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Updated: June 27, 2025
Over on the hillside lay Captain Goodwin and most of the crew of the Helen Mar, wishing us well, and close to starboard you heard all night the tinkle of the Jiron River down in its channel. It was twenty feet from the deck of the Helen Mar to the ground, and twenty feet from there to the river. Portate was a pleasant little city in those days.
I says to Stevey Todd, "Go on! Run your blamed old hotel standing on your head!" I says, "I'm going to Greenough," and I lit out for Portate, leaving him standing on the bank, with the tears running down his face, like his heart was broken. When I came to the harbour I found there were two ships in port bound for California, and one by way of Panama. She was named the Jane Allen.
He sang hoarsely as follows: "Tommy and Dorcas, now adieu; I drops a briny tear on, Mayor, my memories of you; Stevey that brought the beer on; Farewell across the waters blue, Oh, Jiron. "Farewell the nights of ba'my smell, Farewell the alligator, Special them little ones that dwell In the muck hole with their mater. Farewell, Portate, oh, farewell, Equator."
He had a series of fits that was painful, painful." Then he moved away, muttering, "Painful, painful!" climbed over the side, and down the ladder, and went to California. Sadler and Irish were gone, but Stevey Todd and I stayed on at Portate, running the Hotel Helen Mar. Three years we ran her altogether, and made money.
A hoarse, half-whisper winged every word with an imperious threat. Hamilton obeyed. His hands were not firm; his fingers fumbled nervously; but he hurried, and Father Beret soon had the rapier sheathed and secured at his belt beside its mate. A good and true priest is a burden-bearer. His motto is: Alter alterius onera portate; bear ye one another's burdens.
I heard the British consul say to the American consul: "You know, of course, that's what you call a 'put up job' one of your Americanisms," he says. "Shucks! You don't care," says the American consul. "But really, you know, it's not decent," says the British consul. Sadler stood on the after deck of the steamer with his hat off, same as if he was asking a benediction on Portate.
"Why, I got to go down and spank 'em!" he says, and he rolled out of the hammock and went off down the road toward Portate with Irish pattering after him. We saw no more of them that day, and we didn't hear any news until the noon following. There was a gale from the northwest in the morning. I went down to the city in the afternoon, and found the Plaza boiling with news.
By-and-by I beat the shoemaker on metres and the son in the back yard, and then I left 'em, for they was no more use to me. But I never found anything else so much satisfaction as them two pursuits. But I'll go away, Tommy," he says, "I'll leave Portate. I will, honest. I'll be good. I wish they'd quit puttin' temptations on me. But they won't. They're comin' out again! Look at 'em!
Speaking of Rosalia, it's a green and pink and white town, in a valley that opens on the sea, with mountains behind it. It's a prettier town than Portate. In the centre is the little square or plaza, filled with palms and roses and bushes. There's a lamp-post near the middle and the ruins of a stone fountain.
The politics and the climate are like this; when they're quiet, they're asleep; and when they're not, politics are revolutions and guns, and the climate is letting off stray volcanoes and shaking up earthquakes. But it was pleasant to be in the harbour of Portate. Everything there seemed lazy.
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