“No; I am in the office of a weekly paper.”

“Oh!” said the bookkeeper, disdainfully. “They pay beggarly salaries at such places.”

“Then I am favored. I receive more than twice as much as I did in your office.”

Chester did not care to just state how much he received.

“That can’t be possible!”

“It is a fact, however. Has Mr. Fairchild returned?”

“No. Why do you want to know?”

“I have no wish to go back, Mr. Mullins. Don’t be apprehensive of that. I don’t wish to disturb Felix.”

Dick Ralston listened with some interest to the conversation.

“It strikes me the kid has come to no harm from being discharged,” he said.