"No, I am traveling on private business for the head of the firm." "Ah, yes. I don't wish to be inquisitive. You do right to keep the business to yourself." "You see, it is not my business." "Just so! You are young for a business agent." "That is true, but I am growing older every day." "Exactly so! Good joke!" Andy's companion laughed quite heartily, rather to the surprise of his young acquaintance. "I am very glad to have met you. You see, I am very social, and can't stand being alone. By the way, where do you stop in Chicago?" "At the Sherman House." "Good hotel! I have stopped there often. Still, there is nothing as homelike as a private house. I have a friend living in the city who keeps a first-class boarding house and only charges transient guests a dollar and a quarter a day. I wish you could be induced to go there with me. At the hotel you will have to pay three or four dollars." Now, Andy was naturally economical, and thought it would be praiseworthy to save money for Mr. Crawford. He inquired the location of the boarding house, and imprudently decided to act on his companion's proposal. CHAPTER XXXI. THE TRAP. Andy left the depot with his new acquaintance, who gave his name as Percival Robinson, and, following his lead, boarded a horse car, which took them both a distance of three miles to the southern part of the city. As they went on, dwellings became scattering. "Your friend's house seems quite out of the way," said Andy. "Yes; but Chicago is a city of distances. It really doesn't make much difference where you stop. Street cars will carry you anywhere." "Still it would be pleasanter to be centrally located." "But by going some way out you get cheaper accommodations." "That is true," thought Andy; "and I have time enough." At length Robinson signaled to the conductor to stop. Andy followed him out of the car. They seemed to be in the very outskirts of the city. Robinson led the way to a rather shabby brick house standing by itself. It was three stories in height. "This is where my friend lives," he said, walking up the front steps and ringing the front-door bell. Two minutes later the door was opened by a red-haired man in his shirt sleeves. "Hello, Tom!" he exclaimed. "I thought his name was Percival," Andy said to himself. "My young friend and I will stay overnight with you," said Robinson. "All right. Come in." A door on the left was opened, and Andy saw a sanded floor, and on one side of the room a bar. "Go in there a minute," said Robinson, "while I speak to my friend." Andy went in, and picked up a copy of the _Clipper_ from the table--the only paper in the room. In five minutes the two returned. "I'll take your gripsack," said the man in shirt sleeves. "I will show you to your room." They went up two flights of stairs to a room on the third floor. It was a small apartment about ten feet square, with a double bed in one corner.