Our hero told of his adventure in the bar-room.
"So you have not spent any of this money?"
"That is well," said the broker, approvingly. "It shows that you have more good sense than most boys of your class. Now I have a proposition to make to you. How should you like to enter this office?"
"Yes, sir; there aint any chance to rise in the paper business."
"And here, if you do your duty, there will be a chance to rise."
"Very well, I will tell you what I will do. You did me a signal service last night. You saved me from losing a large sum of money, and, what is worse, from serious personal injury. I want to do some thing for you in return. I think you are a smart boy, and, what is better, an honest and trustworthy boy. It so happens that my youngest clerk is in poor health, and is about to leave my employment. I will give you his place."
"As to salary I shall for the present give you the same you have been earning by selling papers,—that is, eight dollars a week. It is nearly double what I have been accustomed to pay, but that is of no consequence. Besides this, I will give you two hundred dollars to add to your fund in the savings-bank, increasing it to five hundred."
"I owe you some kindness," said Mr. Turner. "There are other ways in which I shall find an opportunity to serve you. But of that we will speak here-after. When do you want to come?"
"Then let it be next Monday morning, at nine o'clock. James will remain a week or two, till you get a little familiar with your duties. And now, my young friend, this is all the time I can spare you this morning. Good-by till Monday."
Mr. Turner shook hands with Rufus, and the latter left the office with the strange feeling which we always have when a great change is going to take place in our course of life. He was about to bid farewell to the life of a newsboy, and enter upon a business career in Wall Street. He could not help feeling a thrill of new importance as he thought of this, and his ambition was roused. Why should he not rise to a position of importance like the men whom he had heard of and seen, whose beginnings had been as humble as his own? He determined to try, at all events.
He returned to Miss Manning to acquaint her and Rose with his good fortune. The seamstress seemed quite impressed with the news.