"I hope you will make a much better boy, Dick. Now we'll go in to my
uncle. He wishes to see you before you go."

They went into the reading-room. Dick had wrapped up his
blacking-brush in a newspaper with which Frank had supplied him,
feeling that a guest of the Astor House should hardly be seen
coming out of the hotel displaying such a professional sign.

"Uncle, Dick's ready to go," said Frank.

"Good-by, my lad," said Mr. Whitney. "I hope to hear good accounts
of you sometime. Don't forget what I have told you. Remember that
your future position depends mainly upon yourself, and that it will
be high or low as you choose to make it."

He held out his hand, in which was a five-dollar bill. Dick shrunk
back.

"I don't like to take it," he said. "I haven't earned it."

"Perhaps not," said Mr. Whitney; "but I give it to you because I
remember my own friendless youth. I hope it may be of service to
you. Sometime when you are a prosperous man, you can repay it in the
form of aid to some poor boy, who is struggling upward as you are
now."

"I will, sir," said Dick, manfully.

He no longer refused the money, but took it gratefully, and, bidding