As the day approached when I should have to leave, I found that I had saved but a trifle out of my earnings: the money had gone for a much-needed, but not expensive, ward-robe. I counted over my change and found that I did not have enough money left with which to purchase a ticket for so far away a place as Massachusetts. I mentioned the matter to Thropper. He, in turn, in that generous way of his, began to plan for me. One day he came and said: “Priddy, you know Gloomer, the fellow from Indiana State University; well, if you go down to Indianapolis with him, he’ll see that you get a chance to go on a freight train as far as New York; from there you’ll have enough to get home, won’t you?” “Yes. A freight train, you say? As a tramp, riding on the axles?” I gasped, with an inward shudder at the thought of such a desperate ride. “Of course not!” declared Thropper. “You’d go in the caboose. We’d send you with a load of horses, you know. You’d be the man in charge; to feed them.” “But I don’t know anything about horses, Thropper.” “You don’t have to know anything about them,” he said, with a smile. “It’s just a technical way of expressing it. You see, when the horse-dealers send a carload of horses East, they are entitled to a representative to go along and take care of them. You’d be the representative. Gloomer could give you a line to an Indianapolis sales stable. They’d do the rest--as far as New York. What do you say!” In a wild moment of incautious self-confidence, I responded: “Anything to get to New York, Thropper.” “It’s settled, then,” he responded. “Albert Priddy, horse chaperone, I salute thee,” and he gravely saluted me. “When will his lordship occupy his caboose?” he went on in good-humored raillery. “As soon as I can get it!” I replied. _Chapter XIX. A Chapter Which Has to do with a Series of Exciting Affairs that Occurred between the West and the East, and Which are Better to Read about than to Endure_ Thropper accompanied me to the wharf in Chicago where, so far as I was able to judge, we were to part forever. The manner of our parting was as follows: Thropper insisted on carrying my suit-case, though his own was loaded to excess. On crossing a street to enter the railroad station, I half stumbled, blunderingly, under the heavy hoofs of a dray horse which a swearing driver had pulled shortly into the air, when Thropper, by a lunge at my back with his heavy suit-case, startled me into such action, that I lurched ahead and away from danger. “Thanks, old fellow!” I called, above the roar of the traffic. My train was announced, and as I gripped my suit-case, Thropper blurted out: “Well, Priddy, I wish you luck: plenty of it!” “Well,” I stammered, in return, “you’ve certainly been good to me, Thropper. I shall never forget it!” “I shall miss you, Priddy!” “Maybe I shan’t miss you, old fellow!” I said hoarsely, for I was on the verge of tears. “God bless you!” cried Thropper, with an effort. “God be with you!”