Messer Marco Polo | Page 9

was looking with eyes like gimlets at a big bullock of a soldier that was leading the tormenters.
"Show me something would surprise me," he was ordering. "Be damned to this old woman's entertainment!" says he. "As a magician," says he, "you're the worst I ever saw. If you're a magician," says he, "I'm a rabbit."
And there was a roar at that, because he was known to be a very brave man.
"Show me a magic trick," says he.
Says the Hindu:
"Maybe you'd wish you hadn't seen it."
"Be damned to that!" says the big fellow.
"Look at this man well," the Hindu told the room. "Look at him well." He throws a handful of powder in the fire and chants in his foreign language. A cloud of white smoke arises from the fire. He makes a pass before it, and, lo and behold ye! it's a screen against the wall. And there's a great commotion of shadows on the screen, and suddenly you see what it's all about. It's a platform, and a man kneeling, with his head on the block. You don't see who it is, but you get chilled. And suddenly there's a headsman in a red cloak and a red mask, and the ax swings and falls. The head pops off, and the body falls limp. And the head rolls down the platform and stops, and you see it's the head of the fellow who wanted to see something, and it's in the grisly grin of death. . .
"There's your latter end for you," says the conjurer. "You wanted to see something. I hope you're content."
The big fellow turns white, gulps, gives a bellow, and makes a rush; but the conjurer isn't there, nor his screen nor anything.
Everybody in the room was white and shaken -- all but the sea-captain. He just tamps his pipe as if nothing had happened, and smokes on. He doesn't even take a drink from his glass.
And a little while later an Irish chieftain walks in. He's poor and ragged and very thin. You might know he'd been fighting the heathen for the Holy sepulchre, and so entitled to respect, no matter what his condition. And behind him are five clansmen as ragged as he. But a big German trooper rolls up.
"And what are you?" says the big, burly fellow.
"A gentleman, I hope," says the ragged chief.
"'Tis yourself that says it," laughs the German trooper. The chieftain snicks the knife from his armpit, and sticks him in the jugular as neat as be damned.
"You'd might take that out, Kevin Beg" -- the Irish chief points to the killed man -- "and throw it in the canal. Somebody might stumble over it and bark their shins."
Now this, as you can conceive, roused a powerful commotion in the room. They were all on their feet, captains and mariners and men-at-arms, cheering or grumbling, and arguing the rights and wrongs of the matter. All but the sea-captain, who saw it all, and he never blinked an eyelid, never even missed a draw of the pipe.
And then Marco Polo knew him to be a Chinaman, because, as all the world knows, Chinamen are never surprised at anything.
CHAPTER IV
So Marco Polo goes over and salutes him politely.
"I wonder if you mind my sitting down by you for a while," he says. "I perceive you're from China."
The sea-captain waves him politely to his place.
"I'm from China." He smiles. "You guessed right."
"Is it long since you've been in China?"
"Well, that depends upon what you call long," says the captain. "If you mean time, it's one thing. If you mean voyage, it's another. For you've got to take into account," says he, "adverse winds, roundabout turns to avoid currents, possible delays to have the ship scraped free from the parasite life that does be attaching itself to the strakes, time spent in barter and trade. Other matters, too; the attacks of pirates; cross-grained princes who don't want you to be leaving their ports with a good cargo in your hold; sickness; loss of sails and masts; repairs to the ship. It wasn't a short journey and it wasn't a long one."
"It will be a long ways to China, I'm thinking."
"I can tell you how long it is from China to here, and you can reverse that, and you will get a fair idea of how long it is from here to China. I left Zeitoon with a cargo of porcelain for Japan, and traded it for gold-dust, and from Japan I went to Chamba to lay in a store of chessmen and pen-cases. And from Chamba I sailed to Java, which is the greatest island in the world. Java is fifteen hundred miles from Chamba, south and southeast, and it took me four months sailing, but a sea-captain cannot pass Java by, for it