“I guess I’ll go and see a little more of the town on my own hook before I try to make any arrangements,” he muttered to himself, and strolled on until another drinking place presented itself. Here he met another American, and the pair threw dice for drinks for over an hour. Then the man from Baltimore dozed off in a chair, and did not awaken until a number of hours later.
CHAPTER VII
FROM CURAÇAO TO LA GUAYRA
Leaving the steamer, our friends proceeded to the main thoroughfare of Willemstad, a quaint old street, scrupulously clean—a characteristic of every Dutch town—and with buildings that looked as if they had been moved over from Amsterdam. Not far off was the home of the governor of the island, a mansion with walls of immense thickness. The place fronted the bay and near by was something of a fortress with a few ancient cannon. Here a number of Dutch soldiers were on duty.
“I will see if I cannot get carriages, and then we can drive around,” said Professor Strong, and this was done, and soon they were moving along slowly, for no Dutch hackman ever thinks of driving fast. Besides it was now the noon hour, and the hackmen would rather have taken their midday nap than earn a couple of dollars. The boys soon discovered that in the tropics to do anything, or to have anything done for you, between the hours of eleven to three is extremely difficult. Merchants close their places of business and everybody smokes and dreams or goes to sleep.
“I see a lot of negroes,” observed Mark, as they moved along.
“The population is mostly of colored blood,” answered the professor. “The colored people are all free, yet the few Dutchmen that are here are virtually their masters. The negroes work in the phosphate mines, and their task is harder than that of a Pennsylvania coal miner ten times over. If we had time we might visit one of the phosphate works, but I hate to risk it.”
“For such a small place there are lots of ships here,” put in Sam.
“That is true and I think the reason is because this is a free port of entry. The ships bring in all sorts of things, and some say a good deal of the stuff is afterwards smuggled into Venezuela and Colombia.”
They drove on, past the quaint shops and other buildings, but in an opposite direction to that taken by Dan Markel. During the drive Hockley had little or nothing to say. He was worried over the non-appearance of the man from Baltimore, and looked for him eagerly at every corner and cross road.
“He’s made a mess of it,” he thought. “We’ll be driving back soon and that will be the end of it.” And then he thought of the fifty dollars and began to suspect Markel, and something like a chill passed over him.