“I don’t know.”
“That is what I thought, so I just did the ‘think’ for you, and for the present you are all right.”
We will not relate all the arguments Ike used to induce the poor widow with her child to move into his rooms. He succeeded, however, and he set right to work to move her few things upstairs; she and her daughter were to occupy one room, and Ike determined to take possession of the bed formerly used by his late master, and he did so with the remark.
“I am the boss now.”
That same evening the woman whom he had befriended and whose name was Pell, said:
“As soon as I am well I will repay you for all you have done for us.”
“All right, we will wait until you are well.”
A few days passed. Ike had not fully determined on what he would do, as his provisions were fast being devoured. He had no money to pay his rent on the rooms, and in a most startling manner he learned that he must pay for the rooms or—well, he adopted the or—for he was fully assured that the contemptible landlord had determined to take a mean advantage. In some way the fellow learned or suspected that the man who had paid him for the rooms had gone away. He possibly suspected that the rooms had been paid for in advance to the advantage of the boy, and the widow and her child. At any rate one night he called and demanded the month’s rent.
“No rent is due you,” said Ike; “you have been paid three months in advance from the first of last month.”
“I have, eh?”