Part 12 (1/2)

”Great Heavens, no! I don't want to hire any boy.”

And so it went, hour after hour, until the future, which had looked so beautiful in the morning, gradually became overcast with clouds, and the poor lad was forced to stop and rest from sheer weariness.

He kept it up bravely till night, when he started on his return to his lodgings. He found on inquiry that he was several miles distant, his wanderings having covered more ground than he supposed. He had made over thirty applications, and in no instance had he received one grain of encouragement. In more than one case he had been insulted and ordered from the store, followed by the intimation that he was some runaway or thief.

No wonder that Tom felt discouraged and depressed in spirits as he rode homeward in the street-car. He was so wearied that he dropped down in one corner, where he soon fell asleep, not waking until he had gone fully two miles beyond the point where he should have left the vehicle. This sleep so mixed him up that it was nearly ten o'clock when he reached his hotel, as we may call it.

He was hopeful that Jim would have a better story to tell; but to his amazement, he found that his friend, despite the lateness of the hour, had not yet come back. A s.h.i.+ver of alarm pa.s.sed over Tom, for he was certain that some dreadful evil had befallen him.

Most likely he had been waylaid and killed in some of the hundred different ways which the police reports show are adopted by the a.s.sa.s.sins of New York in disposing of their victims.

Chapter X.

Tom's anxiety for his comrade drove all thought of sleep from his eyes for the time; and he sat long in the hot, smoky air of the room down-stairs, in the hope that Jim would come.

It seemed to the watcher that there was an unusually large number of visitors in the house that evening. There was a great deal of drinking and carousing going on, and many of the men gathered there, he was sure, belonged to the lowest grades of society.

A half-dozen foreign nations were represented, and one had but to listen to the talk for a short while to learn that among them were many whom one might well fear to meet on a lonely road at night.

Tom might have felt some dread but for the fact that, rather strangely, these men showed little disposition to engage in any brawl, and no one seemed to notice him.

Late in the evening a couple of policemen came in and waited a while around the stove. They only spoke to the bartender, who treated them with the greatest consideration; but they scrutinized the lad with a curious look, which caused him to wonder whether they held any suspicion of wrong-doing on his part. They said nothing to him, however, and shortly after went out.

Tom's great alarm for Jim drove nearly every other thought from his mind.

Late as it was, he would have started out to search for him, could he have formed the least idea of the course to take; but, besides being a stranger in the city, he knew that a single man or a hundred might spend weeks in hunting for one in the metropolis, without the least probability of finding him.

It was near midnight when he concluded to make his way to the room, hoping that Jim would show up before morning.

The sounds of revelry below, mingled with shouts and the stamping of feet, together with the feverish condition of the lad, kept him awake another hour; but at last he fell into a light, uneasy sleep, haunted by all sorts of grotesque, awful visions.

Suddenly he awoke; in the dim light of his little room Tom saw the figure of a man standing by the bed.

”Who are you? What do you want?” whispered the terrified lad, struggling to rise to a sitting position.

”Mebbe ye doesn't know me, but I'm Patsey McConough, and it was mesilf that saw ye shtrike out so boldly last night and save the gal that had fallen overboard, and St. Patrick himself couldn't have done it any better than did yersilf.”

”What do you mean by coming into my room this way?” asked Tom, whose fear greatly subsided under the words of the Irishman.

”I come up-stairs to wake ye, for I'm afeard ye are going to have trouble onless ye look mighty sharp.”

”What do you mean?”

Patsey carefully closed and bolted the door behind him, and sat down on the edge of the bed, speaking in a low, guarded voice.

”There's a big crowd down-stairs, and Tim's grog is getting to their heads, and they're riddy for any sort of a job. There are a couple of Italian cut-throats, and though I can't understand much of their lingo, yet I cotched enough of the same to make me sartin they mean to rob ye.”

”But would they dare try it in the house here?”