And so the boy struggled on, growing in bodily strength and mental experience, still the hero among the men for his heroic rescue of the “Boss”--a reputation which he never lost; making friends every day both in the village and in New York and keeping them; absorbed in his slender library, and living within his means, which small as they were, now gave him two rooms at Mrs. Hicks's,--one of which he had fitted up as a little sitting-room and in which Ruth had poured the first cup of tea, her father and some of the village people being guests. His one secret--and it was his only one--he kept locked up in his heart, even from Peter. Why worry the dear old fellow, he had said to himself a dozen times, since nothing would ever come of it. While all this had been going on in the house of MacFarlane, much more astonishing things had been developing in the house of Breen. The second Mukton Lode scoop,--the one so deftly handled the night of Arthur Breen's dinner to the directors,--had somehow struck a snag in the scooping with the result that most of the “scoopings” had been spilled over the edge there to be gathered up by the gamins of the Street, instead of being hived in the strong boxes of the scoopers. Some of the habitues in the orchestra chairs in Breen's office had cursed loud and deep when they saw their margins melt away; and one or two of the directors had broken out into open revolt, charging Breen with the fiasco, but most of the others had held their peace. It was better to crawl away into the tall grass there to nurse their wounds than to give the enemy a list of the killed and wounded. Now and then an outsider--one who had watched the battle from afar--saw more of the fight than the contestants themselves. Among these was Garry Minott. “You heard how Mason, the Chicago man, euchred the Mukton gang, didn't you?” he had shouted to a friend one night at the Magnolia--“Oh, listen! boys. They set up a job on him,--he's a countryman, you know a poor little countryman--from a small village called Chicago--he's got three millions, remember, all in hard cash. Nice, quiet motherly old gentleman is Mr. Mason--butter wouldn't melt in his mouth. Went into Mukton with every dollar he had--so kind of Mr. Breen to let him in--yes, put him down for 2,000 shares more. Then Breen & Co. began to hoist her up--five points--ten points--twenty points. At the end of the week they had, without knowing it, bought every share of Mason's stock.” Here Garry roared, as did the others within hearing. “And they've got it yet. Next day the bottom dropped out. Some of them heard Mason laugh all the way to the bank. He's cleaned up half a million and gone back home--'so afraid his mother would spank him for being out late o' nights without his nurse,'” and again Garry's laugh rang out with such force and earnestness that the glasses on Biffy's table chinked in response.