But who would be less partial? The mate, angry, maintained that to elect one of the buyers was equally objectionable.
Thereon an earthquake began in the fat old lady, and gradually gathered enough force to lift her onto her feet. She took John by the shoulders, and pushed him before her to the scales. Then in a few witty, ringing words she suggested her solution—he should do the weighing.
The audience were pleased: but as soon as John understood he went very red, and wanted to escape. The rest of the children, on the other hand, were eaten with envy.
“Mayn’t I help too?” piped Rachel.
The despairing mate thought he saw just a forlorn hope in this. While John was being instructed, he gathered the other children: and out of the heap of miscellaneous clothing rigged them all out in a sort of fancy dress. Then he gave them the samples to carry round, and the sale began anew.
It had now assumed rather the character of a parochial bazaar. Even the Vicar was present—though less well shaved than he would have been in England, and cunninger-looking. He was one of the only buyers.
The children thoroughly enjoyed themselves, and minced and pranced and tugged each other’s turbans. But the crowd was a Latin one, not Nordic: and their endearing tricks failed altogether to arouse any interest. The sale went worse than ever.
There was only one exception, and that was the important old lady. Once her attention had been called (by her own act) to the children, it fixed itself on one of them, on Edward. She drew him to her bosom, like a mother in melodrama, and with her hairy mouth gave him three resounding kisses.
Edward could no more have struggled than if caught by a boa. Moreover, the portentous woman fascinated him, as if she had been a boa indeed. He lay in her arms limp, self-conscious, and dejected: but without active thought of escape.
And so the business went on: on the one hand the unheeded drone of the mate, on the other the great creature still keeping up her witticisms, still dominating everything: all of a sudden remembering Edward, and giving him a couple of kisses like so many bombs: then clean forgetting all about him: then remembering him again, and hugging him: then dropping her salts: then nearly dropping Edward: then suddenly twisting round to launch a dart into the crowd behind her—she was the despair of that unhappy auctioneer, who saw lot after lot fall for a tenth of its value, or even find no bidder at all.
Captain Jonsen, however, had his own idea of how to enliven a parochial bazaar that is proving a frost. He went on board, and mixed several gallons of that potion known in alcoholic circles as Hangman’s Blood (which is compounded of rum, gin, brandy, and porter). Innocent (merely beery) as it looks, refreshing as it tastes, it has the property of increasing rather than allaying thirst, and so, once it has made a breach, soon demolishes the whole fort.
This he poured out into mugs, merely remarking that it was a noted English cordial, and gave it to the children to distribute among the crowd.
At once the Cubans began to show more interest in them than when they came bearing samples of arrowroot: and with their popularity their happiness increased, and like rococo Ganymedekins and Hebelettes they darted about the crowd, distributing the enticing poison to all who would.
When he saw what was on foot, the mate wiped his mouth in despair.
“Oh you fool!” he groaned.
But the captain himself was highly pleased with his ruse: kept rubbing his hands, and grinning, and winking.
“That’ll liven ’em, eh?”
“Wait and see!” was all the mate let himself say. “You just wait and see!”
“Look at Edward!” said Emily to Margaret in a pause. “It’s perfectly sickening!”
It was. The very first mug rendered the fat señora even more motherly. Edward by now was fascinated, was in her power completely. He sat and gazed up in her little black eyes, his own large brown ones glazed with sentiment. He avoided her moustache, it is true: but on her cheek he was returning her kisses earnestly. All this, of course, without the possibility of their exchanging a single word—pure instinct. “With a fork drive Nature out …” one would gladly have taken a fork to Nature, on that occasion.
Meanwhile, on the rest of the crowd the liquor was having exactly the effect the mate had foreseen. Instead of stimulating them, it dissolved completely whatever vestiges of attention they were still giving to the sale. He stepped down from the platform—gave it all up in despair. For they had now broken up into little groups, which discussed and argued their own affairs as if they were in a café. He in his turn went on board, and shut himself in his cabin—Captain Jonsen could deal with the mess he had made himself!
But alas! No worse host than Jonsen was ever born: he was utterly incapable of either understanding or controlling a crowd. All he could think of doing was plying them with more.
For the children the spectacle was an absorbing one. The whole nature of these people, as they drank, seemed to be changing: under their very eyes something seemed to be breaking up, like ice melting. Remember that to them this was a pantomime: no word spoken to explain, and so the eyes exercised a peculiar clearness.
It was rather as if the whole crowd had been immersed in water, and something dissolved out of them while the general structure yet remained. The tone of their voices changed, and they began to talk much slower, to move more slowly and elaborately. The expression of their faces became more candid, and yet more mask-like: hiding less, there was also less to hide. Two men even began to fight: but they fought so incompetently it was like
