So long." And before
Randolph could thank him, he lurched away again into the semi-darkness
of the wharf.

Overflowing with gratitude at a hospitality so like that of his reckless
brethren of the mines, Randolph picked up the portmanteau and started
for the hotel. He walked warily now, with a new interest in life,
and then, suddenly thinking of his own miraculous escape, he paused,
wondering if he ought not to warn his benefactor of the perils of the
rotten wharf; but he had already disappeared. The bag was not heavy, but
he found that in his exhausted state this new exertion was telling,
and he was glad when he reached the hotel. Equally glad was he in his
dripping clothes to slip by the porter, and with the key in his pocket
ascend unnoticed to 74.

Yet had his experience been larger he might have spared himself that
sensitiveness. For the hotel was one of those great caravansaries
popular with the returning miner. It received him and his gold dust in
his worn-out and bedraggled working clothes, and returned him the next
day as a well-dressed citizen on Montgomery Street. It was hard indeed
to recognize the unshaven, unwashed, and unkempt "arrival" one met on
the principal staircase at night in the scrupulously neat stranger one
sat opposite to at breakfast the next morning. In this daily whirl of
mutation all identity was swamped, as Randolph learned to know.

At present, finding himself in a comfortable bedroom, his first act
was to change his wet clothes, which in the warmer temperature and
the decline of his feverishness now began to chill him. He opened the
portmanteau and found a complete suit of clothing, evidently a foreign
make, well preserved, as if for "shore-going." His pride would have
preferred a humbler suit as lessening his obligation, but there was no
other. He discovered the purse, a chamois leather bag such as miners and
travelers carried, which contained a dozen gold pieces and some paper
notes. Taking from it a single coin to defray the expenses of a meal, he
restrapped the bag, and leaving the key in the door lock for the benefit
of his returning host, made his way to the dining room.

For a moment he was embarrassed when the waiter approached him
inquisitively, but it was only to learn the number of his room to
"charge" the meal. He ate it quickly, but not voraciously, for his
appetite had not yet returned, and he was eager to get back to the
room and see the stranger again and return to hi