"Yes. Let me show you the way."
The room was on the third floor. It was a small one, but would answer the purpose. Bert took out his clothes, and laid them away in the pine bureau near the window.
"Well," he said, as he waited for the bell to summon him to supper, "I have taken the first step toward finding Ralph Harding. I am occupying the room which was once his. What shall be the next step?"
He little anticipated the singular experience that same evening had in store for him.
CHAPTER XXVII.
A BOARDING-HOUSE IN HARRISBURG.
At the supper table Bert made acquaintance with his fellow-boarders. There were eight in all. Three of them worked in the shoe factory where Ralph Harding had been employed, two young ladies were saleswomen in a dry-goods store, Professor Silvio and wife taught a dancing school, and the eighth was the landlady's daughter, a young woman of twenty-five, who resembled Mrs. Stubbs closely. Bert learned afterward that she was employed in a millinery store.
"Gentlemen and ladies," said Mrs. Stubbs, as Bert took the vacant chair that had been assigned to him, "let me introduce a new boarder, Mr. Barton."