The Consul | Page 4

of yellow-fever. Still, if you. insist----"
The practical politician reconsidered hastily. "I'm not the sort," he
protested, "to turn out a man appointed by our martyred President.
Besides, he's so old now, if the fever don't catch him, he'll die of old
age, anyway."
The Secretary coughed uncomfortably. "And they say," he murmured,
"republics are ungrateful."
"I don't quite get that," said the practical politician.
Of Porto Banos, of the Republic of Colombia, where as consul Mr.
Marshall was upholding the dignity of the United States, little could be
said except that it possessed a sure harbor. When driven from the
Caribbean Sea by stress of weather, the largest of ocean tramps, and
even battle-ships, could find in its protecting arms of coral a safe
shelter. But, as young Mr. Aiken, the wireless operator, pointed out,
unless driven by a hurricane and the fear of death, no one ever visited it.
Back of the ancient wharfs, that dated from the days when Porto Banos
was a receiver of stolen goods for buccaneers and pirates, were rows of
thatched huts, streets, according to the season, of dust or mud, a few
iron-barred, jail-like barracks, customhouses, municipal buildings, and
the whitewashed adobe houses of the consuls. The backyard of the
town was a swamp. Through this at five each morning a rusty engine
pulled a train of flat cars to the base of the mountains, and, if
meanwhile the rails had not disappeared into the swamp, at five in the
evening brought back the flat cars laden with odorous coffeesacks.
In the daily life of Porto Banos, waiting for the return of the train, and
betting if it would return, was the chief interest. Each night the consuls,
the foreign residents, the wireless operator, the manager of the rusty
railroad met for dinner. There at the head of the long table, by virtue of

his years, of his courtesy and distinguished manner, of his office, Mr.
Marshall presided. Of the little band of exiles he was the chosen ruler.
His rule was gentle. By force of example he had made existence in
Porto Banos more possible. For women and children Porto Banos was a
death-trap, and before "old man Marshall" came there had been no
influence to remind the enforced bachelors of other days.
They had lost interest, had grown lax, irritable, morose. Their white
duck was seldom white. Their cheeks were unshaven. When the sun
sank into the swamp and the heat still turned Porto Banos into a
Turkish bath, they threw dice on the greasy tables of the Cafe Bolivar
for drinks. The petty gambling led to petty quarrels; the drinks to fever.
The coming of Mr. Marshall changed that. His standard of life, his tact,
his worldly wisdom, his cheerful courtesy, his fastidious personal
neatness shamed the younger men; the desire to please him, to, stand
well in his good opinion, brought back pride and self-esteem.
The lieutenant of her Majesty's gun-boat PLOVER noted the change.
"Used to be," he exclaimed, "you couldn't get out of the Cafe Bolivar
without some one sticking a knife in you; now it's a debating club.
They all sit round a table and listen to an old gentleman talk world
politics."
If Henry Marshall brought content to the exiles of Porto Banos, there
was little in return that Porto Banos could give to him. Magazines and
correspondents in six languages kept him in touch with those foreign
lands in which he had represented his country, but of the country he
had represented, newspapers and periodicals showed him only too
clearly that in forty years it had grown away from him, had changed
beyond recognition.
When last he had called at the State Department, he had been made to
feel he was a man without a country, and when he visited his home
town in Vermont, he was looked upon as a Rip Van Winkle. Those of
his boyhood friends who were not dead had long thought of him as
dead. And the sleepy, pretty village had become a bustling commercial
centre. In the lanes where, as a young man, he had walked among
wheatfields, trolley-cars whirled between rows of mills and factories.
The children had grown to manhood, with children of their own.
Like a ghost, he searched for house after house, where once he had
been made welcome, only to find in its place a towering office building.

"All had gone, the old familiar faces." In vain he scanned even the shop
fronts for a friendly, homelike name. Whether the fault was his,
whether he would better have served his own interests than those of his
government, it now was too late to determine. In his own home, he was
a stranger among strangers. In the service he had so faithfully followed,
rank by