Page:Ned Wilding's Disappearance.djvu/156

146 to see a man staring at him from a small window in an office built against one side of the apartment.

"Lots of 'em," replied the clerk of the lodging house. "Twenty-five cents. Pay in advance. This isn't the Waldorf-Astoria."

Ned handed a quarter through the half circular opening and received in return a key with a big brass tag.

"Do I register?" asked Ned, hoping that he would not have to put down another false name.

"Register nothin'," the clerk replied. "They go by numbers here. Yours is seventeen," and Ned, looking at the tag on his key, saw what the clerk meant.

"I'm glad there's no thirteen in this," the boy thought. "How do I get to my room?" he asked.

"Right along the corridor. You can't miss it. Go on until you strike the right number and go in. Do you snore?"

"No. Why?"

"Because there is a man in the next room to you who says he'll punch my face in, if I put any one near him who snores. It's all right. Go ahead. If you want a bath it's the last room at