"Are Travers and I to go, too?"
"No; you can stay here. I'll direct you to a cheap boarding-house, where you can await my orders. I may take Travers with me."
This arrangement did not suit Brandon very well, though it might had he been entrusted with a liberal sum of money. But Colonel Johnson, having lost the valuable prize for which he had striven, was in no mood to be generous. He agreed to be responsible for Brandon's board, but only gave him two dollars for outside expenses, thus enforcing a degree of temperance which was very disagreeable to Brandon.
CHAPTER XXXII. GRIT RECEIVES A BUSINESS LETTER.
Grit returned to his old business, but I am obliged to confess that he was not as well contented with it as he had been a week previous. The incidents of the past four days had broadened his views, and given him thoughts of a career which would suit him better. He earned a dollar and a quarter during the day, and this made a very good average. Multiply it by six, and it stood for an income of seven dollars and a half per week. This, to be sure, was not a large sum, but it was quite sufficient to maintain the little household in a degree of comfort which left nothing to be desired.
"It's all very well now," thought Grit, "but it won't lead to anything. I'm so old now"—he was not quite sixteen—"that I ought to be getting hold of some business that I can follow when I am a man. I don't mean to be a boatman when I am twenty-five years old."
There was something in this, no doubt. Still Grit need not have felt in such a hurry. He was young enough to wait. Waiting, however, is a very bad thing for boys of his age. I only want to show how his mind was affected, in order that the reader may understand how it happened that he fell unsuspiciously into a trap which Colonel Johnson prepared for him.
After supper—it was two days later—Grit prepared to go to the village. He had a little errand of his own, and besides, his mother wanted a few articles at the grocery-store. Our hero, unlike some boys that I know, was always ready to do any errands for his mother, so that she was spared the trouble of exacting unwilling service.
Grit had done all his business, when he chanced to meet his friend Jesse Burns, who, as I have already said, was the son of the postmaster.