Gold

by White, Stewart Edward

  “He says all Americans sing it. He has taken many up the river.”

  “Too many,” muttered Johnny. “I wish we’d started three months sooner.”

  It was growing dusk when we came in sight of a village of bamboo huts on the right bank. To this we headed. Hardly had the boat struck the beach when both of our men leaped ashore and raced madly toward the huts. Pausing only long enough to slide the boat beyond the grip of the river, we followed, considerably mystified. Quick as we were, we found both the padrone and his man, together with a dozen others, already seated at a monte table. The padrone was acting as banker!

  We discovered the name of this place to be Gatun. Talbot found us a native hut in which were hammocks we could rent for the night. The hut was a two-storied affair, with a notched pole by which to clamber aloft. I took one look and decided to stay below. My weight seemed sufficient to bring the whole thing down about our ears.

  I do not know which had the better of it. My hammock was slung across one corner of the single room. A cooking fire blazed merrily five or six feet away. Some ten or a dozen natives were drinking and talking until nearly morning; and to my personal knowledge some ten or a dozen thousand fleas were doing the same. Six dogs were that hut’s allowance. They discovered that my weight sagged my hammock down to a height just suitable for the rubbing of their backs. In vain I smote with boot or pistol barrel. They kiyied and departed; but only for a moment. I had not even time to fall into a doze before one of the others was back at it. This amused the drinking natives. I suppose the poor beasts very passionately wanted to scratch their backs. I could sympathize with them; none of them could have had as many fleas as I had, for their superficial area was not as great; but perhaps they had as many per square inch.

  In the course of the night it began to rain. I mean really rain, “without going into details as to drops,” as somebody has said. Then I ceased envying my friends upstairs; for from all sounds I judged the roof was leaking.

  Next morning it was still drizzling. The town was full of sad-eyed, wearied men. I think every one had had about the same experience. The padrone was at first a little inclined to delay; but he quickly recognized that our mood was bad, so shortly we were under way.

  That day was not an unmitigated joy. It rained, picking the surface of the river up in little spots and rings. The forest dripped steadily. All the butterflies and bright birds had disappeared; and sullen, shifting clouds fairly touched the treetops. It was cold. Wrap ourselves as we would, we became thoroughly chilled. We should have liked to go ashore for a little fire, or at least a tramp about; but there seemed to be no banks, and the vegetation would not let us approach whatever earth there might be. The padrone and the big negro thrust their heads through holes cut in the middle of their blankets, and seemed happy. Talbot Ward and Yank took it with the philosophy of old campaigners; but Johnny and I had not had experience enough to realize that things have a habit of coming to an end. We were too wet even to smoke.

  That night we spent at a place called Pena Blanca, which differed in no essential from Gatun. We slept there in small sheds, along with twenty or thirty of our ship’s companions wedged tightly together. A dozen other similar sheds adjoined. We were all quarrelsome and disinclined to take much nonsense either from the natives or from each other. Also we needed and wanted food; and we had difficulty in getting it. A dozen incipient quarrels were extinguished because the majority of the crowd would not stand for being bothered by the row. Finally the whole hutful became involved, and it really looked for a moment like a riot. A good deal of bad language flew about, and men seized their weapons. Yank rose to the occasion by appealing to them not “to kick up a muss,” because there was “a lady of our own colour in the next room.” The lady was mythical, but the riot was averted.

  The next day was clearing, with occasional heavy dashing showers, just to keep us interested. The country began more to open up. We passed many grass savannahs dotted with palms and a tree something like our locust. Herds of cattle fed there. The river narrowed and became swifter. Often our men had to lay aside their paddles in favour of the pole or tracking line. Once or twice we landed and walked for a short distance along the banks. At one place we saw several wild turkeys. At another something horrifying, rustling, and reptilian made a dash fairly from between my feet, and rushed flop into the water. The boys claimed I jumped straight upward four feet; but I think it was nearer ten. Talbot said the thing was an iguana. I should like very much to be able to describe it accurately, but my observation was somewhat confused. Beyond the evident fact that it snorted actual fire, I am not prepared to go.

  Along in the early afternoon we reached bolder shores in which the trap rock descended sheer beneath the surface of the water. Directly ahead of us rose a mountain like a cone of verdure. We glided around the base of it, and so came to Gorgona, situated on a high bluff beyond. This we had decided upon as the end of our river journey. To be sure we had bargained for Cruces, six miles beyond; but as the majority of our ship’s companions had decided on that route, we thought the Gorgona trail might be less crowded. So we beached our boat, and unloaded our effects; and set forth to find accommodations for the present, and mules for the immediate future.

  *

  CHAPTER VI

  THE VILLAGE IN THE JUNGLE

  At first there seemed slight chance of getting either. The place was crowded beyond its capacity. The Hotel Française–a shed-and-tent sort of combination with a muddy natural floor–was jammed. The few native huts were crowded. Many we saw making themselves as comfortable as possible amid their effects out in the open. Some we talked with said they had been there for over a week, unable to move because of lack of transportation. They reported much fever; and in fact we saw one poor shaking wretch, wistful-eyed as a sick dog, braced against a tree all alone. The spirit was drained out of him; and all he wanted was to get back.

  While we were discussing what to do next, our muslin-clad ex-padrone, who had been paid and shaken by the hand some time since, approached smoking a longer cigar than ever. This he waved at us in a most debonair and friendly manner.

  “Bread on the water,” commented Talbot after a short conversation. “He says we have treated him like a brother and a true comrade in arms; which means that I did; you fellows, confound your spiteful souls, wanted to throw him overboard a dozen times. And now he says to follow him, and he’ll get us a place to stay.”

  “Some native pig-sty with fleas,” I remarked skeptically, aside, to Johnny.

  “You com’,” begged the padrone, with a flash of teeth.

  We came bearing our household goods, because we could nowhere see any one to bear them for us. At that we had to leave the heaviest pieces on the beach. Talbot insisted on lugging his huge bundle of newspapers.

  “They may come in handy,” he answered us vaguely. “Well, they’re mine, and this is my back,” he countered to Johnny’s and my impatience with such foolishness.

  The padrone led us through town to the outskirts. There we came to a substantial low house of several rooms, with a veranda and veritable chimneys. The earth in front had been beaten so hard that even the downpour of yesterday had not appreciably softened it. To our summons appeared a very suave and courteous figure–that, it appeared, of the alcalde of the place.

  “My fren’,” explained the padrone in English, for our benefit, “they good peepele. They wan’ estay. Got no place estay.”

  The alcalde, a portly gentleman with side whiskers and a great deal of dignity, bowed.

  “My house is all yours,” said he.

  Thus, although arriving late, we stopped at the best quarters in the town. The sense of obligation to any one but our boatman was considerably relieved when next day we paid what we owed for our lodging. Also, had it not been for Talbot and Johnny, I am sure Yank and I would have taken to the jungle. There seemed to be required so much bowing, smiling, punctiliousness and elaborate complimenting that in a short time I felt myself in the prec
ise mental attitude of a very small monkey shaking the bars of his cage with all four hands and gibbering in the face of some benign and infinitely superior professor. I fairly ached behind the ears trying to look sufficiently alert and bland and intelligent. Yank sat stolid, chewed tobacco and spat out of the window, which also went far toward stampeding me. Talbot and Johnny, however, seemed right at home. They capped the old gentleman’s most elaborate and involved speeches, they talked at length and pompously about nothing at all; their smiles were rare and sad and lingering–not a bit like my imbecile though well-meant grinning–and they seemed to be able to stick it out until judgment day. Not until I heard their private language after it was all over did I realize they were not enjoying the occasion thoroughly.

  Toward sunset occurred a welcome break. A mob of natives suddenly burst into view, from the direction of town. They were running madly, led by a very little man and a very big man. The two latter rushed up to the edge of the veranda, on which we were all sitting, and began to talk excitedly, both at once.

  “What’s the row?” we asked Talbot in a breath.

  “Can’t make out yet; something about a fight.”

  The alcalde commanded order. Then the matter became clear. The very large man and the very little man had had a fight, and they had come for justice. This much Talbot made plain. Then he chuckled explosively.

  “The little man is making his accusation against himself!” he told us. “He is charging himself with having assaulted and beaten the other fellow. And the big one is charging himself with having licked the little one. Neither wants to acknowledge he got licked; and each would rather pay a fine and have it entered on the records that he won the fight. So much for sheer vanity!”

  Each had his desire. The alcalde, with beautiful impartiality, fined them both; and nonchalantly pocketed the proceeds.

  At dusk millions of fireflies came out, the earth grew velvet black, and the soft, tepid air breathed up from the river. Lights of the town flickered like larger yellower fireflies through the thin screen of palms and jungle; and the various noises, subdued by distance, mingled with the voices of thousands of insects, and a strange booming from the river. I thought it very pleasant; and wanted to stay out; but for some reason we were haled within. There the lamps made the low broad room very hot. We sat on real chairs and the stilted exchange resumed. I have often wondered whether our host enjoyed it, or whether he did it merely from duty, and was as heartily bored as the rest of us.

  A half-naked servant glided in to tell us that we were wanted in the next room. We found there our good padrone and another, a fine tall man, dressed very elaborately in short jacket and slit loose trousers, all sewn with many silver buttons and ornaments.

  “He my fren’,” explained the padrone. “He have dose mulas.”

  With the gorgeous individual Talbot concluded a bargain. He was to furnish us riding animals at ten dollars each per day; and agreed to transport our baggage at six dollars a hundredweight. The padrone stood aside, smiling cheerfully.

  “I ver’ good fren’? Eh?” he demanded.

  “My son,” said Talbot with feeling, “you’re a gentleman and a scholar; indeed, I would go farther and designate you as a genuine lallapaloozer!”

  The padrone seemed much gratified; but immediately demanded five dollars. This Talbot gave him. Johnny thought the demand went far toward destroying the value of the padrone’s kindness: but the rest of us differed. I believe this people, lazy and dishonest as they are, are nevertheless peculiarly susceptible to kindness. The man had started by trying to cheat us of our bargain; he ended by going out of his way to help us along.

  At supper, which was served very shortly, we had our first glimpse of the ladies of the establishment. The older was a very dignified, placid, rather fat individual, whose chief feature was her shining dark hair. She bowed to us gravely, said a few words in Spanish, and thereafter applied herself with childlike and unfeigned zest to the edibles. The younger, Mercedes by name, was a very sprightly damsel indeed. She too had shining black hair, over which she had flung the most coquettish sort of lace shawl they call a rebosa. Her eyes were large, dark, and expressive; and she constantly used them most provocatively, though with every appearance of shyness and modesty. Her figure, too, was lithe and rounded; and so swathed, rather than clothed, that every curve was emphasized. I suppose this effect was the result of the Spanish mode rather than of individual sophistication; just as the succession of lazy poses and bendings were the result of a racial feminine instinct rather than of conscious personal coquetry. Certainly we four red-shirted tramps were poor enough game. Nevertheless, whatever the motive, the effect was certainly real enough. She was alluring rather than charming, with her fan and her rebosa, her veiled glances, her languorous, bold poses, and the single red flower in her hair. And a great deal of this allurement resided in the very fact that no one could tell how much was simple, innocent, and unconscious instinct, and how much was intended. An unpleasing note in both women was furnished by the powder. This so liberally covered their faces as to conceal the skin beneath a dead mat white.

  Yank and I were kept out of it, or thought we were, by our ignorance of the language. This did not seem to hinder Johnny in the least. In five minutes he was oblivious to everything but his attempts to make himself agreeable by signs and laughing gestures, and to his trials–with help–at the unknown language. The girl played up to him well. Talbot was gravely and courteously polite. At the close of the meal the women rose suddenly, bowed, and swept from the room. Johnny turned back to us a good deal flushed and excited, a little bewildered, and considerably disappointed. The alcalde looked as though nothing unusual were under way. The rest of us were considerably amused.

  “You’ll see her later,” soothed Talbot mockingly.

  Johnny gulped down his coffee without reply.

  After the meal we went outside. Fires had been built on opposite sides of the hard beaten earth in front of the house. Four men with guitars sat chair tilted, backed against the veranda. Thirty or forty people wandered to and fro. They were of the usual native class; our host’s family, and one other, consisting of parents and three grown children, seemed to represent all the aristocracy. These better-class guests came to join us on the veranda. The older people did not greatly differ from our host and his wife, except in cut of masculine whisker, or amount of feminine fat. The younger members consisted of a young lady, tall and graceful, a young girl in white, and a man of twenty or thereabout. He was most gaudily gotten up, for a male creature, in a soft white shirt, a short braided jacket of blue, a wide, red-tasselled sash, and trousers slit from the knees down. The entire costume was sewn at all places, likely and unlikely, with silver buttons. As he was a darkly handsome chap, with a small moustache, red lips and a little flash of teeth, the effect was quite good, but I couldn’t care for his style. The bulk of the villagers were dressed in white. The women all carried the rebosa, and were thickly powdered. We could see a number of the Americans in the background.

  The musicians struck up a strummy, decided sort of marchlike tune; and the dancers paired off. They performed a kind of lancer figure, very stately and solemn, seemingly interminable, with scant variation, small progressions, and mighty little interest to me. We sat in a stiff row and shed the compliment of our presence on the scene. It was about as inspiring as a visit to a hospital ward. What determined the duration of the affair, I cannot tell you; whether the musicians’ fingers gave out, or the dancers’ legs, or the official audience’s patience. But at last they ceased.

  At the beginning of another tune, of much the same solemn character, our young visitor bowed ceremoniously to our host’s daughter, and led her down the steps.

  “Come on, Johnny, be a sport. Dance this one,” said Talbot rising.

  “Don’t know how,” replied Johnny gloomily, his eyes on the receding figure of Mercedes.

  “The lady’ll show you. Come along!”

  Talbot bowed gravely to the yo
ung girl, who arose enchanted. Johnny, with his natural grace and courtesy, offered his arm to the other. She took it with a faintly aloof and indifferent smile, and descended the step with him. She did not look toward him, nor did she vouchsafe him a word. Plainly, she was not interested, but stood idly flirting with her fan, her eyes fixed upon the distance. The dance began.

  It was another of the same general character as the first. The couples advanced and retreated, swung slowly about each other, ducked and passed beneath each other’s arms, all to the stately strumming of the guitars. They kept on doing these things. Johnny and Talbot soon got hold of the sequence of events, and did them too.

  At first Johnny was gloomy and distrait. Then, after he had, in the changes of the dance, passed Mercedes a few times, he began to wake up. I could make out in the firelight only the shapes of their figures and the whiteness of their faces; but I could see that she lingered a moment in Johnny’s formal embrace, that she flirted against him in passing, and I could guess that her eyes were on duty. When they returned to the veranda, Johnny was chipper, the visitor darkly frowning, Mercedes animated, and the other girl still faintly and aloofly smiling.

  The fandango went on for an hour; and the rivalry between Johnny and the young Spaniard grew in intensity. Certainly Mercedes did nothing to modify it. The scene became more animated and more interesting. A slow, gliding waltz was danced, and several posturing, stamping dances in which the partners advanced and receded toward and from each other, bending and swaying and holding aloft their arms. It was very pretty and graceful and captivating; and to my unsophisticated mind a trifle suggestive; though that thought was probably the result of my training and the novelty of the sight. It must be remembered that many people see harm in our round dances simply because they have not become sufficiently accustomed to them to realize that the position of the performers is meaninglessly conventional. Similarity the various rather daring postures of some of these Spanish dances probably have become so conventionalized by numberless repetitions along the formal requirements of the dance that their possible significance has been long since forgotten. The apparently deliberate luring of the man by the woman exists solely in the mind of some such alien spectator as myself. I was philosophical enough to say these things to myself; but Johnny was not. He saw Mercedes languishing into the eyes of his rival; half fleeing provocatively, her glances sparkling; bending and swaying her body in allurement; finally in the finale of the dance, melting into her partner’s arms as though in surrender. He could not realize that these were formal and established measures for a dance. He was too blind to see that the partners separated quite calmly and sauntered nonchalantly toward the veranda, the man rolling a paper cigarro, the woman flirting idly her fan. His eyes glowing dully, he stared straight before him; a spot of colour mounted on his cheekbones.