TOM, THE BOOTBLACK.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCING TOM, THE BOOTBLACK.
"How do you feel this morning, Jacob?" asked a boy of fifteen, bending over an old man crouched in the corner of an upper room, in a poor tenement-house, distant less than a quarter of a mile from the New York City Hall.
"Weak, Tom," whined the old man, in reply. "I—I ain't got much strength."
"Would you like some breakfast?"
"I—I don't know. Breakfast costs money."
"Never you mind about that, Jacob. I can earn money enough for both of us. Come, now, you'd like some coffee and eggs, wouldn't you?"
There was a look of eager appetite in the old man's eyes as he heard the boy speak.
"Yes," he answered, "I should like them; but we can't afford it."