MOK AS A VOCALIST
It would have been very comfortable to the mind of Edna, during her
waiting days in Paris, had she known there was a letter to her from
Captain Horn, in a cottage in the town of Sidmouth, on the south coast of
Devonshire. Had she known this, she would have chartered French trains,
Channel steamers, English trains, flies, anything and everything which
would have taken her the quickest to the little town of Sidmouth. Had she
known that he had written to her the first chance he had had, all her
doubts and perplexities would have vanished in an instant. Had she read
the letter, she might have been pained to find that it was not such a
letter as she would wish to have, and she might have grieved that it
might still be a long time before she could expect to hear from him
again, or to see him, but she would have waited--have waited patiently,
without any doubts or perplexities.
This letter, with a silver coin,--much more than enough to pay any
possible postage,--had been handed by Shirley to the first mate of the
British steamer, in the harbor of Valparaiso, and that officer had given
it to a seaman, who was going on shore, with directions to take it to
the post-office, and pay for the postage out of the silver coin, and
whatever change there might be, he should keep it for his trouble. On the
way to the post-office, this sailor stopped to refresh himself, and
meeting with a fellow-mariner in the place of refreshment, he refreshed
him also. And by the time the two had refreshed themselves to their
satisfaction, there was not much left of the silver coin--not enough to
pay the necessary postage to France.
"But," said the seaman to himself, "it doesn't matter a bit. We are bound
for Liverpool, and I'll take the letter there myself, and then I'll send
it over to Paris for tuppence ha'penny, which I will have then, and
haven't now. And I bet another tuppence that it will go sooner than if I
posted it here, for it may be a month before a mail-steamer leaves the
other side of this beastly continent. Anyway, I'm doing the best I can."
He put the letter in the pocket of his pea-jacket, and the bottom of that
pocket being ripped, the letter went down between the outside cloth and
the lining of the pea-jacket to the very bottom of the garment, where it
remained until the aforesaid seaman had reached England, and had gone
down to see his family, who lived in the cottage in Sidmouth. And there
he had hung up his pea-jacket on a nail, in a little room next to the
kitchen, and there his mother had found it, and sewed on two buttons, and
sewed up the rips in the bottoms of two pockets. Shortly after this, the
sailor, happening to pass a post-office box, remembered the letter he had
brought to England. He went to his pea-jacket and searched it, but could
find no letter. He must have lost it--he hoped after he had reached
England, and no doubt whoever found it would put a tuppence ha'penny
stamp on it and stick it into a box. Anyway, he had done all he could.
One pleasant spring evening, the negro Mok sat behind a table in the
well-known beer-shop called the "Black Cat." He had before him a
half-emptied beer-glass, and in front of him was a pile of three small
white dishes. These signified that Mok had had three glasses of beer, and
when he should finish the one in his hand, and should order another, the
waiter would bring with it another little white plate, which he would put
on the table, on the pile already there, and which would signify that the
African gentleman must pay for four glasses of beer.
Mok was enjoying himself very much. It was not often that he had such an
opportunity to sample the delights of Paris. His young master, Ralph, had
given him strict orders never to go out at night, or in his leisure
hours, unless accompanied by Cheditafa. The latter was an extremely
important and sedate personage. The combined dignity of a butler and a
clergyman were more than ever evident in his person, and he was a painful
drawback to the more volatile Mok. Mok had very fine clothes, which it
rejoiced him to display. He had a fine appetite for everything fit to eat
and drink. He had money in his pockets, and it delighted him to see
people and to see things, although he might not know who they were or
what they were. He knew nothing of French, and his power of expressing
himself in English had not progressed very far. But on this evening, in
the jolly precincts of the Black Cat, he did not care whether the people
used language or not. He did not care what they did, so that he could
sit there and enjoy himself. When he wanted more beer, the waiter
understood him, and that was enough.
The jet-black negro, gorgeously arrayed in the livery Ralph had chosen
for him, and with his teeth and eyeballs whiter than the pile of plates
before him, was an object of great interest to the company in the
beer-shop. They talked to him, and although he did not understand them,
or answer them, they knew he was enjoying himself. And when the landlord
rang a big bell, and a pale young man, wearing a high hat, and sitting at
a table opposite him, threw into his face an expression of exalted
melancholy, and sang a high-pitched song, Mok showed how he appreciated
the performance by thumping more vigorously on the table than any of the
other people who applauded the singer.
Again and again the big bell was rung, and there were other songs and
choruses, and then the company turned toward Mok and called on him to
sing. He did not understand them, but he laughed and pounded his fist
upon the table. But when the landlord came down to his table, and rang
the bell in front of him, that sent an informing idea into the African
head. He had noticed that every time the bell had been rung, somebody had
sung, and now he knew what was wanted of him. He had had four glasses of
beer, and he was an obliging fellow, so he nodded his head violently, and
everybody stopped doing what they had been doing, and prepared to listen.
Mok's repertoire of songs could not be expected to be large. In fact, he
only knew one musical composition, and that was an African hymn which
Cheditafa had taught him. This he now proceeded to execute. He threw
back his head, as some of the others had done, and emitted a succession
of grunts, groans, yelps, barks, squeaks, yells, and rattles which
utterly electrified the audience. Then, as if his breath filled his whole
body, and quivering and shaking like an angry squirrel when it chatters
and barks, Mok sang louder and more wildly, until the audience, unable to
restrain themselves, burst into laughter, and applauded with canes,
sticks, and fists. But Mok kept on. He had never imagined he could sing
so well. There was only one person in that brasserie who did not applaud
the African hymn, but no one paid so much attention to it as this man,
who had entered the Black Cat just as Mok had begun.
He was a person of medium size, with a heavy mustache, and a face
darkened by a beard of several days' growth. He was rather roughly
dressed, and wore a soft felt hat. He was a Rackbird.
This man had formerly belonged to the band of desperadoes which had been
swept away by a sudden flood on the coast of Peru. He had accompanied his
comrades on the last marauding expedition previous to that remarkable
accident, but he had not returned with them. He had devised a little
scheme of his own, which had detained him longer than he had expected,
and he was not ready to go back with them. It would have been difficult
for him to reach the camp by himself, and, after what he had done, he did
not very much desire to go, there as he would probably have been shot as
a deserter; for Captain Raminez was a savage fellow, and more than
willing to punish transgressions against his orders. This deserter,
Banker by name, was an American, who had been a gold-digger, a gambler,
a rough, and a dead shot in California, and he was very well able to take
care of himself in any part of the world.
He had made his way up to Panama, and had stayed there as long as it was
safe for him to do so, and had eventually reached Paris. He did not like
this city half so well as he liked London, but in the latter city he
happened to be wanted, and he was not wanted in Paris. It was generally
the case that he stayed where he was not wanted.
Of course, Banker knew nothing of the destruction of his band, and the
fact that he had not heard from them since he left them gave him not the
slightest regret. But what did astonish him beyond bounds was to sit at a
table in the Black Cat, in Paris, and see before him, dressed like the
valet of a Spanish grandee, a coal-black negro who had once been his
especial and particular slave and drudge, a fellow whom he had kicked and
beaten and sworn at, and whom he no doubt would have shot had he stayed
much longer with his lawless companions, the Rackbirds. There was no
mistaking this black man. He well remembered his face, and even the tones
of his voice. He had never heard him sing, but he had heard him howl, and
it seemed almost impossible that he should meet him in Paris. And yet, he
was sure that the man who was bellowing and bawling to the delight of the
guests of the Black Cat was one of the African wretches who had been
entrapped and enslaved by the Rackbirds.
But if Banker had been astonished by Mok, he was utterly amazed and
confounded when, some five minutes later, the door of the brasserie was
suddenly opened, and another of the slaves of the Rackbirds, with whose
face he was also perfectly familiar, hurriedly entered.
Cheditafa, who had been sent on an errand that evening, had missed Mok
on his return. Ralph was away in Brussels with the professor, so that
his valet, having most of his time on his hands, had thought to take a
holiday during Cheditafa's absence, and had slipped off to the Black
Cat, whose pleasures he had surreptitiously enjoyed before, but never to
such an extent as on this occasion. Cheditafa knew he had been there,
and when he started out to look for him, it was to the Black Cat that he
went first.
Before he had quite reached the door, Cheditafa had been shocked and
angered to hear his favorite hymn sung in a beer-shop by that reprobate
and incompetent Mok, and he had rushed in, and in a minute seized the
blatant vocalist by the collar, and ordered him instantly to shut his
mouth and pay his reckoning. Then, in spite of the shouts of
disapprobation which arose on every side, he led away the negro as if he
had been a captured dog with his tail between his legs.
Mok could easily have thrown Cheditafa across the street, but his respect
and reverence for his elder and superior were so great that he obeyed his
commands without a word of remonstrance.
Now up sprang Banker, who was in such a hurry to go that he forgot to pay
for his beer, and when he performed this duty, after having been abruptly
reminded of it by a waiter, he was almost too late to follow the two
black men, but not quite too late. He was an adept in the tracking of
his fellow-beings, and it was not long before he was quietly following
Mok and Cheditafa, keeping at some distance behind them, but never
allowing them to get out of his sight.
In the course of a moderate walk he saw them enter the Hotel Grenade.
This satisfied the wandering Rackbird. If the negroes went into that
hotel at that time of night, they must live there, and he could suspend
operations until morning.