'Please direct me to some little house where I can obtain a lodging,' he asked of a policeman who was walking on the pavement.
The constable, a fine, burly fellow, surveyed our hero from head to foot. Then he smiled at him, and brought a massive hand on to his shoulder.
'Come along with me,' he said. 'My missus wants a lodger. I was told this morning when I went off on duty that I was to try and hear of one. You'd do for a time. How'd you like to come?'
David smiled back at him promptly. 'Splendid!' he cried. 'I'd be glad to come. I shall be saved heaps of trouble hunting for a room.'
That night he slipped into a cosy bed between the cleanest sheets feeling that fortune had been really kind to him; for since he left home he had done nothing but make friends. There was Andus, the breezy sailor, Mrs. Cartwell, to say nothing of Dick, her jovial son. And now there was the constable; for a nicer fellow than Constable Hemming did not exist, while his wife took a motherly interest in David. It was a good start in life; but would the future be equally prosperous?
CHAPTER III
Wanted a Job
The rattle of wheels in the street outside, and the brilliant rays of the morning sun awakened David on his first morning in London. In a twinkling he was up and dressed.
'Suppose you've come up to start life, sir,' said Constable Hemming when his lodger put in an appearance. 'Breakfast's ready, and you can have it at the back in the parlour, or here in the kitchen along with the missus and me.'