When Rodney came home at supper time he found Mike, dressed in his Sunday suit.
“What’s up now, Mike?” he asked. “Have you retired from business?”
“Yes, from the bootblack business. Tomorrow I shall be a telegraph boy.”
“That is good. You haven’t saved up ten dollars, have you?”
“I saved up two, and a lady gave me ten dollars for findin’ her pocketbook.”
“That’s fine, Mike.”
There chanced to be a special demand for telegraph boys at that time, and Mike, who was a sharp lad, on passing the necessary examination, was at once set to work.
He was immensely fond of his blue uniform when he first put it on, and felt that he had risen in the social scale. True, his earnings did not average as much, but he was content with smaller pay, since the duties were more agreeable.
In the evenings under Rodney’s instruction he devoted an hour and sometimes two to the task of making up the deficiencies in his early education. These were extensive, but Mike was naturally a smart boy, and after a while began to improve rapidly.
So three months passed. Rodney stood well in with Mr. Goodnow, and was promoted to stock clerk. The discipline which he had revived as a student stood him in good stead, and enabled him to make more rapid advancement than some who had been longer in the employ of the firm. In particular he was promoted over the head of Jasper Redwood, a boy two years older than himself, who was the nephew of an old employee who had been for fifteen years in the house.