"Not so very old. I don"t believe he is over sixty."
Really Mr. Linden was but fifty-four, but, being a confirmed invalid, he looked older.
"Should you say that he was likely to live very long?"
"No," answered Dodger. "He looks as if you could knock him over with a feather. Besides, I"ve heard Florence say that she was afraid her uncle could not live long."
"Probably Curtis Waring is counting upon this. If he can keep Florence and her uncle apart for a few months, Mr. Linden will die, and he will inherit the whole estate. What is this will he speaks of in the letter you showed me?"
"I don"t know, sir."
"Whatever the provisions are, it is evident that he thinks it important to get it into his possession. If favorable to him, he will keep it carefully. If unfavorable, I think a man like him would not hesitate to suppress it."
"No doubt you are right, sir. I don"t know much about wills," said Dodger.
"No; I suppose not. You never made any, I suppose," remarked the reporter, with a smile.
"I never had nothing to leave," said Dodger.
"Anything would be a better expression. As your tutor I feel it inc.u.mbent upon me to correct your grammar."
"I wish you would, Mr. Leslie. What do you mean to do when you get to San Francisco?"
"I shall seek employment on one of the San Farncisco daily papers. Six months or a year so spent will restore my health, and enable me to live without drawing upon my moderate savings."
"I expect I shall have to work, too, to get money to take me back to New York."
And now we must ask the reader to imagine four months and one week pa.s.sed.
There had been favorable weather on the whole, and the voyage was unusually short.
Dodger and the reporter stood on deck, and with eager interest watched the pa.s.sage through the Golden Gate. A little later and the queen city of the Pacific came in sight, crowning the hill on which a part of the city is built, with the vast Palace Hotel a conspicuous object in the foreground.
Chapter XXIV.
Florence In Suspense.
We must now return to New York to Dodger"s old home.
When he did not return at the usual hour, neither Florence nor Mrs.
O"Keefe was particularly disturbed.
It was thought that he had gone on some errand of unusual length, and would return an hour or two late.
Eight o"clock came, the hour at which the boy was accustomed to repair to Florence"s room to study, and still he didn"t make his appearance.
"Dodger"s late this evening, Mrs. O"Keefe," said Florence, going up to the room of her landlady.
"Shure he is. It"s likely he"s gone to Brooklyn or up to Harlem, wid a bundle. He"ll be comin" in soon."
"I hope he will be well paid for the errand, since it keeps him so long."
"I hope so, too, Florence, for he"s a good boy, is Dodger. Did I tell you how he served the rapscallion that tried to stale my apples the other day?"
"No; I would like to hear it."
"A big, black-bearded man came along, and asked me for an apple.
""You can have one for two pennies," says I.
""But I haven"t got them," says he.
""Then you must go widout it," says I.
""We"ll see about that," says he.
"And what do you think?--the fellow picked out one of my biggest apples, and was walkin" away! That made me mad.
""Come back, you thafe of the worruld!" says I.
""Silence, you old hag!" says he.
"Actilly he called me an old hag! I wanted to go after him, but there was two hoodlums hangin" round, and I knew they"d carry off some of my apples, when, just as I was at my wits" end, Dodger came round the corner.
""Dodger," I screamed, "go after that man! He"s taken one of my apples, widout lave or license!"
"Upon that, Dodger, brave as a lion, walked up to the man, and, says he:
""Give back that apple, or pay for it!"
""What"s that to you, you impudent young rascal?" says the man, raisin" the apple to his mouth. But he didn"t get a chance to bite it, for Dodger, with a flip of his hand, knocked it on the sidewalk, and picked it up.
"Wasn"t the man mad just?"
""I"ll smash you, boy," he growled.
""I"m a baggage-smasher myself," says Dodger, "and I can smash as well as you."
"Wid that the man up with his fist and struck at Dodger, but he dodged the blow, and gave him one for himself wid his right. Just then up came a cop.
""What"s all this?" says he.
""That man tried to run off wid one of my apples," says I.
""Come along," says the cop. "You"re wanted at the station-house."