“Nine months, two weeks and three days,” said his mother, glibly.  “Won’t you all come in and see the baby?” she invited.

“No,” Spear answered.  “We must steal your husband for a’ little while.  There’s business at the City Hall....”

“Adrian’s become a prominent citizen, you know,” he added at her look of pouting protest.

She brought her husband’s hat.  “Don’t be long,” she urged, and smiled a good-bye from the threshold.  When he heard the door shut, Adrian turned on Brannan.  “What’s up?”

“Plenty,” said the other meaningly.  “The Hounds have broken out.  They looted Little Chili about dark tonight and one of them was shot.  They threaten to burn the foreign quarter.  They’re arming.  There’s trouble afoot.”

“And what do you want of me?” Stanley questioned.

“Damn it!  Wake up, man!” cried Spear.  “A citizens’ committee.  We’re going to enforce the law—­if it takes a rope.”

CHAPTER XXIV

THE CHAOS OF ’49

Inez and Alice were returning from church on Sunday, July 15 when they encountered a strange, unsabbatical procession; a company of grim and tight-lipped citizens marching, rifles over shoulder toward the Bay.  At their head was William Spofford.  Midway of the parade were a dozen rough-appearing fellows, manacled and guarded.  Among these Inez recognized Sam Roberts, gaunt and bearded leader of the hoodlum band known as The Hounds or Regulars.  From Little Chili, further to the north and west, rose clouds of smoke; now and then a leaping tongue of flame.

Presently Benito, musket at shoulder, came marching by and Inez plucked at his arm.

“Can’t stop now,” he told her hurriedly.  “We’re taking these rogues to the sloop Warren.  They’re to be tried for arson and assault in the foreign quarter.”

“By the Eternal!” shouted a bystander enthusiastically.  “We’ve got Law in San Francisco at last....  Hurrah for Bill Spofford and the Citizens’ Committee.”

“There’s Adrian,” cried Inez as the rearguard of the pageant passed.  “Isn’t it fine?  Alice, aren’t you proud?”

But Alice was a practical little body.  “They’ll be hungry when they come home,” she averred.  “Let us hurry back and get their dinner ready.”

[Illustration:  Passersby who laughed at the inscription witnessed simultaneously the rescue of an almost-submerged donkey by means of an improvised derrick.]

The affair of The Hounds was already past history when the gold-seekers, hunted from the heights by early snows, returned to San Francisco in great numbers.  Sara Roberts and his evil band had been deported.  Better government obtained but there were many other civic problems still unsolved.  San Francisco, now a hectic, riotous metropolis of 25,000 inhabitants, was like a muddy Venice, for heavy rains had made its unpaved streets canals of oozy mud.  At Clay and Kearny streets, in the heart of the business district, some wag had placed a placard reading: