The Apple of Discord

Then I was roused to attention by the words:

"Here is the man who can tell you all about it; he's the one that turned in the alarm."

The speaker wore the badge of an assistant chief of the fire department, and he was addressing two young men who held pencil and paper in their hands and looked eagerly at a roughly dressed man who seemed to be dazed at the destruction that was going on about him.

"Yes, I'm the man," he said slowly. "I'm a watchman. I was over there on the wharf–the Beale Street wharf. A while ago–it was a long time ago–"

"Never mind the long while ago–tell us about to-night," interrupted one of the young men impatiently.

"That's what I was telling you about," said the man in an injured tone. "It was a long while ago–to-night. I looked over here just the other side of that oil warehouse–there's only one wall left to it now–an' I saw a fellow strike a match. I thought he was goin' to light his pipe, but he took a box from under his arm an' stuck the match in it. The box flared up as though it was full o' shavings, an' then he stuck it under a lumber-pile. I hollered at him, an' he ran. Then the fire started up, an' I got to the fire-box an' turned in the alarm. Then there was hell to pay." The man made this announcement in a dull, matter-of-fact way that gave a touch of comedy-in-tragedy to his words.

"What sort of looking man was he?" I asked.

"Oh, he was an oldish man–an old man–tall, an' sort of stooped."

"Stout or thin?"

"Thin, I guess–he was too far away for me to say for sure, an' bein' as I was kind of flustered by the fire, too."

At his words an illuminating light came to my mind. The fire was not directed at the Pacific Mail docks. It was set to destroy the yards of the Kendrick Lumber and Milling Company, and it had succeeded. It was the crowning stroke of Peter Bolton's assault on Wharton Kendrick's fortune.

I wondered whether Peter Bolton had himself set the match to the lumber-pile. The description by the watchman fitted him, and he did not lack the will for the deed. But it was so foreign to his cautious temper to take the risks of committing such a crime with his own hand that I hesitated to believe. Yet when he had once resolved upon such a step, it might well have seemed safer to him to perform the act himself, than to confide it to an accomplice who might betray him.

I was turning over this problem in my mind, and watching with unconscious eyes the bold and resolute efforts of the firemen to fight back the flames, when I was roused by a flight of stones. Two of them struck the nearest engine; one knocked the hat off a man of my company; and a fireman was struck down, only to jump to his feet in a moment with a torrent of oaths. The fire chief roared a profane but vigorous condemnation of the assault, and devoted its authors to an even warmer place than the furnace that blazed before us.

"That's the fifth time we've got it," said the engineer, backing up his chief with a contribution of blistering words.

I looked about for the assailants.

"It's those fellows up there on top of the bluff," said the fire chief. "They've been pelting the firemen and the police for half an hour. They can't reach this end of the line very well, but they've made it hot for our men up near First Street. I hear they've killed some of the Vigilantes up there. The Vigilantes tried to rush 'em, but it's up a hundred foot of narrow stair, and they had to give it up. I wish the whole gang up there was pitched into the middle of the fire."

I looked up at the bluff, and saw a black mass lining its upper edge. Two or three hundred men and boys were clustered along its front, yelling and throwing stones. It was evident that their position could not be taken from the front. In no place was there less than fifty feet of sheer ascent. But I recalled that the bluff was open to attack from the rear by the way of First Street.

"I'll settle those fellows," I said.

"I'll see that you get the department medal, if you do," returned the fire chief. "But you can't get up there without wings."

After stationing guards along the line of hose, I still had twenty-five men who could be spared for other service. Most of them were still standing by the engines at the top of the Beale Street hill. So I made my way back to the corner, and with a few words explained the purpose of the expedition we were about to undertake. They had heard the report that a number of the Vigilantes had been killed by the hoodlums, and burning with indignation they welcomed the chance to inflict vengeance on the rioters.

"Keep together," I cautioned them, as we pushed our way through the mob of sightseers and mischief-makers up Harrison Street to First. Evil faces in the crowd gave us savage glances of dislike. But the white band on the arm that marked the members of the Safety Committee, the warning word of "Here come the Vigilantes," and the display of pick-handles, served to discourage the thought of molesting us. There was mass enough among the rough element in that crowd to swallow us ten times over, but they knew that we represented the force of law and government, and the rage for mischief fell to a muttering of threats as we passed.

When we had forced our way through the mass of sightseers to a distance of fifty yards from the edge of the bluff, there was a sudden shot, followed by an answering rattle that sounded like the firing of a pack of giant fire-crackers. Screams of women and shouts of men reinforced the noise of the guns, and we were borne backward in a terrified rush of the crowd. The infection of panic was hard to resist, but I succeeded in giving a steadying word to my men, and they breasted the current till the ground cleared before us. Then I saw that my manoeuver had been anticipated. A company of the Vigilantes had made a flank attack on the hoodlum position from the west by way of Bryant Street. We ran forward to reinforce the company, and I offered our services to its captain.

"They fired on us," he said, "and we've cleaned 'em out, I guess. Here's one fellow shot, anyhow. They've been throwing rocks down on the firemen below, and knocked out half a dozen of them–killed two of 'em, I heard. The cowardly brutes! Hunt 'em out, boys! There's some of 'em left in those yards along the bluff."

I made a dash along the edge of the bluff, and was rewarded by flushing a half-dozen hoodlums who rose from behind an outhouse, like quail from a clump of bushes, and hastily scrambled over a fence. I called to them to halt or we would shoot, and was over the fence after them in an instant. Most of my men were too old for fast work of this sort, but a glance behind me showed that half a dozen had followed me.

The hoodlums had led the way to a cul-de-sac of buildings, and were cursing as they scattered here and there in the effort to find a way out. The form and voice of their leader, and his running stride stirred faintly the chords of memory. I tried vainly to recall where I had seen him before, and the elusive recollection multiplied my desire to capture him. In this resolve chance favored me. A stumble sent him to the ground, and before he could rise I was on top of him, and held a revolver against his head.

"Damn you!" he cried, puffing hoarsely in the effort to regain his breath.

"Take it quietly," I advised him, "or you'll lose what little brains you have."

"Damn you!" he repeated. "Let me up, or I'll kill you."

This time his tone and words stirred memory to definiteness. I had in my hands the fellow whose knife-thrust had been near ending my career, and whose gift of an overcoat had led me to Big Sam. and the train of events which followed upon my visit to the King of Chinatown. Here, then, was an agent of Bolton, and perhaps of Big Sam as well, leading one of the hoodlum gangs in its career of riot and arson. And I felt, as I gripped his throat, that I had within my hand the proof of Bolton's criminal conspiracy. If this man could be got to talk, the jail would close on Peter Bolton in the hour of his triumph; and the furnace that roared and glowed below us would bring ruin to his plans as swiftly as it had consumed the property of his enemy.

CHAPTER XXX

THE END OF THE FEUD

At last the night of alarms was over, and the forces of law and order held San Francisco firmly in their grasp. The police and the Vigilantes were fagged out but triumphant. And though the warehouses and lumber-yards in the amphitheater before the Mail docks were but a smoking mass of ashes and charcoal, the dangers of the conflagration were over. The exhausted firemen were withdrawn to fling themselves down to rest, and only a few hosemen were left to guard the smoldering ruins.

The great conspiracy of the Council of Nine had come to nothing. Parks was the only leader out of jail, and, in the absence of its active heads, the revolution had deliquesced into a series of scattered and objectless riots. The Committee of Safety had proved strong enough to handle the emergency, and the militia companies, held all night in their armories without a call for their services, were dismissed with the dawn.

The first gray of the morning was lightening the eastern sky as I disbanded my company. I had landed my captive in the City Prison, stubbornly uncommunicative, and jauntily confident that he was to be protected from harm. And when at last I had made my report at the Vigilante headquarters, I was driven to Wharton Kendrick's home, consumed with anxiety lest some of the wandering bands of rioters, or another gang of bravoes sent by the highbinders, had been inspired to attack it. Peter Bolton had succeeded in one of his schemes of vengeance, and I trembled lest in the wreck of his conspiracy against the peace of the city he had struck another blow at the person of his enemy.

As we turned the corner into Van Ness Avenue my mind was relieved of one anxiety. The Kendrick house still stood untouched by fire, and the gray dawn showed no sign of further attack.

Andrews received me with composure.

"Oh, yes," he replied to my eager questions, "there was some of them hoodlums come along here–gangs of ten or twenty at a time–and they yelled a good deal. But when we showed our teeth they went by on the other side. There was some shooting a block or two away, but they didn't even throw a rock around here."

At this soothing report I flung myself down in the men's quarters for a hurried sleep, dog-tired, but gratified to feel a reviving spring of courage. It seemed but a moment later that I saw Laura Kendrick threatened by the largest dragon I have ever met–in Dreamland or out. The uncanny monster had the face of Peter Bolton, marvelously magnified to fit a hundred-foot body, and he opened his mouth in sardonic laughter as he moved forward to crush the slight figure that stood in his path. At this sight I was oppressed by a modest but terrified conviction that I would cut but a poor figure in a contest with a dragon. But spurred by fear for the life of the most important girl in the world I ran forward shouting out such threats as I could summon, in the hope of communicating some of my own terrors to the monster, when on a sudden his boiler blew up, and he was scattered into nothingness. The shock of the explosion waked me, and I started up to find Andrews at my side.

"I didn't mean to knock the chair over, sir," he said apologetically, "but you told me to call you at seven. And Miss Kendrick says you are to go upstairs to breakfast, as soon as you're ready."

I collected my faculties sufficiently to make myself presentable, and was received at the door by Laura herself.

"I'm afraid," she said, as she ushered me into the breakfast-room, "that it doesn't agree with you to stay up all night. I don't believe you've had a wink of sleep, but I've made some coffee that's warranted to bring you wide awake before you can shut your eyes."

"If that's the way I look, my personal appearance is a libel on a peaceful citizen. I have slept for close on three hours, and have dreamed of acres of fires, and enough fighting to fill a book."

"Ugh!" exclaimed Miss Laura. "I don't see why men so like to fight. Do you take two lumps in your coffee or three?"

"The explanation is very simple," I returned. "They don't like to fight. One lump, please."

"Then what do they do it for?" she asked. "You had better take more than one chop; they're pretty small, and you've got a big day's work ahead–and behind."

"Why," I argued, "they fight for power, or reputation, or money, or a pair of brown eyes–or blue, as the case may be–for fear somebody will think them afraid–for anger–for almost any reason but enjoyment. I saw ten thousand men in a scrimmage last night, and there were not twenty of them there because they enjoyed the fight. At any rate, I can assure you that the man in the crowd I have the best right to speak for wished himself anywhere but in the front rank of battle."

"Humph!" sniffed Miss Laura incredulously. "I know very well that you couldn't have been hired to keep out of it. You haven't been doing much else but fighting since I got to know you."

"It wasn't from choice," I pleaded.

"Just tell me what happened, and how," she said. "I was scared blue last night with fire-bells and hooting whistles, and men shouting in the streets; and when I peeked out I saw a glare down town as though half the city was going up in smoke."

Laura listened with a grave face as I gave a succinct account of the night's adventures.

"And do you really believe that Mr. Bolton set fire to uncle's lumber-yards?" she asked.

"In person or by proxy," I replied.

"Well, there doesn't seem to be any end to his wickedness," she said. "I suppose he's prepared to finish us to-day."

"I don't think we can count on repentance–not from him. We shall have to find something a great deal safer than that to pull us through. Has your uncle dropped any more hints about that million dollars?"

"He talked of it more than ever, last night. He went over the word 'million' hundreds of times. Then he would call your name and say 'five-sixteen' as though he was trying to make you understand the meaning of the figures."

It was an incomprehensible mystery, and we had to leave it so.

"Do you know what you are going to do, then?" she asked.

"Sell all the unpledged stock in the house, see what Partridge and Coleman can do for us, and try to stand up the banks for the balance."

Laura Kendrick shook her head, with a business-like expression on her face:

"I wish I could think of something better than that," she said with an attempt at cheeriness. "We shall never get through the day at that rate. But I suppose it's the best that's left us."

The door opened, and Mercy Fillmore appeared. The sudden intrusion of a third person brought to my consciousness a realization of the fascinating breakfast I had been conceded. But if I was so ungallant as to feel disappointment at her interrupting presence, it melted away under the soothing influence that surrounded her.

"What a night we have had!" she said, with an anxious note in the gentle harmonies of her voice. "We were worse frightened at the fire-bells and the shouting of men in the distance than at the drunken hoodlums who passed by the house. Was there much fighting?"

"Enough–but nothing to be frightened about."

"If there was violence," said Mercy, with a trace of anxiety in her tone, "I am afraid that Mr. Parks was among the misguided men. Did you see anything of him?"

"No," I replied. "He escaped arrest when the Council of Nine was gathered in, for he was making a speech on the sand-lot. I inquired for him at the City Prison and the Receiving Hospital, but he wasn't there, so I'm sure he must have escaped."

Mercy breathed a sigh of relief.

"Well, Mercy," said Laura Kendrick, "if you expect men to have any sense about such things, you are going to be disappointed. They are fighting animals–at any rate some of them are–and the best we can do is to have a good supply of lint and arnica on hand, and read books on the best way of treating wounds and bruises."

But a few minutes later she had forgotten this sentiment of resignation, for when I set out for the office to prepare for the onslaught that must come with the opening of the business hours, her parting injunction was to "Leave the business of the police to the police, and don't let the Kendrick family go to ruin by getting yourself knocked on the head in some harum-scarum expedition."

I found Brown already at work, and his haggard face showed that he shared in the keen anxieties of the day.

"This is a bad business, Mr. Hampden, a bad business," he sighed. "Four hundred thousand dollars' worth of lumber went up in that fire last night."

"Didn't we have any insurance on it?"

"Why, yes–we had one hundred and fifty thousand on it. But we had borrowed that much on the stock, and the bank holds the policy. I was hoping to get some more money on the lumber to-day, but that chance has gone." Brown shook his head and sighed as though his courage had fallen to a low ebb, and added: "I'm afraid every creditor we have will be down on us now."

"How much shall we have to meet?" I asked.

"I wish I could tell," he groaned. "Mr. Kendrick has been so careless about giving out his notes without having them entered on the books that I can't say. I think there are about two hundred thousand of unsecured notes out, but there may be a million, for all I know."

"How much money have we in hand?"

"It's not much. Not over twenty thousand."

"How much can we get if we drop that confounded load of stock we are carrying?"

"Oh, if we could unload it without breaking the price it would stand us something like two or three hundred thousand dollars, after paying off all loans on it. But it's a ticklish market–a ticklish market. If we start to throw the stock out, there will be a slump that will wipe out our margins and leave us on the wrong side of the ledger."

"I'll see what can be done about it. Perhaps Partridge can get the stock taken into stronger hands. Can you think of anything else that we can turn into money?"

"There's just one thing I have remembered since yesterday. The Oriental Bank let us have a hundred thousand on those Humboldt lumber lands a while ago. The lands ought to be good for as much more if the Oriental is lending at all."

"That sounds as though there might be something in it. I'll see the Oriental Bank people at once–Partridge, too. If we can get a hundred thousand from the bank, and get our margins out of those stocks, we shall have, a fair chance of weathering the storm." As I turned to go, I bethought me to say, "Don't pay out a dollar that you can possibly hold on to."

Brown gave his head a deprecating shake.

"That won't do, Mr. Hampden. You see, we're tied up to our open-handed way of doing business. Now, if we were acting for Peter Bolton, it would be different. When he tells a man to call again for his money, nobody thinks anything about it. They just say he's a skinflint, who could pay and won't. But you know how Wharton Kendrick has run his business. Whenever a man wants his money, he gets it as fast as it can be counted out. There's the trouble now. If we go to asking for time, or putting them off, why everybody will say: 'Aha! Kendrick is in difficulties; I always thought he would go under.' And every account that stands against us would be in before noon."

I had to admit that he was right, and sallied forth to the Oriental Bank. The president received me genially, when I announced myself as the ambassador of Wharton Kendrick, and threw up his hands in good-humored refusal when I told what I wanted.

"You couldn't get a cent on that property to-day, if the trees were made out of gold, Mr. Hampden," he said. "Property outside the city is worth nothing to us. To be frank with you, we should feel easier if we had the money out of the last loan we made you people. I'll make you a first-class offer: Pay the principal, and I'll strike off the interest."

Partridge was hardly more encouraging than the president of the Oriental Bank. He promised to bestir himself to find some one to take the stock, but confessed that he was unable to suggest a buyer. And I was forced to turn toward the office once more with a feeling akin to desperation.

The atmosphere about the business district was not of a quality to reassure the despondent. Although the banks and exchanges had not yet opened for business, I could hear everywhere the buzz of apprehension. Frightened traders hurried along the streets with eyes eloquent of their fears; anxious holders of stocks gathered in groups about Pine and Montgomery Streets, with pale and troubled faces, as they began their curbstone trading; and there were signs of storm indicating that we should have a worse day before us than any that we had weathered.

As I reached the Merchants' Exchange, I came upon William T. Coleman, and he greeted me with an air that warmed my spirit.

"That was a good piece of work you did last night, Hampden," he said. And I blushed under the commendation as proudly as though I were a soldier of the Grand Army called out to receive the ribbon of the Legion of Honor from the hands of the Great Napoleon.

"We suppressed the riots last night," I replied, "but the people don't seem to know it. I see more anxiety among the business men this morning than at any time yet."

"It's absurd," said Coleman abruptly. "I can't understand why they should take that tone. The danger is over. We have the situation perfectly in hand. Men are signing the rolls by the hundred now. We shall have the city so thoroughly guarded to-night that not even a rat can come out of the sewers. It's nonsense to talk of panic conditions, as some of these fellows are doing. By the way, how are Kendrick's affairs? He had a bad loss last night."

I did not hesitate to describe the difficulties of the position.

"I'll see if something can't be done for you," he said. "If I had a little more time I could arrange it, I am sure, but I have my hands pretty full now. As it is, I can't be of much help to you till to-morrow." And he passed on.

There was a stimulating influence in his tones, and, though I had little confidence in his power to arrange for aid, his words sent me back to the office in better spirits. I had need of all my courage, for Brown met me with word that the money was going out rapidly, and that without a turn in the tide we should not last beyond noon.

"God bless you, Hampden!" cried a familiar voice as I entered the waiting-room. "I was wondering whether some of your long-haired Bedlamites hadn't got you and hanged you to your own lamp-post." And the fiery face of General Wilson beamed at me with lively interest as he hastened forward to grasp my hand. "How's Kendrick coming on? I see by the papers that you've been having the devil of a time here."

I admitted the plutonic nature of the city's recent activities, as I led General Wilson into the private office.

"I've been in Stockton," said General Wilson with explosive energy. "To tell the truth, I went up to file that contract for the sale of the tule land. I didn't know how Kendrick's affairs were going to turn out, so I didn't lose any time getting it on record. I've never been caught napping yet, and it wouldn't do to begin at this late day. Now, how are things going? Will Kendrick pull through, or is he up against the wall?"

My heart misgave me at having Wharton Kendrick's business on the tongue of this loquacious boaster, and I was of a mind to deliver to him the same cheery lie that I had poured into the ears of a dozen inquisitive acquaintances. But I remembered the substantial proof of friendly interest that he had already shown, and thought it better that I should once more be frank with him.

General Wilson shook his head with sympathetic concern when I had finished my tale.

"That has a bad look," he said. "You can't get through, unless you get help. Now if it was only fifty thousand, why, I would strain my authority so far as to let you have it–or, by Jove, I'd advance it out of my own pocket, to help Wharton. But the chances are that you'll want ten times that amount, so I can't risk it. You can count on my services, though, if you have to call a meeting of the creditors. I'm famous for managing such affairs, and in Chicago they have a joke about Wilson's Elixir Vitæ for Broken-down Corporations. If the business stops, I can put it on its feet, if anybody can. Why, I've managed twenty big failures if I've managed one, and I brought 'em all through with flying colors. It wasn't three years ago that I was called in to help Seymour, Peters and Blair. They had failed for four million, and their affairs were in the devil of a tangle. I wouldn't have touched the thing for money, but I couldn't resist the pleading of my old friend Seymour. He came to me crying like a baby, and was ready to blow his brains out if I failed him. So I took hold, worked like a beaver for three weeks–night and day–got the creditors to scale their claims and take six-, nine- and twelve-months' notes, and had the concern going smoothly inside of thirty days. To-day you'll find Seymour, Peters and Blair one of the soundest firms in Chicago. Why, I've reorganized three railroads, and–"