. Things happen +there intermittently. Even Time seems hang his scythe daily on the +branch of an orange tree while he takes a siesta and a cigarette. + +After the ineffectual revolt against the administration of President +Losada, the country settled again into quiet toleration of the abuses +with which he had been charged. In Coralio old political enemies went +arm-in-arm, lightly eschewing for the time all differences of opinion. + +The failure of the art expedition did not stretch the cat-footed Keogh +upon his back. The ups and downs of Fortune made smooth travelling +for his nimble steps. His blue pencil stub was at work again before +the smoke of the steamer on which White sailed had cleared away from +the horizon. He had but to speak a word to Geddie to find his credit +negotiable for whatever goods he wanted from the store of Brannigan +& Company. On the same day on which White arrived in New York Keogh, +at the rear of a train of five pack mules loaded with hardware and +cutlery, set his face toward the grim, interior mountains. There +the Indian tribes wash gold dust from the auriferous streams; and +when a market is brought to them trading is brisk and ~muy bueno~ +in the Cordilleras. + +In Coralio Time folded his wings and paced wearily along his drowsy +path. They who had most cheered the torpid hours were gone. Clancy +had sailed on a Spanish barque for Colon, contemplating a cut across +the isthmus and then a further voyage to end at Callao, where the +fighting was said to be on. Geddie, whose quiet and genial nature had +once served to mitigate the frequent dull reaction of lotus eating, +was now a home-man, happy with his bright orchid, Paula, and never +even dreaming of or regretting the unsolved, sealed and monogramed +Bottle whose contents, now inconsiderable, were held safely in the +keeping of the sea. + +Well may the Walrus, most discerning and eclectic of beasts, place +sealing-wax midway on his program of topics that fall pertinent and +diverting upon the ear. +Atwood was gone--he of the hospitable back porch and ingenuous +cunning. Doctor Gregg, with his trepanning story smoldering within +him, was a whiskered volcano, always showing signs of imminent +eruption, and was not to be considered in the ranks of those who +might contribute to the amelioration of ennui. The new consul's note +chimed with the sad sea waves and the violent tropical greens--he had +not a bar of Scheherezade or of the Round Table in his lute. Goodwin +was employed with large projects: what time he was loosed from them +found him at his home, where he loved to be. Therefore it will be +seen that there was a dearth of fellowship and entertainment among +the foreign contingent of Coralio. + +And then Dicky Maloney dropped down from the clouds upon the town, +and amused it. + +Nobody knew where Dicky Maloney hailed from or how he reached Coralio. +He appeared there one day; and that was all. He afterward said that +he came on the fruit steamer ~Thor~, but an inspection of the ~Thor's~ +passenger list of that date was found to be Maloneyless. Curiosity, +however, soon perished; and Dicky took his place among the odd fish +cast up by the Caribbean. + +He was an active, devil-may-care, rollicking fellow with an engaging +gray eye, the most irresistible grin, a rather dark or much sunburned +complexion, and a head of the fieriest red hair ever seen in that +country. Speaking the Spanish language as well as he spoke English, +and seeming always to have plenty of silver in his pockets, it was not +long before he was a welcome companion whithersoever he went. He had +an extreme fondness for ~vino blanco~, and gained the reputation of +being able to drink more of it than any three men in town. Everybody +called him "Dicky"; everybody cheered up at the sight of him-- +especially the natives, to whom his marvellous red hair and his free- +and-easy style were a constant delight and envy. Wherever you went +in the town you would soon see Dicky or hear his genial laugh, and +find around him a group of admirers who appreciated him both for +his good nature and the white wine he was always so ready to buy. + +A considerable amount of speculation was had concerning the object of +his sojourn there, until one day he silenced this by opening a small +shop for the sale of tobacco, ~dulces~ and the handiwork of the +interior Indians--fibre-and-silk-woven goods, deerskin ~zapatos~ and +basketwork of tule reeds. Even then he did not change his habits; +for he was drinking and playing cards half the day and night with +the ~comandante~, the collector of customs, the ~jefe politico~ and +other gay dogs among the native officials. + +One day Dicky saw Pasa, the daughter of Madama Ortiz, sitting in the +side-door of the Hotel de los Extranjeros. He stopped in his tracks, +still, for the first time in Coralio; and then he sped, swift as +a deer, to find Vasquez, a gilded native youth, to present him. + +The young men had named Pasa ~La Santita Naranjadita~." ~Naranjadita~ +is a Spanish word for a certain color that you must go to more trouble +to describe in English. By saying "The little saint, tinted the most +beautiful-delicate-slightly-orange-golden," you will approximate +the description of Madama Ortiz's daughter. + +La Madama Ortiz sold rum in addition to other liquors. Now, you must +know that the rum expiates whatever opprobrium attends upon the other +commodities. For rum-making, mind you, is a government monopoly; +and to keep a government dispensary assures respectability if not +preeminence. Moreover, the saddest of precisians could find no fault +with the conduct of the shop. Customers drank there in the lowest +of spirits and fearsomely, as in the shadow of the dead for Madama's +ancient and vaunted lineage counteracted even the rum's behest to be +merry. For, was she not of the ~Iglesias~, who landed with Pizarro? +And had not her deceased husband been ~comisionado de caminos y +puentes~ for the district? + +In the evenings Pasa sat by the window in the room next to the one +where they drank, and strummed dreamily upon her guitar. And then, +by twos and threes, would come visiting young caballeros and occupy +the prim line of chairs set against the wall of this room. They were +there to besiege the heart of ~La Santita~." Their method (which +is not proof against intelligent competition) consisted of expanding +the chest, looking valorous, and consuming a gross or two of +cigarettes. Even saints delicately oranged prefer to be wooed +differently. + +Dona Pasa would tide over the vast chasms of nicotinized silence with +music from her guitar, while she wondered if the romances she had read +about gallant and more--more contiguous cavaliers were all lies. At +somewhat regular intervals Madama would glide in from the dispensary +with a sort of drought-suggesting gleam in her eye, and there would be +a rustling of stiffly starched white trousers as one of the caballeros +would propose an adjournment to the bar. + +That Dicky Maloney would, sooner or later, explore this field was +a thing to be foreseen. There were few doors in Coralio into which +his red head had not been poked. + +In an incredibly short space of time after his first sight of her +he was there, seated close beside her rocking chair. There was no +back-against-the-wall poses in Dicky's theory of wooing. His plan +of subjection was an attack at close range. To carry the fortress +with one concentrated, ardent, eloquent, irresistible ~escalade~-- +that was Dicky's way. + +Pasa was descended from the proudest Spanish families in the country. +Moreover, she had had unusual advantages. Two years in a New Orleans +school had elevated her ambitions and fitted her for a fate above +the ordinary maidens of her native land. And yet here she succumbed +to the first red-haired scamp with a glib tongue and a charming smile +that came along and courted her properly. + +Very soon Dicky took her to the little church on the corner of the +plaza, and "Mrs. Maloney" was added to her string of distinguished +names. + +And it was her fate to sit, with her patient, saintly eyes and figure +like a bisque Psyche, behind the sequestered counter of the little +shop, while Dicky drank and philandered with is frivolous +acquaintances. + +The women, with their naturally fine instinct, saw a chance for +vivisection, and delicately taunted her with his habits. She turned +upon them in a beautiful, steady blaze of sorrowful contempt. + +"You meat-cows," she said, in her level, crystal-clear tones; "you +know nothing of a man. Your men are ~maromeros~. They are fit only +to roll cigarettes in the shade until the sun strikes and shrivels +them up. They drone in your hammocks and you comb their hair and feed +them with fresh fruit. My man is of no such blood. Let him drink +of the wine. When he has taken sufficient of it to drown one of your +~flaccitos~ he will come home to me more of a man than one thousand +of your ~pobrecitos~. My hair he smooths and braids; to me he sings; +he himself removes my zapatos, and there, there, upon each instep +leaves a kiss. He holds--Oh, you will never understand! Blind ones +who have never known a ~man~." + +Sometimes mysterious things happened at night about Dicky's shop. +While the front of it was dark, in the little room back of it Dicky +and a few of his friends would sit about a table carrying on some kind +of very quiet ~negocios~ until quite late. Finally he would let them +out the front door very carefully, and go upstairs to his little +saint. These visitors were generally conspirator-like men with dark +clothes and hats. Of course, these dark things were noticed after +a while, and talked about. + +Dicky seemed to care nothing at all for the society of the alien +residents of the town. He avoided Goodwin, and his skilful escape +from the trepanning story of Doctor Gregg is still referred to, +in Coralio, as a masterpiece of lightning diplomacy. + +Many letters arrived, addressed to "Mr. Dicky Maloney," or "Senor +Dickee Maloney," to the considerable pride of Pasa. That so many +people should desire to write to him only confirmed her own suspicion +that the light from his red head shone around the world. As to their +contents she never felt curiosity. There was a wife to you! + +The one mistake Dicky made in Coralio was to run out of money at the +wrong time. Where his money came from was a puzzle, for the sales +of his shop were next to nothing, but that source failed, and at a +peculiarly unfortunate time. It was when the ~comandante~, Don Senor +el Coronel Encarnacion Rios, looked upon the little saint seated in +the shop and felt his heart go pitapat. + +The ~comandante~, who was versed in all the intricate art of +gallantry, first delicately hinted at his sentiments by donning his +dress uniform and strutting up and down fiercely before her window. +Pasa, glancing demurely with her saintly eyes, instantly perceived +his resemblance to her parrot, Chichi, and was diverted to the extent +of smile. The ~comandante~ saw the smile, which was not intended +for him. Convinced of an impression made, he entered the shop, +confidently, and advanced to open compliment. Pasa froze; he pranced; +she flamed royally; he was charmed to injudicious persistence; she +commanded him to leave the shop; he tried to capture her hand and-- +Dicky entered, smiling broadly, full of white wine and the devil. + +He spent five minutes in punishing the comandante scientifically and +carefully, so that the pain might be prolonged as far as possible. +At the end of that time he pitched the rash wooer out the door upon +the stones of the street, senseless. + +A barefooted policeman who had been watching the affair from across +the street blew a whistle. A squad of four soldiers came running +from the cuartel around the corner. When they saw that the offender +was Dicky, they stopped, and blew more whistles, which brought out +reinforcements of eight. Deeming the odds against them sufficiently +reduced, the military advanced upon the disturber. + +Dicky, being thoroughly imbued with the martial spirit, stooped and +drew the ~comandante's~ sword, which was girded about him, and charged +his foe. He chased the standing army four squares, playfully prodding +its squealing rear and hacking at its ginger-colored heels. + +But he was not so successful with the civic authorities. Six +muscular, nimble policemen overpowered him and conveyed him, +triumphantly but warily, to jail. "~El Diablo Colorado~" they +dubbed him, and derided the military for its defeat. + +Dicky, with the rest of the prisoners, could look out through the +barred door at the grass of the little plaza, at a row of orange trees +and the red tile roofs and 'dobe walls of a line of insignificant +stores. + +At sunset along a path across this plaza came a melancholy procession +of sad-faced women bearing plantains, cassava, bread and fruit--each +coming with food to some wretch behind those bars to whom she still +clung and furnished the means of life. Twice a day--morning and +evening--they were permitted to come. Water was furnished to her +compulsory guests by the republic, but no food. + +That evening Dicky's name was called by the sentry, and he stepped +before the bars of the door. There stood his little saint, a black +mantilla draped about her head and shoulders, her face like glorified +melancholy, her clear eyes gazing longingly at him as if they might +draw him between the bars to her. She brought a chicken, some +oranges, dulces and a loaf of white bread. A soldier inspected +the food, and passed it in to Dicky. Pasa spoke calmly, as she always +did, briefly, in her thrilling, flute-like tones. "Angel of my life," +she said, "let it not be long that thou art away from me. Thou +knowest that life is not a thing to be endured with thou not at +my side. Tell me if I can do aught in this matter. If not, I will +wait--a little while. I come again in the morning." + +Dicky, with his shoes removed so as not to disturb his fellow +prisoners, tramped the floor of the jail half the night condemning +his lack of money and the cause of it--whatever that might have been. +He knew very well that money would have brought his release at once. + +For two days succeeding Pasa came at the appointed times and brought +him food. He eagerly inquired each time if a letter or package had +come for him, and she mournfully shook her head. + +On the morning of the third day she brought only a small loaf of +bread. There were dark circles under her eyes. She seemed as calm +as ever. + +"By jingo," said Dicky, who seemed to speak in English or Spanish as +the whim seized him, "this is dry provender, ~muchachita~. Is this +the best you can dig up for a fellow?" + +Pasa looked at him as a mother looks at a beloved but capricious babe. + +"Think better of it," she said, in a low voice; "since for the next +meal there will be nothing. The last ~centavo~ is spent." She +pressed closer against the grating. + +"Sell the goods in the shop--take anything for them." + +"Have I not tried? Did I not offer them for one-tenth their cost? +Not even one ~peso~ would any one give. There is not one ~real~ in +this town to assist Dickee Malonee." + +Dick clenched his teeth grimly. 'That's the ~comandante~," he growled. +"He's responsible for that sentiment. Wait, oh, wait till the cards +are all out." + +Pasa lowered her voice to almost a whisper. "And, listen, heart of +my heart," she said, "I have endeavored to be brave, but I cannot +live without thee. Three days now--" + +Dicky caught a faint gleam of steel from the folds of her mantilla. +For once she looked in his face and saw it without a smile, stern, +menacing and purposeful. Then he suddenly raised his hand and his +smile came back like a gleam of sunshine. The hoarse signal of an +incoming steamer's siren sounded in the harbor. Dicky called to +the sentry who was pacing before the door: "What steamer comes?" + +"The ~Catarina~." + +"Of the Vesuvius line?" + +"Without doubt, of that line." + +"Go you, ~picarilla~, "said Dicky joyously to Pasa, "to the American +consul. Tell him I wish to speak with him. See that he comes +at once. And look you! let me see a different look in those eyes, +for I promise your head shall rest upon this arm tonight. + +It was an hour before the consul came. He held his green umbrella +under his arm, and mopped his forehead impatiently. + +"Now, see here, Maloney, "he began, captiously, "you fellows seem +to think you can cut up any kind of row, and expect me to pull you out +of it. I'm neither the War Department nor a gold mine. This country +has its laws, you know, and there's one against pounding the senses +out of the regular army. You Irish are forever getting into trouble. +I don't see what I can do. Anything like tobacco, now, to make you +comfortable--or newspapers--" + +"Son of Eli," interrupted Dicky, gravely, "you haven't changed +an iota. That is almost a duplicate of the speech you made when old +Koen's donkeys and geese got into the chapel loft, and the culprits +wanted to hide in your room." + +"Oh, heavens!" exclaimed the consul, hurriedly adjusting his +spectacles. "Are you a Yale man, too? Were you in that crowd? +I don't seem to remember any one with red--any one named Maloney. + Such a lot of college men seem to have misused their advantages. + One of the best mathematicians of the class of '91 is selling +lottery tickets in Belize. A Cornell man dropped off here last +month. He was second steward on a guano boat. I'll write to +the department if you like, Maloney. Or if there's any tobacco, +or newspa--" + +'There's nothing," interrupted Dicky, shortly, "but this. You go +tell the captain of the ~Catarina~ that Dicky Maloney wants to see +him as soon as he can conveniently come. Tell him where I am. +Hurry. That's all." + +The consul, glad to be let off so easily, hurried away. The captain +of the ~Catarina~, a stout man, Sicilian born, soon appeared, +shoving, with little ceremony, through the guards to the jail door. +The Vesuvius Fruit Company had a habit of doing things that way +in Anchuria. + +"I am exceeding sorry--exceeding sorry," said the captain, "to see +this occur. I place myself at your service, Mr. Maloney. What you +need shall be furnished. Whatever you say shall be done." + +Dicky looked at him unsmilingly. His red hair could not detract +from his attitude of severe dignity as he stood, tall and calm, with +his now grim mouth forming a horizontal line. + +"Captain De Lucco, I believe I still have funds in the hands of your +company--ample and personal funds. I ordered a remittance last week. +The money has not arrived. You know what is needed in this game. +Money and money and more money. Why has it not been sent?" + +"By the ~Cristobal~," replied De Lucco, gesticulating, "it was +despatched. Where is the ~Cristobal~? Off Cape Antonio I spoke +her with a broken shaft. A tramp coaster was towing her back to New +Orleans. I brought money ashore thinking your need for it might not +withstand delay. In this envelope is one thousand dollars. There +is more if you need it, Mr. Maloney." + +"For the present it will suffice," said Dicky, softening as he +crinkled the envelope and looked down at the half-inch thickness +of smooth, dingy bills. + +"The long green!" he said, gently, with a new reverence in his gaze. +"Is there anything it will not buy, Captain?" + +"I had three friends," replied De Lucco, who was a bit of +a philosopher, "who had money. One of them speculated in stocks +and made ten million; another is in heaven, and the third married +a poor girl whom he loved." + +"The answer, then," said Dicky, "is held by the Almighty, Wall +Street, and Cupid. So, the question remains." + +"This," queried the captain, including Dicky's surroundings in +a significant gesture of his hand, "is it--it is notiit is not +connected with the business of your little shop? There is no +failure in your plans?" + +"No, no," said Dicky. "This is merely the result of a little private +affair of mine, a digression from the regular line of business. +They say for a complete life a man must know poverty, love, and war. +But they don't go well together, ~capitan mio~. No; there is no +failure in my business. The little shop is doing very well." + +When the captain had departed Dicky called the sergeant of the jail +squad and asked: + +"Am I ~preso~ by the military or by the civil authority?" + +"Surely there is no martial law in effect now, senor." + +"~Bueno~. Now go or send to the ~alcalde~, the ~Juez de la Paz~ +and the ~Jefe de los Policios~. Tell them I am prepared at once to +satisfy the demands of justice." A folded bill of the "long green" +slid into the sergeant's hand. + +Then Dicky's smile came back again, for he knew that the hours of +his captivity were numbered; and he hummed, in time with the sentry's +tread: + + "They're hanging men and women now, + For lacking of the green." + +So, that night Dicky sat by the window of the room over his shop an +his little saint sat close by, working at something silken and dainty. +Dicky was thoughtful and grave. His red hair was in an unusual +state of disorder. Pasa's fingers often ached to smooth and arrange +it, but Dicky would never allow it. He was poring, tonight, over +a great litter of maps and books and papers on his table until that +perpendicular line came between his brows that always distressed Pasa. +Presently she went and brought his hat, and stood with it until he +looked up, inquiringly. + +"It is sad for you here," she explained. "Go out and drink ~vino +blanco~. Come back when you get that smile you used to wear. +That is what I wish to see." + +Dicky laughed and threw down his papers. "The ~vino blanco~ stage +is past. It has served its turn. Perhaps, after all, there was less +entered my mouth and more my ears than people thought. But, there +will be no more maps or frowns tonight. I promise you that. Come." + +They sat upon a reed ~silleta~ at the window and watched the quivering +gleams from the lights of the ~Catarina~ reflected in the harbor. + +Presently Pasa rippled out one of her infrequent chirrups of audible +laughter. + +"I was thinking," she began, anticipating Dicky's question, "of +the foolish things girls have in their minds. Because I went to +school in the States I used to have ambitions. Nothing less than +to be the president's wife would satisfy me. And, look, thou red +picaroon, to what obscure fate thou hast stolen me!" + +"Don't give up hope," said Dicky, smiling. "More than one Irishman +has been the ruler of a South American country. There was a dictator +of Chili named O'Higgins. Why not a President Maloney, of Anchuria? +Say the word, ~santita mia~, and we'll make the race." + +"No, no, no, thou red-haired, reckless one!" sighed Pasa; "I am +content"--she laid her head against his arm--"here." + + + +XVI + +Rouge et Noir + +It has been indicated that disaffection followed the elevation of +Losada to the presidency. This feeling continued to grow. Throughout +the entire republic there seemed to be a spirit of silent, sullen +discontent. Even the old Liberal party to which Goodwin, Zavalla and +other patriots had lent their aid was disappointed. Losada had failed +to become a popular idol. Fresh taxes, fresh import duties and, +more than all, his tolerance of the outrageous oppression of citizens +by the military had rendered him the most obnoxious president since +the despicable Alforan. The majority of his own cabinet were out +of sympathy with him. The army, which he had courted by giving it +license to tyrannize, had been his main, and thus far adequate, +support. + +But the most impolitic of the administration's moves had been when +it antagonized the Vesuvius Fruit Company, an organization plying +twelve steamers with a cash capital somewhat larger than Anchuria's +surplus and debt combined. + +Reasonably, an established concern like the Vesuvius would become +irritated at having a small, retail republic with no rating at all +attempt to squeeze it. So, when the government proxies applied for +a subsidy they encountered a polite refusal. The president at once +retaliated by clapping an export duty of one ~real~ per bunch on +bananas--a thing unprecedented in fruit-growing countries. The +Vesuvius Company had invested large sums in wharves and plantations +along the Anchurian coast, their agents had erected fine homes in +the towns where they had their headquarters, and heretofore had worked +with the republic in good-will and with advantage to both. It would +lose an immense sum if compelled to move out. The selling price of +bananas from Vera Cruz to Trinidad was three ~reales~ per bunch. +This new duty of one ~real~ would have ruined the fruit growers in +Anchuria and have seriously discommoded the Vesuvius Company had it +declined to pay it. But for some reason, the Vesuvius continued to +buy Anchurian fruit, paying four ~reals~ for it; and not suffering +the growers to bear the loss. + +This apparent victory deceived His Excellency; and he began to hunger +for more of it. He sent an emissary to request a conference with a +representative of the fruit company. The Vesuvius sent Mr. Franzoni, +a little, stout, cheerful man, always cool, and whistling airs from +Verdi's operas. Senor Espirition, of the office of the Minister +of Finance, attempted the sandbagging in behalf of Anchuria. The +meeting took place in the cabin of the ~Salvador~, of the Vesuvius +line. + +Senor Espirition opened negotiations by announcing that the government +contemplated the building of a railroad to skirt the alluvial coast +lands. After touching upon the benefits such a road would confer upon +the interests of the Vesuvius, he reached the definite suggestion that +a contribution to the road's expenses of, say, fifty thousand ~pesos~ +would not be more than an equivalent to benefits received. + +Mr. Franzoni denied that his company would receive any benefits +from a contemplated road. As its representative he must decline +to contribute fifty thousand ~pesos~. But he would assume +the responsibility of offering twenty-five. + +Did Senor Espirition understand Senor Franzoni to mean twenty-five +thousand ~pesos~? + +By no means. Twenty-five ~pesos~. And in silver, not in gold. + +"Your offer insults my government," cried Senor Espirition, rising, +with indignation. + +"Then," said Mr. Franzoni, in warning tone, "~we will change it.~" + +The offer was never changed. Could Mr. Franzoni have meant the +government? + +This was the state of affairs in Anchuria when the winter season +opened at Coralio at the end of the second year of Losada's +administration. So, when the government and society made its annual +exodus to the seashore it was evident that the presidential advent +would not be celebrated by unlimited rejoicing. The tenth of November +was the day set for the entrance into Coralio of the gay company +from the capital. A narrow-gauge railroad runs twenty miles into +the interior from Solitas. The government party travels by carriage +from San Mateo to this road's terminal point, and proceeds by train +to Solitas. From here they march in grand procession to Coralio +where, on the day of their coming, festivities and ceremonies abound. +But this season saw an ominous dawning of the tenth of November. + +Although the rainy season was over, the day seemed to hark back to +reeking June. A fine drizzle of rain fell all during the forenoon. +The procession entered Coralio amid a strange silence. + +President Losada was an elderly man, grizzly bearded, with +a considerable ratio of Indian blood revealed in his cinnamon +complexion. His carriage headed the procession, surrounded +and guarded by Captain Cruz and his famous troop of one hundred +light horse "~El Ciento Huilando~." Colonel Rocas followed, +with a regiment of the regular army. + +The president's sharp, beady eyes glanced about him for the expected +demonstration of welcome; but he faced a stolid, indifferent array +of citizens. Sightseers the Anchurians are by birth and habit, and +they turned out to their last able-bodied unit to witness the scene; +but they maintained an accusive silence. They crowded the streets +to the very wheel ruts; they covered the red tile roofs to the eaves, +but there was never a "~viva~" from them. No wreaths of palm +and lemon branches or gorgeous strings of paper roses hung from +the windows and balconies as was the custom. There was an apathy, +a dull, dissenting disapprobation, that was the more ominous because +it puzzled. No one feared an outburst, a revolt of the discontents, +for they had no leader. The president and those loyal to him had +never even heard whispered a name among them capable of crystallizing +the dissatisfaction into opposition. No, there could be no danger. +The people always procured a new idol before they destroyed an old +one. + +At length, after a prodigious galloping and curvetting of red-sashed +majors, gold-laced colonels and epauletted generals, the procession +formed for its annual progress down the Calle Grande to the Casa +Morena, where the ceremony of welcome to the visiting president +always took place. + +The Swiss band led the line of march. After it pranced the local +~comandante~, mounted, and a detachment of his troops. Next came +a carriage with four members of the cabinet, conspicuous among them +the Minister of War, old General Pilar, with his white moustache +and his soldierly bearing. Then the president's vehicle, containing +also the Ministers of Finance and State; and surrounded by +Captain Cruz's light horse formed in a close double file of fours. +Following them, the rest of the officials of state, the judges and +distinguished military and social ornaments of public and private +life. + +As the band struck up, and the movement began, like a bird of +ill-omen the ~Valhalla~, the swiftest steamship of the Vesuvius line, +glided into the harbor in plain view of the president and his train. +Of course, there was nothing menacing about its arrival--a business +firm does not go to war with a nation--but it reminded Senor +Espirition and others in those carriages that the Vesuvius Fruit +Company was undoubtedly carrying something up its sleeve for them. + +By the time the van of the procession had reached the government +building, Captain Cronin, of the ~Valhalla~, and Mr. Vincenti, +member of the Vesuvius Company, had landed and were pushing their +way, bluff, hearty and nonchalant, through the crowd on the narrow +sidewalk. Clad in white linen, big, debonair, with an air of +good-humored authority, they made conspicuous figures among the dark +mass of unimposing Anchurians, as they penetrated to within a few +yards of the steps of the Casa Morena. Looking easily above +the heads of the crowd, they perceived another that towered above +the undersized natives. It was the fiery poll of Dicky Maloney +against the wall close by the lower step; and his broad, seductive +grin showed that he recognized their presence. + +Dicky had attired himself becomingly for the festive occasion in +a well-fitting black suit. Pasa was close by his side, her head +covered with the ubiquitous black mantilla. Mr. Vincenti looked +at her attentively. + +"Botticelli's Madonna, he remarked, gravely. "I wonder when she +got into the game. I don't like his getting tangled with the women. +I hoped he would keep away from them." + +Captain Cronin's laugh almost drew attention from the parade. + +"With that head of hair! Keep away from the women! And a Maloney! +Hasn't he got a license? But, nonsense aside, what do you think of +the prospects? It's a species of filibustering out of my line." + +Vincenti glanced again at Dicky's head and smiled. "~Rouge et noir~," +he said. "There you have it. Make your play, gentlemen. Our money +is on the red." + +"The lad's game," said Cronin, with a commending look at the tall, +easy figure by the steps. "But 'tis all like fly-by-night theatricals +to me. The talk's bigger than the stage; there's a smell of gasoline +in the air, and they're their own audience and scene-shifters." + +They ceased talking, for General Pilar had descended from the first +carriage and had taken his stand upon the top step of Casa Morena. +As the oldest member of the cabinet, custom had decreed that he should +make the address of welcome, presenting the keys of the official +residence to the president at its close. + +General Pilar was one of the most distinguished citizens of the +republic. Hero of three wars and innumerable revolutions, he was +an honored guest at European courts and camps. An eloquent speaker +and a friend to the people, he represented the highest type of +the Anchurians. + +Holding in his hand the gilt keys of Casa Morena, he began his address +in a historical form, touching upon each administration and the +advance of civilization and prosperity from the first dim striving +after liberty down to present times. Arriving at the regime of +President Losada, at which point, according to precedent, he should +have delivered a eulogy upon its wise conduct and the happiness of +the people, General Pilar paused. Then he silently held up the bunch +of keys high above his head, with his eyes closely regarding it. +The ribbon with which they were bound fluttered in the breeze. + +"It still blows," cried the speaker, exultantly. "Citizens of +Anchuria, give thanks to the saints this night that our air is +still free." + +Thus disposing of Losada's administration, he abruptly reverted +to that of Olivarra, Anchuria's most popular ruler. Olivarra had +been assassinated nine years before while in the prime of life and +usefulness. A faction of the Liberal party led by Losada himself +had been accused of the deed. Whether guilty or not, it was eight +years before the ambitious and scheming Losada had gained his goal. + +Upon this theme General Pilar's eloquence was loosed. He drew the +picture of the beneficent Olivarra with a loving hand. He reminded +the people of the peace, the security and the happiness they had +enjoyed during that period. He recalled in vivid detail and with +significant contrast the last winter sojourn of President Olivarra +in Coralio, when his appearance at their fiestas was the signal +for thundering vivas of love and approbation. + +The first public expression of sentiment from the people that day +followed. A low, sustained murmur went among them like the surf +rolling along the shore. + +"Ten dollars to a dinner at the Saint Charles," remarked Mr. Vincenti, +"that rouge wins." + +"I never bet against my own interests," said Captain Cronin, lighting +a cigar. "Long-winded old boy for his age. What's he talking about?" + +"My Spanish," replied Vincenti, "runs about ten words to the minute; +his is something around two hundred. Whatever he s saying, he's +getting them warmed up." + +"Friends and brothers," General Pilar was saying, "could I reach out +my hand this day across the lamentable silence of the grave to +Olivarra the Good, to the ruler who was one of you, whose tears fell +when you sorrowed and whose smile followed your joy--I would bring him +back to you, but--Olivarra is dead--dead at the hands of a craven +assassin!" + +The speaker turned and gazed boldly into the carriage of the +president. His arm remained extended aloft as if to sustain his +peroration. The president was listening aghast, at this remarkable +address of welcome. He was sunk back upon his seat, trembling with +rage and dumb surprise, his dark hands tightly gripping the carriage +cushions. + +Half rising, he extended one arm toward the speaker and shouted +a harsh command at Captain Cruz. The leader of the "Flying Hundred" +sat his horse, immovable, with folded arms, giving no sign of having +heard. Losada sank back again, his dark features distinctly paling. + +Who says that Olivarra is dead?" suddenly cried the speaker, +his voice, old as he was, sounding like a battle trumpet. His body +lies in the grave, but to the people he loved he has bequeathed +his spirit--yes, more--his learning, his courage, his kindness--yes, +more--his youth, his image--people of Anchuria, have you forgotten +Ramon, the son of Olivarra?" + +Cronin and Vincenti, watching closely, saw Dicky Maloney suddenly +raise his hat, tear off his shock of red hair, leap up the steps +and stand at the side of General Pilar. The Minister of War laid +his arm across the young man's shoulders. All who had known President +Olivarra saw again his same lion-like pose, the same frank, undaunted +expression, the same high forehead with the peculiar line of +the clustering, crisp black hair. + +General Pilar was an experienced orator. He seized the moment +of breathless silence that preceded the storm. + +"Citizens of Anchuria," he trumpeted, holding aloft the keys of Casa +Morena, "I am here to deliver these keys--the keys to your homes and +liberty--to your chosen president. Shall I deliver them to Enrico +Olivarra's assassin, or to his son?" + +"Olivarra! Olivarra!" the crowd shrieked and howled. All vociferated +the magic name--men, women, children and the parrots. + +And the enthusiasm was not confined to the blood of the plebs. +Colonel Rocas ascended the steps and laid his sword theatrically +at young Ramon Olivarra's feet. Four members of the cabinet embraced +him. Captain Cruz gave a command, and twenty of ~El Ciento Huilando~ +dismounted and arranged themselves in a cordon about the steps +of Casa Morena. + +But Ramon Olivarra seized that moment to prove himself a born +genius and politician. He waved those soldiers aside, and descended +the steps to the street. There, without losing his dignity or +the distinguished elegance that the loss of his red hair brought +him, betook the proletariat to his bosom--the barefooted, the dirty, +Indians, Caribs, babies, beggars, old, young, saints, soldiers +and sinners--he missed none of them. + +While this act of the drama was being presented, the scene shifters +had been busy at the duties that had been assigned to them. Two +of Cruz's dragoons had seized the bridle reins of Losada's horses; +others formed a close guard around the carriage; and they galloped +off with the tyrant and his two unpopular Ministers. No doubt a place +had been prepared for them. There are a number of well-barred stone +apartments in Coralio. + +"~Rouge~ wins," said Mr. Vincenti, calmly lighting another cigar. + +Captain Cronin had been intently watching the vicinity of the stone +steps for some time. + +"Good boy!" he exclaimed suddenly, as if relieved. "I wondered if +he was going to forget his Kathleen Mavourneen." + +Young Olivarra had reascended the steps and spoken a few words to +General Pilar. Then that distinguished veteran descended to the +ground and approached Pasa, who still stood, wonder-eyed, where Dicky +had left her. With his plumed hat in his hand, and his medals and +decorations shining on his breast, the general spoke to her and gave +her his arm, and they went up the stone steps of the Casa Morena +together. And then Ramon Olivarra stepped forward and took both +her hands before all the people. + +And while the cheering was breaking out afresh everywhere, Captain +Cronin and Mr. Vincenti turned and walked back toward the shore where +the gig was waiting for them. + +"There'll be another '~presidente proclamada~' in the morning," said +Mr. Vincenti, musingly. "As a rule they are not as reliable as the +elected ones, but this youngster seems to have some good stuff in him. +He planned and maneuvered the entire campaign. Olivarra's widow, +you know, was wealthy. After her husband was assassinated she went +to the States, and educated her son at Yale. The Vesuvius Company +hunted him up, and backed him in the little game." + +"It's a glorious thing," said Cronin, half jestingly, "to be able +to discharge a government, and insert one of your own choosing, in +these days." + +"Oh, it is only amatter of business," said Vincenti, stopping and +offering the stump of his cigar to a monkey that swung down from +a lime tree; "and that is what moves the world of today. That extra +real on the price of bananas had to go. We took the shortest way +of removing it." + + + +XVII + +Two Recalls + +There remains three duties to be performed before the curtain falls +upon the patched comedy. Two have been promised: the third is no +less obligatory. + +It was set forth in the program of this tropic vaudeville that +it would be made known why Shorty 0'Day, of the Columbia Detective +Agency, lost his position. Also that Smith should come again to tell +us what mystery he followed that night on the shores of Anchuria when +he strewed so many cigar stumps around the coconut palm during his +lonely night vigil on the beach. These things were promised; but +a bigger thing yet remains to be accomplished--the clearing up of a +seeming wrong that has been done according to the array of chronicled +facts (truthfully set forth) that have been presented. And one voice, +speaking, shall do these three things. + +Two men sat on a stringer of a North River pier in the City of New +York. A steamer from the tropics had begun to unload bananas and +oranges on the pier. Now and then a banana or two would fall from +an overripe bunch, and one of the two men would shamble forward, +seize the fruit and return to share it with his companion. + +One of the men was in the ultimate stage of deterioration. As far as +rain and wind and sun could wreck the garments he wore, it had been +done. In his person the ravages of drink were as plainly visible. +And yet, upon his high-bridged, rubicund nose was jauntily perched +a pair of shining and flawless gold-rimmed glasses. + +The other man was not so far gone upon the descending Highway of the +Incompetents. Truly, the flower of his manhood had gone to seed--seed +that, perhaps, no soil might sprout. But there were still cross-cuts +along where he travelled through which he might yet regain the pathway +of usefulness without disturbing the slumbering Miracles. This man +was short and compactly built. He had an oblique, dead eye, like +that of a sting-ray, and the moustache of a cocktail mixer. We know +the eye and the moustache; we know that Smith of the luxurious yacht, +the gorgeous raiment, the mysterious mission, the magic disappearance, +has come again, though shorn of the accessories of his former state. + +At his third banana, the man with the nose glasses spat it from him +with a shudder. + +"Deuce take all fruit!" he remarked, in a patrician tone of disgust. +"I lived for two years where these things grow. The memory of their +taste lingers with you. The oranges are not so bad. Just see if you +can gather a couple of them, O'Day, when the next broken crate comes +up." + +Did you live down with the monkeys?" asked the other, made tepidly +garrulous by the sunshine and the alleviating meal of juicy fruit. +"I was down there, once myself. But only for a few hours. That was +when I was with the Columbia Detective Agency. The monkey people +did me up. I'd have my job yet if it hadn't been for them. I'll +tell you about it. + +"One day the chief sent a note around to the office that read: 'Send +O'Day here at once for a big piece of business.' I was the crack +detective of the agency at that time. They always handed me the big +jobs. The address the chief wrote from was down in the Wall Street +district. + +"When I got there I found him in a private office with a lot of +directors who were looking pretty fuzzy. They stated the case. +The president of the Republic Insurance Company had skipped with +about a tenth of a million dollars in cash. The directors wanted +him back pretty bad, but they wanted the money worse. They said +they needed it. They had traced the old gent's movements to where +he boarded a tramp fruit steamer bound for South America that same +morning with his daughter and a big gripsack--all the family +he had. + +"One of the directors had his steam yacht coaled and with steam up, +ready for a trip; and he turned her over to me, cart blongsh. In +four hours I was on board of her, and hot on the trail of the fruit +tub. I had a pretty good idea where old Wahrfield--that was his name, +J. Churchill Wahrfield--would head for. At that time we had a treaty +with about every foreign country except Belgium and that banana +republic, Anchuria. There wasn't a photo of old Wahrfield to be +had in New York--he had been foxy there--but I had his description. +And besides, the lady with him would be a dead-give-away anywhere. +She was one of the high-flyers in Society--not the kind that have +their pictures in the Sunday papers--but the real sort that open +chrysanthemum shows and christen battleships. + +"Well, sir, we never got a sight of that fruit tub on the road. +The ocean is a pretty big place; and I guess we took different +paths across it. But we kept going toward this Anchuria, where +the fruiter was bound for. + +"We struck the monkey coast one afternoon about four. There was a +ratty-looking steamer off shore taking on bananas. The monkeys were +loading her up with big barges. It might be the one the old man had +taken, and it might not. I went ashore to look around. The scenery +was pretty good. I never saw any finer on the New York stage. +I struck an American on shore, a big, cool chap, standing around +with the monkeys. He showed me the consul's office. The consul was +a nice young fellow. He said the fruiter was the ~Karlsefin~, running +generally to New Orleans, but took her last cargo to New York. Then +I was sure my people were on board, although everybody told me that +no passengers had landed. I didn't think they would land until after +dark, for they might have been shy about it on account of seeing that +yacht of mine hanging around. So, all I had to do was to wait and nab +'em when they came ashore. I couldn't arrest old Wahrfield without +extradition papers, but my play was to get the cash. They generally +give up if you strike 'em when they're tired and rattled and short +on nerve. + +"After dark I sat under a coconut tree on the beach for a while, +and then I walked around and investigated that town some, and it was +enough to give you the lions. If a man could stay in New York and be +honest, he'd better do it than to hit that monkey town with a million. + +"Dinky little mud houses; grass over your shoe tops in the streets; +ladies in low-neck-and-short-sleeves walking around smoking cigars; +tree-frogs rattling like a hose cart going to a ten blow; big +mountains dropping gravel in the back yards, and the sea licking +the paint off in front--no, sir--a man had better be in God's country +living on free lunch than there. + +"The main street ran along the beach, and I walked down it, and +then turned up a kind of lane where the houses were made of poles +and straw. I wanted to see what the monkeys did when they weren't +climbing coconut trees. The very first shack I looked in I saw my +people. They must have come ashore while I was promenading. A man +about fifty, smooth face, heavy eyebrows, dressed in black broadcloth, +looking like he was just about to say, "Can any little boy in the +Sunday school answer that?' He was freezing on to a grip that weighed +like a dozen gold bricks, and a swell girl--a regular peach, with +a Fifth Avenue cut--was sitting on a wooden chair. An old black woman +was fixing some coffee and beans on a table. The light they had come +from a lantern hung on a nail. I went and stood in the door, and they +looked at me, and I said: + +"Mr. Wahrfield, you are my prisoner. I hope, for the lady's sake, +you will take the matter sensibly. You know why I want you.' + +"'Who are you?' says the old gent. + +"'O'Day,' says I, 'of the Columbia Detective Agency. And now, sir, +let me give you a piece of good advice. You go back and take your +medicine like a man. Hand 'em back the boodle; and maybe they'll let +you off light. Go back easy, and I'll put in a word for you. I'll +give you five minutes to decide." I pulled out my watch and waited. + +"Then the young lady chipped in. She was one of the genuine +high-steppers. You could tell by the way her clothes fit and +the style she had that Fifth Avenue was made for her. + +"'Come inside,' she says. 'Don't stand in the door and disturb the +whole street with that suit of clothes. Now, what is it you want?' + +"'Three minutes gone,' I said. 'I'll tell you again while the other +two tick off.' + +"'You'll admit being the president of the Republic, won't you?' + +"'I am,' says he. + + +'Well, then,' says I, 'it ought to be plain to you. Wanted, in +New York, J. Churchill Wahrfield, president of the Republic Insurance +Company. + +"'Also the funds belonging to said company, now in that grip, in +the unlawful possession of said J. Churchill Wahrfield.' + +"'Oh-h-h-h!' says the young lady, as if she was thinking, 'you want +to take us back to New York?' + +"'To take Mr. Wahrfield. There's no charge against you, miss. +There'll be no objection, of course, to your returning with your +father.' + +"Of a sudden the girl gave a tiny scream and grabbed the old boy +around the neck. 'Oh, father, father!' she says, kind of contralto, +'can this be true? Have you taken money that is not yours? Speak, +father!' It made you shiver to hear the tremolo stop she put on her +voice. + +"The old boy looked pretty bughouse when she first grappled him, +but she went on, whispering in his ear and patting his offshoulder +till he stood still, but sweating a little. + +"She got him to one side and they talked together a minute, and then +he put on some gold eyeglasses and walked up and handed me the grip. + +"'Mr. Detective,' he says, talking a little broken, 'I conclude +to return with you. I have finished to discover that life on this +desolate and displeased coast would be worse than to die, itself. +I will go back and hurl myself upon the mercy of the Republic Company. +Have you brought a sheep?' + +"'Sheep!' says I; 'I haven't a single--' + +"'Ship,' cut in the young lady. 'Don't get funny. Father is of +German birth, and doesn't speak perfect English. How did you come +up?' + +"The girl was all broke up. She had a handkerchief to her face, +and kept saying every little bit, '0h, father, father!' She walked +up to me and laid her lily-white hand on the clothes that had pained +her at first. I smelt a million violets. She was a lulu. I told +her I came in a private yacht. + +"'Mr. O'Day,' she says. 'Oh, take us away from this horrid country +at once. Can you! Will you! Say you will.' + +"'I'll try,' I said, concealing the fact that I was dying to get them +on salt water before they could change their mind. + +"One thing they both kicked against was going through the town to +the boat landing. Said they dreaded publicity, and now that they +were going to return, they had a hope that the thing might yet be +kept out of the papers. They swore they wouldn't go unless I got +them out to the yacht without any one knowing it, so I agreed +to humor them. + +"The sailors who rowed me ashore were playing billiards in a bar-room +near the water, waiting for orders, and I proposed to have them take +the boat down the beach half a mile or so, and take us up there. +How to get them word was the question, for I couldn't leave the grip +with the prisoner, and I couldn't take it with me, not knowing but +what the monkeys might stick me up. + +"The young lady says the old colored woman would take them a note. +I sat down and wrote it, and gave it to the dame with plain directions +what to do, and she grins like a baboon and shakes her head. + +"Then Mr. Wahrfield handed her a string of foreign dialect, and she +nods her head and says, 'See, senor' maybe fifty times, and lights +out with the note. + +"'0ld Augusta only understands German,' said Miss Wahrfield, smiling +at me. 'We stopped in her house to ask where we could find lodging, +and she insisted upon our having coffee. She tells us she was raised +in a German family in San Domingo.' + +"'Very likely,' I said. 'But you can search me for German words, +except ~nix verstay~ and ~noch einst~, I would have called that +"See, senor" French, though, on a gamble.' + +"Well, we three made a sneak around the edge of town so as not to +be seen. We got tangled in vines and ferns and the banana bushes +and tropical scenery a good deal. The monkey suburbs was as wild +as places in Central Park. We came out on the beach a good half +mile below. A brown chap was lying asleep under a coconut tree, +with a ten-foot musket beside him. Mr. Wahrfield takes up the gun +and pitches it into the sea. 'The coast is guarded,' he says. +'Rebellion and plots ripen like fruit.' He pointed to the sleeping +man, who never stirred. 'Thus,' he says, 'they perform trusts. +Children!' + +"I saw our boat coming, and I struck a match and lit a piece of +newspaper to show them where we were. In thirty minutes we were +on board the yacht. + +"The first thing, Mr. Wahrfield and his daughter and I took the grip +into the owner's cabin, opened it up, and took an inventory. There +was one hundred and five thousand dollars. United States treasury +notes in it, besides a lot of diamond jewelry and a couple of hundred +Havana cigars. I gave the old man the cigars and a receipt for the +rest of the lot, as agent for the company, and locked the stuff up +in my private quarters. + +"I never had a pleasanter trip than that one. After we got to sea +the young lady turned out to be the jolliest ever. The very first +time we sat down to dinner, and the steward filled her glass with +champagne--that director's yacht was a regular floating Waldorf- +Astoria--she winks at me and says, 'What's the use to borrow trouble, +Mr. Fly Cop? Here's hoping you may live to eat the hen that scratches +on your grave.' There was a piano on board, and she sat down to it +and sung better than you give up two cases to hear plenty times. She +knew about nine operas clean through. She was sure enough ~bon ton~ +and swell. She wasn't one of the 'among others present' kind; she +belonged on the special mention list! + +"The old man, too, perked up amazingly on the way. He passed the +cigars, and says to me once, quite chipper, out of a cloud of smoke, +'Mr. O'Day, somehow I think the Republic Company will not give me +the much trouble. Guard well the gripvalise of the money, Mr. O'Day, +for that it must be returned to them that it belongs when we finish +to arrive.' + +"When we landed in New York I 'phoned to the chief to meet us in +that director's office. We got in a cab and went there. I carried +the grip, and we walked in, and I was pleased to see that the chief +had got together that same old crowd of moneybugs with pink faces +and white vests to see us march in. I set the grip on the table. +'There's the money,' I said. + +"'And your prisoner?' said the chief. + +"I pointed to Mr. Wahrfield, and he stepped forward and says: + +"'The honor of a word with you, sir, to explain.' + +"He and the chief went into another room and stayed ten minutes. +When they came back the chief looked as black as a ton of coal. + +"'Did this gentleman,' he says to me, 'have this valise in +his possession when you first saw him?' + +"'He did,' said I. + +"The chief took up the grip and handed it to the prisoner with +a bow, and says to the director crowd: 'Do any of you recognize +this gentleman?' + +"They all shook their pink faces. + +"'Allow me to present,' he goes on, 'Senor Miraflores, president +of the republic of Anchuria. The senor has generously consented +to overlook this outrageous blunder, on condition that we undertake +to secure him against the annoyance of public comment. It is a +concession on his part to overlook an insult for which he might +claim international redress. I think we can gratefully promise him +secrecy in the matter.' + +"They gave him a pink nod all round. + +"'O'Day,' he says to me. 'As a private detective you're wasted. +In a war, where kidnapping governments is in the rules, you'd be +invaluable. Come down to the office at eleven.' + +"I knew what that meant. + +"'So that's the president of the monkeys,' says I. 'Well, +why couldn't he have said so?' + +"Wouldn't it jar you?" + + + +XVIII + +The Vitagraphoscope + +Vaudeville is intrinsically episodic and discontinuous. Its audiences +do not demand denouements. Sufficient unto each "turn" is the evil +thereof. No one cares how many romances the singing comedienne may +have had if she can capably sustain the limelight and a high note or +two. The audiences reck not if the performing dogs get to the pound +the moment they have jumped through their last hoop. They do not +desire bulletins about the possible injuries received by the comic +cyclist who retires head-first from the stage in a crash of (property) +china-ware. Neither do they consider that their seat coupons entitle +them to be instructed whether or no there is a sentiment between the +lady solo banjoist and the Irish monologist. + +Therefore let us have no lifting of the curtain upon a tableau of +the united lovers, backgrounded by defeated villainy and derogated +by the comic, osculating maid and butler, thrown in as a sop to +the Cerberi of the fifty-cent seats. + +But our program ends with a brief "turn" or two; and then to the +exits. Whoever sits the show out may find, if he will, the slender +thread that binds together, though ever so slightly, the story that, +perhaps, only the Walrus will understand. + + +~Extracts from a letter from the first vice-president of the Republic +Insurance Company, of New York City, to Frank Goodwin, of Coralio, +Republic of Anchuria.~ + +~My Dear Mr. Goodwin:~--Your communication per Messrs. Howland and +Fourchet, of New Orleans, has reached us. Also their draft on N.Y. +for $100,000, the amount abstracted from the funds of this company +by the late J. Churchill Wahrfield, its former president.... The +officers and directors unite in requesting me to express to you their +sincere esteem and thanks for your prompt and much appreciated return +of the entire missing sum within two weeks from the time of its +disappearance.... Can assure you that the matter will not be allowed +to receive the least publicity.... Regret exceedingly the distressing +death of Mr. Wahrfield by his own hand, but... Congratulations on your +marriage to Miss Wahrfield... many charms, winning manners, noble and +womanly nature and envied position in the best metropolitan +society.... + +~Cordially yours, +Lucius E. Applegate,~ +FIRST VICE-PRESIDENT THE REPUBLIC INSURANCE +COMPANY. + + + +~The Vitagraphoscope~ +(Moving Pictures) +~The Last Sausage~ + +SCENE--An Artist's Studio. The artist, a young man of prepossessing +appearance, sits in a dejected attitude, amid a litter of sketches, +with his head resting upon his hand. An oil stove stands on a pine +box in the center of the studio. The artist rises, tightens his waist +belt to another hole, and lights the stove. He goes to a tin bread +box, half-hidden by a screen, takes out a solitary link of sausage, +turns the box upside-down to show that there is no more, and chucks +the sausage into a frying-pan, which he sets upon the stove. +The flame of the stove goes out, showing that there is no more oil. +The artist, in evident despair, seizes the sausage, in a sudden access +of rage, and hurls it violently from him. At the same time a door +opens, and a man who enters receives the sausage forcibly against +his nose. He seems to cry out; and is observed to make a dance step +or two, vigorously. The newcomer is a ruddy-faced, active, keen- +looking man, apparently of Irish ancestry. Next he is observed +to laugh immoderately; he kicks over the stove; he claps the artist +(who is vainly striving to grasp his hand) vehemently upon the back. +Then he goes through a pantomime which to the sufficiently intelligent +spectator reveals that he has acquired large sums of money by trading +pot-metal hatchets and razors to the Indians of the Cordillera +Mountains for gold dust. He draws a roll of money as large as +a small loaf of bread from his pocket, and waves it above his head, +while at the same time he makes pantomime of drinking from a glass. +The artist hurriedly secures his hat, and the two leave the studio +together. + + +~The Writing on the Sands~ + +SCENE--The Beach at Nice. A woman, beautiful, still young, +exquisitely clothed, complacent, poised, reclines near the water, +idly scrawling letters in the sand with the staff of her silken +parasol. The beauty of her face is audacious; her languid pose +is one that you feel to be impermanent--you wait, expectant, for her +to spring or glide or crawl, like a panther that has unaccountably +become stock-still. She idly scrawls in the sand; and the word that +she always writes is "Isabel." A man sits a few yards away. You can +see that they are companions, ever if no longer comrades. His face +is dark and smooth, and almost inscrutable--but not quite. The two +speak little together. The man also scratches on the sand with his +cane. And the word that he writes is "Anchuria." And then he looks +out where the Mediterranean and the sky intermingle with death in +his gaze. + + +~The Wilderness and Thou~ + +SCENE--~The Borders of a Gentleman's Estate in a Tropical Land.~ +An old Indian, with a mahogany-colored face, is trimming the grass +on a grave by a mangrove swamp. Presently he rises to his feet and +walks slowly toward a grove that is shaded by the gathering, brief +twilight. In the edge of the grove stands a man who is stalwart, +with a kind and courteous air, and a woman of a serene and clear-cut +loveliness. When the old Indian comes up to them the man drops money +in his hand. The grave-tender, with the stolid pride of his race, +takes it as his due, and goes his way. The two in the edge of +the grove turn back along the dim pathway, and walk close, close-- +for, after all, what is the world at its best but a little round +field of the moving pictures with two walking together in it? + +CURTAIN + + + + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Cabbages and Kings, by O Henry + diff --git a/old/ckngs10.zip b/old/ckngs10.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..849cf37 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/ckngs10.zip |
