Bob Chester's Grit; Or, From Ranch to Riches

"Hey, boy! What's your name?"

"Bob Chester."

"Where are you going with that basket of groceries?"

"To deliver an order to one of my guardian's customers."

"Are you honest?"

"I hope so, sir," replied Bob, his face expressing surprise that his probity should be questioned.

The man who had hailed Bob Chester appeared to be about twenty-five years old, and his clothes were well-fitting, giving him the air of a man of means. With him were two other men; one of whom, several years older, was also well dressed. The third member of the group was entirely different from the others. His clothes were grotesque, and bore every trace of having been purchased in some country store. His derby hat was green-black, and apparently a size too small, judging from the manner in which it rested on his head. Had not his appearance bespoken that he was a stranger come from the country to see the sights of New York, his face, sunburned and honest, would have proclaimed him as one unaccustomed and unfamiliar with the wiles of a great city.

Prior to his having been addressed, the boy who had given his name as Bob Chester had noticed the difference between the three men as they stood in earnest conversation on the sidewalk, and instinctively he had been attracted by the frankness of the countryman's face. He had been wondering why the two New Yorkers were so interested in the other man, but the unexpectedness of his being accosted had driven all thought from his mind, and he had given his answers as though compelled by the searching glance the younger of the two men had directed at him.

All three watched him intently, and as he made his answer that he hoped he was honest, the elder of the New Yorkers exclaimed:

"I think he will do, Harry."

"Well, if you say so, all right," returned the other, and then turning to Bob, he asked:

"Would your guardian object seriously if you did not deliver your order for about half an hour?"

"I don't know. Saturday is always a busy day at the store, and Mr. Dardus always scolds me if I don't get right back. It doesn't make any difference to him how far I have to go, he always thinks I should be back within fifteen minutes after I have started. So I'd rather not delay-because I don't like to be scolded," added the boy, as though by way of apologizing for his refusal.

"Well, if we gave you a dollar, don't you think you could stand the old man's scolding, if you were half an hour late?" asked the elder of the New Yorkers, at the same time putting his hand in his pocket and drawing forth a large roll of bills, which he opened ostentatiously. The figures were so large that Bob's eyes seemed as though they would pop out of his head, so eagerly did they scan them. The man extracted a dollar bill.

The sight of so much money in the possession of one man fairly hypnotized the boy, and he replied:

"Do you mean you will give me a whole dollar if I will wait here half an hour?"

"That's what!" exclaimed the man with the roll of bills. "But there is a little more to it. Our friend, Mr. Anthony Simpkins, and we, have an important business transaction in hand, involving fifteen hundred dollars. My friend and I don't happen to have more than five hundred dollars with us, while Mr. Simpkins has seven hundred and fifty, and so we want you to hold this money while my friend and I go to our bank and get the two hundred and fifty dollars more, which is our share in the deal."

"What, me hold twelve hundred and fifty dollars!" exclaimed Bob, as though unable to believe his ears. "Why, you don't know anything about me. I might run off with it."

"You look honest," replied the man who had hailed him, "and that's why we stopped you. Besides, you wouldn't be able to run away if you wanted to, because Mr. Simpkins is going to wait here with you until we return."

"And you will give me a dollar just for keeping the money until you come back?" demanded Bob.

"Exactly."

"All right. That's half as much as I get for working a week."

"That's the boy. I am glad to see that you have the sense of thrift so strongly developed. Now we will just put Mr. Simpkins' seven hundred and fifty dollars and our five hundred dollars in this envelope, which you will keep until we return."

As he spoke, the elder of the New Yorkers counted out five hundred dollars, put it in the envelope, and then asked the countryman for his share. After verifying the amount, he placed it with the other money, then handed an envelope to Bob, exclaiming:

"Now you two stay right here, and we will be back within fifteen minutes."

"All right, sir," said Bob, as he grasped the envelope. And as his fingers closed about it, he unconsciously threw back his head, and squared his shoulders, proud of the thought that he had been selected as the custodian of such a large sum of money.

Again repeating their promise to return within a quarter of an hour, the two New Yorkers hastened away, and were soon lost among the people who thronged the thoroughfare.

Oblivious as the people who live in New York are to the presence of their fellowmen, the sight of the man so obviously from the country and the bright-eyed, alert boy, closely clasping the envelope in one hand, while at his feet rested the basket packed with groceries, attracted many a passing glance.

Between Simpkins and Bob, however, no words were exchanged; though each, while apparently gazing at the passersby, kept a sharp lookout upon the other.

Minute after minute went by, without the return of the two men, who had said they were going to the bank for money, and as the time wore on without their re-appearance, Simpkins exclaimed:

"I wonder what's keeping them? I don't want to stand here all day."

"And I can't," said Bob. "I will be more than half an hour late in getting back to the store, and I know Mr. Dardus will be very angry. I most wish I hadn't said I'd wait. It just shows that Mr. Dardus is right when he says there is no pleasure in having money that isn't earned honestly, and getting a dollar for just holding this money isn't really honest work."

"Well, if you think you ought to be delivering your groceries, why not give the envelope to me? I'll stay here and wait, though I must say I am getting tired."

"Oh, no," said Bob. "I gave my word that I would stay, and I will."

The countryman's suggestion that he be intrusted with the money aroused Bob's suspicion, for he remembered that the others had placed five hundred dollars in the envelope, and he thought it was a scheme on the part of Simpkins to get possession of this money. So that after this interchange of words, both lapsed into silence.

As the quarter hour lengthened into a half, then to three-quarters, and finally to an hour, without the re-appearance of the two well-dressed New Yorkers, Bob's dread of his guardian's anger outweighed his desire to earn the dollar, and he finally exclaimed:

"I can't wait any longer; honest I can't." And then, chancing to catch sight of a policeman standing on the corner about a hundred feet away, a way out of the difficulty suggested itself, and he said to the countryman:

"I tell you how we can fix it. We will go over to that policeman and explain the matter to him, and I'll ask him to hold the envelope until those men come back."

And without giving Simpkins time to protest, Bob picked up his basket, and led the way to where the guardian of the law was standing, indolently surveying the crowd.

Casting a contemptuous glance at the two ludicrous figures that approached him, the policeman first listened to the excited explanation of the boy indifferently, then with incredulity, and finally with amusement.

"I have heard of such easy marks, but I never expected to see them in flesh and blood," exclaimed the officer, when Bob stopped speaking. "So you think you are holding some money in that envelope, do you, kid? Well, I'll bet a year's pay that there is nothing in it but old paper."

And while the countryman and the boy gazed at him in speechless dismay, the policeman took the envelope from Bob's hand, opened it, and drew forth to their startled gaze a roll of tissue-paper.

"I told you so," grunted the policeman, but further comment was interrupted by the actions of Simpkins.

No sooner had he discovered that he had been swindled than he shouted at the top of his lungs:

"I've been robbed! I've been robbed! They've stolen seven hundred and fifty dollars from me!"

The loud, excited words and the gesticulations of the grotesquely-garbed man quickly drew the attention of the passersby, and in a trice the victims of the swindlers and the policeman were the center of a curious throng of people.

"I want my money! I want my money!" bellowed Simpkins.

"You stand a fine chance of getting it," returned the policeman, "but I will do what I can for you. I'll take you around to the police station, and you can make a complaint to the sergeant and give him a description of the 'con' men."

As word of the swindle was passed among the crowd, various were the comments and bits of advice offered.

At first Bob had been too stunned by the discovery that he had been made an innocent party to the swindle even to think, but as he gradually recovered from the unpleasant surprise, his one thought was to get away from Simpkins, to deliver his groceries and get back to the store as quickly as possible. In order to carry out this plan, he began to worm his way through the constantly increasing crowd.

One of the men who were offering advice chanced to see him, and cried:

"There goes the boy! He was probably standing in with the swindlers. Why don't you arrest him, Mr. Officer?"

"That's the thing to do," agreed several others, and the policeman, evidently thinking that it would be a wise procedure for him to seize some one in connection with the swindle, leaped after Bob, grasped him roughly by the shoulder, and started for the station-house, followed by Simpkins and those of the crowd who had nothing better to do.

Arrived at the police station, the countryman and the patrolman both talked at once, while Bob stood in silence, overcome by the disgrace of his arrest.

Taking his pencil, the sergeant stopped the countryman's torrent of words, and began to ask him questions as to his meeting with the strangers, eliciting the information that he had met them coming over on the ferry-boat from Jersey City, and that the business deal they had proposed was the betting of fifteen hundred dollars on a race horse that was sure to win.

"It's a pity there isn't a law to keep you country people out of the cities," grunted the sergeant, when the details of the story had been told him, and then, turning to the policeman, he said:

"You did right in bringing along the boy, McCarty. He is evidently one of the gang, or he wouldn't have been passing along the street just as he was. We may be able to learn from him who the 'con' men are, and where they hang out. Search him, and then take him back to a cell. I'll send a couple of plain-clothes men in to talk with him."

And grabbing Bob by the arm, the policeman dragged him toward the door which led to a cell.

* * *

Among those who had heard the story of the swindling of the countryman were several reporters for the great metropolitan afternoon papers, and as the burly policeman dragged the pathetic figure of the grocer's boy to the cell, one of these, a particularly clean-cut, wide-awake young fellow, exclaimed:

"Sergeant, that's the rawest thing I ever saw you do. I don't believe that boy knows anything more about those 'con' men, and probably not as much, as you do. It's a shame to lock him up, and I am going to give you the hottest roast for doing so that the paper will stand for."

"You do, and you'll never set foot inside this station while I'm in charge," retorted the officer. "If you knew as much about old Dardus as I do, you wouldn't be so keen to champion this boy. The old man has been mixed up in many a questionable transaction, and I shouldn't be surprised if it turned out that he was in league with these fellows who got that country bumpkin's seven hundred and fifty dollars, and that he put the boy up to playing the part he did."

"I don't know anything about Dardus," announced the reporter who had taken up the cudgel in Bob's behalf, "and I don't care. If he is mixed up in questionable dealings, that doesn't mean that the boy is necessarily a party to them. You can't tell me that a chap, with a face as honest as that boy has, is a criminal."

"When you've been doing police stations longer, Foster, you will learn that you can't judge criminals by their faces," snarled the sergeant, and as the other reporters heard this caustic comment, they laughed uproariously.

"Laugh if you want to," returned Bob's champion, "but I am going to prove the boy's innocence of any complicity in the swindle."

And without more ado, the reporter left the police station.

Although the representatives of the other papers had sided in with the police official who announced his belief in Bob's guilt, they nevertheless experienced a feeling of uneasiness, lest Foster might after all be right, and they were holding consultation as to the advisability of investigating the story more thoroughly, when the sergeant exclaimed:

"Don't let that fellow worry you. I've known Len Dardus for years. He's as crooked as they make them, and he never had an honest man work for him that I know of."

As the acceptance of the police official's theory would save them the necessity of investigating the story further, the reporters agreed to accept his version, and to accord with it they wrote their stories.

As Jack Foster left the police station, his anger at the system which made it impossible for a person without influence or money to obtain justice, was strong, and his heart went out to the boy, as he thought how he would feel, were he himself in his place.

"If that boy isn't honest from the soles of his feet to the top of his head, I shall be the most surprised man in New York," he said to himself, "and if my paper has any influence, I am going to get him out of his trouble."

Occupied with considering various plans for aiding Bob, Foster quickly reached the store of Len Dardus, but as he entered and caught sight of an old, gray-haired man, with a face in which craftiness was the chief characteristic, he wondered if, after all, the police sergeant could have been right.

"Is this Mr. Len Dardus?" asked Foster, walking up to the counter, behind which this repelling creature stood.

"That's my name," snapped the proprietor of the store, adding as he scrutinized his questioner closely:

"What do you want?"

"I want to know if you have a boy working for you by the name of Bob Chester."

"I have, but I won't have after to-night, I can tell you. I have no use for lazy boys, and for laziness he can't be beaten. Here I sent him to deliver some goods more than two hours ago, and he hasn't got back yet, and this is my busiest day."

So disagreeable was the tone in which the old man spoke that Foster could not refrain from remarking:

"Well, you do not seem to be overrushed with trade just now. However, that is neither here nor there. How long have you had Bob in your employ?"

"Ever since he was big enough to be of any service to me."

"He's a good boy, isn't he?"

"No, he's not. Didn't I just tell you he has been gone over two hours, delivering an order that should not have taken him more than fifteen minutes at the most? No good boy would dawdle so about his business. But why do you ask?"

Foster, however, was not ready to tell Bob's employer of his predicament until he had obtained more information about the boy, and instead of answering the question, said:

"You misunderstood my meaning. I want to know whether or not he is honest or has any bad habits."

"He has the habit of taking a long time to deliver his orders, and he always has some plausible excuse for the delay-although I never accept his excuses. It isn't the way to bring up a boy. But he doesn't steal, and I don't let him go out nights, so he can't have any companions. But why do you ask? What business of yours is it?"

"Just one more question before I answer you."

"You seem mighty long on questions, but I'll not answer another one until you tell me why you are taking such pains to find out about Bob. He hasn't any friend but me. I'm his guardian."

So hostile was the grocer's manner becoming, and with such increasing suspicion did he view his inquisitor, that Foster realized it would be necessary to explain Bob's predicament were he to be able to help him, and briefly he told the story that had been repeated in the police station.

"That just goes to show my theory is right," declared the grocer, when he had been given the particulars of his ward's arrest. "If Bob had gone about his business and delivered the order, instead of being tempted by the offer of a dollar, he wouldn't have got into this trouble. It will be a good lesson for him, and I shall be able to get along some way, I suppose, until he comes back."

"But surely you don't mean to say that you are not going to do anything to help him out of his trouble?" exclaimed Foster in amazement, as he heard the heartless words.

With a depreciating shrug of his shoulders, Len Dardus responded:

"But what can I do? It will cost money to hire a lawyer, or even to bail him out. Besides, as I said, it will be a good lesson for him."

"But hasn't he any money of his own?" queried the reporter.

"What do you want to know for? Are you a lawyer? No, sir! if you are, and have come to tell me about Bob in the hope that I will hire you, you might as well go back to your place of business. I won't spend a cent on him. The lesson will do him good."

The heartlessness of the grocer incensed Foster, and he retorted:

"It happens that I am not a lawyer, so it isn't any money that I am after. I am acting simply from a desire to see the boy get fair treatment, and if I were his guardian, whether he had any money or not, I would do everything in my power to help him out of his trouble."

"But what can I do? There is no one to stay in the store here, and I don't see how I could help any way."

"You could go down to the police station and speak a word for the lad. If you have had the care of him for so long, what you could say in regard to his honesty ought to be sufficient to cause his release."

As he mentioned the grocer's going to the police station, Foster thought he noticed the old man tremble, as though in fear, and what the sergeant had said about Dardus recurred to him, and while he hesitated as to whether or not he should press the point, Bob's guardian exclaimed:

"I can't go now. There is no one to look after the store. But perhaps I can go down this evening."

"That would be too late. His case will come up in court this afternoon."

"Well, if it does, the boy'll have to take the consequences. I always told him he shouldn't linger over delivering his orders. It will be a good lesson to him."

The incessant repetition of the last words grated on Foster's ears, and, realizing that he was only wasting time in trying to persuade the hard-hearted guardian to help his ward, he exclaimed:

"Then you refuse to do anything to assist Bob, do you?"

"Well, I don't know as I would put it exactly that way. I'll see if I can't do something this evening."

"Well, you may be obliged to leave your store, whether you want to or not," retorted Foster, and with this enigmatical remark, the very suggestiveness of which caused an expression of fear to settle on the face of the grocer, the reporter turned on his heel and left the shop.

* * *

While Bob's champion, unknown to the boy, was interesting himself in his cause, Bob was sitting on a little iron bunk his cell contained, staring about him as though unable to comprehend the situation.

After a few minutes he heard footsteps approaching down the corridor, and then he was suddenly aroused from his reverie by a voice exclaiming:

"Well, kid, you came near making a good-sized bit of money."

"I don't call a dollar a very large sum," retorted Bob.

"A dollar? What do you mean?" exclaimed one of the two men whom Bob beheld standing outside the cell door, staring at him through the bars. "You had seven hundred and fifty dollars of that countryman's money, didn't you?"

"I saw seven hundred and fifty dollars of his money put in the envelope, but all I was to get for holding the envelope until those bad men returned was to be one dollar-and they didn't even come back to pay me, and now I haven't delivered the groceries, and Mr. Dardus will be very angry."

"Oh, ho! So you are Len Dardus' kid, are you?" queried the other of Bob's inquisitors.

"I'm not his kid, but he is my guardian," corrected the lad in a voice so full of reproach that the two men could not refrain from smiling.

"Then you don't like Dardus?" smiled the one who had addressed him first.

"I think he is unreasonable," returned Bob.

"Yes, and none too honest," commented the other.

With the various methods known only to the police detectives of the large metropolitan police forces, the two men put Bob through a grilling examination, trying in every possible way to scare him into admitting either a knowledge of who the swindlers were, or of direct complicity in the confidence game, but without being able to shake his story, even in the slightest detail.

Loath as the police officials were to admit Bob's innocence, his straightforward answers and manly manner finally convinced them that he was, as he had said, entirely guiltless, and they withdrew.

As they returned to the outer room of the police station, the sergeant looked at them questioningly.

"That boy had nothing to do with the swindle," announced one of the men who had been examining Bob.

"That's what," confirmed the other. "If there ever was an honest boy in New York, that poor little chap back in the cell is one. If you take my advice, sergeant, you will let him go, and you will change the entry on your police book from 'Arrested and Held for Complicity,' to 'Held for Examination'."

"What's the matter with all you guys, anyway?" snarled the sergeant, as he saw that the weight of opinion was against him. "Has the boy hypnotized you? It's enough to convict him that he should be working for Len Dardus."

"That isn't his fault," returned the officer who had advised the sergeant to change the entry in his book. "His mother and father died when he was three years old, and his father provided in his will that Dardus should be his guardian, though from what the boy has told us, he hasn't had any too happy a time of it, poor little shaver."

"Now don't go turning on the sympathy," growled the sergeant. "I don't care whether the boy is guilty or not. All I know is that we have got to make a case against him. It would never do to have it said that two sharpers could rob a countryman in broad daylight in our precinct. Haven't our reports to headquarters said, and haven't the papers said, that our precinct has been free from all such crimes for more than six months, and this is one of the rawest swindles that has been worked for a long time. So you two get busy and fix up your case if you want to stay in this precinct. If you don't, I'll tell the captain and the inspector, and you will be sorry."

Without response, the two officers, who believed in Bob's innocence, turned on their heels, and started toward the door of the police station.

"Hey, you two! Go down to the court. I am going to send this boy right down, and mind you remember what I told you," shouted the sergeant. And, suiting his action to his words, he gave orders for Bob to be brought from his cell and taken to the police court.

Just as Bob appeared in the outer room of the station house, Foster entered.

As he saw the boy whose cause he had espoused, the reporter exclaimed:

"So you have decided to release him, have you, sergeant?"

"Release nothing," growled the official. "He's on his way to court," and then, as he had read from the expression on Foster's face that his mission to interview Len Dardus had not been altogether satisfactory, he continued: "You found I was pretty near right about old Dardus, didn't you?"

"He surely isn't a very agreeable person," answered the reporter, "and I quite agree with you that if there was money enough in the undertaking, he would never stop to question whether or not it was against the law. But I tell you one thing, sergeant, you are dead wrong about the boy. The old man actually hates him."

"Then it would be an easy way for him to get rid of the kid by getting him into just this kind of a mess."

"Maybe you're right," assented Foster, as this theory was announced, "still I don't believe you are. I am more convinced than ever that the boy had nothing to do with the swindle, and I don't think old Dardus did, either."

"Well, it won't help matters to keep arguing about it here. We'll let the judge decide. McCarty, call a patrol wagon, and take the kid to court."

"Oh, I say! you are surely not going to make that kid ride in the patrol wagon?" protested one of the other newspaper men. "That would be rubbing it in too hard."

Emphatically the others added their protest, and in the face of such opposition, the sergeant countermanded his order for the police wagon, and instead instructed Patrolman McCarty to take the boy to court, which was less than two blocks away.

Surrounded by the reporters, Bob and the patrolman walked down the street, closely followed by the countryman, whose desire to make money without working for it had led to the loss of the seven hundred and fifty dollars.

Arrived at the building in which the court was located, Bob was led away to the detention room, to await the calling of his case, while the reporters and Simpkins made their way direct to the court room.

In due course the case was reached.

When the presiding magistrate caught sight of Bob's sad face, the stern expression on his own countenance relaxed, and he bestowed upon the trembling boy a glance full of encouragement.

Noting this, Foster, who had been watching the judge intently, was inspired with the hope that the boy would be quickly discharged. But his pleasure was only momentary, for, as the magistrate read the charge, his face became even more austere than usual.

"Well, Chester, what have you to say for yourself?" demanded the judge, directing a glance at the boy, as though he would pierce his very soul. "Are you guilty, or not guilty?"

"WELL CHESTER, WHAT HAVE YOU TO SAY FOR YOURSELF?"

Bob Chester's Grit Page 24

The strangeness of the scene and lack of familiarity with the procedure of a court caused Bob to remain silent.

Again the magistrate repeated his question, but still Bob made no reply.

"I think he wants to plead guilty," interposed one of the plain-clothes men whom the sergeant had ordered to make a case against the boy. "Perhaps if you offered to give him a light sentence if he would tell us who the two men are who got away with the money, he would do so."

"How about that?" demanded the magistrate, again directing his gaze at the boy.

But before Bob had a chance to reply, Foster exclaimed:

"He does not want to plead guilty, your honor. This whole business in dragging this boy to court is an outrage. He had no more knowledge of the fact that those men intended to, or were, swindling this man from the country, than you have."

The tone in which the reporter spoke was one that could not fail to be impressive, and after a moment's hesitation, the magistrate, who knew Foster as a reporter and admired him for his manly fearlessness, asked:

"What do you know about the case?"

"I protest, your honor, that this man should not be allowed to interfere with the case," said one of the plain-clothes officers. "He was not a witness of the transaction. I think it would be more proper to hear Simpkins' version of the affair."

"When I wish your advice, officer, I will ask for it," snapped the magistrate, and turning again to Foster, he said:

"Tell me all you know about this business."

"Thank you, your honor, I will:

"I happened to be in the police station when the boy was brought in. He told a straightforward story about having been on the way to deliver some groceries, when he was hailed by one of three men, who asked him a few questions, and then offered him a dollar if he would hold an envelope, which was supposed to contain twelve hundred and fifty dollars, for a few minutes. The thought of earning such a sum of money so easily evidently caused the boy to forget all discretion. But as the minutes went by and the two men did not reappear, the boy grew restless, and finally suggested that he hand the envelope to Officer McCarty here, and that he be allowed to go about his errand of delivering the groceries. Then--"

Interrupting, the magistrate turned to Simpkins, and demanded suddenly:

"Is that true?"

The question was so unexpected that the countryman was surprised into answering truthfully, and replied:

"Yes, sir."

Realizing that the turn of affairs was making them appear ridiculous, the officer who had suggested that Bob be allowed to plead guilty, and receive a light sentence, if he would divulge the name of the two swindlers, hurriedly exclaimed:

"But the boy has a bad record, your honor."

"That is not so, your honor," retorted Foster hotly. "When I found that the sergeant was determined to hold the boy, I went to the man for whom he works-his name is Len Dardus-and made inquiries about him. Mr. Dardus is his guardian, and though it was evident that he had no love for the boy, the worst he could say about him was that he took a half hour to deliver an order that should have been delivered in twenty minutes. As to his associating with bad companions, that is not so, for his guardian said he was never out at night, always preferring to read."

"If the boy is such a paragon of virtue, why didn't his guardian come to court himself and try to help the boy, instead of leaving it to a reporter?" sneered the officer who was trying so hard to make a case against Bob.

"I tried to get him to come," exclaimed Foster, "but he refused on the ground that he could not leave his store."

"You reporters are certainly good ones at putting up a plausible story," retorted the officer contemptuously.

Striking his desk a sharp rap with his gavel, the magistrate exclaimed:

"When I want to hear from you, sir, I will let you know. You would make a far better impression if you and the sergeant and every other available man connected with the precinct were out searching for the two swindlers, instead of trying to send a poor, almost friendless, lad to prison. If you arrested half as many criminals as you do innocent men, it wouldn't take long to rid this city of crime."

So stinging was this rebuke that the reporters were busy writing down the words of the judge, and before they had finished, the magistrate said:

"Does your guardian treat you well, Bob?"

"Why, sir, I suppose so, sir; but he scolds me a lot. He seems to think that every time he sends me out to deliver an order, that I should come back within a quarter of an hour, no matter whether I have to go one block or twenty."

"How much does he pay you?"

"Two dollars a week, sir."

"What do you read at night?"

"About farming and ranching out West, sir."

"Then you want to go out West?"

"Yes, sir. I'm going just as soon as I have money enough. I have saved ten dollars already towards going."

"Huh! What becomes of your charge that the boy has evil associates, Mr. Officer?" snapped the magistrate, as he heard Bob's reply. "Any boy who earns two dollars a week, and has managed to save ten, surely can't have any bad habits.

"Bob, you are discharged. The disgrace to which you have been subjected of being arrested and brought to court is an outrage, and I wish there was some way that you could obtain redress from the officers who subjected you to it, but unfortunately there is not."

Reaching into his pocket, the magistrate drew forth some bills, from which he selected one of the denomination of five dollars, and handed it to Bob.

"Put this with your ten dollars," he continued. "It will help some toward getting you out West, and now you go back to Mr. Dardus, and tell him that Judge Bristol said that your arrest was an outrage. Clerk, call the next case."

If Bob had been bewildered by the circumstances that had led to his being brought to court, he was still more so with the sudden turn in events that had resulted in his release, and it was not until one of the court attachés good-naturedly advised him to leave the court room as soon as he could, that he realized he was again free.

But in his haste to obey, he suddenly remembered the reporter whose interest in him had been of such assistance, and he stopped and looked about the courtroom for him. But Foster and the other reporters were busy telephoning the story to their papers, and repeating the magistrate's scathing rebuke to the police of the precinct and the city, so that Bob could not see them. And, after lingering a moment or so, he finally decided to return to his guardian without more delay, promising himself that he would search out his champion and thank him another time.

* * *