Title: The Young Vigilantes - A Story of California Life in the Fifties
Author: Drake, Samuel Adams
Language: English
As this book started as an ASCII text book there are no pictures available.


*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Young Vigilantes - A Story of California Life in the Fifties" ***


[Transcriber's Note: Every effort has been made to replicate this
text as faithfully as possible, including obsolete and variant
spellings and other inconsistencies. Text that has been changed is
noted at the end of this ebook.]



THE YOUNG VIGILANTES



[Illustration: Walter and Bill tramping across the Isthmus.--_Page
132._]



  THE YOUNG VIGILANTES

  A STORY OF CALIFORNIA
  LIFE IN THE FIFTIES

  BY

  SAMUEL ADAMS DRAKE

  Author of "Watch Fires of '76," "On Plymouth Rock," "Decisive
  Events in American History Series," etc.

  _ILLUSTRATED BY L. J. BRIDGMAN_


  [Illustration]


  BOSTON
  LEE AND SHEPARD
  1904



  Published August, 1904


  COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY LEE AND SHEPARD

  _All rights reserved_

  THE YOUNG VIGILANTES


  Norwood Press
  BERWICK & SMITH CO.
  Norwood, Mass.
  U. S. A.



                        CONTENTS


  CHAPTER                                           PAGE

      I. A NARROW ESCAPE                               9
     II. WALTER TELLS HIS STORY                       18
    III. AND CHARLEY TELLS HIS                        30
     IV. WHAT HAPPENED ON BOARD THE "ARGONAUT"        37
      V. ONE WAY OF GOING TO CALIFORNIA               45
     VI. A BLACK SHEEP IN THE FOLD                    66
    VII. THE FLIGHT                                   82
   VIII. OUTWARD BOUND                               100
     IX. ACROSS NICARAGUA                            117
      X. THE LUCK OF YANKEE JIM                      141
     XI. SEEING THE SIGHTS IN 'FRISCO                154
    XII. AN UNEXPECTED MEETING                       165
   XIII. IN WHICH A MAN BREAKS INTO HIS OWN
            STORE, AND STEALS HIS OWN SAFE           182
    XIV. CHARLEY AND WALTER GO A-GUNNING             203
     XV. THE YOUNG VIGILANTES                        215
    XVI. RAMON FINDS HIS MATCH                       231
   XVII. A SHARP RISE IN LUMBER                      241
  XVIII. A CORNER IN LUMBER                          250
    XIX. HEARTS OF GOLD                              262
     XX. BRIGHT, SEABURY & COMPANY                   274



                    ILLUSTRATIONS


                                                    PAGE

  Walter and Bill tramping across the Isthmus
                             (_Frontispiece._)       132
  Walter rescuing Dora Bright                         42
  Waiting for the opening of the mail                160
  The hunters hunted by a grizzly bear               208
  Ramon made to give up his stealings                236
  Arrival of the _Southern Cross_ at Sacramento      254



THE YOUNG VIGILANTES



I

A NARROW ESCAPE


From the _Morning Post-Horn_:

     "As passenger train Number Four was rounding a curve at full
     speed, ten miles out of this city, on the morning of October 4,
     and at a point where a deep cut shut out the view ahead, the
     engineer saw some one, man or boy, he could not well make out
     which, running down the track toward the train, frantically
     swinging both arms and waving his cap in the air as if to attract
     attention. The engine-man instantly shut off steam, whistled for
     brakes, and quickly brought the train to a standstill.

     "The engine-man put his head out of the cab window. The conductor
     jumped off, followed by fifty frightened passengers, all talking
     and gesticulating at once; while the person who had just given the
     warning signal slackened his breakneck pace, somewhat, upon seeing
     that he had succeeded in stopping the train.

     "'What's the matter?' shouted the impatient engine-man when this
     person had come within hearing.

     "'What do you stop us for?' called out the little conductor
     sharply, in his turn, at the same time anxiously consulting the
     face of the watch he held in his hand.

     "To both questions the young man seemed too much out of breath to
     reply, offhand; but turning and pointing in the direction whence
     he came, he shook his head warningly, threw himself down on the
     roadbed, as limp as a rag, and began fanning himself with his cap.
     After getting his breath a little, he made out to say, 'Bridge
     afire--quarter mile back. Tried put it out--couldn't. Heard train
     coming--afraid be too late. Couldn't run another step.'

     "'Get aboard,' said the conductor to him. 'Jake,' to the grinning
     engine-man, 'we'll run down and take a look at it. Get out your
     flag!' to a brakeman. 'Like as not Thirteen'll be along before we
     can make Brenton switch. All aboard!' The delayed train then moved
     on.

     "As it neared the burning bridge it was clear to every one
     that the young man's warning had prevented a disastrous wreck,
     probably much loss of life, because the bridge could not be seen
     until the train was close upon it. All hands immediately set to
     work with pails extinguishing the flames, which was finally done
     after a hard fight. To risk a heavy train upon the half-burned
     stringers was, however, out of the question. Leaving a man to see
     that the fire did not break out again, the train was run back to
     the next station, there to await further orders. We were unable
     to learn the name of the young man to whose presence of mind
     the passengers on Number Four owed their escape from a serious,
     perhaps fatal disaster. But we are informed that a collection
     was taken up for him on the train, which he, however, refused to
     accept, stoutly insisting that he had only done what it was his
     duty to do under the circumstances."

Thus far, the _Morning Post-Horn_. We now take up the narrative where
the enterprising journal left off.

While the delayed train was being held for orders, the young man whose
ready wit had averted a calamity stood on the platform with his hands
in his trousers pockets, apparently an unconcerned spectator of what
was going on around him. The little pug-nosed conductor stepped up to
him.

"I say, young feller, what may I call your name?"

"Seabury."

"Zebra, Zebra," repeated the conductor, in a puzzled tone, "then I
s'pose your ancestors came over in the Ark?"

"I didn't say Zebra; I said Seabury plain enough," snapped back the
young man, getting red in the face at seeing the broad grins on the
faces around him.

"Don't fire up so. Got any first name?"

"Walter."

"Walter Seabury," the conductor repeated slowly, while scratching it
down. "Got to report this job, you know. Say, where you goin'?"

"I'm walkin' to Boston."

"Shanks' mare, hey. No, you ain't. Get aboard and save your muscle.
You own this train to-day, and everything in it. Lively now." The
conductor then waved his hand, and the train started on. At the bridge
a transfer was effected to a second train, and this one again was soon
reeling off the miles toward Boston, as if to make up for lost time.

Being left to himself, young Seabury, whom we may as well hereafter
call by his Christian name of Walter, could think of nothing else than
his wonderful luck. Instead of having a long, weary tramp before him,
here he was, riding in a railroad train, and without its costing him a
cent. This was a saving of both time and money.

Pretty soon the friendly conductor came down the aisle to where Walter
sat, looking out of the car window. After giving him a sharp look, the
conductor made up his mind that here was no vagabond tramp. "It's none
of my business, but all the same I'd like to know what you're walkin'
to Boston for, young feller?" he asked.

"Going to look for work."

"What's your job?"

"I'm a rigger." And his hands, tarry and cracked, bore out his story
perfectly.

"Ever in Boston?"

"Never."

"Know anybody there?"

"Nobody."

"Got any of this--you know?" slapping his pocket.

At this question Walter flushed up. He drew himself up stiffly, smiled
a pitying smile, and said nothing. His manner conveyed the idea that
he really didn't know exactly how much he was worth.

"That's first-rate," the conductor went on. "Now, look here. You'll
get lost in Boston. I'll tell you what. When we get in, I'll show you
how to go to get down among the riggers' lofts. You're a rigger, you
say?" Walter nodded. "They're all in a bunch, down at the North End,
riggers, sailmakers, pump- and block-makers, and all the rest. Full
of work, too, I guess, all on account of this Californy business.
Everybody's goin' crazy over it. You will be, too, in a week."

By this time, the train was rumbling over the long waste of salt-marsh
stretching out between the mainland and the dome-capped city, and in
five minutes more it drew up with a jerk in the station, with the
locomotive puffing out steam like a tired racehorse after a hard push
at the finish.

The conductor was as good as his word. He told Walter to go straight
up Tremont Street until he came to Hanover, then straight down Hanover
to the water, and then to follow his nose. "Oh, you can't miss it,"
was the cheerful, parting assurance. "Smell it a mile." But going
straight up this street, and straight down that, was a direction not
so easy to follow, as Walter soon found. The crowds bewildered him,
and in trying to get out of everybody's way, he got in everybody's
way, and was jostled, shoved about, and stared at, as he slowly made
his way through the throng, until his roving eyes caught sight of the
tall masts and fluttering pennants, where the long street suddenly
came to an end. Walter put down his bundle, took off his cap, and
wiped the perspiration from his forehead. Whichever way he looked,
the wharves were crowded with ships, the ships with workmen, and the
street with loaded trucks and wagons. Casting an eye upward he could
see riggers at work among the maze of ropes and spars, like so many
spiders weaving their webs. Here, at least, he could feel at home.



II

WALTER TELLS HIS STORY


Walter's first want was to find a boarding house suited to his means.
Turning into a side street, walled in by a row of two-story brick
houses, all as like as peas in a pod, he found that the difficulty
would be to pick and choose, as all showed the same little tin sign
announcing "Board and Lodging, by the Day or Week," tacked upon the
door. After walking irresolutely up and down the street two or three
times, he finally mustered up courage to give a timid pull at the
bell of one of them. The door opened so suddenly that Walter fell
back a step. He began stammering out something, but before he could
finish, the untidy-looking girl sang out at the top of her voice:
"Miss Hashall, Miss Hashall, there's somebody wants to see you!" She
then bolted off through the back door singing "I want to be an angel,"
in a voice that set Walter's teeth on an edge. To make a long story
short, Walter soon struck a bargain with the landlady,--a fat, pudgy
person in a greasy black poplin, wearing a false front, false teeth,
and false stones in her breastpin. True, Walter silently resented her
demanding a week's board in advance, it seemed so like a reflection
upon his honesty, but was easily mollified by the motherly interest
she seemed to take in him--or his cash.

Bright and early the next morning Walter sallied out in search of
work. His landlady had told him to apply at the first loft he came to.
"Why, you can't make no mistake," the woman declared. "They're all
drove to death, and hands is scurse as hens' teeth, all on account of
this Kalerforny fever what carries so many of 'em off. Don't I wish
I was a man! I'd jest like to dig gold enough to buy me a house on
Beacon Street and ride in my kerridge. You just go and spunk right up
to 'em, like I do. That's the way to get along in this world, my son."

Walter's landlady had told him truly. The demand for vessels for the
California trade was so urgent that even worm-eaten old whaleships
were being overhauled and refitted with all haste, and as Walter
walked along he noticed that about every craft he saw showed the same
sign in her rigging, "For San Francisco with dispatch." "Well, I'll
be hanged if there ain't the old _Argonaut_ that father was mate of!"
Walter exclaimed quite aloud, clearly taken by surprise at seeing an
old acquaintance quite unexpectedly in a strange place, and quickly
recognizing her, in spite of a new coat of paint alow and aloft.

The riggers were busy setting up the standing rigging, reeving new
halliards, and giving the old barky a general overhauling. Walter
climbed on board and began a critical survey of the ship's rigging,
high and low.

"What yer lookin' at, greeny?" one of the riggers asked him, at
seeing Walter's eyes fixed on some object aloft.

"I'm looking at that Irish pennant[1] on that stay up there," was the
quick reply. This caused a broad smile to spread over the faces of the
workmen.

     [1] A strand of marline carelessly left flying by a rigger.

"You a rigger?"

"I've helped rig this ship."

"Want a job?"

"Yes."

"Well, here," tossing Walter a marline-spike, "let's see you make this
splice." It was neatly and quickly done. "I'll give you ten dollars
a week." Walter held out for twelve, and after some demurring on the
part of the boss, a bargain was struck. Walter's overalls were rolled
up in a paper, under his arm, so that he was immediately ready to
begin work.

Being, as it were, in the midst of the stream of visitors to the ship,
hearing no end of talk about the wonderful fortunes to be made in
the Land of Gold, Walter did not wholly escape the prevailing frenzy,
for such it was. But knowing that he had not the means of paying for
his passage, Walter resolutely kept at work, and let the troubled
stream pass by. There was still another obstacle. He would have to
leave behind him a widowed aunt, whose means of support were strictly
limited to her actual wants. He had at once written to her of his good
fortune in obtaining work, though the receipt of that same letter had
proved a great shock to the "poor lone creetur," as she described
herself, because she had freely given out among her neighbors that
a boy who would run away from such a good home as Walter had, would
surely come to no good end.

Walter had struck up a rather sudden friendship with a young fellow
workman of about his own age, named Charley Wormwood. On account of
his name he was nicknamed "Bitters." Charley was a happy-go-lucky sort
of chap, valuing the world chiefly for the amusement it afforded,
and finding that amusement in about everything and everybody. Though
mercilessly chaffed by the older hands, Charley took it all so
good-naturedly that he made himself a general favorite. The two young
men soon arranged to room together, and had come to be sworn friends.

One pleasant evening, as the two sat in their room, with chairs
tilted back against the wall, the following conversation was begun by
Charley: "I say, Walt, we've been together here two months now, to
a dot, and never a word have you said about your folks. Mind now, I
don't want to pry into your secrets, but I'd like to know who you are,
if it's all the same to you. Have you killed a man, or broke a bank,
or set a fire, or what? Folks think it funny, when I have to tell them
I don't know anything about you, except by guess, and you know that's
a mighty poor course to steer by. Pooh! you're as close as an oyster!"

Walter colored to his temples. For a short space he sat eyeing
Charley without speaking. Then he spoke up with an evident effort
at self-control, as if the question, so suddenly put, had awakened
painful memories. "There's no mystery about it," he said. "You want to
hear the story? So be it, then. I'll tell mine if you'll tell yours.

"I b'long to an old whaling port down on the Cape. I was left an
orphan when I was a little shaver, knee-high to a toadstool. Uncle
Dick, he took me home. Aunt Marthy didn't like it, I guess. All she
said was, 'Massy me! another mouth to feed?' 'Pooh, pooh, Marthy,'
uncle laughed, 'where there's enough for two, there's enough for
three.' She shut up, but she never liked me one mite."

"An orphan?" interjected Charley. "No father nor mother?"

"I'll tell you about it. You see, my father went out mate on a whaling
voyage in the Pacific, in this very same old _Argonaut_ we've been
patchin' and pluggin' up. It may have been a year we got a letter
telling he was dead. Boat he was in swamped, while fast to a whale--a
big one. They picked up his hat. Sharks took him, I guess. Mother was
poorly. She fell into a decline, they called it, and didn't live long.
We had nothin' but father's wages. They was only a drop in the bucket.
Then there was only me left."

"That was the time your uncle took you home?"

"Yes; Uncle Dick was a rigger by trade. He used to show me how to
make all sorts of knots and splices evenings; and bimeby he got me a
chance, when I was big enough, doin' odd jobs like, for a dollar a
week, in the loft or on the ships. Aunt Marthy said a dollar a week
didn't begin to pay for what I et. Guess she knew. Pretty soon, I got
a raise to a dollar-half."

"But what made you quit? Didn't you like the work?"

"Liked it first-rate. Like it now. But I couldn't stand Aunt Marthy's
sour looks and sharp tongue. Nothing suited her. She was either as
cold as ice, or as hot as fire coals. When she wasn't scolding, she
was groaning. Said she couldn't see what some folks was born into this
world just to slave for other folks for." A frown passed over Walter's
face at the recollection.

"Nice woman that," observed the sententious Charley. "But how about
the uncle?" he added. "Couldn't he make her hold her yawp?"

"Oh, no better man ever stood. He was like a father to me--bless him!"
(Walter's voice grew a little shaky here.) "But he showed the white
feather to Aunt Marthy. Whenever she went into one of her tantrums, he
would take his pipe and clear out, leaving me to bear the brunt of it.

"A good while after mother died, father's sea-chest was brought home
in the _Argonaut_. There was nothing in it but old clothes, this watch
[showing it], and some torn and greasy sea-charts, with the courses
father had sailed pricked out on 'em. Those charts made me sort o'
hanker to see the world, which I then saw men traveled with the aid of
a roll of paper, and a little knowledge, as certainly, and as safely,
as we do the streets of Boston. You better believe I studied over
those charts some! Anyhow, I know my geography." And Walter's blue
eyes lighted up with a look of triumph.

"Bully for you! Then that was what started you out on your travels,
was it?"

"No: I had often thought of slipping away some dark night, but
couldn't make up my mind to it. It did seem so kind o' mean after all
Uncle Dick had done for me. But one day (one bad day for me, Charley)
a man came running up to the loft, all out of breath, to tell me that
Uncle Dick had fallen down the ship's hatchway, and that they were now
bringing him home on a stretcher. I tell you I felt sick and faint
when I saw him lying there lifeless. He never spoke again.

"Shortly after the funeral, upon going to the loft the foreman told me
that work being slack they would have to lay off a lot of hands, me
with the rest. Before I went to sleep that night I made up my mind to
strike out for myself; for now that Uncle Dick was gone, I couldn't
endure my life any longer. I set about packing up my duds without
saying anything to my aunt, for I knew what a rumpus she would make
over it, and if there's anything I hate it's a scene."

"Me too," Charley vigorously assented. "Rather take a lickin'."

"Well," Walter resumed, "I counted up my money first. There was
just forty-nine dollars. Lucky number: it was the year '49 too. I
put ten of it in an envelope directed to my aunt, and put it on the
chimney-piece where she couldn't help seeing it when she came into
my room. Then I took a piece of chalk and wrote on the table top:
'I'm going away to hunt for work. When I get some, I'll let you know.
Please take care of my chest. Look on the mantelpiece. Good-bye. From
Walter.'

"Then, like a thief, I slipped out of the house by a back way, in my
stocking feet, and never stopped running till I was 'way out of town.
There I struck the railroad. I knew if I followed it it would take me
to Boston. And it did. That's all."



III

AND CHARLEY TELLS HIS


There was silence for a minute or two, each of the lads being busy
with his own thoughts. Apparently they were not pleasant thoughts.
What a tantalizing thing memory sometimes is!

But it was not in the nature of things for either to remain long
speechless. Walter first broke silence by reminding Charley of his
promise. "Come now, you've wormed all that out of me about my folks,
pay your debts. I should like to know what made you leave home. Did
you run away, too?"

At this question, Charley's mouth puckered up queerly, and then
quickly broke out into a broad grin, while his eyes almost shut tight
at the recollection Walter's question had summoned up. "It was all
along of 'Rough on Rats,'" he managed to say at last.

"'Rough on Rats?'"

"Yes, 'Rough on Rats.' Rat poison. You just wait, and hear me through.

"I've got a father somewhere, I b'leeve. Boys gen'ally have, I s'pose,
though whether mine's dead or alive, not knowin', can't say. We were
poor as Job's turkey, if you know how poor that was. I don't. Anyway,
he put me out to work on a milk and chicken farm back here in the
country, twenty miles or so, to a man by the name of Bennett, and then
took himself off out West somewhere."

"And you've never seen him since?"

"No; I ha'n't never missed him, or the lickin's he give me. Well,
my boss he raised lots of young chickens for market. We was awfully
pestered with rats, big, fat, sassy ones, getting into the coops
nights, and killing off the little chicks as soon's ever they was
hatched out. You see, they was tender. Besides eating the chicks they
et up most of the grain we throw'd into the hens. The boss he tried
everything to drive those rats away. He tried cats an' he tried traps.
'Twan't no use. The cats wouldn't tech the rats nor the rats go near
the traps. You can't fool an old rat much, anyhow," he added with a
knowing shake of his head.

"Well, the boss was a-countin' the chicks one mornin', while ladling
out the dough to 'em. 'Confound those rats,' he sputtered out;
'there's eight more chicks gone sence I fed last night. I'd gin
something to red the place on 'em, I would.'

"'Uncle,' says I (he let me call him uncle, seein' he'd kind of
adopted me like)--'uncle,' says I, 'why don't you try Rough on Rats?
They say that'll fetch 'em every time.'

"'What's that? Never heer'd on't. How do you know? Who says so?' he
axed all in one breath."

"'Anyhow, I seen a big poster down at the Four Corners that says
so,' says I. 'The boys was a-talkin' about what it had done up to
Skillings' place. Skillings allowed he'd red his place of rats with
it. Hadn't seen hide nor hair of one sence he fust tried it. Everybody
says it's a big thing.'

"The old man said nothin' more just then. He didn't let on that my
advice was worth a cent; but I noticed that he went off and bought
some Rough on Rats that same afternoon, and when the old hens had gone
to roost and the mother hens had gathered their broods under 'em for
the night, uncle he slyly stirred up a big dose of the p'isen stuff
into a pan of meal, which he set down inside the henhouse.

"Uncle's idea was to get up early in the mornin', so's to count up the
dead rats, I s'pose.

"But he did not get up early enough. When he went out into the
henhouse to investigate, he found fifteen or twenty of his best hens
lying dead around the floor after eatin' of the p'isen'd meal.

"When I come outdoors he was stoopin' down, with his back to me
pickin' 'em up."

Walter laughed until the tears rolled down his cheeks, sobered down,
and then broke out again. Charley found the laugh infectious and
joined in it, though more moderately.

"Go ahead. Let's have the rest, do," Walter entreated. "What next?"

"I asked Uncle Bennett what he was goin' to do with all those dead
hens. He flung one at my head. Oh! but he was mad. 'Just stop where
you be, my little joker,' says he, startin' off for the stable; 'I've
got somethin' that's Rough on Brats, an' you shall have a taste on't
right off. Don't you stir a step,' shakin' his fist at me, 'or I'll
give you the worst dressin' down you ever had in all your life.'

"While he was gone for a horsewhip, I lit out for the Corners. You
couldn't have seen me for dust.

"I darsen't go back to the house and I had only a silver ninepence in
my pocket and a few coppers, but I managed to beg my way to Boston.
Oh! Walt, it was a long time between meals, I can tell you. I slept
one night in a barn, on the haymow. Nobody saw me slip in after dark.
I took off my neckerchief and laid it down within reach, for it was
hot weather on that haymow, and I was 'most choked with the dust I
swallowed. I overslept. In the morning I heard a noise down where the
hosses were tied up. Some one was rakin' down hay for 'em. I reached
for my neckerchief, thinkin' how I should get away without being seen,
when a boy's voice gave a shout, 'Towser! Towser!' and then I knew it
was all up, for that boy had raked down my neckerchief with the hay,
and he knew there was a tramp somewhere about.

"The long and short of it is, that the dog chased me till I was ready
to drop or until another and a bigger one came out of a yard and
tackled him. Then it was dog eat dog.

"When I got to Boston it was night. I had no money. I didn't know
where to go. Tired's no name for it. I was dead-beat. So I threw
myself down on a doorstep and was asleep in a minnit. There was an
alarm of fire. An ingine came jolting along. I forgot all about being
tired and took holt of the rope, and ran, and hollered, with the rest.
The fire was all out when we got there, so I went back to the ingine
house, and the steward let me sleep in the cellar a couple of hours
and wash up in the mornin'. But I'm ahead of my story. They had hot
coffee and crackers and cheese when they got back from the fire. No
cheese ever tasted like that before. Give me a fireman for a friend
at need. I hung round that ingine house till I picked up a job. The
company was all calkers, gravers, riggers, and the like. Tough lot!
How they could wallop that old tub over the cobblestones, to be sure!"

And here Charley fell into a fit of musing from which Walter did not
attempt to rouse him. In their past experiences the two boys had found
a common bond.



IV

WHAT HAPPENED ON BOARD THE "ARGONAUT"


Seeing that Walter also had fallen into a brown study, Charley quickly
changed the subject. "See here, Walt!" he exclaimed, "the _Argonaut's_
going to sail for Californy first fair wind. To-morrow's Sunday, and
Father Taylor's goin' to preach aboard of her. He's immense! Let's go
and hear him. What do you say?"

Walter jumped at the proposal. "I want to hear Father Taylor ever so
much, and I shouldn't mind taking a look at the passengers, too."

Sunday came. Walter put on his best suit, and the two friends strolled
down to the wharf where the _Argonaut_ lay moored with topsails
loosened, and flags and streamers fluttering gayly aloft. The ship
was thronged not only with those about to sail for the Land of Gold,
but also with the friends who had come to bid them good-bye; besides
many attracted by mere curiosity, or, perhaps, by the fame of Father
Taylor's preaching. There was a perfect Babel of voices. As Walter was
passing one group he overheard the remark, "She'll never get round the
Horn. Too deep. Too many passengers by half. Look at that bow! Have to
walk round her to tell stem from starn."

"Oh, she'll get there fast enough," his companion replied. "She knows
the way. Besides, you can't sink her. She's got lumber enough in her
hold to keep her afloat if she should get waterlogged."

"That ain't the whole story by a long shot," a third speaker broke in.
"Don't you remember the crack ship that spoke an old whaler at sea,
both bound out for California? The passengers on the crack ship called
out to the passengers on the old whaler to know if they wanted to be
reported. When the crack ship got into San Francisco, lo and behold!
there lay the 'old tub' quietly at anchor. Been in a week."

Strange sight, indeed, it was to see men who, but the day before, were
clerks in sober tweeds, farmers in homespun, or mechanics in greasy
overalls, now so dressed up as to look far more like brigands than
peaceful citizens; for it would seem that, to their notion, they could
be no true Californians unless they started off armed to the teeth. So
the poor stay-at-homes were given to understand how wanting they were
in the bold spirit of adventure by a lavish display of pistols and
bowie-knives, rifles and carbines. Poor creatures! they little knew
how soon they were to meet an enemy not to be overcome with powder and
lead.

Between decks, if the truth must be told, many of the passengers
were engaged in sparring or wrestling bouts, playing cards, or
shuffleboard, or hop-scotch, as regardless of the day as if going
to California meant a cutting loose from all the restraints of
civilized life. The two friends made haste to get on deck. As they
mingled with the crowd again, Walter exchanged quick glances with a
middle-aged gentleman on whose arm a remarkably pretty young lady was
leaning. Walter was saying to himself, "I wonder where I have seen
that man before," when the full and sonorous voice of Father Taylor,
the seaman's friend, hushed the confused murmur of voices around him
into a reverential silence. With none of the arts and graces of the
pulpit orator, that short, thick-set, hard-featured man spoke like one
inspired for a full hour, and during that hour nobody stirred from
the spot where he had taken his stand. Father Taylor's every word had
struck home.

The last hymn had been sung, the last prayer said. At its ending the
crowd slowly began filing down the one long, narrow plank reaching
from the ship's gangway to the wharf. Nobody seemed to have noticed
that the rising tide had lifted this plank to an incline that would
make the descent trying to weak nerves, especially as there were five
or six feet of clear water to be passed over between ship and shore.
It was just as one young lady was in the act of stepping upon this
plank that two young scapegraces ahead of her ran down it with such
violence as to make it rebound like a springboard, causing the young
lady first to lose her balance, then to make a false step, and then to
fall screaming into the water, twenty feet below.

Everybody ran to that side, and everybody began shouting at once:
"Man overboard!" "A boat: get a boat!" "Throw over a rope!--a plank!"
"She's going down!" "Help! help!" but nobody seemed to have their wits
about them. With the hundreds looking on, it really seemed as if the
girl might drown before help could reach her.

Both Charley and Walter had witnessed the accident: coats and hats
were off in a jiffy. Snatching up a coil of rope, it was the work of
a moment for Walter to make a running noose, slip that under his arms,
sign to Charley to take a turn round a bitt, then to swing himself
over into the chains and be lowered down into the water on the run by
the quick-witted Charley.

Meantime, the young lady's father was almost beside himself. In one
breath he called to his daughter, by the name of Dora, to catch at
a rope that was too short to reach her; in the next he was offering
fifty, a hundred dollars to Walter if he saved her.

[Illustration: Walter rescuing Dora Bright.--_Page 42._]

Giving himself a vigorous shove with his foot, in two or three strokes
Walter was at the girl's side and with his arms around her. It was
high time, too, as her clothes, which had buoyed her up so far, were
now water-soaked and dragging her down. Only her head was to be seen
above water. At Walter's cheery "Haul away!" fifty nervous arms
dragged them dripping up the ship's side. The young lady fell, sobbing
hysterically, into her father's arms, and was forthwith hurried off
into the cabin, while Walter, after picking up his coat and hat,
slipped off through the crowd, gained the wharf unnoticed, and with
the faithful, but astonished, Charley at his heels, made a bee-line
for his lodgings. Moreover, Walter exacted a solemn promise from
Charley not to lisp one word of what had happened, on pain of a good
drubbing.

"My best suit, too!" he ruefully exclaimed, while divesting himself
of his wet clothes. "No matter: let him keep his old fifty dollars.
Pretty girl, though. I'm paid ten times over. A coil of rope's a handy
thing sometimes. So's a rigger--eh, Charley?"

Charley merely gave a dissatisfied grunt. He was very far from
understanding such refined sentiments. Besides, half the money, he
reflected, would have been his, or ought to have been, which was much
the same thing to his way of thinking. And when he thought of the many
things he could have done with his share, the loss of it made him feel
very miserable, and more than half angry with Walter. "Fifty dollars
don't grow on every bush," he muttered. "Then, what lions we'd 'a'
been in the papers!" he lamented.

"You look here. Can't you do anything without being paid for it? I'd
taken thanks from the old duffer, but not money. Can't you understand?
Now you keep still about this, I tell you."

Though still grumbling, Charley concluded to hold his tongue, knowing
that Walter would be as good as his word; but he inwardly promised
himself to keep his eyes open, and if ever he should see a chance to
let the cat out of the bag without Walter's knowing it, well, the
mischief was in it if he, Charley, didn't improve it, that was all.



V

ONE WAY OF GOING TO CALIFORNIA


The _Argonaut_ affair got into the newspapers, where it was correctly
reported, in the main, except that the rescuer was supposed to be one
of the _Argonaut's_ passengers, and as she was now many miles at sea,
Mr. Bright, the father of Dora, as a last resort, put an advertisement
in the daily papers asking the unknown to furnish his address without
delay to his grateful debtors. But as this failed to elicit a reply,
there was nothing more to be done.

Walter, however, had seen the advertisement, and he had found out
from it that Mr. Bright was one of the _Argonaut's_ principal owners.
He therefore felt quite safe from discovery when he found himself
reported as having sailed in that vessel.

Time moved along quietly enough with Walter until the Fourth of July
was near at hand, when it began to be noised about that the brand-new
clipper ship then receiving her finishing touches in a neighboring
yard would be launched at high water on that eventful day. What was
unusual, the nameless ship was to be launched fully rigged, so that
the riggers' gang was to take a hand in getting her off the ways.
Everybody was consequently on the tiptoe of expectation.

The eventful morning came at last. It being a holiday, thousands
had repaired to the spot, attracted by the novelty of seeing a ship
launched fully rigged. At a given signal, a hundred sledges, wielded
by as many brawny arms, began a furious hammering away at the blocks,
which held the gallant ship bound and helpless to the land. The men
worked like tigers, as if each and every one had a personal interest
in the success of the launch. At last the clatter of busy hammers
ceased, the grimy workmen crept out, in twos and threes, from
underneath the huge black hull, and a hush fell upon all that vast
throng, so deep and breathless that the streamers at the mast-head
could be heard snapping like so many whiplashes in the light breeze
aloft.

"All clear for'ard?" sang out the master workman. "All clear, sir,"
came back the quick response. "All clear aft?" the voice repeated.
"Aye, aye, all clear." Still the towering mass did not budge. It
really seemed as if she was a living creature hesitating on the brink
of her own fate, whether to make the plunge or not. There was an
anxious moment. A hush fell upon all that vast throng. Then, as the
stately ship was seen to move majestically off, first slowly, and then
with a rush and a leap, one deafening shout went up from a thousand
throats: "There she goes! there she goes! hurrah! hurrah!" Every one
declared it the prettiest launch ever seen.

Just as the nameless vessel glided off the ways a young lady, who
stood upon a tall scaffold at the bow, quickly dashed a bottle of
wine against the stem, pronouncing as she did so the name that the
good ship was to bear henceforth, so proudly, on the seas--the _Flying
Arrow_. Three rousing cheers greeted the act, and the name. The crowd
then began to disperse.

As Walter was standing quite near the platform erected for this
ceremony, his face all aglow with the vigorous use he had made of
the sledge he still held in his hand, the young lady who had just
christened the _Flying Arrow_ came down the stairs. In doing so, she
looked Master Walter squarely in the face. Lo and behold! it was the
girl of the _Argonaut_. The recognition was instant and mutual.

Walter turned all colors at once. Giving one glance at his greasy duck
trousers and checked shirt, his first impulse was to sneak off without
a word; but before he could do so he was confronted by Mr. Bright
himself. Walter was thus caught, as it were, between two fires. Oh,
brave youth of the stalwart arm and manly brow, thus to show the white
feather to that weak and timid little maiden!

Noticing the young man's embarrassment, Mr. Bright drew him aside,
out of earshot of those who still lingered about. "So, so, my young
friend," he began with a quizzical look at Walter, "we've had some
trouble finding you. Pray what were your reasons for avoiding us?
Neither of us [turning toward his daughter] is a very dangerous
person, as you may see for yourself."

"Now, don't, papa," pleaded Dora. Then, after giving a sidelong and
reproachful look at Walter, she added, "Why, he wouldn't even let us
thank him!"

Walter tried to stammer out something about not deserving thanks. The
words seemed to stick in his throat; but he did manage to say: "Fifty
stood ready to do what I did. I only got a little wetting, sir."

"Just so. But they didn't, all the same. Come, we are not ungrateful.
Can I depend on you to call at my office, 76 State Street, to-morrow
morning about ten?"

"You can, sir," bowing respectfully.

"Very good. I shall expect you. Come, Dora, we must be going." Father
and daughter then left the yard, but not until Dora had given Walter
another reproachful look, out of the corner of her eye.

"Poor, proud, and sheepish," was the merchant's only comment upon this
interview, as they walked homeward. Mentally, he was asking himself
where he had seen that face before.

Dora said nothing. Her stolen glances had told her, however, that
Walter was good-looking; and that was much in his favor. To be sure,
he was plainly a common workman, and he had appeared very stiff and
awkward when her father spoke to him. Still she felt that there was
nothing low or vulgar about him.

Punctual to the minute, Walter entered the merchant's counting room,
though, to say truth, he found himself ill at ease in the presence of
half a dozen spruce-looking clerks, who first shot sly glances at him,
then at each other, as he carefully shut the door behind him. Walter,
however, bore their scrutiny without flinching. He was only afraid of
girls, from sixteen to eighteen years old.

Mr. Bright immediately rose from his desk, and beckoned Walter to
follow him out into the warehouse. "You are prompt. That's well,"
said he approvingly. "Now then, to business. We want an outdoor clerk
on our wharf. You have no objection, I take it, to entering our
employment?"

Walter shook his head. "Oh, no, sir."

"Very good, then. I'll tell you more of your duties presently. I hear
a good account of you. The salary will be six hundred the first year,
and a new suit of clothes, in return for the one you spoiled. Here's
a tailor's address [handing Walter a card with the order written upon
it]. Go and get measured when you like, and mind you get a good fit."

Walter took a moment to think, but couldn't think at all. All he could
say was: "If you think, sir, I can fill the place, I'll try my best to
suit you."

"That's right. Try never was beat. You may begin to-morrow." Walter
went off feeling more happy than he remembered ever to have felt
before. In truth, he could hardy realize his good fortune.

This change in Walter's life brought with it other changes. For
one thing it broke off his intimacy with Charley, although Walter
continued to receive occasional visits from his old chum. He also
began attending an evening school, kept by a retired schoolmaster, in
order to improve his knowledge of writing, spelling, and arithmetic,
or rather to repair the neglect of years; for he now began to feel his
deficiencies keenly with increasing responsibilities. He was, however,
an apt scholar, and was soon making good progress. The work on the
wharf was far more to his liking than the confinement of the warehouse
could have been; and Walter was every day storing up information which
some time, he believed, would be of great use to him.

Time wore on, one day's round being much like another's. But once
Walter was given such a fright that he did not get over it for weeks.
He was sometimes sent to the bank to make a deposit or cash a check.
On this particular occasion he had drawn out quite a large sum, in
small bills, to be used in paying off the help. Not knowing what else
to do with it, Walter thrust the roll of bills into his trousers
pocket. It was raining gently out of doors, and the sidewalks were
thickly spread with a coating of greasy mud. There was another call
or two to be made before Walter returned to the store. At the head of
the street Walter stopped to think which call he should make first.
Mechanically he thrust his hand in his pocket, then turned as pale as
a sheet, and a mist passed before his eyes. The roll of bills was not
there. A hole in the pocket told the whole story. The roll had slipped
out somewhere. It was gone, and through his own carelessness.

After a moment's indecision Walter started back to the bank, carefully
looking for the lost roll at every step of the way. The street was
full of people, for this was the busiest hour of the day. In vain he
looked, and looked, at every one he met. No one had a roll of bills
for which he was trying to find an owner. Almost beside himself, he
rushed into the bank. Yes, the paying teller remembered him, but was
quite sure the lost roll had not been picked up there, or he would
have known it. So Walter's last and faintest hope now vanished. Go
back to the office with his strange story, he dared not. The bank
teller advised his reporting his loss to the police, and advertising
it in the evening editions. Slowly and sadly Walter retraced his
steps towards the spot where he had first missed his employer's
money, inwardly scolding and accusing himself by turns. Vexed beyond
measure, calling himself all the fools he could think of, Walter
angrily stamped his foot on the sidewalk. Presto! out tumbled the
missing roll of bills from the bottom of his trousers-leg when he
brought his foot down with such force. It had been caught and held
there by the stiffening material then fashionable.

Walter went home that night thanking his lucky stars that he had come
out of a bad scrape so easily. He was thinking over the matter, when
Charley burst into the room. "I say, Walt, old fel, don't you want to
buy a piece of me?" he blurted out, tossing his cap on the table, and
falling into a chair quite out of breath.

Walter simply stared, and for a minute the two friends stared at each
other without speaking. Walter at length demanded: "Are you crazy,
Charles Wormwood? What in the name of common sense do you mean?"

"Oh, I'm not fooling. You needn't be scared. Haven't you ever heard of
folks buying pieces of ships? Say?"

"S'pose I have; what's that got to do with men?"

"I'll tell you. Look here. When a feller wants to go to Californy
awful bad, like me, and hasn't got the chink, like me, he gets some
other fellers who can't go, like you, to chip in to pay his passage
for him."

"Pooh! That's all plain sailing. When he earns the money he pays it
back," Walter rejoined.

"No, you're all out. Just you hold your hosses. It's like this. The
chap who gets the send-off binds himself, good and strong, mind you,
to divide what he makes out there among his owners, 'cordin' to what
they put into him--same's owning pieces of a ship, ain't it? See? How
big a piece'll you take?" finished Charley, cracking his knuckles in
his impatience.

Walter leaned back in his chair, and burst out in a fit of
uncontrollable laughter. Charley grew red in the face. "Look here,
Walt, you needn't have any if you don't want it." He took up his cap
to go. Walter stopped him.

"There, you needn't get your back up, old chap. It's the funniest
thing I ever heard of. Why, it beats all!"

"It's done every day," Charley broke in. "You won't lose anything by
me, Walt," he added, anxiously scanning Walter's face. "See if you do."

Walter had saved a little money. He therefore agreed to become a
shareholder in Charles Wormwood, Esquire, to the tune of fifty
dollars, said Wormwood duly agreeing and covenanting, on his part, to
pay over dividends as fast as earned. So the ingenious Charley sailed
with as good a kit as could be picked up in Boston, not omitting a
beautiful Colt's revolver (Walter's gift), on which was engraved,
"Use me; don't abuse me." Charles was to work his passage out in the
new clipper, which arrangement would land him in San Francisco with
his capital unimpaired. "God bless you, Charley, my boy," stammered
Walter, as the two friends wrung each other's hands. He could not
have spoken another word without breaking down, which would have been
positive degradation in a boy's eyes.

"I'll make your fortune, see if I don't," was Charley's cheerful
farewell. "On the square I will," he brokenly added.

The house of Bright, Wantage & Company had a confidential clerk for
whom Walter felt a secret antipathy from the first day they met. We
cannot explain these things; we only know that they exist. It may be
a senseless prejudice; no matter, we cannot help it. This clerk's
name was Ramon Ingersoll. His manner toward his fellow clerks was so
top-lofty and so condescending that one and all thoroughly disliked
him. Some slight claim Ramon was supposed to have upon the senior
partner, Mr. Bright, kept the junior clerks somewhat in awe of him.
But there was always friction in the counting-room when the clerks
were left alone together.

The truth is that Ramon's father had at one time acted as agent for
the house at Matanzas, in Cuba. When he died, leaving nothing but
debts and this one orphan child, for he had buried his wife some
years before, Mr. Bright had taken the little Ramon home, sent him to
school, paid all his expenses out of his own pocket and finally given
him a place of trust in his counting-house. In a word, this orphaned,
penniless boy owed everything to his benefactor.

As has been already mentioned, without being able to give a reason for
his belief, Walter had an instinctive feeling that Ramon would some
day get him into trouble. Fortunately Walter's duties kept him mostly
outside the warehouse, so that the two seldom met.

One day Ramon, with more than ordinary cordiality, asked Walter to
visit him at his room that same evening In order to meet, as he
said, one or two particular friends of his. At the appointed time
Walter went, without mistrust, to Ingersoll's lodgings. Upon entering
the room he found there two very flashy-looking men, one of whom was
short, fat, and smooth-shaven, with an oily good-natured leer lurking
about the corners of his mouth; the other dark-browed, bearded, and
scowling, with, as Walter thought, as desperately villainous a face as
he had ever looked upon.

"Ah, here you are, at last!" cried Ramon, as he let Walter in. "This
is Mr. Goodman," here the fat man bowed, and smiled blandly; "and
this, Mr. Lambkin." The dark man looked up, scowled, and nodded. "And
now," Ramon went on, "as we have been waiting for you, what say you to
a little game of whist, or high-low-jack, or euchre, just to pass away
the time?"

"I'm agreeable," said Mr. Goodman, "though, upon my word and honor,
I hardly know one card from another. However, just to make up your
party, I will take a hand."

The knight of the gloomy brow silently drew his chair up to the table,
which was, at least, significant of his intentions.

Walter had no scruples about playing an innocent game of whist. So he
sat down with the others.

The game went on rather languidly until, all at once, the fat man
broke out, without taking his eyes off his cards, "Bless me!--why, the
strangest thing!--if I were a betting man, I declare I wouldn't mind
risking a trifle on this hand."

Ramon laughed good-naturedly, as he replied in an offhand sort of way:
"Oh, we're all friends here. There's no objection to a little social
game, I suppose, among friends." Here he stole an inquiring look at
Walter. "Besides," he continued, while carelessly glancing at his own
hand, "I've a good mind to bet a trifle myself."

Though still quite unsuspicious, Walter looked upon this interruption
of the harmless game with misgiving.

"All right," Goodman resumed, "here goes a dollar, just for the fun of
the thing."

The taciturn Lambkin said not a word, but taking out a well-stuffed
wallet, quietly laid down two dollars on the one that Goodman had just
put up.

"I know I can beat them," Ramon whispered in Walter's ear. "By Jove,
I'll risk it just this once!"

"No, don't," Walter whispered back, pleadingly, "it's gambling."

"Pshaw, man, it's only for sport," Ramon impatiently rejoined,
immediately adding five dollars of his own money to the three before
him.

Walter laid down his cards, leaned back in his chair, and folded his
arms resolutely across his chest. "And the fat man said he hardly knew
one card from another. How quick some folks do learn," he said to
himself.

"Isn't our young friend going to try his luck?" smiled, rather than
asked, the unctuous Goodman.

"No; I never play for money," was the quiet response.

Once the ice was broken the game went on for higher, and still higher,
stakes, until Walter, getting actually frightened at the recklessness
with which Ramon played and lost, rose to go.

After vainly urging him to remain, annoyed at his failure to make
Walter play, enraged by his own losses, Ramon followed Walter outside
the door, shut it behind them, and said in a menacing sort of way,
"Not a word of this at the store."

"Promise you won't play any more."

"I won't do no such thing. Who set you up for my guardian? If you're
mean enough to play the sneak, tell if you dare!"

Walter felt his anger rising, but controlled himself. "Oh, very well,
only remember that I warned you," he replied, turning away.

"Don't preach, Master Innocence!" sneered Ramon.

"Don't threaten, Master Hypocrite!" was the angry retort.

Quick as a flash, Ramon sprang before Walter, and barred his way. All
the tiger in his nature gleamed in his eyes. "One word of this to Mr.
Bright, and I'll--I'll fix you!" he almost shrieked out.

With that the two young men clinched, and for a few minutes nothing
could be heard but their heavy breathing. This did not last. Walter
soon showed himself much the stronger of the two, and Master Ramon, in
spite of his struggles, found himself lying flat on his back, with his
adversary's knee on his chest. Ramon instantly gave in. Choking down
his wrath, he jerked out, "There, I promise. Let me up."

"Oh, if you promise, so do I," said Walter, releasing his hold on
Ramon. He then left the house without another word. He did not see
Ramon shaking his fist behind his back, or hear him muttering threats
of vengeance to himself, as he went back to his vicious companions.
Walter did wish, however, that he had given Ramon just one more punch
for keeps.

So they parted. Satisfied that Walter would not break his promise,
Ramon made all haste back to his companions, laughing in his sleeve to
think how easily he had fooled that milksop Seabury. His companions
were two as notorious sharpers as Boston contained. He continued to
lose heavily, they luring him on by letting him win now and then,
until they were satisfied he had nothing more to lose. At two in the
morning their victim rose up from the table, hardly realizing, so far
gone was he in liquor, that he was five hundred dollars in debt to
Lambkin, or that he had signed a note for that sum with the name of
his employers, Bright, Wantage & Company. He had found the road from
gambling to forgery a natural and easy one.



VI

A BLACK SHEEP IN THE FOLD


Leaving Ingersoll to follow his crooked ways, we must now introduce a
character, with whom Walter had formed an acquaintance, destined to
have no small influence upon his own future life.

Bill Portlock was probably as good a specimen of an old, battered
man-o'-war's man as could be scared up between Montauk and Quoddy
Head. While a powder-monkey, on board the _President_ frigate, he had
been taken prisoner and confined in Dartmoor Prison, from which he
had made his escape, with some companions in captivity, by digging a
hole under the foundation wall with an old iron spoon. Shipping on
board a British merchantman, he had deserted at the first neutral
port she touched at. He was now doing odd jobs about the wharves, as
'longshoreman; and as Walter had thrown many such in the old salt's
way a kind of intimacy had grown up between them. Bill loved dearly to
spin a yarn, and some of his adventures, told in his own vernacular,
would have made the late Baron Munchausen turn green with envy. "Why,"
he would say, after spinning one of his wonderful yarns, "ef I sh'd
tell ye my adventers, man and boy, you'd think 'twas Roberson Crushoe
a-talkin' to ye. No need o' lyin'. Sober airnest beats all they make
up."

Bill's castle was a condemned caboose, left on the wharf by some ship
that was now plowing some distant sea. Her name, the _Orpheus_, could
still be read in faded paint on the caboose; so that Bill always
claimed to belong to the _Orpheus_, or she to him, he couldn't exactly
say which. When he was at work on the wharf, after securing his castle
with a stout padlock, he announced the fact to an inquiring public by
chalking up the legend, "Aboard the brig," or "Aboard the skoner," as
the case might be. If called to take a passenger off to some vessel
in his wherry, the notice would then read, "Back at eight bells." A
sailor he was, and a sailor he said he would live and die.

No one but a sailor, and an old sailor at that, could have squeezed
himself into the narrow limits of the caboose, where it was not
possible, even for a short man like Bill, to stand upright, though
Bill himself considered it quite luxurious living. There was a rusty
old cooking stove at one end, with two legs of its own, and two
replaced by half-bricks; the other end being taken up by a bench, from
which Bill deftly manipulated saucepan or skillet.

"Why, Lor' bless ye!" said Bill to Walter one evening, "I seed ye
fish that ar' young 'ooman out o' the dock that time. 'Bill,' sez I
to myself, 'thar's a chap, now, as knows a backstay from a bullock's
tail.'"

"Pshaw!" Then after a moment's silence, while Bill was busy lighting
his pipe, Walter absently asked, "Bill, were you ever in California?"

"Kalerforny? Was I ever in Kalerforny? Didn't I go out to Sandy Ager,
in thirty-eight, in a hide drogher? And d'ye know why they call it
Sandy Ager? I does. Why, blow me if it ain't sandy 'nuff for old Cape
Cod herself; and as for the ager, if you'll b'leeve me, our ship's
crew shook so with it, that all hands had to turn to a-settin' up
riggin' twict a month, it got so slack with the shakin' up like."

"What an unhealthy place that must be," laughed Walter. Then suddenly
changing the subject, he said: "Bill, you know the _Racehorse_ is a
good two months overdue." Bill nodded. "I know our folks are getting
uneasy about her. No wonder. Valuable cargo, and no insurance. What's
your idea?"

Bill gave a few whiffs at his pipe before replying. "I know that ar'
_Racehorse_. She's a clipper, and has a good sailor aboard of her:
but heavy sparred, an' not the kind to be carryin' sail on in the
typhoon season, jest to make a quick passage." Bill shook his head.
"Like as not she's dismasted, or sprung a leak, an' the Lord knows
what all."

The next day happened to be Saturday. As Walter was going into the
warehouse he met Ramon coming out. Since the night at his lodgings,
his manner toward Walter, outwardly at least, had undergone a marked
change. If anything it was too cordial. "Hello! Seabury, that you?" he
said, in his offhand way. "Lucky thing you happened in. It's steamer
day, and I'm awfully hard pushed for time. Would you mind getting
this check on the Suffolk cashed for me? No? That's a good fellow. Do
as much for you some time. And, stay, on your way back call at the
California steamship agency--you know?--all right. Well, see if there
are any berths left in the _Georgia_. You won't forget the name? The
_Georgia_. And, oh! be sure to get gold for that check. It's to pay
duties with, you know," Ramon hurriedly explained in an undertone.

"All right; I understand," said Walter, walking briskly away on his
errand. He quite forgot all about the gold, though, until after he
had left the bank; when, suddenly remembering it, he hurried back to
get the coin, quite flurried and provoked at his own forgetfulness.
The cashier, however, counted out the double-eagles, for the notes,
without remark. Such little instances of forgetfulness were too common
to excite his particular notice.

On that same evening, finding time hanging rather heavily on his
hands, Walter strolled uptown in the direction of Mr. Bright's house,
which was in the fashionable Mt. Vernon Street. The truth is that
the silly boy thought he might possibly catch a glimpse of a certain
young lady, or her shadow, at least, in passing the brilliantly
lighted residence. It was, he admitted to himself, a fool's errand,
after walking slowly backwards and forwards two or three times, with
his eyes fastened upon the lighted windows; and with a feeling of
disappointment he turned away from the spot, heartily ashamed of
himself, as well, for having given way to a sudden impulse. Glad he
was that no one had noticed him.

Walter's queer actions, however, did not escape the attention of a
certain lynx-eyed policeman, who, snugly ensconced in the shadow of
a doorway, had watched his every step. The young man had gone but a
short distance on his homeward way, when, as he was about crossing
the street, he came within an ace of being knocked down and run over
by a passing hack, which turned the corner at such a break-neck pace
that there was barely time to get out of the way. There was a gaslight
on this corner. At Walter's warning shout to the driver, the person
inside the hack quickly put his head out of the window, and as quickly
drew it in again; but in that instant the light had shone full upon
the face of Ramon Ingersoll.

The driver lashed his horses into a run. Walter stood stupidly staring
after the carriage. Then, without knowing why, he ran after it,
confident that if he had recognized Ramon in that brief moment, Ramon
must also have recognized him. The best he could do, however, was to
keep the carriage in sight, but he soon saw that it was heading for
the railway station at the South End.

Out of breath, and nearly out of his head, too, Walter dashed through
the arched doorway of the station, just in time to see a train going
out at the other end in a cloud of smoke. In his eagerness, Walter ran
headlong into the arms of the night-watchman, who, seeing the blank
look on Walter's face, said, as he had said a hundred times before to
belated travelers, "Too late, eh?"

"Yes, yes, too late," repeated Walter, in a tone of deep vexation.
While walking home he began to think he had been making a fool of
himself again. After all, what business was it of his if Ramon had
gone to New York? He might have gone on business of the firm. Of
course that was it. And what right had he, Walter, to be chasing
Ramon through the streets, anyhow? Still, he was sure that Ramon had
recognized him, and just as sure that Ramon had wished to avoid being
recognized, else why had he not spoken or even waved his hand? Walter
gave it up, and went home to dream of chasing carriages all night long.

Walter went to the wharf as usual the next morning. In the course
of the forenoon a porter brought word that he was wanted at the
counting-room. When Walter went into the office, Mr. Bright was
walking the floor, back and forth, with hasty steps, while a very
dark, clean-shaven, alert-looking man sat leaning back in a chair
before the door. This person immediately arose, locked the office
door, put the key in his pocket, and then quietly sat down again.

Walter's heart was in his mouth. He grew red and pale by turns. Before
he could collect his ideas Mr. Bright stopped in his walk, looked him
squarely in the eye, and, in an altered voice, demanded sharply and
sternly: "Ingersoll--where is he? No prevarication. I want the truth
and nothing but the truth. You understand?"

Walter tried hard to make a composed answer, but the words would not
seem to come; and the merchant's cold gray eyes seemed searching him
through and through. However, he managed to stammer out: "I don't
know, sir, where he is--gone away, hasn't he?"

"Don't know. Gone away," repeated the merchant. "Now answer me
directly, without any ifs or buts; where, and when, did you see him
last?"

"Last night; at least, I thought it was Ramon." The dark man gave his
head a little toss.

"Well, go on? What then?"

"It was about nine o'clock, in a close carriage, not far from the
Common." That, by the way, was as near to Mr. Bright's house as Walter
thought proper to locate the affair.

Mr. Bright exchanged glances with the dark man, who merely nodded, but
said never a word.

Thinking his examination was over, Walter plucked up the courage to
say of his own accord, "I ran after the carriage as tight as I could;
but you see, sir, the driver was lashing his horses all the way, so I
couldn't keep up with it; and when I got to the depot the train was
just starting."

"Pray, what took _you_ to that neighborhood at that hour?" the silent
man demanded so suddenly that the sound of his voice startled Walter.

If ever conscious guilt showed itself in a face, it now did in
Walter's. He turned as red as a peony. Mr. Bright frowned, while the
dark-skinned man smiled a knowing little smile.

"Why, nothing in particular, sir. I was only taking a little stroll
about town, before going home," Walter replied, a word at a time.

"Yet your boarding place is at the other end of the city, is it not?"
pursued Mr. Bright.

"Yes, sir, it is."

"Walter Seabury, up to this time I have always had a good opinion of
you. This is no time for concealments. The house has been robbed of a
large sum of money--so large that should it not be recovered within
twenty-four hours we must fail. Do you hear--fail?" he repeated as if
the word stuck in his throat and choked him.

"Robbed; fail!" Walter faltered out, hardly believing his own ears.

"Yes, robbed, and as I must believe by a scoundrel warmed at my own
fireside. And you: why did you not report Ingersoll's flight before it
was too late to stop him?"

Though shocked beyond measure by this revelation, Walter made haste
to reply: "Because, sir, I was not sure it was Ramon. It was just a
look, and he was gone like a flash. Besides----"

"Besides what?"

"How could I know Ramon was running away?"

"Why, then, did you run after him? Are you in the habit of chasing
every carriage you may chance upon in the street?" again interrupted
the silent man.

Stung by the bantering tone of the stranger, Walter made no reply.
Mr. Bright was his employer and had a perfect right to question him;
but who was this man, and by what right did he mix himself up in the
matter?

"Quite right of you, young man, to say nothing to criminate yourself;
but perhaps you will condescend to tell us, unless it would be
betraying confidence [again that cunning smile], if you knew that this
Ingersoll was a gambler?"

The tell-tale blood again rushed to Walter's temples, but instantly
left them as it dimly dawned upon him that he was suspected of knowing
more than he was willing to tell.

"Gently, marshal, gently," interposed Mr. Bright. "He will tell all,
if we give him time."

"One moment," rejoined the chief, with a meaning look at the merchant.
"You hear, young man, this firm has been robbed of twenty thousand
dollars--quite a haul. The thief has absconded. You tell a pretty
straight story, I allow, but before you are many hours older you will
have to explain why you, who have nothing to do with that department,
should draw two thousand dollars at the bank yesterday; why, after
getting banknotes you went back after gold," the marshal continued,
warming up as he piled accusation on accusation; "why, again, you went
from there to secure a berth in the _Georgia_, which sailed early this
morning; and why you are seen, for seen you were, first watching Mr.
Bright's house, and then arriving at the station just too late for
the New York express. Take my advice. Make a clean breast of the whole
affair. If you can clear yourself, now is the time; if you can't,
possibly you may be of some use in recovering the money."

Walter felt his legs giving way under him. At last it was all out.
Now it was as clear as day how Ingersoll had so craftily managed
everything as to make Walter appear in the light of a confederate.
Now he knew why Ingersoll had wished to avoid being recognized. In
a broken voice he told what he knew of Ingersoll's wrong-doings,
excusing his own silence by the pledge he had given and received.

When he had finished, the two men held a whispered conference
together. "Clear case," observed the marshal; "one watched your house
while the other was making his escape."

"I'll not believe it. Why, this young man saved my daughter's life."

"Think as you like. At any rate, I mean to keep an eye on him." So
saying, the marshal went on his way, humming a tune to himself with as
much unconcern as if he had just got up from a game of checkers which
he had won handily. At the street corner he hailed an officer, to whom
he gave an order in an undertone, and then walked on, smiling and
nodding right and left as he went.

Left alone with Mr. Bright, Walter stood nervously twisting his cap
in both hands, like a culprit awaiting his sentence. It came at last.
"Until this matter is cleared up," Mr. Bright said, "we cannot retain
you in our employ. Get what is due you. You can go now." He then
turned his back on Walter, and began busying himself over the papers
on his desk.

Walter went out of the office without another word. He was simply
stunned.



VII

THE FLIGHT


Walter walked slowly down the wharf, feeling as if the world had
suddenly come to an end. Nothing looked to him exactly as it looked
one short hour ago. He did not even notice that a policeman was
keeping a few rods behind him. As he walked along with eyes fixed on
the ground, a familiar voice hailed him with, "Why, what ails ye, lad?
Seen a ghost or what?"

"Bill," said Walter, "would you believe it, that skunk of a Ramon has
run off with a lot of the firm's money--to California, they say? And,
oh, Bill! Bill! they suspect me, _me_, of having helped him do it. And
I'm discharged. That's all." It was no use trying to keep up longer.
Walter broke down completely at the sound of a friendly voice at last.

Bill silently led the way into the caboose. He first lighted his pipe,
for, like the Indians, Bill seemed to believe that a good smoke tended
to clear the intellect. He then, save for an occasional angry snort or
grunt, heard Walter through without interruption. When the wretched
story was all told Bill struck his open palm upon his knee, jerking
out between whiffs: "My eye, here's a pretty kettle o' fish! Ruin,
failure, crash, and smash. Ship ashore, and you all taken aback. Ssh!"
suddenly checking himself, as a shadow darkened the one little pane of
glass that served for a window. A policeman was looking in at them.
Giving the two friends a careless nod, he walked slowly away.

It slowly dawned upon Walter that the man with the black rosette in
his hat, whom he had seen at the office, had set a watch upon him.
"Bill, you mustn't be seen talking to me," said Walter, rising to
leave. "They'll think you are in the plot, too. Oh! oh! they dog me
about everywhere."

The old fellow laughed scornfully. "That," he exclaimed, snapping his
fingers, "for the hull b'ilin' on 'em. I've licked many a perleeceman
in my time, and can do it again, old as I am. But we can be foxy,
too, I guess. Listen. When I sees you comin', I'll go acrost the
wharf to where that 'ar brig lays, over there. You foller me." Walter
nodded. "I go up aloft. You follers. We has our little talk out in the
maintop, free and easy like, and the perleeceman, he has his watch
below."

When Walter reached his boarding house his landlady met him in the
entry. She seemed quite flustered and embarrassed. "Oh, Mr. Seabury,"
she began, "I'm so glad you've come! Such a time! There has been an
officer here tossing everything topsy-turvy in your room. He would
do it, in spite of all I could say. I told him you were the best
boarder of the lot; never out late nights, or coming home the worse
for liquor, and always prompt pay. Do you think, he told me to shut
up, and mind my own business. Oh, sir, what _is_ the matter? That ever
a nasty policeman should came ransacking in my house. Goodness alive!
why, if it gets out, I'm a ruined woman. Please, sir, couldn't you
find another boarding place?"

This was the last straw for poor Walter. Without a word he crept
upstairs to his little bedroom, threw himself down on the bed, and
cried as if his heart would break.

Walter was young. Conscious innocence helped him to throw off the
fit of despondency; but in so far as feeling goes, he was ten years
older when he came out of it. It was quite dark. Lighting a lamp, he
hastily threw a few things into a bag, scribbled a short note to his
aunt, inclosing the check received when he was discharged, settled
with the landlady, who was in tears, always on tap; took his bag under
his arm, and after satisfying himself that the coast was clear, struck
out a roundabout course, through crooked ways and blind alleys, to the
wharf. For the life of him, he could not keep back a little bitter
laugh when he called to mind that this was the second time in his
short life that he had run away.

The wharf was deserted. There was no light in the caboose; but upon
Walter's giving three cautious raps, the door was slid back, and as
quickly closed after him. "Well," he said, wearily throwing himself
down on a bench, "here I am again. I've been turned out of doors now.
You are my only friend left. What would you do, if you were in my
place? I can't bear it, and I won't," he broke out impulsively.

"I see," said Bill, meditatively shutting both eyes, to give emphasis
to the assertion.

"Nobody will give me a place now, with a cloud like that hanging over
me."

Bill nodded assent.

"I can't go back to the loft where I worked before, to be pointed at
and jeered at by every duffer who may take it into his head to throw
this scrape in my face. Would you?"

As Bill made no reply, but smoked on in silence, Walter exclaimed,
almost fiercely, "Confound it, man, say something! can't you? You
drive me crazy with all the rest."

This time Bill shook the ashes from his pipe. "What would I do? Why,
if it was me I'd track the rascal to the eends of the airth, and jump
off arter him, but I'd have him. And arter I'd cotched him, I'd twist
his neck just as quick as I would a pullet's," was Bill's quiet but
determined reply.

Walter simply stared, though every nerve in his body thrilled at the
bare idea. "Pshaw, you don't mean it. What put that silly notion into
your head? Why, what could I do single-handed and alone, against such
a consummate villain as that? Where's the money to come from, in the
first place?"

Bill watched Walter's sudden change from hot to cold. "Jest you take
down that 'ar coffee-pot over your head." Walter handed it to him, as
requested. First giving it a vigorous shake, which made the contents
rattle again with a metallic sound, Bill then raised the lid, showing
to Walter's astonished eyes a mixture of copper, silver, and even a
few gold, coins, half filling the battered utensil.

"Thar's a bank as never busts, my son," chuckled the old man, at
the same time turning the coffee-pot this way and that, just for
the pleasure of hearing it rattle. "What do you think of them 'ar
coffee-grounds, heh? Single-handed, is it?" he continued, with a sniff
of disdain. "I'll jest order my kerridge, and go 'long with ye, my
boy."

It took some minutes for Walter to realize that Bill was in real,
downright, sober earnest. But Bill was already shoving some odds and
ends into a canvas bag to emphasize his decision. "Strike while the
iron's hot" was his motto. Walter started to his feet with something
of his old animation. "That settles it!" he exclaimed. "Since I've
been turned out of doors, I feel as if I wanted to put millions of
miles between me and every one I've ever known. Do you know, I think
every one I meet is saying to himself, 'There's that Walter Seabury,
suspected of robbing his employers'? Go away I must, but I've found
out from the papers that no steamer sails before Saturday, and to-day
is Wednesday, you know. Where shall I hide my face for a day or two?
How do I know they won't arrest me, if they catch me trying to leave
the city? Oh, Bill, I can never stand that disgrace, never!"

Having finished with his packing, Bill blew out the light, pushed back
the slide, and gave a rapid look up and down the wharf. As he drew in
his head, he said just as indifferently as if he had proposed taking a
short walk about town, "'Pears to me as if the correck thing for folks
in our sitivation like was to cut and run."

"True enough for me. But how about you? They'll say that you were as
deep in the mud as I am in the mire. Give it up, Bill. No, dear old
friend, I mustn't drag you down with me. I can't."

"Bah! Talk won't hurt old Bill nohow. Bill's about squar' with the
world. He owes just as much as he don't owe."

Walter was deeply touched. He saw plainly that it was no use trying to
shake the old fellow's purpose, so forbore urging him further.

The old man waited a moment for Walter to speak, and finding that
he did not, laid his big rough hand on the lad's shoulder and asked
impressively, "Did you send off your chist to your aunt as I told ye
to?"

"I did, an hour ago."

"An' did you kind o' explanify things to the old gal?"

"How could I tell her, Bill? Didn't she always say I would come to no
good end? I wrote her that I was going away--a long way off--and for
a long time. I couldn't say just how long. A year or two perhaps. My
head was all topsy-turvy, anyhow."

"You didn't forgit she took keer on ye when ye war a kid?"

"I sent her the check I got from the store, right away."

"Then I don't see nothin' to--hender us from takin' that 'ar little
cruise we was a-talkin' about."

It was pitch-dark when our two adventurers stepped out of the caboose.
After securing the door with a stout padlock, Bill silently led the
way to the stairs where he kept his wherry. Noiselessly the boat was
rowed out of the dock, toward a light that glimmered in the rigging
of an outward-bound brig that lay out in the stream waiting for the
turning of the tide. Bill did not speak again until they were clear of
the dock. "Yon brig's bound for York. I know the old man first-rate,
'cause I helped load her. He'll give us a berth if we take holt with
the crew. Here we are." As he climbed the brig's side he set the
wherry adrift with a vigorous shove of his foot.

A day or two after the events just described, Mr. Bright and the
marshal met on the street, the former looking sober and downcast, the
latter smiling and elate. "What did I tell you?" cried the marshal,
evidently well pleased with the tenor of the news he had to relate;
"your _protégé_ has gone off with an old wharf rat that I've had my
eye on for some time."

"To tell you the whole truth, marshal, my mind is not quite easy about
that boy," the merchant replied.

"Opportunity makes the thief," the officer observed carelessly.

"I'm afraid we've been too hasty."

"Perhaps so; but it's my opinion that when Ramon is found, the other
won't be far off. I honor your feelings in this matter, sir, but my
experience tells me that every rascal asserts his innocence until his
guilt is proved. I've notified the police of San Francisco to be on
the lookout for that precious clerk of yours. Good-day, sir."

When Mr. Bright returned to the store, on entering the office he
saw an elderly woman, in a faded black bonnet and shawl, sitting
bolt-upright on the edge of a chair facing the door, with two bony
hands tightly clenched in her lap. There was fire in her eye.

"That is Mr. Bright, madam," one of the clerks hastened to say.

"What can I do for you, madam?" the merchant asked.

The woman fixed two keen gray eyes upon the speaker's face, as she
spoke up, quite unabashed by the quiet dignity of the merchant's
manner of speaking.

"Well," she began breathlessly, "I'm real glad to see you if you have
kept me waiting. Here I've sot, an' sot, a good half-hour. 'Pears to
me you Boston folks don't get up none too airly fer yer he'lth. I was
down here before your shop was open this mornin'. Better late than
never, though."

The merchant bent his head politely. His visitor caught her breath and
went on:

"I'm Miss Marthy Seabury. What's all this coil about my nevvy? He's
wrote me that he was goin' away. Where's he gone? What's he done?
That's what I'd like to know, right up an' down." She paused for a
reply, never taking her eyes off the merchant's troubled face for an
instant.

"My good woman," Mr. Bright began in a mollifying tone, when she broke
in upon him abruptly:

"No palaverin', mister. No beatin' the bush, if ye please. Come to the
p'int. I left my dirty dishes in the sink to home, an' must go back in
the afternoon keers."

"Then don't let me detain you," resumed Mr. Bright gravely. "There
has been a defalcation. I'm sorry to say your nephew is suspected of
knowing more than he was willing to tell about it. So we had to let
him go. Where he is now, is more than I can say."

"What's a defalcation?"

"A betrayal of trust, madam."

"Do you mean my boy took anything that didn't belong to him?"

"Not quite that. No, indeed. At least, I hope not. But, you see,
Walter is badly mixed up with the precious rascal who did."

"Well, you'd better not. I'd like to see the man who'd say my boy was
a thief, that's all. Why, I'd trust him long before the President of
the United States!" The woman actually glared at every one in the
office, as if in search of some one willing to take up her challenge.

"If you'll try to listen calmly, madam," interposed the merchant,
"I'll try to tell you what we know." He then went on to relate the
circumstances already known to us.

Aunt Martha gave an indignant sniff when the merchant had finished.
"You call yourself smart, eh? Why, an old woman sees through it with
one eye. Walter was just humbugged. So was you, warn't ye? An' goin'
on right under your own nose ever so long, an' ye none the wiser
for't. Well, I declare to goodness, if I was you I sh'ld feel real
downright small potatoes!"

"I think, madam, perhaps we had better bring this interview to a
close. It is a very painful subject, I do assure you."

"Very well, sir. I sh'ld think you'd want to. But mark my words.
You'll be sorry for this some day, as I am now that Walter ever laid
eyes on you or--your darter." With this parting shot she bounced out
of the office, shutting the door with a vicious bang behind her.

But Mr. Bright's worries that day were not to be so easily set at
rest. Upon reaching his home for a late dinner, looking pale and
careworn, it was Dora who met him in the hallway, who put her arms
round her father's neck, and who kissed him lovingly on both cheeks.

"Dear papa, I know all," she said with a little sob.

"Ah!" he ejaculated. "Then you have heard----"

"Yes, papa; our next-door neighbor, Mrs. Pryor, has told me all about
it. Hateful old thing!"

The merchant made a gesture of resignation.

"She said you would have to discharge most of your clerks."

Mr. Bright made a gesture of assent.

"Then I want to do something. I can give music lessons. I'll work my
fingers off to help. I know I shall be a perfect treasure. But why
_did_ you send Mr. Seabury away, papa?"

"Because he was unfaithful."

"I don't believe a word of it."

"Appearances are strongly against him."

"I don't care. I say it's a wicked shame. Why, what has he done?"

"What has he done? Why, he knew Ramon gambled, and wouldn't tell. He
knew Ramon had gone, and never lisped a syllable."

"Yes, but that's what he didn't do."

"He was caught hanging around our house the night that Ramon ran away.
There, child, don't bother me with any more questions. Guilty or not,
both have gone beyond reach."

Dora came near letting slip a little cry of surprise. She knew that
she was blushing furiously, but fortunately the hall was dark. A new
light had flashed upon her. And she thought she could guess why Walter
had been lurking round their house on that, to him, most eventful
night. Although she had never exchanged a dozen words with him, he had
won her gratitude and admiration fairly, and now she began to feel
great pity and sorrow for the friendless clerk.

Hearing Dora crying softly, her father put his arm around her waist
and said soothingly: "There, child, don't cry; we must try to bear up
under misfortune. But 'tis a thousand pities----"

"Well," anxiously.

"Well, if I had known all that in season, the worst might have been
prevented."

"And now?"

"And now, child, your father is a ruined man." So saying, the
merchant hung up his hat and walked gloomily away.

Dora ran upstairs to her own room and locked herself in, leaving the
despondent merchant to eat his dinner solitary and alone.



VIII

OUTWARD BOUND


"Beats Boston, don't it?" said Bill to Walter, as the _Susan J._ was
slowly working her way up the East River past the miles of wharves and
warehouses with which the shores are lined.

"Maybe it's bigger, but I don't believe it's any better," was Walter's
guarded reply.

As soon as the anchor was down, the two friends hailed a passing
boatman, who quickly put them on shore at the Battery, whence
they lost no time in making their way to the steamship company's
office--Bill to see if he could get a chance to ship for the run to
the Isthmus, Walter to get a berth in the steerage just as soon as
Bill's case should be decided. So eager were they to have the matter
settled that they would not stop even to look at the wonders of the
town.

While waiting their turn among the crowd in the office, Bill's roving
eye happened to fall on a big, square-shouldered, thick-set man who
sat comfortably warming his hands over a coal fire in the fireplace,
which he wholly monopolized, apparently absorbed in his own thoughts.
It was now the month of December, and the air was chilly. Bill hailed
him without ceremony. "Mawnin', mister. Fire feels kind o' good this
cold mawnin', don't it?"

The person thus addressed did not even turn his head.

Unabashed by this cool reception, Bill added in a lower tone, "Lookin'
out for a chance to ship, heh, matey?"

At this question, so squarely put, a suppressed titter ran round
the room. The silent man gave Bill a sidelong look, shrugged his
shoulders, and absently asked, "What makes you think so?"

"D'ye think I don't know a sailorman when I see one? Mighty stuck
up, some folks is. Better get that Ingy-ink out o' yer hands ef yer
'shamed on it."

The silent man rose up, buttoned his shaggy buffalo-skin coat up to
his chin, pulled his fur cap down over his bushy eyebrows, and strode
out of the office without looking either to the right or the left.

"I say, you!" a clerk called out to Bill. "Do you know who you were
talking to? That's the old man."

"I don't keer ef it's the old boy. Ef that chap ha'n't hauled on a
tarred rope afore now, I'm a nigger; that's all."

"That was Commodore Vanderbilt, the owner of this line," the clerk
retorted very pompously, quite as if he expected Bill to drop.

The general laugh now went against Bill. "Whew! was it, though? Then I
s'pose my cake's all dough," he grumbled to himself, but was greatly
relieved when the shipping clerk, after a few questions, told him to
sign the articles. Walter was duly engaged, in his turn, as a cabin
waiter. This being settled, the two friends sallied forth in high
spirits to report on board the _Prometheus_, bound for San Juan del
Norte.

Nowhere, probably, since the days of Noah was there ever seen such
utter and seemingly helpless confusion as on one of those great
floating arks engaged in the California trade by way of the Isthmus,
in the early fifties, just before sailing. Bullocks were dismally
lowing, sheep plaintively bleating, hogs squealing. Men were wildly
running to and fro, shouting, pushing, and elbowing each other
about, as if they had only a few minutes longer to live and must
therefore make the most of their time. Women were quietly crying, or
laughing hysterically, by turns, as the fit happened to take them.
Of human beings, upwards of a thousand were thus occupied on board
the _Prometheus_; while on the already crowded slip the shouting
of belated hack drivers, who stormed and swore, the loud cries of
peddlers and newsboys, who darted hither and thither among the surging
throng, served to keep up an indescribable uproar. Add to this, that
the sky was dark and lowering, the black river swimming with floating
ice, crushing and grinding against the slip, as it moved out to sea
with the ebb; and possibly some idea may be formed of what was taking
place on that bleak December afternoon.

But all things must come to an end. All this confusion was hushed
when the word was passed to cast off, the paddle wheels began slowly
to turn, and the big ship, careening heavily to port under its human
freight, who swarmed like bees upon her decks, forged slowly out into
the stream, carrying with her, if the truth must be told, many a sorry
and homesick one already.

Walter, however, drew a long breath of relief as the ship moved away
from the shores. It was the first moment in which he had been able to
shake off the fear of being followed. He therefore went about his
duties cheerfully, if not very skillfully.

Oh, the unspeakable misery of that first night at sea! A stiff
southeaster was blowing when the steamer thrust her black nose outside
of Sandy Hook. And as the hours wore on, and the gale rose higher and
higher, with every lurch the straining ship would moan and tremble
like a human being in distress. Now and then a big sea would strike
the ship fairly, sending crockery and glassware flying about the
cabin with a crash, then as she settled down into the trough, for one
breathless moment it would seem as if she would never come up again.
Twenty times that night the affrighted passengers gave themselves
up for lost. Most of them lay in their berths prostrated by fear or
seasickness. A few even put on life preservers. Perhaps a score or
more, too much terrified even to seek their berths, crouched with
pallid faces on the cabin stairs, foolishly imagining that if the
ship did go down they would thus have the better chance of saving
themselves. Some half-crazed women had even put on their bonnets, in
order, as they sobbed out, to die decently.

It was hardly light, if a blurred gray streak in the east could be
called light, when Walter crept up the slippery companionway. His head
felt like a balloon, his eyes like two lumps of lead, his legs like
mismatched legs. The ship was working her engines just enough to keep
her head to the sea. The deck was all awash, and littered with the
rubbish of a row of temporary, or "standee," bunks abandoned by their
occupants, and broken up by the force of the gale. The paddle-boxes
were stove, and tons of water were pouring in upon the decks with
every revolution of the wheels. By watching his chance, when the ship
steadied herself for another plunge, Walter managed to work his way
out to the forepart of the vessel. Here he found Bill, with half a
dozen more, all wringing-wet, hastily swallowing, between lurches of
the ship, a cupful of hot coffee, which the cook was passing out to
them from the galley. If ever men looked completely worn out, then
those men did.

Bill no sooner caught sight of Walter, than he offered him his dipper.
Walter put it away from him with a grimace of disgust.

"Dirty night," said Bill, cooling his coffee between swallows; "blowed
fresh; nary watch below sence we left the dock; no life in her;
steered like a wild bull broke loose in Broadway. She's some easier
now. Better have some [again holding out his cup]; 't will do you
good. No? Well, here goes," tilting his head back and draining the cup
to the last drop.

Just then the first officer came bustling along in oilskins and
sou'wester. "Here, you!" he called out, "lay for'ard there, and get
the jib on her; come, bear a hand!" Walter went forward with the men.
Hoisting the sail was no easy matter, with the ship plunging bows
under every minute, but no sooner did the gale fill It fairly, than
away it went with a report like a cannon, blown clean out of the
bolt-rope, as if it had been a boy's kite held by a string. While the
men were watching it disappear in the mist, crash came a ton or more
of salt water pouring over the bow, throwing them violently against
the deck-house. Shaking himself like a spaniel, the mate darted off to
give the steersman a dressing-down for letting the ship "broach to."

Two sailors had been lost overboard during the night. On a hint
dropped by Bill, Walter was taken from the cabin, where there was
little to do, and put to work with the carpenter's gang, repairing
damages. The change being much to his liking, Walter applied himself
to his new duties with a zeal that soon won for him the good will of
his mates. And when it came to doing a job on the rigging, though
out of practice, Walter was always the one called upon to do it.
The captain, a quiet, gentlemanly man, who looked more like a
schoolmaster than a shipmaster, told the purser to put Walter in the
ship's books.

Thoroughly tired out with his day's work, Walter was going below
when the mate called out to him: "I say, youngster, you're not going
down into that dog-hole again. There's a spare bunk in my stateroom.
Get your traps and sail in. You can h'ist in as much sleep as you've
storage room for."

By noon of the second day out, the _Prometheus_ had run into the Gulf
Stream. The gale had sensibly abated, though it still blew hard. When
the captain came on deck, after taking a long look at the clouds, he
said to the mate, "Mr. Gray, I think you may give her the jib and
mainsail, to steady her a bit."

At break of day on the morning of the fourth day out, as Walter was
leaning over the weather rail, his eye caught sight of a dark spot
rising out of the water nearly abeam. The mate was taking a long
look at it through his glass. In reply to Walter's inquiring look,
the mate told him it was a low-lying reef called Mariguana, one of
the easternmost of the Bahamas. It was not long before most of the
passengers were crowding up to get sight of that little speck of dry
land, the first they had laid eyes on since the voyage began. "Now,
my lad, you can judge something of how Columbus felt when he made his
first landfall hereabouts so long ago!" exclaimed the mate. "Good for
sore eyes, ain't it? We never try to pass it except in the daytime,"
he added; "if we did, ten to one we'd fetch up all standing."

"San Domingo to-morrow!" cried the mate, rubbing his hands as he came
out of the chart room on the fifth day. As the word passed through the
ship it produced a magical effect among the passengers, whose chief
desire was once more to set foot on dry land, and next to see it.

Sure enough, when the sun rose out of the ocean next morning there
was the lovely tropic island looming up, darkly blue, before them.
There, too, were the hazy mountain peaks of Cuba rising in the west.
All day long the ship was sailing between these islands, on a sea as
smooth as a millpond. Every day she was getting in better trim, and
going faster; and the spirits of all on board rose accordingly at the
prospect of an early ending of the voyage.

"This beats all!" was Walter's delighted comment to Bill, who was
swabbing down the decks in his bare feet.

"'Tis kind o' pooty," Bill assented, wiping his sweaty face with his
bare arm. "That un," nodding toward Cuba, "Uncle Sam ought to hev,
by good rights; but this 'ere," turning on San Domingo a look of
contempt, "'z nothin' but niggers, airthquakes, an' harricanes. Let
'em keep it, says Bill;" then continuing, after a short pause, "Porter
Prince is up in the bight of yon deep bay. I seen the old king-pin
himself onct. Coal-tar ain't a patchin' to him; no, nor Day & Martin
nuther. Hot? If you was ashore there, you'd think it was hot. Why,
they cook eggs without fire right out in the sun."

A two-days' run across the Caribbean Sea brought the _Prometheus_ on
soundings, and a few hours more to her destined port. Every one was
now making hurried preparations to leave the ship, bag and baggage;
every eye beamed with delight at the prospect of escaping from the
confinement of what had seemed more like a prison than anything else.
While the _Prometheus_ was heading toward her anchorage there was time
allowed for a brief survey of the town and harbor of San Juan del
Norte, or, as it was then commonly called, Greytown.

These were really nothing more than an open roadstead, bounded by
a low, curving, and sandy shore, along which half a hundred poor
cabins lay half hid among tall cocoanut palms. From the one two-story
building in sight the British flag was flying. The harbor, however,
presented a very animated and warlike appearance, in consequence of
the warm dispute then in progress between England and the United
States as to who should control the transit from ocean to ocean. Two
American and two British warships lay within easy gunshot of each
other, flying the flags of their respective nations, and no sooner
were the colors of the starry banner caught sight of than a tremendous
cheer burst from the thousand throats on board the _Prometheus_. Her
anchor had hardly touched bottom when a boat from the _Saranac_ came
alongside, the officer in charge eagerly hailing the deck for the
latest news from the States. As for the jackies, to judge from their
looks they seemed literally spoiling for a fight.

Walter had no very clear idea upon the subject of this international
dispute, still less of the importance it might assume in the future,
but the evident anxiety shown on the faces around him led him to
suppose that the matter was serious. He stood holding onto the lee
rigging, watching the American tars in the boat alongside, and
thinking what fine, manly fellows they looked, when two passengers
near him began an animated discussion which set him to thinking.

"Sare," said one, with a strong French accent, "it was, _ma foi_, I
shall recollect--_ah oui_--it was my countryman, one Samuel Champlain,
who first gave ze idea of cutting--what you call him?--one sheep canal
across ze Eesmus. I shall not be wrong to-day."

"Excuse me, monsieur," the other returned, "I think Cortez did that
very thing long before him."

"Nevair mind, _mon ami_. I _gage_ you 'ave ze _histoire_ correct. Eet
only prove zat great minds 'ave always sometime ze same ideas. _Mais_,
your Oncle Sam, wiz hees sillee Monroe Doctreen, he eez like ze dog
wiz his paw on ze bone: he not eat himself; he not let any oder dog:
he just growl, growl, growl."

"But, monsieur, wouldn't Uncle Sam, as you call him, be a big fool to
let any foreign nation get control of his road to California?"

The Frenchman only replied by a shrug.

Even before the _Prometheus_ dropped anchor she was surrounded by a
swarm of native boatmen, of all shades of color from sour cream to
jet-black, some holding up bunches of bananas, some screaming out
praises of their boats to such as were disposed to go ashore, others
begging the passengers to throw a dime into the water, for which they
instantly plunged, head first, regardless of the sharks which could be
seen lazily swimming about the harbor, attracted by the offal thrown
over from the ships.

"I don't know how 'tis," said Bill in Walter's ear, "but them
sharks'll never tech a nigger. But come, time to wake up! Anchor's
down. All's snug aboard. Now keep your weather eye peeled for a long
pull across the Isthmus."

"Good luck to ye," said the jolly mate, shaking Walter heartily by the
hand as he was about leaving the ship. "I'm right glad to see you've
been trying to improve your mind a bit, instead of moonin' about like
a catfish in a mudhole, as most of 'em do on board here. Use your
eyes. Keep your ears open and don't be afraid to ask questions. That's
the way to travel, my hearty!" And with a parting wave of the hand he
strode forward.



IX

ACROSS NICARAGUA


In the course of an hour or so three light-draught stern-wheel
steamboats ("wheelbarrows," Bill derisively called them) came puffing
up alongside. Into them the passengers were now unceremoniously
bundled, like so many sheep, and in such numbers as hardly to allow
room to move about, yet all in high glee at escaping from the
confinement of the ship, at which many angrily shook their fists as
the fasts were cast off. In another quarter of an hour the boats were
steaming slowly up the San Juan River, thus commencing the second
stage of the long journey.

For the first hour or two the travelers were fully occupied in looking
about them with charmed eyes, as with mile after mile, and turn after
turn, the wonders of a tropical forest, all hung about with rare and
beautiful flowers, and all as still as death, passed before them. But
Bill, to whom the sight was not new or strange, declared that for his
part he would rather have a sniff of good old Boston's east wind than
all the cloying perfumes of that wilderness of woods and blossoms.
It was not long, however, before attention was drawn to the living
inhabitants of this fairyland.

First a strange object, something between a huge lizard and a bloated
bullfrog, was spied clinging to a bush on the bank. No sooner seen
than crack! crack! went a dozen pistol shots, and down dropped the
dirty green-and-yellow creature with a loud splash into the river.

"There's a tidbit gone," observed Bill, in Walter's ear.

"What! eat that thing?" demanded Walter with a disgusted look.

"Sartin. They eat um; eat anything. And what you can't eat, 'll eat
you. If you don't b'leeve it, look at that 'ar reptyle on the bank
yonder," said Bill, pointing out the object in question with the stem
of his pipe.

Walter followed the direction of Bill's pipe.

Looking quite as much like a stranded log as anything else, a
full-grown alligator lay stretched out along the muddy margin of the
river at the water's edge. No sooner was he seen, than the ungainly
monster became the target for a perfect storm of bullets, all of which
glanced as harmlessly off his scaly back as hailstones from a slate
roof. Disturbed by the noise and the shouts, the hideous animal slid
slowly into the water and disappeared from sight, churning up the
muddy bottom as he went.

Bill put on a quizzical look as he asked Walter if he knew why some
barbarians worshiped the alligator. Walter was obliged to admit that
he did not. "'Cause the alligator can swaller the man, but the man
can't swaller the alligator," chuckled Bill.

Now and then a native bongo would be overhauled, bound for San
Carlos, Grenada, or Leon, with a cargo of European goods. They were
uncouth-looking boats, rigged with mast and sail, and sometimes thirty
to forty feet long. Many a hearty laugh greeted the grotesque motions
of the jet-black rowers, who half rose from their seats every time
they dipped their oars, and then sank back with a grunt to give their
strokes more power. The _patrón_, or master, prefaced all his orders
with a persuasive "Now, gentlemen, a little faster, if you please!"

"And so that's the way, is it, that all inland transportation has been
carried on here for so many hundred years?" thought Walter. "Well, I
never!"

Incidents such as these served, now and then, to cause a ripple of
excitement, or until even alligators became quite too numerous to
waste powder upon. As darkness was coming on fast, there being no
twilight to speak of in this part of the world, a ship's yawl was seen
tied up under the bank for the night. Its occupants were nowhere in
sight, but the dim light of a fire among the bushes showed that they
were not far off. "Runaway sailors," Bill explained; "stole the boat,
an' 'fraid to show themselves. Poor devils! they've a long pull afore
'em ef they get away, an' a rope's-end behind 'em if they're caught."

"Why, how far is it across?"

"It's more'n a hundred miles to the lake, and another hundred or so
beyond."

"Whew! you don't say. Well, I pity them."

When darkness had shut down, the steamers also were tied up to trees
on the bank, scope enough being given to the line to let the boats
swing clear of the shores, on account of the mosquitoes, with which
the woods were fairly alive. In this solitude the travelers passed
their first night, without other shelter than the heavens above,
and long before it was over there was good reason to repent of the
abuse heaped upon the _Prometheus_, since very few got a wink of
sleep; while all were more or less soaked by the rain that fell in
torrents, as it can rain only in the tropics, during the night. As
cold, wet, and gloomy as it dawned, the return of day was hailed with
delight by the shivering and disconsolate travelers. In truth, much
of the gilding had already been washed off, or worn off, of their El
Dorado. And, as Bill bluntly put it, they all looked "like a passel of
drownded rats."

Bill made this remark while he and Walter were washing their hands
and faces in the roily river water, an easy matter, as they had only
to stoop over the side to do so, the boat's deck being hardly a foot
out of water. Suddenly Walter caught Bill's arm and gave it a warning
squeeze. Bill followed the direction in which Walter was looking, and
gave a low whistle. A beautifully mottled black-and-white snake had
coiled itself around the line by which the boat was tied to the shore,
and was quietly working its way, in corkscrew fashion, toward the now
motionless craft. Seizing a boat-hook, Bill aimed a savage blow at the
reptile, but the rope only being struck, the snake dropped unharmed
into the river.

"Do they raise anything here besides alligators, snakes, lizards, and
monkeys?" Walter asked the captain, who was looking on, while sipping
his morning cup of black coffee.

Glancing up, the captain good-humoredly replied, "Oh, yes; they
raise plantains, bananas, oranges, limes, lemons, chocolate-nuts,
cocoanuts----"

"Pardon me," Walter interrupted; "those things are luxuries. I meant
things of real value, sir."

"A very proper distinction," the captain replied, looking a little
surprised. "Well, then, before you get across you will probably see
hundreds of mahogany trees, logwood trees, fustic and Brazil-wood
trees, to say nothing of other dye-woods, more or less valuable,
growing all about you."

"Oh, yes, sir, I've seen all those woods you tell of coming out of
vessels at home, but never growing. Somehow I never thought of them
before as trees."

"Then there is cochineal, indigo, sugar, Indian corn, coffee, tobacco,
cotton, hides, vanilla, some India rubber----"

Walter looked sheepish. "I see now how silly my question was. Please
excuse my ignorance."

"That's all right," said the captain pleasantly. "Don't ever be afraid
to ask about what you want to know. I suppose I've carried twenty
thousand passengers across, and you are positively the first one to
ask about anything except eating, sleeping, or when we are going to
get there."

The two succeeding days were like the first, except that the river
grew more and more shallow in proportion as it was ascended, and
the country more and more hilly and broken. This furnished a new
experience, as every now and then the boats would ground on some
sand-bar, when all hands would have to tumble out into the water to
lighten them over the rift, or wade ashore to be picked up again at
some point higher up, after a fatiguing scramble through the dense
jungle. "Whew! This is what I calls working your passage," was Bill's
quiet comment, as he and Walter stood together on the bank, breathing
hard, after making one of these forced excursions for half a mile.

"Is here where they talk of building a canal?" Walter asked in
amazement, casting an oblique glance into the pestilential swamps
around him. "Surely, they can't be in earnest."

"They'll need more grave-diggers than mud-diggers, if they try it on,"
was Bill's emphatic reply. "White men can't stand the climate nohow.
And as for niggers--well, all you can git out o' 'em's clear gain,
like lickin' a mule," he added, biting off a chew of tobacco as he
spoke.

On the afternoon of the third day the passengers were landed at the
foot of the Castillio Rapids, so named from an old Spanish fort
commanding the passage of the river at this point, though many years
gone to ruin and decay. Walter and Bill climbed the steep path leading
up to it. The castle was of great age, they were told, going back to
the time of the mighty Philip II of Spain perhaps, who spent such
vast sums in fortifying his American colonies against the dreaded
buccaneers. Walter could not help feeling awe-struck at the thought
that what he saw was already old when the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth
Rock. Some one asked if this was not the place where England's naval
hero, Lord Nelson, first distinguished himself, when the castle was
taken in 1780.

Leaving these crumbling ruins to the snakes, lizards, and other
reptiles which glided away at their approach, the two went back to
the clump of rough shanties by the river, and it was here that Walter
made his first acquaintance with that class of adventurers who, if not
buccaneers in name, had replaced them, to all intents, not only here
but on all routes leading to the land of gold.

There was a short portage around the rapids. A much larger and
more comfortable boat had just landed some hundreds of returning
Californians at the upper end of this portage, and a rough-and-ready
looking lot they were, betraying by their talk and actions that they
had long been strangers to the restraints of civilized life. Of course
every word they dropped was greedily devoured by the newcomers, by
whom the Californians were looked upon as superior beings.

The two sets of passengers were soon exchanging newspapers or scraps
of news, while their baggage was being transferred around the portage.
Giving Walter a knowing wink, Bill accosted one of the Californians
with the question, "I say, mister, is it a fact, now, that you can
pick up gold in the streets in San Francisco?"

"Stranger," this individual replied, "you may bet your bottom dollar
you can. It's done every day in the week. You see a lump in the
street, pick it up, and put it in your pocket until you come across a
bigger one, then you heave the first one away, same's you do pickin'
up pebbles on the beach, _sabe_?" Giving a nod to the half-dozen
listeners, who were eagerly devouring every word, the fellow turned on
his heel and walked off to join his companions.

The run across Lake Nicaragua was made in the night. When the
passengers awoke the next morning the steamer was riding at anchor at
a cable's length from the shore, on which a lively surf was breaking.
Behind this was a motley collection of thatched hovels known as
Virgin Bay. The passengers were put ashore in lighters, into which as
many were huddled as there was standing-room for, were then hauled
to the beach by means of a hawser run between boat and shore, and,
with their hearts in their mouths while pitching and tossing among
the breakers, at last scrambled upon the sands as best they might,
thanking their lucky stars for their escape from drowning.[2]

     [2] The picture is by no means overdrawn, as on a subsequent
         occasion, by the capsizing of a lighter in the surf, many
         passengers were drowned.

Walter and Bill found themselves standing among groups of chattering
half-breeds, half-nude children, dried-up old crones, and hairless,
dejected-looking mules, whose shrill hee-haws struck into the general
uproar with horribly discordant note. It was here bargains were made
for the transportation of one's self or baggage across the intervening
range of mountains to the Pacific. Secure in their monopoly of all the
animals to be had for hire, the avaricious owners did not hesitate
to demand as much for carrying a trunk sixteen miles as its whole
contents were worth--more indeed than a mule would sell for.

Walter was gazing on the novel scene with wide-open eyes. Already
their little store of cash was running low.

"You talk to them, Bill; you say you know their lingo," Walter
suggested, impatient at seeing so many of the party mounting their
balky steeds and riding away.

Bill walked up to a sleepy-looking mule driver who stood nearby idly
smoking his cigarette, and laying his hand upon the animal's flank,
cleared his throat, and demanded carelessly, in broken Spanish, "Qui
cary, hombre, por este mula?"

The animal slowly turned his head toward the speaker, and viciously
let go both hind feet, narrowly missing Bill's shins.

"Wow! he's an infamous rhinoceros, este mula!" cried Bill, drawing
back to a safe distance from the animal's heels.

"Si, señor," replied the unmoved muleteer. "Viente pesos, no mas," he
added in response to Bill's first question.

"Twenty devils!" exclaimed Bill in amazement, dropping into forcible
English; "we don't want to buy him." Then resorting to gestures, to
assist his limited vocabulary, he pointed to his own and Walter's
bags, again demanding, "Quantos por este carga, vamos the ranch, over
yonder?"

"Cinco pesos," articulated the impassive owner, between puffs.

"Robber," muttered Bill under his breath. Rather than submit to be so
outrageously fleeced, Bill hit upon the following method of traveling
quite independently. He had seen it done in China, he explained,
and why not here? Getting a stout bamboo, the two friends slung
their traps to the middle, lifted it to their shoulders, and in this
economical fashion trudged off for the mountains, quite elated at
having so cleverly outwitted the Greasers, as Bill contemptuously
termed them. In fact, the old fellow was immensely tickled over the
ready transformation of two live men into a quadruped. Walter should
be fore legs and he hind legs. When tired, they could take turn and
turn about. If the load galled one shoulder, it could be shifted over
to the other, without halting. "Hooray!" he shouted, when they were
clear of the village; "to-morrow we'll see the place where old Bill
Boar watered his hoss in the Pacific."

"Balboa, Bill," Walter corrected. "No horse will drink salt water,
silly. You know better. Besides, it wasn't a horse at all. 'Twas a
mule."

Night overtook the travelers before reaching the foothills, but after
munching a biscuit and swallowing a few mouthfuls of water they
stretched themselves out upon the bare ground, and were soon traveling
in the land of dreams.

The pair were bright and early on the road again, which was only a
mule-track, deeply worn and gullied by the passing to and fro of many
a caravan. It soon plunged into the thick woods, dropped down into
slippery gorges, or scrambled up steep hillsides, where the pair would
have to make a short halt to mop their brows and get their breath.
Then they would listen to the screaming of countless parroquets, and
watch the gambols of troops of chattering monkeys, among the branches
overhead. Bill spoke up: "I don't believe men ever had no tails like
them 'ar monkeys; some say they did: but I seen many a time I'd like
to had one myself when layin' out on a topsail yard, in a dark night,
with nothin' much to stan' on. A tail to kinder quirl around suthin',
so's to let you use your hands and feet, is kind o' handy. Just look
at that chap swingin' to that 'ar branch up there by his tail, like a
trapeze performer, an' no rush o' blood to the brain nuther." Walter
could hardly drag Bill away from the contemplation of this interesting
problem.

For six mortal hours the travelers were shut up in the gloomy tropical
forest; but just at the close of day it seemed as if they had suddenly
stepped out of darkness into light, for far and wide before them lay
the mighty Pacific Ocean, crimsoned by the setting sun. Once seen, it
was a sight never to be forgotten.

Walter and Bill soon pushed on down the mountain into the village
of San Juan del Sur, of which the less said the better. Thoroughly
tired out by their day's tramp, the wayfarers succeeded in obtaining
a night's lodging in an old tent, at the rate of four bits each.
It consisted in the privilege of throwing themselves down upon the
loose sand, already occupied by millions of fleas, chigoes, and other
blood-letting bedfellows. Glad enough were they at the return of day.
Bill's eyes were almost closed, and poor Walter's face looked as if he
had just broken out with smallpox.

San Juan del Sur was crowded with people anxiously awaiting the
arrival of the steamship that was to take them on up the coast. The
only craft in the little haven was a rusty-looking brigantine, which
had put in here for a supply of fresh water. Her passengers declared
that she worked like a basket in a gale of wind. Learning that the
captain was on shore, our two friends lost no time in hunting him up,
when the following colloquy took place:

"Mawnin', cap," said Bill. "How much do you ax fur a cabin passage to
'Frisco?"

"A hundred dollars, cash in advance. But I can't take you; all full in
the cabin."

"Well, s'pos'n I go in the hold; how much?"

"Eighty dollars; but I can't take you. Hold's full, too."

"Jerusalem! Why can't I go in the fore-peak? What's the price thar?"

"Eighty dollars; but I can't take you. Full fore and aft."

"'Z that so? Well, say, cap, can't I go aloft somewhere? What 'll you
charge then?"

"We charge eighty dollars to go anywhere; but can't carry you aloft.
Got to carry our provisions there."

Bill mused a minute. "Hard case, ain't it?" appealing first to Walter,
then to the captain. "But as I want to go mighty bad, what 'll you
tax to tow me?"

The captain turned away, with a horselaugh and a shake of the head,
to attend to his own affairs, leaving our two friends in no happy
frame of mind at the prospect before them. With the utmost economy
their little stock of money would last but little longer. The heat was
oppressive and the place alive with vermin. Hours were spent on the
harbor headland watching for the friendly smoke of the overdue steamer.

Several days now went by before the delayed steamer put in an
appearance. It was none too soon, for with so many mouths to feed,
the place began to be threatened with famine. It was by the merest
chance that Walter secured a passage for himself in the steerage,
and for Bill as a coal-passer, on this ship. Luckily for them, the
captain's name happened to be the same as Walter's. He also hailed
from New Bedford. He even admitted, though cautiously, that there
might be some distant relationship. So Walter won the day, with the
understanding that he was to spread his blanket on deck, for other
accommodations there were none; while before the ship was two days at
sea, men actually fought for what were considered choice spots to lie
down upon at night.

The event of the voyage up the coast was a stay of several days at
Acapulco, for making repairs in the engine room and for coaling
ship. What a glorious harbor it is! land-locked and so sheltered by
high mountains, that once within it is difficult to discover where a
ship has found her way in, or how she is going to get out. Here, in
bygone times, the great Manila galleons came with their rich cargoes,
which were then transported across Mexico by pack-trains to be again
reshipped to Old Spain. The arrival of a Yankee ship was now the only
event that stirred the sleepy old place into life. At the sound of
her cannon it rubbed its eyes, so to speak, and woke up. Bill even
asserted that the people looked too "tarnation" lazy to draw their
own breath.

Ample time was allowed here for a welcome run on shore; and the
arrival of another steamer, homeward bound, made Acapulco for the time
populous. Bill could not get shore leave, so Walter went alone. There
were a custom-house without custom, a plaza, in which the inhabitants
had hurriedly set up a tempting display of fruits, shells, lemonade,
and home-made nicknacks to catch the passengers' loose change,
besides a moldy-looking cathedral, whose cracked bells now and again
set a whole colony of watchful buzzards lazily flapping about the
house-tops. And under the very shadow of the cathedral walls a group
of native Mexicanos were busily engaged in their favorite amusement of
gambling with cards or in cock-fighting.

After sauntering about the town to his heart's content, Walter joined
a knot of passengers who were making their way toward the dilapidated
fort that commands the basin. On their way they passed a squad
of barefooted soldiers, guarding three or four villainous-looking
prisoners, who were at work on the road, and who shot evil glances at
the light-hearted Americanos. Walter thought if this was a fair sample
of the Mexican army, there was no use in crowing over the victories
won by Scott and Taylor not many years before.

At the end of a hot and dusty walk in the glare of a noonday sun, the
visitors seated themselves on the crumbling ramparts of the old fort,
and fell to swapping news, as the saying is. One of the Californians
was being teased by his companions to tell the story of a man lost
overboard on the trip down the coast; and while the others stretched
themselves out in various attitudes to listen, he, after lighting a
cheroot, began the story:

"You know I can't tell a story worth a cent, but I reckon I can give
you the facts if you want 'em. There was a queer sort of chap aboard
of us who was workin' his passage home to the States. We know'd him
by the name of Yankee Jim, 'cause he answered to the name of Jim, and
said as how he come from 'way down East where they pry the sun up
every morning with a crowbar. He did his turn, but never spoke unless
spoken to. We all reckoned he was just a little mite cracked in the
upper story. Hows'ever, his story came out at last."



X

THE LUCK OF YANKEE JIM


One scorching afternoon in July, 185--, the Hangtown stage rumbled
slowly over the plank road forming the principal street of Sacramento
City, finally coming to a full stop in front of the El Dorado Hotel.
This particular stage usually made connection with the day boat
for "The Bay"; but on this occasion it came in an hour too late,
consequently the boat was at that moment miles away, down the river.
Upon learning this disagreeable piece of news, the belated passengers
scattered, grumbling much at a detention which, each took good care to
explain, could never have been worse-timed or more inconvenient than
on this particular afternoon.

One traveler, however, stood a moment or two longer, apparently
nonplused by the situation, until his eye caught the word "Bank"
in big golden letters staring at him from the opposite side of the
street. He crossed over, read it again from the curbstone, and then
shambled in at the open door. He knew not why, but once within, he
felt a strange desire to get out again as quickly as possible. But
this secret admonition passed unheeded.

Before him was a counter extending across the room, at the back of
which rose a solid wall of brick. Within this was built the bank
vault, the half-open iron door disclosing bags of coin piled upon the
floor and shelves from which the dull glitter of gold-dust caught the
visitor's eye directly. The middle of the counter was occupied by
a pair of tall scales, of beautiful workmanship, in which dust was
weighed, while on a table behind it were trays containing gold and
silver coins. A young man, who was writing and smoking at the same
time, looked up as the stranger walked in. To look at the two men,
one would have said that it was the bank clerk who might be expected
to feel a presentiment of evil. Really, the other was half bandit in
appearance.

Although he was alone and unnoticed, yet the stranger's manner was
undeniably nervous and suspicious. Addressing the cashier, he said:
"I say, mister, this yer boat's left; can't get to 'Frisco afore
to-morrow" (inquiringly).

"That's so," the cashier assented.

"Well," continued the miner, "here's my fix: bound home for the States
[dropping his voice]; got two thousand stowed away; don't know a live
_hombre_ in this yer burg, and might get knifed in some fandango. See?"

"That's so," repeated the unmoved official. Then, seeing that his
customer had come to an end, he said, "I reckon you want to deposit
your money with us?"

"That's the how of it, stranger. Lock it up tight whar I kin come fer
it to-morrow."

"Down with the dust then," observed the cashier, taking the pen from
behind his ear and preparing to write; but seeing his customer cast
a wary glance to right and left, he beckoned him to a more retired
part of the bank, where the miner very coolly proceeded to strip to
his shirt, in each corner of which five fifty-dollar "slugs" were
knotted. An equal sum in dust was then produced from a buckskin belt,
all of which was received without a word of comment upon the ingenuity
with which it had been concealed. A certificate of deposit was then
made out, specifying that James Wildes had that day deposited with
the Mutual Confidence and Trust Company, subject to his order, two
thousand dollars. Glancing at the scrap of crisp paper as if hardly
comprehending how that could be an equivalent for his precious coin
and dust, lying on the counter before him, Jim heaved a deep sigh of
relief, then crumpling the certificate tightly within his big brown
fist, he exclaimed: "Thar, I kin eat and sleep now, I reckon. Blamed
if I ever knew afore what a coward a rich man is!"

Our man, it seems, had been a sailor before the mast. When the anchor
touched bottom, he with his shipmates started for the "diggings,"
where he had toiled with varying luck, but finding himself at last in
possession of what would be considered a little fortune in his native
town. He was now returning, filled with the hope of a happy meeting
with the wife and children he had left behind.

But while Yankee Jim slept soundly, and blissfully dreamed of pouring
golden eagles into Jane's lap, his destiny was being fulfilled. The
great financial storm of 185-- burst upon the State unheralded and
unforeseen. Like a thief in the night the one fatal word flashed over
the wires that shut the door of every bank, and made the boldest turn
pale. Suspension was followed by universal panic and dismay. Yankee
Jim was only an atom swallowed up in the general and overwhelming
disaster of that dark day.

In the morning he went early to the bank, only to find it shut fast,
and an excited and threatening crowd surging to and fro before the
doors. Men with haggard faces were talking and gesticulating wildly.
Women were crying and wringing their hands. A sudden faintness came
over him. What did it all mean? Mustering courage to put the question
to a bystander, he was told to look and read for himself. Two ominous
words, "Bank Closed," told the whole story.

For a moment or two the poor fellow could not seem to take in the full
meaning of the calamity that had befallen him. But as it dawned upon
him that his little fortune was swept away, and with it the hopes that
had opened to his delighted fancy, the blood rushed to his head, his
brain reeled, and he fell backward in a fit.

The first word he spoke when he came to himself was "Home." Some
kind souls paid his passage to 'Frisco, where the sight of blue
water seemed to revive him a little. Wholly possessed by the one
idea of getting home, he shipped on board the first steamer, which
happened to be ours, going about his duty like a man who sees without
understanding what is passing around him.

My own knowledge of the chief actor in this history began at four
o'clock in the morning of the third day out. The _California's_
engines suddenly stopped. There was a hurried trampling of feet, a
sudden rattling of blocks on deck, succeeded by a dead silence--a
silence that could be felt. I jumped out of my berth and ran on deck.
How well I can recall that scene!

The night was an utterly dismal one--cold, damp, and foggy. A pale
light struggled through the heavy mist, but it was too thick to see a
cable's length from the ship, although we distinctly heard the rattle
of oars at some distance, with now and then a quick shout that sent
our hearts up into our mouths. We listened intently. No one spoke. No
one needed to be told what those shouts meant.

How long it was I cannot tell, for minutes seemed hours then; but at
last we heard the dip of oars, and presently the boat shot out of the
fog within a biscuit's toss of the ship. I remember that, as they came
alongside, the upturned faces of the men were white and pinched. One
glance showed that the search had been in vain.

The boat was swung up, the huge paddles struck the black water
like clods, the huge hulk swung slowly round to her helm. But at
the instant when we were turning away, awed by the mystery of this
death-scene, a cry came out of the black darkness--a yell of agony and
despair--that nailed us to the deck. May I never hear the like again!
"Save me! for God's sake, save me!" pierced through that awful silence
till a hundred voices seemed repeating it. The cry seemed so near that
every eye instinctively turned to the spot whence it proceeded--so
near that it held all who heard it in breathless, in sickening
suspense. Had the sea really given up its dead?

Before one could count ten, the boat was again manned and clear of the
ship. How well I recall the bent figure of the first officer as he
stood in the stern-sheets, with the tiller-ropes in his hand, peering
off into the fog! I can still see the men springing like tigers to
their work again, and the cutter tossing on the seething brine astern
like a chip. Then the fog shut them from our view. But nevermore was
that voice heard on land or sea. No doubt it was the last agonized
shriek of returning consciousness as the ocean closed over Yankee
Jim's head.

At eight bells we assembled around the capstan at our captain's call,
when the few poor effects of the lost man were laid out to view.
His kit contained one or two soiled letters, a daguerreotype of two
blooming children hand in hand, a piece of crumpled paper, and a few
articles of clothing not worth a picayune. I took notice that while
smoothing out the creases in this scrap of paper, the captain suddenly
became deeply attentive, then thoughtful, then very red. Clearing his
throat he began as follows:

"It's an old sea custom to sell by auction the kit of a shipmate who
dies on blue water. You all know it's a custom of the land to read the
will of a deceased person as soon as the funeral is over. The man we
lost this morning shipped by his fo'castle or sea name--a very common
thing among sailors; but I've just found out his true one since I
stood here; and what's more I've found out that the man had been in
trouble. An idea strikes me that he found it too heavy for him. God
only knows. But it's more to the point that he has left a wife and two
children dependent upon him for support. Gentlemen and mates, take off
your hats while I read you this letter."

The letter, which bore evidence of having been read and read again,
ran as follows:

     "Oh, James! and are you really coming home, and with such a lot of
     money too? Oh, I can't believe it all! How happy we shall be once
     more! It makes me feel just like a young girl again, when you and
     I used to roam in the berry pastures, and never coveted anything
     in the wide world but to be together. You haven't forgot that,
     have you, James? or the old cedar on the cliff where you asked me
     for your own wife, and the sky over us and the sea at our feet,
     all so beautiful and we so happy? Do come quick. Surely God has
     helped me to wait all this long, weary time, but now it seems as
     if I couldn't bear it another day. And the little boy, James, just
     your image; it's all he can say, 'Papa, come home.' How can you
     have the heart to stay in that wicked place?"

When the reading was finished some of the women passengers were crying
softly. The men stood grimly pulling their long mustaches. After a
short pause the captain read aloud the fatal certificate of deposit,
holding it up so that all might see.

"Now, ladies and gentlemen," he went on, "you've heard the story and
can put this and that together. When we get to Panama I'm going to
write a letter to the widow. It's for you to say what kind of a letter
it shall be. Now, purser, you may put up the certificate of deposit."

"How much am I offered--how much?" said the purser, waving the
worthless bit of paper to right and left.

Ten, twenty, forty, fifty dollars were bid before the words were
fairly out of the purser's mouth. Then a woman's voice said seventy,
another's one hundred, and the men, accepting the challenge, ran the
bidding up fifty more, at which price the certificate was knocked
down to a red-shirted miner who laid three fifty-dollar pieces on the
capstan, saying as he did so: "'Tain't a patchin', boys. Sell her
agin, cap--sell her agin."

So the purser, at a nod from the captain, put it up again, and the
sale went on, each buyer in turn turning the certificate over to the
purser, until the noble emulation covered the capstan with gold.

"Stop a bit, purser," interrupted Captain M----, counting the money.
"That will do," he continued. "The sale is over. Here are just two
thousand dollars. The certificate of deposit is redeemed."



XI

SEEING THE SIGHTS IN 'FRISCO


It was a fine, sunny afternoon when the _Pacific_ turned her prow
landward, and stood straight on for a break in the rugged coast line,
like a hound with its nose to the ground. In an hour she was moving
swiftly through the far-famed Golden Gate. A fort loomed up at the
right, then a semaphore was seen working on a hilltop. In ten minutes
more the last point was rounded, the last gun fired, and the city,
sprung like magic from the bleak hillsides of its noble bay, welcomed
the weary travelers with open arms. The long voyage was ended.

The wharf was already black with people when the steamer came in
sight. When within hailing distance a perfect storm of greetings,
questions, and answers was tossed from ship to shore. Our two friends
scanned the unquiet throng in vain for the sight of one familiar face.
No sooner did the gangplank touch the wharf than the crowd rushed
pell-mell on board. Women were being clasped in loving arms. Men were
frantically hugging each other. While this was passing on board,
Walter and Bill made their escape to the pier, hale and hearty, but as
hungry as bears. Forty days had passed since their long journey began.
What next?

Our two adventurers presently found themselves being hurried along
with the crowd, without the most remote idea of where they were going.
As soon as possible, however, Bill drew Walter to one side, to get
their breath and to take their bearings, as he phrased it. "Well,"
said he, clapping Walter on the back, "here we be at last!"

Walter was staring every passer-by in the face. From the moment he had
set foot on shore his one controlling thought and motive had come back
to him with full force.

"Come, come, that's no way to set about the job," observed the
practical-minded Bill. "One thing to a time. Let's get sumfin' t' eat
fust; then we can set about it with full stomachs. How much have you
got?"

Walter drew from his pocket a solitary quarter-eagle, which looked
astonishingly small as it lay there in the palm of his hand. Bill
pulled out a handful of small change, amounting to half as much
more. "But coppers don't pass here, nor anything else under a dime,
I'm told," observed Walter. "No matter, they'll do for ballast,"
was Bill's reply, whose attention was immediately diverted to a
tempting list of eatables chalked upon the door-post of a restaurant.
Beginning at the top of the list, Bill began reading in an undertone,
meditatively stroking his chin the while:

"'Oxtail soup, one dollar.' H'm, that don't go down. 'Pigs' feet, one
dollar each.' Let 'em run. 'Fresh Californy eggs, one dollar each.'
Eggs is eggs out here. 'Corned beef, one dollar per plate.' No salt
horse for Bill. 'Roast lamb, one dollar.' Baa! do they think we want
a whole one? 'Cabbage, squash, or beans, fifty cents.' Will you look
at that! Move on, Walt, afore they tax us for smellin' the cookin'. My
grief!" he added with a long face, as they walked on, "I'm so sharp
set that if a fun'ral was passin' along, I b'leeve I could eat the
co'pse and chase the mo'ners."

Fortunately, however, Bill was not driven to practice cannibalism, for
just that moment a Chinaman came shuffling along, balancing a trayful
of pies on his head. Bill was not slow in hailing the moon-eyed
Celestial in pigtail, to which the old fellow could not resist giving
a sly tweak, just for the fun of the thing: "Mawnin', John. Be you a
Whig or Know-Nothin'?" at the same time helping himself to a juicy
turn-over, and signing to Walter to do the same.

"Me cakes. Melican man allee my fliend. Talkee true. You shabee, two
bitee?" This last remark referred to the pie which Bill had just
confiscated.

Sauntering on, jostling and being jostled by people of almost every
nation on the face of the earth, they soon reached the plaza, or great
square of the city. Not many steps were taken here, when the strains
of delicious music floated out to them from the wide-open doors of a
building at their right hand. Attracted by the sweet sounds of "Home,
Sweet Home," our two wayfarers peered in, and to Walter's amazement at
least, brought up as he had been at home, for the first time in his
life he found himself gazing into the interior of a gambling-house,
in full swing and in broad daylight, like any legitimate business,
courting the custom of every passer-by.

"Walk in, gentlemen," said a suave-looking individual who was standing
at the door. "Call for what you like. Everything's free here. Free
lunch, free drinks, free cigars; walk in and try your luck."

"'Walk into my parlor, sez the spider to the fly,'" was Bill's
ironical comment upon this polite invitation. "Walt," he continued, a
moment later, "I'm 'feared we throw'd our money away on that Chinee.
Here's grub for nothin'." If they had only known it, the person they
were looking for was inside that gambling den at that very moment.
After rambling about until they were tired, the two companions looked
up a place in which to get a night's lodging--a luxury which cost them
seventy-five cents apiece for the temporary use of a straw mattress, a
consumptive pillow, and a greasy blanket. After making the most frugal
breakfast possible, it was found that their joint cash would provide,
at the farthest, for only one meal more. The case began to look
desperate.

They were sitting on the sill of the wharf, silently ruminating on the
situation, when the booming of a cannon announced the arrival of a
steamer which had been signaled an hour earlier from Telegraph Hill. A
swarm of people was already setting toward the plaza. The movement of
a crowd is always magnetic, so Walter and Bill followed on in the same
direction.

When within two blocks of the plaza they saw a long zigzag line of men
and boys strung out for that distance ahead of them, some standing,
some leaning against a friendly awning, some squatted on the edge of
the plank sidewalk, while newcomers were every moment lengthening out
the already long queue.

"What a long tail our cat's got!" was Bill's pithy remark. "Be they
takin' the census, or what?"

It was learned that all these people were impatiently waiting for the
opening of the post-office, but how soon that event was likely to
happen nobody could tell. So the men smoked, whistled, chaffed every
late arrival, and waited.

[Illustration: Waiting for the opening of the mail.--_Page 160._]

On the instant Walter was struck with a bright idea. Charley had
never written him one word, it is true; but as it was ten to one
everybody in the city would be at the post-office during the day, this
seemed as likely a place as any to meet with him. Shoving Bill into
a vacant place in the line, Walter started toward the head of it,
staring hard at every one, and being stared at in return, as he walked
slowly along. When nearing the head, without seeing a familiar face, a
man well placed in the line sang out, "I say, _hombre_, want a job?"

"What job?"

"Hold my place for me till I kin go git a bite to eat."

"I would in a minute, only I can't stop. I'm looking for some one,"
said Walter, starting on.

"You can't make five dollars no easier."

This startling proposition to a young fellow who did not know where
his next meal was coming from, hit Walter in his weak spot.

"Talk fast. Is it a whack?" the hungry man demanded. "I've been here
two hours a'ready; be back before you can say Jack Robinson."

This singular bargain being struck, Walter stepped into line, when his
file-leader turned to him with the remark, "Fool you hadn't stuck out
for ten. That man runs a bank."

"Does he?" Walter innocently inquired. "What kind of a bank?"

"Faro-bank."

A loud guffaw from the bystanders followed this reply.

As soon as the hungry man came back to claim his place, and had paid
over his five dollars, Walter hurried off to where he had left Bill,
who stopped him in his story with the whispered words, "I seed him."

"Him? Who? Not Charley?"

"No; t'other duffer."

Walter gave a low whistle. "Where? Here? Don't you see I'm all on
fire?"

"Right here. Breshed by me as large as life, and twice as sassy. Oh,
I know'd him in spite of his baird. Sez I to myself, 'Walk along,
sonny, and smoke your shugarette. Our turn's comin' right along.'"

"Too bad, too bad you didn't follow him." Walter was starting off
again, with a sort of blind purpose to find Ramon, collar him, and
make him disgorge his ill-gotten gains on the spot, when Bill held
him back. "Tut, tut, Walt," he expostulated, "if the lubber sees you
before we're good and ready to nab him, won't he be off in a jiffy?
Now we know he's here, ain't that something? So much for so much. Lay
low and keep shady, is our best holt."

To such sound reasoning Walter was fain to give in. Besides, Bill now
insisted upon staying in the line until he could sell out too. With
a jerk of the thumb, he pointed to where one or two patient waiters
were very comfortably seated on camp-stools, and in a husky undertone
proposed finding out where camp-stools could be had. Taking the hint,
Walter started off, instanter, in search of a dealer in camp-stools,
with whom he quickly struck a bargain for as many as he could carry,
by depositing his half-eagle as security. The stools went off like
hot cakes, and at a good profit. Bill, too, having got his price, by
patient waiting, the two lucky speculators walked away to the first
full meal they had eaten since landing, the richer by twenty dollars
from the morning's adventure. Bill called it finding money; "just like
pickin' it up in the street."



XII

AN UNEXPECTED MEETING


It was getting along toward the middle of the afternoon when the two
newly fledged speculators turned their steps to the waterside, Bill to
have his after-dinner smoke in peace and quiet, while scanning with
critical eye the various craft afloat in that matchless bay. Something
he saw there arrested his attention wonderfully, by the way he grasped
Walter's arm and stretched out his long neck.

"Will you look! Ef that arn't the old _Argonaut_ out there in the
stream, I'm a nigger. The old tub! She's made her last v'y'ge by the
looks--topmasts sent down, hole in her side big 'nuff to drive a yoke
of oxen through. Ain't she a beauty?"

After taking a good look at the dismantled hulk, Walter agreed that
it could be no other than the ship on which he and Charley met with
their adventure just before she sailed. It did seem so like seeing an
old friend that Walter was seized with an eager desire to go on board.
Hailing a Whitehall boatman, they were quickly rowed off alongside,
and in another minute found themselves once more standing on the
_Argonaut's_ deck. A well-grown, broad-shouldered, round-faced young
fellow, in a guernsey jacket and skull-cap, met them at the gangway.
There were three shouts blended in one:

"Walter!"

"Charley!"

"Well, I'm blessed!"

Then there followed such a shaking of hands all round, such a volley
of questions without waiting for answers, and of answers without
waiting for questions, that it was some minutes before quiet was
restored. Charley then took up the word: "Why, Walt, old fel',"
holding him off at arm's length, "I declare I should hardly have
known you with that long hair and that brown face. Yes; this is the
_Argonaut_. She's a storeship now; and I'm ship-keeper." He then went
on to explain that most of the fleet of ships moored ahead and astern
were similarly used for storing merchandise, some merchants even
owning their own storeships. "You see, it's safer and cheaper than
keeping the stuff on shore to help make a bonfire of some dark night."

"Don't you have no crew?" Bill asked.

"No; we can hire lightermen, same's you hire truckmen in Boston. All
those stores you see built out over the water get in their goods
through a trap-door in the floor, with fall and tackle."

It may well be imagined that these three reunited friends had a good
long talk together that evening. Charley pulled a skillet out of a
cupboard, on which he put some sliced bacon. Bill started a fire in
the cabin stove, while Walter made the coffee. Presently the bacon
began to sizzle and the coffee to bubble. Then followed a famous
clattering of knives and forks, as the joyous trio set to, with
appetites such as only California air can create.

Walter told his story first. Charley looked as black as a
thundercloud, as Ramon's villainy was being exposed. Bill gave an
angry snort or grunt to punctuate the tale. Walter finished by saying
bitterly, "I suppose it's like looking for a needle in a haystack."

"Not quite so bad as that," was Charley's quick reply. "It's a pity if
we three," throwing out his chest, "can't cook his goose for him. Bill
has seen him. Didn't you say he gambled? Thought so. Oh, he won't be
lonesome; there's plenty more here of that stripe. Gamblers, thieves,
and sharks own the town. They do. It ain't safe to be out late nights
alone, unless you've got a Colt or a Derringer handy, for fear of the
Hounds."

"The Hounds!" echoed Walter and Bill.

"Yes, the Hounds; that's what they call the ruff-scuff here. There's
a storm brewing," he added mysteriously, then suddenly changing the
subject, he asked, "Where do you _hombres_ ranch?"

"Under the blue kannerpy, I guess," said Bill in a heavy tragedian's
voice.

"Not by a jugful! You'll both stop aboard here with me. I'm cap'n,
chief cook, and bottle-washer. Bill's cut out for a lighterman, so
he's as good as fixed. Something 'll turn up for Walt."

"What did you mean by ranching?" Walter asked.

"This is it. This is my ranch. You hire a room or a shanty, do your
own cooking and washing, roll yourself up in your blanket at night and
go it alone, as independent as a hog on ice. Oh, you'll soon get used
to it, never fear, and like it too; bet your life. Women's as scarce
as hens' teeth out here. You can't think it. Why, man alive, a nice,
well-dressed lady is such a curiosity that I've seen all hands run
out o' doors to get a sight of one passin' by. Come, Bill, bear a
hand, and pull an armful of gunny-bags out of that bale for both your
beds. Look out for that candle! That's a keg of blastin' powder you're
settin' on, Walt! If I'd only known I was goin' to entertain company
I'd 'a' swep' up a bit. Are you all ready? Then one, two, three, and
out she goes." And with one vigorous puff out went the light.

When Bill turned out in the morning he found Charley already up and
busying himself with the breakfast things. "What's this 'ere craft
loaded with?" was his first question.

"Oh, a little of everything, assorted, you can think of, from
gunny-bags to lumber."

Walter was sitting on a locker, with one boot on and the other in his
hand, listening. At hearing the word lumber he pricked up his ears.
"That reminds me," he broke in. "Bright & Company shipped a cargo out
here; dead loss; they said it was rotting in the ship that brought
it."

Charley stopped peeling a potato to ask her name.

"The _Southern Cross_."

"Bark?"

"Yes, a bark."

"Well, p'r'aps now that ain't queer," Charley continued. "That's
her moored just astern of us. Never broke bulk; ship and cargo sold
at auction to pay freight and charges. Went dirt cheap. My boss, he
bought 'em in on a spec. And a mighty poor spec it's turned out. Why,
everybody's got lumber to burn."

Charley seemed so glum over it that Walter was about to drop the
subject, when Charley resumed it. "You see, boys," he began, "here's
where the shoe pinches. I had scraped together a tidy little sum of
my own, workin' on ship work at big wages, sometimes for this man,
sometimes for that. I was thinkin' all the while of buying off those
folks at home who fitted me out (Walt here knows who I mean), when
along comes my boss and says to me, 'I say, young feller, you seem
a busy sort of chap. I've had my eye on you some time. Now, I tell
you what I'll do with you. No nonsense now. Got any dust?' 'A few
hundreds,' says I. 'Well, then,' says he, 'I don't mind givin' you a
lift. Here's this _Southern Cross_ goin' to be sold for the freight.
I'll buy it in on halves. You pay what you can down on the nail, the
rest when we sell out at a profit. _Sabe?_' Like a fool I jumped at
the chance."

"Well, what ails you?" growled the irrepressible Bill; "that 'ar ship
can't git away, moored with five fathoms o' chain, can she? Pine
boards don't eat nor drink nothin', do they?"

"Who said they did?" Charley tartly retorted. It was plain to see that
with him the _Southern Cross_ was a sore subject.

"Waal, 'tain't ushil to cry much over bein' a lumber king, is it?"
persisted Bill, in his hectoring way. "Down East, whar I come from,
they laugh and grow fat."

"You don't hear me through. Listen to this: My partner went off to
Australia seven or eight months ago, to settle up some old business
there, he said. I've not heard hide nor hair of him since. Every red
cent I'd raked and scraped is tied up hard and fast in that blamed old
lumber. Nobody wants it; and if they did, I couldn't give a clean bill
o' sale. Now, you know, Walt, why I never sent you nothin'!"

Walter was struck with an odd idea. In a laughing sort of way, half
in jest, half in earnest, he said, "You needn't worry any more about
what you owe me, Charley; I don't; but if it will ease your mind any,
I'll take as much out in lumber as will make us square, and give you a
receipt in full in the bargain."

"You will?" Charley exclaimed, with great animation. "By George!"
slapping his knee, "it's a bargain. Take my share for what I owe you
and welcome."

"Pass the papers on't, boys. Put it in black an' white; have
everything fair and square," interjected the methodical Bill.

Charley brought out pen and ink, tore a blank leaf out of an account
book, and prepared himself to write the bill of sale.

"Hold on!" cried Walter, who seemed to be in a reckless mood this
morning. "Put in that I'm to have the refusal of the other half of the
cargo for ninety days at cost price. In for a penny, in for a pound,"
he laughed, by way of reply to Charley's wondering look.

For a minute or two nothing was heard except the scratching of
Charley's busy pen. Walter's face was a study. Bill seemed lost in
wonder.

"There. Down it is," said Charley, signing the paper with a flourish.
"'Pears to me as if we was doin' a big business on a small capital
this morning. And now it's done, what on earth did you do it for,
Walt?"

"Oh, I've an idea," said Walter, assuming an air of impenetrable
mystery.

"Have your own way," rejoined Charley, whose mind seemed lightened of
its heavy load. "Here, Bill, you put these dirty dishes in that bread
pan, douse some hot water over them--there! Now look in that middle
locker and you'll find a bunch of oakum to wipe 'em with. Walter, you
get a bucket of water from the cask with the pump in it, on deck, and
fill up the b'iler."

Under Charley's active directions the breakfast things were soon
cleared away. Walter then asked to be put on shore, giving as a reason
that he must find something to do without delay. "Whereabouts do they
dig gold here?" he innocently asked.

At this question Charley laughed outright. He then told Walter how
the diggings were reached from there, pointing out the steamboats
plying to "up-country" points, and then to distant Monte Diablo as
the landmark of the route. "There ain't no actual diggin's here in
'Frisco," he went on to say, "but there's gold enough for them as is
willin' to work for it, and has sense enough not to gamble or drink
it all away. Mebbe you won't get rich quite so fast, and then again
mebbe you will. _Quien sabe?_"

"Queer sitivation for a lumber king," grumbled Bill.

"I didn't come out here to get rich; you know I didn't," said Walter
excitedly, rising and putting on his cap with an air of determination.

"Easy now," urged Charley, putting an arm around Walter; "now don't
you go running all over town in broad daylight after that fellow.
Better send out the town crier, and done with it. That's not the way
to go to work. Do you s'pose a chap in his shoes won't be keepin' a
sharp lookout for himself? Bet your life. Yes, sir-ee! Now, look here.
My idee is not to disturb the nest until we ketch the bird. This is my
plan. We three 'll put in our nights ranging about town, lookin' into
the gambling dens, saloons, and hotels. If the skunk is hidin' that's
the time he'll come out of his hole, eh, Bill?"

"Sartin sure," was the decided reply.

"Well, then, Walt, hear to reason. Don't you see that if there's
anything to be done, the night's our best holt to do it in?"

Walter was not more than half convinced. "Couldn't I have him arrested
on the strength of the handbill Marshal Tukey got out, offering a
reward, and describing Ramon to a hair? See, here it is," drawing it
out of an inside pocket and holding it up to view. "I could swear to
him, you know, and so could Bill."

"On a stack of Bibles," Bill assented.

"Let me see it," Charley demanded, rapidly running his eye over the
precious document. "'Five hundred dollars reward!' Five hundred
fiddlesticks! Why, he'd go five hundred better and be off in a jiffy,
with just a nod and a wink from the officers to keep out of the way a
while." Having expressed this opinion, Charley tossed the handbill on
the table with a disdainful sniff.

Walter was dumb. He had actually thought for a whole month that the
mere sight of this accusing piece of paper would make the guilty
wretch fall on his knees and beg for mercy. And to be told now that it
was only so much waste paper struck him speechless.

Charley again came to the rescue. "Come, come; don't stand there
looking as if you'd lost every friend you had on earth, but brace up.
If you'd wanted to have that robber arrested, you should have gone a
different way to work--'cordin' to law."

"What's to be done, then?"

"My idee is like this. Californy law is no good, anyhow. It's on the
side that has most dust. But here's three of us and only one of him.
We can lay for him, get him into some quiet corner, and then frighten
him into doing what we say. How's that?"

"Capital! Just the thing. I always said you had the best head of the
three."

"All right, then," cried Charley in his old, sprightly way; "I give
you both a holiday, so you can see the sights. Walter, you take care
that Bill don't get lost or stolen."

"Me take care o' him, you mean," Bill retorted.

Getting into the boat the two friends then pulled for the shore.
Walter's first remark, as they slowly sauntered along, was: "What a
wooden-looking town! Wooden houses, wooden sidewalks, plank streets.
It looks as if everything had sprung up in a night."

And so it had. At this time the city was beginning to work its way out
from the natural beach toward deeper water; for as deep water would
not come to the city, the city had to go out to deep water. And as
many of the coming streets were as yet only narrow footways, thrust
out over the shallow waters of the bay, the entire ragged waterfront
seemed cautiously feeling its way toward its wished-for goal. Cheap
one-story frame buildings were following these extensions of new and
old streets, as fast as piles could be driven for them, so that a
famous clattering of hammers was going on on every side from morning
to night.

The two friends soon had an exciting experience. Just ahead of them, a
dray was being driven down the wharf at a rapid rate, making the loose
planks rattle again. In turning out to let another dray pass him, the
driver of the first went too near the edge of the wharf, when the
weight of horse and dray suddenly tilted the loose planks in the air,
the driver gave a yell, and over into the dock went horse, dray, and
man with a tremendous splash.

It was all done so quickly that Walter and Bill stood for a moment
without stirring. Fortunately their boat was only a few rods off,
so both ran back for her in a hurry. A few strokes brought them to
where the frightened animal was still helplessly floundering in the
water, dragged down by the weight of the dray. The man was first
pulled into the boat, dripping wet. Bill then cut the traces with
his sheath-knife, while the drayman held the struggling animal by
the bit. He was then towed to the beach safe and sound. By this time
a crowd had collected. Seeing his rescuers pushing off, the drayman
elbowed his way out of the crowd, and shouted after them, "I say, you,
_hombres_, this ain't no place to take a bath, is it? This ain't no
place to be bashful. Come up to my stand, Jackson and Sansome, and ask
for Jack Furbish."

"Is your name Furbish?" asked Bill, resting on his oars.

"Yes; why?"

"Oh, nothin', only we lost a man overboard onct off Cape Horn. His
name was Furbish."

"Well, 'twarn't me. I was lost overboard from Pacific Wharf. Jackson
and Sansome! Git up, Jim!" bringing his blacksnake smartly down on his
horse's steaming flanks.



XIII

IN WHICH A MAN BREAKS INTO HIS OWN STORE, AND STEALS HIS OWN SAFE


Walter's idea, as far as he had thought it out, was to hold on to
this lumber cargo until Mr. Bright could be notified just how the
matter stood. Should the merchant then choose to take any steps toward
recovering the cargo of the _Southern Cross_, Walter thought this act
on his part might go far to remove the unjust suspicions directed
against himself. For this reason he had secured, as we have seen, a
refusal of the cargo long enough for a letter to go and return.

Walter now set about writing his letter, but he now found that what
had seemed so simple at first was no easy matter. As he sat staring
vacantly at the blank paper before him, tears came into his eyes;
for again the trying scene in the merchant's counting-room rushed
vividly upon his memory. An evil voice within him said, "Why should
I trouble myself about those who have so ill-used me and robbed me
of my good name?" Yet another, and gentler, voice answered, "Do unto
others as you would that they should do unto you." Compressing his
lips resolutely, he succeeded in writing a very formal letter, not at
all like what he had intended. But the main thing was to make himself
clearly understood. So he carefully studied every word before putting
it down in black and white, as follows:

     "MR. BRIGHT,

     "_Sir_: This is to inform you of my being here. I could not bear
     to be suspected of dishonesty when I knew I was innocent of
     wrongdoing. So I left. This is to inform you that the _Southern
     Cross_ is in charge of my friend Mr. Charles Wormwood. You may
     recollect him. He is a fine young man. Between us, we've got hold
     of half the cargo, and I have the refusal of the other half for
     ninety days. The man who owns it has gone away. If you think it
     worth while, send directions to somebody here what to do about it.
     This is a great country, only I'm afraid it will burn up all the
     time.

                                   "Your true friend,
                                        "WALTER SEABURY."

While on his way uptown to post his letter, Walter heard a familiar
voice call out, "Hi, _hombre_! lookin' for a job?" It was the drayman
of yesterday's adventure, placidly kicking his heels on the tail of
his dray.

Walter candidly admitted that he would like something to do. The
drayman spoke up briskly: "Good enough. Not afraid of dirty hands?
No? Good again. Got some _plata_? No? Cleaned out, eh? So was I. Say,
there's a first-rate handcart stand, on the next corner above here,
I've had my eye on for some time. More people pass there in a day
than any other in 'Frisco. Talk biz. That comer has been waiting for
you, or it would 'a' been snapped up long ago. No job less than six
bits. You can make anywhere from five to ten dollars a day. Come, what
do you say? Do we hitch hosses or not?"

Walter had a short struggle with his pride. It did seem rather low,
to be sure, to be pushing a handcart through the streets, like
the rag-men seen at home, but beggars should not be choosers, he
reflected. So, putting his pride in his pocket, the bargain was closed
without more words.

Certainly Walter's best friends would hardly have known him when
he made his first appearance on the stand, bright and early next
morning, rigged out in a gray slouch hat, red woolen shirt, and blue
overalls tucked into a pair of stout cowhide boots. His face, too, was
beginning to show signs of quite a promising beard which Walter was
often seen caressing as if to make sure it was still there overnight
and which, indeed, so greatly altered his looks that he now felt
little fear of being recognized by Ramon, should they happen to meet
some day unexpectedly in the street.

Walter ranched with his employer in a loft. With a hammer, a saw,
and some nails, he had soon knocked together a bunk out of some old
packing boxes. In this he slept on a straw mattress also of his own
make, with a pair of coarse blankets for bedclothes. Another packing
box, a water pail, a tin wash-basin, towel, and soap comprised all
necessary conveniences, with which the morning toilet was soon made.
The bed required no making. Rather primitive housekeeping, to be sure;
yet Walter soon learned, from actual observation, that a majority
of the merchants, some of whom were reputed worth their hundreds of
thousands, were no better lodged than himself.

On the whole, Walter rather liked his new occupation, as soon as his
first awkwardness had worn off. Here, at any rate, he was his own
master, and Walter had always chafed at being ordered about by boys
no older than himself. Then, he liked the hearty, democratic way in
which everybody greeted everybody. It made things move along much more
cheerfully. Walter was attentive. Business was good. At the close of
each day he handed over his earnings to his employer, who kept his own
share, punctually returning Walter the rest. "You'll be buyin' out
Sam Brannan one of these days, if you keep on as you're goin'," was
Furbish's encouraging remark, as he figured up Walter's earnings at
twenty-five dollars, at the end of the first week.

"Who's Sam Brannan?"

"Not know who Sam Brannan is?" asked the drayman, lifting his eyebrows
in amazement. "He's reputed the richest man in 'Frisco. Owns a big
block on Montgomery Street. Income's two thousand a day, they tell
me."

Walter could only gape, open-mouthed, in astonishment. The bare idea
of any one man possessing such unheard-of wealth was something that he
had never dreamed of.

"Fact," repeated the drayman, observing Walter's look of incredulity.

The restaurant at which Walter took his meals, until circumstances
suggested a change, was one of the institutions peculiar to the San
Francisco of that day. An old dismantled hulk had been hauled up
alongside the wharf, the spar-deck roofed over, and some loose boards,
laid upon wooden trestles, made to serve the purpose of a table, while
the ship's caboose performed its customary office of scullery and
kitchen.

The restaurant keeper was evidently new to the business, for he
was in the habit of urging his customers to have a second helping
of everything, much to the annoyance of his wife, who did the
cooking. This woman was one of the class locally known as Sydney
Ducks, from the fact that she had come from Australia under the
sanction of a ticket-of-leave. She was fat, brawny, red-faced,
and quick-tempered,--in fact, fiery,--and when out of sorts gave
her tongue free license. The pair were continually quarreling at
meal-times, regardless of the presence of the boarders, some of whom
took a malicious pleasure in egging on the one or the other when words
failed them. But it happened more than once that, when words failed,
man and wife began shying plates, or cups and saucers, at each other's
head, which quickly cleared the table of boarders.

Walter stood this sort of thing stoically until, one noon, when he
was just entering the dining room, a flat-iron came whizzing by him,
narrowly missing his head. The language that accompanied it showed
madam to be mistress of the choicest Billingsgate in profusion. By the
time a second flat-iron sailed through the door Walter was a block
away, and still running. It was shrewdly surmised that man and wife
had broken up housekeeping.

Meanwhile the search for Ramon was faithfully kept up, yet so far with
no better success than if the ground had opened and swallowed him up.
Nobody knew a person of the name of Ingersoll. No doubt he had assumed
another less incriminating. A decoy letter dropped in the post-office
remained there unclaimed until sent to the dead-letter office. "Fool
if he hadn't changed his name," muttered Bill, as Walter and he stood
at a street corner, looking blankly into each other's face.

They were taking their customary stroll uptown in the evening, when
the big bell on the plaza suddenly clanged out an alarm of fire.
There was no appearance of fire anywhere,--no shooting flames, no
smoke, no red glare in the sky,--yet every one seemed flocking, as if
by a common understanding, toward the Chinese quarter. Catching the
prevailing excitement, the three friends pressed forward with the
crowd, which at every step was visibly increasing. Upon reaching the
point where the fire-engines were already hard at work, the crowd grew
more and more dense, shouts and cries broke out here and there, lights
were glancing hither and thither, and still no sign of fire could be
detected. What could it all mean?

It meant that by a secret understanding among the firemen, winked at
by the city authorities, the fire department was "cleaning out" the
Chinese quarter, which had become an intolerable nuisance, dangerous
to health on account of the filthy habits of the moon-eyed Celestials.
The fire lads were only too willing to undertake the job, which
promised to be such a fine lark, and at the first tap of the bells
they had rushed their machines to the indicated spot, run their hose
into the houses, and, regardless of the screams and howlings of the
frightened inmates, who were wildly running to and fro in frantic
efforts to escape, a veritable deluge of water was being poured upon
them from a dozen streams, fairly washing the poor devils out of house
and home, some by the doors, some by leaping out of the windows, and
some by the roofs. Whenever one made his appearance, the shouts of the
mob would direct the firemen where to point their powerful streams,
which quickly sent the unresisting victim rolling in the dirt, from
which he scrambled to his feet more dead than alive.

Meantime the Chinese quarter had been thoroughly drenched, inside and
out, the terrified inhabitants scattered in every direction, their
belongings utterly ruined either by water or by being thrown into the
street pell-mell, and they themselves chased and hunted from pillar to
post like so many rats drowned out of their holes by an inundation,
until the last victim had fled beyond the reach of pursuit.

When the whole district had been thus depopulated the vast throng
turned homeward in great good humor at having shown those miserable
barbarians how things were done in civilized America.

Time slipped away in this manner, and gradually the edge was being
taken off from the keenness of the search, though never completely
lost sight of. Not a nook or corner of the town had been left
unvisited, and still no Ramon. It was, even as Walter had first
described it, quite like looking for a needle in a haystack.

One morning Walter was called to help Furbish move some goods from
a downtown wharf to a certain warehouse uptown. The owner was found
standing among his belongings, which were piled and tossed about
helter-skelter, in a state of angry excitement, which every now
and then broke forth in muttered threats and snappy monosyllables,
directed to a small crowd of bystanders who had been attracted to the
spot.

"There'll be some hanging done round here before long," he muttered,
scowling darkly at two or three rough-looking men, each armed with a
brace of pistols, who stood with their backs against the door of the
building from which the man's goods had been so hastily thrown out.

This building stood on one of the new streets spoken of in a former
chapter as built out over the water, or on what was then known as a
water-lot. It seems that the title to this lot was claimed by two
parties. The late occupant had taken a lease from one claimant for a
term of years, and had built a store upon the lot, wholly ignorant
that another party claimed it. He had punctually paid his rent to
his landlord every month, and was therefore dumfounded when, late
one afternoon, the second claimant, armed with an order of a certain
judge and accompanied by a sheriff's posse, walked into his store, and
after demanding payment of all back rents, which was stoutly refused,
promptly ejected the unfortunate tenant, neck and heels, from his
place of business. His goods were then thrown out into the street
after him, and the door locked against him, with an armed guard
keeping possession. This was the state of things when Furbish and
Walter arrived on the ground.

"It's a wicked shame," declared Walter indignantly.

"Makes business good for us," was Furbish's careless reply. Then
lowering his voice, he added, "Talk low and keep shady. Mark my words.
There'll be hanging done before long," thus unconsciously echoing the
very words of the dispossessed tenant.

Walter took the hint. He stared, it is true, but went to work without
further comment, though he could see that the sympathy of the crowd
was clearly with the unfortunate tenant. When the last load had
been carted away, the crowd slowly dispersed, leaving only the
surly-looking guards on the spot.

"Is all out?" demanded Furbish of the merchant, nodding his head
toward the empty building.

"All but my safe. I want that bad; but you see these robbers won't
let me in. It was too heavy for them to move, or they were too lazy,
and now they won't even let me take my papers out of it. Curse them!"

"Got the key?"

"Oh, yes! That's all safe in my pocket. But what's a man going to do
with a key?"

"You want that safe bad?"

"I'd give a hundred dollars for it this minute; yes, two hundred."

Furbish now held a whispered colloquy with Walter. "Do you think your
friends would take a hand?"

"Oh, I'll answer for them," was the ready reply.

"Enough said."

A place of meeting was then fixed upon, after which the three
conspirators went their several ways--Furbish to mature his plan of
action, the merchant to nurse his new-found hopes, Walter to enlist
his two friends in the coming adventure. Charley was in high spirits
at the prospect. Bill thought it a risky piece of business, but if
his boys were going to take a hand in it he would have to go too.
Charley put an end to further argument by declaring that it was a
burning shame if a man couldn't go into his own store after his own
property, law or no law. For his part, he was bound to see the thing
through. Walter stipulated that there should be no violence used, and
that he should not be asked to enter the building if it was found to
be still in the hands of the sheriff's men.

Just at midnight a row-boat, with an empty lighter in tow, put off
from the _Argonaut's_ side, care being taken to keep in the deep
shadows as much as possible. Not a word was exchanged as the tow was
quietly brought to the place agreed upon, where it lay completely
hidden from curious eyes, if any such had been abroad at that hour. As
the lighter lightly grazed the wharf a dark figure stole cautiously
out from the shadow cast by a neighboring warehouse, and dropped into
the hands stretched out to receive it: still another followed, and the
party, now complete, held a short council in whispers.

Furbish had reconnoitered the store, finding only one watchman on
guard outside. Yet he was positive that there were two or more
inside, as he had seen a light shining through a crevice in the
window-shutters, which suddenly disappeared while he was watching it.

The evicted merchant then explained that this light must have come
from the little office, at the right hand of the street door, where
he usually slept. This information confirmed the belief that the men
inside had turned in until their turn should come to relieve the
guard outside. If this should prove true, the midnight intruders felt
that they would have a more easy task than they had supposed. This,
however, remained to be seen. After listening to a minute description
of the store, inside and out, Furbish gave the signal to proceed.

Making the boat fast to the scow's stern, the latter was poled along
in the shadows of the wharves until, under Bill's skillful guidance,
she glided between the two piers which supported the building that the
party was in search of.

All listened intently for any sound indicating that their approach
had been detected. As all seemed safe, the scow was quickly made
fast directly underneath the trap-door contrived for hoisting up
merchandise into the store by means of a block and tackle secured
to a stout rafter overhead--an operation at which Charley had often
assisted. It was, therefore, through this same trap-door that the
intruders now meant to effect an entrance. But a first attempt, very
cautiously made, to raise it, proved it to be bolted on the inside.
This contingency, however, had been provided against, for Charley now
produced a large auger, on which he rubbed some tallow to deaden the
sound, while the merchant held a dark lantern in such a way as to
show Charley where to use his tool to advantage.

Very cautiously, and with frequent pauses to listen, a large hole was
bored next to the place where the bolt shot into the socket. Two or
three minutes were occupied in this work. Charley then succeeded in
drawing back the bolt with his fingers, a little at a time, when the
trap was carefully lifted far enough to let the merchant squeeze his
body through it, and so up into the store. As this was felt to be the
critical moment, those who were left below listened breathlessly for
any sound from above, as the trap was immediately lowered after the
merchant passed through it.

It was, of course, pitch-dark in the store, but knowing the way as
well in the dark as in the daytime, and being in his stocking-feet,
the merchant stood only a moment to listen. Out of the darkness the
sleeping watchmen could be heard snoring heavily away in the little
corner office. Groping his way with cat-like tread, the merchant,
with two or three quick turns of the wrist, screwed a gimlet into the
woodwork of the office door, over the latch, thus securely fastening
the sleepers in. Observing the same precautions, he then felt for the
lock on the front door, and finding the key in the lock he turned it
softly, putting the key in his pocket. Even should they awake, the
watchmen inside the office could only get out by breaking down the
door; while their comrade outside would be kept from coming to their
assistance. The merchant had certainly shown himself not only to be a
man of nerve, but no mean strategist.

The merchant having signaled that all was safe, all the rest of the
party, except Walter, immediately joined him. The safe was speedily
located, some loose gunny-bags were spread upon the floor to deaden
the sound, two stout slings were quickly passed around the safe, the
tackle hooked on, and in less than ten minutes the object of the
adventure was safely lowered into the lighter. No time was lost in
getting the scow clear of her dangerous berth, nor was it until they
had put a long stretch of water behind them that the adventurers
breathed freely.

The daring midnight burglary was duly chronicled in the evening papers
as one of the boldest and most successful known to the criminal
annals of San Francisco. Would it be believed, it was asked, that
with three heavily armed guards on the watch inside and outside of
the building, the burglars had actually succeeded in carrying off so
bulky an article as an iron safe under the very noses of these alleged
guardians? Connivance on their part was strongly hinted at. The police
were on the track of the gang who did the job, and the public might
rest assured that when caught they would be given short shrift. The
burglars were supposed to have sunk the safe in the harbor after
rifling it of its contents.



XIV

CHARLEY AND WALTER GO A-GUNNING


Charley frequently came ashore in the evening, leaving Bill in charge
of the ship. Walter ranched at Clark's Point, near the waterside, and
only a few steps from the landing place. The neighborhood, to tell
the truth, did not bear a very good reputation, it being a resort for
sailors of all nations, whose nightly carousals in the low dramshops
generally kept the place in an uproar till morning, and often ended in
bloodshed.

Walter was busily engaged in sewing up a rip in his overalls, meantime
humming to himself snatches of "The Old Folks at Home," when Charley
came stamping into the room. Seating himself on an empty nail-keg, he
proceeded to free his mind in the following manner:

"You've been working pretty steady now for--how long?"

"Three months last Monday," assisted Walter, consulting a chalk mark
on the wall.

"Long 'nuff to entitle you to a bit of a vacation, I'm a-thinkin'.
What say to takin' a little gunnin' trip up country? Bill knows the
ropes now pretty well. A friend of mine 'll lend me the shootin'
fixin's. Couldn't you get off for a few days, think? Come, get that
Ramon chap out of your head for a bit. It's wearin' on you."

Walter jumped at the offer. Thus far he had never set foot out of the
city, and Charley, an enthusiast in anything that he had set his mind
upon, now portrayed the delights of a tramp among the foothills of
the Coast Range in glowing colors. Walter easily found a substitute
for the few days he expected to be away, while Charley had nobody's
permission to ask. So the very next afternoon saw the two sportsmen
crossing the ferry to Contra Costa, Charley carrying a rifle and
Walter a shotgun, the necessary traps for camping out being divided
equally between them.

"I only hope we may set eyes on a grizzly," Charley remarked, slapping
the breech of his rifle affectionately, as they stepped on shore.
"That's why I chose this feller," he added.

"Better let grizzlys alone. From all I hear they're pretty tough
customers," was Walter's cautious comment.

"I don't care. Just you wait till I see one, that's all. I'm all fixed
for him--lock, stock, and barrel."

They soon struck into the well-beaten road leading to the Coast Range,
and after steadily tramping until dark entered a small settlement
where travelers, coming and going over this route, usually put up for
the night. A night's lodging was soon arranged for at the only public
house that the place could afford, and after eating a hearty supper,
and leaving word with the landlord to call them up as soon as it was
light in the morning, the two amateur hunters were glad to tumble into
bed.

The house was a two-story frame building, with the second-story
windows in front opening upon a veranda, after the Southern style
of public houses. The air being hot and close in their room, Walter
threw up a window the first thing upon going into it. He saw that one
might easily step out from the room onto the veranda, or in, for that
matter. Then, there was no lock on the door, but as neither he nor
Charley was afraid of being robbed, the want of a lock did not prevent
their going to sleep as soon as they struck their beds. It is probable
that they did not even turn over once during the night.

Walter was awakened by the sound of a gentle scratching, or tapping,
at the door. Upon opening his eyes he perceived that it was beginning
to be quite light. He listened until the sound was repeated, sat up in
bed, and being satisfied that it must be some one calling them to get
up, slipped out of bed, yawning and stretching himself, went to the
door, half opened it, and, still only half awake, peered out.

What he saw made him start back in affright, and his hair to rise up
on his head In an instant.

Standing erect on his hind feet, clumsily beating the air with his
forepaws and lolling out a long red tongue, was an enormous, shaggy
grizzly bear at least a foot taller than Walter himself.

One look was enough. Giving one yell, Walter made a dash for the open
window, leaped out upon the veranda, vaulted over it, and grasping
firm hold of the railing, let himself drop down into the street.
Imagining that the bear was close behind, he incontinently took to his
heels, not even turning to look back over his shoulder to see what had
become of Charley.

Startled out of a sound sleep by Walter's cry of alarm, Charley threw
off the bedclothes, rubbed his eyes, and, with their aid, saw the
bear waddling with rolling gait into the room on all fours. He too
made a dash for the window, adopting without hesitation the only route
of escape open to him.

The bear quickly followed suit, sliding with ease down an upright,
and, on touching the ground, immediately set off after the fugitives,
upon whom the discovery that the bear was after them acted like a spur
upon a mettled charger. They no longer ran, they flew.

[Illustration: The hunters hunted by a grizzly bear.--_Page 208._]

Up to this hour the village had not shaken off its slumbers, but the
frantic shouts of the fugitives, who saw that the faster they ran the
faster ran the bear, quickly aroused other sleepers from their morning
nap. Dogs began to bark and give chase to the bear. Windows began to
be thrown up, and heads to appear at them. Still the race for life
continued. Bruin was evidently gaining upon the fugitives, who could
not much longer keep up the pace at which they were going. Feeling his
breath failing him, Charley, who was a few rods behind Walter, had
even almost made up his mind to stop short in his tracks, face about,
and let the bear work its will upon him, so giving his bosom friend a
chance to escape.

Fortunately, however, this heroic self-sacrifice was not to be made.
At the last house a street door was seen very cautiously to open,
while a head protruded from it. Ceremony here was quite out of the
question. Walter instantly dashed into this welcome haven of refuge,
with Charley, now quite spent, at his heels, overturning the man of
the house in their mad rush for safety. It took but a moment to shut
and bolt the door, and, as if that was not enough, Walter braced his
back against it, panting and breathless. Only when this was done, did
the two friends draw a free breath. Both were completely done up.

Excited by the chase, enraged at seeing his victims escaping, the bear
snuffed the air, pawed at the door, swayed his huge bulk to and fro,
and gave vent to his rage in loud and unearthly roarings that could be
heard by every inhabitant of the village.

Meantime the man into whose premises the two young men had so
unceremoniously entered, after taking a good look at the bear out of
the window, almost bent double in the effort to control his laughter.
"Why, boys," said he, between fits of choking, "that's Jem Stackpole's
tame grizzly." He had recognized the animal now holding them besieged
as one that had been taken when a cub, and brought up by the landlord
of the public house from which the boys had made their sudden exit,
as an object of curiosity to his guests. The iron collar which Bruin
still wore confirmed this account. It was all plain enough now. Having
contrived to free himself from his chain, the bear had easily gained
access to the house by climbing up the before-mentioned veranda
bear-fashion. He was considered quite harmless, the man explained,
but on seeing the young men run away the bear had run after them, at
first out of mere playfulness. So Walter and Charley had been running
a race with a tame grizzly, through the public street of the village,
in broad daylight, in their night clothes.

By this time something of a crowd had collected, all tongues going at
once. The laugh of course went against the boys, though some were in
favor of shooting the bear, and so putting an end to his wild pranks.
His master, however, who now came forward with a pitchfork in one
hand and an earthenware dish containing a stiff mixture of whisky and
honey in the other, objected to having the bear killed, although the
creature was now so ferocious that no one dared to go near him.

Setting the dish down upon the ground, and silently waving the crowd
back, the man began calling the bear by his pet name of "Rusty" in
a coaxing tone, and presently Bruin, having scented the seductive
mixture, marched toward it and began lapping it up, occasionally
emitting a fierce growl by way of notifying the bystanders to keep
their distance.

By the time the dish was licked clean Bruin was dead-drunk and rolling
helplessly in the dirt. His chain was then securely fastened on, and
the brute ignominiously dragged off to the stable to sleep off his
potations.

Walter and Charley were compelled to borrow a pair of trousers apiece
before they could venture back to the public house, the observed of
all observers. Needless to say, they made all haste to leave the
inhospitable spot. Upon calling for their bill, the landlord declared
there was nothing to pay, and, with a straight face, politely hoped
they would recommend his house to their friends.

Walter insisted upon paying, but the landlord was firm. The fame of
the tame-bear hunt would attract customers to his house, he said.
Under the circumstances he could not think of making any charge
whatever.

When they were well out of the village, Charley, who had maintained a
dogged silence, suddenly turned to Walter and exclaimed, "I won't tell
if you won't!"

"Don't be a ninny," was the curt reply.

"If I'd only had my rifle!" muttered Charley, who, all the same, could
not forbear looking backward every few minutes as they trudged on.

The disconsolate pair made their way up among the foothills, but
neither seemed to be in the right mood for keen sportsmen, or else
game was not so plenty as they had expected to find it. After
Charley had blown the nipple out of his rifle in firing at a coyote,
and Walter had shot half a dozen rabbits, which, though wounded,
succeeded in reaching their holes and crawling into them, the twain
willingly turned their faces homeward. Footsore and weary, but with
appetites sharpened by their long tramp, they were only too glad
to set foot once again in the streets of the city. With a brief "So
long, Charley," "So long, Walt," "Mum, you know," "Hope to die," they
separated to go their respective ways.



XV

THE YOUNG VIGILANTES


While on his way to work on Saturday morning, full of his own
thoughts, Walter could not help noticing the absence of the usual
bustle and movement in the streets. If the shops had not been open, he
would have thought it was Sunday, instead of the last day of the week.
All business seemed to be at a standstill. Merchants stood outside
their doors, glancing uneasily up and down the street and from time to
time holding whispered talks with their neighbors. Every one wore a
sober face; every one seemed expecting something to happen. But what
was it? What could it be?

Yesterday Walter would have passed along the same streets hardly
noticed. To-day he wondered why everybody stared at him so. Furbish
was about starting off on his dray when Walter reached the stand. He,
too, hardly replied when Walter gave him the customary "Good-morning."
What could it all mean?

Suddenly the big bell on the plaza thundered out three heavy
strokes--one, two, three, and no more--boom! boom! boom!

To the last day of his life Walter never forgot the sight that
followed. At the first stroke of that deep-toned bell the strange
quiet burst its bounds. Those already in the streets started off on
the run for the plaza. Those who were indoors rushed out, buckling on
their weapons as they ran. Workmen threw down their tools to join in
the race. Furbish jumped off his dray, shouting to Walter as he ran,
"Come on! Don't you hear it?" There was no noise except the trampling
of feet. Nobody asked a question of his neighbor. But every eye wore a
look of grim determination, as if some matter of life and death dwelt
in the imperious summons of that loud alarm-bell.

After gazing a moment in utter bewilderment, Walter started off on the
run with the rest. He, too, had caught the infection. The distance was
nothing. He found the plaza already black with people. Beyond him,
above the heads of the crowd, he saw a glittering line of bayonets;
nearer at hand men were pouring out of a building at the right, with
muskets in their hands. Walter stood on tiptoe. Some one was speaking
to the crowd from an open window fronting the plaza, but Walter was
too far off to catch a single word. The vast throng was as still as
death. Then as the speaker put some question to vote, one tremendous
"aye" went up from a thousand throats. It was the voice of an outraged
people pronouncing the doom of evil-doers.

By the gleam of satisfaction on the faces around him, Walter knew that
something of unusual moment had just been decided upon. Burning with
curiosity he timidly asked his nearest neighbor what it all meant.
First giving him a blank look the man addressed curtly replied, "Get
a morning paper," then moved off with the crowd, which was already
dispersing, leaving the plaza in quiet possession of a body of
citizen soldiers, with sentinels posted, and the strong arm of a new
power uplifted in its might. That power was the dreaded Vigilantes,
organized, armed, and ready for the common protection.

Though terribly in earnest, it was by far the most orderly multitude
Walter remembered ever having seen, and he had seen many. In the
newspaper he read what everybody else already knew, that one of the
most prominent citizens had been brutally murdered in cold blood by
a well-known gambler, in a crowded street and at an early hour of
the previous evening. The victim's only provocation consisted in
having spoken out like a man against the monstrous evils under which
the law-abiding citizens had so long and so silently been groaning.
This murder was the last straw. The murderer had been promptly taken
by members of the secret Committee of Vigilance; the trial had been
swift; and the hangman's noose was being made ready for its victim.
The account closed with a burning appeal to all law-abiding citizens,
at every cost, to rid the city of the whole gang of gamblers, thieves,
and outlaws infesting it like a plague. "When the sworn officers of
the law are so notoriously in league with such miscreants, nothing is
left for the people but to rise in their might. _Vox populi, vox Dei!_
Down with the Hounds!"

Charley and Bill were quietly eating their noonday meal, when Walter
burst into the _Argonaut's_ cabin in a state of wild excitement.
Without stopping to take breath, he rapidly related what he had seen
and heard that morning, while his listeners sat with wide-open eyes
until the tale was finished.

For a few moments the three friends stared at each other in silence.
Ever prompt, Charley was the first to break it. Jumping to his feet,
he struck the haft of his knife on the table with such force as to
set the dishes rattling, then waving it in the air he cried out
exultingly, "Now we've got him!" As the others made no reply except to
look askance, he went on to say, "Don't you see that, foxy as he is,
Ramon will be smoked out of his hole? Didn't I tell you there would
be hanging before long? Why, there won't be one of his kidney left in
'Frisco inside of a week."

"You're right," said Walter, "for as I came along I saw men putting up
posters ordering all criminals out of the city, on pain of being put
on board an outbound vessel and shipped off out of the country."

"Good enough for 'em, too. The heft of 'em is Sydney Ducks an'
ticket-o'-leave men, anyhow," quoth Bill, with a shake of the head.

"Hark!" commanded Walter, holding up his hand for silence. Even as
he spoke, the deep tones of a bell came booming across the water. At
that moment the bodies of two condemned murderers were swinging from
crossbeams from an upper window of the plaza.

"If we're ever going to catch that chap, we'd better set about it
before it's too late. What's to hinder our working this Vigilante
business a little on our own hook? Nothing. Who's going to ask any
questions? Nobody. Do you catch my idee?" questioned Charley.

Without more words the three friends hastened on shore, Walter leading
the way to his stand. They had agreed not to separate again, and were
busy talking over their plans when a Chinaman came up to Walter and
slipped a paper in his hand. Walter ran his eye over it, then crushed
it in his hand. Turning to the Chinaman he simply said, "All right,
John; I'll be there."

"Allee light," repeated the Chinaman, making off into the crowd.

Walter drew the heads of his two friends close to his own. Then he
whispered: "What do you think? This is an order to take some things
from a certain house on Dupont Street to a warehouse on Long Wharf, at
ten o'clock to-night. (Night work's double pay.) I can't be mistaken.
The order is in _his_ handwriting; I could swear to it."

"I consait we orter follow the Chinee," Bill suggested tentatively.

"No," objected Charley. "Prob'ly he'd lead us a wild-goose chase all
over town. If Walter's right, we're hot on the scent now. Don't muddy
the water, I say. The eel's a slippery cuss, and might wiggle away.
Bill, let's you and I go take a look at that warehouse. Walt, don't
you let on that you suspicion a thing. Why, you're all of a tremble,
man! Straighten out your face. Anybody could read it like a book. Pull
yourself together. Look at me! By jings, I feel like a fighting-cock
just now!"

"What a bantam!" muttered Bill, following in Charley's springing
footsteps.

At ten o'clock Walter was at the door of the house on Dupont Street
with his cart. His knock was answered by the same Chinaman who had
brought him the note in the morning. Several parcels were brought
out and placed in the cart, but still no sign of the owner. The
Chinaman then explained, in his pigeon English, that this person would
meet Walter at the warehouse on the wharf, for which place Walter
immediately started, revolving in his own mind whether this was not
some trick of Ramon's contriving to throw him, Walter, off the scent.

Nobody appeared to answer Walter's knock at the warehouse door.
Evidently it was deserted, but a low whistle gave notice that Charley
and Bill were close at hand. Indeed, so well had they concealed
themselves that Walter had passed on without seeing them.

"Have you got the rope all right, Bill?" Walter nervously whispered,
as the three crouched in the friendly shadow of a narrow passageway,
while waiting for their victim to show himself.

"Sartin," that worthy calmly replied, "and all I wish is that
what's-his-name was on one end, and I on t'other."

"I don't half like this way of doing things; looks too much like
kidnapping," Walter whispered, half to himself.

"Come, Walt, you're not going to show the white feather now, after all
this trouble, I hope," Charley impatiently said. "Ssh! here he comes.
It's now or never."

Sure enough, the sound of approaching footsteps was now plainly heard.
As Ramon came nearer, walking fast, Bill, stepping out of the shadows,
slowly lurched along ahead, cleverly imitating the zigzag walk of a
tipsy sailor--no unusual sight at that time of night. When Ramon had
passed a few rods beyond their hiding place, Charley quietly slipped
out behind him, taking care to tread as softly as one of Cooper's
Indians on the warpath. This plan had been carefully devised, for fear
that Ramon might give an alarm if they attempted, all at once, to rush
out upon him unawares. They now held their intended victim, as it
were, between two fires.

At that hour the street was so lonely and deserted that there was
little fear of interruption, so Charley did not hurry. When Bill had
reached the place agreed upon, where the street narrowed to a lane
in which not more than two persons could walk abreast, he began to
slacken his pace, so as to let Ramon come up with him. As nothing
could be seen, at a few rods off, in that uncertain light, the signal
agreed upon was to be given by Bill's striking a match, when Walter
and Charley were to come up as rapidly as possible.

As Ramon tried to push on by Bill, that worthy placed himself squarely
in the way, pulled out his pipe, and gruffly demanded a light. He
acted his part so well as completely to disarm Ramon's suspicions,
had he had any.

At being thus suddenly brought to a stand, Ramon attempted to shoulder
Bill out of his path, but on finding himself stoutly opposed, he
instinctively drew back a step.

"Refuse a gen'leman a light, does yer? Want a whole street to
yourself, does yer?" sputtered Bill, obstinately holding his ground.
Ramon made a threatening movement. "Shove! I dare ye, ye lubber,"
continued the irate sailor, purposely raising his voice as his
companion came in sight. "I'm a match for you any day in the week," he
grumbled, striking a light as if to enforce the challenge.

By the light of the match Bill instantly recognized Ramon. At the same
moment Ramon saw that the speaker was a total stranger. Charley barred
the way behind him. Ramon's first thought had been that he was being
waylaid by footpads and, instinctively his hand went to his pistol;
but as no demand was made for his valuables, he quickly concluded it
to be a chance encounter with a couple of tipsy sailors. A street row
was the very thing he most dreaded. He was in a fever to be off. Then
the thought struck him that perhaps he might turn these fellows to his
own advantage. So he altered his tone at once. "Oh, it's all right,
lads," he said apologetically, "but one must be careful in these
times, you know; and you certainly did give me a start. Never mind. If
you've got a boat handy, I'll make this the best night's work you ever
did in the whole course of your lives."

Charley, who had edged up closer, now nudged Bill to hold his tongue.
Speaking thickly, Charley said: "If you wants a boat we've got the one
we was just goin' off in aboard ship. She lays right here, just ahead
of us. If you come down han'some, we're the lads you want. 'Nuff said."

Ramon was completely deceived. "All right, then. I've got some traps
yonder. They're waiting for me, I see. We'll get them, and you can
set me aboard the _Flamingo_. Hurry up! I've no time to lose."

Walter was nonplused when he saw the trio approaching in so friendly
a manner. He was about to say something, when Charley trod sharply
on his foot to enforce silence. All four then went down to the boat
with Ramon's luggage. After handing Walter a gold piece, Ramon
stepped lightly into the boat, Bill shipped the oars, and Charley
took the tiller. Walter first cast off the painter, gave the boat a
vigorous shove, and then leaped on board himself. He could not make
out what had happened to change their plans, but this was no time for
explanations.

Seeing the supposed cartman get into the boat, it then first flashed
upon Ramon that he had been tricked. Half rising from his seat, he
made a movement as if to leap overboard, but a big, bony hand dragged
him backward. Maddened to desperation, Ramon then reached for his
revolver, but before he could draw it, Walter threw his arms around
him, and held him fast in spite of his struggles. Meantime Bill was
taking two or three turns round Ramon's body with a stout rope,
brought along for that very purpose, and in a twinkling that worthy
found himself bound and helpless.

No word was spoken until the boat touched the _Argonaut's_ side.
Thoroughly cowed, shivering with cold and fright, Ramon's terror was
heightened by the thought that he was being carried off to sea. As the
black hull of the _Argonaut_ loomed up before him the dreadful truth
seemed to break upon him clearly. Yes, there was no doubt of it: he
was being shanghaied, as the forcible kidnaping of sailors was called.

Charley went up the side first. In a minute he reappeared with a
lighted lantern. A dull numbness had seized Ramon. He did not even
attempt to cry out when Charley called to the others, in a guarded
undertone, to "pass him along." Four stout arms then lifted, or
rather boosted, Ramon on board the vessel, as limp and helpless as a
dead man. "I knew it," he groaned, with chattering teeth; "shanghaied,
by all that's horrible!"



XVI

RAMON FINDS HIS MATCH


Charley at once led the way into the cabin. When all four had passed
in he shut the door, turned the key in the lock, and set down the
lantern on the table, when, by its dim light, Ramon saw, for the first
time, the faces of his abductors. Stealing a quick glance around him
he met Walter's set face and stern eye. The faces of the others gave
him as little encouragement. Greatly relieved to find his worst fears
unfounded, his courage began to rise again. He met Walter's look with
one of defiance, and inwardly resolved to brazen it out. His life,
he knew, was safe enough. To show that he was not afraid, he assumed
a careless tone, as if he looked upon the whole thing as a joke.
"You've got me, boys. But now you've got me, what do you want with
me?" he demanded, twisting a cigarette in his trembling fingers.

"First," said Walter, a trifle unsteadily, for the sight of his
enemy was almost too much for him, "first we want you to sign this
paper," taking it out of his pocket. "It is--you can read it--a full
confession of your robbery of Bright & Company." In spite of his
effrontery, Ramon could not help wincing a little. Walter went on
without mercy, "And of your clever little scheme to throw suspicion
on me as your accomplice." Ramon merely gave a contemptuous little
shrug. "And lastly, of what you've done with all the property you--you
stole." Ramon scowled and gnawed his mustache.

Now that he knew the worst, Ramon began to bluster. "Oh, you shall
smart for this when I get on shore--yes, all of you," he declared
hotly. "You've got the wrong pig by the ear this time; yes, you have.
As for you," this to Bill, "you hoary-headed old villain, I'll have
you skinned alive and hung up by the heels for a scarecrow."

Bill could hold in no longer. "Who said anything about your goin'
ashore, I'd like to know?" he asked, in his bantering way. "You
never'd be missed, nohow. Here yer be, and here you stop till we've
done with you. So none of your black looks nor cheap talk. They won't
pass here."

"Stop me if you dare! It's abduction, kidnaping, felony!" cried Ramon,
glancing fiercely from one face to the other. "I despise you and your
threats. Where are your proofs? Where is your authority?"

"Ugly words those, big words. You want proofs, eh? What do you say to
this?" Walter asked, in his turn, unfolding a handbill before Ramon's
eyes with one hand, while with the other he held the lantern up so
that the accusing words, in staring print, might be the more easily
read:

                          STOP THIEF!!!

                          $500 REWARD!

     The above reward will be paid for the apprehension of one Ramon
     Ingersoll, an absconding embezzler.

This was followed by a detailed description of his personal appearance.

"Now will you sign?" Walter again demanded of the branded thief and
fugitive from justice.

Ramon smiled a sickly smile. "Oh! it's the reward you're after, is it?
Hope you may get it, that's all."

At this fresh insult two red spots flamed up on Walter's cheeks.
Ramon's dark eyes sparkled at having so cleverly seen through the
motives of his captors.

"Is that your last word?"

"Before I'll sign that paper I'll rot right here!"

"You had better sleep on it," replied Walter, turning away.

"What! before s'archin' him for the stealin's?" Bill asked, with
well-feigned surprise, at the same time critically looking Ramon over
from head to foot.

Ramon's hand went to his neckcloth, as if already he felt the
hangman's noose choking him, the observant Bill meanwhile watching
him as a cat does a mouse. "Come, my lad, turn out your pockets," he
commanded, in a most business-like way.

Pale with anger, Ramon first pulled out a leather pocket-book, which
he threw upon the table, with something that sounded very much like a
muttered curse, after which he folded his arms defiantly across his
chest. "Now you've got it, much good may it do you," he sneered.

The pocket-book contained only a few papers of little value to anybody.

"What has become of all the money you took?" Walter demanded.

"Gone," was the curt reply.

"What! gone! You can't have spent it all so soon. Think again. There
must be a trifle left."

Ramon shrugged his shoulders by way of reply.

"Feel for his belt, Bill," Charley struck in. Charley had been growing
impatient for some time over so much waste of words. Bill hastened to
take the hint.

"Hands off! I tell you, I'll not be searched," shouted Ramon, carrying
his hands to the threatened spot like a flash. In spite of his
struggles, however, the belt, which every one wore in that day, was
secured, and in it ten new fifty-dollar gold pieces were found, and
turned out upon the table. Again Ramon's hand went to his neckcloth,
nervously, tremblingly. In a twinkling Bill had twitched that article
off and tossed it to Walter. "Good's a belt, hain't it?" asked Bill in
answer to Walter's look. "I seed him grabbin' at it twicet. S'arch it!
s'arch it!"

[Illustration: Ramon made to give up his stealing's.--_Page 236._]

Rolled up in a little wad, in the folds of the neckerchief, they found
two certificates of deposit of a thousand dollars each, and in
another similar roll several notes of hand for quite large sums, made
payable to Bright & Company, but with forged indorsements to a third
party, who, it is needless to say, was no other than Ramon himself,
who had thus added forgery to his catalogue of crime. Fortunately, his
hurried departure had prevented the negotiating of these notes, which
now furnished the most damning evidence of his misdeeds.

"Now, then," said Walter, sweeping the money and papers together in a
heap, "we've drawn his teeth, let him bite if he can."

At this cutting taunt, Ramon summoned to his aid the remains of his
fast-waning assurance. "Oho! my fine gentlemen, suppose I'm all you
say I am, if you take my money you're as deep in the mud as I am in
the mire; eh, my gallant highwaymen?" he hissed out.

"Enough of this. We shall take good care of you to-night; but
to-morrow we mean to hand you over to the Vigilantes. You can then
plead your own cause, Master Embezzler." So saying, Walter pointed to
a stateroom opposite, to signify that the last word had been said.

Ramon's face instantly turned of a sickly pallor. As Bill afterwards
said, "Walter's threat took all the starch out of him." In a broken
voice he now pleaded for mercy. "I give it up. I'll confess. I'll sign
all you say--anything--if you'll promise not to give me up to those
bloodhounds," he almost whimpered. Truly, his craven spirit had at
last got the mastery.

Walter pretended to hesitate, but in truth he was only turning over
in his own mind how best to dispose of Ramon. Hitherto the wish for
revenge had been strong within him, had really gone hand-in-hand with
that to see wrong made right. But Ramon was now only an object of
pity, of contempt. The confession was again placed before him with the
addition of a clause stating that the money surrendered was the same
he had taken from his employers. He himself added the words, "This is
my free act and deed," after which he signed his full name as if in a
hurry to have it over with. The two friends then witnessed it.

Walter put this precious document in his pocket with a feeling of real
triumph. At last his good name would be vindicated before all the
world. Once again he could look any man in the face without a blush.
It seemed almost too good to be true, yet there sat Ramon cowering in
a corner, while he, Walter, held the damning proofs of the robbery in
his possession. No, it was not a dream. Right was might, after all.

Instead of asking to be set at liberty, Ramon now begged to be kept
hid from the dreaded Vigilantes. "Give me just money enough to get
away with, set me on shore after dark, and I'll take my chances,"
he pleaded. Only too glad to be well rid of him, the three friends
willingly agreed to this proposal. After darkness had set in, Bill
pulled Ramon to a distant spot above the town, among the sand dunes.
Handing the discomfited wretch his own pocket-book, with the contents
untouched, Bill gave him this parting shot: "Take it, and go to
Guinea! If this is the last on ye, well an' good, but it's my 'pinion
there's more rascality stowed away in that cowardly carkiss o' yourn."
Without replying, Ramon stole away in the darkness, and was soon lost
to sight.



XVII

A SHARP RISE IN LUMBER


"Isn't that the Sacramento boat?" asked Charley, looking off in the
direction of a rapidly approaching bank of lights. "How plainly we can
hear the drumming of her big paddles. Listen!"

"If it is, she's all of two hours ahead of time," was Walter's reply.

"Yes, it's the old _Senator's_ day. She's a traveler all the time, and
to-night she has the tide with her. Do you know, they say she's made
more money for her owners than she could carry on one trip?"

"Sho! You don't mean it."

"True as you stand there."

They stood watching the _Senator_ work her way into her dock, when
Charley suddenly asked, "What are you so glum about to-night, Walt?"

"I was thinking what I would do if I had a boatload of money."

"Hope you may get it, that's all. Hark! Ah, here's Bill back again."

By the way that Bill was rowing, he seemed in a great hurry. Greatly
to the surprise of the two friends, he was closely followed up the
side by a stranger, to whom Bill lent a helping hand as this person
stumbled awkwardly to the deck. At first both Walter and Charley
thought it must be Ramon returning.

"Hello! what's up now?" both exclaimed in one breath.

"What's up? Lumber's up. Got any?" answered a quick, sharp voice not
at all like Ramon's.

As nobody spoke Bill made a hurried explanation. "Sacramento's all
burnt up, lock, stock, and barrel. Boat's goin' right back to-night.
I seen her comin' lickety-split, fit to bust her b'iler; so I kinder
waited round for the news. I heered this man askin' who had lumber, so
I jest mittened onto him, and here he is."

"Whar's this yer lumber--afloat or on shore?" the newcomer impatiently
demanded.

"Afloat," Charley replied.

"Good enough! How's it stowed: so's it can be got at?"

"It's a whole cargo. Never been broken out."

"Good again! What sort is it? Can I see it?"

"Come into the cabin and I'll get out the manifest. You can't see
anything till daylight."

"Burn the manifest!" returned the stranger, still more impatiently.
"Daylight's wuth dollars now. Show me the man can tell what that thar
lumber is, or isn't."

"I can," Walter put in, "'cause I saw it loaded."

"Then you're the very man I want. Talk fast. I'm bound to go back on
that thar boat."

Thus urged, Walter began the inventory on his fingers. "There's six
two-story dwelling houses, all framed, ready to go up."

"Whoop-ee! how big?"

"About 24x36, high-studded, pitched roof, luthern windows. The rest
is building stuff--all of it--sills, joists, rough and planed boards,
matched boards----"

"Any shingles?" the impatient man broke in.

"Yes, a big lot; and clapboards too."

"Talk enough. Whar's the owner?"

"You're talking to him now," said Charley quickly.

"Well, then, I reck'n we'd better have a little light on the subject,
hadn't we?" the stranger suggested.

Upon this hint Charley led the way to the cabin, where the parties
took a good look at each other. The stranger glanced over the
manifest, laid a big, brawny hand upon it, then, turning to Walter,
but without betraying surprise at his youthful appearance, said
pointedly, "Name your price, cash down, stranger, for the lot. I'm
here for a dicker."

Walter began a rapid mental calculation. "Those houses are worth all
of twenty-five hundred apiece," he declared, glancing at Charley.

"More," Charley assented positively.

"Wuth more for firewood," added Bill.

"Houses and all; all or none. How much for the hull blamed cargo?" the
stranger again demanded, getting up to expectorate in a corner.

"Lumber is lumber," observed Charley, wrinkling his forehead in deep
thought.

"Do I ask you to give it away? Name your figure," the would-be
purchaser insisted. "Come up to the scratch. I've no time to waste
here palavering. What do you take me for?" he added angrily.

Walter again had recourse to his mental arithmetic. "Six times two
fifty, fifteen; lump the rest at ten; freight money five, storage
five more, insurance five. Forty thousand dollars!" he exclaimed
desperately at a venture, feeling the cold sweat oozing out all over
him.

"It's mine. I'll take it," said the stranger, coolly suiting the
action to the word by dragging out of his coat pockets first one
chuggy bag of gold dust and then another, which he placed before
Walter on the table. "Here's something to bind the bargain." Then,
seeing Bill critically examining a pinch of the dull yellow grains
in the palm of his hand, he added: "Oh! never fear! That's the real
stuff. You get the rest when that lumber's delivered alongside
Sacramento levee at my expense. Talk fast. Is it a whack?"

"Hold on, stranger," cried the acute Charley, pushing back the gold.
"We don't agree to no such thing, mister. We deliver it right here
from the ship."

The stranger smote the table with his clenched fist. "Can't waste no
time loading and unloading," he declared; "that's half the battle. I
must have this cargo ahead of everybody, up river. You say it's all
loaded. That's why I pay high for it. I don't care shucks how you get
it there; so fix it somehow; for it's make or break with me this time.
_Sabe?_"

"Why not tow her up and back, if he pays for it?" Bill suggested.

The buyer caught as eagerly at the idea as a drowning man does at a
straw. "Sartin. Tow her up!" he exclaimed. "I hire the boat and pay
all expenses. How many hands of you? Three. All right. You get ten
dollars apiece a day till the ship's unloaded."

The man's eagerness to buy his way through all obstacles rather
confused Walter, who now turned inquiringly toward Bill.

"She draws nigh onto twenty feet this blessed minute," Bill said in a
doubtful undertone.

"Why, the river is booming!" cried the stranger, looking from one to
the other, with eager, restless eyes, as this unforeseen difficulty
presented itself to his mind.

Again Bill came to the rescue. "I'll tell ye, mates, what we can do.
Lash an empty lighter on each side of her; that'll lift her some; then
if she takes the ground, we might break out cargo into the lighters,
till she floats agin."

The lumber speculator listened like one who hears some one speaking in
a strange tongue. He, however, caught at Bill's idea. "Yes, that's the
how, shoah," he joyfully assented. "I'll hire a towboat to-night, if
one's to be had in 'Frisco for money. I don't know shucks 'bout these
yer ships, but when it comes to steamboats I reck'n I kin tell a snag
from a catfish."

"I think we may risk it, then," observed Charley, who, as ship-keeper,
felt all his responsibility for her safety.

Walter then drew up the contract in proper form, after which it was
duly signed, sealed, and witnessed.

"Now, then," resumed the stranger, "you boys get everything good and
ready for a quick start. Thar's your dust. You play fa'r with me, an'
I'll play fa'r with you. Shake."

He then put off with Bill for the shore.

"Dirt cheap," said Charley, eying Walter sidewise.

"Thrown away," groaned Walter peevishly, by way of reply.

And to think that only the day before the lumber would not have paid
for the unloading!



XVIII

A CORNER IN LUMBER


By dint of hard work the _Southern Cross_ was got ready to cast off
her moorings by the time the tug came puffing up alongside, early in
the morning. They were soon under weigh, but the ship's bottom was so
foul that she towed like a log.

Bill steered, while Charley and Walter went forward to pass the word
from the tug or tend the hawser, as might be necessary. It being
smooth water here, in an hour or so the tow passed out into San Pablo
Bay, where it met not only a stiff head wind, but a nasty little
choppy sea. That made towing slow work, but by noon they were abreast
of Benicia and entering the Straits of Carquinez, with old Monte
Diablo peering down upon them on the starboard hand.

Beyond this point the tow steamed across still another bay, for some
fifteen miles more, without mishap. They had now left the coast
mountains far behind, and were heading straight for what seemed an
endless waste of tall reeds, through which both the Sacramento and San
Joaquin wind their way out to the sea.

So far plenty of water and plenty of sea room had been found. The
worst was yet to come. The young navigators, however, pushed boldly
on between the low mud-banks without delay, feeling much encouraged
by their success thus far, and wishing to make the most of the short
two hours of daylight remaining, after which the captain of the tug
declared it would be unsafe to proceed.

After seeing the ship tied up to the bank for the night, the tug
pushed on in search of a wood-yard some miles farther on. It was quite
ten o'clock the next morning before the boys saw her come puffing back
around the next bend of the river above. She had run so far after
wood, that the captain said he would not risk putting back before
daylight again.

All went smoothly until the middle of the afternoon, when, to their
great annoyance, the ship suddenly brought up on a mud-bank, where she
stuck hard and fast. A hawser was quickly carried out astern, at which
the tug pulled and hauled for some time to no purpose. The _Southern
Cross_ would not budge an inch.

It being evident that the ship would not come off by that means,
hatches were taken off, the boys threw off their coats, and, spurred
on by Bill's report that he believed the river was falling, all hands
went to work breaking out cargo into the lighters, as if their very
lives depended upon their haste. It was now that Bill's foresight came
in for the warmest commendations, as without the lighters the voyage
must have ended then and there.

They worked on like beavers all the rest of that afternoon, the tug
giving an occasional pull at the hawser, without starting the ship
from her snug berth. They, therefore, made themselves some coffee,
and were talking the situation over in no very happy frame of mind,
when a large, high-pressure steamboat was seen heading down the river,
half of which she seemed pushing in front of her, and dragging the
other half behind. "Stand by to haul away!" shouted Bill, with quick
presence of mind, to the men on the tug, running aft to take another
turn in the hawser. As the steamer passed by, churning the muddy water
into big waves, the tug put on all steam, the hawser straightened out
as tense as iron, the big ship gave a lazy lurch as a wave struck her,
and to the unspeakable delight of all hands they found themselves once
more afloat and in deep water.

Although the ship was aground several times after this, they were so
lucky in getting her off, that by noon of the third day the _Southern
Cross_ lay snugly moored, stem and stern, to a couple of live oaks
at the Sacramento levee. The first person to jump on board was the
purchaser himself, followed by a gang of laborers, who had been
waiting only for the ship's arrival to set to work at unloading her
cargo. Meantime the boys set about making all snug aboard, and then
after seeing the balance of the purchase money weighed out, on a
common counter-scale in the cabin, they took turns in mounting guard
over what had been so fairly earned. In plain truth, all three were
fairly dazed by the possession of so much wealth.

[Illustration: Arrival of the _Southern Cross_ at Sacramento.--_Page
254._]

This duty of standing watch and watch kept the friends from leaving
the ship even for a single moment, if indeed they had felt the least
desire to do so. In fact all that there was left of the late bustling
city was spread out stark and grim before their wondering eyes from
the deck of the ship, and a dismal sight it was. Acres of ground,
so lately covered with buildings so full of busy life, were now
nothing but a blackened waste of smoldering rubbish. Here and there
some solitary tree, scorched and leafless, lifted up its skeleton
branches as if in silent horror at the surrounding desolation. Men,
singly, or in little groups, were moving about in the gray-white smoke
like so many uneasy specters. Others were carefully poking among the
rubbish for whatever of value might have escaped the flames. But more
strange than all, even while the ruins were ablaze about them, it was
to see a gang of workmen busy laying down the foundations for a new
building. There was to be no sitting down in sackcloth and ashes here.
That was California spirit.

All this time the lumber dealer was by great odds the busiest man
there. He was fairly up to his ears in business, selling lumber, in
small parcels or great, from the head of a barrel, to a perfect mob
of buyers, who pushed and jostled each other in their eagerness to
be first served. All were clamoring as loudly for notice as so many
Congressmen on a field-day to the Speaker of the House. To this horde
of hungry applicants the lumberman kept on repeating, "First come,
first served. Down with your dust." The man was making a fortune hand
over fist.

Scarcely had our boys the time to look about them, when they were
beset with offers to lease or even to buy the ship outright. One
wanted her for a store, another for a hotel, another for a restaurant,
a saloon, and so on. Men even shook pouches of gold-dust in their
faces, as an incentive to close the bargain on the spot. As such a
transaction had never entered their heads, the three friends held a
hurried consultation over it. Charley firmly held to the opinion that
he had no right to dispose of the ship without the owner's consent,
and that was something which could not be obtained at this time.
Walter was non-committal. Bill was nothing if not practical. Bill was
no fool.

"Ef she goes back, what does she do?" he asked, squinting first at one
and then at the other. "Why, she lays there to her anchors rottin',
doin' nobody no good," he added.

"She won't eat or drink anything if she does," Charley said rather
ambiguously.

"Seems as though we ought to put her back where we found her," Walter
suggested, in a doubtful sort of way.

"Settle it to suit yourselves," was Bill's ready rejoinder. "But how
does the case stand? Here's a lot of crazy _hombres_ e'en a'most ready
to fight for her. 'Twould cost a fortin to get her ready for sea. Her
bottom's foul as a cow-yard; some of her copper's torn off; upper
works rotten; she needs calkin', paintin', new riggin', new----"

"There, hold on!" cried Charley, laughing heartily at Bill's truly
formidable catalogue of wants; "I give in. I vote to lease the old
barky by the month--that is, if Walt here thinks as I do."

"In for a penny, in for a pound," Walter assented decisively.

So the bargain was concluded before the cargo was half out of the
ship, so eager was the lessee to get possession. Walter drew up the
lease, a month's rent was paid in advance, and the thing was done.

"Well, now, boys, that's off our minds," said Charley gleefully; "my
head's been turning round like a buzz-saw ever since this thing's been
talked about."

"And a good job, too, seein' as how we skipped without a clearance,"
Bill put in quietly.

The two friends looked at him blankly, then at each other. It was
plain that no such matter had ever entered their minds. Charley gave a
long, low whistle. "By George, I never thought of that!" he exclaimed,
in great ill humor with Bill. "What'll they do to us?"

"No use cryin' over spilt milk," said that worthy. "Keep dark's our
lay. Didn't Noah's Ark sail without a clearance, without papers or
flag, and for no port?" he added.

"We 'cleared out,' as the sayin' is, with a vengeance," Charley
remarked, trying to turn the matter off with a joke.

"There's only one thing for us to do," said Walter, "and that is to
go right up to the custom-house and explain matters to the collector,
when we get back to the Bay. Perhaps he'll let us off with a fine,
when he finds we didn't mean to run away with the ship and turn
pirates."

The idea of turning the old, water-logged _Southern Cross_ into a
pirate was so comical that all three joined in a hearty laugh.

What to do with all their money was the most perplexing question.
They could neither eat nor sleep for thinking of it. In every face
they saw a thief, every footstep startled them. In their dilemma it
was determined that the safer way would be to divide it up between
them. Three miner's belts were therefore procured, and after locking
themselves up in the cabin the three friends stuffed these belts
as full as they would hold with the precious metal. But there was
still a good-sized pile left to be disposed of when this was done,
so Bill suggested sewing the remainder in their shirts. At it they
went, without more words, sitting meantime in their trousers and
undershirts; and a truly comical sight was this original sewing
circle, stitching away for dear life under lock and key.

But even when this operation was finished, a heap of the shining metal
still lay on the table before them. All were so weighed down with
what they had about them that they waddled rather than walked. Bill
declared that if anything happened to the boat at their returning they
would all sink to the bottom like so much lead. While thus at their
wits' end, Charley's eagle eye chanced to fall upon an old fowling
piece hung up by some hooks in the cabin. This was quickly torn from
its resting place, the charges drawn, and while the others looked on
in silent wonder Charley filled both barrels with gold dust, after
which the muzzles were tightly fitted with corks. "She's loaded for
big game. We take turns carryin' her, don't you see?" he remarked
with a broad grin.

Towards dusk the trio took passage on board the first boat bound for
the Bay, nor did they feel themselves wholly safe with their treasure
until they once more trod the deck of the old _Argonaut_, fairly worn
out with a week of such rapidly shifting fortunes as no one but an old
Californian has ever experienced.

The three inseparables were snugly rolled up in their blankets, Bill
loudly snoring in his bunk, when the distant booming of a gun caused
Walter to raise his head and say drowsily, "Hello! a steamer's in."

"I don't care if there's twenty steamers," Charley yawned, at the same
time burying his nose still deeper under his blanket; "I was almost
gone and now you've made me begin all over again. All ashore that's
goin' ashore."



XIX

HEARTS OF GOLD


Mr. Bright came in that steamer. As Walter's letter seemed to hold
out fair hopes of recovering some part of the _Southern Cross_ and
her cargo, the merchant had decided to look into the matter himself,
though in truth both he and his partners had long regarded the venture
as a dead loss.

Had he suddenly dropped from the clouds, the _Argonaut's_ little
company could not have been more astonished than when the merchant
stepped on deck, smiling benignantly at the evident consternation he
thus created.

After a hearty greeting all round, though poor Walter turned all
colors at the remembrance of how and where they had last met, Mr.
Bright began by explaining that he had found them out through the
consignee of the _Southern Cross_. "But where in the world is the
_Southern Cross_?" he asked. "Here has the boatman been rowing me
around for the last hour, trying to find her. Nothing has happened to
her, I hope," he hastily added, observing the friends exchanging sly
glances.

This question, of course, led to an explanation from Walter, during
which the old merchant's face was a study. His first look of annoyance
soon changed to one of blank amazement, finally settling down into
a broad smile of complete satisfaction when the story was all told.
Then he shook his gray head as if the problem was quite too knotty for
him to solve, how these boys, hardly out of their teens, should have
dared, first to engage in such a brilliant transaction, and then have
succeeded in carrying it through to the end without a hitch.

"Pretty well for beginners, I must say," he finally declared. "Taken
altogether that's about the boldest operation I ever heard of, and
I've known a few in my experience as a business man. But," looking at
Walter, "where's all this money? Quite safe, I hope."

By way of answer, the young men brought out their treasure from
various ingenious hiding-places, the fowling piece included. When all
the belts and parcels of dust were piled in a heap on the table, Mr.
Bright sat for some time with his hand over his eyes without speaking.
What the merchant's thoughts were it were vain to guess. Finally he
said, "You seem to have done everything for the best. Bill here was
quite right about the ship. She is earning something where she is, at
least. Now about the cargo?" turning to Walter; "I think you said in
your letter that Charley here bought half of that in?"

Walter gave a nod of assent.

"Why, then," resumed Mr. Bright, "as the other half belongs to his
partner, I don't see that we've anything to do with this money.
Perhaps we may compromise as to the ship," he added, looking at
Charley.

Charley then explained his agreement with his partner, who had so
mysteriously disappeared. "I sold out to Walter. Settle it with him,"
he finished, jamming his hands in his pockets and turning away.

"Well, then, Walter, what do you say?"

"I say that Charley ought to have half the profits. Why, when I wrote
you, the lumber was worthless. Besides, Charley did all the business.
Settle it with him."

"I see. The situation was changed from a matter of a few hundreds to
thousands shortly after your letter was written." Walter nodded. "And
you don't care to take advantage of it?" Walter simply folded his
arms defiantly. "But between you you saved the cargo," the merchant
rejoined. "We've no claim. You must come to terms. Was there no
writing?"

Walter scowled fiercely at Charley, who, notwithstanding, immediately
produced his copy of the agreement. The merchant glanced over it with
a smile hovering on his lips.

"Why, this is perfectly good," he declared. "Well, then, as neither of
you has a proposition to make, I'll make you one. Perhaps Walter here
felt under a moral obligation to look after our interests in spite of
the unjust treatment he had received. That I can now understand, and I
ask his pardon. But you, Charles, had no such inducement."

"No inducement!" Charley broke out, with a quivering lip; "no
inducement, heh, to see that boy righted?" he repeated, struggling
hard to keep down the lump in his throat.

"Axin' pardons don't mend no broken crockery," observed Bill gruffly.

Mr. Bright showed no resentment at this plain speech. He sat wiping
his glasses in deep thought. Perhaps there was just a little moisture
in his own eyes, over this evidence of two hearts linked together as
in bands of steel.

The silence was growing oppressive, when Walter nerved himself to say:
"You see, sir, Charley and me, we are of one mind. As for me, I'm
perfectly satisfied to take what I put in to fit Charley out, provided
you pay him back his investment, and what's right for his and Bill's
time and trouble."

Charley coughed a little at this liberal proposal, but Walter signed
to him to keep quiet. Bill grunted out something that might pass for
consent.

But Mr. Bright was not the man to take advantage of so much
generosity. In truth, he had already formed in his own mind a plan by
which to come to an agreement. Changing the subject for the moment, he
suddenly asked, "By the way, have you never heard anything of Ramon?"

At this unexpected question a broad grin stole over the faces of the
three kidnapers. "I was coming to that," Walter replied, bringing out
from his chest the money and papers which Ramon had been so lately
compelled to disgorge. The merchant took them in his hands, ran his
eye rapidly over them, and exclaimed in astonishment, "What! did he
make this restitution of his own accord? Wonders will never cease, I
declare."

"Well, no, sir, not exactly that; the truth is, he was a trifle
obstinate about it at first, but we found a way to persuade him. That
confession was signed in the very same chair you are now sitting in."

Mr. Bright again said, with a sigh of deep satisfaction, "Marvelous!
We shall now pay everything we owe, except our debt to you, Walter;
that we can never pay."

"If my good name is cleared, I'm perfectly satisfied," Walter
rejoined, a little nervously, yet with a feeling that this was the
happiest day of his life.

"And his good name, too, why don't you say?' interrupted the
matter-of-fact Bill, from his corner. "Seems to me that's about the
size of it," he finished, casting a meaning look at the dignified old
merchant, who sat there twiddling his glasses, clearly oppressed by
the feeling that, as between himself and Walter, Walter had acted the
nobler part. He could hardly control a slight tremor in his voice when
he began to speak again.

"I see how it is," he said. "You return good for evil. It was nobly
done, I grant you--nobly done. But you must not wonder at my surprise,
for I own I expected nothing of the sort. Still, all the generosity
must not be on one side. By no means. Since I've sat here I've been
thinking that now we are embarked in the California trade, we couldn't
do better than to start a branch of the concern in this city. Now,
don't interrupt," raising an admonitory hand, "until you hear me
through. If you, Walter, and you, Charles, in whom I have every
confidence--if you two will accept an equal partnership, your actual
expenses to be paid at any rate, we will put all the profits of this
lumber trade of yours into the new house to start with. Suppose we
call it Bright, Seabury & Company. Fix that to suit yourselves, only
my name ought to stand first, I think, because it will set Walter here
right before the world."

Neither Walter nor Charley could have said one word for the life of
him, so much were they taken by surprise. Bill's eyes fairly bulged
out of his shaggy head. Mr. Bright went on to say, "With our credit
restored, we can send you all the goods you may want. Suppose we now
go and deposit this money--one-half to the new firm's credit, one half
in trust for Charles' former partner. I myself will put a notice of
the copartnership in to-morrow's papers, and as soon as I get home in
the Boston papers, and I should greatly like to see the new sign up
before I go."

It was a long speech, but never was one listened to with more rapt
attention. Charley turned as red as a beet, Walter hung his head, Bill
blew his nose for a full half-minute.

"Where does Bill come in?" he demanded, with a comical side glance at
the merchant.

His question, with the long face he put on, relieved the strain at
once.

"Oh, never fear, old chap; you shall have my place and pay on the old
ship," Charley hastened to assure him.

"Then you accept," said Mr. Bright, shaking hands with each of the new
partners in turn. "Something tells me that this is the best investment
of my life. The papers shall be made out to-day, while we are looking
up a store together. Really, now, I feel as if I ought to give a
little dinner in honor of the new firm--long life and prosperity to
it! Where shall it be?"

"What ails this 'ere old ship where the old house came to life agin,
an' the new babby wuz fust born inter the world?" was Bill's ready
suggestion.

"Capital! couldn't be better," exclaimed the merchant. "And now,"
taking out his notebook, "tell me what I can do for each of you
personally when I get back to the States?"

Walter spoke first. "Please look up my old aunty, and see her made
comfortable." Mr. Bright jotted down the address with an approving
nod, then looked up at Charley.

"Send out a couple of donkey engines; horses are too slow."

Mr. Bright then turned to Bill.

"Me? Oh, well, I've got no aunt, I've no use for donkeys. You might
lick that sneakin' perleeceman on the wharf an' send me his resate."

When the two young men took leave of Mr. Bright, on board the _John L.
Stephens_, after a hearty hand-shaking all round, that gentleman gave
them this parting advice: "Make all the friends you can, and keep them
if you can. Remember, nothing is easier than to make enemies."

At a meaning look from Walter, Charley withdrew himself out of
earshot. Walter fidgeted a little, blushed, and then managed to ask,
"Have I your permission to write to Miss Dora, sir?"

Mr. Bright looked surprised, then serious, then amused. "Oho! now I
begin to catch on. That's how the land lies, is it? So that was the
reason why you were prowling around our house one night after dark,
was it? Well, well! Certainly you may write to Dora. And by the way,
when next you pass through our street you may ring the doorbell."



XX

BRIGHT, SEABURY & COMPANY


Thus the new firm entered upon its future career with bright
prospects. A suitable warehouse on the waterfront was leased for a
term of years. True to their determination to stick together, the two
junior partners fitted up a room in the second story, and on the day
that the doors were first opened for business they moved in. The next
thing was to get some business to do.

Charley had a considerable acquaintance among the ranchmen across
the Bay, which he now improved by making frequent trips to solicit
consignments of country produce. The sight of an empty store and bare
walls was at first depressing, but their first shipments from the East
could not be expected for several months. There was a sort of tacit
understanding that Walter should attend to the financial end of the
business, while Charley took care of the outdoor concerns. They were
no longer boys. The sense of assumed responsibilities had made them
men.

The two partners were busy receiving a sloop-load of potatoes,
with their shirt sleeves rolled up, when a big, burly, bewhiskered
individual dropped in upon them. Scenting a customer, Charley, always
forward, briskly asked what they could do for him.

"I want to see the senior partner."

Charley nodded toward Walter, who was checking off the weights.

The man gave a quick look at the tall, straight young fellow before
him, then said, "Can I speak to you in private for five minutes?"

"Come this way," Walter replied, showing the stranger into the little
office.

The newcomer sat down, crossed one leg over the other, stroked his
long beard reflectively a little, and said, "I've come on a very
confidential matter. Can I depend upon the strictest privacy?"

"You may," said Walter, quite astonished at this rather unexpected
opening. "Nobody will interrupt us here."

The man cast an inquisitive look around, as if to make sure there were
no eavesdroppers near, then, lowering his voice almost to a whisper,
said pointedly, "You may have heard something about a plan to aid the
poor, oppressed natives of Nicaragua to throw off the tyrannical yoke
of their present rulers?"

"I've seen something to that effect in the papers," said Walter
evasively.

"So much the better. That clears the way of cobwebs. I want your
solemn promise that what passes between us shall not be divulged to a
human being."

"I have no business secrets from my partners," Walter objected.

"Your partners! Oh! of course not."

"I've already promised," Walter assented, more and more mystified by
the stranger's manner. "Nobody asked you for your secrets. You can do
as you like about telling them," he continued rather sharply.

"I'll trust you. You are a young concern. Well connected. Bang-up
references. Likely to get on top of the heap, and nat'rally want to
make a strike. Nothing like seizing upon a golden opportunity. 'There
is a tide'--you know the rest. Now, I'm just the man to put you in the
way of doing it, as easy as rolling off a log."

As Walter made no reply, the visitor, after waiting a moment for his
words to take effect, went on: "Now, listen. I don't mind telling
you, in the strictest confidence, then, that I'm fiscal agent for
this here enterprise. I'm in it for glory and the _dinero_. We want
some enterprising young firm like yours to furnish supplies for the
emigrants we're sending down there," jerking his head toward the
south. "There's a big pile in it for you, if you will take hold with
us and see the thing through."

Walter kept his eyes upon the speaker, but said nothing.

"You see, it's a perfectly legitimate transaction, don't you?" resumed
the fiscal agent a little anxiously.

"Then why so much secrecy?"

"Oh! there's always a lot of people prying round into what don't
concern them. Busybodies! If it gets out that our people aren't
peaceable emigrants before we're good and ready, the whole thing might
get knocked into a cocked hat. They'd say--well, they even might call
us filibusters," the man admitted with an injured air.

Walter smiled a knowing smile. "What do you want us to do?" he asked.

"In the first place, we want cornmeal, hard bread, bacon, potatoes,
an' sich, for a hundred and fifty men for two months. I can give you
the figures to a dot," the agent rejoined, on whom Walter's smile had
not been lost. "See here." He drew out of his pocket a package of
freshly printed bonds, purporting to be issued by authority of the
Republic of Nicaragua, and passed them over for Walter's inspection.
"Now, the fact is, we want all our ready funds for the people's
outfit, advance money, vessel's charter, and so on. Now, I'm going to
be liberal with you. I'll put up this bunch of twenty thousand dollars
in bonds, payable on the day Nicaragua is free, for five thousand
dollars' worth of provisions at market price. Think of that! Twenty
thousand dollars for five thousand dollars. You can't lose. We've got
things all fixed down there. Why, man, there's silver and gold and
jewels enough in the churches alone to pay those bonds ten times over!"

"What! rob the churches!" Walter exclaimed, knitting his brows.

"Why, no; I believe they call that merely a forced loan nowadays,"
objected the fiscal agent in some embarrassment.

Seeing that he paused for a reply, Walter observed that he would
consult his partner. Charley was called in and the proposal gone over
again with him. As soon as advised of its purport he turned on his
heel.

"Not any in mine," was his prompt decision.

"Mine either," assented Walter.

The stranger seemed much disappointed, but not yet at the end of his
resources. "Well, then," he began again, "you take the bonds, sell
them for a fair discount for cash, and use the proceeds towards those
provisions?"

"Hadn't you better do that yourself? We're not brokers. We're
commission merchants. If you come to us with cash in hand we'll sell
you anything money will buy, and no questions asked; but Nicaragua
bonds, payable any time and no time, are not in our line." So said
Walter.

"Not much," echoed Charley.

"Your line seems to be small potatoes," muttered the stranger
testily. Then quickly checking himself, he carelessly asked, "I
suppose you'd have no objection to keeping these bonds in your
safe for a day or two for me, giving me a receipt for them, or the
equivalent? I don't feel half easy about carrying them about with me."

"Why, no," said Charley, looking at Walter, to see how he would take
it.

"Yes," objected Walter, "most decidedly."

"'No;' 'yes;' who's boss here, anyhow?" sneered the agent, dismissing
his wheedling tone, now that he had played his last card. Even Charley
seemed a trifle nettled at being snubbed by Walter in the presence of
a stranger. After all, it seemed a trifling favor to ask of them.

"My partner and I can settle that matter between ourselves. Once for
all, we don't choose to be mixed up in your filibustering schemes in
any way. Your five minutes have grown to three-quarters of an hour
already. This is our busy day," he concluded, as a broad hint to the
stranger to take leave, and at once.

"Very well," said the unmoved fiscal agent, buttoning up his coat.
"But you'll repent, all the same, having thrown away the finest
opportunity of making a fortune ever offered----"

"This way out, sir," Charley interrupted, throwing wide the office
door.

When the strange visitor had gone Charley asked Walter why he refused
to let the bonds be put in the safe. "Now we've made an enemy," he
said resignedly.

"To let him raise money on that receipt for twenty thousand dollars,
_or equivalent_--on Mr. Bright's name? No, sir-ee. Where were your
wits, Charles Wormwood? That fellow's a sharper!"

"Guess I'd better attend to those potatoes," was all the junior
partner could find to say, suiting the action to the word.

As was quite natural, much curiosity was felt as to what had become
of Ramon, by his former business associates. In some way he had found
out that Mr. Bright was in San Francisco, and taking counsel of his
fears of being sent back to Boston as a confessed felon, he cast his
lot among the most lawless adventurers of the day. Learning that a
filibustering expedition was being fitted out at San Francisco against
Lower California, under command of Walker, the "Gray-eyed Man of
Destiny," Ramon joined it, keeping in hiding meanwhile, until the
vessel was ready to sail. As is well known, the affair was a complete
failure, Walker's famished band being compelled to surrender to the
United States officers at San Diego. From this time Ramon disappeared.

       *       *       *       *       *

Some five years later a young man, ruddy-cheeked, robust, and well
though not foppishly dressed, drove up to the door of a pretty cottage
in one of the most fashionable suburbs of Boston. Alighting from his
buggy and hitching his horse, he walked quickly up the driveway to the
house. The front door flew open by the time he had put his hand on the
knob; and a young woman, with the matchless New England pink and white
in her cheeks, called out, "Why, Walter, what brings you home so early
to-day? Has anything happened?"

"Yes, Dora; Charles Wormwood is coming out to dine with us to-day. He
only arrived to-day overland. I want to show him my wife."


THE END


The transcriber made these changes to the text:

  1. p. 152, "the the certificate" changed to "the certificate"
  2. p. 224, "eend" changed to "end"
  3. p. 246, "Charlay" changed to "Charley"
  4. p. 281, "dimissing" changed to "dismissing"





*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Young Vigilantes - A Story of California Life in the Fifties" ***

Copyright 2023 LibraryBlog. All rights reserved.