The Blonde in Lower Six

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It was a night when swirling fog scurried over the high peaks of San Francisco, to settle down in the comparatively windless tranquillity over Chinatown. Having hurried in from the ocean, the fog now became leisurely, settling down slowly upon the carved dragons, the distinctive roofs with their peculiar upturned corners — down to the level of the second- and third-story windows — and stopping.

As I emerged from the Stockton Street Tunnel, I couldn’t help noticing this vagary of the fog and wondering about the reason for it. So many nights I had seen the fog rush breathlessly in over the peaks, pause to hover over Chinatown, then settle to a point where the red neon signs gave it the appearance of fine blood particles suspended in the air in little ominous eddies — and down on the sidewalks there would be no fog at all, only a peculiar hush, a dampness — and a menace.

Behind me, lay the city of San Francisco, modem, up-to-date, plagued with those problems which are brought about by the complexities of civilization. Ahead of me was a section which, so far as the eye could tell, might well have been eight thousand miles away — a section of old Cathay. San Francisco’s Chinatown is like that, and the line of demarcation is as sharp as though it had been etched with the blade of a keen dagger.

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