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TITLE: BILLY AND THE BIG STICK
AUTHOR: RICHARD HARDING DAVIS
EBOOK: E01144 (O'Briens Book Cellar)

BILLY AND THE BIG STICK

by Richard Harding Davis

Had the Wilmot Electric Light people remained content only to make
light, had they not, as a by-product, attempted to make money, they
need not have left Hayti.

When they flooded with radiance the unpaved streets of Port-
au-Prince no one, except the police, who complained that the lights
kept them awake, made objection; but when for this illumination the
Wilmot Company demanded payment, every one up to President Hamilear
Poussevain was surprised and grieved. So grieved was President Ham,
as he was lovingly designated, that he withdrew the Wilmot
concession, surrounded the power-house with his barefooted army,
and in a proclamation announced that for the future the furnishing
of electric light would be a monopoly of the government.

In Hayti, as soon as it begins to make money, any industry, native
or foreign, becomes a monopoly of the government. The thing works
automatically. It is what in Hayti is understood as BAUTE FINANCE.
The Wilmot people should have known that. Because they did not as
vice-consul, law and order were as solidly established as the stone
jetties, and by contrast the eccentricities of the Black REPUBLIC
baffled and distressed him.

"It can't be that you blackmail the president," said the consul,
"because I understand he boasts he has committed all the known
crimes.

"And several he invented," agreed Billy.

"And you can't do it with a gun, because they tell me the president
isn't afraid of anything except a voodoo priestess. What is your
secret?" coaxed the consul. "If you'll only sell it, I know several
Powers that would give you your price. Billy smiled modestly.

"It's very simple," he said. "The first time my wages were shy I
went to the palace and told him if he didn't come across I'd shut
off the juice. I think he was so stunned at anybody asking him for
real money that while he was still stunned he opened his safe and
handed me two thousand francs. I think he did it more in admiration
for my nerve than because he owed it. The next time pay-day
arrived, and the pay did not, I didn't go to the palace. I just
went to bed, and the lights went to bed, too. You may remember?"
The consul snorted indignantly.

"I was holding three queens at the time," he protested. "Was it YOU
did that?"

"It was," said Billy. "The police came for me to start the current
going again, but I said I was too ill. Then the president's own
doctor came, old Gautier, and Gautier examined me with a lantern
and said that in Hayti my disease frequently proved fatal, but he
thought if I turned on the lights I might recover. I told him I was
tired of life, anyway, but that if I could see three thousand
francs it might give me an incentive. He reported back to the
president and the three thousand francs arrived almost instantly,
and a chicken broth from Ham's own chef, with His Excellency's best
wishes for the recovery of the invalid. My recovery was
instantaneous, and I switched on the lights.

"I had just moved into the Widow Ducrot's hotel that week, and her
daughter Claire wouldn't let me eat the broth. I thought it was
because, as she's a dandy cook herself, she was professionally
jealous. She put the broth on the top shelf of the pantry and wrote
on a piece of paper, 'Gare!' But the next morning a perfectly good
cat, who apparently couldn't read, was lying beside it dead."

The consul frowned reprovingly.

"You should not make such reckless charges," he protested. "I would
call it only a coincidence."

"You can call it what you please," said Billy, "but it won't bring
the cat back. Anyway, the next time I went to the palace to
collect, the president was ready for me. He said he'd been taking
out information, and he found if I shut off the lights again he
could hire another man in the States to turn them on. I told him
he'd been deceived. I told him the Wilmot Electric Lights were
could work them. And I pointed out to him if he dismissed me it
wasn't likely the Wilmot people would loan him another expert; not
while they were fighting him through the courts and the State
Department. That impressed the old man; so I issued my ultimatum.
I said if he must have electric lights he must have me, too.
Whether he liked it or not, mine was a life job."

"What did he say to that?" gasped the new consul.

"Said it wasn't a life job, because he was going to have me shot at
sunset."

"Then you said?"

"I said if he did that there wouldn't be any electric lights, and
you would bring a warship and shoot Hayti off the map."

The new consul was most indignant.

"You had no right to say that!" he protested. "You did very ill. My
instructions are to avoid all serious complications."

"That was what I was trying to avoid," said Billy. "Don't you call
being shot at sunset a serious complication? Or would that be just
a coincidence, too? You're a hell of a consul!"

Since his talk with the representative of his country four months
had passed and Billy still held his job. But each month the number
of francs he was able to wrest from President Hamilcar dwindled,
and were won only after verbal conflicts that each month increased
in violence.

To the foreign colony it became evident that, in the side of
President Ham, Billy was a thorn, sharp, irritating, virulent, and
that at any moment Ham might pluck that thorn and Billy would leave
Hayti in haste, and probably in hand- cuffs. This was evident to
Billy, also, and the prospect was most disquieting. Not because he
loved Hayti, but because since he went to lodge at the cafe of the
Widow Ducrot, he had learned to love her daughter Claire, and
Claire loved him.

On the two thousand dollars due him from Ham they plotted to marry.
This was not as great an adventure as it might appear. Billy knew
that from the Wilmot people he always was sure of a salary, and one
which, with such an excellent housekeeper as was Claire, would
support them both. But with his two thousand dollars as capital
they could afford to plunge; they could go upon a honeymoon; they
need not dread a rainy day, and, what was of greatest importance,
they need not delay. There was good reason against delay, for the
hand of the beautiful Claire was already promised. The Widow Ducrot
had promised it to Paillard, he of the prosperous commission
business, the prominent EMBONPOINT, and four children. Monsieur
Paillard possessed an establishment of his own, but it was a villa
in the suburbs; and so, each day at noon, for his DEJEUNE he left
his office and crossed the street to the Cafe Ducrot. For five
years this had been his habit. At first it was the widow's cooking
that attracted him, then for a time the widow herself; but when
from the convent Claire came to assist her mother in the cafe, and
when from a lanky, big- eyed, long-legged child she grew into a
slim, joyous, and charming young woman, she alone was the
attraction, and the Widower Paillard decided to make her his wife.
Other men had made the same decision; and when it was announced
that between Claire and the widower a marriage had been "arranged,"
the clerks in the foreign commission houses and the agents of the
steamship lines drowned their sorrow in rum and ran the house flags
to half-staff. Paillard himself took the proposed alliance calmly.
He was not an impetuous suitor. With Widow Ducrot he agreed that
Claire was still too young to marry, and to himself kept the fact
that to remarry he was in no haste. In his mind doubts still
lingered. With a wife, young enough to be one of his children,
disorganizing, the routine of his villa, would it be any more
comfortable than he now found it? Would his eldest daughter and her
stepmother dwell together in harmony? The eldest daughter had
assured him that so far as she was concerned they would not; and,
after all, in marrying a girl, no matter how charming, without a
dot, and the daughter of a boarding-house keeper, no matter how
respectable, was he not disposing of himself too cheaply? These
doubts assailed Papa Paillard; these speculations were in his mind.
And while he speculated Billy acted.

"I know that in France," Billy assured Claire, "marriages are
arranged by the parents; but in my country they are arranged in
heaven. And who are we to disregard the edicts of heaven? Ages and
ages ago, before the flood, before Napoleon, even before old
Paillard with his four children, it was arranged in heaven that you
were to marry me. So, what little plans your good mother may make
don't cut enough ice to cool a green mint. Now, we can't try to get
married here," continued Billy, "without your mother and Paillard
knowing it. In this town as many people have to sign the marriage,
contract as signed our Declaration of Independence: all the civil
authorities, all the clergy, all the relatives; if every man in the
telephone book isn't a witness, the marriage doesn't 'take.' So, we
must elope!"

Having been brought up in a convent, where she was taught to obey
her mother and forbidden to think of marriage, Claire was naturally
delighted with the idea of an elopement.

"To where will we elope to?" she demanded. Her English, as she
learned it from Billy, was sometimes confusing.

"To New York," said Billy. "On the voyage there I will put you in
charge of the stewardess and the captain; and there isn't a captain
on the Royal Dutch or the Atlas that hasn't known you since you
were a baby. And as soon as we dock we'll drive straight to the
city hall for a license and the mayor himself will marry us. Then
I'll get back my old job from the Wilmot folks and we'll live happy
ever after!"

"In New York, also," asked Claire proudly, "are you directeur of
the electric lights?"

"On Broadway alone," Billy explained reprovingly, "there is one
sign that uses more bulbs than there are in the whole of Hayti!"

"New York is a large town!" exclaimed Claire.


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