“Oh, hell, yes!” agreed Johnny, “I’ll have a drink!”
392CHAPTER XLII
SAN FRANCISCO AGAIN
We drew up to San Francisco early in the afternoon, and we were, to put it mildly, thoroughly astonished at the change in the place. To begin with, we now landed at a long wharf projecting from the foot of Sacramento Street instead of by lighter. This wharf was crowded by a miscellaneous mob, collected apparently with no other purpose than to view our arrival. Among them we saw many specialized types that had been lacking to the old city of a few months ago–sharp, keen, businesslike clerks whom one could not imagine at the rough work of the mines; loafers whom one could not imagine at any work at all; dissolute, hard-faced characters without the bold freedom of the road agents; young green-looking chaps who evidently had much to learn and who were exceedingly likely to pay their little fortunes, if not their lives, in the learning. On a hogshead at one side a street preacher was declaiming.
Johnny had by now quite recovered his spirits. I think he was helped greatly by the discovery that he still possessed his celebrated diamond.
“Not broke yet!” said he triumphantly. “You see I was a wise boy after all! Wish I had two of them!”
We disembarked, fought our way to one side, and discussed our plans.
393“Hock the diamond first,” said Johnny, who resolutely refused to borrow from me; “then hair-cut, shave, bath, buy some more clothes, grub, drink, and hunt up Talbot and see what he’s done with the dust we sent down from Hangman’s.”
That program seemed good. We strolled toward shore, with full intention of putting it into immediate execution. “Immediate” proved to be a relative term; there was too much to see.
First we stopped for a moment to hear what the preacher had to say. He was a tall, lank man with fine but rather fanatical features, dressed in a long black coat, his glossy head bare. In spite of the numerous counter-attractions he had a crowd; and he was holding it.