Digging for Gold: Adventures in California. Robert Michael Ballantyne
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understand, uncle, perfectly,” replied Frank with a smile. “The fact is that I had made up my mind, lately, not to oppose your wishes any longer, but to agree to go into an office at home. Of course it is more agreeable to me to think of going into one abroad.”
“I’m glad you take such a sensible view of the matter, Frank,” said Mr Allfrey, much mollified.
“Besides,” continued Frank, “I have read a good deal about that country of late, and the descriptions of the magnificence of the scenery have made me long to have an opportunity of painting it and—”
He paused abruptly and started up, for his uncle had seized a book, which usually lay open on his desk, and was in fact a sort of dummy intended to indicate the “study” that was supposed to go on there. Next moment Frank sprang laughing into the passage, and the book flew with a crash against the panels of the door as he shut it behind him, leaving Mr Allfrey to solace himself with a large meerschaum, almost the only unfailing friend that he possessed.
Thus it came to pass that Frank Allfrey went out to the gold regions of California.
Chapter Two.
Frank discusses his Prospects with a Friend
We pass over our hero’s long voyage round “the Horn,” and introduce him in a totally new scene and under widely different circumstances—seated near a magnificent tree of which he is making a study, and clad in a white linen coat and pantaloons and a broad-brimmed straw hat.
Just the day before, the “House” to which he had been sent had failed. Two years had he spent in grinding at its account books, perched on a three-legged stool, and now he found himself suddenly cast loose on the world. Of course when the stool was knocked from under him his salary was stopped, and he was told by his employers that it would be necessary for him to go elsewhere to earn a subsistence.
This was rather a startling piece of advice, and for a time Frank felt much depressed, but on returning to his lodgings the day he received his dismissal, his eye fell on his palette and brushes, which he at once seized, and, hastening out to his favourite tree, was soon so thoroughly absorbed in the study of “nature” that his sorrows vanished like morning mist.
After three hours’ steady work he arose refreshed in soul and comforted.
Thereafter he returned to his lodgings and sat down to think over his prospects. His cogitations were temporarily interrupted, and afterwards materially assisted, by a short thick-set man of about thirty years of age who entered with a deferential air, and pulled his forelock.
“Come in, Joe. I was just thinking over my future plans, and I daresay you can assist me, being, I suppose, in the same fix with myself.”
Joe Graddy had been a porter in the “House” which had failed, and was indeed in the “same fix,” as Frank said, with himself.
“I’ve comed, sir,” said Joe, “to ax yer advice, an’ to offer ye my sarvice, it it’s of any use,” said the porter, who was a shrewd straightforward man, and had originally been a sailor.
“If you had come to offer me advice and ask my services,” said Frank, “I would have been better pleased to see you. However, sit down and let me hear what you have to say.”
“Well, sir,” said Joe; “this is wot I’ve got for to say, that we are in what the Yankees call a pretty considerable fix.”
“I know it, Joe; but how do you think we are to get out of the fix?”
“That’s just wot I comed for to ax,” said the man; “and when you’ve told me how, I’ll lend a hand to weigh anchor an’ set sail. The fact is, I’m in want of a place, and I’m willing to engage with you, sir.”
Frank Allfrey experienced a strange mingling of feelings when he heard this. Of course he felt much gratified by the fact that a man so grave and sensible as Joe Graddy should come and deferentially offer to become his servant at a time when he possessed nothing but the remnant of a month’s salary; and when he considered his own youth, he felt amazed that one so old and manly should volunteer to place himself under his orders. The fact is that Frank was not aware that his straightforward earnest manner had commended him very strongly to those with whom he had lately come in contact. He was one of those attractive men whose countenances express exactly what they feel, who usually walk with a quick earnest step, if we may say so, and with a somewhat downcast contemplative look. Frank knew well enough that he was strong and tall, unusually so for his age, and therefore did not continually assert the fact by walking as if he was afraid to fall forward, which is a common practice among men who wish to look bigger than they are. Besides, being an ardent student of nature, Frank was himself natural, as well as amiable, and these qualities had endeared him to many people without his being aware of it.
“Why, Joe!” he exclaimed, “what do you mean?”
“I mean wot I says, sir.”
“Are you aware,” said Frank, smiling, “that I do not possess a shilling beyond the few dollars that I saved off my last month’s salary?”
“I s’posed as much, sir.”
“Then if you engage with me, as you express it, how do you expect to be paid?”
“I don’t expect to be paid, sir.”
“Come, Joe, explain your meaning, for I don’t pretend to be a diviner of men’s thoughts.”
“Well, sir, this is how it is. W’en we got the sack the other day, says I to myself, says I, now you’re afloat on the world without rudder, compass, or charts, but you’ve got a tight craft of your own,—somewhat scrubbed, no doubt, with rough usage, but sound,—so it’s time for you to look out for rudder, compass, and charts, and it seems to me that thems to be found with young Mister Allfrey, so you’d better go an’ git him to become skipper o’ your ship without delay. You see, sir, havin’ said that to myself, I’ve took my own advice, so if you’ll take command of me, sir, you may steer me where you please, for I’m ready to be your sarvant for love, seein’ that you han’t got no money.”
“Most obliging of you,” said Frank, laughing, “and by this offer I understand that you wish to become my companion.”
“Of coorse, in a country o’ this kind,” replied Graddy, “it’s difficult,—I might a’most say unpossible,—to be a man’s sarvant without bein’ his companion likewise.”
“But here is a great difficulty at the outset, Joe. I have not yet made up my mind what course to pursue.”
“Just so, sir,” said the ex-seaman, with a look of satisfaction, “I know’d you wouldn’t be doin’ that in a hurry, so I’ve comed to have a talk with ’e about it.”
“Very good, sit down,” said Frank, “and let us consider it. In the first place, I regret to say that I have not been taught any trade, so that I cannot become a blacksmith or a carpenter or anything of that sort. A clerk’s duties I can undertake, but it seems to me that clerks are not much wanted here just now. Porterage is heavy work and rather slow. I may be reduced to that if nothing better turns up, but it has occurred to me that I might try painting with success. What would you say to that, Joe?”
The man looked at Frank in surprise. “Well,” said he, “people don’t look as if they wanted to paint their houses here, an’ most of ’em’s got no houses.”
“Why, man, I don’t mean house-painting. It is portrait and landscape painting that I refer to,” said Frank, laughing.
Joe shook his head gravely. “Never do, Mr Frank—”
“Stop! if you and I are to be companions in trouble, you must not call me Mister Frank, you must drop the mister.”
“Then I won’t go with ’e, sir, that’s all about it,” said Joe firmly.
“Very well, please yourself,” said Frank, with a laugh; “but if painting is so hopeless, what would you advise?”
“The diggin’s,” answered Joe.
“I