Port O' Gold Part 50

The Bank of California was reopened. Ralston, buried with the pomp and splendor of a sorrowing mult.i.tude, was presently forgotten. Few new troubles came upon the land. Overspeculation in the Comstock lode brought economic unrest.

Thousands were unemployed in San Francisco. Agitators rallied them at public meetings into furious and morbid groups. From the Eastern States came telegraphic news of strikes and violence. Adrian returned one evening, tired and hara.s.sed.

"I don't know what's got into the working people," he said to Inez.

"Oh, they'll get over that," p.r.o.nounced Francisco, with the sweeping confidence of youth. "These intervals of discontent are periodical--like epidemics of diseases."

Adrian glanced at the treatise on Political Economy in his son's hand.

"And what would you suggest, my boy?" he asked with a faint smile.

"Leave them alone," said Francisco. "It goes through a regular form.

They have agitators who talk of Bloodsucking Plutocrats, Rights of the People and all that. But it generally ends in mere words."

"The Paris Commune didn't end in mere words," reminded Adrian.

"Oh, that!" Francisco was a trifle nonplussed. "Well, of course--"

"There have been serious riots in Eastern States."

"But--they had leaders. Here we've none."

"I'm not so sure of that," said Adrian thoughtfully. "D'ye know that Irish drayman, Dennis Kearney?"

"Y-e-s ... the one who used to be a sailor?"

"That's the man. He's clever; knows men like a book.... Has power and a knack for words. He calls our Legislature 'The Honorable Bilks.' Wants to start a Workingmen's Party. And he'll do it, too, or I'm mistaken.

His motto is 'The Chinese Must Go!'"

"By Harry! There's a story for the paper," said Francisco. "I must see the fellow."

Robert Windham and Po Lun were out for a morning promenade. They often walked together of a Sunday. Robert, though he was now twenty-six, still retained his childhood friendship for the Chinese servitor; found him an agreeable, often-times a sage companion. Urged by Alice, whose ambitious love included all within her ken, Po Lun attended night school; he could read and write English pa.s.sably, though the letter "r" still foiled his Oriental tongue. Today they were out to have a look at the new city hall.

On a sand lot opposite several hundred men had gathered, pressing round a figure mounted on a barrel. The orator gesticulated violently. Now and then there were cheers. A brandishing of fists and canes. Po Lun halted in sudden alarm. "Plitty soon they get excited. They don't like Chinese.

I think maybe best we go back."

But already Po's "pig-tail" had attracted attention. The speaker pointed to him.

"There's one of them Heathen Chinese," he cried shrilly. "The dirty yaller boys what's takin' bread out of our mouths. Down with them, I say. Make this a white man's country."

An ominous growl came from the crowd. Several rough-looking fellows started toward Robert and Po Lun. The latter was for taking to his heels, but Robert stood his ground.

"What do you fellows want?"

They paused, abashed by his intrepid manner. "No offense, young man. We ain't after you. It's that Yaller Heathen.... The kind that robs us of a chance to live."

"Po Lun has never robbed anyone of a chance to live. He's our cook ...

and my friend. You leave him alone."

"He sends all his money back to China," sneered another coming closer, brandishing a stick. "A fine American, ain't he?"

"A better one than you," said Robert hotly. Anger got the better of his judgment and he s.n.a.t.c.hed the stick out of the fellow's hand, broke it, threw it to the ground.

Savagely they fell upon him. He went down, stunned by a blow on the head, a sense of crushing weight that overwhelmed his strength. He was vaguely conscious of a tirade of strange words, of an arm at the end of which was a meat cleaver, lashing about. The vindictive bark of a pistol. Shouts, feet running. A blue-coated form. A vehicle with champing horses that stood by.

"Are you hurt very bad, young feller?"

Robert moved his arms and legs. They appeared intact. He rose, stiffly.

"Where's Po Lun?"

"In the wagon."

Robert, turning, observed an ambulance. "Not--dead?"

"Well, pretty near it," said the policeman. "He saved your life though, the yellow devil. Laid out half a dozen of them hoodlums with a hatchet.

He's shot through the lungs. But Doc. says he's got a chance."

Late that afternoon William T. Coleman sat closeted with Chief Ellis of the San Francisco police. Coleman bore but scant resemblance to the youth of 1856. He was heavier, almost bald, moustached, more settled, less alert in manner. Yet his eyes had in them still the old invincible gleam of leadership.

"But," he was saying to the man in uniform, "that was twenty years ago.

Can't you find a younger chap to head your Citizens' Committee?"

"No," said Ellis shortly. "You're the one we need. You know the way to deal with outlaws ... how to make the citizens respond. Do you know that the gang wrecked several Chinese laundries after the attack on Windham?

That they threaten to burn the Pacific Mail docks?"

Chief Ellis drew a little nearer. "General McComb of the State forces has called a ma.s.s meeting. He wishes you to take charge...."

CHAPTER LXVI

THE PICK-HANDLE BRIGADE

Benito found his son awaiting when he returned from the Citizens' Ma.s.s Meeting at midnight. Robert, insisting that he was "fit as a fiddle,"

had nevertheless been put to bed through the connivance of an anxious mother and the family physician, who found him to have suffered some severe contusions and lacerations in the morning's fray. But he was wide awake and curious when his father's latch key grated in the door.

"It must have seemed like old times, didn't it, dad?" he asked with enthusiasm. The Vigilance Committee of the Fifties in his young mind was a knightly company. As a boy he used to listen, eager and excited, to his father's tales of Coleman. Now his hero was again to take the stage.

"Yes, it took me back," said Windham. "I was about your age then and Coleman was just in his thirties." He sat down a trifle wearily. "The years aren't kind. Some of the fellows who were young in '56 seemed old tonight.... But they have the same spirit."

"Tell me what happened," said Robert, after a pause.

Benito's eyes flashed. "You should have heard them cheer when Coleman rose. He called for his old comrades and we stood up. Then there was more cheering. Coleman is all business. He commenced at once enrolling men for his pick-handle brigade; he's refused fire-arms. He has fifteen hundred already, divided into companies of a hundred each--with their own officers."

"And are you an officer, dad?" asked Robert.

"Yes," Benito smiled. "But my company is one man short. We've only ninety-nine."