Part 11 (1/2)

The laugh struck the Governor as impertinent.

”Then you must leave by the next mail-steamer, if you have any money to pay your pa.s.sage, or, if you have no money, you must go to work on the roads. Have you any money?”

”If I had, I wouldn't--be a vagrant,” the young man answered. His voice was low and singularly sweet. It seemed to suit the indolence of his att.i.tude and the lazy, inconsequent smile. ”I called on our consular agent here,” he continued, leisurely, ”to write a letter home for money, but he was disgracefully drunk, so I used his official note-paper to write to the State Department about him, instead.”

The Governor's deepest interest was aroused. The American consular agent was one of the severest trials he was forced to endure.

”You are not a British subject, then? Ah, I see--and--er--your representative was unable to a.s.sist you?”

”He was drunk,” the young man repeated, placidly. ”He has been drunk ever since I have been here, particularly in the mornings.”

He halted, as though the subject had lost interest for him, and gazed pleasantly at the sunny bay and up at the moving palms.

”Then,” said the Governor, as though he had not been interrupted, ”as you have no means of support, you will help support the colony until you can earn money to leave it. That will do, sergeant.”

The young man placed his hat upon his head and turned to move away, but at the first step he swayed suddenly and caught at the negro's shoulder, clasping his other hand across his eyes. The sergeant held him by the waist, and looked up at the Governor with some embarra.s.sment.

”The young gentleman has not been well, Sir Charles,” he said, apologetically.

The stranger straightened himself up and smiled vaguely. ”I'm all right,” he murmured. ”Sun's too hot.”

”Sit down,” said the Governor.

He observed the stranger more closely. He noticed now that beneath the tan his face was delicate and finely cut, and that his yellow hair clung closely to a well-formed head.

”He seems faint. Has he had anything to eat?” asked the Governor.

The sergeant grinned guiltily. ”Yes, Sir Charles; we've been feeding him at the barracks. It's fever, sir.”

Sir Charles was not unacquainted with fallen gentlemen, ”beach-combers,”

”remittance men,” and vagrants who had known better days, and there had been something winning in this vagrant's smile, and, moreover, he had reported that thorn in his flesh, the consular agent, to the proper authorities.

He conceived an interest in a young man who, though with naked feet, did not hesitate to correspond with his Minister of Foreign Affairs.

”How long have you been ill?” he asked.

The young man looked up from where he had sunk on the steps, and roused himself with a shrug. ”It doesn't matter,” he said. ”I've had a touch of Chagres ever since I was on the Isthmus. I was at work there on the railroad.”

”Did you come here from Colon?”

”No; I worked up the Pacific side. I was clerking with Rossner Brothers at Amapala for a while, because I speak a little German, and then I footed it over to Puerto Cortez and got a job with the lottery people.

They gave me twenty dollars a month gold for rolling the tickets, and I put it all in the drawing, and won as much as ten.” He laughed, and sitting erect, drew from his pocket a roll of thin green papers. ”These are for the next drawing,” he said. ”Have some?” he added. He held them towards the negro sergeant, who, under the eye of the Governor, resisted, and then spread the tickets on his knee like a hand at cards.

”I stand to win a lot with these,” he said, with a cheerful sigh. ”You see, until the list's published I'm prospectively worth twenty thousand dollars. And,” he added, ”I break stones in the sun.” He rose unsteadily, and saluted the Governor with a nod. ”Good-morning, sir,” he said, ”and thank you.”

”Wait,” Sir Charles commanded. A new form of punishment had suggested itself, in which justice was tempered with mercy. ”Can you work one of your American lawn-mowers?” he asked.

The young man laughed delightedly. ”I never tried,” he said, ”but I've seen it done.”

”If you've been ill, it would be murder to put you on the sh.e.l.l road.” The Governor's dignity relaxed into a smile. ”I don't desire international complications,” he said. ”Sergeant, take this--him--to the kitchen, and tell Corporal Mallon to give him that American lawn-mowing machine. Possibly he may understand its mechanism. Mallon only cuts holes in the turf with it.” And he waved his hand in dismissal, and as the three men moved away he buried himself again in the perplexities of the dog-tax.