full of 'em, all sizes, all kinds. It looked like recess time at a boys' orphan asylum, and with me against the field I stood to be a sure loser. I hadn't no more'n climbed out before they starts to throw the josh my way.

"Hey, Reddy, get in line! The foot for yours, Peachblow!" they yells at me.

And then I comes back. "Ah, flag it!" says I. "Do I look like I belonged in your class? Brush by, you three-dollar pikers, and give a salaried man a show!"

With that I makes a quick rush at 2146 and gets through the door before they has time to make a howl. The letterin' on the ground3 glass was what got me. It said as how this was the home office of the Glory Be Mining Company, and there was a string of high-toned names as long as your arm. But the minute I sizes up the inside exhibit I wasn't so anxious. I was lookin' for about a thousand feet of floor space; but all I could see was a couple of six by nines, includin' a clothes closet and a corner washbowl. There was a grand aggregation of two as an office force. One was a young lady key pounder, with enough hair piled on top of her head to stuff a mattress. The other was a long faced young feller with an ostrich neck and a voice that sounded like a squeaky door.

3

"Go outside!" says he, wavin' his hands and puttin' on a weary look. "Mr. Pepper can't see any of you until he has finished with the mail. Now run along."

"I can't," says I; "my feet won't let me. Is that the Pepper box in there?"

The door was open a foot or two; so I steps up to take a peek at the main squeeze. And say, the minute I sees him I knew he'd do. He wa'n't one of these dried up whiskered freaks, nor he wa'n't any human hog, with no neck and three chins. He was the kind of a gent you see comin' out of them swell cafés, and he looked like a winner, Mr. Belmont Pepper did. His breakfast seemed to be settin' as well as his coat collar, and you could tell with one eye4 that he wouldn't come snoopin' around early in the day, nor hang around the shop after five. Pepper has his heels up on the rolltop, burnin' a real Havana. That's the kind of a boss I likes. I lays out to connect, too.

4

"Say," says I to the long faced duck, "you hold your breath a minute and I'll be back!"

Then I steps outside, yanks the "Boy Wanted" sign off the nail, and says to the crowd good and brisk, just as though 

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