Ten anxious heads lean out from ten abbreviated windows; ten distressed voices ask in all available tongues, “Where is the Doctor?” We ask the official—the one with the rose—if he has seen one called the Doctor, with bland, smiling face, round and jovial; blue eyes, light hair, walking with a confident, easy swing, wearing a linen suit and East Indian pith helmet. No one answering that description had come to the station. Fully half an hour before we left the Gran Hotel de Venezuela, the Doctor had taken a cab, so that there should be no doubt or question as to his being on time; for the Doctor was an orderly man, of decided opinions and exact habits. He was never known to be late at an appointment. He had with him the free untrammelled air of the unmarried man. He had neither wife to detain, nor sweetheart to beguile him. He was a free-lance, and yet here it was, a moment before the time for departure, and the Doctor nowhere to be seen.
The train shivers, quivers, gives a bump or so, squeaks out a funny foreign whistle, and we are moving out of Caracas. Ten of us instead of eleven. Ten much troubled wanderers, thinking and wondering a very great deal. We pass the curious little chapel upon the hill, with its five disjointed little steeples, looking as if one more quake of the grand old Mother would topple them all over for good; pass the low adobe huts on the outskirts of the city, and then catch a last glimpse of the Cathedral and its dear old bells, and the trees about the Square of Bolivar; and are almost into the rich country, outlaying the great city. But where is the Doctor! Had he been beguiled or waylaid, or had he waited for one too many a sip of the unforgettable lemonade; or had he gone to sleep with the priests under the magic of the old bells?
No, nothing seemed to fit in just right. The Doctor had reached years of discretion, he knew the wiles of women, and, as for being waylaid, that was hardly possible, for he always carried his chest high; and, as for the priests,—no, it was not the priests, for the Doctor had paid his respect to the Cathedral the day before. Hadn’t we seen his white hat disappear under the big, open doorway as we were on the way to market? But the lemonade,—there was the hitch; he might have longed for one more glimpse of the Dulceria, and the tall glass and the indescribable nectar,—con un poquito de Rom Imperial,—yes, he might have done so, any normal being might have done so, and that must be the whole trouble; then, just as we had decided on the lemonade, we stop at Palo-Grande, out in the gardens beyond the town, and into the car rushed a red-faced, very mad American, with satchels and luggage and souvenirs in his hands, and rage upon his face,—the Doctor; none more—none less,—the lost wanderer!
If any one was ever welcome, he was. We figuratively threw our arms about him, and wept with joy at the return of our long-lost brother. The Doctor’s face was a study. From despair, it changed to delight, and he flung himself into a seat, too happy to speak. But the Doctor was not slow in giving us an explanation. He had been experimenting on some very choice, newly acquired Spanish. That was the trouble, and instead of taking him to the city station, the cabby, probably anxious for a good fare, had driven about five miles to the first way-station on the road. I did not think the Doctor could ever have been disconcerted under any circumstances, but he was as thoroughly scared as one has need to be and live; and for the rest of the day, every few minutes, he would break out with some forceful expression about fool Americans who couldn’t speak Spanish and fool Spaniards who couldn’t speak English. We all then and there decided that we would learn Spanish or die. One or the other we are sure to do.
II.
It is a difficult matter to engage the Doctor in either scenery or conversation, and, in spite of all the wonders in which we find ourselves, as the plucky little train hurries along, it is a sort of laugh and jollification all the way with the Doctor.
I shall never forget the willows at the station where our Doctor appeared. They were so exquisitely graceful and beautiful. They were tall, with somewhat of the habits of the Lombardy poplar, close-limbed, sinewy, and with the plumy grace of a bunch of feathers, bending, bowing, whirling, swishing, in the cool mountain air, and I shall always think of them as the Doctor’s willows; for just as his frightened face popped into the door, in the twinkling of an eye, I glanced out of the window, and there stood that row of tall willows, like coy, young maidens, bowing their gentle heads in graceful congratulation. The Doctor’s willow was to me one of the rarest, sweetest trees of that wonderful day of trees, of that wonderful world of trees, of that wonderful land of infinite beauties, known only to those whose eyes have touched the vibration of their being. This willow, modest, unassuming as it is, so unlikely to attract attention, without flower or colour, other than the richest green that sunshine ever bestowed upon a leaf, was in its way as exquisite as a dream of lace and dew-drops, as tender as the sound of a lute, as sweetly sinuous as the drop of a violet’s head; and the mountain air, filtering through the thin, arrow-like leaves, was music fit for gods,—not men.
But the Doctor would not look at the willows, nor at the tall grass—tall—tall—tall—following along the bed of a limpid stream—the Guaira—tumbling along over pools and rocks and mossy beds; grasses so high that even Jack’s famous giants must needs stand on tiptoe to peep over the top; grass twenty to thirty feet high, with feathery plumes gracing the tall spires in masses of waving beauty. He would not see the beauty of the picture that the Great Mother showed us, for he was still in a dazed state of combined bewilderment, anger, and joy, and you know it takes time to find one’s feet after such an experience.
But did I tell you how as usual bravery was rewarded? When we boarded the train, we noticed our coach was unusually fine for a Venezuelan railway, and we wondered at it. Later the conductor explained that it was the private car of the general manager, all the common coaches being taken up to complete the Special Train; and so the Doctor was at last content.