Matt told him, and also gave Andrew Dilks a brief bit of his history. The auctioneer listened with interest, and then told a number of things concerning himself. He had been with Caleb Gulligan four years. He had been sick several times, but, nevertheless, had managed to save a hundred and thirty-five dollars.
“I’ve got seventy-five dollars saved, part of which I got from other brokers than Mr. Fenton, for running errands, and so forth,” said Matt. “That and your money would make two hundred and ten dollars. Couldn’t we start out on that?”
“We might,” replied Andrew Dilks reflectively. “You are on your way to work now, are you not?”
“Yes, and I ought to be at the office this minute!” cried Matt, with a start. “Mr. Fenton will be 31 tearing mad, I know. But I won’t care—that is, if we come to a deal.”
“Come and see me this evening, then. I am stopping at the Columbus Hotel, on the Bowery.”
“I know the place, and I’ll be up at seven o’clock,” returned Matt; and on this agreement the two separated.
“My, but I would like to become a traveling auctioneer!” said the boy to himself, as he hurried down Broadway. “I wish I had enough money so that we could go in as equal partners. He seems a first-rate chap in every way, and honest, too, or he would not have gotten into that row over the five-dollar counterfeit.”
Matt had lost much time in talking to Andrew Dilks, and now, in order to reach Wall street the quicker, he hopped upon the tail-end of a dray that was moving rapidly toward the Battery.
“Beating the cable cars out of a nickel!” he called to the driver, and that individual smiled grimly, and said nothing.
Less than ten minutes later the boy entered the stock-broker’s main office. He was just about to pass into Randolph Fenton’s private apartment when the figure of a man moving rapidly down the street attracted his attention. It was the red 32 mustached man who had created the trouble at the auction store.