CHAPTER XVI.

AN UNEXPECTED MEETING.

Wade followed the servant up the stairs; and this fellow seemed to be laughing too. What had got into them all? He had done nothing to make them laugh. The people in the hotel seemed to know Jeremy Diddler, but not Caleb Klucker. If the fellow was a rogue, as Wade believed he was by this time, very likely he had two names.

Wade followed his conductor to the very top of the house; and it seemed to him he had never been so near heaven before. Then the man led him by devious winding ways, through long passages and halls, till he thought he had walked half a mile.

“How much farther are you going?” asked Wade, unable to forget the laugh of the clerks and the servant, which seemed to have something to do with the distance he had travelled.

“It isn’t more nor a mile furder,” replied the Irish waiter.

“A mile!” exclaimed Wade, lost in wonder again at the immense size of the hotel. “It will take us all the rest of the day to get to the room.”

“Faith, it will, and half of the night.”

“How many stories high is this hotel?”

“Only thirteen.”

“Thirteen!”

“Yes; and the last place I lived, the house was twenty-one.”

The fellow chuckled so that Wade was afraid he was lying. He did not believe any hotel could be twenty-one stories high.

“Rather high houses,” said he coolly, “but not so high as they might be. The tavern in Midhampton, where I come from, is thirty-two stories high.”

“Spake the truth, man!”

“I guess my story is as true as yours.”

“Wait here a minute,” said the man, halting at a narrow passage-way; and Wade thought it looked very like one he had passed twice before in his tour in the upper regions of the hotel. “I will go to the room, and see if the gintleman is within.”

Wade did wait a minute, then five minutes; and then half an hour. The laughing seemed to be explained. The clerks had been making game of him. They had sent him on a wild-goose chase. He did not believe that Mr. Diddler was in the hotel, though the clerk said he was always there. He walked through the long passage-way, looking at the numbers on the doors: there were none as high as 942. Indeed, he could find none half as big. He kept walking till he came to what he thought was a closet, with a gas-light burning in it. A man was standing at the door.

“Are you going down?” asked the man, as Wade looked into the thing.

“That’s what I want to do,” replied the wanderer, who was wondering whether he could find his way down.

“Jump in, then,” added the attendant.

Wade began to suspect that this was some new trick, and he looked very cautiously into the closet. Then he concluded that it was not a closet at all. It had seats all around it like the depot omnibus in Midhampton, and was carpeted and cushioned like a fine parlor. At a venture, he concluded to go in, and he seated himself on the velvet divan. The man closed the door, and pulled a wire rope which ran through the thing. Then Wade thought the bottom was dropping out of the concern, but he soon found the whole affair was descending; and in a minute or two the attendant pulled the wire again, and it stopped. When the door opened, he found he was near the office where the clerks had fooled him. He was astonished to see how quick he had come down; and this was his first experience in an elevator, for he had never even heard of such a thing.

“Did you find him?” asked the clerk, when he showed himself in the office.

“I didn’t find him,” replied Wade indignantly; “and you knew very well I should not find him.”

“I think he was out,” added the clerk, looking very serious now. “Did you go to No. 542?”

“No, sir: we went to No. 942, where you sent us.”

“No,--542. I think the bell-boy did not understand me. Try again; and I think you will find him this time. You can go up in the elevator.”

Though Wade was satisfied that the clerk wanted to fool him again, he thought he would take another ride in that machine. Another bell-boy was called, and directed to show the young man to 542.

“And, young man, you must open the door, and go right in. Don’t stop to knock; for Mr. Diddler owes money to various people, and sometimes he will not answer when he is summoned. Go in without ceremony.”

Again the boy from the country ascended to the upper regions of the hotel: and, without going far, his conductor led him to the room on the door of which was the number which the clerk had named last. The bell-boy did not wait, but left him to carry out the instructions he had received in the office. Wade was in no hurry to open the door. Perhaps Mr. Klucker, who was not much of a saint after all, might be ugly: he might show fight. But Wade meant to stick to him till he had got his money back. Placing his hand on the knob of the door, he hesitated a moment, and wished he had a club, or something to defend himself with if the missionary showed fight.

After he had braced his nerves up to the sticking-point, he turned the knob, and shoved the door wide open, so that Mr. Klucker could not shut it before he had time to enter. It was not fastened, as it might have been, and yielded to the first force he applied.

If ever Wade Brooks was astonished, it was when he opened that door, and saw who were in the room. He was prepared to find the New York saint, and no one else. But in that room, considering the size of it, saints were scarce, and sinners plenty. At the table in the middle of the chamber sat two boys, counting a pile of money, or rather the two piles of money into which they had divided the one. The two boys were Lon Trustleton and Matt Swikes.

The reader is not half so much astonished as Wade Brooks was when he saw his late fellow-voyagers in the “Mud-turtle,” settled in a room in the Fifth Avenue Hotel; for he knows that the young rascals had not given up their “good time” in the great city, and that Matt had obtained possession again of the wallet and its contents. After breakfast, Matt had looked up his companion in crime; and, when they had laid their plans, they walked to the next station north of Midhampton, which was not the way to go to New York direct, and took a train. As something had been said by Wade about going to New York, they were afraid of being followed if they went the other way. By a roundabout route, they reached New York, and had just arrived. Lon wanted to take charge of the money this time; but the best Matt would do was to divide, and they had made two piles of the money that remained after paying their expenses so far.

Lon had often heard his father speak of the Fifth Avenue Hotel; and as he saw a stage at the station, with the name upon it, he decided to go there, though he had no idea what sort of a house it was. The clerk in the office did not seem to think every thing was regular about the boys, as they had no baggage; but Lon was well dressed, and they were willing to pay in advance. He was disposed to make fun of them; and it was a practical joke on his part, to send the country boy to the chamber of the new arrivals.

“Wade Brooks!” exclaimed Lon, as the boy of all work sprang into the room. “How under the canopy came you here?”

“I did not expect to find you here,” replied Wade, when he had recovered from his surprise enough to speak.

“Then you were not looking for us?”

“No, I was not: I was looking for another man,” replied Wade.

“Who?”

“His name is Jeremy Diddler,” answered Wade, with his usual candor and simplicity.

“Jeremy Diddler!” exclaimed Lon, who knew the individual by reputation. “Are you a fool, Wade Brooks?”

“I don’t think I am. The man’s other name is Caleb Klucker.”

“They are making fun of you, Wade,” said Lon. “What have you been doing since I left you yesterday morning?”

Wade told the story just as it was,--that he had sold the boat for twenty dollars, and the money had been taken from him by a fellow whose name was Jeremy Diddler. Lon laughed outright.

“Jeremy Diddler is a name given to any one that swindles folks out of their money, you ninny!” said the more experienced Lon. “I didn’t think you was such a fool.”

“Is that it?” added Wade, laughing at his own foolishness, and seeing now what the clerks had been laughing at. “I’m glad to know it; and I see that is your name, Lon.”

“None of your sauce, Wade Brooks,” said Lon, beginning to look savage.

“I’m not afraid of you now; and I had just as lief fight as not. I see you and Matt have swindled Obed Swikes out of his two hundred dollars again; and I think you and he both will fit the meaning you give to the name. There’s the old wallet on the table; and they can’t say I took it this time.”

Lon looked at Matt, and Matt looked at Lon. They did not seem to like the situation, for Wade had caught them in the act of counting the money. It was no use to deny it this time; and he had only to tell the clerk, in order to get them into trouble.