Nostromo - A Tale of the Seaboard.pdf - Planet eBook

which I, having been in my time accredited to the Court ofSt. James, am able to speak with some knowledge.’Only then Sir John thought fit to respond, which he didgracefully in bad French, punctuated by bursts of applauseand the ‘Hear! Hears!’ of Captain Mitchell, who was able tounderstand a word now and then. Directly he had done, thefinancier of railways turned to Mrs. Gould—‘You were good enough to say that you intended to askme for something,’ he reminded her, gallantly. ‘What is it?Be assured that any request from you would be consideredin the light of a favour to myself.’She thanked him by a gracious smile. Everybody was risingfrom the table.‘Let us go on deck,’ she proposed, ‘where I’ll be able topoint out to you the very object of my request.’An enormous national flag of Costaguana, diagonal redand yellow, with two green palm trees in the middle, floatedlazily at the mainmast head of the Juno. A multitude offireworks being let off in their thousands at the water’s edgein honour of the President kept up a mysterious crepitatingnoise half round the harbour. Now and then a lot of rockets,swishing upwards invisibly, detonated overhead with onlya puff of smoke in the bright sky. Crowds of people couldbe seen between the town gate and the harbour, under thebunches of multicoloured flags fluttering on tall poles. Faintbursts of military music would be heard suddenly, and theremote sound of shouting. A knot of ragged negroes at theend of the wharf kept on loading and firing a small ironcannon time after time. A greyish haze of dust hung thin