Young Wallingford

Author of THE EARLY BIRD THE MAKING OF BOBBY BURNIT
COPYRIGHT 1910 The Bobbs-Merrill Company
PRESS OF BRAUNWORTH & CO. BOOKBINDERS AND PRINTERS BROOKLYN, N. Y.

A natural again!” exulted Jonathan Reuben Wix, as the dice bounded from his plump hand and came to rest upon the billiard-table in Leiniger’s Select Café, with a five and a deuce showing. “Somebody ring the bell for me, because I’m a-going to get off.”
He was a large young man in every dimension, broad of chest and big and pink of face and jovial of eye, and he chuckled as he passed the dice to his left-hand neighbor. There was a hundred dollars on the table and he gathered it up in a wad.
“Good-by, boys, and many merry thanks for these kind contributions,” he bantered as he stuffed the money into his pocket. “It’s me for Bunkville-amidst-the-ferry-boats, on the next Limited.”

He was back in less than three days, having spent just twenty-four hours in New York. The impulsively decided journey was nothing unusual for him, but it had an intimate bearing upon his future in that it forced upon him the confidence of secretive Clifford Gilman, who lived next door.
“Home so soon?” inquired Gilman in surprise. “They must have robbed you!”
“Robbed!” laughed Wix. “I should say not. I didn’t waste a cent. Railroad ticket, sleepers, meals and extra fare on the Limited cost twenty-five each way. That left fifty. My room at the hotel cost five dollars. Breakfast was two dollars; morning drive through Central Park, four; lunch, three-fifty; matinée ticket, with cab each way, five; dinner, eight, with the ordinary champagne of commerce; theater and cab hire, five-fifty; supper, twelve, including a bottle of real champagne at eight dollars, and the balance in tips.”
Clifford gasped as he hungrily reviewed these luscious items.