OCR Text |
Show Chapter 1: I Seek My Fortune Hy tale begins on July 15, 1897* the day I saw the grizzled old man dragging his worn leather suitcases down the gangplank of the steamer, Excelsior, just docked in the San Francisco harbor. I was thirteen years old that summer, the youngest of the hack drivers on the waterfront, transporting with my rented horse and wagon anything the steamers discharged. But that July morning when the stubby Excelsior spewed out her motely-looking passengers, even the oldest hack driver, Old Andy, held his horse in rein. Behind the old man a cluster of men and women staggered down the gangplank, dragging suitcases and boxes. They all had the same fearful look, as if when they collapsed on land, their old bulging suitcases would begin dragging them. "Cannibals," I thought. And so must have Rexy, my horse, |