satisfactory except for the table crowded with rowdies seated directly beside it. Two men and a tawdry lady barge in the front door. Daniel seizes his opportunity. The stool it must be.
“Say there, little brother, can you tell me what is a brick?” says a huge rowdy at the table. He sports an enormous mustache, a bush of a beard, and long, wild yellow hair beneath a Stetson hat. A cape of mangy fur that looks and stinks like bearskin is draped around the shoulders of his bright blue Prince Albert coat.
“What is a brick?” Daniel says, playing along.
“Why, there are gold bricks and silver bricks and bricks made without straw. There are bricks to be hurled at mad dogs. Ergo, bricks!” The rowdy slaps his suede chaps. One trouser leg is tucked into a fancy-stitched cowboy boot. The other leg isn’t. He toasts Daniel and triumphantly tosses a shot of whiskey down his throat, pleased at his own pronouncement.
“Joaquin, you are living proof that American poets have yet to master the English language,” says his gaunt companion. The companion smiles dreamily, sipping his beer. He wears a sea captain’s cap over his mop of dark curls, though from his pale aristocratic face, pale elegant hands, and foppish bowtie, he is clearly no sailor. “Sir, may I introduce you to the great Californian poet, Joaquin Miller. And a very fine poet he would be too, if only he could make a lick of sense.”
“Ergo, bricks,” Daniel says. “Actually, sir, I think I am drunk enough to understand Mr. Miller. Bricks made of stardust, bricks made of wormwood, bricks to be juggled by a beautiful lady. Ergo, bricks!”
“Bravo! Another boilermaker for the young gentleman,” roars Joaquin Miller. “And may I introduce George Sterling, who might one day amount to a great Californian writer if only he could give up carousing among the redwoods long enough to write something. Carousing, I might add, with fair maidens clad in togas! Do you comprehend what a toga is? A drapery in the Greek style, under which the maidens in question wear nothing but their. . . .”
“Gifts from God,” interjects George Sterling. His gaunt face remains expressionless, but his eyes twinkle at Daniel. “I myself have been known to wear a toga, sir.”
“To togas,” says Daniel, toasting Mr. Sterling with his boilermaker.
“Try an alligator pear, sir,” says the third member of their party. He offers Daniel a plate of thin slices of a pale green fruit sprinkled with salt and pepper. He’s a handsome blond fellow dressed like a dandy in the height of European fashion--a fitted burgundy topcoat, a canary yellow waistcoat, and spats. Spats! “The greasers call them avocados. You must try a dish called guacamole at Luna’s in North Beach.” He leans forward confidentially. “You’ve just come from the Continent, I take it?”
“Indeed, I have, sir,” Daniel says, trying the green fruit, which has a strange oily taste and is not sweet at all. “Is it so obvious?”
“Verily, Frank has been across the pond and back again himself, is that not so, Frank?” says Joaquin Miller.
“Name’s Frank Norris,” says the blond fellow and shakes Daniel’s hand. “Truthfully, I haven’t been to Paris since college. Haven’t the time. The novels must come first.”
“By God, sir, you write novels?”
“Oh, certainly. The first book is called Blix. A romance, with tequila. Got another in mind, going to call it McTeague. A tragic one, that. Nasty fellow beats his pretty wife to death.”
Everyone guffaws, and Daniel is enchanted. Marvelous Californ’! Old cowboys and failed prospectors and Holy Rollers; these he expected. But poets and novelists? Dreamers like himself? Oh, hand of destiny! That merciless hand does not oppress him now. Yes, a great fate awaits him, live or die. He raises his glass. “To the First and Last Chance Saloon!”
“To our dear, dear watering hole.” Joaquin Miller wipes a tear from his eye.
“To the Fourth of July!”
“To Johnny Heinold!”
“Hear, hear!”
The beerslinger grins and lights another stogie.
Now a rough-looking kid charges in. Startlingly handsome, he’s got a broad sunburnt face and hands to match. He finds a spare barrel and rolls it over to the table, nodding to the assembled company and fetching himself a beer.
Daniel nods to the newcomer and proclaims to his new friends, “I am Daniel J. Watkins of Saint Louis, London, and Paris, and I’m looking for lodging in San Francisco. Could anyone recommend a place?”
“Try the Palace Hotel,” says the rough kid sarcastically. His quick eyes flick over Daniel’s suit. Filthy