But
they'll never get anything on Jose. Have him tell you about it in
Spanish if you sabe the lingo."
But Jose was a gallego, whence instead of the voluble flood of
protesting words one expects from a Spaniard on such an occasion,
he wrapped himself in a stoical silence. Not until we were on our
way to the railroad station did I get him to talk. Then he
explained in quiet, unflowery, gestureless language.
He had come to the Canal Zone chiefly to gather literary material.
Not being a man of wealth, however, nor one satisfied with
superficial observation, he had sought employment at his trade as
stationary engineer. Besides laying in a stock for more important
writing he hoped to do in the future, he was Zone correspondent of
"El Liberal" of Madrid and other Spanish cities. In the social
life of his fellow-countrymen on the Isthmus he had taken no part,
whatever. He was too busy. He did not drink. He could not dance;
he saw no sense in squandering time in such frivolities. But ever
since his arrival he had been promising himself to attend one of
these wild Saturday-night debauches in the edge of the jungle that
he might use a description of it in some later work. So he had
coaxed his one personal friend, the boy, to go with him. It was
virtually the one thing besides work that he had ever done on the
Zone.
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