He did not, could not, read it over. He folded the poem and slipped it into an envelop. He felt he could not rest until it was mailed. Lest he disturb his mother, he took off his shoes, and quietly stole down-stairs, let himself out the door, and hurried to the corner post. Then as quietly he stole back to his room, while behind her closed door his mother knelt by her bed, listening to the stealthy footsteps, and longing with all the intensity of her soul to find some way to comfort him. The week-end passed. There was an idyllic Saturday at the zoo, and a Sunday in London, with a morning service in the abbey, and an afternoon when they wandered arm in arm like lovers along the embankment. Dorothy's name was not mentioned again. Monday morning Walton packed his bag, and in the cold, gray drizzle of a windy day made his way back to Oxford. The usual high-priced cabby drove him back in the usual drafty hansom to his college rooms. He found Scroggs, his scout, lighting the fire in his grate. The kindly, wrinkled old servant cast one look at his master's white, exhausted face, and hobbled off for coffee. Walton sat down by the fire, trying to prepare himself for that day and the days and days to come. The blaze had warmed him a little, and a suggestion of color had come back to his face when Scroggs returned with a large tray neatly set with white-and-gold dishes, with coffee, toast, and jam. "Ere, sir," he said, "that ought ta put 'eart into you. And 'ere's the post, sir, 'as just came." Walton took the tray indifferently. Why, that was Dorothy's writing on the little, square, gray envelop. His mind failed to conjure up any probable explanation. With trembling fingers he tore open the letter. He almost wished she had not written. It would have been easier. He read: My dear Mr. Walton: I did not care for the poem you sent me, and am writing another I like better. Come around if you care to hear it. It is called "Dearest Adonis." Always yours, DOROTHY PELHAM. FOR a second time Walton cut Wyckham-Smith's coaching. In this second instalment of the account of his travels in the West Indies Harry Franck covers the fascinating, old-new city of Havana. Its people, customs, sports, and buildings are discussed in the author's inimitable manner. A CONSTANT procession of motors, their mufflers wide open, went hiccoughing out the Carlos III Boulevard toward the Havana ball-park. The entrance-gate, at which they brought up with a snort and a sudden, bronco-like halt that all but jerked their passengers to their feet, was a seething hubbub. Ticket-speculators, renters of cushions, venders of everything that can be consumed on a summer afternoon, were bellowing their wares into the ears of the fanáticos who scrimmaged about the ticket-window. Men a trifle seedy in appearance wandered back and forth holding up half a dozen tiny envelops, arranged in fanshape, which they were evidently trying to sell or rent. The pink entradas I finally succeeded in snatching carried us as far as the grand stand, where another maelstrom was surging about the chicken-wire wicket behind which a henminded youth was dispensing permissions to sit down. He would have been more successful in the undertaking if he had not needed to thumb over a hundred or more seat-coupons reserved for special friends of the management or of himself every time he sought to serve a mere spectator. however, of the front-row places we obtained except that, in the free-for-all Spanish fashion, all the riffraff of venders crowded the foot-rests that were supposedly reserved for front-row occupants. Nine nimble Cubans were scattered about the flat expanse of Almendares Park, backed by Príncipe Hill, with its crown of university buildings. Royal palms waved their plumes languidly in the ocean breeze. A huge Cuban flag undulated beyond the outfielders. A score of vultures circled lazily overhead, as if awaiting a chance to pounce upon the "dead ones" which the wrathful "fans" announced every time a player failed to live up to their hopes. On a bench in the shade sat all but one of the invading team, our own "Pirates" from the Smoky City. The missing one was swinging his club alertly at the home plate, his eyes glued on the Cuban zurdo, or "southpaw," who had just begun his contortions in the middle of the diamond. The scene itself was familiar enough, yet it seemed out of place in this tropical setting. It was like coming upon a picture one had known since childhood, to find it inclosed in a strange new frame. I reached for my kodak, then reWe certainly could not complain, strained the impulse. A camera is of little use at a Cuban ball game. Only a recording phonograph could catch its chief novelties. An uproar as incessant as that of a rolling-mill drowned every individual sound. It was not merely the venders of "El escor oficial," of sandwiches, lottery-tickets, cigars, cigarettes, bottled beer by the basketful, who created the hubbub; the spectators themselves made most of it. The long, two-story grand stand behind us was packed with Cubans of every shade from ebony black to the pasty white of the tropics, and every man of them seemed to be shouting at the top of his welltrained lungs. I say "man" advisedly, for with the exception of Rachel there were just three women present, and they had the hangdog air of culprits. But scores of men were on their feet, screaming at their neighbors and waving their hands wildly in the air. "Which do you like best, base-ball or bull-fights?" I shouted to my neighbor on the left. He was every inch a Cuban, by birth, environment, point of view, in his very gestures, and he spoke not a word of English. Generations of Spanish ancestry were plainly visible through his grayish features; I happened to know that he had applauded many a torero in the days before the rule of Spain and "the bulls" had been banished together. Yet he anYet he answered instantly: "Base-ball by far; and so do all Cubans." But base-ball, strictly speaking, is not what the Cuban enjoys most. It is rather the gambling that goes with it. Like every sport of the Spanish-speaking race, with the single exception of bullfighting, base-ball to the great majority is merely a pretext for betting. The throng behind us was everywhere waving handfuls of money, real American money, for Cuba has none of her own larger than the silver dollar. Small wonder the bills are always ragged and worn and half obliterated, for they are constantly passing, like crumpled waste-paper, from one sweaty hand to another. The Platt Amendment showed incomplete knowledge of Cuban conditions when it decreed the use of American money on the island; it should have gone further and ordered the bills destined for Cuba to be made of linoleum. Bets passed at the speed of sleight-of-hand performances. The fanáticos bet on every swing of the batter's club, on every ball that rose into the air, on whether or not a runner would reach the next base, on how many fouls the inning would produce. Most of the wagers passed so quickly that there was no time for the actual exchange of money. A flip of the fingers or a nod of the head sufficed to arrange the deal. There were no dividing lines either of color or distance. Full-fledged Africans exchanged wagers with men of pure Spanish blood. Cabalistic signs passed between the grand stand and the sort of royal box high above. Across the field the crowded sol, as the Cuban calls the unshaded bleachers, in the vocabulary of the bullring, was engaged in the same moneywaving turmoil. The curb market of New York is slow, noiseless, and phlegmatic compared with a ball-game in Havana. The game itself was little different from one at home. The Cuban players varied widely in color, from the jetblack third baseman to a short-stop of rice-powder complexion. Their playing was of high order, quite as "fast" as the average teams of our big leagues. Cubans hold several world championships in sports requiring a high degree of skill and swiftness. The umpire in his protective paraphernalia looked quite like his fellows of the North, but behind his mask he was a rich mahogany brown. His official speech was English, but when a dispute arose he changed quickly to voluble Spanish. The "bucaneros," as the present-day pirates who had descended upon the Cuban coast were best known locally, won the game on this occasion; but the day before they had not scored a run. Base-ball-commonly pronounced "bahseh-bahl" throughout the islandhas won a firm foothold in Cuba. Those familiar with Spanish can find constant amusement in Havana's sporting pages. "Fans" quite unfamiliar with the tongue would experience no great difficulty in catching the drift of the Cuban reporter, though it would be Greek to a Spaniard speaking no base-ball, as a brief example will demonstrate: EL HABANA DEJO EN BLANCO José del Carmen Rodríguez realizó varios doubleplays sensacionales BRILLANTE PITCHING DE TUERO El catcher rojo, Miguel Angel González, cerró con doble llave la segunda base a los corredores americanos THE visitor whose picture of Havana is still that of the drowsy tropical city of our school-books is due for a shock. ceeded in slamming the door really shut, there you are at Perez's zaguan. Fords scurry by thousands through the streets of Havana day and night, ever ready to pick up a passenger or two and set them down again in any part of the business section for a mere twentycent piece a peseta in Cuban parlance. More expensive cars are now and then seen for hire; by dint of sleuth-like observation I did at last discover one Ford that was confined to the labor of carry Officers of the Cuban army physical exertion quickly bathes the body in perspiration, and nowhere is a wilted. collar worse form than in Havana. Moreover, one must be exceedingly nimble-footed to trust to the prehistoric means of transportation. The custom of always riding has left no rights to the pedestrian in the Cuban capital. The chances of being run down are excellent, and the result is apt to be not merely broken ribs, but a bill for damages to the machine. Hence, the expression "cojemos un For'" is synonymous with going a journey, however short, anywhere within the city. Your Havanese friend never says, "Let 's stroll around and see Perez," but always, "Let's catch a Ford," and by the time you have suc ing its owner. But those are the exceptions that prove the rule, and the rule is that the instant you catch sight of the familiar plebeian features of a "flivver" you know, even without waiting to see the hospitable "Se Alquila" ("Rents Itself") on the wind-shield, that you need walk no farther, whatever your sex, complexion, or previous condition of pedestrianism. They are particularly suited to the narrow streets that the Spaniard, in his Arabic avoidance of the sun, bequeathed the Cuban capital. There is many a corner in the business section which larger cars can turn only by backing or by mounting one of the scanty sidewalks. The closed taxi of the North, too, would be as much out of place in Havana as overcoats at a Fourth of July celebration. A few of the horse carriages of olden days still offer their services; but as neither driver, carriage, nor horse seem to have been groomed or fed since the war of independence, even those in no haste are apt to think twice or thrice, and finally put their trust in gasolene. Hence the Ford has taken charge of Havana, like an army of occupation. Unfortunately, a Ford and a Cuban chauffeur make a bad combination. The native temperament is quick-witted, but it is scantily gifted with patience. In the hands of a seeker after pesetas a "flivver" becomes a prancing, dancing steed, a snorting charger that knows no fear and yields to no rival. Apparently some Cuban Burbank has succeeded in crossing the laggard of our Northern highways with the kangaroo. The whis-, per of your destination in the driver's ear is followed by a leap that leaves the adjoining façades a mere blur upon the retina. The newspapers run a daily column for those who have been "Ford-ed" to hospitals or cemeteries. What are a few casualties a day in a city of nearly half a million, with prolific tendencies? There are voluminous traffic and speed rules, but he would be a friendless fellow who could not find a compadre with sufficient political power to "fix it up." Death corners-bill-boards or streethugging house-walls, from behind which he may dart without warning-are the joy of the Cuban chauffeur. Courtesy in personal intercourse stands on a high plane in Havana, but automobile politeness has not yet reached the stage of consideration for others. Traffic policemen, soldierly fellows widely varied in complexion, looking like bandsmen in their blue denim uniforms, are efficient, and accustomed to be obeyed; but they cannot be everywhere at once, and the automobile is. They confine their efforts, therefore, to a few seething corners, and humanity trusts to its own lucky star in the noman's-lands between. in the kiosk facing Morro Castle and the harbor entrance, an endless procession of seven-passenger motors files up and down the wide Prado and along the sea-washed Malecón, two, or at most three, haughty beings, not infrequently with kinky hair, lolling in every capacious tonneau. Liveried chauffeurs are the almost universal rule. The caballero who drives his own car would arouse the wonder, possibly the scorn, of his fellow-citizens; once and once only did we see a woman at the wheel. The cost of a car in Havana is from twenty to thirty per cent. higher than in the States, which supplies virtually all of them. A dollar pays for two gallons of gasolene instead of four. Licenses are a serious item, particularly to private owners in Havana, for the fee depends on the use to which the car is put. Fords for hire carry a white tag with black figures and pay $12.50 a year. Private cars bear a pink chapa at a cost of $62.50. Tags with blue figures announce the occupant a government official or a physician. Then, every driver must be supplied with a personal license, at a cost of $25. In theory that Cuban boys engrossed in a game of base-ball outside the great Spanish-built cárcel, or prison, facing Havana harbor The private machines alone would give Havana a busy appearance. All day long and far into the night the big central plaza is completely fenced in by splendid cars parked compactly ends to curb. Toward sunset, especially on the days when a military band plays the retreta is all, except a day or two of waiting in line at the municipal license bureau. In practice there are many little political wheels to be oiled if one would see the car free to go its way the same year it is purchased. Once the visitor has learned to dis |
