seventy-five cents a day,
and sometimes as much as a dollar and a quarter. He was not without
competitors. More than once, on reaching his accustomed stand, he found
a rival occupying it before him. In such cases he quietly passed on,
and set up his business elsewhere, preferring to monopolize the trade,
though the location might not be so good.

Teddy O'Brien did not again enter the field. We left him, at the end
of the last chapter, trying to escape from Mike and Jim, who demanded a
larger sum than he was willing to pay for their services. He succeeded
in escaping with his money, but the next day the two confederates caught
him, and Teddy received a black eye as a receipt in full of all demands.
So, on the whole, he decided that some other business would suit
him better, and resumed the blacking-box, which he had abandoned on
embarking in commercial pursuits.

Mike Donovan and Jim Parker were two notoriously bad boys, preferring to
make a living in any other way than by honest industry. As some of these
ways were not regarded as honest in the sight of the law, each had more
than once been sentenced to a term at Blackwell's Island. They made a
proposition to Paul to act as decoy ducks for him in the same way as for
Teddy. He liked neither of the boys, and did not care to be associated
with them. This refusal Mike and Jim resented, and determined to "pay
off" Paul if they ever got a chance. Our hero from time to time saw them
hovering about him, but took very little notice of them.

He knew that he was a match for either, though Mike exceeded him in
size, and he felt quite capable of taking care of himself.

One day Mike and Jim, whose kindred tastes led them to keep company,
met at the corner of Liberty and William streets. Mike looked unusually
dilapidated. He had had a scuffle the day before with another boy, and
his clothes, always well ventilated, got torn in several extra places.
As it was very uncertain when he would be in a financial condition to
provide himself with another suit, the prospect was rather alarming. Jim
Parker looked a shade more respectable in attire, but his face and
hands were streaked with blacking. To this, however, Jim had become so
accustomed that he would probably have felt uncomfortable with a clean
face.

"How are you off for stamps, Jim?" asked Mike.

"Dead broke," was the reply.

"So am I. I ain't had no breakfast."

"Nor I 'cept an apple. Couldn't I eat, though?"

"Suppose