Close by Engelbaum's gate he overtook three small boys contending around a suit-case: the point being that all three could not demand reward for carrying so light a burden. If the owner were a fool, or generously inclined (which amounted to the same thing), two of the three might put in a colourable claim for services rendered.
In white countries one boy fights with another. In San Ramon as many as fifteen can fight indiscriminately, and the vanquished are weeded out by gradual process. Farrell shook the urchins apart, driving them for a moment from the suit-case as one would drive three wasps off a honey-pot.… It lay at his feet. Yes, he'd have recognised it anywhere, even without help of the half-effaced "J. F." painted on its canvas cover. It was a far-travelled piece of luggage, and much-enduring—What are those adjectives by which Homer is always calling Ulysses?… It bore many labels. One, with "Southampton" upon it, was apparently pretty recent… and another with "Waterloo."
He turned the case over while the boys eyed him, keeping their distance. His brain worked more and more clearly. . . Foe had returned to England, then, to pick up the trail. But how had he struck it?… There was only one way.… He had, of course, been obliged to send letters home from time to time—letters to his firm, to his bankers for money—instructions to pay his housekeeper— possibly a score of letters in all. Foe must have obtained possession of one and spotted the postmark on the Peruvian stamp. …
Of a sudden he realised his cowardice; and flushed, with shame and manhood together, there in the pathway.… This thing was no longer a duel. Three were in it now, and the third was Santa.… The old scare had caught him, surprised him, and he had run from recollected habit.… It had been base.… Why, of course, Santa made all the difference! He must go back to protect Santa.
At the thought of her he felt a second flush of shame sweep up in him, quite different from the first and quite horrible. The tide of it scorched his face as if flaying it. And so—if you'll understand—in the very moment of knowing himself twice vulnerable— no, ten times as vulnerable—this Farrell, loving this woman, became a man: and three small ragamuffins stood about him and witnessed the outward process.
The outward process ended in his fishing out three dineros from his trouser pocket and bestowing one on each of them—twopence-halfpenny or thereabouts is a godsend to a juvenile in San Ramon. "There, little fools!" he said. "Take the stranger's bag along and don't quarrel any more. There is nothing in this world so silly as quarrelling."
With that he went back down the hill, and so came on Foe and on Santa, talking down to Foe from the balcony porch.
"Hallo, old man!" said Farrell, looking Foe straight in the eyes: and "Hallo!" answered Foe, looking Farrell straight in the eyes. Santa, gazing down from the rail, thought it strange that they did not shake hands, as Britons and Americans do when they met.
"I found three rascals," said Farrell easily, "scrapping for the honour of delivering a suit-case at Engelbaum's hotel—a suit-case that I recognised. I rescued it, and it is now safe in the porch. … Oh, by the way, though you seem to have made acquaintance, let me do the formal and introduce you to my wife. Santa, this is Doctor Foe, an old fellow-traveller."
Foe gave him one glance, shrewd and steady, before looking aloft and again raising his hat. The thrust did not penetrate Farrell's defence.