The next morning we started to pick after having received our instructions from the boss Chinaman, namely, "To pickee clean, and leave a little stem so as people can catchee hold of the bellies." Alas! the difficulty was to find the berries, and we were to be paid according to our picking; the water-carrier was far too industrious, for his watering beneath a hot sun was certainly bad for the plants; it did not require a farmer to know that. Needless to say, we remonstrated in a very short time and demanded our wages, in spite of the boss Chinaman coming forward with three berries on the palm of his right hand, and crying exultingly, "Lookee at the big bellies I pickee!" We received our money, which amounted to very little, less than half a dollar between us, and left. It is surprising the number of jobs that I have left with very low wages to come, just enough to buy a bag of peanuts or the price of a shave. Of course we would not have been quite so independent as this had we not left Pat Healey at work two weeks before. Thinking he must now have ten or fifteen dollars saved, we resolved to call on him, and after getting him discharged, help him to spend his savings. With this object we boarded a fast freight train, and arrived that night at the place where we had left him--where he had accepted light work in a garden. The next morning Brum called at the house for breakfast, which the good lady at once supplied. Brum had not seen any signs of Pat, so he made enquiries, and the lady informed him that the man had gone away the day before, "with ten or fifteen dollars," thought Brum, and groaned. I was so disappointed when I received from Brum this information, that I was ill for several days after. I must have been light-headed for several days, for I thought every voice I heard was Pat calling to us, and every form I saw in the distance seemed to be his. V Queer Places