She never permitted an indecorum in public.She never countenanced the familiarities of California society.She declaimed against the prevailing tone of infidelity and scepticism in religion.Few people who were present will ever forget the dignified yet stately manner with which she rebuked Mr.Hamilton in the public parlor for entering upon the discussion of a work on materialism, lately published; and some among them, also, will not forget the expression of amused surprise on Mr.Hamilton's face, that gradually changed to sardonic gravity, as he courteously waived his point; certainly not Mr.Oakhurst, who, from that moment, began to be uneasily impatient of his friend, and even--if such a term could be applied to any moral quality in Mr.Oakhurst--to fear him.
For during this time Mr.Oakhurst had begun to show symptoms of a change in his usual habits.He was seldom, if ever, seen in his old haunts, in a bar-room, or with his old associates.Pink and white notes, in distracted handwriting, accumulated on the dressing-table in his rooms at Sacramento.It was given out in San Francisco that he had some organic disease of the heart, for which his physician had prescribed perfect rest.He read more; he took long walks; he sold his fast horses; he went to church.
I have a very vivid recollection of his first appearance there.He did not accompany the Deckers, nor did he go into their pew, but came in as the service commenced, and took a seat quietly in one of the back-pews.By some mysterious instinct, his presence became presently known to the congregation, some of whom so far forgot themselves, in their curiosity, as to face around, and apparently address their responses to him.Before the service was over, it was pretty well understood that "miserable sinners" meant Mr.
Oakhurst.Nor did this mysterious influence fail to affect the officiating clergyman, who introduced an allusion to Mr.Oakhurst's calling and habits in a sermon on the architecture of Solomon's temple, and in a manner so pointed, and yet labored, as to cause the youngest of us to flame with indignation.Happily, however, it was lost upon Jack: I do not think he even heard it.His handsome, colorless face, albeit a trifle worn and thoughtful, was inscrutable.
Only once, during the singing of a hymn, at a certain note in the contralto's voice, there crept into his dark eyes a look of wistful tenderness, so yearning and yet so hopeless, that those who were watching him felt their own glisten.Yet I retain a very vivid remembrance of his standing up to receive the benediction, with the suggestion, in his manner and tightly-buttoned coat, of taking the fire of his adversary at ten paces.After church, he disappeared as quietly as he had entered, and fortunately escaped hearing the comments on his rash act.His appearance was generally considered as an impertinence, attributable only to some wanton fancy, or possibly a bet.One or two thought that the sexton was exceedingly remiss in not turning him out after discovering who he was; and a prominent pew-holder remarked, that if he couldn't take his wife and daughters to that church, without exposing them to such an influence, he would try to find some church where he could.Another traced Mr.
Oakhurst's presence to certain Broad Church radical tendencies, which he regretted to say he had lately noted in their pastor.
Deacon Sawyer, whose delicately-organized, sickly wife had already borne him eleven children, and died in an ambitious attempt to complete the dozen, avowed that the presence of a person of Mr.
Oakhurst's various and indiscriminate gallantries was an insult to the memory of the deceased, that, as a man, he could not brook.
It was about this time that Mr.Oakhurst, contrasting himself with a conventional world in which he had hitherto rarely mingled, became aware that there was something in his face, figure, and carriage quite unlike other men,--something, that, if it did not betray his former career, at least showed an individuality and originality that was suspicious.In this belief, he shaved off his long, silken mustache, and religiously brushed out his clustering curls every morning.He even went so far as to affect a negligence of dress, and hid his small, slim, arched feet in the largest and heaviest walking-shoes.There is a story told that he went to his tailor in Sacramento, and asked him to make him a suit of clothes like everybody else.The tailor, familiar with Mr.Oakhurst's fastidiousness, did not know what he meant."I mean," said Mr.
Oakhurst savagely, "something RESPECTABLE,--something that doesn't exactly fit me, you know." But, however Mr.Oakhurst might hide his shapely limbs in homespun and homemade garments, there was something in his carriage, something in the pose of his beautiful head, something in the strong and fine manliness of his presence, something in the perfect and utter discipline and control of his muscles, something in the high repose of his nature,--a repose not so much a matter of intellectual ruling as of his very nature,--that, go where he would, and with whom, he was always a notable man in ten thousand.Perhaps this was never so clearly intimated to Mr.Oakhurst, as when, emboldened by Mr.Hamilton's advice and assistance, and his own predilections, he became a San Francisco broker.Even before objection was made to his presence in the Board,--the objection, I remember, was urged very eloquently by Watt Sanders, who was supposed to be the inventor of the "freezing-out" system of disposing of poor stockholders, and who also enjoyed the reputation of having been the impelling cause of Briggs of Tuolumne's ruin and suicide,--even before this formal protest of respectability against lawlessness, the aquiline suggestions of Mr.
