pitch in and help the family. I'm to start work to-morrow for a grocery company."
"And you wanted to go to college!" exclaimed Frank. "It's a shame, that's what it is!"
"Can't be helped," replied Perry, with a grimace. "I can consider myself lucky I got this far. I guess I'll have to give up all those ideas now and settle down to learn the grocery business. There's one good thing about it—I'll have a chance to learn it from the ground up. I'm starting in the delivery department. Perhaps in about fifty years I'll be head of the firm."
"You'll make good at whatever you tackle," Joe assured him. "But I'm sorry you won't be able to go through college as you wished. Don't give up hope yet, Slim. You never know what may happen. Perhaps they'll find the fellow who did rob Tower Mansion."
Both boys wanted to tell their chum about the clues they had discovered the previous day, but the same thought was in their minds—that it would be unwise to raise false hopes. It would go much harder with Perry, they knew, if he began to think the capture of the thief was imminent, only to have the hope dashed to earth again. So they said good-bye to him and wished him good luck. Perry tried hard to be cheerful, but his smile was very faint as he
