The young man handed our hero an addressed note and told him to deliver it, and wait for an answer. At the same time he gave Ike a quarter to pay his car-fare.
Ike wasn’t spending any money for car-fares, and away he went like a young deer. He reached the house, a nice three-story brown-stone house, located in a side street leading off from Fifth avenue. He rang the bell, and to the colored boy who answered the ring he handed the note and said he was to wait for an answer. He was kept waiting on the stoop for fully fifteen minutes, when the colored boy brought him a note, and handed him twenty-five cents.
“Well,” muttered Ike as he walked away, “this is a great day’s business.”
He observed that the note was addressed in a lady’s fine hand, and in good season he appeared at the office and delivered the missive to young Mr. Burlein, who handed him a half dollar. As Ike passed over the note and received his pay, he observed that Fellman, the senior partner, was glancing out from under his shaggy eyebrows. A moment after Ike had left the office and was walking along in an exuberant feeling at the idea of having made one whole dollar, when he felt a hand laid on his shoulder. He started, and on the instant it shot through his mind that he had been recognized by one or the other of the two men whom he had run across upon the preceding evening, but instead he recognized Fellman.
“Come with me, lad,” said the man.
Ike asked no questions. He was a lightning thinker, and in a few brief seconds quite a volume of conjectures had run through his mind.
The man led our hero down a narrow side street, and then coming to a halt, inquired abruptly:
“Did you deliver a letter this morning?”
“Yes, I did.”
“To whom?”