The Iron Boys in the Steel Mills Part 19

"Certainly not, but she will hear of it, and I'll wager that she will give you a worse trouncing than did Kalinski. I got a job for us to-day, Bob."

"What's that?"

"I got a job."

"What is it?"

Rush told him. Jarvis looked at his companion a moment in silence, then burst out laughing.

"Fifty cents a day? Well, I must say we're getting up in the world. How do you suppose we are going to live?"

"I have been thinking of that. In fact I saw the necessity of readjusting our finances before we lost our jobs in the mills."

"I should say so," agreed Jarvis.

"We have been getting six dollars a week in the mills here, and we are paying five apiece for our board. If we take the new job we shall be getting only three dollars a week and paying out five."

"We'll have to make an a.s.signment then," grinned Bob.

"I know a better way."

"What?"

"Get a new boarding place, where we shall be able to live within our means or thereabouts."

"I'd hate to live in the boarding house that would come within our new means," grumbled Jarvis. "This one is about the limit. It strikes me that the best way to make money for ourselves would be to start a boarding house."

"We are not in that line of business," answered Steve shortly. "Ignatz, do you know of a clean, cheap place where we can get board and room?"

"Clean and cheap," Bob repeated. "They don't make 'em. High-priced and dirty is the rule."

Jarvis laughed loudly.

"Me know place," nodded Brodsky.

"Good, I thought you would. Where is it?"

"You come by my house."

"What's that? Your house?"

Ignatz nodded.

"Why, your mother would not take us. She has a large family, and she would have no time."

"Come by my house. I fix it."

"What do you think of that, Bob?"

"It strikes me, Steve."

"I am afraid your mother will not listen to it, but I am sure it would please us very much if she were to take us."

"Come, I make her."

"No, we won't do that. If she is willing and can make us a price within our means, of course we will go."

Ignatz had risen and was waiting for them to go with him.

"Will you come, Bob?"

"Sure I will. Maybe I'll meet Kalinski on the way," grinned Jarvis.

The three boys started off for the Brodskys. Mrs. Brodsky welcomed them, for she liked these two open-faced young fellows for whom her son held such an affection. He talked of them most of the time when he was at home. Ignatz was full of his subject to the bursting point.

"My friends come live by us, Mother," he said finally.

"What you say?"

"Steve and Bob come live by us."

Mrs. Brodsky opened her eyes.

"So?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"Now, to-morrow."

"It is this way, Mrs. Brodsky; we have to find a new boarding place,"

Steve explained. "We were asking Ignatz if he knew of a place, and he said he thought you might be willing to take us. We shall not be much trouble to you, as we don't throw things about in our rooms. We can sleep in one bed and we will make that up if you do not have the time to do so."

"So?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Mrs. Brodsky was rather dazed. She never had taken boarders before, and she hardly knew what to say. She looked from the now eager face of Ignatz to the expectant ones of the Iron Boys.

"So?" she murmured.

"Yes, ma'am."

"They come by us to-morrow," urged Ignatz.

"How about it, Mrs. Brodsky?"