"
"When Mr. Anderson gets back, he will find it necessary to employ you
as assistant editor, for it won't do to let the paper get back to its
former dulness."
"I will accept," said Harry, "if he makes the offer. I feel more and
more that I must be an editor."
"You are certainly showing yourself competent for the position."
"I have only made a beginning," said our hero, modestly. "In time I
think I could make a satisfactory paper."
One day, about two months after Mr. Anderson's departure, Ferguson
and Harry were surprised, and not altogether agreeably, by the
entrance of John Clapp and Luke Harrison. They looked far from
prosperous. In fact, both of them were decidedly seedy. Going West
had not effected an improvement in their fortunes.
"Is that you, Clapp?" asked Ferguson. "Where did you come from?"
"From St. Louis."
"Then you didn't feel inclined to stay there?"
"Not I. It's a beastly place. I came near starving."
Clapp would have found any place beastly where a fair day's work was
required for fair wages, and my young readers in St. Louis,
therefore, need not heed his disparaging remarks.
"How was it with you, Luke?" asked Harry. "Do you like the West no
better than Clapp?"
"You don't catch me out there again," said Luke. "It isn't what it's
cracked up to be. We had the hardest work in getting money enough to
get us back.
Pages:
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212