ut if you had beaten me you would
have got off for nothing."

"I don't see how I'm goin' to live on five dollars a week," thought
Sam, uncomfortably, "I wonder when they'll raise me."

CHAPTER VI.

SAM'S LUCK.

When towns and cities find their income insufficient to meet their
expenditures, they raise money by selling bonds. Sam would gladly have
resorted to this device, or any other likely to replenish his empty
treasury; but his credit was not good. He felt rather bashful about
applying to his roommate for money, being already his debtor, and, in
his emergency, thought of the senior clerk, William Budd.

"Mr. Budd," he said, summoning up his courage, "will you lend me a
dollar?"

"What for?" inquired the young man, regarding him attentively.

"I haven't got anything to pay for my meals the rest of the week,"
said Sam.

"How does that happen?"

"I can't live on five dollars a week."

"Then suppose I lend you a dollar, I don't see that you will be able
to repay me."

"Oh, I'll pay you back," said Sam, glibly.

"Have you got any security to offer me?"

"Any security?" asked Sam, who was inexperienced in business.

"Yes. Have you got any houses or lands, any stocks or bonds, which you
can put in my hands as collateral?"

"I guess not," said Sam, scratching his head. "If I had any houses,
I'd sell 'em, and then I wouldn't have to borrer."

"So you can't get along on five dollars a week?"

"No."

"The boy that was here before you lived on that."

"I've had to pay a lot of money for clothes," Sam explained,
brightening up with the idea.

"How much?"

"Well, I had to buy the suit I have on, and then I had to get some
shirts the other day."

"How much does it cost you for billiards?" asked William Budd,
quietly.

Sam started and looked embarrassed.

"Billiards?" he stammered.

"Yes, that's what I said."

"Who told you I played billiards?"

"No one."

"I guess you're mistaken, then," said Sam, more boldly, concluding
that it was only a conjecture of his fellow clerk.

"I don't think I am. I had occasion to go into French's Hotel, to see
a friend in the office, and I glanced into the billiard room. I saw
you playing with another boy of about your age. Did he beat you?"

"Yes."

"And you had to pay for the game. Don't you think, as your income is
so small, that you had better stop playing billiards till you get
larger pay?"

"I don't play very often," said Sam, uneasily.

"I