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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 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 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 + |