“I see,” said Jones; “well, come an’ have a drink, Mr. Wooley, which is the best thing we can do when we boys meet together from Jamaica.”
Tom accepted the invitation. Susan heard and was delighted. She was certain that Tom would say nothing about their old relations in Jamaica, and she was equally certain that Jones could know nothing of those relations. Again, she felt, her luck was in the ascendant. Then, some one touched her on the arm, and, turning, she saw Mackenzie.
The two moved quickly to a corner of the room, for the dancers were now preparing to begin a waltz. Mackenzie explained that he had received an invitation to this party, and almost at the last moment had accepted, thinking that Susan would probably be there. He had come over to Colon by a late train. “Sam don’t seem to like me much now,” he remarked; “that’s why I don’t take a run over on a Sunday to see both of you, though I find it sort of lonely up at Culebra.”
Then he asked her to dance, and she consented, and they joined the slowly whirling groups.
The room was terribly warm. Although the windows were all wide open, no breath of wind was stirring that night, and the movements of the dancers in the crowded “ball-room” caused the perspiration to stream from their faces and drench their bodies. Only West Indians would have found pleasure in dancing under such circumstances, and even these felt the discomfort of the heat after a time.
“Lord! it hot!” panted a fat lady as she bounded across the room—they were now dancing a set of lancers. “I suffocate,” giggled a thin creature, as a burly fellow clasped her to his breast. But still the musicians played with undiminished energy, and still the dancers danced. And the stamping of feet upon the floor ceased only when one dance was at an end and a new set was being formed.
Tom had two drinks with Jones, and then returned to the dancing-hall, where he stationed himself against a wall, watching Susan and reflecting on his forlorn state. Those two drinks had reduced him to a maudlin condition, and just then his loss appeared to him as the one calamity of the world, though he had managed to bear it with equanimity since leaving Jamaica. Jones had also returned, had danced once with Susan and once with another lady, and then had adjourned to the refreshment-room, where, on a long table surrounded by chairs, stood a number of bottles containing various liquors, and some huge dishes filled with ham, beef, and chicken sandwiches. A few men were seated round this table, and these Jones joined. Conversation ensued, and this, probably because of the drink imbibed, soon turned to topics connected with their old life in Jamaica. Being Jamaicans, these men had grievances. Being British subjects, their grievances were against the Jamaica Government.
“De Jamaica Government don’t take enough care of we,” observed a heavy-looking man, who, when in Jamaica, had displayed extraordinary ingenuity in evading the payment of his taxes. “We ’ave no protection in dis place, an’ so these foreigners here can treat a Jamaican like a dawg.”
“Thet is a fact,” agreed a dapper little fellow who sported eyeglasses, and who was a clerk in one of the mercantile houses of Colon (he had been a lawyer’s clerk in Kingston). “There is no protection here whatever. A man’s rights are not regarded. The labourers are badly treated and have no redress. Representations should at once be made to the British Government about the Jamaica Government, who are neglectful. It is my intention to write to the Jamaica papers in re the matter.”
Jones at once recognized in this speaker a man of distinguished ability. He asked him to have a drink with him, and then made his contribution to the conversation.