“Maybe she would,” Harry answered. “But Sanger can pay three and I’m going to see that he does it.”
“How?” asked Hansel.
“I’m going to stop there now, see Phin and tell him to make his mother promise not to come down on her price.”
“What are you going to tell Phin?”
“No more than I have to. I’ll tell him that Sanger and Shill are looking for a room, that they can pay three, and will do it if they have to. Then to-morrow you and I, Hansel, will hike around and get a refusal on every decent room there is left.”
“That’s great!” said Bert. “I’d go around with you and help, only I’m afraid I’d get sort of mixed up and hire the rooms by mistake. Landladies can do anything they want with me. The first year I was here I couldn’t get on the campus, and I went to look at a room at Mrs. Stevens’s place. It was a beast of a room, but she took me up three flights of stairs and went to a lot of trouble to show it and so—well, first thing I knew I had taken it for the year!”
“You’d better keep out of it, I guess,” laughed Hansel. “And supposing Bert and I go on to the corner and wait for you, Harry? If we all go in Phin may suspect something. You know he’d forbid us to do what we’re doing if he found out about it.”
“Don’t see why,” Bert objected.
“He would, though,” said Hansel stoutly. “We’ll wait for you at the corner. Don’t stay long; it’s getting frosty.”