186 THE COUNTRY BOY 



bay and the closer we got to San Francisco, 

 the faster the train ran; and as the conductor 

 came through and gave each of us a ferry 

 ticket to cross the baj^ from Oakland to San 

 Francisco, I saw that I had spent the last cent 

 of change father gave me, — that I had made 

 it just a dead heat. 



Aside from the twenty-dollar gold piece 

 in my undershirt, I was completely out. 



I wanted to get to the JNIurphy Building, 

 in which building we had some friends living. 

 A drummer put me on a car as it stood on 

 the turn-table at the foot of IMarket Street. 

 As this car rolled off the turn-table, I saw what 

 a peculiar position I was in financially. 

 When the conductor came for the fare, I told 

 him that I had come from Oregon, that my 

 father thought he gave me enough change to 

 last until I got to San Francisco, but that he 

 hadn't. That on my back, sewed in my 

 underclothes, I had a twenty-dollar gold piece. 

 That if he would let me off at the IMurphy 

 Building, I would get some change there, and 

 pay him when his car oame back. But he said 

 gruffly: "I haven't the slightest doubt, after 

 a look of your valise, that you have money 



