"No," answered Palmer fervently. "I--I feel that I have had a narrow escape." Two weeks passed without any event of importance. Robert had no difficulty in "getting the run" of the business in the office, and it is not too much to say that he became in that short time quite as efficient as Livingston Palmer, though the latter had been in the office for several years. Robert was on the whole satisfied with his position, but it must be confessed that he was looking around for something better. "I am sure Mr. Marden wouldn't want me to remain here if I could improve myself," he thought. "In fact, I think he would like me the better for striking out for myself." "It's a terribly dull life--this in a stuffy office," said Livingston Palmer one day. Since his upsetting with the variety singer the senior clerk had hardly known what to do with himself. "That's true," answered Robert. "But it's much better than doing nothing." "That's true." "When I struck out from home I was at first afraid I would be left stranded." "Humph! that wouldn't happen to me," said Palmer loftily. "I am certain I could strike something at once, if I tried." Robert did not agree with his fellow clerk, since he had seen many a poor fellow on the streets begging for work of any kind. But he saw it would be useless to attempt to argue Palmer out of his high opinion of himself. On the day following there came a long letter for Robert. It was postmarked Timberville, Michigan, and was from Dick Marden. "My dear Robert," wrote the miner, "I've been wanting to drop you a few lines for some time, but could not get around to do it. When I arrived here I found my uncle, Felix Amberton, very ill, and I have had to take practically entire charge of his affairs. My uncle is a bachelor like myself, so he hadn't even a wife to depend upon in this emergency. "My uncle owns a large lumber interest here, close to the upper end of the State, and several Canadians are trying to force him into a sale of his lands at a low price. They claim to have some hold upon the land. "I must say I wish you were up here with me--to help run the lumber office. I have to be out on the lands a greater part of the time, and the office clerk is not to be trusted, since he is a great friend of the Canadians I mentioned. I am in hopes that my uncle will soon recover, to take charge for himself." Dick Marden's letter interested Robert greatly. The confinement of city life was beginning to tell on the boy, who had heretofore lived more or less in the open at home. "I'd like to go to Timberville," he said to Palmer, when he showed the communication. "The smell of pine and spruce would do a fellow a world of good." "It wouldn't suit me," said Palmer, with a decided shake of his head. "Why, you have no amusements in a place like that--no theaters, no concerts, no billiard parlors, nothing."