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Alger, Horatio, Jr.

"Struggling Upward"

You'd better come along, too, and
smoke a cigarette. It is time you began to smoke. Most boys
begin much earlier."
Luke shook his head.
"I don't care to learn," he said.
"Oh, you're a good boy--one of the Sunday-school kind,"
said Coleman, with a slight sneer. "You'll get over that
after a while. You'll be here when I come back?"
Luke promised that he would, and for the next half hour he
was left alone. As his friend Mr. Coleman left the car,
he followed him with his glance, and surveyed him more attentively
than he had hitherto done. The commercial traveler was attired
in a suit of fashionable plaid, wore a showy necktie, from the
center of which blazed a diamond scarfpin. A showy chain crossed
his vest, and to it was appended a large and showy watch, which
looked valuable, though appearances are sometimes deceitful.
"He must spend a good deal of money," thought Luke. "I wonder
that he should be willing to go to a two-dollar-a-day hotel."
Luke, for his own part, was quite willing to go to the Ottawa
House. He had never fared luxuriously, and he had no doubt
that even at the Ottawa House he should live better than at home.


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