Cabbages and Kings | Page 3

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Digitized for Project Gutenberg by Earle C. Beach ([email protected]) Italicized text is bracketed by ~'s.

CABBAGES AND KINGS
by O Henry

Contents
The Proem "Fox-in-the-Morning" The Lotus and the Bottle Smith Caught Cupid's Exile Number Two The Phonograph and the Graft Money Maze The Admiral The Flag Paramount The Shamrock and the Palm The Remnants of the Code Shoes Ships Masters of Arts Dicky Rouge et Noir Two Recalls The Vitagraphoscope

CABBAGES AND KINGS
The Proem
By the Carpenter
They will tell you in Anchuria, that President Miraflores, of that volatile republic, died by his own hand in the coast town of Coralio; that he had reached thus far in flight from the inconveniences of an imminent revolution; and that one hundred thousand dollars, government funds, which he carried with him in an American leather valise as a souvenir of his tempestuous administration, was never afterward recovered.
For a ~real~, a boy will show you his grave. It is back of the town near a little bridge that spans a mangrove swamp. A plain slab of wood stands at its head. Some one has burned upon the headstone with a hot iron this inscription:
RAMON ANGEL DE LAS CRUZES Y MIRAFLORES PRESIDENTE DE LA REPUBLICA DE ANCHURIA QUE SEA SU JUEZ DIOS
It is characteristic of this buoyant people that they pursue no man beyond the grave. "Let God be his judge!"--Even with the hundred thousand unfound, though they greatly coveted, the hue and cry went no further than that.
To the stranger or the guest the people of Coralio will relate the story of the tragic end of their former president; how he strove to escape from the country with the publice funds and also with Dona Isabel Guilbert, the young American opera singer; and how, being apprehended by members of the opposing political party in Coralio, he shot himself through the head rather than give up the funds, and, in consequence, the Senorita Guilbert. They will relate further that Dona Isabel, her adventurous bark of fortune shoaled by the simultaneous loss of her distinguished admirer and the souvenir hundred thousand, dropped anchor on this stagnant coast, awaiting a rising tide.
They say, in Coralio, that she found a prompt and prosperous tide in the form of Frank Goodwin, an American resident of the town, an investor who had grown wealthy by dealing in the products of the country--a banana king, a rubber prince, a sarsaparilla, indigo and mahogany baron. The Senorita Guilbert, you will be told, married Senor Goodwin one month after the president's death, thus, in the very moment when Fortune had ceased to smile, wresting from her a gift greater than the prize withdrawn.
Of the American, Don Frank Goodwin, and of his wife the natives have nothing but good to say. Don Frank has lived among them for years, and has compelled their respect. His lady is easily queen of what social life the sober coast affords. The wife of the governor of the district,