“No, Bob, I will never take that except as a last resort. While I have my health I shall not allow myself to accept charity. I am not afraid to do any sort of work, and sooner or later I am confident that I shall find employment. This morning I earned seventy five cents shoveling snow from the stoops of houses. This sort of employment, however, is very uncertain, as so little snow falls here; but there are other odd jobs to be done, and I shall try and get my share of them.”
“I didn’t know you was doing that kind of work, Herbert,” said Bob, with a deep drawn sigh. “It ain’t right for a boy with your learnin’ to come down to that.”
“It’s right for me to do anything temporarily to earn an honest penny. One who is above work cannot hope to succeed. I am here, and I am going to stay, and the best I can do is to do always the best I can, and the best I can do just at present is to be a porter, an errand boy, a boy of all work—ready for anything, and willing to do anything, always keeping my eyes open for a chance to go a step higher.
“The trouble with me now, Bob, is that I started in too elegantly at first. I commenced in a broker’s office, when I should have started at the bottom, in order to know anything about the first round of the ladder. I’m at the bottom now, and it looks as if I would have to remain there long enough to learn a good deal about that position.”
“I’m glad you feel that way, Herbert, for I thought you was getting discouraged,” replied Bob, his face brightening up.
“I did feel utterly discouraged for the first two or three weeks; but you know, Bob, one can get used to anything, and I have become sufficiently accustomed to this miserable kind of work, and to the beggarly pennies I earn from time to time, so that it is less cutting to me than at first. I try to content myself with the belief that it will be better by and by, though I get heartsick sometimes. It seems almost useless to try farther for work in any well established business.”
The foregoing will give a very slight idea of the struggle young Randolph made to keep his head above water, and it presents a pretty true picture of the difficulties a boy will ordinarily encounter in attempting to make his way unaided in a great city like New York. Of course difficulties vary in character and severity; but it would not be safe for the average boy to expect to find less than those that surrounded our hero. Some would be more fortunate, while others would be less favored. Herbert Randolph was especially fortunate in meeting Bob Hunter, whose friendship proved as true as steel. What would have become of him while in the hands of old Gunwagner, but for Bob’s effort to rescue him? And, again, how could he have fought away despondency during his enforced idleness had he lived by himself in a cold and cheerless room? Brave and manly as he was, he owed much to his warm hearted companion, whose presence and sympathy revived his drooping and almost crushed spirits.
As the days passed by, Herbert Randolph turned his attention to the most practical purposes. He almost entirely gave up looking for a steady situation, and devoted his time to doing whatever odd jobs he could hit upon that would bring him in a little money. Among the many kinds of humble employment to which he bent his energies was that of working the hoist. In New York the tall warehouses, those not supplied with an elevator, have a windlass at the top, to which is attached a heavy rope, that passes down through a wide opening to the ground floor. This rope, with a large iron hook at the end, is attached to heavy cases, or whatever is to be taken to any of the upper lofts. Another rope, passing over a big wheel, when pulled turns the windlass. This winds the main rope around it, and thus draws it up, taking with it its load, whatever that may be. Perhaps no harder or less poetic work to an educated boy could be found than this; yet Herbert Randolph did not hesitate to throw off his coat, and work with an aching back and smarting hands as few porters would do.
He worked faithfully and honestly, with no hope of reward other than the money he would earn by his labor. And yet this very employment—this humble porter work—opened up to him an opportunity of which he had never dreamed—suggested to him an idea that he never before thought of.
It came about in this way. One day, after he had toiled for two hours or so on the hoist, and had finished his work, he went up to the cashier to get his money, as he had done many times before. A man with a satchel strapped to his shoulder was just ahead of him.