"An' me can't see how de hell me gwine mek up to any man if me got fi' fling in him face a old blue ship me did got las' week. W'en is Scipio gwine bring me dat shawl him pramise fi' giv' me?"
"Me no fond ha-tall o' any 'Panish man," cried Anesta, "an' me don't see how me can—"
Miss Buckner swung around, struck. "Yo' t'ink so, he, his dat wha' yo' t'ink? Well, yo' bess mek up unna mind—all o' unna! Well, wha' a bunch o' lazy ongrateful bitches de whole carload of unna is, dough he?"
Suddenly she broke off, anger seaming her brow. "Unna don't know me his hindebted to him, no? Unna don't know dat hif hit wasn't farrim a lot o' t'ings wha' go awn up yah, would be street property long ago—an' some o' we yo' see spo'tin' roun' yah would be some way else, an' diffrant altogaddah."
"Ah know not me."
"Ah know Oi ain't owe nobody nothin'—"
"Yo' think yo' don't! But don't fool your-selves, children, there is more to make the mare go than you think—I see that now."
She busied herself gathering up glasses, flouncing off to the pantry.
The Palm Porch was not a canteen, it was a house. But it was a house of lavish self-containment. It was split up in rooms, following a style of architecture which was the flair of the Isthmian realtors, and each room opened out on the porch. Each had, too, an armor of leafy laces; shining dust and scarlet. Each had its wine and decanters, music and song.
On the squalid world of Colon it was privileged to gaze with hauteur, for Miss Buckner, the owner of the Palm Porch, was a lady of poise, charm and caution. Up around the ribs of the porch she had put a strip of canvas cloth. It shut out eyes effectively. Glancing up, one saw boxes of rosebush and flower vines, but beyond that—nothing. The porch's green paint, the opulent flower pots and growing plants helped to plaster on it the illusion of the tropical jungle.