_ That weird three-part drama in the plaza which had so puzzled Miss
Polly Brewster had developed in this wise:--
Coincidently with the departure of Preston Fairfax Fitzhugh
Carroll from the hotel in his cab, the Unspeakable Perk emerged
from a store near the far corner of the square, which exploited
itself in the purest Castilian as offering the last word in the
matter of gentlemen's apparel. "Articulos para Caballeros" was the
representation held forth upon its signboard.
If it had articled Mr. Perkins, it must be confessed that it had
done its job unevenly, not to say fantastically. His linen was
fresh and new, quite conspicuously so, and, therefore, in sharp
contrast to the frayed and patched, but scrupulously clean and
neatly pressed khaki suit, which set forth rather bumpily his
solid figure. A serviceable pith helmet barely overhung the
protrusive goggles. His hands were encased in white cotton gloves,
a size or two too large. Dismal buff spots on the palms impaired
their otherwise virgin purity. As the wearer carried his hands
stiffly splayed, the blemishes were obtrusive. Altogether, one
might have said that, if he were going in for farce, he was
appropriately made up for it.
At the corner above the beggar's niche he was turning toward a
pharmacist's entrance, when the mirth of the departing crowd that
had been enjoying the free oratory attracted his attention. He
glanced across at the beggar, now rocking rhythmically on his
stumps, hesitated a moment, then ran down the steps.
At the same moment Carroll's cab stopped on the other angle of the
curb. The occupant put forth his head, saw the goggled freak
descending to the legless freak, and sat back again.
"Hola, Pancho! Are you ill?" asked the newcomer.
The beggar only swung back and forth, muttering with frenzied
rapidity. With one hand the Unspeakable Perk stopped him, as one
might intercept the runaway pendulum of a clock, setting the other
on his forehead. Then he bent and brought his goblin eyes to bear
on the dark face. The features were distorted, the eyelids
tremulous over suffused eyes, and the teeth set. Opening the man's
loose shirt, Perkins thrust his hand within. It might have been
supposed that he was feeling for the heart action, were it not
that his hand slid past the breast and around under the arm. When
he drew it out, he stood for a moment with chin dropped, in
consideration.
Midday heat had all but cleared the plaza. As he looked about, the
helper saw no aid, until his eye fell upon the waiting cab. He
fairly bounded up the stairs, calling something to the coachman.
"No," grunted that toiler, with the characteristic discourtesy of
the Caracunan lower class, and jerked his head backward toward his
fare.
"I beg your pardon," said the Unspeakable Perk eagerly, in
Spanish, turning to the dim recess of the victoria. "Might I--Oh,
it's you!" He seized Carroll by the arm. "I want your cab."
"Indeed!" said Carroll. "Well, you're cool enough about it."
"And your help," added the other.
"What for?"
"Do you have to ask questions? The man may be dying--is dying, I
think."
"All right," said Carroll promptly. "What's to be done?"
"Get him home. Help me carry him to the cab."
Between them, the two men lifted the heavy, mumbling cripple,
carried him up the steps with a rush, and deposited him in the
cab, while the driver was still angrily expostulating. The beggar
was shivering now, and the cold sweat rolled down his face. His
bearers placed themselves on each side of him. Perkins gave an
order to the driver, who seemed to object, and a rapid-fire
argument ensued.
"What's wrong?" asked Carroll.
"Says he won't go there. Says he was hired by you for shopping."
Carroll took one look at the agony-wrung face of the beggar, who
was being held on the seat by his companion.
"Won't he?" said he grimly. "We'll see."
Rising, he threw a pair of long arms around those of the driver,
pinning him, caught the reins, and turned the horses.
"Now ask him if he'll drive," he directed Perkins.
"Si, senor!" gasped the coachman, whose breath had been squeezed
almost through his crackling ribs.
"See that you do," the Southerner bade him, in accents that needed
no interpretation.
Presently Perkins looked up from his charge.
"Got a cigar?" he asked abruptly.
"No," replied the other, a little disgusted by this levity in the
presence of imminent death.
Perkins bade the driver stop at the corner.
"Don't let him fall off the seat," he admonished Carroll, and
jumped out.
In the course of a minute he reappeared, smoking a cheroot that
appeared to be writhing and twisting in the effort to escape from
its own noxious fumes.
"Have one," he said, extending a handful to his companion.
"I don't care for it," returned the other superciliously. While
willing to aid in a good work, he did not in the least approve
either of the Unspeakable Perk or of his offhand manners.
Before they had gone much farther, his resentment was heated to
the point of offense.
"Is it necessary for you to puff every puff of that infernal smoke
in my face?" he demanded ominously.
"Well, you wouldn't smoke, yourself."
"If it weren't for this poor devil of a sick man--" began Carroll,
when a second thought about the smoke diverted his line of
thought. "Is it contagious?" he asked.
"It's so regarded," observed the other dryly.
"I'll take one of those, thank you."
Perkins handed him one of the rejected spirals. In silence, except
for the outrageous rattling of the wheels on the cobbles, they
drove through mean streets that grew ever meaner, until they drew
up at the blind front of a building abutting on an arroyo of the
foothills. Here they stopped, and Carroll threw his jehu a five-
bolivar piece, which the driver caught, driving away at once,
without the demand for more which usually follows overpayment in
Caracuna. Convenient to hand lay a small rock. Perkins used it for
a knocker, hammering on the guarded wooden door with such
vehemence as to still the clamor that arose from within.
Through the opening, as the barrier was removed by a leather-
skinned old crone, Carroll gazed into a passageway, beyond which
stretched a foul mule yard, bordered by what the visitor at first
supposed to be stalls, until he saw bedding and utensils in them.
The two men lifted the cripple in, amid the outcries and
lamentations of the aged woman, who had looked at his face and
then covered her own. At once they were surrounded by a swarm of
women and children, who pressed upon them, hampering their
movements, until a shrill voice cried:--
"La muerte negra!"
The swarm fell into silence, scattered, vanished, leaving only the
moaning woman to help. At her direction they settled the patient
on a straw pallet in a side room.
"That's all you can do," said the Unspeakable Perk to his
companion. "And thank you."
"I'll stay."
The goggles gloomed upon him in the dim room.
"I thought probably you would," commented Perkins, and busied
himself over the cripple with a knife and some cloths. He had
stuffed his ludicrous white gloves into his pocket, and was
tearing strips from his handkerchief with skillful fingers.
"Oughtn't he to have a doctor?" asked Carroll. "Shall I go for
one?"
"His mother has sent. No use, though."
"He can't be saved?"
"Not a chance on earth. I should say he was in the last stages."
"What is it?" said Carroll hesitantly.
"La muerte negra. The black death."
"Plague?"
"Yes."
"Are you sure? Are you an expert?"
"One doesn't have to be to recognize a case like that. The lump in
the armpit is as big as a pigeon's egg."
"Why have you interested yourself in the man to such an extent?"
asked Carroll curiously.
"He's a friend of mine. Why did you?"
"Oh, that's quite different. One can't disregard a call for help
such as yours."
"A certain kind of 'one' can't," returned the Unspeakable Perk,
with his half-smile. "You don't mind my saying, Mr. Carroll,
you're a brave man."
"And I'd have said that you weren't," replied the other bluntly.
"I give it up. But I know this: I'm going to be pretty wretchedly
frightened until I know that I haven't got it. I'm frightened
now."
"Then you're a braver man than I thought. But the danger may be
less than you think. Stick to that cigar--here are two more--and
wait for me outside. Here's the doctor."
Profound and solemn under a silk hat, the local physician entered,
bowing to Carroll as they passed in the hallway. Almost
immediately Perkins emerged. On his face was a sardonic grin.
"Malaria," he observed. "The learned professor assures me that
it's a typical malaria."
"Then it isn't the plague," said Carroll, relieved.
His relief was of brief duration.
"Of course it's plague. But if Professor Silk Hat, in there,
officially declared it such, he'd have bracelets on his arms in
twelve hours. The present Government of Caracuia doesn't believe
in bubonic plague. I fancy our unfortunate friend in there will
presently disappear, either just before or just after death. It
doesn't greatly matter."
"What is to be done now?" asked Carroll.
"See that brush fire up there?" The hermit pointed to the
hillside. "If we steep ourselves in that smoke until we choke, I
think it will discourage any fleas that may have harbored on us.
The flea is the only agent of communication."
Soot-begrimed, strangling, and with streaming eyes, they emerged,
five minutes later, from the cloud of smoke. From his pocket the
Unspeakable Perk dragged forth his white gloves. The action
attracted his companion's attention.
"Good Lord!" he cried. "What has happened to your hands?"
"They're blistered."
"Stripped, rather. They look as if you'd fallen into a fire, or
rowed a fifty-mile race. That message of Mr. Brewster's--See here,
Perkins, you didn't row that over to the mainland? No, you
couldn't. That's absurd. It's too far."
"No; I didn't row it to the mainland."
"But you've been rowing. I'd swear to those hands. Where? The
blockading Dutch warship?"
The other nodded.
"Last night. Yah-h-h!" he yawned. "It makes me sleepy to think of
it."
"Why didn't they blow you out of the water?" "Oh, I was
semiofficially expected. Message from our consul. They transferred
the message by wireless. I'm telling you all this, Mr. Carroll,
because I think you'll get your release within forty-eight hours,
and I want you to see that some of your party keeps constantly in
touch with Mr. Sherwen. It's mighty important that your party
should get out before plague is officially declared."
"Are you going to report this case?"
"All that I know about it."
"But, of course, you can't report officially, not being a
physician," mused the other. "Still, when Dr. Pruyn comes, it will
be evidence for him, won't it?"
"Undoubtedly. I should consider any delay after twenty-four hours
risky for your party."
"What shall you do? Stay?"
"Oh, I've my place in the mountains. That's remote enough to be
safe. Thank Heaven, there's a cloud over the sun! Let's sit down
by this tree for a minute."
Unthinkingly, as he stretched himself out, the Unspeakable Perk
pushed his goggles back and presently slipped them off. Thus, when
Carroll, who had been gazing at the mist-capped peak of the
mountain in front, turned and met his companion's eyes, he
underwent something of the same shock that Polly Brewster had
experienced, though the nature of his sensation was profoundly
different. But his impression of the suddenly revealed face was
the same. Ribbed-in though his mind was with tradition, and
distorted with falsely focused ideals and prejudices, Preston
Fairfax Fitzhugh Carroll possessed a sound underlying judgment of
his fellow man, and was at bottom a frank and honorable gentleman.
In his belief, the suddenly revealed face of the man beside him
came near to being its own guaranty of honor and good faith.
"By Heavens, I don't believe it!" he blurted out, his gaze direct
upon the Unspeakable Perk.
"What don't you believe?"
"That rotten club gossip."
"About me?"
"Yes," said Carroll, reddening.
The hermit pushed his glasses down, settled into place the white
gloves, with their soothing contents of emollient greases, and got
to his feet.
"We'd best be moving. I've got much to do," he said.
"Not yet," retorted Carroll. "Perkins, is there a woman up there
on the mountains with you?"
"That is purely my own business."
"You told Miss Brewster there wasn't. If you tell me--"
"I never told her any such thing. She misunderstood."
"Who is the woman?"
"If you want it even more frankly, that is none of your concern."
"You have been letting Miss Brewster--"
"Are you engaged to marry Miss Brewster?"
"No."
"Then you have no authority to question me. But," he added
wearily, "if it will ease your mind, and because of what you've
done to-day, I 'll tell you this--that I do not expect ever to see
Miss Brewster again."
"That isn't enough," insisted Carroll, his face darkening. "Her
name has already been connected with yours, and I intend to follow
this through. I am going to find out who the woman is at your
place."
"How do you propose to do it?"
"By coming to see."
"You'll be welcome," said the other grimly. "By the way, here's a
map." He made a quick sketch on the back of an envelope. "I'll be
there at work most of to-morrow. Au revoir." He rose and started
down the hill. "Better keep to yourself this evening," he warned.
"Take a dilute carbolic bath. You'll be all right, I think."
Slowly and thoughtfully the Southerner made his way back to the
hotel. After dining in his own room, he found time heavy on his
hands; so, dispatching a note of excuse to Miss Brewster on the
plea of personal business, he slipped out into the city. Wandering
idly toward the hills, he presently found himself in a familiar
street, and, impelled by human curiosity, proceeded to turn up the
hill and stop opposite the blank door.
Here he was puzzled. To go in and inquire, even if he cared to and
could make himself understood, would perhaps involve further risk
of infection. While he was considering, the door slowly opened,
and the leather-skinned crone appeared. Her eyes were swollen. In
her hand she carried a travesty of a wreath, done in whitish
metal, which she had interwoven with her own black mantilla, the
best substitute for crape at hand. This she undertook to hang on
the door. As Carroll crossed to address her, a powerful, sullen-
faced man, with a scarred forehead and the insignia of some
official status, apparently civic, on his coat, emerged from a
doorway and addressed her harshly. She raised her reddened eyes to
him and seemed to be pleading for permission to set up the little
tribute to her dead. There was the exchange of a few more words.
Then, with an angry exclamation, the official snatched the wreath
from her. Carroll's hand fell on his shoulder. The man swung and
saw a stranger of barely half his bulk, who addressed him in what
seemed to be politely remonstrant tones. He shook himself loose
and threw the wreath in the crone's face. Then he went down like a
log under the impact of a swinging blow behind the ear. With a
roar he leaped up and rushed. The foreigner met him with right and
left, and this time he lay still.
Hanging the tragically unsightly wreath on the door, through which
the terrified mourner had vanished, Carroll returned to the Gran
Hotel Kast, his perturbed and confused thoughts and emotions
notably relieved by that one comforting moment of action. _