Read Online The Salvation of Pisco Gabar and Other Stories by Geoffrey Household - Free Book Online Page B

know where he stood, you see.”
    â€œWith Doña Clara?”
    â€œWith me. I was being shown the door—though I paid my own first-class fare and had my steamship ticket. He had word that I wasn’t to be allowed to tender for the army contracts.”
    â€œRifles?”
    â€œGod, no! Rubber goods. There’d been a bit of a stink about them in Bogotá. They were rotten, and unfortunately somebody opened the cases before I could put my next deal through at Quito. Pennyfather—that’s the consul—had had a letter, one of those marked confidential with the lion and the unicorn shouting secrets at each other across the top. He said he didn’t want to tell the War Ministry about me, but that he would if I didn’t clear out.
    â€œWe were late arriving at the station. The consul had given me lunch. He was very friendly once it had been decided that I’d go quietly. He’d been in business himself.
    â€œYou know the first-class coach that goes down to Guayaquil three times a week. It was the same one in those days—the same ten armchairs mounted on swivels so that you can turn round and talk to your three nearest fellow passengers. Like a little club for bishops and landowners.
    â€œThere were only two travelers going down to the coast, though what with all the fuss and baggage it looked as if half Quito were traveling with them. Doña Clara was saying good-bye. Her servants were weeping—though I’ll bet they were glad to be rid of her—and her friends and her enemies and the stationmaster and the porters were rushing in and out of the coach. That woman and her stuff were all over the place.
    â€œTucked away behind a pile of suitcases was her husband, Don Anastasio. He was taking his wife for a holiday by the same boat I was bound north on. He was the vice president of the republic at the time. There was a senator sitting on each arm of his chair and all their three heads were wagging together. They were pretending to be occupied with last-minute affairs of state, and actually protecting themselves against Doña Clara. I tell you there was more cackle going on round that first-class coach than the two others.”
    This was a good illustration, for the two coaches next to the locomotive were always crammed with Indians and mestizos, passengers overflowing on to the platform, onlookers overflowing into the train. The railway still held romance and a journey by it was an excuse for a family gathering. Even a traveler to one of the little country towns of the plateau, a day’s ride on a horse, was seen off by all his relations if he took the train.
    â€œThe consul just had time to introduce me to the pair of them. I wasn’t popular with Doña Clara, but Don Anastasio was cordial. He was glad to see me. It meant he wouldn’t have to listen to his wife all the way to Guayaquil.
    â€œPennyfather had no sooner seen me into the train than it jerked. You know that jerk. It’s the only way to clear the coaches of non-travelers. They don’t pay any attention to the conductor or the whistle or the station bell, but the false start tumbles them out like fleas off the back of a dog. The train travels about two feet and then stops. It doesn’t really leave for another thirty seconds.
    â€œWell, Doña Clara spent the thirty seconds bowing and smiling to all the human souls she had incommoded, and giving Pennyfather dirty looks. She didn’t pay much attention to small fry such as consuls. She liked ministers. And as Great Britain didn’t have a minister in Ecuador, she was all the more annoyed with Pennyfather. Besides, she thought it was pretty poor taste on his part to stick a friend on the train when she wanted it to herself.
    â€œYou should have seen that coach when we pulled out of Quito. There wasn’t a seat and hardly standing room in the aisle. Two chairs were occupied by the vice president and his missus, three by