Roy J. Snell

“ His first thought, as his heart went racing and he dropped to earth with the quickness of a cat, was that he had come close to the lair of a jaguar.
This thought was dispelled by the white gleam of a blade.
“Diaz!” he told himself. “And we are alone. There is to be a battle after all, a battle, perhaps to the death, with weapons which he has been familiar with since a child.”
One thought gave him courage as, springing away to the right, fighting for time to draw a blade, hotly pursued by the panting Spaniard, he rounded a great mahogany tree. ”

“ There is a certain joy to be had from a journey on foot through a tropical jungle. There is a glimmer of green, a fresh damp odor of decay, faint and pleasing as musk, and there always comes from the bushes and trees a suggestion of low, joyous music, made, perhaps by bees and birds, but nevertheless it is there, an indescribable music. Johnny had enjoyed all this until he had begun to feel the need of food and refreshment. ”

“ Madge Kennedy, who had turned out to be a Scotch girl, had insisted upon his accompanying her to the house to meet her grandfather, Donald Kennedy. The grandfather, a great gray-bearded man with a store of knowledge that could come only from long study and many years in the jungle, had proven a find indeed. Johnny did not soon tire of sitting on the broad veranda of the long one-story house, listening to the old man as he rambled on about bananas and grapefruit, strange tropical foods, Carib Indians, and the future of their little Central American Colony. ”

“ Johnny shuddered as he heard the crack and crash of giant trees torn and tortured by the wind.
“What shall we do?” he said to the girl. “Can we get out of this?”
“No.” She spoke slowly, deliberately, as one may who knows her land and its storms. “The tossing banana plants will shut off the roads. Some will fall, blocking the way. The wind will increase in violence. The storm will last for hours.”
“Then we must find shelter.”
“Yes.”
“But where?”
The girl shook her head. “I don’t know.” As if determined to destroy them, the palm sent a second discarded frond sailing toward them. ”

“ The younger boy’s tone was earnest, entreating. “Don’t spoil the old Don by making him rich.”
“It’s not for us to decide what a man’s rightful possessions will do for him,” said Pant thoughtfully. “The only question for us to ask is, ‘Are they his?’”
“Perhaps,” he said after a moment’s silence, “your Uncle can help us out.”
“I am sure he can,” said Kirk.
Nothing could exceed the astonishment of the chicle magnate when, having lifted the lid of the ancient silver box, his eyes fell upon the treasure of pearls within. Instinctively, he stepped back and locked the door to his office. ”

“ Men, many men, most men perhaps, have come to think of capital as a great monster that always crushes the weak.
[243]
“But is that true? Take this Central America. It is true that we, the Fruit Company, have a monopoly of the banana importing business. But what was Central America before we came? Where miles on miles of bananas grow there was wilderness. Where naked half-savage people hunted deer and wild pigs, or sucked the milk from cocoanuts, there now lives a happy, reasonably prosperous and contented people. Who changed it all? Did not the Fruit Company do it? ”

“ He had a glorious mental picture of the light on his grandfather’s face as he saw a hundred Caribs at work on their concession and saw in it a promise of a rebuilt fortune.
“Chicle gathering,” he thought. “What a strange way to amass a fortune! Yet how sure.”
As he closed his eyes he saw the work begun. The Carib Indians—great bronze men, one time cannibals, now partially Christianized and caught in the spell of white man’s influence, had always been friends of his grandfather, as they had been of Kennedy and of every true man. ”

“ On one occasion, during the terrible yellow-fever plague, he had toiled days without end, burying the Carib dead and caring for the stricken ones until the hand of the dread enemy was stayed.
“Not a native in all Stann Creek district but knows and loves him,” Johnny told himself. “And now, in his old age, when he truly needs a lift and we try to help him, see how things come out! We are blocked by a scheming Spaniard who never fought for any country, nor for the good of any person beside himself. He probably never had an unselfish thought in the whole of his life.” ”

“ On the third day Pant had come to the office only to find the safe looted, the map gone.
“What can we do?” he asked. “We know Diaz has it, but we can’t prove it.”
“We cannot,” the old Colonel had agreed. “Nor is there a chance of getting another before it is too late. The bleeding season for chicle begins with the first rainfall. To begin without a map is to court disaster. With a big and jealous American company on one side of us and a crooked Spaniard on the other, we are between the rocks and the tide. We are sure to encroach upon one or the other. ”

“ There came the snap of Pant’s flashlight.
[46]
The next instant, as if pushed by a sudden force, they all fell back. Before them, drawn up on the beach, with paddles crossed over the seat, was a light canoe.
Staring with all their eyes, they stood there expecting any moment to see the mysterious canoeist emerge from the dim distance beyond.
Not knowing what to think, Pant stood at attention. As he did so, a strange chattering struck his ears. Wheeling about, he discovered the cause. The black giant’s teeth were chattering. Once more he was shaking from head to foot. ”

“ The thieves who had broken into the safe were now well away in the jungle. There was no time to be lost. He’d catch them, he was sure of that. A jaguar couldn’t escape him, much less a man. Yet the map might be destroyed. Without it nothing could be accomplished. Thousands were at stake, the treasure of a lifetime. And some one dearer to Pant than life itself was scheduled to lose. All day in that stuffy office he had waited for Johnny. ”

“ A moment later, the Carib crept up the bank of the pit to disappear into the storm. Ten minutes later, when he reappeared, his jacket was filled with cocoanuts.
“Food and drink,” smiled Madge. “We shall not fare so badly in our cave, after all.”
Still the wind raged on. Rain came and with it night.
A great flat boulder, turned half over by the uprooted tree, left a sort of narrow grotto with a stone floor. By crowding well back into this grotto, Johnny and the girl were able to escape the terrific downpour of rain. ”

“ He wasted little time in thought, but springing with a twisting glide, he attempted to throw Johnny off his guard. In this he was not successful.
For a full quarter of an hour, battling, perspiring, crossing blades, bending, thrusting, each striving for an advantageous opening, the two men fought on.
Then a sudden catastrophe threatened. On stepping backward Johnny caught his heel in a tie-tie vine that grew low to the ground. The next instant, with the Spaniard all but on top of him, he went crashing to earth. ”

“ No true blade could have inspired greater skill than the boy displayed before an empty world and without a real adversary.
The battle ended when with one swift stroke he severed the stem in the middle and with a sweeping twirl sent it thudding down.
[190]
“Cut his head off!” he chuckled, throwing himself upon the ground to mop the perspiration from his brow.
“It’s like boxing,” he thought, “this great Central American sport of machete fighting, only—it’s different. You feel as if only half of you were in it.”
As a boxer Johnny was neither right nor left handed. He was ambidextrous. ”

“ What about the butterflies he crushes with his swinging trunk? The butterflies appear to enjoy life as they flit in the sunshine. What of them?”
“Young man,” said the magnate rather sharply, “come down to brass tacks. What is it you are talking about?”
“Well then, specifically,” Johnny smiled broadly, “there is a fine old man named Kennedy who has a niece quite as fine. They live in a Central American jungle. Every Carib loves them because they love the Caribs.
“Until you signed this agreement they were very poor. The grapefruit aboard this ship is theirs.” ”

“ Sun-browned arms, honest freckles, strong and healthy muscles, that was Madge Kennedy. Though only nineteen years of age, she had taken over the largest share of the task of keeping the orchard in order.
Underbrush and creepers grow fast in this warm, moist land. A constant war must be waged against them. Johnny had found her doing her bit by swinging a short stout brush scythe. Two husky Carib Indians were working with her, but Johnny noted with no little pleasure that she was the best worker of the three. ”

“ Was the whole affair to be spoiled by a whiff of sulphur or a fuse that burned too long?
“If they rise, if they block the view,” he thought, “then all will be—”
[17]
But no, they settled back. The whiff of sulphur had passed. But what was this? A black man jumped. Had the smell of burnt powder reached him? Had the sput-sput of the fuse reached his sensitive ear?
Whatever it was, it came too late. Of a sudden there sounded out a loud boom, and at once, for a fraction of a second, the whole place, cabin, bamboo trees, and the surrounding jungle was lighted as with a moment’s return of the sun. ”

“ Johnny’s heart beat fast. His mind worked like some speeding mechanism.
“Shall I?” he asked himself. “I will.”
“In the name of one who deserves much, our friend Donald Kennedy, I shall ask one favor.”
“Ask it.”
“That you sell me the crop of bananas on this plantation.”
“They are worthless. The storm has ruined them.”
“Not all. There is still a ship load of good ones.”
“How can I grant such a request? I am under contract to deliver these bananas to the Fruit Company.”
[187]
“No contract,” Johnny’s voice vibrated with earnestness, “stands before an act of God. The storm was an act of God. ”

“ She’s the Company’s steamer that our Unwilling Guest was to sail on.”
“He’ll be all excited if he sees her,” said Johnny.
“Little good it will do him,” grumbled Kennedy. “We’ll be far enough from the Arion by night.”
He hurried away to impart his all but miraculous knowledge of the coming storm to the captain.
The sea was still calm, though here and there, racing away with the speed of the wind, like hurried messengers, dark ripples sped across its surface. It was then that the Unwilling Guest left his stateroom for the first time. ”

“ When I am of age it will be mine to manage. My Uncle believes I should know all there is to be known about the business, from the jungle to the wrapper,” he laughed.
“So he sent me down there. He got the Carib giant for my bodyguard, and told me to go where I chose, only to keep my eyes open. I came at last to the old Don’s. I liked it so much up there that I stayed a long time.”
“Glorious, wasn’t it!” said Pant. “I’d like to live there with the old Don for a whole year.
“This,” he said, patting the package beside him, “will make the old Don rich.”
“The old Don! It’s yours!” Kirk stared. ”

“ From somewhere forward there came the rattle of a banjo, the tom-tom-tom of a snake-head drum. Aft, the chant of a weird song rose and fell with the boat.
[210]
“They don’t realize they are going to war,” said Johnny.
“That’s the pity. They never do,” said the girl, shading her eyes to gaze away at the perfect blue of the lovely Caribbean Sea.
All too soon the thrum of the banjo ceased, the tom-tom of the drum became muffled and low. Land, the point of Porte Zelaya, had been sighted.
Rising, the girl and the old man made their way along the deck. ”

“ His only child, a boy of ten, had been sent back to Virginia while he struggled on, wresting a fortune from the jungle.
Life in Central America is one gamble after another. Longstreet had played in every game. He had always won, in the end to lose again. Fortunes in sugar, bananas and mahogany had been his. Sudden drops in prices, a revolution, the dread Panama disease, had cost him all of these. ”

“ At that moment the moonlight, falling through an open space among the trees and spreading a yellow gleam upon the trail, showed him that which brought him up short. In a damp spot at the base of a rock were footprints, the marks of a slim foot clad in sandals, and stranger than this in so wild a spot, the marks of a leather shoe.
[20]
“Huh!” He stood for a moment in perplexity.
One who knows the jungle is seldom surprised at what he finds there. Pant was surprised. This portion of the jungle was new to him. “Twenty miles from the coast,” he murmured. “How strange!” ”

“ Brave and strong, good color, clear eyes, a clearer skin, strong as a man, yet tender hearted and kind, giving her spare hours to her grandfather, yet alert and alive to every sport and joy of life, she seemed worthy of a place in a great drama or a book.
[237]
“That friend of ours,” said Kennedy, resuming his seat, “he will come out of his hole sooner or later. Then he’s going to talk. Who will he talk to? To an old man. That’s me. Everyone talks to an old man if he has a chance. Did you ever notice that, Johnny?” ”

“ The motion of the ship was something tremendous. Now she rose high in air to strike square into a great world of water; and now, lifting, lifting, lifting, she appeared to start on a flying trip to the stars, only at last to put her prow down as gently as a child drops his foot on a pebbly shore.
“She’s a grand old ship,” he thought to himself.
[252]
These were not his only thoughts. He thought of the great, gray-whiskered man and his granddaughter sitting there before him, the man who had given much to humanity and asked little in return. ”

“ To add one ship after another, one plantation, one narrow-gauge railroad after another until the ships are a fleet, railroads a system and the plantations a little world all their own. I’ve dreamed of living such a life myself. It’s a grand and glorious dream.
[271]
“But sometimes,” his tone was slow and thoughtful, “it’s hard on the little fellow. Sometimes the great promoter, dreaming his great dream, forgets the little fellow, the man with a few acres of bananas, a few cocoanuts or grapefruit trees.
“The elephant enjoys himself as he goes thrashing his way through the jungle. ”

“ He had done nothing except insist upon buying twenty thousand bunches of bananas. He had tried to do a great service to a splendid old man and a beautiful girl. He had reason enough for wanting to be out of prison, plenty of reasons. There was the girl, Madge Kennedy, back there in the orchard of forbidden fruit, and her grandfather, the aged Britisher who was so much of a man and so little of a business man that his orchards and banana plantations would never make him a cent unless some one took a hand. ”

“ Diaz thinks he has us and he means to do his worst.
“I suppose,” she said, “we’ll have to sell to the Spaniards. It will break grandfather’s heart. He wouldn’t mind if it went to a fellow countryman.
[150]
“You know,” she reminisced, “that’s been our land longer than I can remember, much longer. It’s our home. Don’t you see, Johnny? It’s the only home I’ve ever known. You don’t like to see your home sold to some one you don’t like, do you? Your home is part of you. When you sell it, you sell part of yourself.
“It would have been all right if it hadn’t been for the Panama disease. ”

“ The picture of the stout, prosperous American and the crafty Spaniard passed before him. “So that’s his game,” he thought. “He’s got Kennedy in a hole. The sale of his grapefruit would let him out. Diaz is determined to block the shipment, and is in the position to do it. The scoundrel!”
“The Spaniards down here don’t love us, the English and Scotch, too much,” Madge Kennedy went on. “The trouble goes clear back to the days of buccaneers and the Spanish Main. The English and Scotch logwood gatherers drove the Spaniards from the mouth of the Belize River. They have never forgiven us. ”

“ A pit-pan, the seventy foot dugout of the Carib country, when manned by a score of expert boatmen, is a swift river craft. Without giving his grandfather any definite reason for his sudden departure, he had hired a twelve foot dugout from a native bushman and had set out in pursuit of the chicle sack that contained his treasure of pearls in a beaten silver box. ”

“ What of Johnny and his precious cargo?
As the days passed and land, the shore of his native land, was sighted, the face of the Unwilling Guest once more took on a shrewd, calculating expression of a business man whose financial interests are vast. Already, in his mind, he was entering his office, was sitting at his desk, dictating letters, pushing buttons, issuing orders, calculating profits; he was sitting in financial conferences with other rich and successful men. Little wonder that his chest began to bulge as he strolled the deck. ”