[Originally published in Munsey's Magazine,
December, 1908.]
"But can thim that helps others help
thimselves!"
—Mulvaney.
This is the story that William Trotter told me on the beach at Aguas Frescas
while I waited for the gig of the captain of the fruit steamer Andador
which was to take me abroad. Reluctantly I was leaving the Land of Always
Afternoon. William was remaining, and he favored me with a condensed oral
autobiography as we sat on the sands in the shade cast by the Bodega
Nacional.
As usual, I became aware that the Man from Bombay had already written the
story; but as he had compressed it to an eight-word sentence, I have become an
expansionist, and have quoted his phrase above, with apologies to him and best
regards to Terence.
II
"Don't you ever have a desire to go back to the land of derby hats and
starched collars?" I asked him. "You seem to be a handy man and a man of
action," I continued, "and I am sure I could find you a comfortable job
somewhere in the States."
Ragged, shiftless, barefooted, a confirmed eater of the lotos, William
Trotter had pleased me much, and I hated to see him gobbled up by the
tropics.
"I've no doubt you could," he said, idly splitting the bark from a section of
sugar-cane. "I've no doubt you could do much for me. If every man could do as
much for himself as he can for others, every country in the world would be
holding millenniums instead of centennials."
There seemed to be pabulum in W. T.'s words. And then another idea came to
me.
I had a brother in Chicopee Falls who owned manufactories—cotton, or sugar,
or A. A. sheetings, or something in the commercial line. He was vulgarly rich,
and therefore reverenced art. The artistic temperament of the family was
monopolized at my birth. I knew that Brother James would honor my slightest
wish. I would demand from him a position in cotton, sugar, or sheetings for
William Trotter—something, say, at two hundred a month or thereabouts. I
confided my beliefs and made my large propositions to William. He had pleased me
much, and he was ragged.
While we were talking, there was a sound of firing guns—four or five,
rattlingly, as if by a squad. The cheerful noise came from the direction of the
cuartel, which is a kind of makeshift barracks for the soldiers of the
republic.
"Hear that?" said William Trotter. "Let me tell you about it.
"A year ago I landed on this coast with one solitary dollar. I have the same
sum in my pocket to-day. I was second cook on a tramp fruiter; and they marooned
me here early one morning, without benefit of clergy, just because I poulticed
the face of the first mate with cheese omelette at dinner. The fellow had kicked
because I'd put horseradish in it instead of cheese.
"When they threw me out of the yawl into three feet of surf, I waded ashore
and sat down under a palm-tree. By and by a fine-looking white man with a red
face and white clothes, genteel as possible, but somewhat under the influence,
came and sat down beside me.
"I had noticed there was a kind of a village back of the beach, and enough
scenery to outfit a dozen moving-picture shows. But I thought, of course, it was
a cannibal suburb, and I was wondering whether I was to be served with carrots
or mushrooms. And, as I say, this dressed-up man sits beside me, and we become
friends in the space of a minute or two. For an hour we talked, and he told me
all about it.
"It seems that he was a man of parts, conscientiousness, and plausibility,
besides being educated and a wreck to his appetites. He told me all about it.
Colleges had turned him out, and distilleries had taken him in. Did I tell you
his name? It was Clifford Wainwright. I didn't exactly catch the cause of his
being cast away on that particular stretch of South America; but I reckon it was
his own business. I asked him if he'd ever been second cook on a tramp fruiter,
and he said no; so that concluded my line of surmises. But he talked like the
encyclopedia from 'A–Berlin' to 'Trilo–Zyria.' And he carried a watch—a silver
arrangement with works, and up to date within twenty-four hours, anyhow.
"'I'm pleased to have met you,' says Wainwright. 'I'm a devotee to the great
joss Booze; but my ruminating facilities are unrepaired,' says he—or words to
that effect. 'And I hate,' says he, 'to see fools trying to run the world.'
"'I never touch a drop,' says I, 'and there are many kinds of fools; and the
world runs on its own apex, according to science, with no meddling from me.'
"'I was referring,' says he, 'to the president of this republic. His country
is in a desperate condition. Its treasury is empty, it's on the verge of war
with Nicamala, and if it wasn't for the hot weather the people would be starting
revolutions in every town. Here is a nation,' goes on Wainwright, 'on the brink
of destruction. A man of intelligence could rescue it from its impending doom in
one day by issuing the necessary edicts and orders. President Gomez knows
nothing of statesmanship or policy. Do you know Adam Smith?'
"'Lemme see,' says I. 'There was a one-eared man named Smith in Fort Worth,
Texas, but I think his first name was—'
"'I am referring to the political economist,' says Wainwright.
"'S'mother Smith, then,' says I. 'The one I speak of never was arrested.'
"So Wainwright boils some more with indignation at the insensibility of
people who are not corpulent to fill public positions; and then he tells me he
is going out to the president's summer palace, which is four miles from Aguas
Frescas, to instruct him in the art of running steam-heated republics.
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