The Consul is about United States consul Marshall, who in the 40 years serving his country has never been let down by the state. However, new days bring his authority into question, will he manage to continue his work unscathed? Excerpt: "If Henry Marshall brought content to the exiles of Porto Banos, there was little in return that Porto Banos could give to him. Magazines and correspondents in six languages kept him in touch with those foreign lands in which he had represented his country, but of the country he had represented, newspapers and periodicals showed him only too clearly that in forty years it had grown away from him, had changed beyond recognition. When last he had called at the State Department, he had been made to feel he was a man without a country, and when he visited his hometown in Vermont, he was looked upon as a Rip Van Winkle."