“Yes, sir; I am always willing to stay when you need me.”
“Good! I shan’t forget it.”
Dodger felt proud of his success, and put away the fifteen dollars with a feeling of satisfaction. He had never saved half that sum in the same time before.
“Curtis Waring did me a favor when he sent me out here,” he reflected; “but as he didn’t mean it, I have no occasion to feel grateful.”
Dodger found that he could live for eight dollars a week, and he began to lay by seven dollars a week with the view of securing funds sufficient to take him back to New York.
He was in no hurry to leave San Francisco, but he felt that Florence might need a friend. But he found that he was making progress slowly.
At that time the price of a first-class ticket to New York was one hundred and twenty-eight dollars, besides the expense of sleeping berths, amounting then, as now, to twenty-two dollars extra. So it looked as if Dodger would be compelled to wait at least six months before he should be in a position to set out on the return journey.
About this time Dodger received a letter from Florence, in which she spoke of her discharge by Mrs. Leighton.
“I shall try to obtain another position as teacher,” she said, concealing her anxiety. “I am sure, in a large city, I can find something to do.”
But Dodger knew better than she the difficulties that beset the path of an applicant for work, and he could not help feeling anxious for Florence.