Wayne said no, and the proprietor of the lunch-wagon sighed. “Well, I was only thinking maybe that would make it a lot easier for all hands. But I won’t be urging you, kid. He’s a nice little dog and he sure is fond of you. Any time you want to see him you go around to the house and tell the missis who you are, see? No. 28 Grove Street’s the place. Ring the second bell. Well, so long, fellers. Good luck!”
Perhaps it was Denny’s wish that influenced Fortune that day, for when the two met at noon June proudly displayed two quarters and Wayne was happy over the possibility of securing work in a livery stable. “He said I was to come back in the morning,” explained Wayne as they sought the little lunch-room that they had patronised the previous day. “I reckon he means to take me, June. Wouldn’t that be great?”
“It surely would, Mas’ Wayne. What-all he want you to do?”
“Drive a carriage, one of the closed carriages that take passengers from the station. That’s something I can do, June, drive!”
“Yes, sir, you surely can drive. But that ain’ scarcely fit work for a gen’leman like you is, Mas’ Wayne.”
“I reckon what you do doesn’t matter much, June,” replied Wayne. “I reckon you can be a gentleman and drive a carriage, too. Anyway, I’d rather be earning some money. Just being a gentleman doesn’t get you anything as far as I can see.”
June shook his head at that but didn’t dispute it. He had something on his mind, and as soon as they were seated at the lunch-counter he broached it. “We got to fin’ a place to live, ain’ we, Mas’ Wayne?” he began. Wayne agreed, and June went on. “Yes, sir. Then let me tell you.” What he told amounted to this. His search for the illusive two-bit piece had taken him farther afield than usual and he had plodded to the outskirts of the town where there was a stamping works and a dyehouse and a few other small factories. His journey had brought him no recompense in money but he had discovered their future domicile. It was, he explained, an old street car which had at some time been pulled out into a meadow beyond the factories. “I reckon it was a horse car, like they used to have in Sleepersville, Mas’ Wayne, before the trolleys done come. Mos’ of the windows is knocked out, but we could easy board ’em up. An’ one of the doors don’ shut tight. But it’s got a long seat on both its sides an’ we could sleep fine on them seats. An’ there’s a little old stove at one end that someone done left there, an’ a stovepipe astickin’ out through the roof. I ask a man at the tin factory an’ he say no one ain’ live in it for a long time. An’ there’s a branch close by it, too; mighty nice tastin’ water, Mas’ Wayne; an’ some trees an’ no one to ask you no questions, an’ everythin’!”