The Unspeakable Perk
noon of the day after the British Minister's warning, the refugees found themselves comfortable and content, Miss Brewster having quietly and tactfully ta
crowds on the streets that the Brewsters rather felt themselves to be extorting hospitality
hat way, too,"
sary, and I want to mark
ere any of us should be seen. It is in that s
is
nkis' is his stock in trade. Somebody has been furnishing him
im," grunted Cluff, striding over to the window of the d
origin," admitted Sherwen. "But
uldn't shed any tears over a demon
f diplomatic truth," smil
believe a word of it. Some of my acquaintances at the club, men in high go
eaking being, as you doubtless know, the dis
on Mr. Brewster, but it fai
e that I should go to the office of the Ferr
thing of the sort," c
street, close bounded by blank-walled houses, each with its eyes c
American, I guess,-God save the mark! Nobody seems to be interfering
door, asking to see Mr. Sherwen at once. Miss Polly immediately s
rked Mr. Brewster. "I'll just
ll not have been there; so he felt, with unwonted injury. The
eard from W
An hou
as his
t, any ti
to-night, then, so they ca
tark pa
ions. That's al
r. Brewster that he had figure
t you are talking of my par
The Dutch will let you
rties at Washington," said the magnate,
to Mr. P
That will be-er-suita
ed him fixedly; but, owing to the gogg
convenient for me to go day af
ouse," was the begoggled on
ied the great
t out to-morrow, you may
Dutch permit, it sp
nder quarantine to-night, and Puerto del Norte to-morro
has actuall
acteriological t
o you
sent at th
it? Dr.
ther
en wh
ort after quarantine is on. At least, you couldn't get into any other port, ev
gnate
l, with a due regard for his future, would r
be a
hould have come from the freakish spectacle-wearer seemed impossible. Y
ddress me,
d
boyhood no person has dared or
hion," said the other equably. "
dvice until
er it's declared, if you were the Secretary himself. A point is being stretched in giving you this chance. If you'll agree to ship a doctor,-Stark will find you one,-stay out
Mr. Brewster, jumping to his
ce, "that you are taking a most unwise course. I am advised tha
ruyn is here. I wan
self. I haven't seen him yet myself. Now, Mr. Brewster, ju
argument. At six o'clock I 'll be back here. Unless you decide b
snappers!" fumed Mr. Brewster. But he found that he had no au
other nationalities. Von Plaanden, in full uniform and girt with the short saber that is the special and privileged arm of the crack cavalry regiment to which he belonged at home, had dismounted to deliver personally a huge bouquet f
to declare plague prevalent, in order to close the ports and strangle commerce. Urgante was going about the lower part of the city haranguing on street corners without interference from the police. In the arroyo of the slaught
Raimonda, who had come after luncheon to call on Miss Brewster. "In
raid," said
acunan, with admiration. "You are
that we love excite
ull-fight or 'la boxe.' But for one
the rear and the street in front, an architectural wonder in that city of dead walls flush with the sidewalk line all the way up.
ou honor me by accepting this little whistle? It is my hunting-whistle. And if there should be anything-but I think there will no
stole behind the girl's vision, as she bade him farewell, the undesired phantasm of a very different face, weary and lined and lighted by st
and decided not to venture out, though still deriding the restriction as the merest nonsense, was in a mood
as kept constantly busy. But a few minutes before six, central, in the blandest Spanish, regretted to inform him that Puerto del Norte was cut off. When would service be resumed? Quien sabe? It was an order. Hasta mana
voice, and bidden to come directly up. No time, on this occasion, for Miss Polly to escape. She decided in one breath to ignore the man
e said a little breathless
ghtened p
ind of
ob up this way. They're
see them," cried Miss
ordered Sherwen. "The vines w
ng and whooping, and after them a more compact crowd of men, shoeless, centering on a
did he get that?
aar Americana,"
owled Cluff; "that d
be eulogizing it,
turned to the others. The first face her eyes fell on was that of the ball-player. Every muscle in it was drawn, and from the tightened lips streamed such whispered curses as the girl never before had heard. Next him stood the hermit
the motley crowd below rose a snarl of laughter and
ightening up and grasping the rail
ttered Carroll, white-lip
r's hand flew
the Southerner. But it was not Carroll's han
flung the weapon back
he girl. "You uns
Sherwen was equally quick. H
ld be worth the life of every one here. We've got to stand i
cteristic of the professional ath
he said, almost choking on the
sponse to this spirit. She was lawless with th
had my pistol back, I'd
ned his goggles h
he began, "plea
ak to me!"
ed mass appeared a spot of splendor. It was Von Plaanden, gorgeous in his full regalia, who had turned the corner, returning from the public recept
ork. There's the Ho
ffront. Miss Polly Brewster, American of Americans, whose great-grandfathers had fought with Herkimer and Steuben,-themselves the sons of women who had stood by the loopholes of log houses and caught up the rifles of their fallen pioneer husbands, wherewith to return the fire of the besi
t brought a jubilant yelp from his adherents. Stooping, he ladled up in his cupped hand a quantity of gutter filth. Where the flowers had but a moment before fluttered in the f
grief. To her it seemed that he shot past her horizontally like a human dart. The next second he was over the railing, had swung from a branch of the neighboring tree to the trunk, and leaped to the ground, all in one movement of superhuman agility. To the mob his exploit was apparently wit
staff. As quickly, the American lowered his head and dove. It may not have been magnificent; it certainly was not war by the rules; but it was eminently effective. To say that the lead
o the air. "Football! That cost
hatcher Brewster, cursing in a manner that did credit to his patriotism, but would have adde
off. Several eager followers had lifted Urgante, whose groans and curses suggested a sound basis for Cluff's diagnosis. Himself quite hors de combat, he spat at the Unspeakable Perk, and cried upon his henchmen to kill the "Yanki." It seemed not improbable to the latter that they would do it. Per
one bold spirit rushed in. Perkins met him with a straight lance-thrust of the staff, which sent him reeling and shrieking with pain back to his fellows. But now another knife, and another, struck and fell from the wall at his back
lear and sweet above the swelling growl of the rabble
es to the main entrance, that would serve as a shallow shelter. Without raising his eyes, he nodded comprehension, and began to edge along the wall, swinging his stout weapon. As h
now coming from all directions. On the other hand, he now lacked room to swing his formidable club. The peons, with a shout, closed in to arm's length. Alone on her balcony, the girl turned her head
n the mass of people as ruthlessly as if they had been so many insects. Through the circle he broke, swinging his mount around beside the shallow doorway before which three Caracunans already lay sprawled, attesting the vigor of the defender's final
bounding now, indeed, at full speed up the slope, followed by two of his fellow railroad men, flannel-clad and still perspiring from their afternoon's cricket. Against bare legs a cricket bat is a highly dissuasive argument. The Britons swung low and hard for the ancient right of the breed to br
ame?" inquired the
d, lifted by many arms, a figure with a dead-white face st
my horse," explained the
cry, quite different from its former voice. Galpy'
these blightehs. That yell means blood. We must
he had been able to catch up. Carroll, a leap in advance of the rest, encountered an Indian drover, half-dodged a swinging blow from his whip, and sent him down with a broken shoulder from a chop with a baseball club that he had found in the hallway. A bull-like charge had carried Cluff deep among the Caracunans, where he encountered a huge peon, whom he seized and flung bodily over the iron guard of a samon tree, where the ma
ike arm across the Unsp
?" he crie
t. Who's left wit
We must g
cool voi
ell up. Herr von Plaanden, w
of honor," said
ut for you, they'd h
racunan who had pressed forward a little too near. B
t across the street, Perkin
ered. Instantly Perkins was up again, the blood streaming from the side of his head. He was conscious of brown hands clutching at the cricketer, to drag him away. He
e whom he had knocked down. Sherwen, almost under the cavalryman's mount, was protecting his rear with the fallen Galpy's cricket bat, and the two other cricketers were fighting back to back on the other s
dows and doors tight closed, as befits an aristocratic club that has no concern with the affairs of the rabble. But there is no way of closing a patio from
, also, although not so admittedly as a matter of fashion. Furthermore, he has a profound contempt for the peon class; a contempt extending to life and limb. Therefore, when some two dozen young patricians sallied abruptly forth with their canes, and the mob caught sight, here and there, of a glint of nickel against the black, it gav
ted as a Caracunan national holiday, she raised the flag of an alien nation and fixed it, and the gilded youth of Caracuna in the street below c
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