Port O' Gold Part 52

"Our pa.s.sword's 'The Chinese Must Go.'"

"How do you propose to accomplish this?" asked Stanley.

"Aisy enough," returned the other with supreme confidence. "We'll have the treaty wid Chiny changed. We'll sind back all the yellow divils if they interfere wid us Americans."

Stanley could not repress a smile. Kearney himself had been naturalized only a year before.

For an hour he unfolded principles, threatened men of wealth, pounded Stanley's knee until it was sore and finally stalked off, highly pleased with himself.

"He's amusing enough," said Francisco to his father that evening. "But we mustn't underrate him as you said. The fellow has force. He knows the way to stir up human pa.s.sion and he'll use his knowledge to the full.

Also he knows equity and law. Some of his ideas are altruistic."

"What is he going to do to the Central Pacific nabobs if they don't discharge their Chinese laborers?" asked Adrian.

Young Stanley laughed. "He threatens to dynamite their castles on the hill."

His father did not answer immediately. "It may not be as funny as you think," he commented.

With the weeks Po Lun mended rapidly. Hang Far was at his bedside many hours each day. Alice often found them chatting animatedly.

"When I get plenty well, we mally," Po informed her. "Maybeso go back to China. What you say, Missee Alice?"

"I think you'd better stay with me," she countered. "As for Hang Far, we'll find room for her." She smiled dolefully. "I'm getting to be an old lady, Po Lun ... I need more help in the house."

"You nebbeh get old, Missee Alice," said the sick man. "Twenty yea' I know you--always like li'l gi'l."

"Nonsense, Po!" cried Alice. Nevertheless she was pleased. "Will you and Hang Far stay with me?"

"I t'ink so, Missee," Po replied. "By 'n' by we take one li'l tlip fo'

honeymoon. But plitty soon come back."

The labor movement grew and Dennis with it--both in self-importance and in popularity. He went about the State making speeches, threatening the "shoddy aristocrats who want an emperor and a standing army to shoot down the people."

Every Sunday he harangued a crowd of his adherents on a sand-lot near the city hall and owing to this fact his followers were dubbed "The Sand-Lot Party." One day Robert, after hearing them discourse, returned home shaken and angry.

"The man's a maniac," he told his father; "he talked of nothing but lynching railroad magnates and destroying their property. He wants to blow up the Pacific Mail docks and burn the steamers ... to drop dynamite from balloons on Chinatown."

Young Stanley joined them, smiling, and dropped into a chair. "Whew!" he exclaimed, "it's been a busy day down at the office. Have you heard that Dennis Kearney's been arrested?"

CHAPTER LXVIII

THE WOMAN REPORTER

Francisco stayed for tea and chatted of events. Yes, Dennis Kearney was in jail and making a great hullabaloo about it. He and five of his lieutenants had been arrested after an enthusiastic meeting on the Barbary Coast.

"And what's the Workingmen's Trade and Labor Union doing?" Robert asked.

"Oh, muttering and threatening as usual," Francisco laughed. "They'll not do anything--with the memory of Coleman's 1500 pick-handles fresh in their minds...."

"Well, I'm glad those murderous ruffians are behind the bars," said Alice. But Francisco took her up. "That's rather hard on them, Aunt Alice," he retorted. "They're only a social reaction of the times ...

when railroad millionaires have our Legislature by the throat and land barons refuse to divide their great holdings and give the small farmer a chance.... Kearney, aside from his rant of violence, which he doesn't mean, is advocating much-needed reforms.... I was talking with Henry George today...."

"He's the new city gas and water inspector, isn't he?" asked Benito.

"They tell me he's writing a book."

"Yes, 'Progress and Poverty.' George believes the single tax will cure all social wrongs. But Jean...." He hesitated, flus.h.i.+ng.

"Jean?" His aunt was quick to sense a mystery. "Who is Jean?"

"Oh, she's the new woman reporter," said Francisco hastily. He rose, "Well, I'll be going now."

His aunt looked after him in silent speculation. "So!" she spoke half to herself. "Jean's the woman reporter." And for some occult reason she smiled.

Robert saw them together some days later, talking very earnestly as they walked through "Pauper Alley." Such was the t.i.tle bestowed upon Leidesdorff street between California and Pine streets, where the "mudhens"--those bedraggled, wretched women speculators who still waited hungrily for scanty crumbs from Fortune's table--chatted with broken-down and shabby men in endless reminiscent gabble of great fortunes they had "almost won."

"Miss Norwall's going to do some 'human interest sketches,' as they call 'em," Francisco explained as he introduced his cousin. "Our editor believes in a 'literary touch' for the paper. Something rather new."

Jean Norwall held out her hand. She was an attractive, bright-eyed girl in her early twenties, with a searching, friendly look, as though life were full of surprises which she was eager to probe. "So you are Robert," she remarked. "Francisco's talked a lot about you."

"That was good of him," the young man answered. "He's talked a deal of you as well, Miss Norwall."

"Oh, indeed!"' She reddened slightly. "Well, we must be getting on."

Robert raised his hat and watched them disappear around the corner.

There was a vaguely lonesome feeling somewhere in the region of his heart. He went on past the entrance of the San Francisco Stock Exchange and almost collided with a bent-over, shrewd-faced man, whose eagle-beak and penetrating eyes were a familiar sight along California street.

He was E.J. (better known as "Lucky") Baldwin, who had started the Pacific Stock Exchange.

Baldwin had a great ranch in the South, where he bred blooded horses.

He owned the Baldwin theater and the Baldwin Hotel, which rivaled the Palace. Women, racing and stocks were his hobbies. Benito had done some legal work for Baldwin and Robert knew him casually. Rather to his surprise Baldwin stopped, laid a hand on the young man's shoulder.

"h.e.l.lo, lad," he greeted; "want a tip on the stock market?"

Tips from "Lucky" were worth their weight in gold. Robert was astonished. "Why--yes, thank you, sir," he stammered.

"Well, don't play it ... that's the best tip in the world." The operator walked off chuckling.

Robert continued his walk along Montgomery street to Market, where he turned westward. It was Sat.u.r.day and his father's office, where he was now studying law, had been closed since noon. It had become a custom--almost an unwritten law--to promenade San Francisco's lordly thoroughfare on the last afternoon of the week, especially the northern side. For Market street was now a social barrier. South of it were smaller, meaner shops, saloons, beer-swilling "cafe chantants,"