"Concluded to come back after all, eh?" he said. "Work piling up on me and nobody to help. Pitch in, quick, or I'll thrash you good; do you hear?"
The rest of the evening passed in almost utter silence between them. By ten o'clock the most of the lunch trade came to an end. At eleven Sam Pepper began to lock up.
"I'm going out," he said. "An old friend is sick. Maybe I won't be back till morning. Watch things good while I'm gone."
"None of your business. You mind what I told you, and keep your mouth closed," growled the lunch-room keeper.
Nelson had noticed a heavy handbag lying in the corner of the back room, and now he saw Sam Pepper pick the bag up. As the man moved it, something inside struck together with a hard, metallic sound, as if the bag might contain tools.
When Sam Pepper went out he wore a big slouch hat and a coat which he had not donned for years. He usually wore a derby hat, and his general appearance surprised the newsboy not a little.
"He acts as if he wanted to be disguised," thought the boy. "Something is up, sure."
Then of a sudden he remembered the talk he had had with Pepper about robbing an old man--the man who had in some way been connected with his father's downfall, if Pepper's story was true. Was it possible Pepper was going to undertake the job that very night, and alone?
"I believe he is!" thought Nelson. "And if that's so, I'll follow him!"
With the boy, to think was to act, and in a few minutes he was prepared to follow Sam Pepper. The man had locked the front door and taken the key with him. Nelson slipped out of a rear window and fastened the window from the outside by means of a nail shoved into a hole in a corner--a trick he had learned some time before.
When the boy came out on the street he ran up the thoroughfare for a couple of blocks, and was just in time to see Sam Pepper making his way up the stairs of the elevated railroad station. When the train came along Pepper entered the front car, and our hero took the car behind it. Nelson buttoned up his coat and pulled his hat far down over his eyes to escape recognition, but Sam Pepper never once looked around to see if he was being followed.
Leaving the Bowery, the elevated train continued up Third Avenue until Fifty-ninth Street was reached. Here Sam Pepper got off, and Nelson, who was on the watch, did the same. The man descended to the street and walked slowly toward Fifth Avenue. Our hero followed like a shadow. He was now certain that Pepper was bent on the robbery of the place he had mentioned that afternoon.