Port O' Gold Part 14

"Things always right themselves, my boy," he said. "Don't worry. Keep pegging away at your sand lots. Some day you'll be a millionaire."

"But half of these people are homeless. And every day they come faster.

In our neighborhood are a dozen ramshackle tents where these poor devils keep 'bachelors' hall' with little more than a skillet and a coffee pot.

They call it 'ranching.'" He laughed. "What would our old land barons have thought of a rancho four by six feet, which the first of our trade winds will blow into the bay?"

"The Lord," said Lick, devoutly, "tempers the wind to the shorn lamb.

And also to the homeless squatter on our sandy sh.o.r.es."

"I hope you're right," responded Stanley. "It does me good to hear someone speak of G.o.d in this G.o.dless place. It is full of thieves and cut-throats; they've a settlement at the base of the hill overlooking Clark's Point. No man's life is safe, they tell me, over there."

Lick frowned. "They call it Sydney Town because so many Australian convicts have settled in it. Some day we'll form a citizens' committee and run them off."

"Which reminds me," Lick retorted, "that McTurpin came to town this morning. With a veiled woman ... or girl. She looks little more than a child."

Adrian surveyed the other, startled. "Child?" His mind was full of vague suspicions.

"Well, she didn't weigh more than a hundred. Yes, they came--both on one horse, and the fellow's companion none too well pleased, I should say.

Frightened, perhaps, though why she should be is a puzzle." Lick shrugged his shoulders.

"Has he taken the girl to his--the ranch?" asked Adrian.

"Don't know. I reckon not," Lick answered. "They ate at the City Hotel.

He'd a bag full of dust, so he'll gamble and guzzle till morning most likely." He regarded his friend keenly, a trifle uneasily. "Come, Adrian ... I'll walk past your door with you."

"I'm not going home just yet, thanks," Stanley's tone was nervously evasive.

"Well, good-night, then," said the other with reluctance. He turned south on Kearny street toward his home. Stanley, looking after him, stood for a moment as if undetermined. Then he took his way across the Plaza toward the City Hotel.

In the bar, a long and low-ceiling room, talk buzzed and smoke from many pipes made a bluish, acrid fog through which, Adrian, standing in the doorway, saw, imperfectly, a long line of men at the bar. Others sat at tables playing poker and drinking incessantly, men in red-flannel shirts, blue denim trousers tucked into high, wrinkled boots. They wore wide-brimmed hats, and cursed or spat with a fervor and vehemence that indicated enjoyment. Adrian presently made out the stocky form of McTurpin, gla.s.s upraised. Before him on the bar were a fat buckskin bag and a bottle. He was boasting of his luck at the mines.

A companion "hefted" the treasure admiringly. "Did you make it gamblin', Alec?" he inquired.

"No, by Harry!" said the other, tartly. "I'm no gambler any more. I'm a respectable gentleman with a mine and a ranch," he emptied his gla.s.s and, smacking his lips, continued, "and a beautiful young girl that loves me ... loves me. Understand?" His hand came down upon the other's shoulder with a sounding whack.

"Where is she?" asked the other, coaxingly. "You're a cunning hombre, Alec. Leave us have a look at her, I say."

"Bye and bye," McTurpin spoke more cautiously. "Bye and bye ... then you can be a witness to the marriage, Dave." He drew the second man aside across the room, so near to Adrian that the latter stepped back to avoid discovery.

"She's a respectable la.s.s," he heard McTurpin whisper. "Yes, it's marry or nothing with her ... and I'm willing enough, the Lord knows. Can ye find me a preacher, old fellow?"

He could not make out the other's reply. Their voices died down to an imperceptible whisper as they moved farther away. Stanley thought they argued over something. Then the man called Dave pa.s.sed him and went swiftly up the hill.

Vaguely troubled, Stanley returned to the veranda. It was unoccupied for chilly evening breezes had driven the loungers indoors. Absently he paced the creaking boards and, having reached a corner of the building, continued his promenade along what seemed to be the rear of the building. Here a line of doors opened on the veranda like the upper staterooms of a ship.

Why should he trouble his mind about McTurpin and a paramour? thought Adrian. Yet his thought was curiously disturbed. Something Spear had read from a letter vexed him dimly like a memory imperfectly recalled.

What was there about McTurpin and a child? Whose child? And what had it to do with the veiled woman who had ridden with the gambler from the mines. Impishly the facts eluded him. Inez would know. But Inez must not be bothered just now--at this time.

He paused and listened. Was that a woman sobbing? Of course not. Only his nerves, his silly sentiment. He would go home and forget the whole thing.

There it was again. This time he could not be mistaken. Noiselessly he made his way toward the sound. It stopped. But presently it came again.

From where? Ah, yes, the window with a broken pane.

Soft, heartbroken, smothered wailing. Spasms of it. Then an interlude of silence. Adrian's heart beat rapidly. He tip-toed to the window, tried the door beside it. Locked. After a moment's hesitation he spoke, softly: "Is someone in trouble?"

CHAPTER XX

A CALL IN THE NIGHT

There was no answer. For a second time Adrian's mind fought a belief that sense had tricked him. Now and then a shout from the bar-room reached him as he waited, listening. The wind whistled eerily through the scant-leaved scrub-oaks on the slopes above.

But from the room at the window of which he listened there came no sound.

Adrian felt like one hoaxed, made ridiculous by his own sentimentality.

He strode on. But when he reached the farther corner some involuntary impulse turned him back. And again the sound of m.u.f.fled sobbing came to him from the open window--fainter now, as though an effort had been made to stifle it.

Once more he spoke: "I say, what's the trouble in there? Can I help?"

Almost instantly a face appeared against the pane--a tear-stained face, terrified and shrinking.

"Oh!" said a voice unsteady with weeping. "Oh! sir, if there is a heart in your breast you will help me to escape--to find my father."

Her tone, despite agitation, was that of extreme youth. She was not of the cla.s.s that frequent gambling halls. Both her dress and her manner proclaimed that. Adrian was perplexed. "Are you--" he hesitated, fearing to impart offense, "are you the girl who came with McTurpin?"

"Yes, yes," she spoke hurriedly. "He told me my father was ill. He promised to take me to him. Instead, he locked me in this room. He threatened--oh! he is a monster! Will you help me? Do you know my father, sir?"

"What is his name?" asked Stanley.

"Burthen, sir, James Burthen," she replied, and fell once more to sobbing helplessly. "Oh, if I were only out of here."

Stanley pressed his weight against the door. He was thinking rapidly. So this was the daughter of Benito's partner--the murdered miner of the Eldorado tragedy. He recalled the letter from Colton; the hint of McTurpin's infatuation and its menace. Things became clear to him suddenly. The door gave as he pressed his knee against it. Presently the flimsy lock capitulated and he walked into the room. The girl shrank back against the farther wall at his approach.

"Oh, come," he said, a trifle testily, "I'm not going to hurt you. Get on your hat. I'll see you're taken care of. I'll place you in charge of my wife."

"And my father," she begged. "You'll take me to him?"

"Yes, yes, your father," he agreed in haste. "But first you'll come home with me."

She s.n.a.t.c.hed up a hat and shawl from the commode, and, with hurried movements rearranged her hair; then she followed him submissively into the gathering dusk, shrinking close as if to efface herself whenever they pa.s.sed anyone. The streets were full of men now, mostly bound from hotels, lodging houses and tents to the Eldorado and kindred resorts.

Many of them ogled her curiously, for a female figure was a rarity in nocturnal San Francisco.

They pa.s.sed dimly lighted tents in which dark figures bulked grotesquely against canvas walls. In one a man seemed to be dancing with a large animal which Stanley told her was a grizzly bear.

"They have many queer pets," he said. "One of my neighbors keeps a pet c.o.o.n, and in another tent there are a bay horse, two dogs, two sheep and a pair of goats. They sleep with their master like a happy family."

"It is all so strange," said the girl, faintly. "In the East my father was a lawyer; we had a good house and a carriage; everything was so different from--this. But after my mother died, he grew restless. He sold everything and came to this rough, wild country. None of his old friends would know him now, with his beard, his boots and the horrible red flannel shirt."