She laughed. "You'll be the first that ever got anything out of an instalment dealer!"
"I'll get it," he assured her. "If I don't get quite enough from him, I'll borrow the rest for you."
She looked at him sharply. "That means you'd loan it all. You're mighty kind. But I could never pay it back—to take it would be the same as stealing. I've never stolen from friends, and I'm not going to begin now."
But in the end Rogers prevailed; and when they left it had been settled that Kate was immediately to enter a business school.
Two days before—after Tom had gratefully refused a second better-paying job—David had had a conference with the Mayor. "I been doin' my best talkin' to get him to go," the Mayor said despairingly, "but he says I was good to him when he needed a job and now he's never goin' to leave me. Say, if I don't get rid o' him pretty soon, I got to start my own dish factory. And here's an interestin' point for you, friend: since he's had them better offers he's been hintin' at a raise."
When David entered his room, after telling Rogers good night, he found Tom, who had avoided him the night before and all the day, sitting far down in the rocking-chair, wrapped in dejection. He understood the boy's gloom, for he had suggested a plan to the Mayor.
Tom dropped his eyes when David came in, and answered David's "Hello there," with only a mumble. But at length he looked guiltily up.
"Is dat job you was tellin' me about took yet?" he asked.
David tried to wear an innocent face. "Why? What's the matter?"
"De boss told me yesterday he was losin' money, dat he'd have to cut down his force, an' dat he'd have to let me go."