such as a four-storied brick structure with a tower and a loud-belled clock, called the Clock Building. The bank occupied part of its ground floor. All the big men had their offices upstairs; and on its upper floor was located the County Library. There were also a number of wide, deep overgrown old-fashioned gardens with square cupolaed houses—places whose owners had refused to succumb to commercial expansion. Also remained a number of adobe structures with red-tiled roofs, houses that had been there since the earliest Spanish days. Some of these were still occupied by native Spanish California families; but most of the few still remaining on Main Street had become Chinese laundries. Near the head of Main Street, and a block apart, were two hotels. One, called the San Antonio, was three-storied, of brick, sat directly on the street, and had a wooden awning that extended over the sidewalk. The other, called the Fremont, was a huge rambling affair of wooden construction, with broad verandas. It occupied the centre of an extensive garden of palms, rubber, magnolia, and eucalyptus trees, and a great profusion of flowers of both common and rare species. Vines had covered it and shaded it and glorified it with roses, with passion flower, with wistaria, with honeysuckle and many other sweet or brilliant blooms. A half dozen Chinamen were continuously engaged in watering and tending its lawns and gardens. Visitors from the East who had been there more than two weeks knew of a great many especial features to show the newer comers. Such as the black rose; or the LaMarque, whose stem was six inches in diameter; or the cork tree; or the camphor or bay trees, whose leaves you crushed and smelled. And of course they must eat a ripe olive off the tree:—and go around with a very puckered mouth the rest of the morning! You swept into these grounds on a curving, hospitably wide gravelled road and hitched your horse to a heavy rail made of iron pipe.
There were many of these rails, and they were always more or less occupied. Unless one happened to be a very recent and temporary tourist indeed, he never thought of walking even the shortest distances. Horses were extraordinarily cheap, either to buy or hire. All over the town horses, either under saddle or hitched to buggies, phaetons, or surries, dozed under the feathery pepper trees. If one wanted to go two blocks, he used a horse for that purpose. The length of Main Street was lined with them. Most people owned two or three and alternated them in the somnolent job of awaiting their master's pleasure. As a corollary to this state of affairs the saddler's shops were large, and fascinating with the smell of leather, the sight of carved, silver-mounted saddles, of braided rawhide bridles with long morrales, of inlaid spurs and horsehair work, of riatas, of horse-hair cinchas, of fancy cuartas and the like. There were also monstrous frame stables each accommodating hundreds of animals, with corrals and horse troughs and generally a lot of lolloping dogs stretched in the sunny dust, and Mexicans who smoked brown paper cigarettes. From these each morning a long procession set forth. One man would drive a phaeton and lead a half dozen saddle horses attached to the horns of each other's saddles; another would ride and lead another half dozen. In all directions they scattered out through the town, leaving them by ones and twos here and there at the iron pipe hitching rails. When all but one had been delivered, the Mexican boy rode back to the stable, sitting his saddle loosely with the inimitable grace of the "cowboy seat." At noon it was necessary to go after the vehicles. The saddle horses, however, returned of themselves. The only requirement was to tie the reins to the horns so the animals could not stop to graze, to throw the stirrips across the saddles and to slap the beasts on the rump: they returned staidly or friskily home. At noon and toward six o'clock the streets would be full of these riderless animals. The scheme was eminently labour-saving and picturesque; but was later prohibited by law.
From the door of the bank in the Clock Building a man issued, briskly drawing on his gloves. He was followed by a bareheaded clerk who continued talking to him while he unhitched his horse and buggy. The man was rather short and slight, with a large round head, a very ruddy complexion, an old-fashioned white moustache and goatee, and rather bulging blue eyes. He was dressed carefully, though informally. His Panama hat, loose light tweeds and dark tie were eminently conservative and respectable. But in his small, cloth-topped exquisitely fitted patent leather boots one thought to catch his secret pride, his one harmless little vanity. Indeed, even as he finished his conversation with the clerk, he mechanically produced a large silk handkerchief and with it flecked imaginary dust from one foot, then the other. His name was Oliver Mills, and he was the president of the bank he was now quitting in the middle of a busy morning.
"Well, Simpson," he concluded. "You tell him that. And if he isn't satisfied, he will have to come and see me to-morrow. I wouldn't miss showing at the Colonel's jamboree for a dozen of him. In fact, to-day ought by rights to be a bank holiday, so everyone could go."
He gathered up the reins and clucked to his horse. The animal set himself in motion with a great deal of histrionic up and down and not much straightahead. It was rather a shiny and fancy horse, however, with a light tan harness and a wonderful netted fly cover that caparisoned him like a war horse of old even to his ears, and with dangling tassels that danced like jumping-jacks to his every motion. Mr. Mills, however, was apparently in no haste. He held the reins loosely in his lap, over which he had drawn a thin linen robe, and did not reach for the silver-banded whip in the socket. Up the length of Main Street he drove, bowing right and left to his numerous acquaintance, and casting an appreciative and appraising eye on signs of improvement. These would not have astonished a modern hustler, but they satisfied Mr. Mills that his town was moving on and prosperous. He liked the friendly greetings, he was glad to see a wooden sidewalk going down, he enjoyed the feel of the sun pouring on his back.
At the Fremont he turned in and drove up alongside the very wide, shady veranda, whose floor was only just above the level of the ground. A man seated in one of the capacious wooden rocking chairs heaved himself to his feet and came forward. He was of the build known as stocky, and was clad in a well-cut blue serge. His large head was grown closely with a cap of very black and rather coarse curls. His forehead was low and broad, his eyebrows black and beetling, his eyes humorous, his moustache black, his cheeks red and slightly veined with purple. Altogether a dashing, handsome, black and red, slightly coarse man, with undoubtedly a fund of high spirits and obvious wit. And his eyes and forehead showed ability.
"Good morning, Mr. Mills," he cried in a loud hearty voice. "How are you? Fine morning, isn't it?"
"Of course," replied the banker, a little vaguely.
The other man chuckled.
"'Of course'," he repeated. "I suppose you mean to say all your mornings are fine, eh?"
"At this time of year; yes. How are you feeling?"
"As if the doctor who ordered me out here was a damn liar. Never felt better in my life. If you hadn't said you would be along I would have taken a walk over to the mountains and back to get an appetite for lunch. Not that I need one; I'm as hungry as a wolf."
"Would you, really," said Mills, quizzically. "Before lunch! You are certainly no invalid, Mr. Boyd. Quite an athlete, I should say."
"Why that's no walk," exclaimed Boyd, defensively.
"It's six miles to those mountains."
Boyd checked an exclamation and examined the other closely.
"Looks as though he meant it," he commented, as though to himself. "Can't figure his ulterior motive. Why, you poor chump!" he cried. "What do you take me for? If I can't walk there and back in an hour, I'll eat a hat!"
"The air is very clear," said Mills quietly. "I should admire to see you try. However, get your hat and your boy and we'll be getting on."
"Well, if that's six miles it must be about a mile and a half to the hatrack, so don't expect me back soon," was Boyd's parting rejoinder as he started for the office door.
In a few moments he returned, accompanied by a slender lad of about twenty. The boy was like the next step in
