Читать книгу: «Gold», страница 6

“All right; I’ll do it,” said Yank.

“As for the rest of us,” cried Talbot, “we’ve got to rustle up two hundred and twenty dollars each before to-morrow evening!”

“How?” I asked blankly

“How should I know? Out there” he waved his hand abroad at the flickering lights. “There is the Golden City, challenging every man as he enters her gates. She offers opportunity and fortune. All a man has to do is go and take them! Accept the challenge!”

“The only way I could take them would be to lift them off some other fellow at the point of a gun,” said Johnny gloomily.

CHAPTER XI
I MAKE TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS

We talked the situation over thoroughly, and then turned in, having lost our chance to see the sights. Beneath us and in the tent next door went on a tremendous row of talking, laughing, and singing that for a little while prevented me from falling asleep. But the last month had done wonders for me in that way; and shortly I dropped off.

Hours later I awakened, shivering with cold to find the moonlight pouring into the room, and the bunks all occupied. My blanket had disappeared, which accounted for my dreams of icebergs. Looking carefully over the sleeping forms I discerned several with two blankets, and an equal number with none! At first I felt inclined to raise a row; then thought better of it, by careful manipulation I abstracted two good blankets from the most unprotected of of my neighbours, wrapped them tightly about me, and so slept soundly.

We went downstairs and out into the sweetest of mornings. The sun was bright, the sky clear and blue, the wind had not yet risen, balmy warmth showered down through every particle of the air. I had felt some May days like this back on our old farm. Somehow they were associated in my mind with Sunday morning and the drawling, lazy clucking of hens. Only here there were no hens, and if it was Sunday morning–which it might have been–nobody knew it.

The majority of the citizens had not yet appeared, but a handful of the poorer Chinese, and a sprinkling of others, crossed the Plaza. The doors of the gambling places were all wide open to the air. Across the square a number of small boys were throwing dust into the air. Johnny, with his usual sympathy for children, naturally gravitated in their direction. He returned after a few moments, his eyes wide.

“Do you know what they are doing?” he demanded.

We said politely that we did not.

“They are panning for gold.”

“Well, what of it?” I asked, after a moment’s pause; since Johnny seemed to expect some astonishment. “Boys are imitative little monkeys.”

“Yes, but they’re getting it,” insisted Johnny.

“What!” cried Talbot. “You’re crazy. Panning gold–here in the streets. It’s absurd!”

“It’s not absurd; come and see.”

We crossed the Plaza. Two small Americans and a Mexican youth were scooping the surface earth into the palms of their hands and blowing it out again in a slantwise stream. When it was all gone, they examined eagerly their hands. Four others working in partnership had spread a small sheet. They threw their handfuls of earth into the air, all the while fanning vigorously with their hats. The breeze thus engendered puffed away the light dust, leaving only the heavier pieces to fall on the canvas. Among these the urchins searched eagerly and carefully, their heads close together. Every moment or so one of them would wet a forefinger to pick up carefully a speck of something which he would then transfer to an old buckskin sack.

As we approached, they looked up and nodded to Johnny in a friendly fashion. They were eager, alert, precocious gamins, of the street type and how they had come to California I could not tell you. Probably as cabin boys of some of the hundreds of vessels in the harbour.

“What are you getting, boys?” asked Talbot after a moment.

“Gold, of course,” answered one of them.

“Let’s see it.”

The boy with the buckskin sack held it open for our inspection, but did not relax his grip on it. The bottom of the bag was thickly gilded with light glittering yellow particles.

“It looks like gold,” said I, incredulously.

“It is gold,” replied the boy with some impatience. “Anyway, it buys things.”

We looked at each other.

“Gold diggings right in the streets of San Francisco,” murmured Yank.

“I should think you’d find it easier later in the day when the wind came up?” suggested Talbot.

“Of course; and let some other kids jump our claim while we were waiting,” grunted one of the busy miners.

“How much do you get out of it?”

“Good days we make as high as three or four dollars.”

“I’m afraid the diggings are hardly rich enough to tempt us,” observed Talbot; “but isn’t that the most extraordinary performance! I’d no notion─”

We returned slowly to the hotel, marvelling. Yesterday we had been laughing at the gullibility of one of our fellow-travellers who had believed the tale of a wily ship’s agent to the effect that it was possible to live aboard the ship and do the mining within reach ashore at odd hours of daylight! Now that tale did not sound so wild; although of course we realized that the gold must occur in very small quantities. Otherwise somebody beside small boys would be at it. As a matter of fact, though we did not find it out until very much later, the soil of San Francisco is not auriferous at all. The boys were engaged in working the morning’s sweepings from the bars and gambling houses which the lavish and reckless handling of gold had liberally impregnated. In some of the mining towns nearer the source of supply I have known of from one hundred to three hundred dollars a month being thus “blown” from the sweepings of a bar.

We ate a frugal breakfast and separated on the agreed business of the day. Yank started for the water front to make inquiries as to ways of getting to the mines; Talbot set off at a businesslike pace for the hotel as though he knew fully what he was about; Johnny wandered rather aimlessly to the east; and I as aimlessly to the west.

It took me just one hour to discover that I could get all of any kind of work that any dozen men could do, and at wages so high that at first I had to ask over and over again to make sure I had heard aright. Only none of them would bring me in two hundred and twenty dollars by evening. The further I looked into that proposition, the more absurd, of course, I saw it to be. I could earn from twenty to fifty dollars by plain day-labour at some jobs; or I could get fabulous salaries by the month or year; but that was different. After determining this to my satisfaction I came to the sensible conclusion that I would make what I could.

The first thing that caught my eye after I had come to this decision was a wagon drawn by four mules coming down the street at a sucking walk. The sight did not impress me particularly; but every storekeeper came out from his shop and every passerby stopped to look with respect as the outfit wallowed along. It was driven by a very large, grave, blond man with a twinkle in his eye.

“That’s John A. McGlynn,” said a man next my elbow.

“Who’s he?” I asked.

The man looked at me in astonishment.

“Don’t know who John McGlynn is?” he demanded. “When did you get here?”

“Last night.”

“Oh! Well, John has the only American wagon in town. Brought it out from New York in pieces, and put it together himself. Broke four wild California mules to drag her. He’s a wonder!”

I could not, then, see quite how this exploit made him such a wonder; but on a sudden inspiration I splashed out through the mud and climbed into the wagon.

McGlynn looked back at me.

“Freightin’,” said he, “is twenty dollars a ton; and at that rate it’ll cost you about thirty dollars, you dirty hippopotamus. These ain’t no safe-movers, these mules!”

Unmoved, I clambered up beside him.

“I want a job,” said I, “for to-day only.”

“Do ye now?”

“Can you give me one?”

“I can, mebbe. And do you understand the inner aspirations of mules, maybe?”

“I was brought up on a farm.”

“And the principles of elementary navigation by dead reckoning?”

I looked at him blankly.

“I mean mudholes,” he explained. “Can you keep out of them?”

“I can try.”

He pulled up the team, handed me the reins, and clambered over the wheel.

“You’re hired. At six o’clock I’ll find you and pay you off. You get twenty-five dollars.”

“What am I to do?”

“You go to the shore and you rustle about whenever you see anything that looks like freight; and you look at it, and when you see anything marked with a diamond and an H inside of it, you pile it on and take it up to Howard Mellin & Company. And if you can’t lift it, then leave it for another trip, and bullyrag those skinflints at H. M. & Co.’s to send a man down to help you. And if you don’t know where they live, find out; and if you bog them mules down I’ll skin you alive, big as you are. And anyway, you’re a fool to be working in this place for twenty-five dollars a day, which is one reason I’m so glad to find you just now.”

“What’s that, John?” inquired a cool, amused voice. McGlynn and I looked around. A tall, perfectly dressed figure stood on the sidewalk surveying us quizzically. This was a smooth-shaven man of perhaps thirty-five years of age, grave faced, clean cut, with an air of rather ponderous slow dignity that nevertheless became his style very well. He was dressed in tall white hat, a white winged collar, a black stock, a long tailed blue coat with gilt buttons, an embroidered white waistcoat, dapper buff trousers, and varnished boots. He carried a polished cane and wore several heavy pieces of gold jewellery–a watch fob, a scarf-pin, and the like. His movements were leisurely, his voice low. It seemed to me, then, that somehow the perfection of his appointments and the calm deliberation of his movement made him more incongruous and remarkable than did the most bizarre whims of the miners.

“Is it yourself, Judge Girvin?” replied McGlynn, “I’m just telling this young man that he can’t have the job of driving my little California canaries for but one day because I’ve hired a fine lawyer from the East at two hundred and seventy-five a month to drive my mules for me.”

“You have done well,” Judge Girvin in his grave, courteous tones. “For the whole business of a lawyer is to know how to manage mules and asses so as to make them pay!”

I drove to the beach, and speedily charged my wagon with as large a load as prudence advised me. The firm of Howard Mellin & Company proved to have quarters in a frame shack on what is now Montgomery Street. It was only a short haul, but a muddy one. Nearly opposite their store a new wharf was pushing its way out into the bay. I could see why this and other firms clung so tenaciously to their locations on rivers of bottomless mud in preference to moving up into the drier part of town.

I enjoyed my day hugely. My eminent position on the driver’s seat–eminent both actually and figuratively–gave me a fine opportunity to see the sights and to enjoy the homage men seemed inclined to accord the only wagon in town. The feel of the warm air was most grateful. Such difficulties as offered served merely to add zest to the job. At noon I ate some pilot bread and a can of sardines bought from my employers. About two o’clock the wind came up from the sea, and the air filled with the hurrying clouds of dust.

In my journeys back and forth I had been particularly struck by the bold, rocky hill that shut off the view toward the north. Atop this hill had been rigged a two-armed semaphore, which, one of the clerks told me, was used to signal the sight of ships coming in the Golden Gate. The arms were variously arranged according to the rig or kind of vessel. Every man, every urchin, every Chinaman, even, knew the meaning of these various signals. A year later, I was attending a theatrical performance in the Jenny Lind Theatre on the Plaza. In the course of the play an actor rushed on frantically holding his arms outstretched in a particularly wooden fashion, and uttering the lines, “What means this, my lord!”

“A sidewheel steamer!” piped up a boy’s voice from the gallery.

Well, about three o’clock of this afternoon, as I was about delivering my fifth load of goods, I happened to look up just as the semaphore arms hovered on the rise. It seemed that every man on the street must have been looking in the same direction, for instantly a great shout went up.

“A sidewheel steamer! The Oregon!”

At once the streets were alive with men hurrying from all directions toward the black rocks at the foot of Telegraph Hill, where, it seems, the steamer’s boats were expected to land. Flags were run up on all sides, firearms were let off, a warship in the harbour broke out her bunting and fired a salute. The decks of the steamer, as she swept into view, were black with men; her yards were gay with colour. Uptown some devoted soul was ringing a bell; and turning it away over and over, to judge by the sounds. I pulled up my mules and watched the vessel swing down through the ranks of the shipping and come to anchor. We had beaten out our comrades by a day!

At five o’clock a small boy boarded me.

“You’re to drive the mules up to McGlynn’s and unhitch them and leave them,” said he. “I’m to show you the way.”

“Where’s McGlynn?” I asked.

“He’s getting his mail.”

We drove to a corral and three well-pitched tents down in the southern edge of town. Here a sluggish stream lost its way in a swamp of green hummocky grass. I turned out the mules in the corral and hung up the harness.

“McGlynn says you’re to go to the post-office and he’ll pay you there,” my guide instructed me.

The post-office proved to be a low adobe one-story building, with the narrow veranda typical of its kind. A line of men extended from its door and down the street as far as the eye could reach. Some of them had brought stools or boxes, and were comfortably reading scraps of paper.

I walked down the line. A dozen from the front I saw Johnny standing. This surprised me, for I knew he could not expect mail by this steamer. Before I had reached him he had finished talking to a stranger, and had yielded his place.

“Hullo!” he greeted me. “How you getting on?”

“So-so!” I replied. “I’m looking for a man who owes me twenty-five dollars.”

“Well, he’s here,” said Johnny confidently. “Everybody in town is here.”

We found McGlynn in line about a block down the street. When he saw me coming he pulled a fat buckskin bag from his breeches pocket, opened its mouth, and shook a quantity of its contents, by guess, into the palm of his hand.

“There you are,” said he; “that’s near enough. I’m a pretty good guesser. I hope you took care of the mules all right; you ought to, you’re from a farm.”

“I fixed ’em.”

“And the mud? How many times did you get stuck?”

“Not at all.”

He looked at me with surprise.

“Would you think of that, now!” said he. “You must have loaded her light.”

“I did.”

“Did you get all the goods over?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I’ll acknowledge you’re a judgematical young man; and if you want a job with me I’ll let that lawyer go I spoke to the judge about. He handed it to me then, didn’t he?” He laughed heartily. “No? Well, you’re right. A man’s a fool to work for any one but himself. Where’s your bag? Haven’t any? How do you carry your dust? Haven’t any? I forgot; you’re a tenderfoot, of course.” He opened his buckskin sack with his teeth, and poured back the gold from the palm of his hand. Then he searched for a moment in all his pockets, and produced a most peculiar chunk of gold metal. It was nearly as thick as it was wide, shaped roughly into an octagon, and stamped with initials. This he handed to me.

“It’s about a fifty-dollar slug,” said he, “you can get it weighed. Give me the change next time you see me.”

“But I may leave for the mines to-morrow,” I objected.

“Then leave the change with Jim Recket of the El Dorado.”

“How do you know I’ll leave it?” I asked curiously.

“I don’t,” replied McGlynn bluntly. “But if you need twenty-five dollars worse than you do a decent conscience, then John A. McGlynn isn’t the man to deny you!”

Johnny and I left for the hotel.

“I didn’t know you expected any mail,” said I.

“I don’t.”

“But thought I saw you in line─”

“Oh, yes. When I saw the mail sacks, it struck me that there might be quite a crowd; so I came up as quickly as I could and got in line. There were a number before me, but I got a place pretty well up in front. Sold the place for five dollars, and only had to stand there about an hour at that.”

“Good head!” I admired. “I’d never have thought of it. How have you gotten on?”

“Pretty rotten,” confessed Johnny. “I tried all morning to find a decent opportunity to do something or deal in something, and then I got mad and plunged in for odd jobs. I’ve been a regular errand boy. I made two dollars carrying a man’s bag up from the ship.”

“How much all told?”

“Fifteen. I suppose you’ve got your pile.”

“That twenty-five you saw me get is the size of it.”

Johnny brightened; we moved up closer in a new intimacy and sense of comradeship over delinquency. It relieved both to feel that the other, too, had failed. To enter the Plaza we had to pass one of the larger of the gambling places.

“I’m going in here,” said Johnny, suddenly.

He swung through the open doors, and I followed him.

The place was comparatively deserted, owing probably to the distribution of mail. We had full space to look about us; and I was never more astonished in my life. The outside of the building was rough and unfinished as a barn, having nothing but size to attract or recommend. The interior was the height of lavish luxury. A polished mahogany bar ran down one side, backed by huge gilt framed mirrors before which were pyramided fine glasses and bottles of liquor. The rest of the wall space was thickly hung with more plate mirrors, dozens of well-executed oil paintings, and strips of tapestry. At one end was a small raised stage on which lolled half-dozen darkies with banjos and tambourines. The floor was covered with a thick velvet carpet. Easy chairs, some of them leather upholstered, stood about in every available corner. Heavy chandeliers of glass, with hundreds of dangling crystals and prisms, hung from the ceiling. The gambling tables, a half dozen in number, were arranged in the open floor space in the centre. Altogether it was a most astounding contrast in its sheer luxury and gorgeous furnishing to the crudity of the town. I became acutely conscious of my muddy boots, my old clothes, my unkempt hair, my red shirt and the armament strapped about my waist.

A relaxed, subdued air of idleness pervaded the place. The gamblers lounged back of their tables, sleepy-eyed and listless. On tall stools their lookouts yawned behind papers. One of these was a woman, young, pretty, most attractive in the soft, flaring, flouncy costume of that period. A small group of men stood at the bar. One of the barkeepers was mixing drinks, pouring the liquid, at arm’s length from one tumbler to another in a long parabolic curve, and without spilling a drop. Only one table was doing business, and that with only three players. Johnny pushed rapidly toward this table, and I, a little diffidently, followed.

The game was roulette. Johnny and the dealer evidently recognized each other, for a flash of the eye passed between them, but they gave no other sign. Johnny studied the board a moment then laid twenty-two dollars in coin on one of the numbers. The other players laid out small bags of gold dust. The wheel spun, and the ball rolled. Two of the men lost; their dust was emptied into a drawer beneath the table and the bags tossed back to them. The third had won; the dealer deftly estimated the weight of his bet, lifting it in the flat of his left hand; then spun several gold pieces toward the winner. He seemed quite satisfied. The gambler stacked a roll of twenty-dollar pieces, added one to them, and thrust them at Johnny. I had not realized that the astounding luck of winning off a single number had befallen him.

“Ten to one–two hundred and twenty dollars!” he muttered to me.

The other three players were laying their bets for the next turn of the wheel. Johnny swept the gold pieces into his pocket, and laid back the original stake against even. He lost. Thereupon he promptly arose and left the building.