“I’ll go and find him,” said Bob to himself.  “He’ll know about how much it costs to travel, and all such things, and perhaps he’ll help me to get some work where I can earn more money.  Anyway, I will be able to believe what he tells me, and to depend on his advice.”

So simple a solution of his difficulties gave Bob new courage, until all at once it flashed upon him that he did not know the name of his benefactor, or where to find him.

As this thought occurred to him, Bob stopped still.  However, his having thrown himself upon his own resources was sharpening his wits, and he suddenly exclaimed: 

“I can find out at the police station.  Perhaps he’ll be there.”

And though the boy was fully three miles away from the place where he had suffered such outrageous treatment, he turned his steps to retrace the distance.

When at length he was within sight of the grim building, the same fear of entering it that had made him refuse his guardian’s command to fetch the basket of groceries, again seized him, and he paused.

“I won’t go in,” said Bob, shaking his head decidedly, “but I’ll wait over by that pile of boxes on the opposite side of the street.  Probably he’ll be coming out before long.”

Though this plan of Bob’s would ordinarily have been effective, it happened that Foster had finished his work for the day even before he had paid his visit to the closed store of Len Dardus, and thus the boy was doomed to disappointment, although he stayed at his post of observation until dark began to fall.

With the garish flarings of the street lamps, Bob for the first time realized the true meaning of the step he had taken.  Heretofore he had always possessed a home to which to go, unpleasant as it was, but now he had no place, and the contemplation of his loneliness caused him to grow very sober.

As the pangs of hunger were added to his general feeling of helplessness, for a moment he thought of returning to his guardian, but only for a moment.  As he left the letter in his pocket and remembered the awful stigma his guardian had tried to cast upon his dead father, his pride arose.

“I will never go back there!” he told himself.  “I have money in my pocket, and I can get something to eat.  Then I’ll go over to one of the stations in Jersey City and find some place to sleep.  Perhaps there’ll even be a train going out West to-night that will carry me part way to Oklahoma.”

Coming forth from the pile of boxes from which he had sought in vain to catch a glimpse of his friend, the reporter, Bob walked up the street until he came to a restaurant, brilliantly lighted, and with a sign standing in the door from which the words:  “Pork and Beans, 15 cents a plate,” stared at him invitingly.

Dearly did Bob love pork and beans, but only occasionally had his guardian provided them, and then in such small quantities that the boy had never been able to eat all he wanted, and oftentimes had he promised himself that some day he would have his fill.  Consequently, as he read the sign, he determined to gratify his desire, and timidly entered the restaurant, where there were stools in front of a high counter and tables along the wall, upon which stood an array of food that amazed him, accustomed, as he had been, to living on almost nothing.